User talk:Kevin Gorman/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

moral support

I am sorry you have to go through a trial like fire such as this. If you need any help just ask on my talk page cheers --Guerillero | My Talk 00:44, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Heh, thanks. I wasn't quite expecting a response to the AfD like those. Kgorman-ucb (talk) 01:30, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Its an abnormality. That is the longest reply that I have ever seen for an AfD. --Guerillero | My Talk 16:38, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Also your AfD nomination ended in deletion. --Guerillero | My Talk 01:19, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

heh, thanks for pointing that out. That whole thing was really kind of amazing. Kgorman-ucb (talk) 03:31, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

FREDDYP

Hey Kevin, I'm writing my own page and new to this I've read what i thought I was suppose to do. Rather than reverting my edits can you tell me what maybe I did wrong? Thanks Fred Price — Preceding unsigned comment added by Freddyp7 (talk • contribs) 07:18, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Becauseicouldntsee ‎

Wikipedia:CSD#A7 does in fact cover individual animals. It probably wouldn't be appropriate in this case, since competing in the Grand National could be a credible claim of significance. PROD is perfectly acceptable. Feezo (send a signal | watch the sky) 04:52, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Hahaha, thanks. I typed that looking at the shortened twinkle reminder of the guidelines and not the actual list itself. Kevin (talk) 05:11, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Speedy deletion declined: The DJ Girlzables

Hello — I'm just letting you know that I declined the speedy deletion of The DJ Girlzables, a page you tagged, because of the following concern: Not a member of the categories to which A7 applies. Let me know if you have any questions. Feezo (send a signal | watch the sky) 07:31, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Hi, I retracted my earlier decision and deleted the page; since it's web content it does in fact fall under A7. Thanks for PRODing it, I might not have noticed otherwise. Feezo (send a signal | watch the sky) 07:55, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the notes. Kevin (talk) 08:27, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Speedy Question

Hi, excuse me, but why did my recent articile that I made get deleted? Did I do something wrong? If so, can you tell me what I did wrong? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Littlerock232 (talk • contribs) 17:39, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Hi Littlerock - from what you had put in the article so far, it was very unclear what it was supposed to be about (or what a "Civil was encyclopedia" is.) RHaworth left a comment on your page that might be relevant. Kevin (talk) 19:35, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Regarding the Ecopunk article removal

Hi there! I'm new to wikipedia so I don't really know all the rules, but I just got my Ecopunk page deleted due to "ambiguous copyright infringement", and I'd just like to say that I'm also the creator of the original page it was referred to, and I can't really do infringement on my own stuff, can I? :P Frankichiro (talk) 00:59, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

I have posted a message about this at User talk:Frankichiro. JamesBWatson (talk) 01:23, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

It wasn't clear that you were the original author, which is why it was deleted. I would advise rewriting the text, with a special mind towards meeting wp:notability and wp:verifiability requirements - otherwise, the article is going to be deleted even if you are the original author of the text. (You'll have to jump through some hoops if you want to reuse your original prose that has already been published - I can look up the process for you if you want. But I can guarantee that someone else will delete the article if you repost it in its current state, even if there is no copyright issues - so I think you'd really be better off just rewriting it to meet WP:N and WP:V. If you *really* want to post the article with the original text reused, lemme know and I'll look up the copyright verification process for you.) Kevin (talk) 01:27, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

manual archival of pop-sp-2011 stuff

Thanks for pointing out that bug in the survey. Very astute of you. Maximilianklein (talk) 09:40, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

PoP plan

• obtain immortality

Witherslack Hall School

Yo, Kgorman-ucb thanks for the edit of WHS. Now it looks more neutral which is a good thing, i think well leave it at that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.219.207.202 (talk) 22:28, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Jantakhoj

I have searched the links and their website and found the claims are bogus and are using wikipedia citations for Search Engine Optimization and for marketing. I think it doesnt follow notability guidelines. Haribhagirath (talk) 04:41, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

What about the apparent media coverage - like the articles in The Hindu and The Hindustan Times? A quick glance at it makes it look like, to me at least, the company probably meets WP:GNG/WP:ORG. Kevin (talk) 04:48, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

Media coverage says what the CEO says about the company and it does not independently cite the technology or features of the firm which makes it relevant to be cited in a knowledge database. Moreover their claims seem exaggerated as the website doesn't work as they claim and the organization doesnt seem to have the resources to maintain 500 million records or a suitable platform to extract information at such a magnitude Haribhagirath (talk) 05:34, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

If you want, feel free to AfD it. I haven't looked through everything in as great detail as I think you have, I just removed the prod because a prod on an article with that many genuine media cites seemed very odd. Kevin (talk) 21:43, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

Many firms misuse online press releases and citations to open a page in Wikipedia, since it brings credibility among clients and visibility in google. And seldom the claims have been backed in secondary sources. In most sources it have been quoted by someone from the firm, than the media mentioning it. 300 million records needs a huge infrastructure or a powerful search mechanism. So I felt suspicious and checked in detail, and they haven't provided basic details about CEO, firm address and even number of employees or the technology. Therefore the assumption of using WIkipedia as a marketing platform is strengthened. Haribhagirath (talk) 04:16, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Angelo Sepe

I'm not sure how to use AFD, so can you resubmit. When the Angelo Sepe article was up for AFD, it was 6 years ago. There should be a new discussion. There is not enough references about Sepe to prove he is a notable. He was involved in a heist with a dozen of others guys. There is information about Sepe's involvement in the Lufthansa heist. --Vic49 (talk) 22:02, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Certainly, I'll put it up for you in a minute. Once it's up, you'll be able to click in to it and comment from the top of the Angelo Sepe article. My removal of the prod wasn't really out of a belief it shouldn't be removed, his independent notability looks pretty iffy - just that prod is for uncontroversial deletions, and the fact that there was an AfD, even though it was a long time ago, that resulted in keep, probably means it shouldn't be looked at as uncontroversial today. Kevin (talk) 00:07, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks --Vic49 (talk) 20:16, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Iraq Short Film Festival

Hi Kevin! Hey, I didn't start the article I just WP:MOVEd the page to its current name! You're right, it looks either a G11 or G12. I'll try to chop it into shape. --Shirt58 (talk) 07:43, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

The notification on your talk page was just a twinkle slipup on my end - I loaded the page before you moved it, and didn't refresh it before I deleted it. By the time twinkle processed the deletion paperwork, you had moved it and thus it sent a notification to your page. Kevin (talk) 07:46, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Kevin, I've removed the {{db-multiple|A7|G11}} template, as I think I have established "significance" for this article. WP:NOTABILITY of course has a much higher threshold. Your thoughts about this? Pete, aka --Shirt58 (talk) 11:16, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Honestly, I suspect it still falls short of the notability guidelines and would fail an AfD if put to the test. However, since it no longer runs in to promotional issues and is verifiable, it no longer falls in to the type of article I would put up for AfD myself. Kevin (talk) 20:31, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Nomination of JO Josh Eastman Entertainment for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article JO Josh Eastman Entertainment is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/JO Josh Eastman Entertainment until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on good quality evidence, and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion template from the top of the article. ScottSteiner ✍ 08:26, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Hello, Kevin Gorman. You have new messages at Djc wi's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Tagging of Wendys Child Syndrome article

Greetings, I have responded to your message on the discussion page you started for the deletion of this article. Please respond there. thanks--History Sleuth (talk) 21:19, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Margaret Elizabeth Gates Wallace

You tagged this article as an unsourced BLP, despite the fact that she died 59 years ago... However, it did still need references, so I added a fairly comprehensive findagrave page that I think the original author got the information from. Sellyme^Talk 09:58, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

... wow. That was pretty silly of me. Thanks for the heads-up. Kevin (talk) 10:06, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

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Wiki Activity

Hey. I am swinging by to invite you to Editing Fridays. This time around the topic is whatever the students present would like to be improved. If you are free this friday and would like to attend please sign up. cheers --Guerillero | My Talk 16:28, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Just wanted to clarify

Hiya, just wanted to clarify what I meant by being there longer. I was saying that I could not have followed him there as I had thought I was editing the talk before he showed up on there tonight. I didn't mean it to sound like anything about seniority. Sorry if it came out that way. Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie Say Shalom! 04:43, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Oh, no worries, I got the point of your initial post. I was more intending my comment towards his reply that was trying to argue about who had been there longer. Kevin (talk) 04:44, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Da Cheng Junior High School

Hi; Just letting you know that I have declined your PROD and redirected the school to its locality as per standard procedure for non notable schools that are not Grade 12 high schools. This is an uncontroversial operation that you can do yourself. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 10:10, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads up, I will do so in the future. Kevin (talk) 10:12, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. You may wish to see the page histories to see how this is done, and then do the same for Almond Elementary School, and Anaheim Hills Elementary School. If you get stuck, don't hesitate to ask me on my talk page. Happy editing! --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 10:19, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

I've redirected the articles but my videocard has been in the process of failing and is now producing artifacts telling me I'm crashing in less than a minute. I haven't incorporated snippets of information from the former school articles in to the locality articles yet; I will touch this up tomorrow. Kevin (talk) 10:24, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Userrights

I've given your account reviewer and rollback rights. See WP:ROLL and WP:REVIEWER for info on how to use them. Prodego ^talk 21:44, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! I can't speak to how much I'll use reviewer, but rollback should be quite handy. Kevin (talk) 22:24, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Yo

I saw the post about you on the Wikimedia Blog today. Congrats and good work! /ƒETCHCOMMS/ 04:31, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! Tangentially, and slightly embarrassingly, I've had a series of system failures that have meant I haven't actually uploaded my updates to the perfect 10 v google article, but for anyone looking at the blog post and going "Where are your edits to the only specifically named article?!" - well - they'll be up Soon™. Kevin (talk) 04:55, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Rollback in an edit war

Heh, though it's a good thing to understand not to do it, it's not just an issue of technicality of how an edit's rolled back, but it's mainly that no edit summary/rationale is given to the revert, combined with the one-up, technology-wise—on top of it being yet another revert in an edit war. It's the difference between two people just clicking the rollback button back and forth—regardless of what technology they use—versus clicking "undo" (or reverting to a particular revision) and typing out a reason for why they're doing so/disagreeing with the edit(s) in question.

On a related note, the easiest way to "fix" an accidental rollback or botched edit summary is by simply using a dummy edit. That way, you can kinda-sorta give a retroactive edit summary for others in the page history as to what happened without having to actually perform the edit all over again.

Finally, always keep in mind that undoing an edit because it presumably violates the 3RR is in no way an exception to the 3RR—doing that sort of thing actually involves you in the edit war.

Cheers, --slakr^\ talk / 06:36, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I figured it would put me at risk for a 3rr if I did it too much, I would've stopped before I hit that point - but also figured that doing it twice was fairly reasonable as the guy's edits were worth removing. My first revert had an edit summary in it, which you are right, I should have copied over again to the second time I undid his stuff. I wasn't worried about the revert being bad overall, but I didn't mean to rb it at all in the first place - I'm still not used to the extra button it adds. After accidentally hitting it I wanted to avoid the technicality of a bad rollback (since, if I am not mistaken, although giving an edit summary with twinkle is always a good idea, it's not a violation of the rules of twinkle use to not do so,) and putting back in my first edit summary just didn't occur to me. I shall try to avoid missing edit summaries in any case in the future though.

Thanks for the suggestion of a null edit instead of a messy RB'ing an RB. I had actually not noticed previously that providing an edit summary with a rb expanded times when it is acceptable to use it. Kevin (talk) 06:43, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Waldstock Festival

Hi, my page is all for raising money for charity and is of great interest to lots of people in South East England, so I don't understand why it's marked for deletion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Barneyfrench (talk • contribs) 10:16, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi Barney - the main problem with its current iteration is that it is written in an overly promotional tone. Wikipedia articles are supposed to be written from a neutral point of view, and cannot be written in excessively laudatory tones or serve as advertising - even for good causes. The article is also written in the first person, which is generally inappropriate here. You should also probably read WP:COI - if you are the same Barney who is listed elsewhere as organizing the festival, it is generally considered bad form for you to create/edit the article. If the event is notable, other people will eventually do so. (It could also use some more third party sources to establish it's wp:notability, but that's a secondary problem.)Kevin (talk) 10:24, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi again Kevin, if you have a moment to have another look over my page I would appreciate it. Barneyfrench (talk) 11:23, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Also, if my edit has improved the suitability of my article, can you rescind the speedy deletion notice, or does it have to be done by someone else? Can I talk to an administrator? Will they just delete it without telling me? Sorry for so many questions, I'm new to this and am highly confused and frustrated. Barneyfrench (talk) 13:08, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Martin Hosking

You recently patrolled a wikipage on "Martin Hosking" that was being vandalized by people adding links to products he sold on his website. The Australian legal industry newsblog FirmSpy has recently published a letter from his lawyers saying they will no longer act for his company because of his pro-Hitler stance

http://firmspy.com/tag/martin-hosking

This step by his lawyers to publicly say they will not act for him for this reason is notable and should be included in the wiki bio by an experienced editor. Could you please assist? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.45.114.192 (talk) 02:00, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

I do not believe, with the information I have seen so far, that there is any good reason to include info about this on his article. It appears to be a minimal controversy about a single one of his business ventures. It *might* be appropriate to include on an article about the company/website itself, but there is not one currently, and I really don't think it would belong even there. Additionally, the source you provided does not qualify as a wp:reliable source by our standards, so it would not be an appropriate source to use for such information anyway. It also doesn't look like the source you provided even says what you says it does: it looks like it's a statement from the company's former lawyers saying that they had already terminated their business relationship and do not intend to renew it. It does not suggest that they terminated their relationship over this issue, and even points out that millions of different designs are available on the redbubble site. I also see no adequate reason to call these "neo-nazi tshirts" in the first place. Kevin (talk) 02:12, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

The company's lawyers call it "pro-Hitler merchandise" in their letter There is nothing in the letter to suggest that the lawyers had previously advised that they would not act for the company. If they had done so, they would have said they previously terminated the relationship. So it's is a strange suggestion that the lawyers strong disapproval of the pro-Hitler merchandise and the termination of the relationship are unconnected. Firmspy is cited as a source in Australia by commercial news organizations which have higher standards than Wiki —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zmalqpp (talk • contribs) 12:20, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Do you seriously disagree with the former lawyers that this is "pro-Hitler" or neo-Nazi merchandise http://www.redbubble.com/people/hipsterhitler/t-shirts/6686222-back-to-the-f-hrer ? Why do you consider that you are more of an authority on this issue than the former lawyers? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zmalqpp (talk • contribs) 12:32, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

The letter states that they are not currently advising Redbubble; it does not state that they have terminated their relationship over this matter. There's a world of difference between saying "We quit" and saying "We don't work for them." And yes, I do seriously disagree; you can probably safely label the t-shirts as Nazi chic, neo-Nazism is a different accusation altogether, and one not supported by the currently available facts. I tend to think that Hipster Hitler is no more 'pro-hitler' or neo-Nazi than The Producers (2005 film) was.

Please direct further conversation about this matter to the appropriate venues, which does not include my talk page. Kevin (talk) 19:57, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Hudson Highlands Photo Workshop deletion

I don't see what makes this organization less notable than any other photo club you have listed. Your explanation of deletion is not satisfactory. Freestoneriver (talk) 02:47, 14 May 2011 (UTC)Freestoneriver

I replied on your talk page. Kevin (talk) 03:04, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Good call

[1]. Drmies (talk) 05:38, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Heh, thanks. It obviously needs some more cleanup still and I'll go through it some more later, but that seemed like a real obvious candidate for a fast change. Kevin (talk) 05:48, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

IRC PM

Hey I saw your PM. I was asleep and accidentally left my client to idle. What did you want to ask about? cheers --Guerillero | My Talk 12:27, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

It's a slightly odd question that includes a detail I don't want to post publicly yet. I'll see if I can tag you in irc another time. Kevin (talk) 05:26, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Sounds good --Guerillero | My Talk 10:40, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for fixing the Article on the VW test track. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.218.217.45 (talk) 02:05, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

FOSS

Dear Mr. Gorman How do I proceed then with FOSS Analytical, I have read the policies and your recommendations, but I am not much wiser. I thought it would be valuable to have info on various technology companies in here, but I guess not? We corporate with many universities and Gorvernments and maybe it would be good for, for example students who are doing projects around analysis in any form, to be able to find us and se that we are actually using front edge technologies.

Examples of cooperation with universities •Faculty of Engineering, Lund University •Stockholm University •Technical University of Denmark (DTU) •Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Copenhagen •IT university of Copenhagen •Copenhagen Business School (CBS)

I might very well have the wrong idea about what Wikipedia stands for, but I just need to be sure, so if you could just comment very briefly I would be gratefull. BR Stine —Preceding unsigned comment added by StineDibbern (talk • contribs) 11:04, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi Stine. Wikipedia has a set of inclusion guidelines that require subjects to be "notable." We define notability in an unusual way, if you look over WP:GNG and WP:Notability_(organizations_and_companies) you should be able to get a good idea of the notability standard that your article should pass to be included. Basically, our notability standards mean that to for a company to be included there need to be third party reliable sources that talk about the company and why it is significant. The reason it was speedily deleted was that it did not even contain a claim to notability (which is to say it did not indicate why the subject might be important.)

It's generally strongly discouraged (though not forbidden) for someone to create articles about companies that they have a close personal affiliation with - WP:COI and WP:AUTO contain relevant advice about this. It's usually considered preferable to wait for someone else to create an article on your company - if you have a notable company, most of the time, sooner or later, someone else will create an article on it. (If you do write an article about a company you are closely affiliated to, as long as you make sure it contains third party sources talking about why the company is important and is written from a neutral point of view, it won't be deleted.) Kevin (talk) 21:40, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Paranoia

Yes, really. Wikipedia needs to get a perspective on what they are and aren't going to be sued for. In particular, attempts to avoid libel should be targeted at things that are potentially defamatory rather than just potentially untrue. Distinguish WP:BLP from WP:RS.

Not that WP:RS is much good either; especially when the sources quoted are relying on each other (or Wikipedia) for support.

Meanwhile, WP:NOR also has deep flaws (there is stuff that is blatant OR that isn't picked up upon; other stuff that is basically harmless facts - useful, relevant and (maybe with a bit of work) verifiable are removed claiming "defamation").

Yet, it seems there's little recognition of any of this. Principles must be ideologically followed. I'm not advocating breaking or changing "community concensus", just pointing out what to me seems pretty obvious.

Anyway, my point was that the line of succession should point out that some people enjoy compiling these lists. They're probably a bit strange, but i can't see how they're really any different from Wikipedia hacks. Flying Fische (talk) 22:35, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Please keep conversation about the line of succession article on that talkpage for now. Kevin (talk) 00:38, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

A belated welcome!

Sorry for the belated welcome, but the cookies are still warm!

Here's wishing you a belated welcome to Wikipedia, Kgorman-ucb. I see that you've already been around awhile and wanted to thank you for your contributions. Though you seem to have been successful in finding your way around, you may benefit from following some of the links below, which help editors get the most out of Wikipedia:

• Introduction
• The five pillars of Wikipedia
• How to edit a page
• Help pages
• How to write a great article

Also, when you post on talk pages you should sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); that should automatically produce your username and the date after your post.

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! If you have any questions, feel free to leave me a message on my talk page, consult Wikipedia:Questions, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and ask your question there.

Again, welcome! --Σ _☭^★ 05:12, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

About using Wikipedia in Politics of Piracy this Fall

Hi Kevin, I'm Derrick, a fellow Berkeley student and Wikipedian and along with Matt Senate one of the Regional Ambassadors for the Wikipedia Ambassador Program for Northern California. I attended one of the Politics of Piracy editing parties this Spring and I believe I met you there briefly. Since you're going to be facilitating Politics of Piracy this fall, I wanted to get your feedback on how useful you felt Wikipedia was in the course, feedback on the course and syllabus, and whether you're thinking about using it again. If you are thinking about using it again, we'd like to get started on setting you up with volunteers such as Campus Ambassadors to support your class, and meet to talk about your plans for the class at some point. Feel free to respond here or e-mail me directly at dcoetzee@eecs.berkeley.edu. Thanks! Dcoetzee 00:48, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Hey Dco - yep, we did. I also poked you in IRC a few days ago about something unrelated. We are intending to use it again, I'll drop you an email at some point this week. One of the bigger problems that we had last semester is that Wiki's default editing interface is pretty confusing for people who are used to entirely WYSIWYG stuff. When I was at the foundation a few weeks ago, LiAnna gave me some nifty brochure-type things to hand out to the next class that I anticipate will help with that quite a bit. We will also be revamping the syllabus a good chunk. Kevin (talk) 21:59, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

NovelSat

NovelSat is important becaue, as far as I am aware ( and I should be aware , because I ahve been a satelltite communications professional for many years) it is the ONLY company in the world that offers significant capacity imrovement in satellite communications links. I would be happy to explain this further if you ar familiar with this topic — Preceding unsigned comment added by Neudorf (talk • contribs) 10:28, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia requires independent reliable sources to confirm the notability of companies. Can you provide any independent reliable sources that talk about the importance/notability of the company? (Stuff like newspaper articles or articles in major trade journals.) Kevin (talk) 10:36, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

I need to head to bed, but let me know if you have any questions or need any help in editing. With the explanation you've currently provided, no one is likely to delete the article before you have time to come up with some sourcing for it. (If someone does, you can ask any administrator to restore a copy of it to your userspace.) Please understand that my deletion template wasn't anything personal, but unfortunately a lot of spammy articles on companies are created, so I tend to tag any new articles about companies that don't make clear why they are important. Kevin (talk) 10:55, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Well, there are dozens of sources to choose from , here is one from satcoms UK . BTW, I am editing articles on different articles on satellite communications, and I intend to add names of major players in that market includimg Novelsat's competitors. Kevin, I did not suspect that what you did was personal - after all , we don't know each other... I do suspect, however, that you are not an expert on SATCOM :). BTW, while I have not written much in the English wikipedia, I did contribute a lot to the Hebew one, and I deleted many superflous articles, but alwatys after consulting experts in that field... thanks anyway for this fruitful discussion --Neudorf (talk) 17:38, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately, that looks to be a press release. I have looked around myself some, and haven't been able to find any third party sources talking about the notability of novelsat. It's certainly true that I'm not an expert on satelite communications, but en.wiki's inclusion standards for companies are such that they can generally be judged without subject matter expertise. (Unfortunately, en.wiki gets a *lot* of spam - something like 2200 articles are deleted a day, mostly speedied. The sheer volume of cruft that gets added to en.wiki makes it hard to start a discussion with subject matter experts about each speedy-able article.) Kevin (talk) 03:30, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

email

Kevin, consider turning your email option on. Drmies (talk) 21:49, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Fix'd. Kevin (talk) 21:52, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Hey, that reminds me--it may surprise you, but I don't know yet what I think about G-M's notability. I think it is real, real thin per WP:PROF at best, but he may pass in some other ways. At any rate, I don't want to !vote one way or the other before I look more carefully at what remains in that article and the references. Best, Drmies (talk) 22:32, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you, Kgorman-ucb, for your comments at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#User:Jayen466_wikihounding_User:Cirt. Much appreciated. ;) Cheers, -- Cirt (talk) 01:21, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

No problem. I'd been monitoring the mailing list thread for a while with concern. Regardless of any problems with the article, the venue seemed really inappropriate, and there was just an absurd amount of bad faith going on. Kevin (talk) 01:49, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Did you see...

...this? I'm not sure whether "tenacious" or "stupid" is the best adjective. Maybe both. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:27, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Persistent little bugger. I wonder where he'll show up next after this AfD closes... Kevin (talk) 22:08, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Nice work on the latest sock. I predict this won't be the end: there'll be an attempt to recreate the LGM article (which will get it salted) and editing to the CERN article, and perhaps an attempt to create an article on the Indépendance des Chercheurs collective. Beyond My Ken (talk) 13:25, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Actually, I meant French National Centre for Scientific Research, but the CERN article's a natural target as well. I've watchlisted both, and the IdC title. Beyond My Ken (talk) 13:35, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

I find it pretty stunning that the guy is still trying. I think I have all relevant articles watchlisted at this point. Kevin (talk) 02:53, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Public figures are subject to critiques

http://blog.wikimedia.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/KevinGormanAtWMF.jpg — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.169.112.181 (talk) 05:50, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Huh? Is linking my picture here intended as some sort of really weird threat? I assume this is in relation to your edits at Jona Lendering that I recently reverted. You are right that public figures are subject to critiques, but the only sort of critiques that are appropriate to include in Wikipedia articles are those that are discussed in reliable sources, and none of the points you added were cited to RS's. If you find criticism of Jona Lendering in RS's, I won't remove it. Kevin (talk) 05:54, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Who asked you to revert those citations, Kevin? Have you seen this? http://w ww.cais-soas.com/News/2009/January2009/05-01.htm And this? http://w ww.kavehfarrokh.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/the_article_of_cyrus_cylinder_in_wikipedia_is_being_vandalized5.pdf And we are to suppose that a professor awarded the WALM best history book is not, "a reliable source"? And may I ask your qualifications for denigrating their credentials? http://w ww.kavehfarrokh.com/about/background/ And these gentlemen are also unqualified, right? http://w ww.cais-soas.com/CAIS/about_cais.htm From what I understood of your comment, you implied that you are reverting the article back yourself; looking forward to it because people like Lendering (or David Duke) and their supporters are properly critiqued. 67.169.112.181 (talk) 06:54, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Please take a look at WP:RS and WP:SPS. Whether or not they have credentials that might be impressive in other situations does not matter - the sources you provided simply do not meet Wikipedia's long-established policies on what we consider reliable sources, so they cannot be used as the basis for criticism of a living person here. Kevin (talk) 06:39, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Why don't you itemize why the sources are improper - please be as specific as possible because it appears that several articles are being prepared on the individuals that mask the numerous critiques made by the academic and public interest community against Lendering. A lot of people have complained, they certainly will want to know your viewpoint: Let me help you - Please finish these sentences while giving specifics ... [1] Lendering a self-designated historian who publishes his work on the internet cannot be subject to criticism by Rozaneh Magazine because ... [fill in the blank Kevin] [2] Lendering a self-designated historian who publishes his work on the internet cannot be subject to criticism by Dr. Farrokh the recipient of the WALM best history book award because ... [fill in the blank Kevin] [3] Lendering a self-designated historian who publishes his work on the internet cannot be subject to criticism by the academic staff at CAIS ... [fill in the blank Kevin] [4] The online content that that Lendering produces and uses as citations on Wikipedia are acceptable despite the fact that Lendering is a self-proclaimed historian without a Ph.D, but several of his award-winning critics may not be cited to on Wikipedia because ... [fill in the blank Kevin] * * * Please try not to be vague - because people will see right through equivocation.67.169.112.181 (talk) 06:53, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

I refer you again to WP:RS and WP:SPS. The credentials of the people criticizing Lendering do not matter in this discussion. Because the sources you cited are not sources that meet the criteria laid out at WP:RS, they categorically cannot be used to support material that is critical of a living person. Self-published sources can be used to support material that is of a non-critical nature, but absolutely cannot be used here to support material that is critical of a living person. Kevin (talk) 07:02, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Mr. Kevin Gorman, again you failed to provide SPECIFIC reasons - describe specifically what you find faulty with the sources. I am trying to help you out here as it appears that several thousand people are interested in the subject matter and I have already received 9 messages about individuals wishing to use this talk page as the basis for articles. Here is your chance to show good faith and to provide the PRECISE faults you found with EACH of the citations and to defend the "Lendering/Gorman" position. The fewer riddles, equivocations and conclusionary language you use, the more good faith may be seen in your reversion of edits about a notorious character who uses his pseudo-scholarship to defame people; otherwise people may naturally draw a different conclusion. If you want, we can exchange contact information and conduct a conference over these issues. Please let me know. 67.169.112.181 (talk) 07:14, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

To be clear, I have literally never heard of this guy before an hour ago. I am not allying myself with him or defending him in any way, I am just following site-wide policies. I think that reading WP:SPS and WP:RS would provide a good overview of the issue here, but I will provide a point by point explanation for you.

• This is one source that you included. It's written by Kaveh Farrokh, who, you have pointed out, has at least some academic credentials. However, it's published on his own personal website. Because of long-standing Wikipedia policy outlined at WP:SPS, something that is published on someone's personal website cannot be used to support criticism of a living person in a Wikipedia article. Here's a quote of the relevant policy point: "Never use self-published sources as third-party sources about living people, even if the author is an expert, well-known professional researcher, or writer."
• This is another source that you included. It's from the website of Rozaneh Magazine, an on-line magazine. Per WP:RS, for a source to be considered reliable, it must have "a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." As far as I can tell, Rozaneh Magazine fails that test. (You have also mentioned ww.cais-soas.com/News/2009/January2009/05-01.htm this source but it is a reprint of the Rozaneh material, so the same thing goes for it.)

I'm not saying that the criticisms of Lendering are incorrect or unfounded - I'm only saying that they are not published in sources that can be included in Wikipedia. Kevin (talk) 07:28, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

---

@DougWeller: Your remark is off-point to what I was speaking to Kgorman about - my understanding is that there is an action pending against Lendering and several of his online associates; maybe you should wait to see the results and post that information as it arises. If you want to move your complaints about Farrokh to my talk page, please do so. Of course I will be happy to forward your representations to KFarrokh and ask him to defend himself. Of course, most reasonable people know that working in one field does not preclude working in others; If that's what KFarrokh did, it would not surprise me; nor would it surprise me that he teaches in other fields. But your citations are speculative at best, frivolous and libelous at worst. Why don't you write to him and ask him? Meanwhile, I'm focussed on the article concerning Lendering. 67.169.112.181 (talk) 08:54, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Ironically, saying "Dr. Kaveh Farrokh,a historian with the University of British Columbia is also a BLP violation as it's making claims about a living person that aren't true. As I've said on Lendering's talk page and BLPN, he is a student counselor at Langara College of Higher Learning - see [2]. He has no degree in history or a related field. His PhD was in the field "Research, Educational and Counselling Psychology" which he received from the Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology - his specific subject was "The relationships among cognitive processes, language experience and errors in Farsi speaking ESL adults."[3] His 1988 MA Thesis was on "Patterns of adjustment of international students to the University of British Columbia".[4]. Dougweller (talk) 08:11, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

---

According to your statement you have "never heard" of Lendering up until an hour ago - don't you think then its better to leave the content of article up to individuals who have more than one hour's experience with the subject of an Encyclopedia entry? It's a serious question.

• Rozaneh Magazine is largely published in Persian - you state a magazine must have "a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." Rozaneh, a Persian magazine, is reviewed in Persian. Let me take you out of the comfort zone of Google Translator through transliteration of the Persian language: Shoma, yek kalamehye Farsi mitooni benevisi? Midooni maniye "Rozaneh" chi ast? I've written my question as transliterated Persian: If you can't promptly respond, it means you cannot read Persian and do not have the language skills to make a determination of Rozaneh's "reputation." What would be the basis of your conclusions regarding such a magazine when you can neither read the bulk of the content it publishes nor the reviews it has received? Your lack of familiarity is not an appropriate answer unless we adopt a standard of excluding foreign language sources: I'm sure there are thousands of periodicals you are not familiar with. Do you really mean to imply that Persian magazines are inherently suspect? Are there any you are comfortable with? Do you also have opinions regarding the reputations of journals published in Swahili? You write: "As far as I can tell, Rozaneh Magazine fails that test." The problem is that your skill set is limited: if the bulk of a foreign language journal is unintelligible to you, it is something you likely should not be passing judgment on - let someone else do it. Your criticism is unfounded.

• Regarding Self-published sources: Lendering has a website called "Livius" - Wikipedia is saturated with citations BY Lendering to his OWN website as a basis for authority. Lendering operates as pseudo-historian in the online world (he's actually a former archivist - not a historian, but that's not necessary to our discussion here). When there is an article on Wiki describing what Lendering does as a purported "historian," it naturally makes references to his online work ("Livius"). Because the vast majority of Lendering's publication is done online, the communications and critiques exchanged with him from various academic bodies is also online. Let me give you an analogy: If a new online encyclopedia was founded, and contained an article on Jimmy Wales (the founder of Wikipedia) you can be certain that there would be citations and a link to Wikipedia. Why? Because that is the nature of his work - like Lendering, Jimmy Wales operates online. Another analogy: David Duke publishes online and gets many complaints: Wikipedia notes the complaints, but doesn't pass on the truth or falsity of the complaints. That's precisely what's being done with Lendering. The Rules against self-published sources should be used to clean up articles where Lendering cites to himself as a source of authority. And because Lendering's work is done online, if an article is going to be posted on him, ancillary critiques should also be cited to from online sources.67.169.112.181 (talk) 08:18, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

No, I don't think it's appropriate to leave the article to those with more subject matter expertise. I am confident in my evaluation of your sources, and because negative information about living people can result in legal liability for wikipedia, we're required to be exceptionally cautious in articles about living people, removing questionable information as soon as it is noticed. The Farrokh article is clearly inappropriate, the petition is clearly inappropriate, and the Rozaneh article is almost certainly inappropriate.

You are right that I do not speak Persian, but there are still generally ways to identify what is and is not a reliable source. Rozaneh's website does not appear to have any description of their editorial policy and is obviously a non-professional website, which is a pretty solid indication that they won't meet our standard. Additionally, web analytics tools say that Rozaneh's website gets a very small amount of traffic, making it even less likely. There are also no hits in the google news archives for Rozaneh Magazine, and no independent google scholar hits - 99.9% of reliable publications, no matter what language they are written in, will be referenced in one of those databases. Because you are using the reference to make a negative claim about a living person, the onus is on you to demonstrate that it is a reliable source, not on me to demonstrate that it is not one. If you have evidence that shows that Rozaneh has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy and a solid editorial policy, post it and it can be reincluded. If it's in Persian, there are plenty of people who hang around here who speak persian.

If you look at our article on Jimmy Wales, you'll notice that our article about him does not include a single citation of Wikipedia. Our sourcing standards apply equally to all articles, including those that deal with online figures. If you look at the article on David Duke, although it does talk about criticisms that have been laid against him, absolutely none of the criticisms cited are from self-published sources.

You may be correct that citations of Lendering's website on other articles should be cleaned up, but the fact that they haven't been cleaned up doesn't mean that it would be appropriate to leave criticism of Lendering from self-published sources on his article. Two wrongs don't make a right. (BTW: citation of Lendering's website on his own article is probably appropriate. Our long-established policies consider it O.K. to cite a self-published source to establish facts about itself, but self-published sources are never okay to cite for negative information or contentious information.) Kevin (talk) 09:03, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to sleep shortly, so I will be unlikely to reply any further tonight. Kevin (talk) 09:12, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

IP blocked (not by me) as a sock of Rjbronn Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Rjbronn/Archive is the old case. Dougweller (talk) 12

28, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Jona Lendering

You were right the first time, clear vandalism, not just because of the edit summary but because there was an earlier consensus that it was a BLP violation. Edit-warring from multiple IPs, probably a banned/blocked user. Dougweller (talk) 05:04, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough. I mostly corrected just because I didn't think it ultimately mattered and figured if I left it as vandalism there was half a chance the IP would take it as something to start whining about to distract from the actual issue. Kevin (talk) 23:50, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Sublime

Hey Kevin, thanks for the feedback on Sublime Magazine! If I go through it again to take out any non-neutral wording of the magazine would it be possible for you to remove the tag you put in it? Steve Curtis (talk) 09:10, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

End not in sight ...

Hi Kevin,

Thank you for your calm, succinct comments in the disussions about Aelita Andre. I was glad to see that Cramyourspam claimed to be dropping the issue on the article's talk page, but I'm afraid that intentions are otherwise. Frankly, I'm getting a little tired of this. The debate keeps going in circles because Cramyourspam continues to put forth variants of the same argument that are all irrelevant under WP:NOTABILITY, as you know and have stated before. I've been keeping up regularly with news relevant to the article and, although I don't believe the article had any neutrality problem in the first place, I did manage to track down a single reliable source with criticism, which I inserted and sourced in the article. I can and will ignore Cramyourspam's incessant insistence on my alleged affiliations to whoever and whatever he claims, but I'm still not comfortable with the situation because Cramyourspam isn't showing any intention of leaving the article alone. Although for the time being he isn't editing himself, he's now recruiting other editors to support him. I don't want any more unsourced (or blog-sourced) information in this BLP, and I don't mind talking out the issue with the user involved. But now the user has gone a step further and is trying to involve other editors in his quest to negate the subject's notability and the article's credibility. I find that frustrating. I know that those familiar with WP notability guidelines won't sanction what he says, but I'm tired of it. This has dragged on intermittently for weeks. Can anything be done to put this to rest now, or will we have to patiently wait until it dies down? I don't mind waiting, but after all this time, more of that seems unnecessary to me. What has experience taught you in similar situations?

Armadillopteryx^talk 00:04, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Hi Arma - I'm afraid the brevity was iphone-induced, rather than voluntary. I'll post a longer response when I get home later today, but in the meantime, I would encourage you not to stress over it. No matter how much he posts, his posts alone can't do anything - to delete it he would have to run it through a full AfD where his opinion would only be one of many (and opinions that ignore policy are generally ignored.) Anyway, iphone induced brevity is fun - I'll be back around later. Kevin (talk) 13:32, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Okay, thank you, Kevin. Armadillopteryx^talk 17:27, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Hi Arma - I'm at a real computer now, yay. First, for something unrelated to the rest of the issues here - I don't believe we can use this image in the article. As far as I'm aware photographs like that are considered reproductions of the original artwork, so as long as the artwork is still under copyright we would need the permission of the rights holder (Andre or her parents) before we would be able to use the photograph. It's outside of my normal area of focus so I could be wrong and thus haven't taken it down or anything. Unless you know positively that my understanding is incorrect, we should probably ask at this noticeboard for clarification from someone with more experience in the realm of images.

I can understand why CYS's actions are irritating, but most of it is not going to be stuff you can outright stop. However, most of it, you can safely ignore. You have no obligation to interact with him on the talk page, and unless he starts making significant changes to the actual article that need to be discussed or nominates it for deletion, it is unlikely to be productive for you to interact with him directly more. He has the ability to nominate the article for deletion (AfD) and if he does so you might want to comment on the AfD - but even then you don't really have to. Arguments made at AfD that ignore policy are ignored, and so far he hasn't made any policy-based arguments as to why the article should be deleted. Unless he comes up with some much better arguments, he would have no real chance at getting the article deleted at AfD.

The addition of unsourced material (or material that isn't sourced to BLP standards) is a concern for any BLP, but it hasn't happened much yet. I have the article watchlisted as I'm sure you do, and it's not a big deal to remove poorly sourced stuff as it crops up - it only takes a couple of buttons. If unsourced stuff starts popping up a bunch, there's other stuff we can do to stop it, but until it does a bunch we don't need to worry about it too much.

All of his COI accusations are certainly at least verging on violating a couple of policies, but unless they become substantially more offensive or persistent ignoring them is probably the best course of action. He's definitely not doing a very good job at assuming good faith and he also doesn't seem to be paying too much attention to the civility guideline, but since none of his edits are outrageously over the line trying to get the policies enforced strictly would create a lot more drama than it would stop.

It is worth mentioning that it is possible that, somehow, the article would fail at AfD. I don't think it would, and I'm generally right about such guesses, but stranger things have happened. Even if that somehow happens, I would encourage you to stick around - usually, we're pretty decent at making sense and although sometimes annoying things happen, I think the good of the project far outweighs the bad overall. BTW: I'm usually good at checking my talk page regularly, but if something comes up and I seem to have missed it, feel free to drop me an email. You can do so via a link on the lefthand toolbar from my userpage if you have an email address associated with your account. Kevin (talk) 23:48, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Hi Kevin,

Thanks for your reply. I'll ask about the image, since I also am not well versed in image policy; I know the basics (enough that I felt comfortable uploading it), but I'm certainly far from an expert and so will verify your point with someone who is. I may see about uploading a low-resolution image of the painting, since I have seen justification of low-res artwork use in many articles (for example, images like this in Pablo Picasso).

I'm also fairly confident that any AfD nomination would not be successful, but given that I see CYS soliciting support from others, I am a little worried that he could stir up the idea of false support for himself. I am glad that here on en.wiki, AfD discussions are argument-based rather than vote-based; I have done a bit of editing on pt.wiki, where majority votes with poor reasoning have either deleted good articles or saved bad ones (in my opinion, of course). But aside from all of this, I'm very concerned about the possibility of an AfD nomination since many real-life commitments have been significantly limiting my time here, and I'm afraid that I might not have adequate time to monitor such a discussion. And there's also the fact that I've spent so much time taking care of the article, sourcing it, and adding every bit of info I've found (including CYS's wishes for criticism and mention of the vanity gallery. Sometime after all of this began, a new article was published with some negative feedback, and I added this information). I'm sure you've heard variants of the "but-I've-worked-so-hard" speech a thousand times, though.

This discussion did start after CYS did edit the article with some negative information sourced only by that private blog he has often quoted (here) and put a groundless autobiography tag on the article (here and here). I'm sure you've already seen the bulk of the drama surrounding that on the article's talk page, though.

I'm going to ignore CYS's future comments (like his most recent on my talk page, to which you responded), because I think that might allow the conversation to die out, but I'm still not convinced the article is safe since he has put poorly sourced information in it before and because after he said he "gave up" on the discussion page, he went ahead and asked that other user to get involved. I hope my initial post to you didn't sound like a request for administrative action; it was more of a question about what options were available. This is the first time I've ever been involved in a drawn-out dispute like this on WP, so I'm trying to understand if there is some less severe alternative to put an end to a headache without going to ANI (which I agree is unnecessary at the moment). I am a little annoyed at the (mild) personal attacks, but I know they could be worse and that his weak arguments probably won't convince many other users that I'm a COI editor. After all, anyone really interested could look at my contribution history (past the first page, obviously) on en.wiki and on pt.wiki to see that the topics I edit are diverse and basically all unrelated to Aelita Andre.

Well, thank you again for your help and advice. I hope this issue exhausts itself soon, and I'm grateful for your comments.

Armadillopteryx^talk 00:46, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't think you have too much to worry about in an AfD. Usually enwiki afds are pretty good about sticking to at least mostly policy based reasoning. Since it's not a majority vote, non-policy based support of other people doesn't influence much unless no one else is paying attention - closing admins have broad discretionary power to totally ignore non-policy based arguments. I also the article watchlisted and will notice/be participating in any AfD - and am around enough that I won't accidentally miss it. I also gotta say, it confuses me that CYS's talk page talks about how he hates Wikipedia because he's fed up with deletionists, heh. (Sorry for any incoherence in this post - I've been traveling a ton and am totally zoinked.)Kevin (talk) 03:15, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Kevin. Advice appreciated. Armadillopteryx^talk 17:40, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Re. hi / summit

Hello to you too. I'll leave my own contact info below; I'm staying in Boston until 15th, after that 'normal service' will be resumed (ie, I'm very often available on IRC). Cheers,  Chzz  ►  18:00, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

The best way to contact Chzz is IRC (text-chat), here  · Second-best is my talk page · Third-best is email Chzzlive.co.uk

Re: Personal Attacks

I don't know if your referring to last weeks nominations or something more recent. If it is something recent I don't know what you are talking about because I haven't communicated with Libstar for the past week and don't intend to as it is totally pointless. The only thing that gets me is that you guys are fine with him nominating pages without consulting the authors while any upset this has caused is ignored. Have you talked to Libstar and said perhaps you better cool it on the nominating? Cheers. jsmith006 (talk) 08:40, 10 July 2011

I was talking about this diff on marty's talkpage - the personal attack rules don't only apply when you are directly communicating with someone - if you call someone a douchebag anywhere on-wiki, you're likely to eventually pull a block for it. Is Libstar really still AfDing things without notifying the creators? Kevin (talk) 16:12, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Ok - point taken. He has put a number of mine and Cyperus pages up for nomination and has not contacted me once on my talk page through this whole process despite repeated requests and has simply has said 'its not in the rules' so he doesn't need to do. You should also check on how he communicates with a reasonable comment from Oneusbukguy (I'm not sure if that is the right name) on his talk page to get an idea of how he conducts himself. Also the huge amount of nominations has been commented on by Papurusa who isn't in favour of event pages but this was also ignored. We would have been far more agreeable if he had informed us to start with but clearly finds event pages 'annoying' as he put in his own words so is clearly taking the whole martial arts thing quite personally. I know it takes two to tango and I am not blameless but the end result is that five years of work is being undone in the matter of weeks. The result is that three editors will shortly be leaving this website as we feel we cannot create anything without Libstar and his buddies nominating (and deleting) things with the seeming support of admin. Thanks. jsmith006 (talk) 18:24, 12 July 2011

Sorry for not getting back to you sooner, I've been busy. That's pretty lame. I would agree that notification of the creator of the page should be in most cases a requirement of the deletion process, it is unfortunate that it is not. I will start to monitor his contributions, and if he does so again, will step in and notify the person and ask him to do it going forward. I don't agree with him failing to notify people, and I doubt that his current nomination strategy is the best approach, but the attitude you guys have been adopting is going to limit the sympathy you get from most quarters.

Most (but not all) of the things he's nominating for deletion really do not meet our inclusion guidelines. It's not a slur on their value, it's just that they don't meet long-established guidelines considered to represent the community's consensus as to what should be included and what shouldn't. I've seen y'all talking about leaving Wikipedia to post them elsewhere, and although I would encourage you not to completely leave Wikipedia, I would also encourage you to post stuff like what's currently being nominated for deletion elsewhere going forward. There are tons of sites that will appreciate content of the nature you guys have been generating and I'm sure there are plenty of people who would make use of it - but Wikipedia has made a conscious decision not to be the default repository for everything. Kevin (talk) 04:42, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your advice Kevin. I realise that you've taken the time out to explain things and I really appreciate that. Cheers. jsmith006 (talk) 07:46, 14 July 2011

Kevin - I take it you've been monitoring Libstar have you? He's still nominating pages without notifying people. jsmith006 (talk) 18:56, 22 July 2011

Hello

I was browsing recent changes at Meta and noticed Kevin (WMF) and it was you. Negativecharge (talk) 10:43, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Ah, that makes sense. I forgot I spammed up meta recent changes that badly. Kevin (talk) 19:42, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

May I know why link is removed from "Visa requirements for Chinese citizens" wiki page?

Hi Kgorman-ucb, I noticed that you have revert the link (http://www.evisaasia.com/visa-requirement/tourist-visa-requirements-for-china-citizens/) that was being added to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_requirements_for_Chinese_citizens.

I found that the page consist of useful information that may benefit the readers. May I know why it is being identified as spam? I would be glad if you could review the website to see whether the content is suitable for wiki readers or not.

Thanks.

TW — Preceding unsigned comment added by 175.138.135.148 (talk) 03:42, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Hi TW - our external link guidelines are outlined here, with this section being especially relevant. Kevin (talk) 04:06, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Hi Kevin, Thanks for the info. I will be glad if you could point me to the exact number of that section where the link has violated the guideline.

Thanks. TW — Preceding unsigned comment added by 175.138.135.148 (talk) 04:44, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

It did not look, to me, as if it presented a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a featured article, and also did not look like it was likely to be an authoritative source (which runs in to problems with 1/11.) I caught it as part of a large sweep using WP:STiki and could always be wrong; if you disagree, feel free to readd it. Kevin (talk) 20:57, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Hi Kevin, The page has visa requirement information which is arranged by time required on trip planning, ie no advance planning, 3-days planning and 2 weeks planning. It presents an unique way for travelers to make decision on which countries they wish to travel to. The page is a compilation of research and many years of experience in dealing with tourist visa in Asia. I would be appreciate if you can browse through the website again to read the content in details. Thx. TW 175.138.135.148 (talk) 03:30, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Ramandolo‎

Hi Kevin - I see you deleted an external link to 'finewinepress' from the Ramandolo article. I saw this link added yesterday and also comtemplated deleting it. Concerned that it might be a promotional thing I looked for all the links to 'finewinepress'. I found five, all to wine and food articles and reviewed each one. In each case I think the links add value and suggest that the link for the Ramalodo article is restored. Regards. Orenburg1 (talk) 22:36, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Looking at it further, I agree with you and have restored. Thanks for pointing that out - I only recently started patrolling external link additions, and will slow it down. Kevin (talk) 23:28, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Kevin. Regards Orenburg1 (talk) 10:11, 19 July 2011 (UTC).

A kitten for you!

Does a kitten need a reason?

Drmies (talk) 00:51, 18 August 2011 (UTC)
KIIIIIIITTEEEEEEENS!!!!! Thank you. Kevin (talk) 02:30, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

A glass of wine for you!

	A glass of wine for you!
	Great talking to you on IRC and I hope to meet you next week. :) Viva la revolution! SarahStierch (talk) 01:07, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

Thank you!

	Thank you!
	Thanks for all of your help, Kevin! You Rock! :) Mokapantages (talk) 20:59, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Evolution

What do you think? Drmies (talk) 20:41, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks for butting in; I appreciate your opinion in these things. Take it easy, Drmies (talk) 18:38, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Politics of piracy

Hey Kevin, It's Harrison. I just emailed Matt a few hours ago just to make sure if he is okay with me being an ambassador for the politics of piracy class this semester of if he needs me somewhere else. I'll let you know when I find out. Talk to you soon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lemmmma (talk • contribs) 05:44, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Psilocybe cyanescens

Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:02, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Whacking with a Wet Trout

Nice Trout. (",) Just a comment. 99.181.156.11 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 02:21, 7 September 2011 (UTC).

Lol, yay, someone finally trouted me. Kevin (talk) 04:52, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

A beer for you!

For joining WP:XX...and because you were whining about being out of cold beer =) SarahStierch (talk) 03:54, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

MEOW

SarahStierch (talk) 20:33, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Testing, testing, 1 2 3

	B-3
	BATTLESHIP SarahStierch (talk) 01:14, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

A cookie for you!

thanks for coming to the workshop today! Anonymousnobodyperson (talk) 19:49, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

I was just going to do the same

And remove that content, thanks for posting the policy regarding it, I was searching for it. And thanks for being bold. Regardless of where both parties stand, attacks on either side aren't welcome here and talk pages aren't meant to be places for people to use as a soapbox. Thanks again. SarahStierch (talk) 03:43, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

FYI

I left a comment on Kaldari's talk page mentioning the need for oversight on the men's rights article. Fluffernutter also took a look and decided against semi-protecting it at this time due to "see how things work out" (from IRC). I'm really sorry that the Jay user called you a bigot - and the community - at that. SarahStierch (talk) 21:56, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

A beer for you!

Is it beer time yet in Berkeley? SarahStierch (talk) 17:51, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Disrespectful behaviour

I'm sorry to do this on a publicly visible page, but I am afraid I am going to have to ask you to correct your disrespectful behaviour towards myself and other editors on the Men's Rights page. Citing policies everyone is already well aware of, threatening bans and actually going through with them is not exactly exhibiting the assumption of good faith that you demand from others. As I have made it clear, I believe the majority of users are acting in good faith in their attempts to bring Men's Rights up to a decent standard. In fact, I am endeavouring to make it the sort of article that is featured on the front page.

Wikipedia is supposed to be an open community, it is not acceptable for administrators to be threatening users who make edits they do not agree with with suspensions. Please do not make such threats again without good cause.

I hope we can turn our attention to more productive subjects in the future. Hermiod (talk) 08:33, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not an administrator. But I do understand our content and behavioral policies fairly well, and was giving you a heads up that the way that you have been behaving violates the established behavioral standards of our community. Continuing to speculate on the motives of other contributors with a complete lack of evidence, besides being a drastic violation of WP:AGF, will end up being considered WP:HARASS or WP:NPA. You can choose to conform to the standards of our community, or you can choose to continue to violate them. It's up to you, but if you choose to continue to violate them (especially after being warned so many times) then you will eventually be blocked by established community processes. Kevin (talk) 08:44, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

At this point it's clear that it's pointless trying to discuss this with you positively. I am afraid that this will require formal dispute resolution, which I have now initiated. Please consider this your required notification. Hermiod (talk) 08:54, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is "Men's Rights". Thank you. --Hermiod (talk) 09:26, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Threats against you

I was unaware of any threats against you or the way you have been treated on the greater Internet. Whatever dispute you and I may have, I do not condone such behaviour and if it means anything you have my sympathy. Hermiod (talk) 17:47, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

You're internet-famous!

Though, i'm sad to say, not in a good way. :(

See "Men’s Rights Fight Breaks Out On Wikipedia". Silverseren^C 02:15, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Well... although it's not the way I'd prefer to be internet famous, it's a substantially better way to be internet famous than that which has occupied most of the last couple days. I'd prefer to be on jezebel for 'Wikipedia editors miraculously reach agreement and produce encyclopedic high quality page on men's rights' - but given the choice between being on jezebel for this and being everywhere else I've been lately, I'd definitely take jezebel, heh. Kevin (talk) 04:40, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

At least the article doesn't make you look like the bad guy --Guerillero | My Talk 17:25, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

hang in there, perhaps you'll get the article to GA after all. You have my sympathies and respect for the harassment and your handling of it. I've been stalked and harassed myself, I know what it can do to you. If you ever want to vent, give me a hollar. KillerChihuahua^?!? 17:47, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, it was a good idea

But apparently Cybermud managed to not notice the editnotice. We can still hope it will cut down on such instances, though. Hopefully others will notice and read it. :-/ KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:46, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

FYI

User:Jayhammers. Kaldari (talk) 01:34, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

A beer for you!

I miss you! :( My IRC is not nearly as fun without you around. SarahStierch (talk) 20:47, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Lawson Adit

Panyd^{The muffin is not subtle} 00:02, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

/* An award for you! */

		Mind the Gap Award
		Thank you for taking on the task of moderator on Gender Gap-l! It is so appreciated; as is your offline work. I can't wait to see what happens next! :) SarahStierch (talk) 03:58, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Speedy deletion contested: User:R T Kiran

Hello Kgorman-ucb, and thanks for patrolling new pages! I am just letting you know that I contested the speedy deletion of User:R T Kiran, a page you tagged for speedy deletion, because of the following concern: Its a user page so i believe that does not apply. You may wish to review the Criteria for Speedy Deletion before tagging further pages. Thank you. Kangaroopowah 06:38, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

replied on your talk page... but all of the general criteria apply to all namespaces. Please review WP:CSD. Kevin (talk) 06:44, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Classroom coordination/SFSU Class Project#Checklist for articles

Well, it looks like they're all done (ages ago). If you're still up for it, could you please fly through the articles and fill in the ticks? Many thanks. (If you can't for some reason, please let me know, and I will look after it.) Best wishes, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 08:28, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

NNU Class Project - Winter 2012

Please consider adding your name at: Wikipedia:School and university projects/NNU Class Project/Winter 2012

Many thanks, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:00, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Article about Restaurant Week

Hi. I have created a new article about an event. Just wanted your feedback on it. Does it meet Wiki standards? Would appreciate your comments and feedback (and help!). Here's the link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/Bangalore_restaurant_week.Varunr (talk) 10:37, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks!

Thanks for your kind words. I'm glad to be of help, please let me know if I can be more helpful. HectorMoffet (talk) 02:31, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Gavin Aronsen

Thanks for your note - I'll leave the article alone for now, and look forward to seeing your additions. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 09:29, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

There's still nothing in the article to establish his notability, and there are no independent sources. Do you intend to do any more to the article? AndrewWTaylor (talk) 11:28, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

The wonders of getting sick :) I should have edits up within the next several days. Kevin (talk) 22:23, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Toolserver, edit count lookup etc

Hi, no offence was intended regarding the lookup. You had commented in the WP:AN thread regarding discretionary sanctions for Indian subcontinent caste-related issues and I was merely trying to figure out who the heck you were. I've only been truly active for the last 12 months and could not recall seeing your name bandied about ... but it was obvious that you understood what has been going on. It is a very handy tool and something needs to be sorted out but it really is beyond my capabilities. - Sitush (talk) 00:48, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

Haha, no worries, none was taken. I just like popping up like a ninja wherever my name is mentioned. Kevin (talk) 01:07, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

I was watching an old episode of QI earlier today and ninjas were mentioned. I always thought that they wore black (it is so slimming) but apparently that is not the case and the discrepancy is a result of some Japanese theatre form whereby stagehands wear black in order to move props around while the action continues. I've got a home-built TV recording/domestic distribution system that can hold around 1000 hours of recordings - I'll try to find the episode again tomorrow and watch the subtitles properly because the precise theatre form was named and, compared to most TV comedy quiz shows, this one is usually pretty much on the mark. Is there no limit to my curiousity?! - Sitush (talk) 01:16, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

If I'm not mistaken, the stagehands would be kuroko. It makes me a little bit sad that I know that off the top of my head... Kevin (talk) 01:22, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

Not sad at all. That is an example of the wonders of communal interaction. It sounds about right, too. I was born profoundly deaf and rely on subtitles etc for TV (they don't subtitle radio yet - now there is a challenge!). Sometimes the subs are mis-spelled but kuroko seems pretty near to what I saw. - Sitush (talk) 01:32, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

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survey

I threw out about 50 messages about interviews for an MSU class at the request of a fellow ambassador. It didn't actually occur to me that research committee approval or bot approval might be needed before AWB'ing out invitations for something like that until I was about fifty messages in. I'm poking in to it currently, but if you received a message about it, please don't take offense :) Kevin (talk) 03:28, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Happy Valentine's Day

File:Valentine's Ducks.jpg	Rubber duckies for you
	Happy Valentine's Day Kevin! May this year bring you lots of #WikiLove, as you deserve it! SarahStierch (talk) 19:23, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar
	Thank you for acting as a responsible contributing editor on Richard Santulli and being objective. Monstermike99 (talk) 01:04, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Et de deux ...!

	a round of applause...
	...for your rapid, no-nonsense, wiki-justified editing of Richard Santulli. CaptainScreebo Parley! 17:25, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, thanks guys. Kevin (talk) 02:46, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Speedy deletion declined: Nicholas forrest

Hello Kgorman-ucb, and thanks for patrolling new pages! I am just letting you know that I declined the speedy deletion of Nicholas forrest, a page you tagged for speedy deletion, because of the following concern: The article makes a credible assertion of importance or significance, sufficient to pass A7. You may wish to review the Criteria for Speedy Deletion before tagging further pages. Thank you. ϢereSpielChequers 14:26, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Heh, it was a bit silly of me to tag this page. Oh well, NPP'ing while tired may not have been the best idea ever. Kevin (talk) 02:39, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

Reply

Since the TFD has largely turned into a platform for people to attack each other without actually addressing anything, I'll reply to you here. If you look further up in the TFD, you'll see where I linked to some of the discussions regarding {{Deleted template}}, so its use is not exactly without some sort of prior discussion or practice. It is currently in use for {{Expand}}, and using it with such a previously widely used template helped work out a number of logic bugs in {{Deleted template}}'s code. The template works well for message box templates such as these, but at present it would likely be ill-suited for lower level templates. I suppose for templates that a typical editor would normally add by hand, such as message boxes, navigation boxes, etc, {{Deleted template}} could work well, but I don't know that it would be of much use without some significant additional code for say a depreciated formatting template or citation template. --Tothwolf (talk) 19:39, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

How we do it

Regarding this. Thick skins! I saw it and decided to ignore, mainly because if it is one person who does the necessary every time then the idea of a cabal just becomes stronger. I've had death threats, so this is (relatively) minor. Nonetheless, I am grateful to you for stepping in. Someone has to. - Sitush (talk) 00:27, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Death threats are always fun :) I still receive them occasionally related to some of my former editing, though luckily most of that stupidity has tapered off. I really do pity you guys with the caste articles though, I may watchlist a few more of them so that I can help out with them more often. Kevin (talk) 00:47, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

More eyes would be most welcome. - Sitush (talk) 10:45, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

AN comments

I have made subsequent comments at the AN discussion about a topic ban.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 18:10, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

WikiJaguar

		The WikiJaguar Award for Excellence
		Nothing like fixing my day-olde typos! Cheers, oh great Userpage stalker, Cheers! Achowat (talk) 22:10, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, at least someone noticed

Thanks for you kind comments. I'm going to go on wikibreak now to see how things play out and whether my already-invested time gets used or wasted. I know I could spent a lifetime adding cites to the Kernighan article, but I have no faith that time would sway minds.

I started a number of articles for you guys, and nearly half of them got CSDed within instants. "All the world's knowledge" includes people currently in power in major US cities-- if wikipedia can't include that information (with enought RS sources), I'm wasting my time here and should just give up and join facebook.

I have more sympathy for the Category deletion. It's a group of people who, if you look at them, they all have something in common. Will the Wikipedia experts find a good name to describe this group, or will they delete the hours I spent tracking those individuals down. The title needs to change, that's always been obvious to me.

What I didn't anticipate was just how easy it is to copy "delete per nom" compared to actually helping solve the problem. Solutions are hard and they take time. Deletion is easy, and sweeps the problem under the rug.

Anyway, I whine too much. There' a timeline in my userspace of the oakland city council. Obviously, I'm not inclined to debug timeline code until I have a better sense of whether my work will be used in Wikipedia or not.

If I wind up vanishing, you might try to rescue it and putting it in the appropriate articles, if any. If it's not appropriate for any articles, you many delete it on your own authority-- I trust ya.

thanks again for your kind words. I realize I'm being a bit of a diva here, but it never cross my minds that Wikipedia can't cover legislators and imprisoned journalists. --HectorMoffet (talk) 23:21, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Minor modification

Hi, just to let you know, I was making a minor modification to my post for clarity but got an EC. As I didn't feel my modifications changed the meaning, I went ahead and submitted them anyway even though you had already replied [5]. Cheers Nil Einne (talk) 23:55, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the mention of it, but no worries. Kevin (talk) 23:56, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Teahouse

Feel free to invite your students and whatnots :) WP:Teahouse SarahStierch (talk) 00:09, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

There should be some by in a few weeks :) Kevin (talk) 00:12, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Hi

Hi, Kevin. Please read my reply to Phlippe. Thank you. --Meno25 (talk) 07:05, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Grant Cardone

Hello - I have reverted your edit of the Grant Cardone article. I'm not sure where you get the idea that Cardone's to email Scientologists is copyright. Has he made such a claim that you are aware of? I know the email was published in the Village Voice and there has been no such claim made against that publication. I would value your comment on this. Many thanks. Henry Sewell (talk) 12:14, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Copying this over to the article talk page and responding there. Kevin (kgorman-ucb) (talk) 15:11, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Re: Bisexual Erasure Article

Bisexual erasure is a new topic, poorly sourced in the real world, with little or no academic papers on the subject. According to WP under Wikipedia:Verifiability in the section entitled:

What counts as a reliable source The word "source" in Wikipedia has three meanings: the work itself (a document, article, paper, or book), the creator of the work (for example, the writer), and the publisher of the work (for example, Oxford University Press). All three can affect reliability.

The key words here are "the work itself," which in this case is the website itself, which is cited.

In addition "If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it." From the 5th pillar of Wikipedia "Wikipedia does not have firm rules." at Wikipedia:Five pillars

This is the basis of my edit. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Benjamin9832 (talk • contribs) 06:49, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

Maggie's Farm

Hi, Kgorman-ucb! I left a note for you on the "Maggie's Farm" talk page with a request for feedback. Thanks. Allreet (talk) 15:19, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

Replied there, thanks for the note. Kevin (kgorman-ucb) (talk) 20:25, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

And thanks for your quick reply. I'll leave the OR tag alone for now and will replace it once I start to source the material and get a better handle on how far afield the original editors went. Allreet (talk) 04:52, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for contributing to the Teahouse!.

Hi! Kevin Gorman, thanks for visiting the Teahouse! As an experienced editor, your knowledge is very valuable to new editors. Teahouse Hosts help new editors at the Teahouse and beyond. If you'd like to get involved in assisting new editors at the Teahouse, please learn more here Sarah (talk) 03:58, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

I had thought I told you about the host program (and invited you to participate originally?). Just wanted to FYI you about this :) Sarah (talk) 03:58, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

The Tea Leaf - Issue One - Recent news from the Teahouse

Hi! Welcome to the first edition of The Tea Leaf, the official newsletter of the Teahouse!

Spring has sprung! Stop by the Teahouse for a cup of tea under the cherry blossoms.

• Metrics are out from week one. Week one showed that the need for Teahouse hosts to invite new editors to the Teahouse is urgent for this pilot period. It also showed that emailing new users invitations is a powerful tool, with new editors responding more to emails than to talk page templates. We also learned that the customized database reports created for the Teahouse have the highest return rate of participation by invitees. Check out the metrics here and see how you can help with inviting in our Invitation Guide.
• A refreshed "Your hosts" page encourages experienced Wikipedians to learn about the Teahouse and participate. With community input, the Teahouse has updated the Your hosts page which details the host roles within the Teahouse pilot and the importance that hosts play in providing a friendly, special experience not always found on other welcome/help spaces on Wikipedia. It also explains how Teahouse hosts are important regarding metrics reporting during this pilot. Are you an experienced editor who wants to help out? Take a look at the new page today and start learning about the hosts tasks and how you can participate!
• Introduce yourself and meet new guests at the Teahouse. Take the time to welcome and get to know the latest guests at the Teahouse. New & experienced editors to Wikipedia can add a brief infobox about themselves and get to know one another with direct links to userpages. Drop off some wikilove to these editors today, they'll surely be happy to feel the wikilove!

You are receiving The Tea Leaf after expressing interest or participating in the Teahouse! To remove yourself from receiving future newsletters, please remove your username here. Sarah (talk) 16:06, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Reminder! Women's History Month edit-a-thon

Just a friendly reminder about the Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon for Women's History Month :)

Date: Saturday, March 17, 2012 from 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM (PT)

Location: Wikimedia Foundation Offices 149 New Montgomery Street, 6th floor San Francisco, CA 94105

Bring: Your laptop and charger (we'll have some extra computers available), your questions, and your friends!

What to expect: A fun, laid-back environment with food, drink, a great mix of people, and a wealth of knowledge and resources.

Public transport: BART to Montgomery station and walk 1 block down New Montgomery St.

Reminder: The St. Patricks Day parade will be starting at 11:30 on Market Street. Market street will most likely be closed to cars so please plan your journey accordingly ;-)

When you arrive: A volunteer will be at the front of the building to greet everyone arriving 12:40 - 1:20. You will take the elevator up to the 6th floor.

If you are early: If you expect to come earlier than 12:40 to help set-up, please let us know, so we can give you a contact number.

If you arrive later: No problem. There will be a phone number posted to the front door of the office building. A volunteer will run down and let you in.

We can't wait to see you on Saturday! Maryana (WMF) (talk) 23:28, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

DYK for Obsidian Finance Group, LLC v. Cox

Orlady (talk) 00:04, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

HighBeam

• Hello Kevin, I am sending this message to editors who signed up for the Women's History Month Edit-a-thon. Please help spread the word. HighBeam Research--an online, pay-for-use search engine for newspapers, magazines, academic journals, newswires, trade magazines and encyclopedias has agreed to give free, full-access, 1-year accounts for up to 1000 Wikipedia editors to use. HighBeam has access to over 80 million articles from 6,500 publications, most of which are not available for free elsewhere on the internet. Aside from a free 7-day trial (credit card required), access to HighBeam would cost $30 per month or $200 per year for the first year and $300 for subsequent years, so this is a wonderful, free, no-strings-attached opportunity. To qualify, editors must have at least a 1 year-old account with 1000 edits. Please add your name to the WP:HighBeam/Applications account sign-up page if you are interested. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 18:32, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Just saying hi!

Hi there, Just wanted to drop by and say hi! It was great meeting you at the San Francisco Women's History Month Edit-a-Thon. Thanks for all of your great input on incorporating Wikipedia into undergrad coursework! Cupcakemuffin (talk) 02:08, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Please timestamp talk page posts

Hi.

I noticed this message of yours just now. You didn't include a timestamp when posting these messages, so the archive bots can't know how old the message is (and thus simply don't ever move the message into an archive subpage). Please remember to always sign your posts with ~~~~ (or you can include just a timestamp by using ~~~~~).

It also wouldn't be the worst idea in the world for you to go back through your old messages and correct them, if you have time. --MZMcBride (talk) 19:44, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Sorry for not handling this earlier. The timestamps got lost some time after my initial posts - I did timestamp them originally. I just started an AWB run to retimestamp all of them. Kevin (kgorman-ucb) (talk) 23:06, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Crashed the bejesus out of AWB but I'll clean it up tomorrow by hand. Kevin (kgorman-ucb) (talk) 23:11, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Heh, thanks for your efforts. :-) I stalk User talk:Brandon. Hopefully the bot will pick up the timestamp now. --MZMcBride (talk) 00:31, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Doodle for April Wikipedia Education Program meeting

Please leave your availability for the April Wikipedia Education Program Metrics and Activities Meeting on this Doodle so we can find the best time for all of us.

I also need a volunteer to lead the meeting! Will you help? Leave a message. It requires no advanced preparation, just the ability to welcome everyone and move us through the agenda. -- LiAnna Davis (WMF) (talk)

If this message is not on your home wiki's talk page, update your subscription ·  Distributed via Global message delivery, 20:50, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

The Tea Leaf - Issue Two

Hi! Welcome to the second edition of The Tea Leaf, the official newsletter of the Teahouse!

• Teahouse celebrates one month of being open! This first month has drawn a lot of community interest to the Teahouse. Hosts & community members have been working with the project team to improve the project in many ways including creating scripts to make inviting easier, exploring mediation processes for troubling guests, and best practices regarding mentoring for new editors who visit the Teahouse.

Springtime means fresh tea leaves...

• First month metrics report an average of 30 new editors visiting the Teahouse each week. Approximately 30 new editors participate in the Teahouse each week, by way of asking questions and making guest profiles. An average of six new questions and four new profiles are made each day. We'd love to hear your ideas about how we can spread the word about the Teahouse to more new editors.
• Teahouse has many regulars. Like any great teahouse, our Teahouse has a 61% return rate of guests, who come back to ask additional questions and to also help answer others' questions. Return guests cite the speedy response rate of hosts and the friendly, easy to understand responses by the hosts and other participants as the main reasons for coming back for another cup o' tea!
• Early metrics on retention. It's still too early to draw conclusions about the Teahouse's impact on new editor retention, but, early data shows that 38% of new editors who participate at the Teahouse are still actively editing Wikipedia 2-4 weeks later, this is compared with 7% from a control group of uninvited new editors who showed similar first day editing activity. Additional metrics can be found on the Teahouse metrics page.
• Nine new hosts welcomed to the Teahouse. Nine new hosts have been welcomed to the Teahouse during month one: Chicocvenancio, Cullen328, Hallows AG, Jeffwang, Mono, Tony1, Worm That Turned, Writ Keeper, and Nathan2055. Welcome to the Teahouse gang, folks!
• Say hello to the new guests at the Teahouse. Take the time to welcome and get to know the latest guests at the Teahouse. Drop off some wikilove to these editors today, as being welcomed by experienced editors is a really nice way to make new editors feel welcome.

You are receiving The Tea Leaf after expressing interest or participating in the Teahouse! To remove yourself from receiving future newsletters, please remove your username here. -- Sarah (talk) 21:42, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Dispute resolution survey

Dispute Resolution – Survey Invite Hello Kevin Gorman. I am currently conducting a study on the dispute resolution processes on the English Wikipedia, in the hope that the results will help improve these processes in the future. Whether you have used dispute resolution a little or a lot, now we need to know about your experience. The survey takes around five minutes, and the information you provide will not be shared with third parties other than to assist in analyzing the results of the survey. No personally identifiable information will be released. Please click HERE to participate. Many thanks in advance for your comments and thoughts. You are receiving this invitation because you have had some activity in dispute resolution over the past year. For more information, please see the associated research page. Steven Zhang DR goes to Wikimania! 01:38, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Join us Monday for April Wikipedia Education Program meeting

Greetings,

I need your help to lead the next Wikipedia Education Program Metrics and Activities Meeting! Will you leave a message if you can help? It requires no advanced preparation, just the ability to welcome everyone and move us through the agenda.

The next meeting has been scheduled for Monday, April 23 at 20:00 UTC. See the meeting information page for joining instructions and a time converter. Hope to talk with you on Monday! -- LiAnna Davis (WMF) (talk)

If this message is not on your home wiki's talk page, update your subscription ·  Distributed via Global message delivery, 19:11, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Please stop your bot!!!

I'm not sure what's going on ... for some reason you have a bot running now that is posting a message that I do not want posted on talk pages. Please stop!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jaobar (talk • contribs) 16:45, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Hi Jonathan - the only thing I did today was add timestamps to the end of messages that had previously been sent out but had lost their timestamps. Talk-page archiving bots work by looking at the latest timestamp in a section - if there is no timestamp, archive bots will never archive that section. I had initially posted ~50 messages about your adminship interviews at the request of Anna, because I had access to AWB and she didn't. It's good practice to always time-stamp talk page posts, and at the request of someone at the top of this page, I went back and retroactively dated all of the messages I had initially posted so as to unbreak the archive bots. Kevin (kgorman-ucb) (talk) 22:13, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Mentioned your name

Hi Kevin, hope everything is going well :-) Just wanted to let you know that I mentioned your name here. Best --Frank Schulenburg (Wikimedia Foundation) (talk) 14:32, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

Hi Frank, thanks for dropping by. I actually came down withmononucleosis this week and have an especially high fever today, so I'm having a mite of trouble following some of the edu program related threads today. I'll be chiming in more actively on them once I manage to break this fever, though. Kevin Gorman (talk) 17:53, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

Yikes

My apologies for this mistake; and now I don't know whose page I was on when I typed that. Get well soon! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:43, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm guessing you just saw my mention of User:Kevin (WMF) on my userpage without realizing that it wasn't an active account (and that I wasn't WMF staff even when it was.) I feel a bit snarky pointing this out instead of just correcting it myself, but I'm not an online ambassador either. I am a campus ambassador, which I do not feel a need to self-disclose on the AfD, because I do not find it relevant. I do not vote blanket-keep on education program articles, have deleted or merged them myself previously, was not canvassed for the AfD (I came across it at ANI) and have not discussed the AfD off-wiki with any other education program people. (And thanks - and sorry if I'm coming off as extra-grump in any of my replies - mono is being a giant pain in the ass.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:46, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Don't take it personally, Sandy has a habit of using a very wide brush when she perceives there is a COI. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 03:06, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your recent edit (undo)

at Men's Rights. I found the statement "the inability of feminist to acknowledge that men have problems worthy of being rectified." to be particularly noteworthy because I can think of no feminist, and I've known quite a few, who would not acknowledge that men have problems worthy of being rectified. In fact, a lot of them. Einar aka Carptrash (talk) 04:40, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks :) the article as a whole tends to attract a lot of trouble. It's in pretty rough shape as it is, but attracts so many disruptive editors that I've never attempted a solid rewrite of it - but I do try to keep new silly stuff out. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:49, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I just looked at the history and I edited that last October. Since then there have been maybe 500 edits and a lot of BS. I bailed out and must commend you for hanging in there. A nasty job that someone needs to do, but, it turns out, not me. Carptrash (talk) 05:04, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Admin noticeboard

Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. Sarah (talk) 16:38, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Your mail

What, were you hoping to date her? Drmies (talk) 17:54, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha Kevin Gorman (talk) 18:16, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

help with course of action concerning possible infringement

Hello Kevin!

It's evening here in Romania and I'm back on WP. Thanks for your offer to help. Here's the story in a nutshell: I went to school with a famous sportsperson and multiple Olympic champion and she's still a rather close friend. Needless to say none of the existing WP articles about her were written by me because, despite the notability being out of question, I felt I couldn't be objective. But those articles exist. Yesterday she brought to my attention that a book was published in the States,(apparently in 2010) containing her biography and with the statement on the cover that it was "based on high quality Wikipedia articles". She says that, according to what she was told, it sells on Amazon for 50 USD/48 EUR and that she would send me a link from the Barnes&Noble website. There are several issues here: first, both she and I don't think it's ethical to publish any kind of biography of a living person without notifying the person (and at least her business address is widely known). Secondly, and which has to do directly with Wikipedia, both she and I don't believe that one can, just like that, copy &paste content that is made available for free and make profit out of it (how much of this book did the authors actually work for? we don't know, because we don't have it yet; but they take pride in "basing" it on wp which is not a good sign).

OK, I tried to read my way through the terms of use pages, read about the new terms of use, too (although probably they shouldn't apply retroactively) but I couldn't get a clear picture of what applies here and what can be done. I'll come back with the link when I get it. Thanks again Cristixav (talk) 18:07, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

It's an unfortunate situation, but unfortunately, one about which little can be done. There are a number of 'companies' (I hope none of them have very high sales) that scrape Wikipedia for articles and throw them together hodgepodge in to print-on-demand books which they then list on Amazon.

Wikipedia's content is licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0 and the GFDL, the terms of which are found at the bottom of every edit window. The licenses do allow for commercial reuse, as long as you attribute the original author. The book probably fails to follow the technical terms of the license (you have to attribute the actual author, not just "Wikipedia,") but unfortunately that is something that would only allow limited redress (and you would have to have authored the content to pursue it,) and you'd also have to buy a copy of the book to see whether or not they actually followed the license, anyway.

I would suggest, as unfortunate as it is, just completely ignoring it. It's unlikely that the 'book' has actually sold a single copy - these places are almost exclusively print-on-demand. I agree with you that it's shitty to publish a book about a living person without their knowledge (and shittier to make it on of Wikipedia articles,) but there's nothing anyone can really do to stop it, and it's unlikely anyone will actually ever read the 'book' anyway.

As a tangent: if the Wikipedia articles related to her aren't very good, if you'd like, if you draft a rewrite of them, I'd be happy to look over it, make sure it is objective (and if necessary, rewrite parts of them in a more neutral way) and then make those changes to the existing article. Kevin Gorman (talk) 18:23, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

As Kevin said, those books are probably best ignored (I ordered one of them once just to see what was going on there, and Kevin is right-- there's nothing Wikipedia can do to stop them). The reason they are so expensive (who would pay $50 to get what they can read on Wikipedia?) is that they are "printed on demand"-- there aren't copies of them available unless someone orders one. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:33, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

The only thing I know to do is keep sending complaints to Barnes and Noble and Amazon asking them to stop stocking these companies' books. Kaldari (talk) 18:48, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) One would want to read [6]. Trust me. Hipocrite (talk) 20:02, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Damn, I have a lot of talk page stalkers. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:17, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks

Hi Kevin, thanks for your help with the Anne Bremer page. I didn't get any notice that you'd replied at the Teahouse, but maybe that's because I eliminated that heading on my talk page. It's all so confusing! Ann HarZim (talk) 20:20, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

FOR SCIENCE

		The FOR SCIENCE! Barnstar
		Hey, Kevin! Thanks for your awesome hand-coding work for WP:AFT5 :). Have a barnstar! Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 12:32, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Regarding your comments...

... please tell me which campus ambassador was involved with approving these articles for DYK and Good Article. I do not in anyway blame the students here and I will apologise profusely to them for my incivil behavior, explain my frustration was borne not out of their individual actions but because their instructor and campus ambassador did not meet WP:COMPETENCE, that the programme they were involved in was not designed to maximise to set them up for success and actually set them up to fail. I will offer to help them improve their articles after their course is done because really? It isn't their fault. In the mean time, please help clean up the rest of the problems that you're culpable in supporting and busily not fixing. This is an example of WP:COMPETENCE on your part and a violation of WP:CIVIL because of your obligation to help and your helping to maximise student failure. --LauraHale (talk) 22:41, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Let me expand on my original post a little bit: if you levy further accusations against me without supporting diffs in the future, or if you ever make an edit like this one or some of your other recent edits again or continue your use of overly aggressive edit summaries directed towards new editors, I'll be posting on AN/I asking for an uninvolved administrator to sanction you. Being frustrated is okay, forgetting that WP:CIVIL is policy isn't. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:59, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I will endeavor to be more civil. In the mean time, I would humbly ask for your assistance in cleaning up work of these non-voluntary contributors. I understand the problems are not the students fault, but rather because they have not had proper training and unclear instructional objectives that clearly articulate learning goals that match Wikipedia's purpose. In many ways, they are innocents who are being compelled to edit with an obvious conflict of interest of meeting course objectives. Sadly, this means work for it and I'm not qualified to clean up psychology problems. So please, please, please, please help clean up these articles in a more productive way than I have been able to do by removing all the unsourced material, by removing the WP:ESSAY nature and by ridding all the WP:MEDRS violations because I just do not have the time. It is why I am not a campus ambassador. --LauraHale (talk) 23:09, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

The reason I haven't touched the psychology articles that currently have issues myself directly is because I barely know our medical sourcing standards. I'm familiar enough with them that when my writing touches on medical issues I won't violate them, but me copyediting a psych article is the next thing to useless. The only class at Berkeley that has approached me wanting to participate in the education program that would've focused on medical issues I declined to support, for this reason. I'm going to be looking at some of the articles created by the recently discovered non-USEP class (that's on ANI currently) later today to see what I can do about them, and generally do try to help out with education program issues that are unrelated to anything I actually do as I can. Please understand that as a campus ambassador my general 'job' (and it's still a volunteer position, so not terribly different from any other editor) is to support local classes, not to generally supervise the edu program - until the education noticeboard came around, I had no idea the number of problems medical classes had been running in to, and I have had literally nothing to do with their inception. Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:25, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Teahouse bots

Thanks!! It's totally okay to undo what I did completely if that's easier! heather walls (talk) 06:54, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

I *think* what I did will fix it, but I'm not sure. If any weird problems pop up, it may be easier to just undo all your changes. I'm not especially fluent in template, but with any luck at all my reexpansions of those two templates will fix it :) Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:59, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

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A barnstar for you!

	The Barnstar of Diplomacy
	For your fine work on the Education noticeboard, and for helping to ensure that we all remember what it was like to be a new contributor. -Philippe (talk) 01:11, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Why thanks :) Kevin Gorman (talk) 18:47, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

DYK for Occupy the Farm

Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:03, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Aelita Andre and Vanity gallery

Hi Kevin, I'm not sure whether you remember me, but a year ago, you helped resolve a small disagreement related to User:Cramyourspam inserting POV material in the Aelita Andre article. Would you be willing to weigh in on a resurgence of this issue? It appeared to be resolved last June, but this week, Cramyourspam has returned to the article insistent upon listing Vanity gallery as a related topic. He (or she) is also adding Aelita Andre as a related topic to the Vanity gallery article. I have already reverted these edits twice, and given the user's editing patterns, I don't assume the re-addition of this material will stop anytime soon. I think these edits place undue weight on something that is appropriately mentioned in the relevant section of the article. If you have time, would you mind helping out on that page as you did last year? I really appreciate what you did already and would be grateful if you're willing to do it again. Thanks, Armadillopteryx^talk 02:13, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

(edit) RV count is now up to 3. Armadillopteryx^talk 02:21, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the note. I'd actually already noticed his edits since I had never unwatchlisted the articles, but this week is finals for me, so I hadn't taken action yet. He's currently at 4 reverts - which means he's in violation of WP:3rr and blockworthy. I'm not currently bothering to report him, but please bring him to WP:AN3 if he makes another violation of 3rr, or WP:BLPN if he continues to edit war on a WP:BLP without even bothering to provide sources or try to legitimately address those who disagree. Kevin Gorman (talk) 09:09, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

inserting POV material? writes the person who created the article and keeps deleting what s/he seems to feel might look negative? extensive commentary is here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Vanity_gallery#Aelita_Andre cheers. Cramyourspam (talk) 15:36, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Putin

Hi! Please stick around on the Putin page and give your opinion whenever you feel like it. We need some more diversity there, it's getting rather monotonous ;) Thanks. Malick78 (talk) 09:07, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

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You're invited: San Francisco WikiWomen's Edit-a-Thon 2!

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The San Francisco WikiWomen's Edit-a-Thon 2 will be held on Saturday, June 16, 2012 at the Wikimedia Foundation offices in San Francisco. Wikipedians of all experience levels are welcome to join us! This event will be specifically geared around encouraging women to learn how to edit and contribute to Wikipedia. Workshops on copy-editing, article creation, and sourcing will be hosted. Bring a friend! Come one, come all! EdwardsBot (talk) 23:30, 22 May 2012 (UTC) · Unsubscribe

San Francisco Wiknic 2012

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	You are invited to the second Great American Wikinic taking place in Golden Gate Park, in San Francisco, on Saturday, June 23, 2012. We're still looking for input on planning activities, and thematic overtones. List your add yourself to the attendees list, and edit the picnic as you like. —Max Klein {chat} 18:35, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
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Thanks for expressing interest in the Wikipedia Education Program Metrics and Activities Meeting. I'm investigating ways to make the meeting more effective, and I'd love to get feedback from you as to what we could do to improve the meeting. Please weigh in on the discussion there! -- LiAnna Davis (WMF) (talk)

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The Tea Leaf - Issue Four

Hi! Welcome to the fourth issue of The Tea Leaf, the official newsletter for the Teahouse!

• Teahouse pilot wraps up after 13 weeks After being piloted on English Wikipedia starting in February, the Teahouse wrapped up its pilot period on May 27, 2012. We expect this is just the beginning for the Teahouse and hope the project will continue to grow in the months to come!

Thank you and congratulations to all of the community members who participated - and continue to participate!

• What you've all been waiting for: Teahouse Pilot Report is released! We look forward to your feedback on the methodology and outcomes of this pilot project.
• ....and if a pilot report wasn't enough, the Teahouse Pilot Metrics Report is out too! Dive into the numbers and survey results to learn about the impact the Teahouse has made on English Wikipedia.
• Teahouse shows positive impact on new editor retention and engagement

• 409 new editors participated during the entire pilot period, with about 40 new editors participating in the Teahouse per week.
• Two weeks after participating, 33% of Teahouse guests are still active on Wikipedia, as opposed to 11% of a similar control group.
• New editors who participated in the Teahouse edit 10x the number of articles, make 7x more global edits, and 2x as much of their content survives on Wikipedia compared to the control group.

• Women participate in the Teahouse 28% of Teahouse participants were women, up from 9% of editors on Wikipedia in general, good news for this project which aimed to have impact on the gender gap too - but still lots to be done here!
• New opportunities await for the Teahouse in phase two as the Teahouse team and Wikipedia community examine ways to improve, scale, and sustain the project. Opportunities for future work include:

• Automating or semi-automating systems such as invites, metrics and archiving
• Experimenting with more ways for new editors to discover the Teahouse
• Building out the social and peer-to-peer aspects further, including exploring ways to make answering questions easier, creating more ways for new editors to help each other and for all participants to acknowledge each other's efforts
• Growing volunteer capacity, continuing to transfer Teahouse administration tasks to volunteers whenever possible, and looking for new ways to make maintenance and participation easier for everyone.

• Want to know how you can lend a hand at the Teahouse? Become a host! Learn more about what makes the Teahouse different than other help spaces on Wikipedia and see how you can help new editors by visiting here.
• Say hello to the new guests at the Teahouse. Take the time to welcome and get to know the latest guests at the Teahouse. Drop off some wikilove to these editors today, as being welcomed by experienced editors is really encouraging to new Wikipedians.

You are receiving The Tea Leaf after expressing interest or participating in the Teahouse! To remove yourself from receiving future newsletters, please remove your username here. Sarah (talk) 16:44, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Still need reviews for the Wikipedia Education Program research project

Hey, Kevin! As if I don't ask enough of you already, I thought I'd post this message to you in case you have some time to spare this week:

If you have some time to review the quality of some articles, we're using the results for a really important research project that will help shape the future of the US/Canada Education Program. For a few projects, we're on a pretty tight timeline and are really eager to have many more of these articles reviewed over the next week. However, we think it's most useful to come from experienced Wikipedia editors.

I have gone through each class to prioritize for various projects, and everyone on the Education team at the Wikimedia Foundation would be extremely grateful if you could participate by reviewing a few articles ('pre' and 'post' versions). If we can rally a lot of editors to review one or two articles each day, we will be able to make the most use of this research for our tight timeline. As many of our Ambassadors have requested it, we are really eager to find out which classes have been successful according to the Wikipedian standard.

If you can spare some time, please check out these priority articles and give it a go. Even 1 or 2 a day would help immensely! JMathewson (WMF) (talk) 02:12, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

• (talk page stalker) I don't mind helping out while this Gorman person is hitting on wikiwomen in his polyester suit in Washington DC, but I don't see any articles that still need reviewing--or is this, again, too complicated for me? Or does every article need more than three reviews? Drmies (talk) 02:55, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

July 2012

Please stop attacking other editors, as you did on Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Bbb23. If you continue, you may be blocked from editing Wikipedia. You're way out of line, pal, attacking an admin. I'm going to hunt you down and shove that badge down your throat. (I'm attending DGG's session, BTW.) Drmies (talk) 18:38, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

• Man, that IP vandalism is really getting out of hand, isn't it. Maybe you should geolocate and see if it wasn't gate B76 at Dulles, bwuhaha! Drmies (talk) 18:04, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Lamer, you left without saying hi?!? I did geolocate it, and was actually just about to post on your talkpage. you quack a lot, sir. Kevin Gorman (talk) 18:07, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

No, it wasn't me, it was some weird guy sitting next to me, I think. Are you still in DC? Unconferencing? Drmies (talk) 18:10, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm in DC until tomorrow, currently at the unconference. I will be leaving DC tomorrow and hanging out for a few days in Baltimore before I go back to the bay. Kevin Gorman (talk) 18:14, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Sounds like a well-deserved vacation to me, Mr. Gorman. I hope you enjoy and that you get to see a couple of things as well. See you...next year? somewhere. Drmies (talk) 01:29, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Article about Radha Thomas

I am currently working on the Wiki page for Ms Radha Thomas. She is an Indian jazz singer and songwriter. In fact, she is known as a diva in the Indian jazz scene. She previously was with the band Human Bondage and has sung and performed globally. The article is still under development. I haven't completed it or submitted it for review yet. You can have a look at it at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/Radha_Thomas. I will be requesting your help and advice (as usual) in making it conform to all Wiki standards. If you do a Google Search for Radha (https://www.google.co.in/#hl=en&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&q=Radha+Thomas&oq=Radha+Thomas&gs_l=hp.3..0l2j0i30l2.1190.3159.0.3385.12.12.0.0.0.0.282.1949.0j11j1.12.0...0.0...1c.dYmnNUlMsQM&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.,cf.osb&fp=f6ee012440c72a74&biw=1024&bih=509) you will find dozens of articles and links to her work. As of now, the article is still under development and I will come bug you for help soon! Varunr (talk) 06:38, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

EduWiki Conference 5-6 September in Leicester, UK

I am writing to you as you have signed up to the Education Meetup at Wikimania 2012 and perhaps are interested in how Wikipedia links to education. Wikimedia UK is now running a education related event that may be of interest to you: the EduWiki Conference on 5-6 September in Leicester. This event will be looking at Wikipedia and related charitable projects in terms of educational practice, including good faith collaboration, open review, and global participation. It's a chance to talk about innovative work in your institution or online community, and shape the future of Wikimedia UK's work in this area!

The conference will be of interest to educators, scholarly societies members, contributors to Wikipedia and other open education projects, and students.

For details please visit the UK Chapter Wiki.

Please feel welcome to register or promote within your network.

Thank you, Daria Cybulska (talk) 16:19, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

The Tea Leaf - Issue Five

Stop by for a tasty glass of wiki-iced tea at the Teahouse, today!

Hi! Welcome to the fifth edition of The Tea Leaf, the official newsletter of the Teahouse!

• Guest activity increased in July. Questions are up from an average of 36 per week in June to 43 per week in July, and guest profile creation has also increased. This is likely a result of the automatic invite experiments we started near the end of month, which seeks to lessen the burden on hosts and other volunteers who manually invite editors. During the last week of July, questions doubled in the Teahouse! (But don't let that deter you from inviting editors to the Teahouse, please, there are still lots of new editors who haven't found Teahouse yet.)
• More Teahouse hosts than ever. We had 12 new hosts sign up to participate at the Teahouse! We now have 35 hosts volunteering at the Teahouse. Feel free to stop by and see them all here.
• Phase two update: Host sprint. In August, the Teahouse team plans to improve the host experience by developing a simpler new-host creation process, a better way of surfacing active hosts, and a host lounge renovation. Take a look at the plan and weigh in here.
• New Teahouse guest barnstar is awarded to first recipient: Charlie Inks. Using the Teahouse barnstar designed by Heatherawalls, hosts hajatvrc and Ryan Vesey created the new Teahouse Guest Barnstar. The first recipient is Charlie Inks, for her boldness in asking questions at the Teahouse. Check out the award in action here.
• Teahouse was a hot topic at Wikimania! The Teahouse was a hot topic at Wikimania this past month, where editor retention and interface design was heavily discussed. Sarah and Jonathan presented the Teahouse during the Wikimedia Fellowships panel. Slides can be viewed here. A lunch was also held at Wikimania for Teahouse hosts.

As always, thanks for supporting the Teahouse project! Stop by and visit us today!

You are receiving The Tea Leaf after expressing interest or participating in the Teahouse! To remove yourself from receiving future newsletters, please remove your username here. Sarah (talk) 08:31, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

This Month in Education: August 2012

This Month in Education – Volume 1, Issue 1, August 2012 Headlines Welcome to the first This Month in Education newsletter! EduWiki Conference, UK "Students Write Wikipedia", Czech Republic Reaching out to different target groups in Germany Involving more professors in the Wikipedia Education Program in Brazil Working with International Baccalaureate students at ITESM-Campus Ciudad de México Cairo Pilot wraps up successfully with conference Project TAO at Wikimania: Promoting Wikipedia among Seniors "Wikipedia for Seniors": Upcoming Presentation at WikiCon 2012 (Austria) To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

If this message is not on your home wiki's talk page, update your subscription · Distributed via Global message delivery, 18:35, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

My new project - WWC

Hi Kevin! I hope all is well. I wanted to stop by to share a new project with you that I am developing, called the WikiWomen's Collaborative. I would love your input about the project.

WWC needs you!

• You can find the project page here.
• On the talk page, you'll find a number of questions I'm seeking input on. I'm especially seeking thoughts about hosting the space off of Wikipedia (in the WordPress section). I hope you will join in on the conversation.
• Finally, this project will be developed with volunteers from around the world who want to engage and support bringing new women to Wikipedia. If you think you'd like to be involved in some capacity, that'd be awesome. We're still working on developing roles, but, you can learn more about volunteer opportunities here.

Thank you for the consideration and I hope you'll participate in developing this exciting new project to bring more women to Wikipedia! SarahStierch (talk) 23:01, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

Action at WP:ANI

Hi Kevin. Please note this action at WP:ANI, in which you have been named.

Best wishes,

Noetica^Tea? 12:25, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

Hi Kevin. As you know, the action was completed at WP:ANI. (I have updated the link above, since the section is now archived.) I am grateful to you for advertising a deadline after which you would take things forward; but 24 hours (in particular, that 24 hour period) was very difficult for me to meet. May I ask: having pushed for the matter to go quickly to ANI, why did you not make a contribution there? I laid everything out from my point of view, hoping for your response and for an opportunity to respond in turn. I stayed with the thread till well after midnight (in Eastern Australia), but could then wait no longer.

Best wishes,

Noetica^Tea? 01:10, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

I looked at it a few hours after it was posted intending to reply later, but by the time I was free to respond it had already been closed by Bushranger.

I'm sorry if you felt pressured by me trying to set a deadline. There was nothing particularly special about 24 hours to me, I just didn't want forward progress on the page to be indefinitely held up by a threatened ANI action in the wake of a thirty four day long RfC. I probably should have just said "please proceed to ANI at your earliest convenience if you intend to do so, otherwise, please just drop the issue," and will do so if somehow I'm in a similar situation in the future.

If I had replied to it before it had been closed, I wouldn't have said anything that hadn't been said in it already. I don't think I would've brought up any novel points, the other posters in the thread summed up how I felt nicely: KC accurately judged that consensus to move the page existed after an adequate process. Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:24, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

Re: Men's rights

Kevin, thanks for the explanations but in fact they highlight my biggest concern about making controversial title changes outside the RM process. The biggest concern is that outside RM and more specifically WP:RMCI we run the risk of poorly made moves that screw things up and cause a lot of unneccessary work after the fact, not only technically, but from a title policy standpoint as well. WP:RMCI has pretty clear guidance on the balance of consensus and title policy, the responsibilities of the closer assess that balance, make a decision and to do all the cleanup after the move. Additionally, this section of RMCI Conflicts of interest is clear on the need for uninvolved Admins to make the close and do the clean-up work. In your explanation, you're suggesting that involved admins help make the move. I was never suggesting that KC did anything wrong, however if you applied the standards in WP:RMCI to the close, she didn't live up to the closer's responsibility. We don't make deletion decisions outside the established 3 tier deletion process--CSD, PROD and AfD. Why should we make controversial title decisions outside a long-standing RM process? No body has yet to explain that rationally. --Mike Cline (talk) 15:00, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

You're confusing RM procedures, which are outlined in detail, with other moves, which are not. Secondly, I was asked to judge the Rfc, not move the article - they are two different things outside RMland, so I "lived up to" my responsibility just fine, thank you. Thirdly, the deletion process is admin only so the procedures are necessarily more formal and structured than moves, which any editor can do. Trying to apply deletion standards to moves is simply not appropriate. They are fundamentally different. And lastly, no one objected to the snowball move decision except on a fine technicality which you insist does not even exist; there was one very weak oppose in which the lone opposer actually agreed with the rationale for the move; the discussion ran for over a month, so the editors of that page had absolutely no reason to think the move would be controversial at all. The previous RM was during a time when we had a mass influx of Reddit/men's rights meatpuppets, here specifically to edit war. As they are all gone, most of them indef'd, there was no reason to think there would be any issue at all with this rename. In short, they would have gone RM if they'd thought there would be any issues. An issue arrived ex post facto, and you're treating it as though it is their fault their crystal balls didn't work. I find this badgering of good faith editors disturbing. KillerChihuahua^?!? 17:03, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

There's a strong reason to have an uninvolved editor find the balance of consensus of a controversial discussion. There's not an equally strong reason to require that uninvolved closer to handle the mechanics of moving a page immediately upon closing a discussion. And there's a strong reason not to do so in any situation where implementing the close in a way that makes sense requires making decisions about content, as in this case. In pretty much any other situation it would be considered strongly inappropriate for someone who just closed a contentious discussion as an uninvolved editor to jump in and start making content decisions immediately after, and I see no reason for this type of situation to be different. Kevin Gorman (talk) 18:48, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

ArbCom request: Men's rights, WP:TITLE, User:KillerChihuahua

You are involved in a recently filed request for arbitration. Please review the request at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests#Men's rights, WP:TITLE, User:KillerChihuahua and, if you wish to do so, enter your statement and any other material you wish to submit to the Arbitration Committee. Additionally, the following resources may be of use—

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests#Requests for Arbitration;
• Wikipedia:Arbitration guide.

Thanks,

Noetica^Tea? 03:41, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

Pronouns

Saw that comment about gender-specific pronouns. :) Personally, I prefer to avoid using pronouns altogether if I can't nail the right one. On Wikipedia that generally means saying "editor", "person", "individual" or simply using the username. That way I don't risk offending anyone if I say "he" when I am actually talking to a "she" and I don't end up making grammatical errors or using obscure terminology.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 22:29, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Hello, Kevin Gorman. You have new messages at Zaldax's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

The Olive Branch: A Dispute Resolution Newsletter (Issue #1)

Welcome to the first edition of The Olive Branch. This will be a place to semi-regularly update editors active in dispute resolution (DR) about some of the most important issues, advances, and challenges in the area. You were delivered this update because you are active in DR, but if you would prefer not to receive any future mailing, just add your name to this page.

Steven Zhang's Fellowship Slideshow

In this issue:

• Background: A brief overview of the DR ecosystem.
• Research: The most recent DR data
• Survey results: Highlights from Steven Zhang's April 2012 survey
• Activity analysis: Where DR happened, broken down by the top DR forums
• DR Noticeboard comparison: How the newest DR forum has progressed between May and August
• Discussion update: Checking up on the Wikiquette Assistance close debate
• Proposal: It's time to close the Geopolitical, ethnic, and religious conflicts noticeboard. Agree or disagree?

Read the entire first edition of The Olive Branch -->

--The Olive Branch 19:11, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

The Tea Leaf - Issue Six

Hi! Welcome to the sixth edition of The Tea Leaf, the official newsletter of the Teahouse!

• Teahouse serves over 700 new editors in six months on Wikipedia! Since February 27, 741 new editors have participated at the Teahouse. The Q&A board and the guest intro pages are more active than ever.

A lovely little teahouse nestled in Germany from Wiki Loves Monuments

• Automatic invites are doing the trick: 50% more new editors visiting each week. Ever since HostBot's automated invite trial phase began we've seen a boost in new editor participation. Automating a baseline set of invitations also allows Teahouse hosts to focus on serving hot cups of help to guests, instead of spending countless hours inviting.
• Guests to the Teahouse continue to edit more & interact more with other community members than non-Teahouse guests according to six month metrics. Teahouse guests make more than twice the article edits and edit more talk pages than other new editors.
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• Host lounge renovations nearing completion. Working closely with Teahouse hosts, we've made some major renovations to the Teahouse Host Lounge - the main hangout and resource space for hosts. Learn more about the improvements here.

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You're invited! - Wiki Loves Monuments - San Francisco Events

Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco

Hi! As part of Wiki Loves Monuments, we're organizing two photo events in the San Francisco Bay Area and one in Yosemite National Park. We hope you can come out and participate! Feel free to contact User:Almonroth with questions or concerns.

There are three events planned:

• September 15, Saturday - A bike ride along San Francisco's waterfront
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Article about Radha Thomas

Hi. I have created an article about Ms Radha Thomas and am contemplating moving it to the AFC space. Before that, I'd really appreciate if you could have a look and give me some inputs, suggestions and advice and hopefully a green signal :-). Here's the link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/Radha_Thomas Varunr (talk) 09:03, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

This Month in Education: September 2012

This Month in Education – Volume 1, Issue 2, September 2012 Headlines EduWiki Conference 5-6 September 2012 Leicester, UK Next year of cooperation between WikiProject Protected areas on Czech Wikipedia and Charles University International Baccalaureate students in Mexico begin working on Fall 2012 project ASA Annual Meeting features Wikipedia initiative Journal article shows four case studies Blog post highlights U.S. student's contributions Media coverage of program grows in Arabic, English Communicate OER project getting underway To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

If this message is not on your home wiki's talk page, update your subscription · Distributed via Global message delivery, 22:10, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Notice of Dispute resolution discussion

Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard regarding a content dispute in which you may have been involved. Content disputes can hold up article development, therefore we request your participation in the discussion to help find a resolution. The thread is "Men's Rights". Thank you! EarwigBot ^{operator / talk} 15:49, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

You're invited! Ada Lovelace Day San Francisco

October 16 - Ada Lovelace Day Celebration - You are invited!

Come celebrate Ada Lovelace Day at the Wikimedia Foundation offices in San Francisco on October 16! This event, hosted by the Ada Initiative, the Mozilla Foundation, and the Wikimedia Foundation. It'll be a meet up style event, though you are welcome to bring a laptop and edit about women in STEM if you wish. Come mix, mingle and celebrate the legacy of the world's first computer programmer. The event is October 16, 5:00 pm - 8:00 pm, everyone is welcome! You must RSVP here - see you there! SarahStierch (talk) 19:53, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

This Month in Education: October 2012

This Month in Education – Volume 1, Issue 3, October 2012 Headlines Day of the Dead Wiki Style at ITESM-Campus Ciudad de México Wikipedia de la A a la W by Tomás Saorin of the University of Murcia Communicate OER: Help improve Wikipedia content about education! Czech program concentrates on promotion and high-quality guidelines Editatón at the University of the Cloister of Sor Juana Research shows students improve English Wikipedia Workshops introduce education program in Brazil Professor argues for Wikipedia's use in class Cairo students' translation work featured Professor from Brazil profiled on blog To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

If this message is not on your home wiki's talk page, update your subscription · Distributed via Global message delivery, 23:10, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

You've been noticed ...

http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/16/wikipedia-evangelist-spreads-the-word/ Congratulations. Good work Kevin. — ChedZILLA 07:20, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

One more of these and you could meet WP:GNG, which will help Wikipedia expand it's article base with a Kevin Gorman article. Thanks for giving 110%! -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 11:50, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

God I hope not :). Thanks for the kind words guys. The combination of exam season and starting to finish up my work reviewing the Grants Program has kept me on the ridiculously busy side lately, it'll be nice to have a reasonable amount of time to actually-edit again in the near future. (Also, haha, I don't think I ever described myself as a wikignome, I'm not sure how that got in there.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:46, 22 October 2012 (UTC)

Lawson Adit

In cause you are interested in expanding the article more, there's a lot more information about the Lawson Adit in Google books. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 05:07, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

Sadly, there's actually not too much there. Most of the mentions are in passing, really old, or both. With the exception of some stuff about acid drainage that I may add at some point, the article already contains pretty much all the info that is in gbooks. I know that my library has some publications with more info about it (that were small printings and haven't been digitized,) but I haven't gotten around to digging the actual material out. We also have some historical/in-progress maps of the adit that I'm hoping to eventually get someone at the university to agree to release, but that's another thing I haven't gotten around to yet :) Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:51, 22 October 2012 (UTC)

Do you remember?

So, I was asked to look into some cross-wiki harassment, and guess what I ran into--reference to our old pal LGM, here. I hope that editor (indef-blocked here) has nothing to do with him. How are you, Kevin? Still living large, West Coast style? Drmies (talk) 22:03, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

San Francisco Women's History Month Edit-a-Thon

San Francisco Women's History Month Edit-a-Thon! Who should come? You should. Really.
	The San Francisco Women's History Month Edit-a-Thon will be held on Saturday, March 17, 2012 at the the Wikimedia Foundation offices in San Francisco! Participate in editing subjects about women's history and beyond! Workshops will also be hosted. New and experienced editors of any gender are welcome! We look forward to seeing you there!

Saturday - and we need your help!

San Francisco WikiWomen's Edit-a-Thon 2! See you there
	The San Francisco WikiWomen's Edit-a-Thon 2 is this Saturday at the Wikimedia Foundation! We look forward to hosting you! If you'd like to bring a family member or friend, please sign them up on the event page or Eventbrite! Also, don't forget to bring your laptop! And we also need your help! Check out the Etherpad to learn more! Please arrive as close 1 PM as you can. We'll see you Saturday!

This Month in Education: November 2012

This Month in Education – Volume 1, Issue 4, November 2012 Headlines Preliminary results of cooperation about protected areas Winners of the Day of the Dead Wiki Style contest announced More than 20 classes join Egypt program this term U.S. student improves article on bird species Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

If this message is not on your home wiki's talk page, update your subscription · Distributed via Global message delivery, 02:25, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Edit

It is a sentence fragment I recently added, since you forgot to use {{cite needed}} I have re added it with appropriate source. if you have any further with it please take it to the talk page.--Mor2 (talk) 07:51, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

It's a non-neutral sentence fragment. The source you used to readd it is not at all an appropriate source. Please, as I asked you, revert yourself or rewrite it to be neutral and acceptably sourced. I'll talk it to the talk page of the article too, but seriously, non-neutral unsourced sentence fragments are not okay. Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:52, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Regarding what we talked about. I seen your recent edits and I still think that phrasing there is little bit murky, though overall its a great improvement.--Mor2 (talk) 14:18, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

Psilocybe cyanofriscosa

Hi Kevin. I noticed your post on Drmies' talk page about this mushroom. I'm curious to know where the species has been described, because I can't find any information about it. Can you let me know/add the reference to the article? Thanks SmartSE (talk) 17:12, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

I'll get the article updated and in to main space later today. It was described in the December edition of the journal Czech Mycology. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:48, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Ah right, so it is actually Psilocybe allenii then? SmartSE (talk) 21:02, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, it is. 'Cyanofriscosa' was one of the names used for the mushroom before it was described, since it was pretty clearly distinct from the other members of the caramel capped psilocybe complex, and was what the original Wikipedia article had named it as. I had it userfied hoping that there would be useful reusable information in it that I could scrape for an article on Psilocybe allenii, but unfortunately it looks like the original article was pretty sparse. I'll have an article up in main space later today under the correct name hopefully. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:11, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine/UCSF

Hi Kevin. Thanks for posting on my page and for your offer of help with planning the upcoming sessions. I would be delighted to meet with you to discuss this more, especially as I'm now in the active planning phases. Are you free any time this week to meet by phone? Please feel free to email me, as well. Thanks! Michaelturken (talk) 07:22, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I have pneumonia currently, so I'm definitely not good for the next few days as talking is hard :) I'll definitely email you soon. I'll be free to meet up in person probably from the 16th to the 21st, and then starting again in early January. Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:27, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

I am so sorry to hear you are not well. Please take my best wishes for a speedy recovery and get in touch with me whenever you feel up to it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Michaelturken (talk • contribs) 07:37, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

Fixed the link. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 17:19, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

I created an essay

You inspired me to do it. Wikipedia:Recruiting those in academia or WP:RECRUIT. Could you share your wisdom there? Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) 19:07, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I have an awful lot on my plate this month, and this is something I would rather do properly than halfassedly (or while sick.) At some point - hopefully in the not that distant future - I will try to do a writeup of some of my outreach activities, covering stuff like how they've been conducted, how I've presented the value proposition of the assignment, how they've been received, how they've grown, and all that fun stuff. Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:31, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

Edit-a-thon tomorrow (Saturday) in Oakland

Hi, I hope you will be joining us tomorrow afternoon at the Edit-a-thon at Tech Liminal, in Oakland. We'll be working on articles relating to women and democracy (and anything else that interests you). It's sponsored by the California League of Women Voters, Tech Liminal, and me.

If this is the first you are hearing of this event, my apologies for the last-minute notice! I announced it on the San Francisco email list and by a banner on your watchlist, but I neglected to look at the San Francisco invitation list until this evening. If you can't make it this time, I hope to see you at a similar event soon! -Pete (talk) 04:46, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

This Month in Education: December 2012

This Month in Education – Volume 1, Issue 5, December 2012 Headlines wikiArS initiative in Catalonia Pilot Project "Wikipedia in University", Coquimbo, Chile Editathon with the Digital Humanities Winter Institute and the University of Maryland Some Statistics from the Czech program: explosion of new projects Fall 2012 summary Tecnológico de Monterrey- Campus Ciudad de México NCA conference highlights Wikipedia initiative Sample syllabus brochure revamped Student's article featured the psychology of music preference on main page Ambassadors in Cairo hold many student workshops Brazil student creates important chemistry article Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

If this message is not on your home wiki's talk page, update your subscription · Distributed via Global message delivery, 22:41, 17 December 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassadors update

Hi! You're getting this message because you are or have been a Wikipedia Ambassador. A new term is beginning for the United States and Canada Education Programs, and I wanted to give you an update on some important new information if you're interested in continuing your work this term as a Wikipedia Ambassador.

You may have heard a reference to a transition the education program is going through. This is the last term that the Wikimedia Foundation will directly run the U.S. and Canada programs; beginning in June, a proposed thematic organization is likely to take over organizing the program. You can read more about the proposal here.

Another major change in the program will take effect immediately. Beginning this term, a new MediaWiki education extension will replace all course pages and Ambassador lists. (See Wikipedia:Course pages and Help:Education Program extension for more details.) Included in the extension are online volunteer and campus volunteer user rights, which let you create and edit course pages and sign up as an ambassador for a particular course.

If you would like to continue serving as a Wikipedia Ambassador — even if you do not support a class this term — you must create an ambassador profile. If you're no longer interested in being a Wikipedia Ambassador, you don't need to do anything.

Please do these steps as soon as possible

First, you need the relevant user rights for Online and/or Campus Ambassadors. (If you are an admin, you can grant the rights yourself, for you as well as other ambassadors.) Just post your rights request here, and we'll get you set up as quickly as possible.

Once you've got the ambassador rights, please set up at a Campus and/or Online Ambassador profile. You can do so at:

• Special:CampusAmbassadorProfile
• Special:OnlineAmbassadorProfile

Going forward, the lists of Ambassadors at Special:CampusAmbassadors and Special:OnlineAmbassadors will be the official roster of who is an active Ambassador. If you would like to be an Ambassador but not ready to serve this term, you can un-check the option in your profile to publicly list it (which will remove your profile from the list).

After that, you can sign on to support courses. The list of courses will be at Special:Courses. (By default, this lists "Current" courses, but you can change the Status filter to "Planned" to see courses for this term that haven't reached their listed start date yet.)

As this is the first term we have used the extension, we know there will be some bugs, and we know the feature set is not as rich as it could be. (A big wave of improvements is already in the pipeline. And if you know MediaWiki and could help with code review, we'd love to have your help!) Please reach out to me (Sage Ross) with any complaints, bug reports, and feature suggestions. The basic features of the extension are documented at Wikipedia:Course pages, and you can see a tutorial for setting up and using them here.

Communication and keeping up to date

In the past, the Education Program has had a pretty fragmented set of communication channels. We're trying to fix that. These are the recommended places to discuss and stay up-to-date on the education program:

1. The education noticeboard has become the main on-wiki location for discussion of the Education Program. You can post there about broad education program issues as well as issues with individual courses.
2. The Ambassadors Announce email list is a very low-traffic announcements list of important information all Ambassadors need to be aware of. We encourage all Ambassadors (and other interested Wikipedians) to subscribe to the list; follow the instructions on the link to add your email address.
3. If you use IRC regularly, or need to try to reach someone immediately, the #wikipedia-en-ambassadors ^connect IRC channel is the place to find me and fellow Ambassadors.

Ambassador training and resources

We now have an online training for Ambassadors, which is intended to be both an orientation about the Wikipedia Ambassador role for newcomers and the manual for how to do the role. (There are parallel trainings for students and for educators as well.)

Please go through the training if you feel like you need a refresher on how a typical class is supposed to go and where the Ambassadors fit in, or if you want to review and help improve it. If there's something you'd like to see added, or other suggestions you have for it, feel free to edit the training and/or leave feedback. A primer on setting up and using course pages is included in the educators' training.

The Resources page of the training is the main place for Ambassador-related resources. If there's something you think is important as a resource that's not on there, please add it.

Finally, whether or not you work with any classes this term, I encourage you to post entries to the Trophy Case whenever you see excellent work from students or if you have great examples from past semesters. And, as always, let students (and other editors!) know when they do things well; a little WikiLove goes a long way!

--Sage Ross (WMF) (talk) 20:51, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

Recent Edits

Hello Kevin Gorman. I have notice that you have recently edited or reverted a couple of my contributions to Wikipedia.
I know you are a Wikimedia and Wikipedia expert. However, I'd like to talk about something.
I improve Wikipedia because Wikipedia is a wonderful website where you can ignore all rules if (and only if) it makes Wikipedia better. Since Mozio was definitely a notable startup (it was featured on the Huffington Post, TechCrunch, The Daily Californian, and much more), I decided to add it as a "test" of my first article. It was nominated for deletion, but because it had too many citations from various sources, the result was keep. I have written Mozio, to the best of my ability, in an NPOV manner. I have NOT introduced any kind of original research on the Mozio article. All data on that article is paraphrased from the citations. If you do not believe me, please carefully read through all the references and look at the contents of each cited article, as well as the "Additional Sources Used" for the page. — Carrot Lord (talk) 13:04, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

I've restored the tag, because I do see problems in the article. I'll add the article to my cleanup list, but it may be some time before I get around to cleaning it up unfortunately - that list is pretty long. Please do not remove the COI tag yourself - it's best to wait for an uninvolved editor to do so. Even with the best intentions, it is often hard to write objectively about a company that employs you, especially when you are new to Wikipedia - and doing so is strongly discouraged.

The page wasn't actually nominated for deletion, it was tagged as a candidate for speedy deletion. Only articles that completely lack any credible claim to importance can be speedy deleted under criterion A7 - the threshold at the WP:AFD process is much higher. I don't intend to put Mozio through the AfD process, but if someone else did, I honestly doubt that it would be kept with the sources currently used in the article. If you'd like to ensure that Mozio is kept and that any future articles you write about companies are kept, you should probably read our guidelines on reliable sources as well as the corporate notability guideline. Our guidelines on reliable sources are probably different than you would expect.

If you have a question about the reliability or appropriate, WP:RSN is a good place to ask. Glancing through the sources in the article, Mashable, Crunchbase, GigaOM, KillerStartups, Silobreaker, the IT Chronicle, Tnooz, and Skift are all probably not appropriate sources. The Huffington Post article could be appropriate for factual information, but it's written by David Litwak himself, which means that it's not a secondary source and thus doesn't count towards notability. The Daily Cal article is similarly not a secondary source, and wouldn't count very much towards notability even if it was, since it's a college paper writing about an alumni. Most of the remaining sources in the article are from Mozio itself. The TechCrunch and Venturebeat sources are usable, but not sufficient to establish notability by themselves. Kevin Gorman (talk) 18:17, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for reminding me about regular AfD rather than just WP:SPEEDY. Carrot Lord (talk) 18:26, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

This Month in Education: January 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 1, January 2013 Headlines United Kingdom sums up its year in Education Outreach Education Program kicks off in Sweden Teaching the Teachers in UK Secondary Schools Pilot program for Mexican university students working with Wikipedia to satisfy community service requirement Worldwide resources page created on outreach wiki Trophy Case highlights excellent student work Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

If this message is not on your home wiki's talk page, update your subscription · Distributed via Global message delivery, 21:15, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

course page details

Hey Kevin! (I remember leaving a message about this last week, but I must not have successfully saved.) Thanks for helping get the Bay Area classes situated. Two things:

• Just for the sake of getting all the current cohort listed in the same term, please used "2013 Q1" rather than "Spring 2013" or similar.
• If you like, you can use {{course page wizard}} in the description field of course pages, which lets you and/or the professor set up a course page like this one. Aside from the default content which may or may not be helpful, the main advantage is that it puts all the content onto talk space subpages that are editable without advanced user rights and includes edit links for each section (which isn't currently working without hackery, otherwise). Alternatively, you can put {{Course page 2/Header}} at the top of the Description to just get that bar of relevant links. (That will become automatically included at the top of course pages after the next round of extension updates.)--Sage Ross (WMF) (talk) 15:07, 23 January 2013 (UTC)

Hi Sage - I can definitely list everything as Q1 if you'd like, but no matter how listings are done, Berkeley's will end up out of sync with those of schools that use quarters. We're one of relatively few universities that use semesters, so we have three terms a year vs the four terms a year that quarter schools have. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:43, 23 January 2013 (UTC)

My talk page is... well my talk page

Regarding this edit [7] Please refrain from replying to people who talk to me on my talk page. Your lack of manners is frankly upsetting, rude and blatantly uncivil and reflects poorly upon you. Even worse is the fact that you do so after having opposed my edits on various occasions based on what you undoubtedly know that I view, right or wrong, as a POV pushing agenda. It's amazing that it even needs to be said, but if you want to talk to editors who talk to me do it on your own talk page or on theirs.--Cybermud (talk) 19:24, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Your talk page, like any other page on Wikipedia, is not owned by you. Replying to comments left on other people's talk pages is not considered uncivil (unless your replies are uncivil, and mine certainly wasn't.) I could have always gone and rejected Ethicalv's AfC (the problems were sufficient enough to do so,) but instead offered good faith advice to him about how to go about starting to fix it. It's kind of amazing that you apparently didn't even notice that I had made a helpful comment on your talk page for two months, and then reacted like this. I realize that you apparently have no interest in engaging productively with Wikipedia so there's probably not much point in saying this, but, as a reminder, if you continue to constantly violate our civility guidelines, someone will eventually bother to indefinitely block you. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:10, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Amazingly you not only do not apologize for what any reasonable person would view as a transgression on your part and a reasonable and civilly worded request on mine, but you project a lack of civility upon me, threaten me with being blocked and impute a lack of interest in engaging productively with WP upon me. You even go so far as to suggest that I should be grateful to you for "being helpful" (in your own estimation -- not mine) and not rejecting Ethicalv's AfC. Does your ego know no bounds? Your behavior constitutes harassment and your condescension is obnoxious and I ask you, once again, to stay off my talk page. I may not "own" that page, but civility and common sense would seem to dicate that, when I asked you to stay off my page a full year ago here [8] you would respect that request unless you have a compelling reason not to. This will be my last attempt at handling this with you directly. Good day, sir.--Cybermud (talk) 02:00, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

You've already been sanctioned a number of times for your behavior regarding this cluster of articles. When I say that if you continue to constantly violate our civility guidelines someone is going to block you, I'm not threatening you with being blocked, just pointing out that you are behaving in the same manner that has already gotten you blocked or topic banned a couple times, and warned by numerous administrators.. If you want to continue to accuse me of harassment, please go ahead and start a thread on WP:ANI or another appropriate forum about it. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:20, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

You seem confused. We are not talking about any "cluster of articles." Indeed we are not talking about any article whatsoever... and that's sort of the point. We are talking about my talk page and your repeated behavior on it after being asked to stop multiple times. I have not been warned, in any way shape or form, for anything related to this interaction -- notwithstanding your bad faith implications and imputations to the contrary.--Cybermud (talk) 06:59, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

If you feel I've done anything wrong, feel free to post on WP:ANI or another appropriate forum asking for uninvolved administrators to look at my behavior. This is my prediction about what will happen.Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:04, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

I am not a drama queen and don't argue and debate for the sake of doing so. Please just stop posting on my talk page. I don't need your advice, I don't need your notification of talk backs, I don't need or want to have any further interactions with you outside of the talk pages of articles. Please just stop being a dick and leave me and my talk page alone. It's really not that hard.--Cybermud (talk) 07:11, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

I really would suggest you read our civility policies. Otherwise, sooner or later, someone really will bother to spend the time to indef block you. I'll stop leaving TB's on your page once you stop posting messages here that warrant replies. If you feel like continuing to sling insults at me, could you do me a favor, and do it at ANI so someone else intervenes without me bothering to reply? Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:27, 29 January 2013 (UTC

"Our civility policies?" Is that like the royal "we?" Listen, it's really not that complicated. This is YOUR talk page. You can respond here to your hearts content. I don't need to be notified of your responses on your talk page by even more comments on my talk page -- indeed, in case I haven't made it clear, that's exactly and precisely what I don't want. Don't you have anything better to do? It's a sincere question... that I don't need or really want an answer to. And should you choose to answer, I don't need yet another notification of your answer on my own talk page. For the final time. Please leave me and my talk page alone.--Cybermud (talk) 07:41, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

It really is kind of amusing to have someone posting on my talk page a ton randomly calling me a dick for no apparent reason while complaining that I leave polite messages on their talk page from time to time. Seriously, if you have a problem with my behavior, take it to an appropriate forum. Otherwise, stop randomly violating WP:CIVIL. Thanks, Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:48, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

The Tea Leaf - Issue Seven

Check out the Teahouse Easter Egg Badge, awarded for helpful suggestions about improving the Teahouse.

Check out the Teahouse Genie Badge, awarded for solving issues on the Teahouse Wishlist.

Hello again! We have some neat updates about the Teahouse:

• We’ve added badges! Teahouse awards is a pilot project to learn how acknowledgement impacts engagement and retention in Teahouse and Wikipedia.

• We’ve got a new WikiLove Badge script that makes giving badges quick and easy. You can add it here. You can give out badges to thank helpful hosts, welcome guests, acknowledge great questions and more.

• Come join the experiment and let us know what you think!

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Thanks again! Ocaasi 02:25, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

Louisiana Act

Hello Kevin, You're doing a great job of adding more balance to that article. I went in and made a couple of simple edits to tighten up the language a bit--but you're the one who is doing the real work there. Best of luck with it! EMP (talk 18:19, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your kind words. Rethrashing the rest of the article is definitely on my to-do list... but unfortunately, I'm going to be pretty time-constrained for at least the next couple months. I'm hoping to get it in to a more reasonable state in the relatively near future, though. `Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:20, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

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This Month in Education: February 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 2, February 2013 Headlines Welcome (back), Rod Dunican! ITESM-Campus Ciudad de México donates 100 photos to Commons School of Open to launch with a Wikipedia course for open education enthusiasts Cairo class creates Spanish literature portal Brazil program organizes Campus Party activities U.S., Canada Thematic Organization proposed Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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A brownie for you!

Thanks for your help in the Teahouse! Jackson Peebles (talk) 06:05, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

No problem :) feel free to drop me a note if you need help figuring something out in the future. Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:30, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedian in Residence

I've put the notice up - sorry for the delay. I ended up using the range [37.6, -122], [38, -122.5], which should cover the city, but you might want to double-check the university is covered - it sometimes happens that institutional networks do strange things on geo-IP lookups. I've set it to run until the end of 10 February (UTC); let me know if you'd like longer. Andrew Gray (talk) 17:43, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks a bunch, Andrew. It looks like the University is covered. A longer running notice shouldn't be needed; I assume that any interested pre-existing Wikipedians will notice it in that time period. Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:08, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

The Tea Leaf - Issue Seven (special Birthday recap)

A celebratory cupcake from the Teahouse Birthday Badge

It's been a full year since the Teahouse opened, and as we're reflecting on what's been accomplished, we wanted to celebrate with you.

Teahouse guests and hosts are sharing their stories in a new blog post about the project.

1 year statistics for Teahouse visitors compared to invited non-visitors from the pilot:

Metric	Control group	Teahouse group	Contrast
Average retention (weeks with at least 1 edit)	5.02 weeks	8.57 weeks	1.7x retention
Average number of articles edited	58.7 articles	116.9 edits	2.0x articles edited
Average talk page edits	36.5 edits	85.6 edits	2.4x talk page edits
Average article space edits	129.6 edits	360.4 edits	2.8x article edits
Average total edits (all namespaces)	182.1 edits	532.4 edits	2.9x total edits

Over the past year almost 2000 questions have been asked and answered, 669 editors have introduced themselves, 1670 guests have been served, 867 experienced Wikipedians have participated in the project, and 137 have served as hosts. Read more project analysis in our CSCW 2013 paper

Last month January was our most active month so far! 78 profiles were created, 46 active hosts answered 263 questions, and 11 new hosts joined the project.

Come by the Teahouse to share a cup of tea and enjoy a Birthday Cupcake! Happy Birthday to the Teahouse and thank you for a year's worth of interest and support :-)

-- Ocaasi and the rest of the Teahouse Team 20:53, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

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Not sure how to approach resolving issues with Carptrash

Hi, I'm hoping that, as an experienced Wikipedian, you may be able to help with Carptrash on the Men's rights movement talk page. 4 years ago when I initially created this account, I stopped contributing after a short time because of similar behavior levied in my direction. I decided to not let that happen this time and was just going to ignore them, but after seeing them immediately act the same way against another user, I can't believe that it will be isolated to just this situation unless something is done to express how toxic these types of actions are to well intentioned and well behaving new editors. I've looked through Wikipedia policies, but they seem to be acting with impunity and I could not find where or how to report this type of behavior. In particular, I am talking about what started with this, then led to this and what finally made me seek out a more experienced Wikipedian of this. Honestly, I'm not sure how much of this sort of thing I can ignore before just giving up again. Ismarc (talk) 01:15, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

Hi

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Chris troutman (talk) 19:01, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Hostile editing environment on the men's rights movement page

Hello Kevin. you have expressed an interest in r/mensrights about have more people come in to improve this page. I have two users WLU and sonicyouth who are creating a very hostile environment on this page, including singling me out with ad hominem rather than discussing my edits. In addition, they are disputing one of my recently added sources, which I believe to be reliable, and repeatedly deleting my contributions without discussion. I believe they are current working in conjunction to get me banned for edit warring by taking turns removing my material. You intervention would be appreciated.Yhwhsks (talk) 20:10, 9 March 2013 (UTC)

Kevin, atm the Men's_rights_movement page is close to demonstrating that the Wikipedia idea does not work. I heeded the call for editors to give it another try. It was working for a while but 2 or more editors then re-appeared, they are now violating every conceivable rule of Wikipedia. It is bare face vandalism and disruptive editing. Someone with some clout needs to pay the page a visit and lay down the law, issue some warnings and act as mediator for a while. All of this is tragic. CSDarrow (talk) 02:12, 11 March 2013 (UTC)

This Month in Education: March 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 3, March 2013 Headlines Program leaders invited to workshop in Milan Chesapeake College Wikipedia Project Toni Sant joins Wikimedia UK as Education Organiser Medical English students begin work with Wikimedia Commons and Wikipedia Farewell, Annie! Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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History of cricket (1726–1740)‎

Given that you have taken it upon yourself to revert this article back to the false and misleading Jbmurray version and given comments by you (at 3RR) which indicate sympathy with him, what will your reaction be when I set about removing all false, misleading, dubious and out of scope content to restore the veracity and credibility of the article based on sources which are reputable having been created by recognised authorities and not by some charlatan whose work has rightly been described by User:CDTPP (a subject matter expert) as "risible"? I think that's a fair question. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 21:27, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

If you do so in a collegial way that follows our conduct policies, I'll be absolutely ecstatic. Wikipedia articles being improved always makes me smile. If you do so in a way that violates WP:NPA//WP:CIVIL//WP:EW, I'll go to ANI and ask for an administrator to step in. I completely accept that you know a lot about cricket and am glad you choose to contribute your expertise to the encyclopedia, but the fact that you're an expert doesn't give you an excuse to treat other people like shit. Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:19, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

I've noticed that you have said several times you are not familiar with the background or that you were not aware of something and so I wonder why, with such limited knowledge of the subject and the issues, you have bothered to get involved? From my point of view, acting on behalf of the readers to prevent articles from being ruined by falsehoods and peripheral theories, being ignored by Jbmurray and the course tutor is being treated like shit. I suggest that if you decide to get involved in future you make sure you fully understand what is going on so that you can see both sides of the argument. I would also point out that you are inflaming a situation that had begun to settle down, first by your unwarranted intervention at ANI when you stirred things up again despite my previous post including an apology and then just now when you so intelligently bring "shit" into the discussion, thereby hypocritically breaching WP:CIVIL. Perhaps I should be raising an ANI topic about you? ----Jack | ^{talk page} 05:19, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Feel free to start an ANI section about me if you feel like it. Telling you to stop treating people like shit when you are treating people like shit is not breaching WP:CIVIL. We have well established ways to handle content disputes, and editwarring without engaging on the talk page of the article or participating in other venues like RSN definitely do not fall within the ways in which it is okay to handle content disputes. I do not need to be intimately familiar with the early history of cricket in order to point out that your behavior is unacceptable. Being a subject matter expert does not make it okay for you to violate Wikipedia's basic standards of behavior. I appreciate the fact that you know a lot about cricket and certainly want subject matter experts to contribute to Wikipedia, but the fact that you are very knowledgeable in your subject area does not mean you can ignore every behavioral standard we have. Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:16, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

You are exaggerating and I again suggest that you get all your facts right and then think about your own attitude and behaviour. I have nothing further to say to you. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 06:22, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Although it's certainly your prerogative not to engage with me, please do change your behavior and if you see issues with the article bring them up on the talk page and participate in the ongoing RSN discussion. Wikipedia is a collaborative project, and if you aren't willing to collaboratively resolve content disputes with other editors, you're likely to end up blocked sooner or later. Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:28, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

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Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2013 April 7

Hi. Please see my question at Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2013 April 7 about File:Leicester city council advert on Ugandan Argus.jpg. In order to keep the image, it needs to be demonstrated not just the advertisement is historically significant, but that seeing the advertisement sufficiently improves the reader's understanding of the topic in a way that could not be accomplished in text alone. --B (talk) 15:01, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

This Month in Education: April 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 4, April 2013 Headlines Survey research and design in psychology - Example of a Wikiversity resource Wikimedia Argentina's educational strategic plan Wikiversity and Moodle Czech program flourishes Egypt program celebrates end of second term Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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DYK for Death during consensual sex

The DYK project (nominate) 08:04, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Wiknic 2013

Wiknic 2013
Sunday, June 23rd · 12:34pm · Lake Merritt, Oakland
Theme: Hyperlocal list-making

Lake Merritt Wild Duck Refuge (Oakland, CA)

This year's 2013 SF Wiknik will be held at Lake Merritt, next to Children's Fairyland in Oakland. This event will be co-attended by people from the hyperlocal Oakland Wiki. May crosspollination of ideas and merriment abound!

Location and Directions

• Location: The grassy area due south of Children's Fairyland (here) (Oakland Wiki)
  • Nearest BART: 19th Street
  • Nearest bus lines: NL/12/72
  • Street parking abounds

EdwardsBot (talk) 04:50, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

You're invited...

to two upcoming Bay Area events:

• Maker Faire 2013, Sat/Sun May 18-19, San Mateo -- there will have a booth about Wikimedia, and we need volunteers to talk to the public and ideas for the booth -- see the wiki page to sign up!
• Edit-a-Thon 5, Sat May 25, 10-2pm, WMF offices in San Francisco -- this will be a casual edit-a-thon open to both experienced and new editors alike! Please sign up if on the wiki page if you can make it so we know how much food to get.

I hope you can join us at one or both! -- phoebe / (talk to me) 01:02, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

This Month in Education: May 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 5, May 2013 Headlines First ever medical school education program pilot begins at UCSF 7th grade Wikipedia project in Geneva Wiki Education Foundation proposed Wikiversity-Moodle project is moving on Principles of radiation astronomy in Wikiversity Trophy Case highlights good student work Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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You've got mail

Hello, Kevin Gorman. Please check your email; you've got mail!
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Hey Kevin, I'm following up on an email I sent you last week, asking for your insights on editor engagement. If you didn't get that email, could you please contact me at fflorinwikimedia.org, so I can tell you more? Thanks! Fabrice Florin (WMF) (talk) 19:22, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Hi Fabrice - I actually didn't get it. My school transitioned email servers in the last week, which seems like it has made a solid five days of my email go missing. I'll drop you a note shortly. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:24, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Hi Kevin, thanks for responding to my talk page message so quickly! Lete me know if you received the message I just sent to your new email address. Cheers. Fabrice Florin (WMF) (talk) 20:37, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the help on Edward Snowden

Just wanted to thank you for the help reverting vandalism on Edward Snowden. I didn't mean to blame you or any of the other editors for not doing a full revert on the semi-protect request; I was just having problems doing the simple approach of clicking "undo" or just rolling back to the old version because I kept getting conflicts with other editors when trying to revert it myself, and figured that was worth pointing out as a reason why semi-protection might work better than relying on people reverting. — λ (talk | contribs) 20:05, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

This Month in Education: June 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 6, June 2013 Headlines Growing contributions from wikiArS initiative German Wikiversity continues its relaunch English Wikipedia program seeks Ambassadors Italian nursing students and Wikipedia Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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This Month in Education: July 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 7, July 2013 Headlines Students' articles nominated for Featured Article Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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SPI

It's easier for the investigators if articles aren't deleted until after the socks have been confirmed. If you notice a likely sock who hasn't been reported, it would be helpful if you'd make a report. —rybec 05:22, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

I have a giant report incoming, I was just waiting to finish up my pattern matching/finish the report before submitting. I'll hold off on prodding stuff until after I submit this report and someone has a chance to deal with it, though. Oof... going to be 20 socks at least off of this one pattern, and I have five or six more queued up to check Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:24, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Thank you! WP:BEANS is good to keep in mind too. —rybec 05:30, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

:). I like avoiding beans. I helped Dennis pop probably half of the first 50 of morning's socks that were uncovered via email. Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:32, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

BLP on Michele Miscavige

As you have shown an interest in holding up biographical articles to a high standard, I'd like for you to take a look at Michele Miscavige and what you think of the BLP violations there, considering the article is almost completely based on unverifiable rumor and speculation. If we're going to maintain high standards for BLP as far as sourcing quality and wording, then this article in particular is extremely problematic considering the violations of BLP at play here. I've also left a note at the noticeboard [9] for other editors to chime in since it's one of those articles where even tagging the article as problematic gets one reverted immediately. If we're going to maintain BLP at high standards across Wikipedia, it should be universal without prejudice. Laval (talk) 00:52, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

The BLP noticebard should help resolve any existing BLP issues with that page. Given the tone of our interactions on Cardone's page, I'd rather not spend my time engaging on a project at your request, however Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:15, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Speedy deletion declined: Gary Read

Hello Kevin Gorman. I am just letting you know that I declined the speedy deletion of Gary Read, a page you tagged for speedy deletion, because of the following concern: There's at least one source that's good enough for A7. May not be enough for AfD, though. . Thank you. GedUK  15:47, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Congratulations

Congratulations, good sir! May all your perambulations be fascinating, and end with fine beverages and company. :) –Quiddity (talk) 01:50, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

Con-graduations. —rybec 21:42, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks guys :) it's been a long time coming, and feels really weird to finally get it over with. And Rybec, I'll drop you an unrelated email tomorrow. Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:35, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

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Edit on Grant Cardone page

Hey Kevin,

Thanks for taking the time to look and review my edit on Grant Cardone's page. However, I think you edited too much out. It's my 10th wikipedia page, and thus I know a little bit about make one. Here, I respected the rules, and granted the page with a lot of content, value and great resources. I'd love for you to point out the points you think must be changed, rather than deleting everything. So let me please suggest you to review your edits, and let's fix the man a better page, wouldn't you agree?

Best, Val — Preceding unsigned comment added by Valefebvre (talk • contribs) 20:09, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

• Hi Val - unfortunately, a lot of the content you added was very promotional in tone, and a lot of it was also sourced to press releases. It might be a good idea for you to take another look through WP:RS and WP:SPS (particularly the WP:SELFSOURCE part of WP:SPS.) I would suggest that in your future edits to Cardone's article, you make small, incremental changes. That way, it will be a lot less work on those looking at the changes, and a lot easier to accept some changes and reject some changes if some were good and some were bad. Unfortunately, when I looked at your last edit, most of it violated our sourcing/content policies, and I didn't have the time at the time to sit down and fix the whole thing, so I took the next best option - which was undoing the whole thing, unfortunately. I'm pretty busy for the next few days, but if you can dig up some additional high quality sources on Cardone, I'd be happy to help you work on the article, or to review your edits and make suggestions for how you can improve them. Thanks, Kevin Gorman (talk) 15:30, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Actually, looking back on it, I see you did make incremental edits. My bad, sorry - I was in a rush out the door when I reverted your changes. Still, I would suggest you make small, incremental edits, and focus on using high quality sources - not press releases. Kevin Gorman (talk) 15:32, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Hi Kevin, Thanks for this answer, I appreciate your time and attention on this particular page and my efforts regarding a better outcome. I get your position, and I respect your points. Indeed as you mentioned, let's work together in enhancing this page to enrich the profile. I believe we can have a positive touch thanks to our experience and resources to make that page more accurate and rich. How shall we proceed from there? Should I just put back all the changes I made and then iterate from there? what's best, perhaps posting bits after bits? Let me know I'm eager to work on it. Best, Val — Preceding unsigned comment added by Valefebvre (talk • contribs) 16:57, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

Hi Val - sorry for my consistently slow replies to you, I'm pretty busy currently. I would suggest adding pieces of information about Cardone, bit by bit, that are sourced to high quality reliable sources - stuff like newspaper articles, and not press releases. It's okay to take some information about a person from their own publications, but it can't be information that comes off in an overly promotional tone. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:32, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

This Month in Education: August 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 8, August 2013 Headlines EduWiki Conference 2013 - Call for Proposals The Singapore Management University Constitutional and Administrative Law Wikipedia Project – putting accurate and free information about Singapore law on the Internet Videos from Open Educational Resources conference Welcome to Sophie Österberg and Tighe Flanagan Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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Article Feedback Tool update

Hey Kevin Gorman. I'm contacting you because you're involved in the Article Feedback Tool in some way, either as a previous newsletter recipient or as an active user of the system. As you might have heard, a user recently anonymously disabled the feedback tool on 2,000 pages. We were unable to track or prevent this due to the lack of logging feature in AFT5. We're deeply sorry for this, as we know that quite a few users found the software very useful, and were using it on their articles.

We've now re-released the software, with the addition of a logging feature and restrictions on the ability to disable. Obviously, we're not going to automatically re-enable it on each article—we don't want to create a situation where it was enabled by users who have now moved on, and feedback would sit there unattended—but if you're interested in enabling it for your articles, it's pretty simple to do. Just go to the article you want to enable it on, click the "request feedback" link in the toolbox in the sidebar, and AFT5 will be enabled for that article.

Again, we're very sorry about this issue; hopefully it'll be smooth sailing after this :). If you have any questions, just drop them at the talkpage. Thanks! Okeyes (WMF) 21:45, 1 September 2013 (UTC)

That's a good idea

I'd like to hear more about the RA that worked towards a potentially funded position. I hope I haven't aggravated you over at WP:ENB. I'd appreciate the chance to meet and chat on Skype sometime. Best regards. Biosthmors (talk) 08:44, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Oftentimes when working with both educational institutions and GLAMs, talking about something in detail in public before it has been officially approved results in tensions with the institutions involved, sometimes to the point where something that would've happened gets killed. For now, all I would prefer to say is there is likely to be at least one funded position in this coming Spring, arranged by an RA, and that tentative approval of the position was facilitated by the fact that the RA could present themselves with a vaguely foofie sounding title, rather than just "Hi, I'm a Wikipedia editor." Generally speaking I don't like or make use of any of the ambassador titles (frankly, I feel ridiculous calling myself an ambassador,) but I do believe they are worth keeping around for situations like this. (And, sure, I'd be available to Skype at some point.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:14, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

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This Month in Education: September 2013

This Month in Education – Volume 2, Issue 9, September 2013 Headlines Wikimania pre-conference draws crowd Student leader achieves Featured Article Spanish-as-a-foreign-language students at ITESM-Mexico City Campus upload photographs on Mexico to Commons Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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Email

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Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 11:21, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Alison Jaggar

We should have a monthly contest, most cited missing Wikipedia article. What a find for August! --(AfadsBad (talk) 06:33, 24 September 2013 (UTC))

Thank you very much, Kevin, for your efforts to improve our coverage of women philosophers, and also any other underrepresented topic areas. It is not at all difficult for me to acknowledge the shortcomings in our coverage. Some editors seem to think we should have two million articles or less, rather than ten million or more. I am with you in the ten million plus camp. Onward. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 07:45, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the kind words AfadsBad and Cullen; I should've figured that a discussion on Jimbo's talk page would rapidly get derailed in the specifics of an example (76, vs the 90's, etc) rather than spark a general discussion about what really is a major problem, Steven just had me feeling overly optimistic :p. I probably should've avoided mentioning citation indexes at all given that they're really only great in the hard sciences (fields like philosophy have fewer journals indexed and also tend to generate less citations in proportion to the prominence of someone in the first place.) It kind of floors me that some editors apparently don't accept that, given our demographic base and the research that has been done in to the issue so far that we have significant content biases. Jaggar is a person of such prominence within her field that any ethicist, feminist philosopher, anyone active in gender and women's studies, and many general academic philosophers would be shocked at the absence of an article about her (and I say that having talked to (and witnessed the shock of) many dozen of them recently.) I think her article in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, which is work incredibly well-respected by 99% of academic philosophers, may literally be the only SEP article where I've ever seen it suggested that it would be nigh impossible to better someone's work, regardless of what field of philosophy they worked in - philosophers just don't make that kind of statement.

Oh well. I'll do what I can in this realm and with helping the educational and cultural institutions that reach out to me concerned about systemic bias (at least half a dozen have proactively done so in the last couple of months.) I'm hopeful that either the Foundation or a chapter will eventually have some sort of systemic bias collaboration coordinator position, analogous to Lori's GLAM position a while back. We have so much social capital right now, and with this many institutions proactively reaching out to us concerned about our biases, I'm sure a coordinated outreach effort with someone's full attention behind it backed by the social capital of the WMF or a chapter would be colossally successful. Btw, I've just started ignoring that section of Jimbo's talk page for now, because the heat to light ratio doesn't seem worth it at this point - please ping me if you happen to notice something there that warrants my attention. Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:33, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

I am not sure why I headed to the talk page, but, while there I saw Jaggar's name and was shocked to see it was a new article. This is the biggest "ignore substantive issues" tactic on Wikipedia, hammer you relentlessly about something trivial, "But you said twinkees cost more at 7-11 when they are $1.23 there and only $1.21 at Walmart," thereby detracting everyone from discussing something that really matters. It was to a shocking degree, and Jimbo noticed it, but I think it is often very young editors who do this, and no one here to write an encyclopedia has the energy to waste time on such silliness, while the time-wasters have nothing but time to waste. Thank you for not wasting your time on Wikipedia. --(AfadsBad (talk) 23:45, 24 September 2013 (UTC))

Also, you do realize she has just been dismissed because the teenage male dominant majority of editors on Wikipedia think a feminist philosopher is just a feminist? Even a Jimbo's it did not seem to sink in that she is a philosopher, not as readily dismissed. --(AfadsBad (talk) 23:48, 24 September 2013 (UTC))

A barnstar for you!

	The Special Barnstar
	I award you this barnstar for improving our coverage of mushrooms, and also, and even more so, for your exemplary work to deal with our pervasive problem with systemic bias. Thanks for all you do. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 07:50, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

• why thank you ;) Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:37, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Feedback

Perhaps a 17 year old being signed for a quarter of a million pounds by one of the biggest clubs in England and playing for his national side 3 years in advance of his age isn't notable enough for an encyclopedia. But then again, half of his team mates at Wolverhampton, without international recognition, older and with the same number of senior appearances ARE 'notable' enough to have their own pages, so I guess consistancy is an issue ?

Sorry to have wasted your time submitting free information.

Dgreid (talk) 16:16, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

• When I declined your submission, is was about two paragraphs long and had no citations. It did not mention any of the facts that you've mentioned as evidence of the guy's notability in your post here. I would encourage you to read our standards on sourcing, expand the citations on the page a bit (although they're better than they were when I rejected it, it'd still be a lot more useful if they had newspaper names etc in them.) Your AfC submission is in much better shape than it was when I looked at it last, and is close to what we would reasonably expect a new article to be - infinitely closer than when I reviewed it Keep in mind I reviewed your submission sixteen months ago, and four other people have declined it after I did. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:36, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Objection

Starting to collapse sections, going to go ahead and agree with Fluffernutter's post.

[10] Or any other definition of the idiom I could find on the Web, all suggest taking joy or celebration over the fact of someone's death. You seem to be well educated, probably more than me, but even I can see the faultiness of accusing Eric Corbett what you accused him. (Eric was making a point, a point to the discussion that he felt was absent and was important to make; his point is best left to him to define -- I won't attempt to paraphrase. His point was conceptual however, and about what is or isn't valid or sensible or fair presumed expectations and responsibilities of Wikipedia editors when online at WP. One thing I'm sure, very sure, he did not do or suggest or emote, was to take any kind or degree of delight, celebration, joy, etc., in the young man's suicide. And to suggest such a thing, to accuse Eric of same, which you did twice [11] [12], is really a kind of careless maliciousness on your part. You should apologize to him for that accusation -- it wasn't right, and it wasn't fair. I personally forgive you in your rush to keep things ideal for the parents of the young man on Jimbo's Talk, since in your rush you made that oversight. But what an oversight to make. [If anyone accused me unfairly, untruely, of taking joy and celebrating someone else's death, when I never did or thought any such thing, I would take that as a cruel and malicious and willful misinterpretation of what I said and meant. And I'd be downright upset about it.]) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 09:15, 9 February 2014 (UTC) p.s. If you can find any definition on the web which does not include celebrating a death, please link it here for my education. Otherwise, I don't think you're so powerful that you can make up your own meanings to language idioms for your own purposes. Words have meanings, even modern idioms. Eric transformed a memorial post to a valued member of our community in to a shitfest, and he did so in a forum where the victim's family is likely to read it. When confronted on it, he continued his behavior and started throwing in a borderline hilarious number of comments that would get anyone who isn't Eric blocked under WP:NPA at me on his talk page. So no, I'm not apologizing to Eric. His behavior was malicious, had the potential to cause real harm, and would have resulted in almost any other editor than Eric receiving a lengthy, uncontroversial block. Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:09, 9 February 2014 (UTC) You're off the mark, Kevin. Accusing Eric of *gravedancing* when that wasn't present even in the slightest, crosses an ethical line and was carelessly malicious on your part and you s/ apologize to him for it, regardless what else you object to re NPA etc. (You're becoming an obvious hypocrite here, accusing Eric of not showing "common decency", yet at same time accusing Eric of something totally evil without any basis for doing.) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 21:53, 9 February 2014 (UTC) That discussion was utterly baffling. Who is the late editor that was its subject? — Scott • talk 20:08, 9 February 2014 (UTC) Scott - it was about User:Jackson_Peebles. He wasn't explicitly named, but enough detail was given that anyone who knew him instantly recognized it, and anyone who didn't could figure it out in about two minutes. I feel bad for effectively streisanding the thing, but didn't feel comfortable letting the thread continue to degrade as it looked to be doing. That thread as it was already was causing emotional harm to his friends, and if his family had stumbled across it - especially if it had degraded further - it would have been way not okay in my book. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:12, 9 February 2014 (UTC) I wasn't able to figure it out at all, hence my asking. Thanks. — Scott • talk 20:14, 9 February 2014 (UTC) Hi Scott - the combination of details given in the original post made it recognizable to those who knew him, and easy to dig up for those who didn't, since we maintain a list of deceased Wikipedians. (Specifically the fact that it was apparently a recent passing, combined with the mention of the template, and the mention of the vandalism - easier if you recognized the early posters as well.) I handled it in the best way I could think of at the time to avoid it blowing up, which appears to have backfired. I still believe I handled it in a more than policy compliant way, but wish I had sleepily come up with a way to hande it that wouldn't have resulted in a blowup the next day. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:19, 9 February 2014 (UTC) I have no objection to your handling of the matter! I was just asking who it was, for myself. — Scott • talk 20:38, 9 February 2014 (UTC)

Mail call

YGM. Go Phightins! 13:58, 9 February 2014 (UTC)

• Responded. Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:09, 9 February 2014 (UTC)

• YGM TheOriginalSoni (talk) 10:38, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

You made me regret supporting you

Starting to collapse sections, going to go ahead and agree with Fluffernutter's post.

When I supported your RfA last month, I didn't think you would be coming on board to threaten one of our best content contributors with a ban for some meaningless and twee nonsense at our co-founder's talk page. More fool him for getting into that debate, and more fool you for behaving like that. You didn't say at your RfA you were going to do stuff like that; I suggest a period of reflection ensue. We do not always need to wave a big stick. There are better ways of doing business than that. That was not a BLP violation. --John (talk) 19:41, 9 February 2014 (UTC) John - there's a pretty significant difference from banning someone from a specific thread and banning someone. Malleus's ability to comment on one particular thread on Jimmy's talk page has absolutely no effect on his ability to create content. His comments on that thread were clearly covered by WP:BLP/WP:BDP, and had the potential to cause harm to numerous living people. Anyone but Malleus would have simply backed off when requested; he required a bigger stick. If you look at how I've handled every content dispute, blp violation, edit war, etc that I've so far handled, you would note that I have generally been far less aggressive in terms of handing out blocks/other actions than the vast majority of our admins are. You're free to feel disappointed in me, but as long as I am able to take small actions to make Wikipedia a safer space than it currently is, I'm going to do so. That thread started off as a memorial to a valued contributor who has passed away and once Eric popped in turned in to a mess that was offensive to his friends, and would be quite offensive to his family if they happened to stumble across it. Do you value his ability to comment on a single thread on Jimmy's talk more than you value the emotions of a dead editor's friends and family? Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:50, 9 February 2014 (UTC) You might consider that you caused far more drama on that page than Eric. J3Mrs (talk) 20:53, 9 February 2014 (UTC) It is certainly true that my handling of the situation resulted in more drama than was initially present (which is why I've commented elsewhere that I wish I had sleepily come up with a better solution - one that had avoided the harm the thread caused, without streisanding the issue. I'll be starting a thread later today with a full explanation of why I did what I did (and why I think it is fully within policy.) I certainly regret streisanding it, but I wasn't expecting a streisand of this magnitude when I did it. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:58, 9 February 2014 (UTC) You didn't expect Streisand effect from threatening Eric with a block based on a non-issue? Please, I know you're new to the job but that is something I would expect all admins to know. Also, three administrators have told you that you are in the wrong, I'd expect you to at least take a step back for reflection. It doesn't help that you have repeatedly attempt to contact me off-wiki despite my requests not to do so. I see some serious problems here if this is the approach you're gonna take in using your administrative toolset. Snowolf How can I help? 21:40, 9 February 2014 (UTC) I would first disagree that it's a non-issue, and secondly point out that I have not repeatedly attempted to contact you off-wiki after requests not to do so. You made one request for me to not contact you off-wiki; I replied to that email with an explanation of why I had originally contacted you off-wiki, and stating that I would be starting an on-wiki discussion as soon as possible (which is imminent, now that I've arrived at my destination.) Please correct your mischaracterization. Thanks, Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:51, 9 February 2014 (UTC) So you thought it wise to say "I will be monitoring this thread for violations of Wikipedia policies, including those that deal with the recently deceased, and will be acting with a heavy degree of WP:IAR. I will be actioning any exceptionally offensive comments in the rest of this thread, regardless of who they originate from." ?? You have lost your damn mind. Sadly, I cast an easy support vote for you at RfA and am now concerned for how the tools have gone to your head. Chris Troutman (talk) 22:07, 9 February 2014 (UTC) Chris: Please explain what exactly is offensive about stating that I'll take action against exceptionally offensive comments. Exceptionally offensive comments, especially those that are offensive BLP wise, should absolutely be actioned. That's a non-trivial part of what admins do. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:58, 9 February 2014 (UTC) @Kevin Gorman: First, WP:BATTLEGROUND. Second, despite the fact that Eric/Malleus is a bomb-thrower whom I dislike, I agree with him on this point. The IP started a thread seemingly meant to provoke hand-wringing about Wikipedians with personal problems. I found the whole display untoward, misplaced, and foolish. I have no sympathy for those that commit suicide. Obviously you've taken offense to Eric/Malleus's comments, which smacks of WP:INVOLVED. I don't think WP:BDP and WP:IAR give you license to take charge of the thread as if you're the arbiter of public decency. I agree with TheEd17 that the discussion needed to be cut off (when it started) but the comments of yours I quoted read like an over-reaction. I've dealt with you in the past in nothing but a positive fashion which is why this recent turn of yours is disappointing. I agree that exchanges like this hurt editor retention and I support strengthening policy to allow admins to ban trolls and other ne'er do-wells on the spot with no warning or discussion. As it is now, policy requires a lot more bureaucratic tape and I lose respect for anyone that acts otherwise. Chris Troutman (talk) 23:23, 9 February 2014 (UTC) Hi Chris - there's a significant difference between what is normally referred to as battleground behavior and an admin stepping in to moderate a discussion that is going the wrong way. This is my first interaction with Eric (yes, really,) and entering the thread I had no strong opinion regarding him. Administrators (or anyone for that matter) trying to ensure that the families and friends of deceased Wikipedians are not unnecessarily harmed isn't battleground behavior; it's exactly what everyone should be doing, and Wikipedia would be a better place if more people did so in discussions that were likely to cause unnecessary harm to people more often. I'm disappointed that you don't see why harder-than-normal wording is warranted to avoid unnecessary harm occurring to those parties, and hope that you rethink the issue and change your mind. And as I said on your talk page, I invite you to examine my past tool usage. It's significantly less heavy-handed than many admins (as, for that matter, has been explicitly pointed out by other admins on my talk or talk archives,) and tends towards warnings and guidance and not blocks and bans. And as it is now, when it has to deal with harm to living people, current policy doesn't require a bunch of bureaucratic red tape, c.f. arbcom discretionary sanctions w/r/t BLP that allow any admin to take action to prevent harm to living people without jumping through a bunch of hoops (and while acting perfectly within policy.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:31, 9 February 2014 (UTC) Belittling the suicide of a Wikipedian isn't a "non-issue". It's pretty damn offensive. Kaldari (talk) 22:27, 9 February 2014 (UTC) So who did that then? Eric Corbett 22:28, 9 February 2014 (UTC) You did, Eric: "When did WP become a psychiatric hospice? People commit suicide every day… If you have mental health problems go see a doctor, don't plaster a template on your talk page." Kaldari (talk) 22:42, 9 February 2014 (UTC) So when did WP become a psychiatric hospice? Eric Corbett 23:06, 9 February 2014 (UTC)

Regarding recent events re: Eric Corbett

collapsing a few more discussions (though as I've said, I'll still answer good faith questions about my actions gladly.)

To start off with: I have had no prior contact with any of the editors involved in this situation, so no WP:INVOLVED issues. Last night, a thread was started on Jimmy's talkpage concerning an editor who recently committed suicide. You can view the (now archived) thread here. Direct reference to the editor's name was not made, but enough details were given that anyone who knew the editor knew who it was, and anyone who didn't know who the editor was would be able to find out in five minutes or less from the details given in the original post. The first half of the thread essentially served as a memorial to the valued, deceased editor. Part of the way through the thread, User:Eric Corbett arrived and began to make comments likely to offend friends of the deceased editor, and even more likely to offend the family of the editor, should they happen to ever find the thread. I viewed this as a significant WP:BLP concern - to excerpt a quote from the policy, "the possibility of harm to living subjects must always be considered when exercising editorial judgment" - that's from a section of BLP pertaining to articles, but I think it sums up the spirit of WP:BLP very nicely. Wikipedia has a duty to not cause unnecessary harm to living people. Seeing the BLP problems as an administrative issue to be dealt with, I began to intervene, asking people to stay on topic, hatting irrelevant material, etc. This was not effective; Eric undid my hatting, etc. I used heavier wording in my initial posts in the thread than I normally would because of the significant potential for emotional harm both to Wikipedia editors and family members of the deceased. After having a conversation with a number of other admins about how to deal with the issue, I went ahead and decided to use the arbcom remedy dealing with biographies of living people to try to ensure the thread did not detiorate further. I placed a notification on Eric's page, instructing him to stop posting in that one particular thread on Jimmy's talkpage, using the BLP discretionary sanctions (which include enforcing the 'spirit' of BLP, as well as the letter of it,) as justification. I did so because I believed there was a significant risk of emotional harm if Eric continued posting in that thread. I stated that if he did not comply I would enforce the thread-ban through other means, but unlike what has been suggested elsewhere, I did not threaten to outright block or ban him. (Eric responded with a string of profanity and misunderstood policy that would have pulled anyone else a block.) Eric stopped posting in the thread, and after further discussion with User:The_ed17 (one of the admins I had spoken with before applying the discretionary sanctions,) Ed archived the thread, and after further discussion with him, I went ahead and collapsed it. I expected that my actions would result in some degree of Streisand effect, but not to the extent it has. If I could redo the situation, I would attempt to find an alternate solution that would minimize the potential harm of hijacking while also minimizing the resultant Streisand effect. However, I believe the actions I took were 100% within policy, were appropriate, and were the best course of action to take barring an alternative method that would have minimized the resultant Streisand effect. Eric's actions were inappropriate, both on Jimmy's talk page and on his own talk page. When I initially posted a warning to stay off the thread citing the BLP sanctions, his first response was, quoting, "What are you, an idiot? How can I be under a BLP sanction for commenting on someone who's dead?" - demonstrating both a poor understanding of our civility policies and a poor understanding of WP:BLP (of which WP:BDP is a subsection.) At various other points, he's also referred to me as a fucking idiot, told me to shut the fuck up, and slung various other personal attacks. I would like to note that I'm typically very light on tool use; if you look through recent posts, you'll note that I lean far more towards guidance and try to avoid blocks. My harsh approach in this situation was because I perceived significant potential for emotional harm both to Wikipedians and to the family of the deceased. No benefit would be had from allowing the thread to be hijacked, and significant harm would come from allowing it to be hijacked from being essentially a memorial to being a combative thread that would cause emotional harm to both close friends of the deceased and to the family of the deceased if they happened across it. If I am presented with a similar situation in the future where the only alternative to allowing Wikipedia editors and potentially someone's family from experiencing potentially significant emotional harm, I would not hesitate to make use of the BLP discretionary sanctions in a similar way. I believe that my actions were fully policy compliant, and I stand by them. I believe that Wikipedia has a duty to avoid harming living people whenever possible, and this was one of those situations. Realistically, if this situation involved anyone other than Malleus, his personal attacks alone would have resulted in an uncontroversial block, rather than hordes of upset people on our talk pages. This should be a dead issue. Appropriate action was taken to avoid harming living people for no purpose, and it worked. The thread in question is now archived, Eric heeded the warning to not participate in it further, and emotional harm to Wikipedians has been minimized and emotional harm to the family of the deceased has been avoided. Wikipedia is often cited as having a toxic environment, and this is a perfect example of that. Reactions like this significantly harm editor retention and related issues. I'm happy to answer any questions about the situation. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:44, 9 February 2014 (UTC) Suicide is an extremely touchy subject. Unsurprisingly, that's occasionally reflected in editors' actions on Wikipedia. While I sympathize with Eric's position that distressed individuals should seek medical attention, denigrating them is an appalling reaction, one I hope his parents never read. There was no reason Eric needed to vocalize his feelings in such a public forum, and I believe that Kevin was correct to attempt to cut it off. Could he have done it better? With the benefit of hindsight, sure. But did some sort of action need to happen? Yes. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 23:03, 9 February 2014 (UTC) Your diff leads to your own edit of the closure of the discussion, rather than Eric's alleged comment, could you possibly correct it and point out the comments you find problematic. Thanks in advance. Nick (talk) 23:19, 9 February 2014 (UTC) (edit conflict) You flatter yourself Kevin, I'd simply said all that needed to be said. And yes, I do mean needed to be said. WP isn't a refuge for the mentally unstable, in fact it's probably one of the the last places anyone with mental health issues should be. Eric Corbett 23:15, 9 February 2014 (UTC) A little friendly advice: hatting that part of the discussion wasn't a bad idea, but putting yourself in charge of the "follow-up" probably was. Admins get in the most trouble when they try to "OWN" their admin and/or moderator actions. Particularly on Jimmy's or Eric's pages, there are plenty of eyes and no pressure to act right away. --SB_Johnny | talk✌ 23:10, 9 February 2014 (UTC) Eddie was also actively involved in the follow-up to it; I was not the only admin acting. (And although only two of us were acting, more of us were in a discussion about the appropriate path to take, which we reached agreement on. In the future I'll have a different admin take the next step.) In retrospect: yes, I could have handled the situation in a way less likely to lead to an explosion, and will endeavor to do so in the future. That said, given that it was a situation involving significant potential for mental/emotional harm both for Wikipedians and for the family of the deceased, I still feel like although not ideal my response was still well within policy. I understand you're offering friendly advice and am sorry if this comes off sounding defensive or hostile: it's been a long day, with half a dozen emails in my inbox demanding my resignation, etc. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:22, 9 February 2014 (UTC) No worries, though you might be missing my message. Worrying too much over tempests in teapots generally leads to burnout. I speak from experience ;-). --SB_Johnny | talk✌ 23:51, 9 February 2014 (UTC) I'll disclose a potential conflict of interest issue here - I was one of the administrators who dealt with the necessary work after the death of the Wikipedian in question was made known to the administrators at the time. I made one logged action, to protect their editor review. I would disagree that any of the thread served in any way as a memorial to the editor in question, it was certainly glowing in the way it described the editor but in no way was it ever intended to be a memorial thread, and it was certainly not in the correct place for such a memorial thread, so closure was absolutely correct and appropriate. The decision to collapse it down and hide it was a very good decision given the number of passing users who might have been a bit confused by it all, but that was all the administrative action needed. Now, as an administrator involved in page protection of the deceased editor, it was not readily apparent to me who was being referred to and frankly for the vast majority of those who read the thread, I don't think it was readily apparent who was being referred to or whether it was a purely hypothetical situation. I've been asked today who the thread was about, so any contention it was thinly veiled or would only take any other editor a five minutes or less to find out who it was all about I think really falls down and is a poor argument. You need to realise not everybody pays as much attention to the behind the scenes stuff. If you're going to be cryptic this is the sort of shambles that results. Always. So, we have a thread where the intention was to obscure or hide who the subject of it was - there's surprisingly, nothing in the BLP policy about a situation like that, so we have to do what is sensible and prudent in this situation, breaking out the tactical nuclear weapon of Arbitration Enforcement isn't ever the option to try first when there's no policy to back up what your doing, and where there's absolutely no need to escalate a situation you don't even know Eric or other contributors knew existed, that they were discussing a real person who had died only a few weeks previously. Your first action should have been to inform Eric and other participants that they were in fact discussing a real person, not a hypothetical situation and that the person they're discussing could possibly be identified, so they might like to consider their choice of words cautiously. I would certainly consider long and hard whether or not Eric's comments made before you warned him could be considered as falling under the BLP policy. The comments Eric made don't violate the BLP policy anyway, so even if it had been known at the start of the discussion, there's nothing immediately problematic. The thread was discussing an event, not a user, and Eric's comments are generic, not directed at the deceased discussed in that thread and cannot be considered to fall foul of any part of the BLP policy as it is currently written. Anyone born within the past 115 years is covered by this policy unless a reliable source has confirmed their death. Generally, this policy does not apply to material concerning people who are confirmed dead by reliable sources. The only exception would be for people who have recently died, in which case the policy can extend for an indeterminate period beyond the date of death - six months, one year, two years at the outside. Such extensions would apply particularly to contentious or questionable material about the dead that has implications for their living relatives and friends, such as in the case of a possible suicide or a particularly gruesome crime. In the absence of confirmation of death, anyone born more than 115 years ago is presumed dead unless listed at oldest people. You might not particularly like what Eric wrote, and it's not the sort of material one would expect to find in a memorial or in a eulogy about the editor, but it's absolutely the sort of material one would expect to find in a discussion about the mental health of Wikipedians in general and how we react to those who might be suicidal, which is all the discussion concerns. I've spoken to a number of fellow Wikipedians at length about this and the comment that resonated with me the most was that if there's any BLP implications, they're for Eric himself, as a result of his own posts. I'm therefore entirely satisfied that in no way could Eric's edits be considered violations of the generic, current BLP policy. The arbitration enforcement you mention comes from a 2008 Arbitration case, which specifically states Special enforcement on biographies of living persons - Administrators are authorized to use any and all means at their disposal to ensure that every Wikipedia article is in full compliance with the letter and spirit of the biographies of living persons policy. Administrators may use the page protection and deletion tools as they believe to be reasonably necessary to effect compliance. If you want those specific Arbitration Enforcement sanctions to extend to talk pages of editors, that needs clarification from the Arbitration Committee as it's clearly not what is specifically stated in those sanctions. You would probably need to ask the 2008 committee what they intended, but your proposed sanction, as I have repeatedly stated, would have been out of process and inappropriate. All in all, threatening sanctions under the auspices of Arbitration Enforcement (out of process) for comments which wouldn't breach the BLP policy if they discussed a specific named person, but in this case refer to a pseudonym offering increased anonymity is problematic. You were told all of this, I explained in length via e-mail why you were wrong but accepted it was a good faith attempt to stop a situation you thought might deteriorate from doing so. I expected a bit of discussion, maybe a thank you, maybe not, and that would have been the end of it. I tend to think Eric was due an apology for the suggestion he's grave dancing (if I wanted to be really arseholish, I'd say that's the most serious BLP violation on that page and a block worthy) but as he was quite unpleasant towards you, I'd be happier if you both dropped it at that point. Anyway, that's how I expected it to go, harmony and understanding would break out. But I'm still writing. Not good. I've been here a stupidly long time now doing all of this, and I've never, in all my years of editing and administrating, been told when letting someone know I think they're wrong (even if I'm mistaken) been told "If you're right (and you aren't,)" in an e-mail, nor have I ever, ever been told in any sort of communication, when raising concerns about administrator behaviour and conduct "I would suggest that instead of starting a thread regarding me, you focus on building the encyclopedia." when I suggested one of us starts a discussion to decide whether Kevin's threat of Arbitration Enforcement against Eric was out of process for the many reasons I've listed above. I can accept Kevin is a new administrator and I genuinely thought it would be good for them to get a bit of feedback about their behaviour over the situation. No calling for heads on sticks or anything. Nah, the attitude I've had to endure whilst trying to get Kevin to ask for feedback is one of complete intransigence, refusal to start any sort of review about their administrative action on Eric's talk page. Not good, not good at all. The final straw came when I looked to see if Kevin was still active/online-ish and saw their contributions to an RfC the were intending to help close. His comments there are so wildly inappropriate [13] [14] and [15] together with accusing Snowolf of making a false statement [16] and [17], other talk pages [18]. There's dozens of diffs at Eric's talkpage and above here, in particular [19] is most worrying but there's also [20] which is still threatening Eric out of process. I think the only option is for resignation. The loss of support from those who supported his RfA and the huge number of problematic edits today leaves me in little doubt that Kevin should not have access to the administrator toolkit at this time. I doubt he will willingly give them up, but I really hope he seeks some significant administrator mentoring away from Ed and the other group who he has been consulting so far. Nick (talk) 01:42, 10 February 2014 (UTC) I'm not going to bother responding to all of your post, because a lot of it is either confusing or seemingly pulled out of the ether. I will go ahead and say that when I accused Snowolf of making a false statement, I earnestly believed he had - he pointed out afterwards that he had made a request for me to not communicate with him via email on page I don't watch. That changes his statement from 'false' to simply 'misleading' - he implied quite clearly that I had purposefully ignored multiple requests to not email him, when in fact the one request I received I responded to with an explanation of why I had emailed him and saying that I would have a complete onwiki statement in the imminent future. I have quite literally no idea why you are concerned at the fact that I started a section on Eric's talk with a link to my statement here, given that multiple people involved in the discussion on Eric's talk had explicitly asked me to write a statement. At that point Eric hadn't even asked me to avoid his talk page, and many people active on his page had asked me to present a full on-wiki statement, which is precisely what that section was trying to do. You have also very significantly misrepresented our email communication, and have indicated that you had communicated several statements in this post to me previously, when they're close to the opposite of what you said via email. Some of the points you make here actually make sense, and things would have been a lot simpler if you had included them in your emails, although I'm going to go ahead and suggest that it would be an awfully good idea to harmonize the actual arbcom case with the policy instructions for administrators as found here one way or the other. I was operating off of instructions found on a policy page rather than reading arbcom cases from 2008. Personally, I'd suggest arbcom update the ruling to reflect a project-wide mandate, since that's how all other BLP policies apply, but that's not up to me. You may be right about the wording of the arbcom case, but acting off a policy page that misrepresents an arbcom case is hardly a mortal sin. Most of the diffs you have presented are either misrepresented or out of context. The diff on Chris's page was a post I made after he (who I consider a friend and correspond regularly with) expressed disappointment in my heavy handed use of the tools. I see no reason why asking him to review my tool use and observe that it is generally lighter than many admins is problematic. I'm also quite confused about how you find my statements to Eric suggesting that if he violates policy he should expect to be sanctioned problematic. Are you suggesting that high volume content contributors are literally immune from our behavioral policies? The fact that you consider accusing someone of grave-dancing a more serious BLP violation than being called a fucking idiot, being told to shut the fuck up, etc, seems to indicate that you have a very unusual value scale. Please do not contact me via email at any point in the future; I'm uncomfortable communicating via email with someone who has so significantly misrepresented the contents of our past communication. I have no intention of resigning over an action that while flawed (as I have already admitted) was within the letter and spirit of policy. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:25, 10 February 2014 (UTC) I didn't contact you via e-mail - you e-mailed me and I replied. I'd very much like permission to post the entire e-mail conversation within a sub-page in either your or my userspace on-wiki please and we will take it from there. Nick (talk) 02:42, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Come on, seriously, both of you. Things went wrong here and everybody's upset, but there's really no reason to perpetuate a who-said-what drama. You're angry at each other. You each think the other has done this exactly wrong. Neither of you is listening to the other. This is really not a good time to start calling for resignations/blood/apologies/fact-finding missions. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 02:49, 10 February 2014 (UTC) We are not perfect, and we all make mistakes. But what is important is the ability to grasp them when pointed out to oneself and learn from them. From the statement here, it is clear Kevin Gorman has sadly learned nothing and still clings to the notion that there was a BLP violation here, even sanctionable with a block. Nick has summed up the situation rather well, and I fully endorse his comments and view. To that I however would like to add that I'm a bit concerned by the persistent use of off-wiki communication to coordinate administrative actions and the discussion thereof, regardless of everything, and I'd like to hear a bit more about this, specifically I'd like to know where did this matter get discussed between Kevin and the other 4 administrators (email, IRC, private mailing list, instant messaging, in person, etc.). I second Nick's wise words suggesting that you take a step back from adminship, as you have been wielding it like a cleaver rather than like a mop. Snowolf How can I help? 02:32, 10 February 2014 (UTC) So... I had a full, reasonable reply typed up to you when someone forwarded me something interesting. Snowolf, can you please explain why you are raising complaints about me asking other administrators for advice off-wiki at the very same time that you are coordinating your responses to me with Nick in an IRC channel? Nick, I'm curious to hear your take on that too. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:50, 10 February 2014 (UTC) I'm not co-ordinating anything with Snowolf, I didn't ask for their comments and have had no interaction at all in what they wrote in response to you. I'd guess that was the same with you, Ed and the other administrators you spoke to - you spoke but you didn't write or co-ordinate each others actions. Nick (talk) 02:54, 10 February 2014 (UTC) I mean, I guess it depends a lot on your definition of coordination, but it's fucking hilarious for Snowolf to complain about me talking to other admins off-wiki at the same time the two of you are discussing me in IRC. Nick: I've answered your reasonable points, and ignored some of your unreasonable ones. Most of the diffs you complained about make zero sense. I've admitted that my actions were less than perfect, and have stated that I will not take the same course in the future. I highly recommend that somebody goes ahead and makes the BLP policy page I linked earlier sync up with the actual arbcom case - I'm not going to do it myself because I imagine someone would complain about it. I agree with Fluffernutter, this entire thing has gotten ridiculous. I'm collapsing all relevant discussion sections 20 minutes from now unless Snowolf comes up with an explanation as to why they are questioning me about talking to admins off-wiki at the same time they're talking to you about me off-wiki that is intriguing enough to make this thread seem worthwhile. And Snowolf, if you're willing to collude off-wiki, I'll bet you a beer at the next Wikimania that I'm not successfully brought up at arbcom within the next six months as you are suggesting in off-wiki communication? Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:02, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Kevin, superb, thank you very much. That's all I wanted when I commented 11 hours ago, a little reassurance you understood there was some degree of error, that you understood not everybody agreed you were right, that you accepted you might have been a little mistaken, and most importantly, that you would take on-board these concerns and do things just a little differently. Thanks, and all the best. Nick (talk) 03:11, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Nick, I literally acknowledged that I had not made an ideal choice in the very first post in this section?... Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:14, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Kevin, please don't abuse the word "literally". You're not a teen anymore. I just placed a comment on Eric's talk page, but after seeing this I realize it's mustard after the meal. For the record, two things--I didn't see a BLP violation, and I'm not sure that any good has ever come out of IRC chatter (that's a general point--I'm not saying this about anyone in particular). Take it easy, Drmies (talk) 06:07, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Eh, I meant it in the dictionary sense - I really did say that in my first post in the section, not in the annoying sense it is commonly used in now. That said, you're the english prof :p Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:23, 10 February 2014 (UTC) I'm not going to handle it myself, but it's going to present a problem in the future if no one syncs the actual arbcom case with the relevant policy page that describes how to implement it. I generally agree with Fluffernutters suggestion that this has gotten comicay ridiculous, but am leaving this part open in the hopes that one of the people watching this takes care of syncing it... and hoping that @Snowolf: comes by to explain why they're criticizing me for talking to other admins off-wiki at the same time they're talking about me with other admins off-wiki. Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:24, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Because they're just hounding you. Ignore it. Kaldari (talk) 03:50, 10 February 2014 (UTC) I note you have declined to answer my question, which is of course your privilege but only serves to further my concerns. I did not complain about you asking other administrators for opinions, I expressed my worry for your reluctance to approach the matter on-wiki when asked to, which is a very different concern. I have no issues with off-wiki communication, that is well know. I have issue with misuse of off-wiki communication, and I note your continued refusal to answer the question of how the matter was approached is concerning. It might very well have been approached correctly, but then you'd have no issues in answering questions about it. I would like to remind you that I have taken no administrative actions in this matter and never had any intentions to do so. Snowolf How can I help? 05:20, 10 February 2014 (UTC) I have discussed the matter briefly with Kevin and I am satisfied with his assurance that the off-wiki discussion were proper. Amusingly, said discussion came off-wiki :D Snowolf How can I help? 05:33, 10 February 2014 (UTC) There really is something kind of amusing about you initially raising the issue of me talking to admins off-wiki in an off-wiki channel, and then the easiest way to talk to you and point out that there was nothing improper about my previous off-wiki communications. Mediawiki is not always a very conduicive format for an actual conversation. Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:04, 10 February 2014 (UTC) I just found out about this because Kevin withdrew from closing an RfC I've been watching. I think that what happened to the now deceased member of our community is incredibly sad. I think that it's appropriate for those of us still here to want to treat what happened with sensitivity and respect, as I believe Kevin thought in good faith that he was doing. But, having looked at the archived discussion, I also think that what Eric said, he had good reasons for saying, and that he, too, is entitled to some understanding. It seems to me that this dispute has rapidly escalated far beyond where it should have gone. I hope that no one will continue to be angry at Kevin, and I hope that no one will continue to be angry at Eric. Life's too short to hold grudges over this. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:52, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks and a further note

Enough said.

I'd like to extend a note of thanks to the several dozen people who contacted me off-wiki yesterday expressing support in one way or another. None of you thought my actions were perfect (and as I noted in my initial post, I don't think they were myself,) and some of you disagreed with them completely, but still saw the reaction here as fucked. Getting literally dozens of messages of support has made dealing with a shitty situation less shitty. Within the next few days, I'm going to be writing an explanation of why I saw a BLP issue where I did, and why I thought AE was the best route to take. I don't expect that everyone will agree with my reasoning behind it, but I suspect that when I have fully articulated what I saw, many people shall - and those that don't will at least see where I was coming from. One of my most significant failures in handling this situation in my view was getting swamped by the number of negative comments here and taking time to respond to them, instead of taking time to fully articulate why I did what I did. Because my explanation will contain material that I do not believe should be posted publicly, I'm not going to post it here - which I'm sure will piss some people off, but I believe is for the better. Once I've finished it (I'm going to take a day or two to unwind before finishing it,) I will make a note here and send it upon request to any admin who wants it (regardless of which side they've taken in this kerfuffle,) as well as any non-admin who I deem to be trustworthy (again, regardless of which side they've taken in this kerfuffle.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:04, 10 February 2014 (UTC) So basically you're going to continue with your malicious allegations of gravedancing, but this time in private. Nice. Eric Corbett 16:11, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Alternative phrasing: in other words, I will comply with standard best practices regarding the treatment of sensitive information on Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects by communicating it freely with any admin who asks and any other user who I deem trustworthy. Btw, I'm going to go ahead and revert any future posts of yours on my talk page without reading them. You are a valued content contributor; you also seem to believe you are immune to every behavioral guideline we have. That's not the case. Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:15, 10 February 2014 (UTC) So you are now judge and jury of who is trustworthy, your arrogance is simply astonishing. You can revert me too as you seem to want to hide away anything resembling the truth. Keep digging the hole. J3Mrs (talk) 16:29, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Reread my post. As it stated, I'll happily send my statement to any admin - even to those who disagree with me - which is perfectly in line with best practices for handling sensitive info on Wikipedia. Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:31, 10 February 2014 (UTC) " as well as any non-admin who I deem to be trustworthy ", I did. J3Mrs (talk) 16:36, 10 February 2014 (UTC) .. Which, again, is perfectly in line with standard Wikimedia practices for handling sensitive information. I expect you'll find that even most of the people who disagreed with my action would agree that it would be inappropriate to hand out something reasonably considered sensitive information to absolutely any user who requested it (whereas many of them would have an issue with me not sharing a statement that contains sensitive details with any admin who requests it.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:39, 10 February 2014 (UTC) The only sensitive thing here seems to be your feelings. You misread a situation from your very first post on Jimbo's page. You sought affirmation from where it can't be seen and you blather about several dozen people who don't want to be identified. Wiki business should be conducted in the open, something you don't seem prepared to do. I don't understand why you need to issue statements, they don't right any wrongs you have committed. J3Mrs (talk) 16:50, 10 February 2014 (UTC) (edit conflict)You're joining Eric in the auto-revert without reading pile after this response, but I will reply to this. For some reason, you don't seem to understand that some administrative decisions are based in part on information about users that is simply inappropriate to share directly on-wiki. I'm talking to numerous people about my way forward regarding this, including most of the admins who have posted on this page from either side.. and so far, even people who think my action was ridiculous have agreed that posting sensitive info directly on-wiki is not an acceptable practice. I sincerely doubt seeking further advice will have anyone say differently, but if I receive significant different advice about it, I'll alter my posting of it accordingly. That said, I would be shocked if that happens. Kevin Gorman (talk) 17:06, 10 February 2014 (UTC) No, not all things can be considered in public. See: arbcom, legal matters, discussions involving private information, suicide threats... the list goes on. And given the vitriolic reactions here, is it any wonder why admins who agree with Kevin's interpretation would rather not speak up? Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 17:02, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Your editsum messages

collapsing a few more discussions (though as I've said, I'll still answer good faith questions about my actions gladly.)

Kevin, your editsum message to me: trust me, it wasnt thoughtless. Plenty of thought was put in to it. Question: what are you referring to with pronoun "it"? (Before replying, be reminded, I never at any time messaged you, or anyone else, on any topic other than your gravedancing accusation levied twice against Eric Corbett.) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 17:53, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Re your other editsum message to me: it's a bit hilarious that anyone thinks an apology to Eric is warranted. Again, my suggestion that you apologize was limited to your vile and untrue accusation that he gravedanced on that suicide victim. (You think that request was "hilarious"!?) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 19:52, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Again, if you can find a definition anywhere on the web re idiom gravedance that doesn't include celebrating or expressing joy over the death of someone, please link it here for my education. Ihardlythinkso (talk) 19:57, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Hi Ihardlythinkso: the edit summary was intended to refer to my general choice to take action against Eric in this situation more than defending my specific word choice; sorry for the ambiguity, I've been responding to people hurriedly given the volume of stuff I've been replying to. Accusing Eric of gravedancing was not a wise choice on my part - because it was unnecessarily inflammatory. If I was put in the same situation again, I would've used a different, significantly less inflammatory description of his behavior, while still taking action to avoid the in-progress situation. That said, I am not going to apologize to Eric for several reasons. First off: even if it were an inappropriate description of his behavior, I find laughable the idea that anyone should apologize to Eric over a perceived personal attack. Eric violates NPA, civil, and a host of other policies far more often than any other user who has not already been banned, and does so unapologetically. Second off: I'm not going to apologize because I am far from convinced that it was not an accurate description of his behavior. I'm not going to try to find a contrary definition to satisfy you, being that it's an idiom, and not one defined many places (and yes, I did check the full OED and half a dozen dictionaries of idioms.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:02, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Notice

collapsing a few more discussions (though as I've said, I'll still answer good faith questions about my actions gladly.)

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is Administrator Kevin Gorman. Thank you. Ross HillTalk to me! 21:59, 10 February 2014 (UTC) Thanks for the notification, Ross. Not sure why Malleus didn't go ahead and make it himself, since a request to stay away from a talk page doesn't apply to administratively mandated notices. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:17, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

• • Speaking of civility, why are you referring to Eric by an old accountname? NE Ent 02:50, 12 February 2014 (UTC)
    • By which account name does Eric currently prefer to be known? "Certainly Malleus has never been an admin, and never will be, but..." ... "Based on the technical evidence I received via my CheckUser queries, I cannot make any conclusion except that the accounts User:George Ponderevo and User:Malleus Fatuorum are being controlled by the same person"... pick one. He should choose one, and then stick to it. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 03:04, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Read WP:ADMINACCT and learn to read and write (WP:Competence is required)

Your opinion has been noted and appropriately filed.
I find laughable the idea that anyone should apologize to Eric over a perceived personal attack. You're a real jerk and s/b desysopped or resign, you know that?! Ihardlythinkso (talk) 08:49, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Plaudits and accolades

Little productive likely to come out of this section

No doubt you will be encouraged by the foolishly given barnstars above. However, this vainglorious beginning to your admin career has placed you amongst Wikipedia's least respected administrators. Whether through ignorance, immaturity or a desire to see your name on the map, you have not served yourself or the project well. To falsely accuse another editor or gravedancing and then attempt a smear campaign to save your own wretched career is deplorable. I'm sure no one, including Eric Corbett, feels anything less than deep sorrow that an editor committed suicide; however, few, if any, of us knew him personally and to use his tragic death as an excuse to excite sentiment and attack other editors in order to promote oneself is something of which you should feel thoroughly ashamed. Your behaviour suggests to me that you are not very old, so I will make allowances for you on grounds of immaturity. Nevertheless, I feel you should resign your tools at once, learn from this experience and re-apply when you are a little older and wiser.  Giano  15:35, 11 February 2014 (UTC) I feel that you should utterly ignore Eric and his hypocritical band of toadies and sycophants (Giano, John, etc.). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.68.179.219 (talk) 15:59, 11 February 2014 (UTC) Was my choice of words wise? No. Was the action utterly justifiable? Yes, and I stand by that more strongly than I did when I made it, for reasons I'll be emailing to arbcom. And no, I'm not sharing the details of what I am talking about with you. Shutting down the thread at the point that I did averted serious actual harm to living people. I believe that a solid portion of that harm does not morally rest on Eric, but the fact that I took an action that averted serious harm to living people makes me feel more than comfortable in stepping on someone's toes in the process - doubly so when owner of said toes belong to someone who has no issue attacking anyone he doesn't like in far more vicious ways than I've ever considered describing Eric in. Speaking more broadly than this set of circumstances: Eric's behavior represents a microcosm of what's wrong with Wikipedia, of why we have trouble attracting and retaining editors, and of why we are unable to effect meaningful demographic change to Wikipedia - and all of those things are necessary if we actually want to build an encyclopedia containing a significant fraction of the world's knowledge. Organizations that allow talented contributors (and Eric is one hell of an encyclopedist) to consistently and flagrantly flaunt behavioral norms consistently set themselves up for failure. One of Eric's recent edit summaries was absolutely on point - the same ruleset needs to apply to editors regardless of their position. Is he the sole reason why Wikipedia is failing in significant ways? Of course not. But he is a perfect example of our cultural problems. If you feel I'm not worthy of respect because I intervened in a situation that prevented harm and did so in a way that did not in any way shape or form impede Eric's ability to help build an encyclopedia, then your opinion matters very little to me. Coincidentally, since you mentioned the barnstars - although I do significantly appreciate the fact that those who placed them were willing to do so in public knowing that it was not unlikely to subject them to vicious personal attacks - if you're worried about the barnstars, you should probably be more worried about the massive number of emailed notes of thanks I have gotten from people stating that they don't want to express their opinions on-wiki because they don't want to tolerate the number of attacks that interfering with Eric generates. Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:20, 11 February 2014 (UTC) It seems most of what you do (or say you do) occurs off Wikipedia. That in itself is reprehensible. You are not the personal custodian of late Wikipedians or their memories and legacies. If you really had information from one of the deceased relatives, you should have passed it straight to the WMF or a responsible Arbitrator to deal with; it was not your place to act alone. Now we have the results of your foolishness for all to see.  Giano  16:26, 11 February 2014 (UTC) Arbcom has standing AE sanctions allowing any admin to take action when needed to prevent significant harm to living people wherever necessary. They have some details from me already, and will have a more full description in their inboxes in the near future. BTW: where have I ever said I had information from anyone's relatives? Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:31, 11 February 2014 (UTC) well I'm afraid that's all a little late in the day. You are going to have to reform your secretive ways. besides which there was no harm to living or dead people in any of Corbett's posts. You misjudged the situation and are now digging for excuses.  Giano  16:37, 11 February 2014 (UTC) I've articulated publicly the initial problems I saw in Eric's post. You can disagree with the judgment call I made, but every ENWP policy and WMF board resolution makes it clear that in BLP situations, erring on the side of caution is called for and even if it were universally agreed that my call was wrong, a good faith bad call is not at all a reason to step down. The follow-up to it that I received is not appropriate to share on-wiki and makes me perfectly confident that shutting down the thread at the point that I did was absolutely appropriate, and if arbcom publicly disagrees with me once I shoot them a more comprehensive summary, I would be more than willing to apologize and not repeat similar actions in the future. That said, they sure as fuck won't. My actions weren't perfectly conducted as I've acknowledged from my first articulation of why I acted, but they were necessary. Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:47, 11 February 2014 (UTC) As I said, it was not your call to make. Furthermore, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, it is not a site for bereavement counselling or 'loving and hugging.' Eric's points were pertinent to the discussion and in no way gravedancing as you alleged.  Giano  17:22, 11 February 2014 (UTC) Echoing Giano, the allegation you made was wrong, and incredibly ugly and offensive. You should apologise. --John (talk) 17:30, 11 February 2014 (UTC) I still don't understand how you're invoking BLP here. The first line of BLP reads: Editors must take particular care when adding information about living persons to any Wikipedia page. (emphasis original) What information about a living person (or recently dead, per BDP) was Eric revealing here? I understand that Eric's comment could easily be perceived as callous. I understand that Eric's comment could've caused offense to the family. I even understand why it might be redacted on those grounds. But it's not a BLP issue, because BLP is not about "anything that offends a living person or their family". BLP is about "information that is unverified or false about a person that could cause themm or their family harm". Eric was being insensitive, yes, but he was only expressing his opinions (and personal history that, while perhaps disturbing, is still not BLP). That's my biggest issue with your actions here, personally. You invoked BLP when there was no BLP violation, and you invoked AE to make your action unreviewable by anyone else, and you don't seem to be listening to anyone who disagrees with you. In fairness to you, most are being much more vociferous than they need to be, and I can't really fault you for tuning them out, but that doesn't make them wrong, and nor does disagreeing with you make them eligible to be written off as the Eric Corbett sycophants. Such apparent unwillingness to admit even the possibility that you were wrong is troubling, to me. Perhaps that's unwarranted, but it's certainly how things look. (To be clear, I'm not contesting that the person here was eligible for BDP protection, nor that a user talk page is subject to BLP/BDP.) Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 17:36, 11 February 2014 (UTC) I have a feeling that you initially misred Corbett's posts and sentiments while simultaneously allowing your personal feelings and emotions to run away with you and affect your judgement. You are now trying desperately hard and belatedly to justify yourself - the former can sometimes be excused in the young, the latter cannot. When in a hole, it's best to stop digging.  Giano  17:44, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

brief explanation pending a further post later today

• When I took action, I was aware that poking Eric is akin to poking a bear. The speed and vitriole of the reaction I received took me off balance (which is impressive, given the amount of past shit I've taken,) and meant that I responded significantly more defensively than was beneficial. Responding to the volume of incoming posts meant that I failed to promptly justify my actions. I did what I did for an explicit, justifiable reason. My actions did not reflect policy to the letter, although I fully believe they reflected the spirit of it accurately, and that, combined with IAR, were absolutely necessary to prevent harm to living people. Multiple arbs are aware of the necessarily private elements of the situation; all will be later. At some point tonight, I will post in explicit detail a step by step explanation of why I took the action I did, barring the necessarily private elements. Someone has pointed out to me that simply protecting Jimbo's page momentarily would have been a /much/ better way to deal with situation, and I agree with them entirely.

Although I believe the actions I took prevented significant harm to living people, I don't believe that Eric intended his comments on Jimmy's talk page as inherently malicious - even though I do believe his comments needed to stop. With Eric not stepping back when I took less direct action to give time to review the situation and avoid the harm at hand, I IAR'ed the steps I viewed as necessary to force him to step back long enough for the thread to die, or at least for the situation to be reviewed. As mentioned earlier, the option of outright protection didn't occur to me, and would've certainly been better, as it would not have implied malice on the part of Eric. A fuller explanation of why I described his conduct as 'gravedancing' will be included in my fuller post tonight; I erred in using the term, and regret doing so. This was not a situation I handled with finesse; I made significant errors. That said, action was necessary to prevent a serious situation from becoming more serious. It has been suggested that I should have emailed emergency@wikimedia.org: if I had anticipated the information I received after the situation was resolved ahead of time, doing so would have been my first course of action.

Despite the fact that I don't view Eric's initial posts as inherently malicious, I find his consistent pattern of personal attacks against anyone he disagrees with to be incompatible with his continued presence in the community. When he returns, if he falls in to the same pattern of behavior, I will be pursuing an RFCU followed by an arbcom case since I believe his status as a vested contributor means that he represents an intractable issue for the community. If he returns and doesn't fall in to the same pattern of behavior, he's one bloody hell of a good encyclopedia writer. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:27, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Collapsed comment from Giano

........"Multiple arbs are aware of the necessarily private elements of the situation;" Who are these multiple Arbs, let's have their names too. You need to get a grip and realize you are an Admin on Wikipedia - not IRC or wherever else it that you and your friends chat. You really do need to resign your tools because even now, you won't apologize and continue to smear and justify - it's astounding.  Giano  20:26, 11 February 2014 (UTC) Lovely edit summary [21], but you're getting confused, your advisers are not here, but on IRC.  Giano  21:21, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Kevin: You imposed your personal view of appropriate phraseology with respect to the dead. Given that you now admit that you don't consider Eric's initial posts as "inherently malicious", I have to ask on what basis you still present them as likely to do harm to living people? You continue to characterize Eric as evincing a "consistent pattern of personal attacks against anyone he disagrees with", despite the fact that you earlier said you were unfamiliar with him and therefore that was not a factor in your initial challenge and templating. This is a personal attack against Eric; I put it to you that just as you did not recognize the legitimacy of alternate responses to the IP's post at Jimbo's talk page, you are imposing a personal definition of personal attack - one based on word choice, perhaps. What is needed is not a formal statement from you (we've had quite a few statements from you, and I recognize that you admit you acted somewhat hastily and regret that you did not consider some alternative options), but either recognition that community standards are not as simple as you have been thinking them to be, or an answer to teh following question: Are you open to recall? Yngvadottir (talk) 23:30, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

On the basis that I was directly speaking to people they were doing harm to - I'll lay out more detail about that portion when I am done with my upcoming outreach event, since I can do so. I would be far less vigorously defending my actions except for communications I received after the fact, the general contents of which has been disclosed to several arbs and the Wikimedia office. Looking through Eric's contribution history, it's perfectly clear that he's engaged in a consistent pattern of personal attacks against editors he disagrees with. I'll provide you diffs tonight if you'd like. Saying that someone who regularly insults anyone he disagrees with engages in personal attacks is not a personal attack. I am open to recall on any issue where I feel comfortable disclosing the full basis of my actions in public; at this point, this one involves sensitive information about other editors that I am not comfortable disclosing in public. If you view it as a significant enough issue to be actionable, arbcom is capable of removing my toolset and will be more fully informed about the basis and followthrough of my actions than can be done publicly. Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:39, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

As a note, I'll be at an outreach event for the next 2-3 hours and thus not replying here. I'd like to reiterate that my actions were far from perfect, that I erred in accusing Malleus of gravedancing, regret accusing him of such, that I would take an alternate path in any future scenario, and, also, that despite the flaws in my actions they still limited harm to living people. Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:45, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Keep in mind:

1. That thread was not about memorializing Mr. (Redacted), it was about the OP's view that Wikipedia's culture is evil (not just a little, but really, really evil). I know this because I know who posted it and why they posted it when they did.
2. Eric's comment was really just a more earthy way of saying WP:NOTTHERAPY.
3. Say what you will about his manners, it's pretty gosh-darn clear that Eric really is here to build an encyclopedia, which when you come down to it is why he seems so "bullet-proof" when people start coming after him for being less WP:CIVIL than some people think he should be.
4. Most importantly, it would be a huge stretch to interpret his comments as "grave dancing" on the headstone of Mr. (Redacted). In fact, it was absolutely inappropriate and vulgar to say that he was. There's really no way of looking at that that would make it appropriate.

So, maybe you should just apologize. And maybe just for fun tell him to fuck off here on your own talk page, block yourself for 5 minutes, and then he'll perhaps feel better that someone blocked you. --SB_Johnny | ^talk✌ 00:16, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Oh wow, the level of juvenile childish behaviour just hit an all time high. "block yourself for 5 minutes, and then he'll perhaps feel better that someone blocked you". Clue: we are not all five years old. Please grow up. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 02:01, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

• Kevin, you probably don't need to hear any more from anyone, yet I'm going to say it anyway: I want to strongly urge you to drop the 50diffs matter. Any number of diffs has a habit of dwindling once they're put under the microscope and that is bound to happen in this case--I know, because I was there for at least a couple of possible supposed civility infractions on Eric's part. Many of these diffs will have to be contextualized, and before you know they have lengthy histories in article disputes where, in many cases, Eric was simply correct but got baited.

  Moreover, I see what you're trying to prove--a long track record and thus this incivility is one more, perhaps the straw that broke the camel's back, but I'm not exactly sure what "this incivility" in my sentence is supposed to point at. It can't be his initial remark, and while I may have missed something, the rest of the exchange a. wasn't so bad, relatively speaking of course (YMMV) and b. is at least in part explained, if not justified, by the context: quite naturally he took offense at your warning, and would have even if it were correct. In other words, it won't get you anywhere, and I don't want to see you becoming entrenched in something that will be more and more difficult to get away from.

  Well, like you needed more advice. You know I think highly of you as an editor; as an admin this is really the first thing I've seen you do. Folks all over the place, some of whom I respect, are calling for your head. I don't and I won't--but I think it is important, especially with your new admin t-shirt and the responsibility that comes with it, to be more flexible, so to speak. Take it easy Kevin, Drmies (talk) 02:15, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

ANI notice

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. Northern Antarctica (talk) Previously known as AutomaticStrikeout 16:11, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Take it easy

Kevin, sometimes the best medicine is the passage of time. As I contributed to that initial thread, I hope nothing I said contributed to the escalation. You are a sincere person and clearly acted in good faith, though "mistakes were made". I wish you the very best, as always, and encourage you to take it easy, stay low key, think about things over time, and learn from the experience. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 04:35, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Final statement

1. To put it more explicitly than I previously have, I fucked up how I handled this situation. If I'm put in a similar situation in the future, I will not handle it in the way I did. I saw a significant problem, and took the course of action that occurred to me would address it, and viewed it as a highly irregular WP:IAR action. It did address it, but that doesn't mean I handled the situation well. If I encounter a similar situation in the future that involves someone like Malleus - a vested contributor - where I am unable to resolve the situation without taking such an action, I'm sending it straight to arbcom and the office. I made significant errors (and have admitted this from the beginning.)
2. The problem involved was serious, which is why I'm not joking when I say that if someone wants me to resign over this they should take me to arbcom. That said, given that the worst thing I have been accused of is accidental incivility and a misuse of a warning, I think it's reasonable to expect that if someone did do so, it would not result in me being desysopped or anything of that nature - even if there were no extenuating circumstances, and there are. I'm not going to post details of what was going on on-wiki, and if I did, they would absolutely justifiably be oversighted. Although I regret the mechanism I used to solve the problem and wish I had used a different one, the most important thing in this is that the problem was solved. I have explicitly informed two arbitrators and Maggie and Philippe of the cause of my action, and will write a statement to the full committee when I have time.
3. When I accused Malleus of grave-dancing, I had just had a conversation with someone (see previous point) that led me to believe it was an accurate description of his behavior. Having gathered further information about the situation, I don't have enough knowledge to know if it was an accurate statement, and I'm perfectly willing to believe his statement that he didn't mean his comments in such a way. With that said, his comments were at best uncivil, and if he returns I really, really hope that he reads something about appropriate ways to talk about suicide that are unlikely to cause other people emotional distress. The former sentence is closely related to both what made me want to do something initially, and emails (one in particular) that I received afterwards confirmed my belief that that thread needed killed, and made me think that I should have simply immediately contacted Philippe rather than trying to handle it myself. I accept that Malleus's behavior is not appropriately described as grave-dancing. I'm not going to explicitly apologize to Malleus over this statement because forced apologies are meaningless and given his conduct any apology I made to him would be insincere. I think his behavior is significantly problematic. That said: he is an amazingly good encyclopedist. No one can deny that he's an amazingly good encyclopedist. He generates huge amounts of high quality content. He randomly copyedited one of my articles last night and every change he made was valuable. He does tons of valuable, high quality work on Wikipedia, and I sincerely hope he comes back with altered behavioral habits.
4. This is the last post I am going to be making on this topic here, because I believe that no good will come of me further engaging this issue on my talk page. In around 36 hours, I'm going to manually archive talk page sections related to this. I believe that this has gone far enough. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:20, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

You are still using an incorrect user name to refer to Eric (see NE Ent's question above), and you have dismissively referred to him as a "vested contributor" as if all the objections to your actions are based solely on Eric's edit count. That is not correct—your assessment of the situation was in good faith, but it was wrong. Rather than "When I accused Malleus of grave-dancing" in (3) above, the comment should say "When I said that Eric was grave-dancing I was incorrect, and I apologize for that error". His comments were blunt—they were not "uncivil" and to believe otherwise would be a second error. Johnuniq (talk) 10:54, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

There's a lot more warranting criticism than that, Johnuniq! Ihardlythinkso (talk) 12:04, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Well perhaps you would like to spend some of your time explaining your extraordinary conduct to the Arbcom, who in spite of your assertions to the contrary are still waiting to hear fully from you.  Giano  20:52, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

And that's Giano, spokesman for Arbomb, demanding you do his bidding. So you'd better get on with it. After all, He knows best! The Rambling Man (talk) 20:54, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

My dearest Giano, I believe Kevin has stated on multiple occasions scattered throughout this talk page that he's informed Arbcom. In fact: "I have explicitly informed two arbitrators and Maggie and Philippe of the cause of my action, and will write a statement to the full committee when I have time." Thanks, Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 21:40, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

• Despite what he says, he has not provided an adequate explanation to anyone. I suggest that he gets on and provides one.  Giano  07:51, 13 February 2014 (UTC)

Thank you

Someone needs to take a stand against what vested contributors are doing to our community.

		The Admin's Barnstar
		For an uncommonly, and very justifiably, brave start to your career. Pakaran 00:24, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Have another one...

		The Resilient Barnstar
		For calmly and coolly dealing with a deluge of abuse, personal attacks and harassment that resulted from a good-faith effort to enforce Wikipedia policies. You handled this ugly mess far better than most users would. Robofish (talk) 00:46, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

		The Barnstar of Integrity
		For recognising that actions on-wiki have implications off-wiki too. Andy Dingley (talk) 01:15, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

	The Resilient Barnstar
	For believing in the importance of human dignity and being willing to defend that belief. Kaldari (talk) 03:51, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

		The Barnstar of Integrity
		For standing by your values in the face of calls to step down as a brand-new administrator. Jackmcbarn (talk) 04:17, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Do something that you enjoy....

.... is great advice, given to me several years ago. Wikipedia is about contributing your own time, free of charge (for most of us), to better the collection of human knowledge that's freely available. Becoming an admin is a good thing mostly, it means once you've had enough experience, you can help reduce the ever-increasing tide of detritus (alternatively, it opens you up to a tirade of insults, false accusations etc). It also makes you feel that you are better enabled to wade into situations. Most often, that wading will end up with you up to (if not over) your neck. There's an inherent inertia (or forcefield, or something) in Wikipedia in certain corners, and there are dark and dusty and cobwebby cubbyholes where you are probably best advised to avoid, a bit like a "dark Wikipedia", where all the normal pillars are ignored.

I see you're through the maelstrom, and hopefully that means you can return to doing (a) what you found interesting and enjoyable about Wikipedia and (b) things to benefit the encyclopaedia. Getting involved in certain patches around here is inevitably going to end in disaster, and sadly you picked one of those. My advice is harmless, really, but I do get tired of some editors spewing bile, threatening retirement time after time after time after time after time......., diva-esque, while their defensive minions rush around screeching. To reiterate, do something you enjoy. Best wishes. Feel free to delete, of course. Just some ramblings. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:30, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the note, TRM... one of the kind of funny things about this week has been that I've actually spent a huge portion of it doing fun, enjoyable work that is going to result in quite a bit of benefit to the encyclopedia. One of the reasons that many of my replies have been delayed on issues this week on-wiki is that I've been spending large chunks of time in meetings with GLAM's about content donations, as well as training upper division undergrads in preparation for having them write significant missing articles about environmental justice issues :) I find it a bit amazing that we don't even have an article about climate resilience, and soon we shall. Best wishes, Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:43, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Request for arbitration

I have requested a case for arbitration which involves you.  Giano  21:05, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

• There's something kind of funny about filing an arbcom request that includes a complaint that I refer to people by previous usernames while at the same time failing to spell my name correctly. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:49, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

Did you know the admirable simplicity of Giano's user page: one castle and one category? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:23, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Gerda, but it's sometimes unimportant what people think - this is one such time. Kevin must find his amusement where he can. The important thing is achieve some rebalance to Eric's reputation.  Giano  12:18, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Giano, I just noticed that Kevin made a mistake that I had made before (telling you that you misspelled a name), - we should keep learning, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:30, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Don't worry Gerda; I can even spell my own name wrong - if it's not in spell checker it can come out in 50 different ways.  Giano  15:54, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Intended point taken Gerda, I hadn't noticed the cat before. I hadn't intended anything particularly malicious from commenting on his misspelling of his name, I just legitimately found it a bit amusing, especially given that I tend to refer to Eric by his former username out of completely innocuous reasons (mainly, if I refer to someone just as "Eric" in a conversation with people who are active on Wikimedia projects outside of ENWP, people tend to think of a number of people before they think of Eric Corbett. (AFAIK, Eric's never asked anyone not to refer to him as Malleus; I'd certainly avoid doing so if he'd asked me to do so, or if I had ever noticed him asking anyone else not to do so.) 22:42, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. I like simplicity, and I admire the castle, missing its builder. As far as I know, Eric talked to me first about using his real name, did you know? Quote: "I think a little more openness might go a long way." --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:55, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Why not just go and apologize to Eric/Malleus? That wouldn't hurt anyone.--MONGO 20:36, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

• That is the smartest thing I've heard all day. Sometimes, a simple apology is enough. If it isn't enough, it was still due. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 16:31, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

• @MONGO, Kevin already explained why not in detail here: I am not going to apologize to Eric for several reasons. Ihardlythinkso (talk) 01:18, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
• As a bit of additional explanation: I don't believe that insincere apologies are respectful, and I think that even Eric would agree with me on that point. I certainly feel sorry about the situation as a whole, but I have a hard time feeling sincerely sorry for a comment I made based off of flawed information to someone whose first response asking him to lay off his participation in a thread was to undo my IAR hatting, whose second response was "What are you, an idiot? How can I be under a BLP sanction for commenting on someone who's dead?", and whose subsequent responses went down from there, culminating in him ragequitting. I'm sure it would satisfy some number of people if I went and posted a mea culpa on his talk page directed explicitly at him, but I don't think it would satisfy him, and I don't think it would be terribly respectful to do so. I made a general life rule some time ago to only apology in situations where I can do so sincerely. If his responses had gone down a different pathway, I'd likely have apologized to him directly some time ago. As it is: I don't feel sincerely sorry for offending Eric, and don't think an apology would carry meaning. Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:35, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
  • • What part of a line to Eric such as: "I am sorry that I misunderstood your comment as gravedancing, and of the consequences that caused." would be insincere? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:46, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
      • Absolutely none of it would be. I'll likely be posting a message to that effect on his talk page shortly. Thank you or the suggestion, and I mean that absolutely non-sarcasticaly. Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:48, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
        • Good work Gerda, soon your Notorious reputation will be softened by your unfailing kindness.  :-)   I understand your overall position, Kevin, but agree with Gerda and MONGO that a sincere apology is 100% possible here. On top of Gerda's wise advice, I'm not sure how you feel about WP:TEMPLAR Kevin, but like Johnuniq, I suspect that it is worth saying something about that. Nobody likes to be template-spammed, but regulars (to most definitely include Eric) often see template-spam as particular unsuitable, and that particular template is incredibly officious and garish. A few words to show you were not kidding, and seriously thought there was a top-priority BLP/BDP issue, hand-typed, may (well... or may not) have significantly altered the course of events. In any case, a few words of sincere apology, that you regret mistakes and misunderstandings, are never amiss. Gives me hope, for the future of the 'pedia.  :-)   TFIW. — 74.192.84.101 (talk) 15:21, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
  • What kind of response do you think was likely after you dropped the largest and most pointy warning box possible (you have violated BLP ... enforced by block ... this is your only warning ... made pursuant to the requirements of this Arbitration remedy) diff? You failed to discuss anything without including threats of blocks (hint: that's not a discussion). No one cares if you offended Eric—it is the underlying issue that should be addressed, namely the correctness of your initial assessment (there was a BLP violation, and there was gravedancing, and Eric lacked common decency). I have said more in response to a suggestion at my talk). Johnuniq (talk) 02:39, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

As a note, I'm not ignoring John's comment, have replied on his talk page, and will likely reply further.

• • You are rationalizing. You made some significant errors in judgement here, and your mistakes are by far a larger problem than his. Eric's mistakes are moot when it comes to your own culpability, they don't justify your mistakes. If anything, you have shot yourself in the foot and guaranteed that no one can even approach him about his mistakes as you won't properly rectify the issue. As an admin, you are held to a higher standard, one you accepted when you got the bit. We all make mistakes, but we admin don't have the luxury of casually walking away from ours. You left the job half done at Arb, although I'm glad you at least started it. If you are not capable of rising above your personal opinions of an editor (Eric or anyone else), and accept responsibility for obvious mistakes without comparing to theirs, then you should do some soul searching as to whether or not adminship is right for you. As an aside, your actions make life more difficult for all admin, and reinforce all the negative stereotypes we endure. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 02:43, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

As a note, I've not ignored Dennis's comments. I'm currently talking with him about this situation elsewhere.

• • "I don't feel sincerely sorry for offending Eric, and don't think an apology would carry meaning." Well, your garbled copy-paste of Gerda's suggestion on that editor's talk page certainly demonstrates that. Let's leave out the name of the editor because it's basically irrelevant. What happened is that you quite wrongly and gratuitously accused another editor of "gravedancing" (with respect to a real death) and of lacking "common decency". Even though you were quite mistaken in your characterisation as numerable people have pointed out to you and as you have grudgingly admitted, you can't apologise because in your view he was an editor that deserved to be offended? Is that how you feel an administrator should behave to any editor? Is that how you feel civility here should fostered and the example you want to set? If you're looking for any more copy paste suggestions. How about: I mistakenly characterised you as gravedancing and lacking common decency. For that I apologise unreservedly. Voceditenore (talk) 15:06, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
    • It wasn't a gratuitous mischaracterization, Voceditenore. See 05:24, 9 Feb'14‎. Kevin's action in response was misguided, methinks, and probably colored by a) Kevin knowing who the deceased person was plus assuming everybody else did too, and b) Kevin knowing who the people commenting in the thread were and c) Kevin knowing that Jimbo's talkpage is an especially-public forum which has consequences in the wider world (which is why the original "Dear Mizter Walez" post was put there in the first place of course).

  As for your suggestion about an addendum to the first-draft apology, Voceditenore, (and my thanks to Kevin for doing so — appreciated) the addendum sounds pretty good to my ears. The characterization was mistaken, and the mistake led to consequences. Better would have been to hat the whole thread; which *is* what happened eventually, but mistakes were made along the way, in haste. Thus here we are. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 15:47, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

• • • • You're a bit off on some of the factors that made me action the thread, but I would rather not go in to more detail about it on-wiki (although I am sure saying that will bring out the sentiment from some people that absolutely everything should be discussed on-wiki... they're wrong. Some matters should be discussed off-wiki, and off-wiki only.) I'm going to agree with 74.192 that I mischaracterized Eric's behavior (at least on those two points, I'm still perfectly comfortable stating that I believe that Eric violated, at a minimum, the spirit of BLP/BDP and the WMF resolution on BLP.) I also agree with the IP that hatting or IAR revdeling the thread would have been a significantly better course of action than the one that I took, and have said so elsewhere before. That all said, I don't intend to massively reword my apology to Eric to be a resummation of everything I've said elsewhere (though when I have time later today, I'll take another look at what I said and potentially reword it.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:59, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

The fact that you're still comfortable saying that about Eric is a big part of why this is still a huge issue.--Cube lurker (talk) 17:05, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

• At this late stage I doubt very much Eric wants some half-hearted, mealy mouthed reworded 'apology' from you. You keep talking about your actions and discussions off-wiki without realising that no one believes you. They are probably as bogus as the secret evidence you claim justified your behaviour, which only justifies your actions in you imagination. In a way, I feel sorry for you, the Arbcom, by refusing to admonish you, have cast you adrift almost as much as Eric.  Giano  17:17, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

(talk page stalker)Kevin. You are missing a significant point. Regardless of Eric's comments (which I happen to agree with but that is by the by) the original post was the thread that violated WP:BDP. BDP affords BLP protection in articles and discussions where "contentious or questionable material about the dead that has implications for their living relatives and friends, such as in the case of a possible suicide.." That thread on the founder's page offended in that the person referred to was readily identifiable from immediately available resources here on WP and subsequently on the wider www. Blaming Eric for BDP while ignoring the same clear offence in the OP is ignorance of the meaning of the very policy you quoted. All Eric did was criticise it in open and honest terms. You jumped on Eric's repudiation of the thread and failed to see the violation in the thread. A double error of judgement. Leaky Caldron 17:20, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

It should be noted that it's extremely doubtful that Eric or many editors this side of the Atlantic had ever heard of that late Wikipedian. I suspect that a lot of this problem could be blamed on the common American belief that there's no world outside the USA.  Giano  17:25, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Wow...that really helps! This is just a misunderstanding more than anything else...the last thing that might fix a misunderstanding is more polarizing commentary.--MONGO 20:58, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

24-36 hours

• As a heads up, I'll be archiving most matters related to this at some point in the next 24-36 hours. This isn't trying to sweep anything under a rug, I just don't think that much productive (unless you count further drama as productive) will come out of continued discussion of this issue here Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:59, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Notification of case being declined

Hello. An Arbitration Case Request that you were listed as being an involved party to titled Kevin Gorman—Eric Corbett has been declined and closed. If you would like to read the arbitrators' comments you can do so here.--Rockfang (talk) 05:19, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Clarification request

FYI: Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification and Amendment#Clarification request: BLP special enforcement (permalink). For what it's worth, while I think your actions were monumentally stupid, I disagree with many people that you acted with malicious intent; I'm more interested in getting ArbCom to clarify the bounds of BLP special enforcement than I am in getting you sanctioned. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 10:35, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps the issue is...

Hey, Kevin. I think the problem here is that, while you've admitted you've made mistakes, you haven't been explicit about what those mistakes were. Saying "I made mistakes" is good, but the point is that it's more than just that you handled it sub-optimally. It's that what you did (invoking BLP/BDP and AE for a non-BLP/BDP comment) was intrinsically wrong. I don't think you've actually acknowledged that aspect of it onwiki, and that's why this keeps going on. (Well, there are other reasons that people keep trying to restart it, of course, but this is why it keeps getting traction, at least.) The way you've apologized has been vague about what you've actually learned; it could've been "I'll be more careful about invoking BLP and AE", but it also could've been just "I'll remember about page protection next time" or "I'll email Arbcom/emergency first" or any number of other things; some of these lessons are good ones, but most miss the point that you can't use BLP/BDP and AE that way. I don't think many of us are asking for self-flagellation here; it's just that people need to be sure that this kind of misapplication of BLP/BDP and AE won't happen again, and your statements have been equivocal (at best) about that so far. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 19:28, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

• Hi Writ Keeper: unfortunately, I have been explicit about what those mistakes were, they've just been buried underneath a flood of hundreds of kilobytes of posts here. I've previous gone in to significant detail on my talk page about them in a diff that has been linked to multiple times at the current RFAR. I haven't exhaustively covered them in public, and I don't feel obligated to at this point. Every single suggestion you've made I've already explicited stated on-wiki. And I've gone in to further detail about them off-wiki with arbcom. I do appreciate the suggestion, but it's not one that I think would be likely to do anything. At this point, I'm more than content to let arbcom put forth a ridiculous meaningless statement that quite literally says less than what arb comments have already said, archive it, and proceed to revert any further trolls who bring it forth. (If you look a few sections up, you'll note that someone was literally hounding me for talking to an OTRS agent off-wiki, in a section that was later literally partially oversighted for revealing too many details on-wiki.) Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate the advice, it's just not something that's going to do anything. I really am tired of having this mess on my talk page, and will be archiving your post in the near future, but to be clear, am not being sarcastic about appreciating it. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:39, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

• You asked me, Do you see any advantage to having two separate discussions and two separate motions about the exact same issue on two different pages? If not, then they should be condensed. The two discussions deal with different issues.

  I hope you'll understand why I didn't respond immediately, and be more patient next time. I answered you several times yesterday, and do not think "WP:ARBACCT" (a flawed concept, by the way, as arbitrators' terms are limited, whereas administrators sit indefinitely) requires me to answer a quick succession of questions. AGK [•] 19:47, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

I hope I'm misreading your last sentence as it seems to imply that arbitrators shouldn't feel an obligation to respond to questions about their actions. As much as anything w/r/t to answering specific questions, I was more bewildered by the fact that I had to ask multiple times, in bold text, pinging specific arbitrators at the RFAR to explain why on earth they thought the motion was necessary, reasonable, and what they thought it actually did than bewildered by your lack of an answer here. Arbcom passing a motion where one arbitrator voting in favor for it pretty explicitly doesn't think it's a good idea and where it took more than 24 hours (where multiple arbs were active on the RFAR) to answer a simple question about an active motion is, to be polite, a bit odd. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:56, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

• @Kevin: If you're talking about this diff, well, no, you don't actually talk about BLP etc. at all. You do talk about some other things, but you don't say "invoking BLP and AE like that, on an edit that didn't actually violate BLP, was wrong, and I won't do it again." I suppose that If I encounter a similar situation in the future that involves someone like Malleus - a vested contributor - where I am unable to resolve the situation without taking such an action, I'm sending it straight to arbcom and the office. could be taken as an indirect admission of this, but it's far from unambiguous, especially with qualifiers like "vested contributor"--invoking BLP and AE for a comment that didn't violate BLP is just as problematic against a newbie as a vested contributor. If that's not the diff you're talking about, I'll keep digging around, but my point is that perhaps you haven't said what you thought you said. And yeah, you're right that writing yet another statement or whatever is not going to stop anything; I'm not really asking you to do so. I'm just trying to explain why at least I wanted further clarification on this. Anyway, archive away or whatever; just wanted to explain myself. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 19:59, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

I hope you don't mind the fact that I'm mentioning you as someone I spoke to off-wiki, but I thought I remembered actually explicitly reassuring you of the fact that I wouldn't use BLP/AE/IAR in that combination again privately. I could be confusing people, because I'm still getting >15 emails a day and multiple chat comments about this, and if so, I'm sorry. I believe I've said it explicitly on-wiki as well, but just in case I haven't: of course I'm not going to use BLP/AE/IAR in the combination again. Besides for the fact that multiple better alternatives have been pointed out (like full page protection or revdeling edits temporarily to force a discussion period,) the degree to which it backfired means that simply sending my information to arbcom and the office and having one or the other deal with it would be an infinitely preferable solution. In the sentence you quoted "such an action" was intended to be explicitly the combination of BLP/AE/IAR. It wasn't perfectly worded, but at the time I posted it my talkpage was being aggressively swarmed to the point of catching me offguard. With almost anyone other than Eric, IAR hatting a thread or part of a thread would be completely sufficient to get them to back off, at least until they understood what was going on. With Eric, it wasn't. I'd feel perfectly comfortable IAR hatting a similar thread in the future based off of similar information, although I'd still probably inform arbcom immediately given how ridiculous this situation has gotten. In a situation where that didn't work, I would consider an alternative (e.g., full protection,) while sending info to arbs and calling Philippe. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:25, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

Arbitration request motion passed

A motion that was proposed for the Arbitration Request initiated on February 17, 2014 that you were a party to has passed. The motion can be found here. The following is the text of the motion:

• The committee notes that it is not in dispute that User:Kevin Gorman has acted out of process and in a manner which is incompatible with the standards to which administrators are held.
• The committee notes and accepts Kevin Gorman's assurances that he has learned by his mistakes and will not repeat them.
• Kevin Gorman is strongly admonished.
• The request shall be filed as "Kevin Gorman".
• The request for a full case is declined.

For the Arbitration Committee, Rockfang (talk) 01:42, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

• I'll be archiving this shortly, as I've been doing with everything else related to this case, but for archival purposes I would like to note:

1. An admonishment is, in a literal sense, meaningless. This was a poorly written motion, in that it failed to acknowledge (a) that I acted in good faith, (b) the problems of other users involved in the case, including the fact that the filer has been arbcom blocked twice for repeated personal attacks and editwarring, (c) that a number of statements on the RFAR made it clear that although my actions should not be repeated, the second half of the first point of the motion motion is factually incorrect, and (d) that the motion doesn't actually do anything - basing a motion off the wording Carcharoth used at the clarification request would've been infinitely more sensible (although I'll note that I'm still disturbed that Carcharoth voted to support a motion that he didn't actually support.)
2. The second bullet point in the motion is rather silly.
3. The third bullet point dealing with the naming of the case doesn't make a whole lot of sense given that the filer of the case has received two arbitration blocks during the course of the case, and it is customary for arbitration outcomes to reflect the actions of all participants. "Kevin Gorman, Giano, et al" would be a much more sensible name, as I would expect NYB would agree.
4. The entire case should have been finished a week ago, even if it ended in a similar motion then. The behavior of certain members of arbcom in the interim has been vaudevillian, and if it was possible to submit an RFAR about the actions of arbcom itself, multiple sitting arbitrators would have been 'strongly admonished' for their quite literally ludicrous actions. And yes, if this motion had come a week ago, I wouldn't be snarking about it.
5. Amazingly, I think the only almost universal point of agreement between me, Giano, and most of the rest of the community is that arbcom badly fucked up their handling of this, and probably shouldn't do so again.

Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:57, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

Arbitration request motion passed

An Arbitration Clarification request motion passed. You contributed to the discussion (or are on the committee or a clerk)

The motion reads as follows:

• By way of clarification, the formal warning issued by Kevin Gorman was out of process and therefore has no effect. The provisions of WP:BLPBAN will be reviewed by the Arbitration Committee and where necessary updated.

For the Arbitration Committee, --MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:59, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

This Month in Education: January 2014

This Month in Education – Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2014 Headlines Wikimedia Deutschland starts alliance for Open Educational Resources (OER); Berlin discusses introduction of OER in schools Next EduWiki conference slated for Serbia Presentation on Wikipedia at the 8th Congress of Innovation and Educational Technology in Monterrey, Mexico Presentation on Wikipedia at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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This Month in Education: February 2014

This Month in Education – Volume 3, Issue 2, February 2014 Headlines Wikimania still accepting submissions for Education related presentations Wikimedia Deutschland: Summany of activities in January 2014 Wiki Borregos begin Spring 2014 projects Free online course: Writing Wikipedia Articles Turning senior Czech citizens into Wikipedians Editing Wikipedia brochure helps newbies learn basics New features for course pages released Interactive elements added to editing tutorials Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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Invitation to a stroll

Rauenthal, Rheingau

On a hike around here, it crossed my mind to invite you to a stroll of my 2013 talk, looking at the (not many) contributions by MF and Eric, including discussion of the name change. I will not judge, look yourself, - of course every guest is "tamed" by my edit notice (not by me) "Every editor is a human being", to something like "OK, later. Have to warn you though that I'm not really a Wikipedian, have never been a Wikipedian, and I scare away women, children and new editors. Allegedly. But I'll try and be gentle." I miss him, not only as a content editor but as a person, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:41, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

When you return, think of improving the Ethics, in prep here, looks like for tomorrow, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:21, 7 March 2014 (UTC)

Actually not gone - just ridiculously busy, the joys of a 60 hour week. I'll try to improve her article before it goes live, and do have all the necessary materials around. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:33, 7 March 2014 (UTC)

Good! It's now in Prep 1, the temporary prep was deleted, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:15, 7 March 2014 (UTC)

ps: I still recommend the stroll. I translated yesterday's TFA, at least a subset, to German and learned a lot, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:20, 7 March 2014 (UTC)

• Boo. I didn't have time to expand it before it went live. I really had intended to, but my dayjob decided to start doing comms outreach over the last two weeks, which has meant that most of my life has involved talking to journalists lately, and has sucked up my free time. I wish I'd managed to expand it before it went up, but will certainly do so in the future once stuf calms down for me irl. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:51, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

You are busy, I can see. I am on vacation, for more stolls, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:42, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

I am back, how about you? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:07, 25 March 2014 (UTC)

Finish our discussion

Kumioko, I did say I'd block you if you used the same IPs you used on my talk elsewhere.

Sorry to change on you again and bring this here but it seems another admin removed talk page access. It really is a trivial thing to get another account and or IP. Anyway, in regards to the ban, that was a dozen users, most of whom wanted me gone long ago and it was closed far too soon. I received many emails fro users saying they never had a chance to vote (some were oppose and some were support). Several also told me that they feared reprisal if they voted so they stayed away. When you have users afraid to vote for fear of being blocked by Arbcom or some admins for supporting a user who is critical of them, that is a major problem IMO. You yourself have seen how petty and frankly stupid they can be. I also understand there is no bad blood between us and you are just, excuse the comment, blindly following policy and blocking a sockmaster. For what its worth, more than half of the socks (about 60 of the 100+) that are accused of being me are not. They are just evidence of how shitty the checkuser tool is. Anyway, feel free to block this IP or whatever, I can get another one. Its amazing but there are literally millions of IP's available for use. 172.56.3.236 (talk) 21:36, 8 March 2014 (UTC) BTW, if I wanted to hide I could or I could do harm. I have been intentionally obvious with my editing. If I wanted to harm the project I would just create a few hundred socks and then put a million articles in the watchlist of each one. That would crush the server and its outside blockable items for admins or even functionaries. 172.56.3.236 (talk) 21:38, 8 March 2014 (UTC) As an initial post, I'd request that any patrolling admins don't block Kumioko immediately as long as he doesn't post anywhere but my own talk page. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:38, 8 March 2014 (UTC) Wow, that was incredibly fast. I think Leaky caldron must have a Kumioko sensor on his butt to get me that quick..Lol. 172.56.3.236 (talk) 21:41, 8 March 2014 (UTC) (edit conflict)Well I don't think that is acceptable. He has exactly at the time of writing 101 socks and you want to give him succour by letting him come here? No way. Off to ANI if that's your way of undermining policy. Leaky Caldron 21:44, 8 March 2014 (UTC) Leaky: do you believe that there is any way to effectively stop Kumioko from posting here if he wants to? Furthermore, which do you suppose is a better option, trying to engage with him and convince him to change his ways so that we don't have to waste time blocking hundreds of socks, or spending a hell of a lot of time blocking tons of socks? You may not have realized it, but in administrative actions I tend to take the lightest route possible in hope it works, and then go on to stronger meaures as necessary. I'll block Kumioko myself if he edits anywhere but my talk page, but for now I'm more than happy to have him edit my talk page (and unless my talk page is semiprotected - which it's not going to be - even blocking this one IP wouldn't stop him from coming here.) If you want to go ANI me, I'm a bit confused, but certainly can't stop you from doing so. Nothing productive would come out of that though. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:53, 8 March 2014 (UTC) As I mentioned before about 60 of those aren't mine. Now granted that's still 40+ but its also a testament to how untrustworthy the checkuser tool is. Its fine Kevin, don't go out on a limb for me, as I said, I can just create another one if that's what they want me to do. 172.56.3.236 (talk) 21:46, 8 March 2014 (UTC) Regarding your second post: that wouldn't bring down our servers, though I suppose it might slow them momentarily while WMF addressed the issue. I have at least half a dozen people on speed dial who could fix you doing that in ten minutes. I would also suggest that you doing that would potentially result in serious, real-world implications for you. In a nutshell: don't do it. You are right that I have seen problems with the way Wikipedia handles many situations. The RFaR involving me was an exercise in Vaudeville, and I said as much at the time. Problems don't just involve arbcom; they involve a large number of other editors and administrators as well. During the RFaR about me, I received literally dozens of messages of support from people who stated that they were uncomfortable posting on-wiki because they were worried they'd be subject to personal attacks by people related to the other side of the RFaR. Just like the fact that some people are uncomfortable speaking up because they are worried of repercussions from contradicting arbs isn't okay, a situation where someone's afraid to post their real thoughts because they are worried they'll get doggy-piled by a bunch of editors also isn't okay. I hope that we find a remedy to both of these situations eventually. However: even though I think we need to fix both of those problems eventually, the way you're approaching trying to do so is extremely unproductive. It's not going to bear any meaningful fruit - it will just result in more drama, you getting blocked a lot, and every side digging their trenches even deeper. Both problems need to be fixed, but at the same time, we're here to build an encyclopedia in the end, and we're here to do that even when other problems also exist. Because I don't think your approach to dealing with arbcom issues is likely to result in anything but drama, and because you are not of late active in actually building the encyclopedia, I'll probably keep blocking your accounts as I see them (although, as a point, I didn't actually initially block you for being Kumioko, I blocked you for obviously not being here to build an encyclopedia.) I'd strongly suggest you go do something else for the next six months and then try to take the WP:SO. You'll come back refreshed, less embittered, and more likely to be able to engage with Wikipedia in a positive way again. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:50, 8 March 2014 (UTC) He's been running multiple, simultaneous socks for months. This week 60 were created in 3 days. Do you seriously expect that he will keep his efforts to a single channel? You are giving him the oxygen of a host page while he goes off and creates more socks. Leaky Caldron 21:58, 8 March 2014 (UTC) He certainly will keep his efforts on this IP to this page. If he doesn't, I'll block him. I can't help what he does with the ridiculous quantity of IP addresses he may be using in the rest of the encyclopedia. Am I confident that talking to Kumioko will benefit from this conversation? No, I'm not at all sure of that. Given that I've talked someone down from a serious legal threat that they were serious about to the point of having retained legal counsel within the last two weeks, I also see no harm in trying. If you're going to ANI me, go ahead and ANI me. A limited discussion on one user talk page with a banned user isn't necessarily typical, but it's certainly within my discretion to allow. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:03, 8 March 2014 (UTC) Although I appreciate the sentiment you and I both know the Standard offer is basically BS as can be seen even in as recently as right now with the Will Beback case. So wether I waited 6 months or 10 years, it wouldn't matter. When a ban is enacted it is forever and even those who abide by it are given no more comment than an F off from Arbcom. Also in regards to the suggestion I had about the watchlists, that is only one of many things. If I really wanted to do harm, I wouldn't be doing it from my home/work computer and I wouldn't use my phone. There are a lot of open IP's around and I travel a fair amount. So all I would need do is wait till my next trip to San Fran and do it from the Starbucks down the street from the WMF (Yes I have been to their office a couple times). I also wanted to point out that I have tried every method of bringing Arbcom and abusive admins to task over the years. I started extremely nicely, then I went to being kirt, then rude and now borderline abusive. Nothing works because those in power do not care. They want to stay in power and they will do anything and use any justification to do so. @Leaky caldron:. Bullshit, I did it for the last couple weeks to prove a point and as I have stated before a lot of those that got blocked weren't even me. They were just innocent editors caught up in the drag net. 172.56.3.236 (talk) 22:01, 8 March 2014 (UTC) I do want to clarify a couple exceptions. The Reguyla account was the account I used for Wikia interactions. I never used it in discussions, votes or anything else. The history of the contribs will show that. I also used a couple IP's from time to time from my home or work. Mostly just out of laziness of logging in when I was in a hurry. Again not in votes or to gain the upper hand in discussions. But I am fully capable of playing games as I have shown. If Leaky wants to continue to act like a child, I can continue as well. 172.56.3.236 (talk) 22:04, 8 March 2014 (UTC) @Kumioko - effective change is possible. In the time I've been around Wikimedia projects, we were able to enact significant changes to how images of living people are treated on the Wikimedia Commons. Someone still has to bring up each image, and there's still always debate about it, but it's gone from "we should totally keep these pictures of topless sunbathing women that were taken with a 50x optical zoom through a fence" to "we can't label this lady who is standing in a street known for prostitution as a prostitute without some form of evidence that she is." Effective change will eventually happen on ENWP. It'll be slow, and for the most part it won't involve intentional disruption, but it will happen. The SO sometimes works, and sometimes doesn't. If you don't sock for the next six months, and return in a way that focuses primarily on building encyclopedic content - something you are quite good at, I will vigorously support your return, and would be surprised if it wasn't allowed. And then eventually, in the slow semi-bureaucratic way that Wikipedia tends to work, a lot of the problems you see with arbcom that also appear with other groups will begin to be addressed. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:13, 8 March 2014 (UTC) If I see another red box Ping from you on my talk page from this IP I will ask Kevin or seek another Admin. to block you. Leaky Caldron 22:14, 8 March 2014 (UTC) Kumioko: I agree that this request is reasonable. Please do not ping Leaky. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:17, 8 March 2014 (UTC) I won't but for what its worth I am going to lose this IP soon. I am using the internet on my phone and I need to make some calls so once I unplug, the IP will change. I also wished I shared your view that change occurs. I have seen changes such as removing the tools from admins after a year of absence (I think it should be 6 months). I also saw the breaking off of some useful tools for the sysop bit (rollback, Filemover, Template editor) but that only occurred and became necessary because there is no trust inthe community. But there are far more issues that remain to be fixed and too many trying to hamstring the project. A few admins have manipulated the community into thinking the admin tools are for gods alone, so now the RFA process is so painful few wish to endure it and even fewer pass it. I do not think that I will be allowed to come back and frankly as long as the project is controlled by a dozen abusive admins and a bunch of Arbs that would rather deliberate than act I don't know if I want too. This project is a complete joke anymore and the environment is toxic. Like you, I used to strongly advocate for the project. I spoke often with people at the National Archives, Smithsonian, DOD, and others in the DC area. I have given all of them better alternatives in the last year than Wikipedia. Flikr just got a mound of images from DOD because I suggested it would be better than commons. It took very little effort to persuade them away. I simply can no longer advocate for this project with the culture the way it is. Unless it changes significantly. 172.56.3.236 (talk) 22:28, 8 March 2014 (UTC) Admittedly the example of change I gave was from Commons rather than here, but I think it represents a pretty significant change. Commons used to regularly keep images related to nudity, sexuality, and crime even when there was no evidence of the consent of the subject - now they don't. I think that was one of Commons biggest moral failings, and the needle has moved significantly from unethical to ethical (even if it's not necessarily there yet.) The RfA pass rate is actually better this year than it has been in past years, and went I went through my own RfA in the recent past, to my surprise, it wasn't a painful process. Cultural change in Wikipedia (and our sister sites) is slow, but it occurs. If you stop socking and disrupting the project, I have little doubt that we'd be able to get you reaccepted as a community member six months from now. If you keep doing the same stuff.. well.. you'll become a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's worth noting that I had no idea you were Kumioko when I blocked you, I just blocked you because your posts were obviously not leading anywhere productive. Chillax for six months, come back, start working on content (which you aren't bad at,) and then slowly start moving in to administrative areas again. If you take a different path, it'll just be creating a lot of (fairly easy) work for the admins you hold such disdain for, which will both mean time taken away from us writing Wikipedia, and fewer good feelings towards you if you do try to come back. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:40, 8 March 2014 (UTC) I have to be honest I don't really recognize the community ban. It wasn't representative of the community in respect to the numbers of people who voted or the time it was held. Especially given the fact they kept reopening new ban discussions until they got what the wanted. It was a joke and a sham. Arbcom is allowed to consider secret evidence in their deliberations, I should be able to count the votes of those that sent me emails too right? I have no interest in spending the next several years building my Wiki career back up when I see abusive admins and editors running all over this site. If they want me to pick a username and stick to that then that's fine I will do that and agree not to create any more accounts or intentionally edit as an IP. But I am not going to let Arbcom or a few abusive admins scare me off of duly criticizing them and their bad decisions. I also freely admit that I am but an insignificnt little flea in this project. But its surprising just how irritating a tiny little flea can be when it won't go away. 172.56.3.236 (talk) 22:58, 8 March 2014 (UTC) So if you think you can get them to agree to me using one account then unlock the Reguyla one and I will stick with that from here on out. I understand you don't have the power to override a community ban, such as it is, but I figure its a reasonable compromise. 23:09, 8 March 2014 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.56.3.236 (talk) I'm pretty much positive I can get one of you accounts unblocked six months from now with a few strictures placed on it if you stop socking. Other than it's dubious. Unfortunately in some situations you cannot count votes emailed to you: otherwise my recent RFaR would've had a far different outcome. Additionally unfortunately, it's not that hard to swat a flea. This is probably the longest dialogue anyone has had with you for a whle, and keep in mind that at least one editor rejected the validity of me even allowing you to post here. Take six months off Wikipedia without socking, come back and present an unban proposal, and it'll likely be accepted - I'll certainly vigorously argue in it's favor. Then what you get back, spend some time dealing with content issues, the stuff you actually liked, before getting dragged in to drama. Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:47, 9 March 2014 (UTC) Im glad your positive but I have been on this project since 2007 and I have seen very few allowed to come back. Most of those who did come back had so many stalkers they were setup for failure. They couldn't make an edit without someone complaining about something. I'm sorry but I cannot allow a few admins to be abusive or continue to allow arbcom to pass changes in secret that allow them and a few admins increased power to eliminate editors they don't like easier. I appreciate taking the time to chat but I cannot accept this request anymore than you could accept mine. Cheers and Happy editing. 172.56.3.125 (talk) 15:37, 9 March 2014 (UTC) Also, for what its worth even if I did wait 6 months I am going to get blamed for editing anyway. The checkuser tool is pretty much crap and is prone to false positives and if an IP or new editor edits any of the pages I tend to edit they are going to get blamed for being me. I have seen it a couple dozen times in just the last couple weeks. As I mentioned, about half the accounts that are listed as being me aren't, so that is evidence in itself. 172.56.3.58 (talk) 18:34, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

• Is it an absolute guarantee? Well, no. But it's better than the odds you've got currently. Without meaning any of this in a perjorative sense, if you continue down the road you're on, you'll end up blocking the efforts of those who would like to see reform, while serving as a sort of useful idiot for those who are perfectly happy with Wikipedia as it is today and don't desire reform. You can continue to minorly disrupt things here and there if you feel like it, but what good does that do anyone? It wastes your time and ours, and makes meaningful reform of some of Wikipedia's serious issues less likely to happen. I would strongly suggest that you pick up a different hobby for the next six months, and then come back and see what happens. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:39, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

ArbCom Notice

You are involved in a recently filed request for arbitration. Please review the request at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Ihardlythinkso and, if you wish to do so, enter your statement and any other material you wish to submit to the Arbitration Committee. Additionally, the following resources may be of use—

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests#Requests for arbitration;
• Wikipedia:Arbitration guide.

Thanks, Northern Antarctica (talk) 16:31, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

Paid editors

Hi Kevin. I'd be interested to know whether you think I've been a good detective or am just paranoid here... Some obvious paid editors IMO and I keep on finding more, but as with Morning277 it's difficult to know how they're linked. What do you reckon should be done about this stale edit by a new editor removing a PROD from an article written by an elancer? SmartSE (talk) 20:39, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi SmartSE - There's certainly a connection between the editor who removed the prod and the one who created the article. There's more or less three possibilities: the prod remover is the subject of the article (or has a direct connection to the subject,) the prod remover is the initial paid editor, or the prod remover is a second paid editor hired to correct the mistakes of the first. Although it's an old edit, CU logs are retained for 90 days, so it's not stale in terms of CU yet. I would AfD the article as you have, and then add the prod remover to the SPI you opened. My opinion of what warrants a CU doesn't always match up with checkusers opinions of what warrants a CU, but from past experience, if one is run, there's a good chance it will turn up other results. If the remover is related to the subject of the article it may be useless, but in both cases #2 and #3 it would provide a reasonable (though not guaranteed) shot at turning up other undeclared accounts of the same paid editor, and would thus give us a reason to block them (since covert paid editing isn't blockable at the moment but socking is.) Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:05, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

I'd bet #2, but regardless it shows something dodgy going on. 90 days ey? I must need to go and read a policy somewhere but neither WP:SOCK or WP:CHECKUSER mention the limit. Can you point me to something before I list it? Cheers SmartSE (talk) 21:46, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi Smartse - that would be my initial guess too, and is the most common outcome in my experience. The duration that CU information is held for is mentioned on meta and is consistent between wikis. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:51, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

Thanks! Strange that it's not mentioned here though. SmartSE (talk) 22:00, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

I know I've seen it mentioned on ENWP previously, but for some reason you are right - it doesn't seem to be mentioned on any of the relevant policy pages. That's probably an oversight worth addressing at some point, but after the last few weeks I'm staying away from trying to shape policy pages for a bit, heh. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:02, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

policy against trolling

Yes since you asked - I do know the policy against trolling (at least on Meta Wiki).

It is located here: [22]

"Trolls in the internet sense of the word are not to be confused with large warty monsters thought to dwell under bridges, in caves, etc. There are many types of disruptive users that are not trolls. Reversion warriors, POV warriors, cranks, impolite users, and vocal critics of Wikipedia structures and processes are not necessarily trolls. Deliberate misuse of processes is a favourite troll game. Examples include continual nomination of articles for w:Wikipedia::Miscellany for deletion, nomination of stubs for w:Wikipedia:Featured article candidates, baseless listing of users at w:Wikipedia:Requests for comment"

Uncle uncle uncle 02:44, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

Revert on Men's rights movement

I don't see how this isn't a blatant one sided attack on this article. Meaning, I should be able to put something there immediately after that saying that mens rights are also seen as a proper movement and something related to the womens rights movement. There is nothing in the first section of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_rights_movement that is an attack on it. Nothing. I see your revert as nothing more than an ideological edit, and feel that your opinion is clouding what the article should be, completely neutral. - StevieY19

• Hi User:StevieY19 - the two pages differ in the content they present because the reliable sources that talk about each subject differ significantly in what they say. WP:NPOV states that we should present content in articles roughly in proportion to how they are presented in reliable sources; if reliable sources differ in what they say (and here they do), then it's perfectly appropriate that the articles differ in what they say. This is something that has been discussed quite often in the past, if you'd like to reopen the discussion, please do so at the relevant talk page: Talk:Men's_rights_movement. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:53, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

Was hoping to ask you, at what level would be an acceptable amount of source be for what I removed to actually stick? Or even, add to it to offer a counter view? It's a hot topic article it seems, and would rather approach it correctlyStevieY19 (talk) 00:44, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi StevieY19 - sorry to not reply yet, but I wanted to take the time to type up a full response that will actually directly answer your question rather than just sending you towards a policy page. I'll ping you again with a real answer later tonight. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:39, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

You're invited! WikiWomen's Edit-a-thon at the University of California, Berkeley

Saturday, April 5 - WikiWomen's Edit-a-thon at the University of California, Berkeley - You are invited!

The University of California, Berkeley's Berkeley Center for New Media is hosting our first edit-a-thon, facilitated by WikiWoman Sarah Stierch, on April 5! This event, focused on engaging women to contribute to Wikipedia, will feature a brief Wikipedia policy and tips overview, followed by a fast-paced energetic edit-a-thon. Please bring your laptop and be prepared to edit about women and women's history! The event is April 5, from 1-5 PM, at the Berkeley Center for New Media Commons at Moffitt Library. You must RSVP here - see you there! SarahStierch (talk) 22:13, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

Concerning non-existent Violence against men article

Surely it's poor practice to redirect to a different article? 'Domestic violence against men' is not the same as 'Violence against men' and until that article is written, the page itself should probably be deleted. --Drowninginlimbo (talk) 22:07, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

• Hi Drowninginlimbo - we generally consider redirects to be in essence an extremely low cost item, even when they're not completely one for one topic matches, and even when they're potentially controversial or non-neutral redirects, as long as they are of potential use to. As it's project wide pretty long-standing practice, it would both be pretty hard to change, and has some significant advantages anyway (mostly, by focusing the discussion of redirects on whether or not they're potentially useful instead of whether or not they're neutral or accurate, we ensure that users are directed to the content they're looking for more often than not, even if their conception doesn't match ours or doesn't match the conception most widely held.) This particular redirect was originally created as a result of a discussion that moved the content that was formerly at that name to a new article titled 'domestic violence against men,' pruning it back slightly in the process (primarily because sources discuss DV against men as a coherent concept, but don't treat 'violence against men' as a coherent concept.) It's been discussed a number of times, and generally held to be worth keeping because at least some fraction of our users are likely to be looking for info about DV against men by searching for 'violence against men,' and because it's the probably the closest thing we have to an article about 'violence against men.'

From a practical standpoint, redirects are not indexed in Google etc anyway, so the only time this redirect will come in to play is if someone explicitly goes looking for it (it's quite possible to make an article about cats show up to look like it's an article about dogs in the text of an article without the presence of a redirect anyway - ex: dogs.) Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:38, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

Okay, I think I understand that. Thank you for such an expansive answer. The thing is, I don't understand why there is a category for 'Violence against men' if 'Violence against men' isn't a coherent topic for an article? Surely one of the two should go? The redirect acts as an excuse for the category, while the category itself doesn't have an article. --Drowninginlimbo (talk) 22:41, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi Drowninginlimbo - now the category itself I don't have as good as an answer for, heh. To be honest I hadn't noticed it existed until looking at your recent edits. It's probably worth listing the category at WP:CFD to either be deleted or renamed as DV against men. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:47, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

Thank you, would you know how to do that? I'm relatively new here, I made an account because I was shocked at some of the biased entries on here. I'll look into that though. Thanks again. --Drowninginlimbo (talk) 22:50, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

Notification of case being declined

The Arbitration Case Request titled Ihardlythinkso has been declined and closed. If you would like to read the arbitrators' comments you can do so here. For the Arbitration Committee, Rockfang (talk) 02:51, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

Userspace drafts with categories

Some your userspace drafts, including User:Kevin Gorman/ResortsandLodges.com, User:Kevin Gorman/RxWiki and User:Kevin Gorman/Search Engine People, have on them categories which should only be added to mainspace articles. These can be removed by adding a colon between the [[ and Category:Foo. Because these pages are fully protected, I cannot do this myself and so ask you if you would remove them until the articles are moved to the mainspace. Thanks, Rcsprinter₁₂₃ (gas) @ 12:37, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

• Awkward - they aren't my drafts, but rather some of the spam done by Wiki-PR that I preserved as a demo for posterity, and I missed the fact that some were still catted. Fixed, sorry about that. Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:01, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

Blue Morpho Ayahuasca center

Kevin, I've been following the Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Blue Morpho Ayahuasca center conversation, including your recent comments on @IronGargoyle:'s talk page. I think you need to take a step back and think about your actions here.

From what I can see, things first went wrong when you stated on the oringal AfD that you knew of reliable sources, but didn't disclose them. If your goal was to improve the encyclopedia, a better thing to do would have been to tell people what these sources were that you had discovered. Even if you didn't have the time to insert them into the article and format them properly, just pasting the raw references into the AfD, or the article's talk page, would have been progress. Instead, you hinted at their existence, and when two other editors said they could not locate these, you failed to supply the needed details. If I was closing the AfD, I would have seen exactly what @Salvio giuliano: saw when he did the close; three people making policy-based arguments for deletion, and one person arguing to keep, but failing to provide any real information. Closing it as delete was a no-brainer.

Then, you dragged it to delrev. You don't seem to understand the purpose of delrev. It is not to give people a second chance to argue the AfD. It is to review if the admin who closed the AfD did so in accordance with policy. Seven people agreed that the close was correct. One person disagreed. 7:1 is about as strong a consensus as we ever get. It's over.

But, what I really don't understand is why you then felt the need to harangue the admin who closed the delrev, on his talk page. There, you state that you don't even really care about the article in question, you're just trying to effect some kind of policy change. That's called making a WP:POINT. It is disruptive, and counter-productive to what we're trying to do here, which is write an encyclopedia. If you believe there is some change needed int the Afd and/or delrev processes, the place to lobby for your desired changes is on Wikipedia_talk:Deletion_policy, and/or Wikipedia talk:Deletion review.

-- RoySmith (talk) 11:32, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

• The amount of bad faith you've managed to cram in to one comment is, frankly, astounding. Yes, I knew of the existence of multiple reliable sources during the AfD. I saw no need to link any of them because they're literally on the first page of google. Anyone who had spent quite literally two minutes with Google would have found the exact same references I did. I failed to supply them when Bearian asked for it because I had an exceptionally busy week, have several thousand pages on my watchlist, and he didn't explicitly ping me. If he had, I would've had the references up the next time I logged on to Wikipedia. And if you think that per nom is a policy based argument for deletion, then I'm more than a bit worried about your ability to determine consensus.

As I stated multiple times during the DRV, I brought it to DRV explicitly because I did have a problem with Salvio's close, as was well laid out by Rich's comment. Given that I've explicitly stated more than once that I believed Salvio's close was inappropriate and that was the reason I brought it to DRV, continuing to accuse me of failing to understand the purpose of DRV is a textbook case of WP:IDHT, bordering on tendentiousness. I'm additionally concerned that you are framing consensus purely in terms of vote count, and additionally concerned that you aren't even counting !votes correctly.

Admins should expect to have questions asked about the actions they take, and framing a fairly simply exercise of WP:ADMINACCT as haranguing them beggars belief. And, if what you got out of my posts on Iron's talk page was that I was trying to effect some sort of policy change, please, go read my posts again. I mean that completely literally, go back and read what I actually wrote. Kevin Gorman (talk) 16:31, 30 March 2014 (UTC)