RFAvaria

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Happy editing! Belbury (talk) 08:44, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Thank you Belbury, that was really nice of you to say. I have some free time for the next foreseeable future, and I was hoping to maybe help provide citations for pages that are missing them and I am fairly good at sorting things to have them dovetail and fit together nicely. Maybe once I get a bit more familiar I can help there also. Seems like there I lots of work to do. thanks again have a good day! RFAvaria (talk) 13:18, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

September 2024

Hello, I'm Myrealnamm-alt. I wanted to let you know that one or more external links you added to National Association of Real Estate Brokers have been removed because they seemed to be inappropriate for an encyclopedia. If you think I made a mistake, or if you have any questions, you can leave me a message on my talk page, or take a look at our guidelines about links. Thank you. Myrealnamm's Alternate Account (talk) 18:30, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

oh Sorry. I thought we had to provide a reference link to show that we werent just making something up that was mentioned but actually existed. thanks for catching that... is it ok if its just like that or do I need to find a different citation?? RFAvaria (talk) 18:53, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Ok, thank you for your reply. I reverted this edit because you added an external link, instead of a source. To add a source/citation, use the button that looks like a quotation mark (") which is next to the link button in visual editor.

However in that edit, there is no need to add the link there because it is the beginning of the article. You can make a section under References called External Links and put the website there.

For your question, I am unsure where you are referring to? Could you please clarify? Thanks! Myrealnamm (💬pros · ✏️cons) 21:11, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

ok thanks, I will put it at the bottom under external links.

On the other question I am just asking about the language used on some of the pages, is it ok to streamline them to make them consistent to all say the same thing/ Some say African American some say blacks some say "the blacks"...and also some say slaves some say enslaved people. Just trying to add consistency to make reading one page to the next more cohesive for the reader, I just wasn't sure if that was a valid of enough of a reason to make an edit. thanks ! RFAvaria (talk) 21:16, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

See the comment at the bottom of this page. Myrealnamm (💬pros · ✏️cons) 21:18, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Hey Myrealnamm- while you are here can I ask you another question? I noticed that a lot of pages related to African American history have flags on them asking for citations or clarifications. I have an extensive background on this topic and have authored a couple books. that said, I noticed that on a lot of pages they say "the blacks" instead of "African Americans" and also there's a lot of usage of the word "slaves" instead of "enslaved people", are we allowed to correct/updates those to the more currently correct language?? RFAvaria (talk) 19:19, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

I don't think so, because Wikipedia is not censored (see WP:CENSOR) and thus it should not be changed. Myrealnamm (💬pros · ✏️cons) 21:13, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

ok, I was just wondering because as I was eating it got a bit difficult to follow when the discussion became about immigrants from Africa and I was like ok what are they referring to the people that migrated or the people that were descendants of slavery...these articles keep interchanging the word "black" so I thought keeping African American consistent might help add clarity ...thanks again for your help RFAvaria (talk) 21:21, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

reading not eating ...lol RFAvaria (talk) 21:40, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia and copyright

Hello RFAvaria! Your additions to African-American history have been removed in whole or in part, as they appear to have added copyrighted content without evidence that the source material is in the public domain or has been released by its owner or legal agent under a suitably free and compatible copyright license. (To request such a release, see Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission.) While we appreciate your contributions to Wikipedia, it's important to understand and adhere to guidelines about using information from sources to prevent copyright and plagiarism issues. Here are the key points:

• Limited quotation: You may only copy or translate a small portion of a source. Any direct quotations must be enclosed in double quotation marks (") and properly cited using an inline citation. More information is available on the non-free content page. To learn how to cite a source, see Help:Referencing for beginners.
• Paraphrasing: Beyond limited quotations, you are required to put all information in your own words. Following the source's wording too closely can lead to copyright issues and is not permitted; see Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing. Even when paraphrasing, you must still cite your sources as appropriate.
• Image use guidelines: In most scenarios, only freely licensed or public domain images may be used and these should be uploaded to our sister project, Wikimedia Commons. In some scenarios, non-freely copyrighted content can be used if they meet all ten of our non-free content criteria; Wikipedia:Plain and simple non-free content guide may help with determining a file's eligibility.
• Copyrighted material donation: If you hold the copyright to the content you want to copy, or are a legally designated agent, you may be able to license the text for publication here. Please see Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials.
• Copying and translation within Wikipedia: Wikipedia articles can be copied or translated, however they must have proper attribution in accordance with Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia. For translation, see Help:Translation § License requirements.

It's very important that contributors understand and follow these practices. Persistent failure to comply may result in being blocked from editing. If you have any questions or need further clarification, please ask them here on this page, or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 19:01, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

Hey there good morning, thanks for the note. can you please share with me what you suspect might be infringing on copyrighted material, as I did actually write the text myself. So if you could provide one or two examples of what you believe is infringing and from where that would be very helpful for me. thanks! RFAvaria (talk) 19:07, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

It looks like you copied a few sentences from this site. Everything from "after 1965" to the end of the paragraph. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 02:20, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

@Firefangledfeathers Hello, hope you had a good day out. I clicked on that link to the Smithsonian article but I can't see where I integrated anything from that article. The only reason this piqued my curiosity of how it got in my edits is that I am not a fan of the Smithsonian at all....ever since that controversy with the NMAAHC I dont see their work as free from political bias or pressure...but that is just my opinion ...neither here nor there.

Here is a list with the history of the 9 edits I have made on the "African American History" page, along with the links to each revision. can you tell me which edit you see it in because I cant seem to put my finger on it, and I'm really curious to get to the bottom of it because I am not keen to just lift copy from someone/somewhere else and even less inclined to use anything from Smithsonian or affiliates... ill try my best to track down where this came from. thanks

Revision as of 08:11, 11 September 2024

RFAvaria (talk | contribs)

Added information about the migration and settlement of the people that came voluntarily to the US that was detailed in Schaefer's book about the legal system in Louisiana and what she learned about voluntary migration of Africans to the US

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=prev&oldid=1245144769

Revision as of 08:13, 11 September 2024

RFAvaria (talk | contribs)

fixed citation error

Tags: Reverted references removed Visual edit

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=next&oldid=1245144769

Revision as of 08:16, 11 September 2024 edit undo

RFAvaria (talk | contribs)

added back citation that was accidentally deleted with previous edit

Tags: Reverted Visual edit

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=next&oldid=1245144916

Revision as of 17:26, 12 September 2024 edit undo

RFAvaria (talk | contribs)

→‎Enslavement: attempted tp put the paragraphs in chronological order because they seemed to be bouncing around a bit making it hard to follow. Also cleaned up a few typos and header issues

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=next&oldid=1245329847

Revision as of 17:27, 12 September 2024 edit undo

RFAvaria (talk | contribs)

→‎Antebellum (1776-1861): added the wod Era so the heading would be consistent with the other sections

Tags: Reverted Visual edit

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=next&oldid=1245375274

Revision as of 17:39, 12 September 2024 edit undo

RFAvaria (talk | contribs)

→‎Racial terrorism: added transitory paragraph that explains the cause of the Great migration

Tags: Reverted Visual edit

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=next&oldid=1245375506

################################################

Revision as of 19:37, 12 September 2024 edit undo

RFAvaria (talk | contribs)

→‎Post-civil rights era: reference to Pierson v ray

Tags: Reverted Visual edit

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=next&oldid=1245395370

Revision as of 21:13, 12 September 2024 edit undo

RFAvaria (talk | contribs)

→‎Scholars of African-American history: list was alphabetized by last name but last name was in second place making the list difficult to follow ..put the list alphabetized and the name being sorted (last name) in the first position ..summary sentence of what each person is famous for which hopefully will help if someone is looking for a certain type of scholar

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=next&oldid=1245402157 RFAvaria (talk) 07:24, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

This matter has been complicated somewhat because an uninvolved admin reviewed the material and found it to be a copyright violation. They deleted the revisions that contained the violations, which means they are no longer visible to you, and the links you provided here don't work for non-admins. You can learn more about that process here, and I encourage you to read through our copyright violation policy. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 11:48, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

Yes I will re-review apparently I've not done a good job of synthesizing.... or as best as I could. I took screenshots of the links as I was creating that list I could try to send them to you or post here so you can see I did not add that statement.... nonetheless It is very interesting that administrators just wholesale delete everything instead of deleting the offending sentence (or even tweaking it)

There are quite a few history pages here on Wiki that are not exactly accurate. The African American history page where we first interacted, has a lot of inaccurate information. I will go over there and we can just have one thread of conversation for ease of following...thanks again for your patience it is very much appreciated, im sure its not always easy. Have a good day and talk soon..bye!! RFAvaria (talk) 12:51, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

Strange edit

Hi RFAvaria, I find myself a bit puzzled by this edit, where you added a lot of information with two sources, neither of which even mentions Sasaki's name. The text is strangely detailed and written in a style that doesn't work in an encyclopedia article. Where, exactly, did you actually find the information? --bonadea contributions talk 19:40, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

Hi there- the books that were citied I pulled up on my library account and then searched electronically for his work, The entire book is not about him. I could not find a book about him I actually found more about the physicst with the same name RFAvaria (talk) 19:42, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

Page numbers in the book? And what about the thesis about Rhys – which page(s) did you find the information in? --bonadea contributions talk 19:47, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

I will need to go back and find them... one sec RFAvaria (talk) 19:50, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

The same thing happened here – you added two sources, neither of them support the information in any way. --bonadea contributions talk 20:00, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

thanks let me go check these because I think maybe I am putting the information in "automatic" incorrectly.... I try to put the ISBN first but the last couple times it said couldn't find it, so then I just put in the title and it popped up, but apparently something is going wrong. I apologize for that let me go and re look at these and get them sorted. thank you for catching it. I will circle back here when I figure out what is going on RFAvaria (talk) 20:03, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

Heyyyy- I just checked the necktie one and the one is correct but the other is not. I went back to my note and it looks like maybe when I put in the book titles the automatic cite finder collected the wring info and I didnt notice. I will go back and delete those and maybe just manually put in citations in future so I dont have to worry about this again. thank you for catching that!! RFAvaria (talk) 20:12, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

oh, you already deleted... awesome. thanks !! RFAvaria (talk) 20:13, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

"our internal team"

Hi, RFAvaria, I saw your most recent post on the police brutality talk page, and it's a bit troubling. You write about asking your admin (I assume you mean your administrative assistant) to review comments, that she was asked to aggregate information from other published Wiki pages that would apply to the topic, and mention an internal team to be reviewing things. How many individual people have made edits under the "RFAvaria" user name? Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 13:06, 14 September 2024 (UTC)

I apologize I am not sure if I understand the question. Are you asking how many people are working on this specific project or how many people are in our organization as a whole? I apologize if I cannot respond right away I am out and about but will respond when I have time. Thanks, have a good weekend!! RFAvaria (talk) 13:51, 14 September 2024 (UTC)

Hmm, okay, first of all: what "project" and "organization" are you referring to? Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 14:48, 14 September 2024 (UTC)

Hey there, good morning.... an internal project for our organization nothing too exciting and probably too detailed to explain online in a summary. Nothing to worry about. Have a good day RFAvaria (talk) 11:57, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

Okay, I'm sorry, but I've applied a block to this account. What you seem to be indicating is that this account is what's known on Wikipedia as a role account, which is to say an account run by an organization that multiple people have access to. This is prohibited by Wikipedia rules; each account must be owned and operated by only one person, and any account that changes hands at any point falls under the category of a prohibited role account. Furthermore, if you're operating on behalf of an organization, you are going to need to be more forthcoming about what the organization is and what its goals on Wikipedia are. If you think there are good reasons for being unblocked, please review Wikipedia's guide to appealing blocks, then add the following text to the bottom of your talk page: {{unblock|reason=Your reason here ~~~~}}. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 17:02, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

@Writ Keeper How interesting. That's odd that instead of trying to ask more questions you chose to make assumptions and block the account. It's even more interesting considering that if we (and others) have access to hundreds of IP addresses then any blocked account will just open another account and it just becomes a ridiculous game of cat and mouse.

Instead of upholding what Wikipedia was designed to do, which is to create a collaborative, not authoritarian environment for the exchange of information, you've chosen to try to enforce power you don't have unless I am mistaken and you were granted the rights and control over all IP addresses in existence. That said, I will not be asking for the account to be "unblocked" because your decisions have no impact or effect on our overall charter, what we will be working to accomplish, or our ability to access Wikipedia or make edits.

I would invite you to try to engage in more conversation and seek a middle ground and in so doing create a more creative and less hostile environment.

Did you stop to even consider that if, and I am not saying we are or are not, however, if we are an organization researching, there would have to be more than one, really more than 25+ people that would have had to have contacted us with the same or similar concern?

As an administrator, it would seem logical that providing 1) accurate, 2) properly sourced, and 3) easy-to-read information would that precedence over arbitrarily blocking accounts based on unfounded assumptions you have chosen to make, with no facts.

Let's look at the irony of that. You keep deleting contributions for being unsourced and what you consider unfounded yet you've chosen to make a decision based only on your assumptions. Can you see how that is a bit duplicitous? RFAvaria (talk) 17:31, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

I did try to ask questions, in this very section, and you declined to give any meaningful answers. I don't see the point of repeatedly asking questions you are apparently unwilling to answer. But no, the block isn't based on assumptions, so much it's based on a plain reading of the words you wrote, both in the diff above and just in this section. You literally just admitted that this account is part of an internal project for our organization, that your admin assistant made the edits to the police brutality in the United States page, that you have an internal team or something, etc. so I don't know why you're trying to be coy about it now.

And no, it's not duplicitous, because blocking accounts is completely different from putting unsourced information/analyses into mainspace Wikipedia articles; the two are not comparable. I was actually assuming you were here in good faith and just misguided as to how Wikipedia works, and I was quite ready to continue explaining what the problem was and work with you to find a solution, though your evasiveness at my questions certainly put a dent in that good faith. But now that you've immediately responded with a more-or-less-veiled "threat" to evade your block, well... Like I said, if you think I've treated you unfairly, feel free to get a second opinion from any other admin with the unblock template. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 21:59, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

@Writ Keeper

No veil at all, for every blocked account there will just be three new people recruited and three new accounts opened, from different states and countries. The reality is that I am one person, there is no reason to block the one account. Every person has a right to have one account no rules were broken- but you don't care about that do you?

The fact that a group of people with a common goal is problematic to you, and they do not see themself as a vassal or you or any other human as their god, or leader to whom they must bow and explain themselves -might make you the issue. Freedom of thought, freedom of expression, and freedom of communication are just that "free", encumbered by no other man.

The fact that you believe your role as an administrator is to demand someone come and explain themself to you, again, might make you the problem. By all means, if a person is not acting in accordance with guidelines educate them, and expect and wait for and try to observe change, but that is not what you did here, is it? You just got yourself all in a knot because you think I- a free person- owe you answers, and am required to kneel before you and plead with you for access to an opensource website.

I disagree.

I know if I were trying to manage a group or page or anything quite frankly, I would not be so quick to block people because I can watch and observe and direct and help manage people I can identify. However, once I block them and when they go set up a new account from a new IP address now id have to find it and then try to block that one again and again and again. Now if you did that, knowing it is one account used by one person, then you would be further substantiating the very issue we are documenting, the arbitrary and subjective nature of decision-making.

All of this is an incredible waste of energy compared to actually talking to people, hearing their thoughts, and working within the processes to create a democratic space.

Example: I took a list of people that was already published on Wikipedia and ALPHABETIZED it. I then took a sentence from EACH PAGE of each person that again, was already published on Wikipedia and put it with each person's name. Did not add so much as an additional vowel ... just took information already published and coalesced it into one area for ease of navigation, and you deleted it.

You cited your rationale as it being "unsourced" (again despite it already being published just not alphabetized) and you cited the "tone not being very encyclopedic" despite literally every word coming from already published Wikipedia pages, WORD FOR WORD. Yet on the same page, there are entire paragraphs of inaccurate information with an admin note "citation needed" allowed to remain published.

Makes the strong argument that this is something other than working in a team environment for the improvement of Wiki for Admins that would act in such a manner.

So please tell me again who is not acting in good faith. RFAvaria (talk) 23:08, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

Okay, I do want to emphasize that these issues with your editing, while present, were not why you were blocked. You were blocked because you were giving pretty clear indications that this account is being shared across multiple people within an organization. I don't know how you expect us to reconcile your new insistence that you are just a single person with your previous statements about youradmin assistant apparently having collated and posted the changes to the police brutality article, and that you'd need to check with her to understand the edit, or with your assertion that you'd get your internal team to review it. This kind of editing arrangement does not at all imply bad faith on your part, just a misunderstanding (albeit a pretty significant one) about how Wikipedia works, which is why I came to you with questions about what the deal was (which you then evaded). But it does require this account to be blocked, as shared accounts and role accounts are not permitted on Wikipedia. That didn't mean you could never edit again; it might just've meant that you needed to create a new account and, after promising not to allow anyone else to use it and making any appropriate conflict-of-interest declarations, I would've been happy to soften the block to allow this. But instead you came out guns blazing, and here we are.

All that said: pulling a sentence out of another Wikipedia article doesn't absolve you of needing to cite your sources, for a number of reasons. First, if you copy text from within Wikipedia, you still need to attribute the copying, since the words you're putting into the destination article aren't your own; otherwise, that's a copyright violation. Wikipedia's license allows free reuse and modification, but only on the condition that the source material is attributed. Second, Wikipedia is not itself a reliable source, so citing a different Wikipedia article is never acceptable as a source unto itself. And in case you're thinking that "those sentences in those articles didn't have inline sources", there are a number of problems with that: Wikipedia is a constant work in progress, and there may be any number of sentences, facts, or entire articles that don't meet our content criteria, so the mere fact that this sentence was in another Wikipedia article doesn't mean it meets our standard for good content, either in the source or the destination. Furthermore, if you (or, as you said earlier, your admin assistant) were pulling those sentences out of the leads of the original articles, then you're running afoul of Wikipedia's house style on lead sections, which tend to discourage the use of inline citations in those leads. The reason for this is that the lead should only be a summary of material that is contained (and cited) later, in the body of the article. Which segues into the final problem, which is that plucking one sentence out of an article and choosing to use it verbatim to represent a topic has the potential to mislead the reader about the actual content, since the sentence now lacks any context. This is just an exaggeration to illustrate a point and not intended to be any kind of equivalence to your editing, which again I don't think was intended maliciously, but imagine if someone had decided to represent the Confederate States of America as a confederation government of "sovereign and independent states" without any further historical context. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 23:43, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

@Writ Keeper

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=African-American_history&diff=prev&oldid=1245445782

An already existing list was ALPHABETIZED.

A summary sentence explaining who the person was, was copied word for word from the person's Wiki page and alongside each person's name, to make the list easier to navigate, if the sentence had a citation where it came from it followed the new area, if it did not have a citation there as no source to follow- it was copied word for word without one punctuation mark even changing.

EVERY NAME was hyperlinked to an already existing Wikipedia page.

All of this was using the current existing material.

If the "tone" was unacceptable, or as you described it "unencyclopedic" to such an offensive degree it would have been offensive on the page it came from. This likelihood is possible in theory, depending on differences in how different editors or administrators view things,

This is why a LIST was used as the target edit because the source material would come from dozens of pages edited by dozens of different editors and overseen by dozens of different admins. You now come along and look at an amalgamated list of information from all of those already published articles and reach the conclusion that all of it is so offensive, being of "poor tone" Despite dozens of editors and admins that found material acceptable and" call into question if all those other editors and admins ability to spot issues, or if edits and contributions become unacceptable based on who provides them.

Last you reach the unilateral conclusion that reverting to an unalphabetized, difficult-to-navigate list is better for the community of Wikipedia users than an alphabetized list with summaries, whilst that same list is sitting on a page with no less than a dozen factual errors and entire paragraphs missing citations, .

One need only take 3 minutes to review the African American History Talk Page to see that throughout three and a half years, multiple people have tried to contribute, and not one person found the page topic compelling enough to even respond. One user @Caffelatteo went to great detail to share many of the factual errors with the page. Instead of hearing him(her), their account was also blocked.

In three and a half years the only acceptable contributions have been hyphen edits and verb tense edits. No contributions to improve the actual content of the "history" being taught on this or a majority of the African-American content pages ever seem to be considered or integrated (see what I did there?)

None of this matters by itself because people, events, and decisions are always highly subjective. What frames this as problematic is that if you or any of the other administrators, and gatekeepers were concerned about accuracy, tone, or the overall improvement of the Wikipedia articles there would not be the willingness to overlook and allow entire paragraphs of factually incorrect information to remain published. Entire paragraphs of uncited opinions and assertions are allowed to stand. The reason the citations have not been added is that they do not exist because the information being communicated is misaligned with actual documented history.

Again, your block is of no consequence to the ability to do the work we have before us, you can stop talking about that. Nonetheless, I will highlight that it is interesting you keep talking about me. While I keep trying to bring you back to the awareness that we are here now, as a result of how certain Wikipedia pages are administrated.

The first contact was me reaching out to you to bring your awareness in this direction. Why? You even asked why you were contacted "out of the blue", yet became so compelled you lost the thread on following that train of thought through to its natural conclusion.

Now the only open question is why are we assembling these examples and what is being done with the screenshots. RFAvaria (talk) 06:25, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

Just for the record, the reason I keep replying here is that there is a commmunity expectation for admins to respond to questions about administrative actions they've performed. So, if you're not interested in discussing the block, I guess there's nothing else to talk about. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 12:31, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

There is not and I appreciate you saying that as I was about to say the same, there are only so many hours in the day and there is a lot of work to do....I guess ill see you when I bump into you again on the next article contribution that is an issue. Have a good day RFAvaria (talk) 13:38, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

@Writ Keeper Just checking in.... did you have any concerns about the contributions and edits made today under the new account? RFAvaria (talk) 20:01, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

What is the new account? Myrealnamm (💬pros · ✏️cons) 00:17, 18 September 2024 (UTC)