Marktwain403

Hello Marktwain403, and welcome to Wikipedia! Here are some recommended guidelines to help you get involved. Please feel free to contact me if you need help with anything. Best of luck and happy editing! Runcorn 10:08, 6 August 2006 (UTC) Getting started Wikipedia Tutorial How to edit a page The five pillars of Wikipedia Manual of Style Be bold in editing How to write a great article WikiProjects Getting your info out there Cite your sources Neutral Point of View Point of View Verifiability Uploading images Image use policy Getting more Wikipedia rules Policy Library Getting help New contributors' help page Where to ask a question Help Desk Frequently Asked Questions Getting along Wikipedians Wikiquette Civility Sign your posts Conflict resolution Getting technical Pages needing attention Peer review Utilities Village pump

Putin article

Please discuss your extensive edits to the Putin article on the article's Talk page. I've already created a section for this discussion. Thanks! --ElKevbo 02:36, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Also be aware of the 3RR rule. In other words avoid reverting edits more than 2 times in the spate of 24 hours or less, as that can lead to a temporary block of your account.59.101.213.17 04:40, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Please try not to start new sections if there are already (multiple) other sections discussing the same issues. And please try to post new comments at the bottom of Talk pages. This will help us stay on task and lessen potential confusion. Thanks! --ElKevbo 19:10, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

I have requested you be temporarily blocked for violating the Three revert rule. --ElKevbo 20:43, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Blocked

You have been blocked for a period of twenty-four hours for violating the three-revert rule on Vladimir Putin. To contest this block, please reply here on your talk page by adding the text {{unblock|your reason here}} along with the reason you believe the block is unjustified, or email the blocking administrator or any administrator from this list. -- tariqabjotu 00:09, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Welcome

Looks like you ran into some trouble over the Putin article. Sorry about that. Honestly, if you want the opinion of an editor who has been there, let it drop for a few weeks. There are enough other articles that need your help and expertise. I notice that you were a chemist, if you want to find some chemistry articles that need help, check out Wikipedia:WikiProject Chemistry. There are lots of active projects seeking to focus and improve entire sections of Wikipedia. There are MANY places to get involved. The Community Portal at the left also has lots of good ways to get into editing.

As an aside on the Putin article, it sucks that one of your first days around here you ran into one of the unbreakable rules of wikipedia: the 3-revert rule. As a basic principle, avoid getting into non-productive back-and-forths with other editors. You can be 100% right, but edit wars don't solve any problems. My best advice again is to let the Putin article be a piece of propagandist trash for a while. There are enough other articles that need help.

If you need any help, or have any questions at all, drop me a note on my talk page. --Jayron32|talk|contribs 03:15, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Warren National University

I've removed your edits to this article. They fail WP:NPOV and appear to be more vandalism than good faith editing. If you decide to continue work on this article, please discuss changes on the talk page first. Avruch^Talk 12:19, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

I concur above. Let's take it to discussion with your edits...

Rkowalke 20:59, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Regarding your question asked at the WNU Wikipage:

2007-10-06T20:32:26 Marktwain403 (18,060 bytes) (Are you on the payroll of this diploma mill, Rkowalke)

Nope. I am on another payroll.

Please refrain from making unconstructive edits to Wikipedia, as you did to Warren National University. Your edits appear to constitute vandalism and have been reverted. If you would like to experiment, please use the sandbox. Thank you.

Marktwain403, I know that your edits are motivated by a noble desire that Wikipedia should tell the truth. I agree that the truth is clear that WNU is academically substandard. If you look on WP:V you'll see that truth really can't be our primary goal. More important is WP:NPOV and WP:V. However, I believe that if WP:NPOV and WP:V are strictly adhered to and there are editors like us to counter the occasional tendentious editor then the truth will win out. Have fun, TallMagic 23:55, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm truly sorry that I had to revert your changes. As indicated by my edit summary, it is bad form to delete properly sourced information from the article without discussing it first. Your other edit that was reverted was adding a summary statement to the lead paragraph. This summary statement was not really directly supported by information in the article. It would first need to be added to the body of the article and supported by WP:V and WP:RS before being added to the lead paragraph. I do thank you and encourage your concern, desire, and effort to improve Wikipedia. I suggest that you review some of the Wikipedia policies and guidelines that have been mentioned. Thank you again, TallMagic 17:19, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Please refrain from your nonconstructive edits.

Further, protect tags only work if you're an admin. HalfShadow 01:51, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Hi Marktwain, regarding this edit of yours [1], you apparently reverted back to a previous version. This required me and others to re-enter our edits. Even though I'm sure it was not your intent to undo my edits your gross nonspecific revert had that effect. Please be more careful that your edits don't actually make the article worse, especially when doing reverts. I only mention this because it is not the first time that you've done this. Thank you for being more careful in the future. TallMagic 01:51, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Today you reverted the Warren National University article back to a 16:43, 20 October 2007 Marktwain403 version. That means that you undid almost a week's worth of edits. Many of those edits were valuable and needed to remain. I have undone this revert of yours. Please be more selective in your editting in the future. TallMagic 20:32, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

I have noticed that your edits to Vladimir Putin were of the same quality. By restoring and editing an older version you did away with quite a lot of hard work by sensible editors. For instance, did you not see that you restored a paragraph that had been web translated from German? You also deleted a lot of icons asking for a source or reference, and re-introduced dead templates. Actually, the fact that some of your edits there were OK made it almost impossible for other editors to simply revert you, but I for one will not hesitate to do that next time, should you again restore doubtful material. "I only mention this because it is not the first time that you've done this. Thank you for being more careful in the future." --Paul Pieniezny 08:29, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Since you did not pay attention, I have blocked you for 24 hours. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 05:22, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Blocked

It seems that you cannot edit any other articles other than Vladimir Putin and Warren National University, and even with those two articles you can't seem to edit constructively. You have been indefinitely blocked.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 00:53, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

This user's unblock request has been reviewed by an administrator, who declined the request. Other administrators may also review this block, but should not override the decision without good reason (see the blocking policy).

Marktwain403 (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

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Request reason:

I have been blocked indefinitely for my edits on the subject of Warren National University and Russian President Putin. I request being unblocked for the following reasons. It seems that Wikipedia is not very well equipped to handle this sort of disagreement. Let me explain. It appears that Wikipedia is very valuable advertising real estate that is highly useful for some purposes. For example, the organization, Warren National "University" that is one of the subjects of this disagreement, has been determined by a government investigation to be nothing more than a diploma mill. I have the highest regard for legitimate education but Warren National "University" does not fall in that category. It appears though, that there is enough income in the business of diploma mills, for them to pay someone to groom their site on Wikipedia and work to remove any critical comments. Some of it may be accomplished by one or two individuals who bought their diploma from the school and therefore there is probably some volunteer effort. There is another category of editing though, which seems to be so regular and one-sided, that it may very well be a paid effort by an employee of the organization. That sort of effort surely was not anticipated by the inventors of Wikipedia. If it was anticipated, then there should be a better method of blocking those people who do not present accurate information. To portray a diploma mill as a legitimate school surely does not do good service to the users of Wikipedia.

The editor whom I suspect of being on the payroll of Warren National University is Rkowalke. The following is what another editor had to say about Rkowalke:

"Your edit record so far is consistent with a single-purpose account dedicated to the glorification of Warren National University."

This comment can be found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Editor_review/rkowalke

Now why would Rkowalke sign up solely for the purpose of glorifying Warren National University? He has said that he has a degree from the organization but as persistent and as one sided as his posts are, a more likely explanation is that he is being paid to glorify the school. According to the hearing in the U.S. Senate, the school takes in millions of dollars each year, so it certainly has the money to pay for grooming its information on Wikipedia. Since there is a history of Rkowalke's edits, anyone can see that Rkowalke's contributions are all for the purpose of making Warren National "University" as respectable as possible when in fact it does not deserve respect.

Now about my edits of the article on Russian President Putin. There are one or two Russian contributors to that article who make a major effort to make Putin look as good as possible, stressing his high poll numbers and removing anything critical of Putin. In fact, Putin is well on his way to becoming a dictator in the same mold as Stalin and Hitler. Also in the case of Putin, the Russian government is spending enormous amounts of money and effort to buy favorable publicity. The Russian government has successfully blocked internal travel by the small opposition. Read the article on Putin and you can see that much of the text is intended to show him in the best light. Every time I put some accurate information in the article about how press freedom and political freedom is being curtailed by the Russian government, it is removed from the article. It may be that this is being done by those who sincerely like the Russian leader. But I would not discount the possibility that it is simply a small part of an immense government effort to get favorable publicity for Putin. The Russian government has also been accused of launching Cyber attacks against some small countries in Eastern Europe with which it has had disagreements.

So in summary, I am willing to change my editing work to more closely conform to Wikipedia guidelines, but I request a high level review of the work of the other editors whom I suspect of being on the payroll of Warren National University and the Russian government. I also request that my block be lifted.

Decline reason:

The alleged deficiencies of the content of the articles Warren National University and Vladimir Putin, or the alleged misbehaviour of other editors of these articles, is not relevant here, because that does not in any case justify your editing these articles in violation of our policies, namely our prohibition on edit warring. Accordingly, you have provided no valid grounds for unblock. Your block is also endorsed on the merits, because a review of your recent contribution shows that your edits have mostly been disruptive, removing or vandalising content without providing a reason in the edit summary. There is no indication that you understand why this is wrong and that you will act accordingly if unblocked. — Sandstein 16:08, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

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If you want to make any further unblock requests, please read the guide to appealing blocks first, then use the {{unblock}} template again. If you make too many unconvincing or disruptive unblock requests, you may be prevented from editing this page until your block has expired. Do not remove this unblock review while you are blocked.

Block evasion

This is not going to help getting you unblocked (oh - and I did not even have to look at the anonymous IP's contributions to know it was probably you!). Please stop this disruption. --Paul Pieniezny 23:26, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

The various editors of Wikipedia seem to show little concern for the truthfulness of the content of the Encyclopedia. There are those editors, such as Rkowalke, who are determined to glorify Warren National "University", a business that sells diplomas by mail. This type of business does great harm to society by offering "education" that is not really education. I suspect that Rkowalke is being paid to groom the article on Wikipedia. I doubt very much if the machinery of Wikipedia is designed to effectively deal with such an organization or such an editor. Warren National University has been identified in proceedings in the U.S. Senate as not being a legitimate school. That is good enough for me. Rkowalke should be the one that is blocked. The subject of Warren National University is the only Wikipedia topic in which he has edited. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Marktwain403 (talk • contribs) 01:00, 1 November 2007

While I can agree with much of your sentiment, Marktwain403, there are Wikipedia rules that must be followed. Many of your edits were disruptive rather than constructive. You would revert the whole article back days and in the process undo many constructive edits. This would lower the overall quality of the article and frustrate your fellow editors. Wikipedia is a team process and we must work with other members of the team even when we might disagree with some of their edits. Regards, TallMagic 17:57, 3 November 2007 (UTC)