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I'm not leaving in speculation based on inaccurate secondary sources
Latest comment: 11 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Use the article talk page
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Did you read what the last person wrote? What you restored? They stated beyond a doubt that the book makes little mention of Bin Laden and also states that what he said is false based off of secondary sources. I don't know how bad your Trump Derangement Syndrome is, but if it's too great to allow you to be objective on facts, then you need to step away. C.horakh (talk) 16:33, 11 September 2023 (UTC)
Don't edit war. We are not allowed to use primary sources in the way you did. Secondary RS take primacy over primary sources. Don't edit war...EVER. Don't restore your original version when it has been rejected (in this case by reversion). That's edit warring. You have little experience and risk getting blocked. I generously offered a suggestion to try adding your content under the original content so we could see how it works. That may have been too generous as I'm not sure your changes don't violate our policies. Now back off if you want to make any more edits at Wikipedia or your visit here will come to an end very quickly. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:39, 11 September 2023 (UTC)
You don't think that the original article that I replaced was an opinion piece?
Latest comment: 11 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Use the article talk page
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
You people are going to be the reason this site fails. I'm letting everyone know about your dishonesty and Wikipedia can thank people like you. C.horakh (talk) 16:53, 11 September 2023 (UTC)
Opinion pieces in secondary RS take precedence over content found in primary sources by editors. We are not authorities. We are not allowed to use OR to right great wrongs we find in content here. We depend primarily on secondary sources rather than primary sources.
That doesn't mean that secondary sources can't get it wrong. That does happen, and we usually fix that situation by using other RS that discover and comment on the discrepancy. No matter what, edit warring is never right and many a potentially good editor has been blocked because they are unwilling to collaborate with other editors and just plow ahead with edit warring as a way to force their preferred version. That never works. I don't want to see that happen to you. You may have a good point to make, so let's find a way to do it properly without any OR. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:06, 11 September 2023 (UTC)
Trump Derangement Syndrome
Latest comment: 11 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
BS. User:Mav214's block is correct: "17:16, 17 August 2023 Bbb23 talk contribs blocked Mav214 talk contribs with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (Disruptive editing, including edit-warring at Biden–Ukraine conspiracy theory based on a report at WP:AN3, and consistent POV editing under the guise of making Wikipedia "neutral")"
If you won't learn the rules here and follow them, then you do not belong here. You're delusional and suffering from the true TDS as are those who believe all the false or misleading statements by Donald Trump, especially those about the 2020 election. He's a failure who lost in the most secure and analyzed election in U.S. history. Just as in the 2016 election, he did not win the popular vote. We the people have never elected Trump to office. Now get lost as block evasion is not allowed here. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 15:31, 15 September 2023 (UTC)
Rane43
Latest comment: 11 months ago6 comments3 people in discussion
I seem to have incurred the wrath of various IP addresses a few times but I don't recall a personal attack signed by Rane42. Here are a few more IP addresses: 2601:14E:80:46D0:F001:2AAF:92C2:A8E (DTrump talk page and on my talk page), 174.216.50.35 ([1]), 2600:1002:b157:b56:4ad:fe6d:1629:32f7 ([2]). What is "duck evidence", as in "if it quacks like ..."? Space4Time3Continuum2x(cowabunga)17:39, 16 September 2023 (UTC)
It was one of his IPs that attacked you here. He may have also attacked your comments elsewhere. You're right about "duck", which means identical agendas and wordings, etc. Such editors consistently attack a perceived left-wing bias (thus revealing their own fringe right-wing bias), remove "false", whitewash content critical of Trump/Fox/GOP, and attack CNN, WaPo, etc. as "fake news", ad libitum, ad nauseum. They lack the most basic and important of all CIR skills, the ability to vet sources for reliability. They equate Fox News with CNN, as if they were somehow on the same level of bias and accuracy. That's utter BS.
That's some pretty strong duck evidence you're rejecting. Maybe you're right. I'll back off and wait for my addition at the SPI to be resolved. Maybe it's Reece, rather than Rane, who is the real problem. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:04, 16 September 2023 (UTC)
Your note
Latest comment: 11 months ago16 comments2 people in discussion
Randy Kryn, I and several others have done so there, but I don't want to bludgeon the discussion. That's why I approached you to plumb your thinking in the hope you would think a bit more deeply.
What do you mean by "back up"? The word has already been dealt with in the body of the article, with sourcing, context, and attribution. Our policies' demands are thus met without violating other policies, like treating opinions as facts or violating WP:LABEL. Those who started and back that RfC have intentions that are not in harmony with our policies or the facts, hence the problematic nature of the way the RfC is worded and trending.
Hi. I do appreciate your concern, and carefully read the discussion before commenting. Sources have evolved and the reporting has moved on from the 2010s. I seldom comment on divisive topics, but this one's language has not caught up with the current sourcing so the proposed wording seems accurate as summarization. In any event, the rfc looks like a no consensus result so it will probably end up with mixed language which will address your concerns while still reflecting sourcing. Randy Kryn (talk) 00:06, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
What's interesting is that in spite of the dossier being thoroughly discussed and analyzed for several years now, some of the most important sources now being known, some being questioned by the FBI and giving testimony, one even through a trial and acquittal (for not revealing his sourcing, while still not renouncing the allegations made in the dossier), etc., no substantial allegation has been proven false, and the most important being proven true by the FBI's own sources and in the Jan. 2017 ODNI report.
Unfortunately, there are some mainstream journalists who don't study these things deeply and maybe are tired of the dossier still being mentioned by right-wing media (mainstream media lost interest pretty quickly) when it turned out to be a dud for its original intended purpose. They just throw words around and "discredited" is one of them. It's rather unfortunate, because there are still serious journalists and authors who say the dossier maintains its credibility as time goes on.
It has been shown to be pretty much on target. Trump and his campaign did indeed cooperate with the Russians. They did lie about it. Steele's sources were six months ahead of the FBI regarding the central allegations, all confirmed to be true. As editors, we shouldn't give more credit to disgruntled or deliberately misleading opinions and shoddy labels. We should not elevate opinions as if they were facts. The word "discredited" has so many possible meanings, and it should not be treated lightly or used without attribution, context, and well-defined specificity about what it is being used to describe. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 00:21, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
Language such as "mostly discredited" or "largely discredited" seem themselves unusual, since a document of this type should be totally accurate without question. Parts can't be maybe accurate but mixed with the now sourced discreditation. If much of it is not true then anything it claims should be set aside, which is what the sourced media has now done, so "discredited" does seem an apt descriptor. Randy Kryn (talk) 00:38, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
That description turns everything on its head for "a document of this type". It's raw intelligence, not a finished product. Maybe those false expectations, which never were Steele's expectations, led to some being disappointed with it (IOW discredited in their minds). It is raw intelligence, IOW everything that all the sources reported to him, before being vetted. Steele never claimed it was 100% true (that NEVER happens with "a document of this type"), and yet none of the allegations have been proven false.
Even though Fusion GPS tried to get Steele to not include the pee tape allegation (which is likely true, but we don't know), there were so many independent Russian sources that provided information about it (and Russians believe it's true) that he would not deviate from his training as an MI6 agent, so he included it. Those agents must include everything their sources tell them. Later vetting sorts it out.
A serious question: I wonder which allegations you believe are "discredited" and in what way?
When investigators cannot speak to the primary sources, their failure to confirm an allegation does not discredit it. That does not mean it's false. It just remains unproven, even though it gives background and explanatory information on proven events. If news media (and editors here) continue to have unrealistic expectations, the "discrediting" is in their heads. They are creating false expectations, so the problem is on them.
You mentioned "understanding of the document" The word "discredited" is no more based on an "understanding of the document" or facts than when Trump called it "fake news" and "discredited" and the judge blasted him for it:
"None of the tweets inescapably lead to the inference that the President's statements about the Dossier are rooted in information he received from the law enforcement and intelligence communities.... The President's statements may very well be based on media reports or his own personal knowledge, or could simply be viewed as political statements intended to counter media accounts about the Russia investigation, rather than assertions of pure fact."[3]
See, this is why I don't edit controversial subjects. Thank you for your very interesting and long answer. Educational. I'm not at all a subject matter expert on this dossier and did not know that, if what you say is accurate, this was supposed to be a report throwing everything in as raw intelligence before being confirmed, then shouldn't that be in the lead descriptor? Because I'm not conversant on this topic, and you make a good case, I'll change my comment to 'Controversial' per this discussion. Hopefully clearer language can be introduced to describe the report as unvetted basic raw intelligence, and that some of this raw intelligence was incorrect. Randy Kryn (talk) 02:30, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
Good point. The first sentence in the second paragraph described it, and the article elaborates more on it, but to make it even clearer, I have developed that sentence even more using content from the body. Here it is now: "When the dossier was published without permission, it was an unfinished 35-page compilation of unverified raw intelligence reports—"not established facts, but a starting point for further investigation" How's that?
There are minor imprecise things, but nothing of significance is seriously inaccurate unless I'm forgetting something right now. I'm pretty tired. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:59, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
As I said, I'm not conversant on the topic, but if accurate and can be sourced that language is an interesting descriptor of the dossier and would have cleared up my understanding of it. How something so raw then got copied and passed around is where much of the controversy takes place. Okay, enough for tonight, more tomorrow. Randy Kryn (talk) 03:13, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
p.s. have just read your edit, good language. It seems much too deep into the lead, I would think that for best encyclopedic understanding of the topic that would be second or third sentence descriptor information. In any case, if accurate, it does present a point of view which I don't think is common knowledge. I hope you went to sleep and don't see this until morning, my "enough for tonight" language discredited. Randy Kryn (talk) 03:27, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
Okay, I'm up early as I couldn't sleep as long as I would like, but as a retiree that's okay. You have expressed some legitimate concerns which I have taken to heart and tried (and will continue to try) to use to improve the article, so I am very grateful to you for your informative and civil engagement here. Feel free to share more ideas. I'll try to move that descriptive sentence up and see if that move will be accepted by the community. I will also see if it's possible to include something about how the dossier failed as opposition research as it did not reach or influence the public before the election. It depends on whether I can find sources that touch on this fact.
I think you'll find the following info interesting. It's all based on sourced info.
You mention it "got copied and passed around". It's more accurate to say that because of the explosive nature of what his sources told him, Steele decided to immediately share his findings, as he got them, with the FBI and British intelligence so the findings could be vetted. (That is in contrast to how the Trump campaign handled their knowledge of the Russian offer of help at Trump Tower. They lied about it and kept it secret for a year.) The allegations touched on serious national security issues that scared the heck out of Steele, who had been Britain's top Russian expert, the head of their Russia desk. He knew how the Russians worked.
Although he may not have known this at the time, we now know that in November 2013 Trump had already told the Russians (a nice picture taken then) of his plans to run in 2016, long before telling the American public, and the Russians already told him then that they would help him.[4] (Yulya/Yulia (Julia) Alferova or Klyushin. Her then-husband, Artem Klyushin, likely FSB, followed me on Twitter, so Russian intelligence is not blind to what we do. They are both mentioned in the Mueller Report.)
So Steele was concerned with the very real possibility that Trump might be a sort of Manchurian candidate. It quickly became obvious to him that Trump and his campaign were knowledgeable about Russian interference and hackings before the FBI knew it, and were hiding their knowledge that the Russians had offered to help Trump and that he was accepting the help. (Note that Steele's sources did not know about the Russian offer of help to Papadopoulos, only about a very similar offer made to Carter Page in Russia.) Never before had a presidential candidate worked together with an enemy of the nation to become elected. (Americans should know better than to ever support the candidate their enemy likes.) That was a serious threat to national security, and that threat has never abated, only gotten worse. The Russians have never stopped their disinformation efforts since the 2016 election. They still support Trump, and they do it openly, still denying they interfered while taking credit for getting him elected.
Ever since Trump's election, American and allied intelligence sources have been endangered, some killed, and the open cooperation between agencies curtailed severely, all because of Trump. Our allies were afraid to share info with American intelligence because Trump shares intelligence with Russia and brags that he has a right to do so.[5] We lost a very valuable source of intelligence because of him. We had a source in the Kremlin who had access to Putin's office all the time. The spy had access to Putin and could actually take pictures of documents on Putin's desk. Because of the dangers imposed by Trump's recent careless disclosures of classified information to Russian officials, the CIA feared their spy was in danger, so the government official and his family were discretely exfiltrated during a family vacation to Montenegro.
There were 17 memos, and as they were produced from the running stream of info Steele was getting, he began to share them with the FBI (although the first ones were delayed, without examination or attention, for a couple of months in the FBI's New York field office, a serious FBI error), and later to some members of the press. The press was only allowed to see them, not copy them, and because they could not vet them, they refused to mention anything about them. Before the election, only two news sources mentioned allegations that came from dossier reports. Steele had been in contact with both authors. These were a September 23, 2016, Yahoo! News article by Michael Isikoff that focused on Carter Page (whose visit to Russia, but not all of his actions, was public knowledge), and an article by David Corn on October 31, 2016, a week before the election, in Mother Jones magazine. After the election, Steele's dossier became one of Washington's "worst-kept secrets", and journalists worked to verify the allegations. Later some copies were given to key persons, and David Kramer, an associate of John McCain, gave the dossier to BuzzFeed in December 2016, weeks after the election. He did not have permission to do this, and BuzzFeed published the unvetted memos without permission. They were not intended for publication ever. They were unvetted and in raw form, and their publication endangered sources. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 13:12, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
I've been trying to analyze our use of "controversial" in the first sentence, and in this case, it is a self-evident truth, not a tautology (there's no repetition). So is it even worth saying? I believe that when qualified it makes sense to do so. In the body we write: "Jane Mayer believes the dossier is "perhaps the most controversial opposition research ever to emerge from a Presidential campaign",[1] and Julian Borger described it as "one of the most explosive documents in modern political history".[2]" -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 13:29, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
Just came back to check out the discussion before I wikibreak in awhile for several hours, and since your long (and appreciated) posts look informative I'll look forward to reading them when I come back online. Thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:01, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
I have created a new section where I try to move and merge that sentence into the first sentence of the first paragaph. The lead here is long and very content-rich, but the article is likewise long and content-rich as it's a very complicated and wide-reaching subject that has been covered widely and thoroughly by all media sources, largely because of its controversial nature, not because of its real importance to the 2016 election (very little influence there).
Not many political topics get this much attention, but the reasons are described here: Jane Mayer believes the dossier is "perhaps the most controversial opposition research ever to emerge from a Presidential campaign",[1] and Julian Borger described it as "one of the most explosive documents in modern political history".[2]
Our job here is to literally document the "sum of all human knowledge" as it's revealed in RS, so we do that here. We don't write summary articles at Wikipedia. Baseball Bugs put it well: "If I go looking for info, and Wikipedia doesn't have it, then Wikipedia has failed." There are editors who defend Trump and wish to minimize and delete content, and even the whole article, but that would violate our mission. History will thank us for being thorough. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 21:02, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
You have a lot of interest and passion on this topic. Since I do not I'll be leaving it alone for the most part. Thanks for the in-depth analysis. As I mentioned, I don't often get involved in major controversial topics or recent political topics, so it is not my intention to work on this page. The changes you've made seem fair (although I'd suggest a paragraph break for the long first paragraph) and I'll keep watch on the discussion with, hopefully, commentary by others. Maybe the question below should actually be on the article talk page and here (and maybe it is, I haven't looked). Hopefully your edits are edits towards accuracy, but I have no more than a passing interest in the topic, and I commented, originally, based on the discussion. Thanks for sharing a point-of-view I had not educated myself about, although not really one I want to focus much attention on. Randy Kryn (talk) 23:45, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
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Dossier lead tweak
Latest comment: 11 months ago3 comments1 person in discussion
An attempt to tweak the lead so it includes what's now the first sentence of the second paragraph.
Current first sentence of first paragraph:
The Steele dossier, also known as the Trump–Russia dossier,[1] is a controversial political opposition research report written by Christopher Steele from June to December 2016, containing allegations of misconduct, conspiracy, and cooperation between Donald Trump's presidential campaign and the government of Russia prior to and during the 2016 election campaign.
Current first sentence of second paragraph:
When the dossier was published without permission, it was an unfinished 35-page compilation of unverified raw intelligence reports—"not established facts, but a starting point for further investigation".[2][3][4] It was based on information from initially anonymous sources known to the author, counterintelligence specialist[5]Christopher Steele.[6] Steele, a former head of the Russia Desk....
Resulting first paragraph and start of second paragraph:
The Steele dossier, also known as the Trump–Russia dossier,[1] is a controversial political opposition research report written by Christopher Steele that was published without permission. It is an unfinished 35-page compilation of unverified raw intelligence reports—"not established facts, but a starting point for further investigation".[2][3][4] It was written from June to December 2016 and contains allegations of misconduct, conspiracy, and cooperation between Donald Trump's presidential campaign and the government of Russia prior to and during the 2016 election campaign.[7] Several key allegations made in June 2016 were later corroborated by the January 2017 report by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence,[8][9] namely that Vladimir Putin favored Trump over Hillary Clinton;[8][10] that he personally ordered an "influence campaign" to harm Clinton's campaign and to "undermine public faith in the US democratic process"; that he ordered cyberattacks on both parties;[8] and that many Trump campaign officials and associates had numerous secretive contacts with Russian agents.[11][12] While Steele's documents played a significant role in initially highlighting the general friendliness between Trump and the Putin administration, the veracity of specific allegations is highly variable. Some have been publicly confirmed,[9][13][8][10] others are plausible but not specifically confirmed,[14][15] and some are dubious in retrospect but not strictly disproven.[16][17][18]
It was based on information from initially anonymous sources known to the author, counterintelligence specialist[5]Christopher Steele.[6] Steele, a former head of the Russia Desk....
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A personal note about Poland
Latest comment: 11 months ago3 comments2 people in discussion
Randy Kryn, I just noticed that you are likely Polish. I have visited Poland once and stayed with a family in Bielsko-Biała for a weekend. We also visited Auschwitz and Krakow. We were very warmly received and treated well by our host family. We were members of a Danish choir that was invited to participate in a weekend of singing with other choirs from many places. We sang several songs, including Gounod's Sanctus (also in the name of our choir, Sanctuskoret).
Latest comment: 11 months ago3 comments2 people in discussion
This is a redirect. A new editor is changing it to a nonexistent article. Last time I had a similar problem with redirects it was politely suggested that I be careful not to go past 3rr. Can you advise please? I don't really understand redirects and when not to revert, sorry. Knitsey (talk) 21:57, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
Sorry, but I know when to not get involved in topics I don't understand. You might try ignoring it. Never edit war. It's not worth it. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:01, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 10 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
I have a theory about accounts like this. If you setup your watchlist to highlight the right articles, you'll see accounts like this pop up out of nowhere and engage in this kind of behavior. If you want to really get down and dirty and explore this kind of idea, take a look at the edit histories of two articles, John Clauser and the CO2 Coalition. You'll see the same patterns and weird behavior. Seemingly random accounts come out of nowhere to coordinate disputed edits between two different articles against consensus. I'm personally convinced that they aren't just randos, but that it's coordinated by people working for CO2 Coalition or their sister organizations. Viriditas (talk) 22:40, 1 October 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 10 months ago17 comments4 people in discussion
I'm trying to think of a meal idea to convince kids that their normal dinner options are fine. What were some of those fermented meet things we talked about in the past? Oh, and no eggnog! Springee (talk) 19:42, 3 October 2023 (UTC)
I swear we talking about something that was less and appetizing and fermenting :D Anyway, I was hoping to cheer you up. It seems like you could use it. Springee (talk) 20:48, 3 October 2023 (UTC)
I almost feel sorry for him, but he brought this on himself, plus he has no moral compass, like his hero. Does that rule which allowed a small radical minority to do this continue to work for future Speakers of the House? That can't be right. Only a dictatorship works by allowing such a small minority to rule. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:50, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Both of my grandfathers didn't serve American armed forces to let dictatorship come to these shores. But don't be discouraged. The unusual weakness of McCarthy is actually that of the Republicans, but American institutions are correcting for vulnerabilities that are being targeted by the MAGAs and Qanons. Just remember whether it's American politics, Wiki politics, or whatever it is. If we all try and learn and adapt we'll probably be OK. Andre🚐04:34, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Andre, as far as the MfDs go, I have archived copies of the pages and am going to cut short the process by blanking them. It's editorial self-censorship/suicide, but cutting short the pain is in my own best interests. When I am the subject of a drama board discussion or an ArbCom (it happened once and I almost committed suicide), it's a very bad thing for me. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 04:46, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
OK. But don't worry. This is just an MFD. You are not the subject of the discussion. You are in good standing. The subject was those user subpages and if they go, so do the proceedings. Andre🚐05:03, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
They are all gone and the proceedings are closed. This is a big loss of face for me. I was born in Japan and raised in Asia, so have much of that thinking in me. It hurts. Now what shall I do? What's a way to develop content without getting into trouble? To understand how this works, think of Wikipedia as a single-story building. The front half is the encyclopedia: articles and their talk pages. The back half is divided into a front 1/3 and a back 2/3. The front 1/3 is Wikipedia space for the front page, PAG, drama boards, etc. The back 2/3 is where editors work and prepare content. It is composed of userspace with user pages, user talk pages, subpages, user essays, etc., and each editor has a desk. Each editor has their own methods for developing potential content and carrying on research. They are volunteers and have much freedom. What they write there is not part of the encyclopedia and not visible to the public. A certain admin has gone to my desk and emptied some of it in a VERY public and humiliating way, even though very few editors even knew what was in that desk. Now I live in fear of that admin. I have a target on my back. Where will this stop? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 05:42, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
While I agree that it was not necessary to delete those pages, understand this is all about politics, and not about your quality of work. You haven't lost face in this. There is no honor in writing essays on Wikipedia, and no dishonor in having someone pick on you and object to them. The only aspect that was objected to is that the essays were taken to be polemical. My suggestion would be to continue editing articles, commenting on talk pages, and writing essays so long as the essays are about Wikipedia process, like creating a lead section. When you want to write something that is political and might raise the hackles of some sensitive individuals, do it on a free Wordpress site or a Substack. Neocities even. What you shouldn't do is allow this event or series of events to affect your self-worth, self-esteem, confidence, or otherwise make you feel bad about yourself. Andre🚐05:50, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
There's no need to live in fear, Valjean. I am sure Beeblebrox didn't mean to harm you. I really doubt that it was personal, and I don't think this will go past essays. It was just something that reasonable editors could disagree over. Just concentrate on articles and you will be fine. starship.paint (RUN)13:18, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Durian is an acquired taste. I remember as a child in the Philippines learning the differences between Jackfruit and Durian. I learned to like both. Both are large and can injure or kill you if they fall on your head. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 15:17, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Oof, I can't stand durian, just the smell. There are very few foods in the world I cannot eat. I'm even down for ortolan and balut. But I can't get past the garbagey odor. I'll take bitter melon though, in a Bicol Express. My girlfriend is Filipino. Andre🚐19:12, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Balut! Just the thought would make me retch. The first time I encountered it was when I was on a bus, maybe in Cebu. I was about 8-9 years old. My mom pointed to a man who was up against a building with his face tight to the wall. She said he was eating balut. I've seen it but didn't get close enough to "appreciate" it. The cheesy odor of durian is an acquired taste. It's so sticky and slimy. Speaking of Filipinas, I'm a huge fan of Lea Salonga. She's such a professional, skilled, ethical, and compassionate singer. Her voice is heavenly. We loved Miss Saigon. I've seen her in concert once. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:22, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Sparkly
Latest comment: 10 months ago3 comments3 people in discussion
Sorry, I just saw this revert by you - the same user "Sparkly" has been going around excising any negative references to James Gordon Meek's sex crimes, guilty plea, etc - starting on the day of Meek's sentencing. He seems to be bordering on bad-faith, throwing ((buzzword)) around common words like "conflict" and in one case throwing ((incomprehensible)) and ((copyedit)) tags on a page simply because at one point it said "and and" instead of "and"...I'm not looking to start drama, but this is a serious frustration - the James Gordon Meek article just got entirely gutted by him with the declaration he's removing 80% of sourced information about the crimes and now it's locked up and basically he's running around other articles seemingly with a focus on Virginia sex offenders or something. Would appreciate if you'd take two minutes just looking into some of the similar edits if you get the chance. Virginia Courtsesan (talk) 03:12, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 10 months ago2 comments1 person in discussion
Saving this here from Andrevan's talk page:
I found something promising. Go to Special:Export and uncheck the checkbox to exclude history, check "save as file," "include templates," and put your pagename into it. When I did this, I downloaded a 50MB XML file which I suspect contains the full history of those pages. We could then load them into another instance of MediaWiki or just write some code to parse out the interesting bits. They also contain all the changes as follows:
</revision> <revision> <id>1139188764</id> <parentid>1139184482</parentid> <timestamp>2023-02-13T21:25:59Z</timestamp> <contributor> <username>Valjean</username> <id>700244</id> </contributor> <comment>/* The factors that influenced the decision */ .</comment> <model>wikitext</model> <format>text/x-wiki</format> <text bytes="11114" xml:space="preserve">This page has been removed from search engines' indexes. Why the Crossfire Hurricane investigation was opened
Hello, Valjean. Please check your email; you've got mail! It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.
Latest comment: 10 months ago34 comments6 people in discussion
This is a general alert/request for further investigation I’m sending to multiple respected users who have been involved with this user in the past. Recently this user accused me of sock puppetry (using extremely poor evidence and no diffs whatsoever) and subsequently two users have come to me with claims that there is off-site coordination, administrative corruption, and undisclosed COIs going on here. See links:
Should we take this to ANI immediately? Philo can definitely just get banned for all the other crap he’s up to recently, but the fact that other users, including an admin, are implicated here is disturbing. Dronebogus (talk) 15:09, 8 October 2023 (UTC)
I'd back far away from accusing an admin, especially that one, of wrongdoing. I am not convinced by those two diffs. You should go back and strike all such mentions and remain focused on Philo. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:44, 8 October 2023 (UTC)
That is not my concern. I'm more concerned with AGF and not getting drawn into accepting blindly Philo's and their fellow traveler's accusations/insinuations.
Someone (maybe you?) mentioned attempts to dox me. That wouldn't do much good for anyone. They'd just be wasting their time. Where was that and what's happening? Activate your email. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:04, 8 October 2023 (UTC)
I think you are wrong about whose laundry is being aired out. Your awful wiki-porn cartoons seem to be a huge blind spot for you. I comment ot WPO as well, the whole community knows that, it's been an issue brought up in several WP:ACE cycles, and I got elected anyway. The community doesn't see this the way you seem to think they do. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:04, 8 October 2023 (UTC)
I tend to find Beeb likes bashing me over my “wiki-porn” at every available opportunity. I don’t care if they’re basically right; I’m sick of being bullied by an admin over a stupid, humiliating incident I did when I was younger and stupider than I am now. Dronebogus (talk) 17:16, 8 October 2023 (UTC)
See, I'm not the one who brought this up, it was the IP who is now blocked, and you ran with it to attack SFR. That was your decision, not mine. If you don't want it to be an issue, it would be easy enough to go over to Commons and have it deleted as it is your own work. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:20, 8 October 2023 (UTC)
Keep in mind that we have no way to know that the posts on those forums are in fact the same person as the wiki user. Andre🚐06:10, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
That's true, there can be bad actors, but are you suggesting a Joe job? Which one(s) might be fake? What I've seen looks like the real editors here: Mr Ernie, PackMecEng, ScottishFinnishRadish, Beeblebrox, Philomathes, Elin Ruby, etc. It's their thoughts and language. Not all is actionable, but it's certainly not collegial. Lots of nasty gravedancing. Please email me the evidence of doxing or planned doxing that has been mentioned. More than one editor has been permabanned here for doing that to me. The risk of harm is lessened now because my children are grown adults, but there was a time when there was coordination between literal people in the USA and Denmark, with my children and their habits being spied on and reported back to the USA. Then death threats and phone calls with "You love your children, don't you?" The lesson? Don't criticize the chiropractic "profession". It became really bad during and after my ArbCom nightmare. My real-life enemies (they lost a court case) now knew I was a Wikipedia editor and found this as a new avenue to pester me. [the ArbCom case where I was later vindicted]. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 06:40, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
The forums in question both have a search function where you can input a username. I really have no idea how to tell a real or a fake. Take a look at this. It can be considered WP:OUTING and the prescribed action to email arbcom. [redacted] etc. I have no idea who these users are and what their deal is. After I created an account on the forum to view the posts, it was banned. @Doug Weller saw the posts also. Andre🚐06:46, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Andre, what kind of funny business? I think that Hemiauchenia » Tue Oct 03, 2023 7:16 pm is right about the IPs being from SkepticAnonymous. (They also make a really good point here.) I don't remember them or their issues or POV, but at this time they are performing a valuable service to the benefit of Wikipedia and its loyal members. Their evidence seems solid and should not be hidden. Since Beeblebrox is on ArbCom, I would say that all hope is out for any resolution. I don't trust ArbCom for stuff like this because they do not work by normal legal rules and a huge COI makes no difference. They will do whatever they want and ignore and bury whatever they want. That has been my experience. I have seen them protect bad actors before, so I am not holding my breath. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:05, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
We don't need any evidence presented by the IP; if they are actually SkepticAnonymous they are blocked, and they'd have to come clean as that LTA and express remorse and probably be given a WP:SO on a leash or whatever they do now, if that's even an option for that user (I do not know what they did, so I don't know). The evidence the IP is presenting is just a bunch of forum posts, which anyone can find by googling and using the forum builtin searches. I know that some of the comments are genuine; I wouldn't assume, for example, the one attributed to SFR is genuine. The question is, what is the action or actionable thing? I believe we should AGF for ARBCOM as well which is to say: email them with the links to the material, so they can consider it. Ultimately, though, unless you have a diff onwiki with something actionable, they aren't going to sanction people for some mean-spirited posts disparaging your essays. Still, arbcom will keep all that evidence if the time comes. You nor I have nothing to hide, so I would assume that some of the arbs such as Wugapodes and others are extremely wise and thoughtful. Beeblebrox has his moments too, I will admit. And you know he's not a big fan of mine. Andre🚐22:11, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I don't really remember much about him and his ArbCom career. What I see happening is that Philomathes is not editing here at all and may hold his head down for a while. That's what he did while blocked. We can resume when he starts editing again and causing more trouble. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:15, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I agree, let's get back to normal and de-escalate. The right wingers are quite restive. Just look at the horrific incursions by Hamas terrorists in the news. I expect the American right wingers are looking to escalate things to help Trump and the MAGA candidates do better in the polls and frighten off any primary challengers like Haley, Christie, Ramaswamy or DeSantis. Andre🚐22:26, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Just to clarify things, I do post at WPO, and ali did make a single comment one time about a sketch drawn by Dronebogus. I've never posted on sucks. I find the idea that anyone would believe that I would create an account on sucks while that ANI thread was active and offer up information on Dronebogus sourced entirely to a screenshot absolutely preposterous.
The reason the ANI thread got closed is because the troll (or trolls) had tried successfully enough that large portions were about my single post about a sketch on an off-wiki forum, and whatever Beeblebrox's post was. If the troll were ignored and a focus was placed on the actual topic of the thread then it might have actually gone somewhere. Instead people decided chasing wild conspiracies, complete with screenshot collages, was the right movie. I'm sure the entire situation was quite the guffaw for the troll. Fed the troll and didn't address the actual issue the thread was opened for, top marks.
SFR, I think you're right about what happened at ANI. I have also repeatedly told Dronebogus and others not to drag you into it. The so-called "evidence" about you was not at all conclusive. As far as emailing you, I don't recall what I said or the situation, but I would never ask you or anyone to !vote or act improperly, but I do use email as an FYI, "heads up", or to seek advice. If I violated some canvassing thing, I apologize. Okay, I found it and there was nothing wrong with what I did. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:51, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Some users prefer to be contacted onwiki. As you know, I don't mind people emailing me privately; when I was an admin, people would often send me stuff. I have emails from many users, some of them famous, infamous, blocked, deceased, etc. from 20 years of Wiki-editing. When I was on MEDCOM and the association of member's advocates and a bureaucrat, people would email me links all the time. Oftentimes I would followup or pursue such private requests if I found they had merit; other times I would warn people for canvassing. But I respect and understand SFR's desire to have it all onwiki. Regardless, I agree with both what SFR and Hemiauchenia and Valjean have written here on the subject of Philomathes; I also left him a pointed comment on the Talk:Douma chemical attack. Andre🚐22:59, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
It is indeed discouraged to publicize such discussions in private to the extent that this is canvassing (as in, influencing an outcome by trying to bring likeminded allies). It's not canvassing to ping an admin or trusted neutral outside user (e.g. WP:3O) to help "keep the peace" or keep people civil and policy-abiding, and the guideline explains what kinds of notification are not canvassing (neutral, nonpartisan, open, etc); in my experience, however, email conversations are fairly common and are not canvassing when done appropriately, but certainly, they must be consensual. At any rate; we needn't dwell on it. I really doubt Valjean will be contacting you via email. Andre🚐23:10, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
WP:STEALTH is pretty clear, Because it is less transparent than on-wiki notifications, the use of email, IRC, Discord, or other off-wiki communication to notify editors is strongly discouraged unless there is a significant reason for not using talk page notifications.ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 23:01, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Hmm, that version is stronger than it used to be. In 2016 it merely read, Because it is less transparent than on-wiki notifications, the use of email or other off-wiki communication to notify editors is discouraged unless there is a significant reason for not using talk page notifications. Depending on the specific circumstances, sending a notification to a group of editors by email may be looked at more negatively than sending the same message to the same group of people on their talk pages.Andre🚐23:05, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
It was three emails. I have them and would defend them as proper. I will try to remember not to use email with SFR. Let's move on. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 23:13, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 10 months ago8 comments2 people in discussion
Continued from above
Doug, now I see that you have contacted Philo with the same concerns and that you and I agree that talk pages are the wrong venue for their concerns. Until they can change policy, they must abide by the current version of our RS policy, even though they don't agree with it. That approach will significantly limit their disruption. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 15:33, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
Doug, would there be any benefit if Philo created a user space essay about sourcing? I think it could be a good place for them to discuss their issues with others without it spilling over to other venues and creating more disruption.
OTOH, from what I've read in their article here and the start of their userpage, their views are heavily infiltrated with conspiratorial thinking, bad faith in other editors, and a distorted view of "neutrality", so the essay would likely be seen as advocacy of fringe POV and conspiracy theories wrapped in an attack page. We do not allow that. Maybe they could sanitize their thoughts of those things and write a better essay worthy of discussion. That way discussions with other editors on the essay's talk page would help them refine their views on the subjects and maybe then approach WP:RSN, and maybe WP:NPOVN, with suggested improvements that might not be rejected immediately.
I AGF in Philo's intentions. They are obviously an experienced, intelligent, and generally civil editor, and I think much of this is about matters that reasonable editors can disagree over. The problem is that such disagreements should not exist to the degree they are in this case. It's divisive and a time-sink. The issue is the serious disruption created on talk pages and their editing of articles, hence why I believe the ANI thread should not have been closed. Editors' disagreements over how to apply policies should not spill over into actual editing. There should be real consensus and no edit warring or back-and-forth changing content because of serious disagreements about policies. As long as Philo maintains their serious disagreements with policies, they will remain a dissatisfied editor who causes problems, and I'd rather see them happy and contributing in harmony with other editors. I'd rather we saved them. Pinging Philomathes2357 and Doug Weller. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:22, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
Yes, a user space essay is a good idea.
No, neither I nor anyone else that I know of wants to doxx you. Your IRL name has been floating around off-Wiki sites for years, as far as I can tell, mainly because it appears on your profile on another MediaWiki platform. I would never repeat that information on-site or encourage anyone else to seek it out. If anyone is putting that information on-Wiki, that's unacceptable and disgusting.
I'm not interested in doxxing anybody, in fact, least of all you or Dronebogus. The SPI against DB was filed in good faith. DB has an extensive history of behavioral issues, and, had I not provoked such animosity in other editors, his conduct towards me would have been sanctionable. The conduct of the troll was remarkably similar, which may indicate a connection, but may also indicate an elaborate joe job. See my reply to Doug on my talk pages for my views on that. I'll note that I was doxxed by this SP troll that we're all currently dealing with, and I know how violated I felt then, so I would never wish that upon you or another user.
I've already been very clear that the problem I've identified cannot be addressed at the article level, only at a system-wide level. I think you'll see that my degree of participation on article talk pages reflects that understanding going forward. I think you'd concede that my talk page post length and frequency has decreased substantially over time.
The notion that my views on proper encyclopedic analysis of modern politics are "conspiratorial" is your opinion, which you're of course welcome to, but I don't think it's an accurate characterization. If I do write a user space essay about this, I'd welcome a specific critique, from you or anyone else.
The conspiratorial aspect refers to your view that top down control by powerful individuals and corporate entities is so powerful that it excludes the possibility that mainstream sources and excellent journalists can't provide good information, and that this results in editors being limited to information provided by biased sources. I don't give that view nearly as much weight as you do. (Spoken by someone who in his youth was nearly a John Birch Society member. I even met Gary Allen privately and discussed, one-on-one, the views he expressed in his book None Dare Call It Conspiracy. I was deeply into conspiracy theories back then.)
Otherwise, do you think you could write an essay that won't be dragged to MfD as soapboxing or pushing of conspiracy theories? I hope so. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:43, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
"...so powerful that it excludes the possibility that mainstream sources and excellent journalists can't provide good information"
I don't think that possibility is excluded. In terms of mainstream sources, I read at minimum, the Washington Post, NYT, CNN, MSNBC, and the Wall Street Journal headlines every day. I used to get the WSJ delivered to my house, for years, and read almost every word. There's lots of great information in mainstream sources. My critique is a lot more nuanced than that, but I'll spare you the details until another day.
Hah, that's pretty neat. In my home town, there was a John Birch society building downtown. They had a big banner facing Main street that said "Get the US out of the UN!". I always thought they were a bit kooky, but I think some of their observations & critiques are valid.
In terms of "conspiracies", they do exist, but I think that a natural, organic confluence of interests can give the outward appearance of a coordinated conspiracy, and that's an analytical misstep that a lot of people make.
I learned to never attribute to conspiracies what can be more easily explained by stupidity, ignorance, differences of opinion, and especially the use of different sources by those in their bubbles who hold opposing POV. Those things have a far greater influence than those sources that are influenced by hidden puppet masters. The influence of mainstream journalists who maintain editorial independence is greatest, but there is danger when the big lie techniques are wielded by the most powerful leader in the country. Fringe views can become adopted by the majority of the populace, as we saw in Germany and now in the GOP. Mass delusions are powerful things.
Likewise, the influence of myriad RS and myriad good editors here can easily overcome the influence of an editor working for the CIA who is paid to slant and distort content in violation of our policies and good RS. The motives of editors are made somewhat irrelevant by their actual edits which they do not own, which are then subjected to analysis by other editors who criticize and change them if they are not in harmony with RS and our PAG. At Wikipedia, the good tends to win over the malign. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:42, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 10 months ago19 comments3 people in discussion
Hey. I saw you went on a deletion spree. I don't blame/fault/disagree. Just wanted to say. If any of those pieces of content were truly drafts, or essays about wikipedia operation (not casual voice explainers that some might say have a point of view which is your own and not a global POV), you shouldn't feel that you need to delete them. You are allowed to have user space drafts. And I hope you're also feeling a bit better about some of your dark thoughts. I don't really know you personally, but most of the work I've seen you do is legitimate, and I'd hate for you to really be suffering because of, honestly, something that isn't important in the scheme of things. Don't let a little scrutiny send you to a dark place. Buy a potted plant. Eat a fresh fish. Go to the art museum. Andre🚐06:30, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I am feeling better. I used distraction with other things, and that helped. When attacked I get tunnel vision and go to dark places. I have never been diagnosed with autism, but after our son was diagnosed with Aspergers, and then other family members were diagnosed (it was a new thing back then), I came to realize that I had some aspects of it in my personality. That explained certain difficulties with interpersonal relationships I have had all my life. It also means I don't think totally normally. The U.S. Navy did like my mind and tried for a long time (during the Vietnam war) to recruit me for their Code (cryptography) division. I might have ended up with the CIA (joke)! Autistic savants are never "balanced" people.
I have severe PTSD after many years ago experiencing severe internet hounding that got very real and threatened my family and business, then barely surviving the ArbCom nightmare, and then surviving the 2018 Camp Fire (fire all around) where we lost everything, lost 95% of our friends who disappeared suddenly to parts unknown, and lost my job as the hospital closed due to damage. I was forced into retirement early with a smaller pension and isolation. I was blocked from Facebook for three years for sharing a joke picture of Trump. That isolated me further, but I am now back online and in touch with old work comrades, friends, and family. But it's only online. I'm still isolated. Wikipedia is very real to me. It is not optional. The learning I get here is invaluable.
Speaking of isolation, for me it's a mixed blessing. I was a shy child in some ways and have always been a loner and enjoy solitary time in my "cave". That's partially an Aspie thing. OTOH, I learned some things about interpersonal relations (things normies know by instinct) that got me out of my shell, and I transformed into a talkative and gregarious person after high school. My wife knows I talk too much, and my friends tolerate it. That was learned behavior, not totally natural to my shy nature. Online I am more open. Brevity is difficult.
I would disagree about being allowed to have user-space drafts. I no longer completely believe that. I have asked Beeblebrox for a clarification and have not received any. Where does it say that all userspace (not mainspace) essays have to be only "about Wikipedia" (PAG)? Where does it say that an editor cannot mention a topic found in articles, especially a possibly controversial topic? I was targeted for that reason. Why? How did they even learn about those two pages? Beeblebrox went into my "desk" and tried to delete two files of painstaking research that took a long time to develop and was not finished, all without any attempt to contact me first to express their concerns. I'm very amenable to such things. The MfDs came as a shock, an invasion of privacy. I still don't feel safe, so I have deleted years of work. It's available as diffs in my archives, but that's not as easy to access and work with. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 07:05, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
The truth is that it doesn't say it clearly anywhere. Wikipedia still runs by consensus. Beeblebrox nominated those essays for MFD. He said "those aren't essays or drafts or research for content work in article space; they appear to be personal screeds." Some editors agreed. I disagreed, but we didn't let it run its course. The truth is no policy says you cannot make drafts or essays; but take a look at the adoring nanny MFD of "lab leak likely." You are 1000% absolutely allowed to have drafts and essays. Drafts, should be early versions of articles, with the same treatment standard as articles. Essays, are meta-content. I agree with you that Beeblebrox was uncollegial and unkind by not contacting you to discuss instead of going straight to railroad with process. However, let's give him the benefit of the doubt; he says he didn't realize you would take it so hard, and I believe that. Everyone makes a mistake or forgets sometimes that we're real people. Not that I think you'll get an apology from him - but the point is, don't let him live rent-free in your head. I promise you, you are allowed to write essays in userspace. And, if you had won the MFD, you'd be allowed to have those essays because consensus determines policy in unclear scenarios (and many clear ones). Also, one other note. Beeblebrox is now an WP:INVOLVED editor with you. He is acting as an editor on this matter, not as an admin or arbitrator, and he might have to recuse himself were there to be a case with your involvement ever (not that I think there should/will be any cases). It also means Beeblebrox should not close any discussion concerning your conduct or block you for a political edit war (not that again, either of those is happening/should happen). But hopefully it makes it a little less intimidating to know he is INVOLVED and therefore acting as an editor. Andre🚐07:11, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Valjean, have you considered publishing the work that's been questioned/challenged/deleted in some other online platform such as Substack or on your own domain? Hosting and blog software is inexpensive, and I have no doubt that you could build a following. Regardless of the question of its suitablity on this site, I don't see anybody denigrating the substance of your efforts. SPECIFICOtalk11:52, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I don't know where the red line is for what's allowed in a user space essay because it isn't clearly defined. Editors are explicitly allowed to voice their opinions, but Beeblebrox thought I went too far in seeming confusion over the difference between a regular essay (where ownership behavior is not allowed) and a private user space essay, where the editor is explicitly allowed to own and control it. Beeblebrox accused me of wanting to control it. Well, that's allowed. Regular essays are more forward facing and visible, and non-editors may discover them. User space essays are hidden in the background, and usually, only other editors see them. That's where these pages were. Very few were even essays, so they were hidden even more. They were labeled as personal and hidden from search engines. I didn't want the public involved, so the accusations and aspersions against me are false. They assume bad faith and abuse of Wikipedia. That's why the effort to MfD them and the accusations against me ring hollow. There was no chance that anyone would mistake them for being "fake articles". They were not simply duplications of existing content. They covered aspects not covered that should be covered. The accusations are just false and a real misunderstanding, although I don't think Beeblebrox would see it that way.
I know I could publish them, but don't want to. That's not my intention. I am not trying to inform the public. These things are mostly my research, with some becoming formulated as essays so other editors might notice them and can comment and help me sort things out. The talk pages of some of them were interesting, and other editors have enlightened me on points of interpretation of RS where I got it wrong. That's a good thing. A number of my essays and subpages have become significant parts of articles, and that's the whole idea. The parts of them that are just my opinion would never be used in article space, but are voiced so other editors can correct me, and that is explicitly allowed in user space essays. (Beeblebrox doesn't seem to realize that.) It's all part of my process of learning and developing content.
If I was interested in pushing my own POV on these subjects, I have plenty of experience with my own websites and blogs to do it, but I am not interested in that. They languish. I have a blog somewhere that is abandoned. I don't think I have any websites up anymore. I think they were lost when Geocities was closed. I used to write a lot and had a bit of a following, but lots of critics who turned nasty and threatened me. Being a quackbuster is fraught with peril, and I have lost interest in doing much about that. My focus is article improvement, and that agenda is a threat to the editors who revel in what Beeblebrox has done. They want to silence me and Beeblebrox is helping them. These tendentious and fringe editors are gravedancing off-wiki and will continue to slant content here with their narratives from unreliable sources. Now Bbb23 is deleting evidence of their wrongdoing and improperly closed a thread at ANI. Where will this end? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 15:34, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Beeblebrox, I see your warning below. You are involved, so be careful not to abuse your tools. Your actions are being questioned by many. Instead, act in good faith and participate here. You are welcome to explain yourself and explain my errors. I am totally open to learning. You have written that I don't understand. So help me understand. You have also written: "I think if we were to sit down and talk, we would find we have basically the same feelings aboiut Donald Trump. Clearly we have very different ideas of what userspace essays are for though." If you are acting in good faith, and I have no reason to doubt that, then here's your chance to explain.
I will ask you again, maybe with better wording than before: Where is the bright red line that I crossed between what's allowed in a normal essay and what's allowed in a private user space essay (which I am explicitly allowed to control)? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:41, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I don't think an answer is forthcoming. There are good faith reasons why Beeblebrox may disagree with us, we don't need to antagonize him. You've already deleted most if not all of the stuff he didn't like, so let's leave him alone now since he seems to be getting a bit agitated. There's plenty of work to do. Andre🚐17:55, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Okay. Maybe we should look at Wikipedia:Essays and improve it. It needs to be made plain that no essay at Wikipedia can even slightly touch on article content (otherwise one will be accused of soapboxing, advocacy, and creating "fake articles"), only about what Beeblebrox called "about Wikipedia" (PAG, editing matters, and such like?). That's what I've learned from the accusations made against me and those two subpages. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:10, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
The idea is good, but by adding it to what all agree is clearly disruptive, one automatically interprets all mention of politics is disruptive polemic and not allowed in private user essays. I have separated it as the two are different matters. What has been forbidden above is draft research content that is clearly intended to improve article content. My tweak means that is no longer allowed. Editors may dispute my change, and that may lead to a useful discussion and the creation of a bright red line so there will be no confusion in the future. I don't want this happening to anyone else. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:27, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I don't see a problem with it. Let's see if anyone else tweaks or reverts. Sorry again you're having this experience. Andre🚐18:29, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
There is an old Danish adage that says "Nothing is so bad it's not good for something."another version If the Essay guideline can be improved, then this nasty experience will have at least produced one good thing. That's the history of the world. Lots of good things have been produced, but only at the cost of wars and much destruction. At Wikipedia, we usually try to do this in a civil manner using softer methods than drama boards and MfDs. Much grief could have been avoided. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:36, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I tweaked the essay guideline a bit more, take one more pass at it, and hopefully nobody comes in and upends the entire applecart, and then let's forget about essays for a few weeks, shall we? there's so much going on right now, no shortage of work to do. In real work. Remember, if it's not masturbation, it's not an essay. ;-) Andre🚐21:38, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
Hmmmm. I think you've gone too far. <removed comment> Now you've justified what happened and erased some of the difference between an outward-facing regular essay seen by anyone and an inward-facing user essay not seen by many editors. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 21:42, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
That's why I said take another pass at it. Let's find the middle ground. I'm playing devil's advocate partly as an exercise. That is how to do it. You know this; it's written all over your pages. Andre🚐21:44, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I tend to be reticent of tweaking something you do out of the respect I have for your wisdom and judgment. I'll think about it. This is a bit of a Gordian Knot, so the question is how to cut it. One option is not not call such subpages "essays". That would be a step in the right direction. Subpages are really hidden away, unlike essays which are in a category. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 21:49, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
I have gone ahead and deleted the new paragraph, while leaving improvements of the previous content in place. It's better now. We need to rethink adding what I've deleted. It would need more work as it could be used to excuse politically motivated hit jobs against good-faith editors. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:11, 11 October 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 10 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Hello, Valjean. Please check your email; you've got mail! It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.
How many times, how many ways, do I have to ask you to stop casting aspersions at me? I'm at the point where I am ready to go request an arbitration about you, due to the private nature of some of the evidence, asking at a bare minimum for you to be banned from commenting on me anywhere on WP, and possibly being banned form the project altogether for harassment and emotional manipulation.
I fully expect that you would go into a full-blown freak out like you did at the MFD, and I don't relish the idea of being on the receiving end of your hysterics again, so I am asking you one last time to stop casting aspersions about me. If I'm that awful, feel free to open an actual discussion of it at ANI or wherever you think is approrpiate. Talking shit again and again on talk pages is not how it is supposed to work. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:09, 11 October 2023 (UTC)
The thing is, I have not acted as an admin in this situation. I nominated two pages for deletion thirteen days ago, and this person has been saying negative things about me again and again since then. If there's a problem with my work as an admin, they are free to adress that through our various established proicesses, which I am certain they are well aware of. I'm not going to ignore a person who seems fixated on me. Valjean is not the victim here. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:34, 11 October 2023 (UTC)
Yes, I will stop mentioning you. Sorry about that. You've gotten caught up in the crossfire in my brain from related issues that make me paranoid. If I can trust you to keep it private, I'll email you why. Reply yes or no. It's quite the story that will help you understand that I'm not totally crazy. This is a case where someone really is "after me". It's not just a joke to me, and outings and doxxing threats really get to me. They have been revived because of those MfDs that were then mentioned here. You didn't do it, but others took advantage of the situation. You also commented there.
Seriously, I will try to be more careful and not mention you. You were acting in good faith. I just wish you had approached me first. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:08, 11 October 2023 (UTC)
I don't need to know your reasons, all I'm asking is that you cut it out, but if someone is really threatening you you should contact Trust and Safety with whatever information you have. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:47, 11 October 2023 (UTC)
Off-wiki activities with blocked and dissatisfied former and present editors, like on that forum and other forums, increase the danger for good-faith editors here. It has been asserted that Philomathes2357 (whose case at ANI was, I and others believe, improperly closed) has been observed colluding with others to dox and damage editors. (The SPI against Dronebogus is part of those efforts, and that is a total dud. No evidence.) I don't have that evidence about Philo, so I can't present it, but the IPs that have been blocked have been providing evidence that has immediately been deleted, so we're in a bad situation. The IPs, whatever their motives, have been providing accurate info. Ask Doug Weller. He has seen accurate info.
What I saw showed three things. One is that Philomathes has an agenda to change our policies at least on sourcing, eg saying at an article talk page herre" I'm suggesting that the structure of western media, described as "effective and powerful ideological institutions that carry out a system-supportive propaganda function, by reliance on market forces, internalized assumptions, and self-censorship, and without overt coercion", is largely responsible for the negative tone that "reliable" sources have taken in their commentary on The Grayzone, and that it exposes a problem with Wikipedia's sourcing standards when it comes to political attitudes. I reverted that. Secondly of course he has a bug about Dronebogus. Oddly various socks are attacking me and other editors saying we are neoNazi's or antisemites. I don't believe that of him (the third thing is that socks are also saying the same thing about him while others are supporting him while attacking me and others as, again, antisemites. This is all pretty bizarre and just shows someone is trolling. Doug Wellertalk07:18, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
I agree it's bizarre. The IPs I saw were correctly pointing out the disruptiveness of Philo, but getting carried away and getting bizarre with accusations of antisemitism. Our danger is that while we get distracted by the IPs we forget about the continuing disruption by Philo. The IPs seem to be blocked, so let's get back to dealing with Philo. That ANI thread should be rebooted. They must stop litigating their ideas about defects in our sourcing policy on article talk pages and only do it at WP:RSN. Period. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 07:38, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
Thanks for dealing with it, Doug. FFF and Materialscientist cleaned up a few more crazy troll posts and revoked TPA last night. I recommend since Philomath has been suitably warned and is expressing a lot of calm introspection and contrition about this whole event (and the meritless SPI against Dronebogus) that we all let it rest now and try to get back to normal, collegial editing. Right? Andre🚐16:59, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 9 months ago5 comments2 people in discussion
You mind if I hang out here for a bit? I'm exhausted from debating. I need a change of scenery.
Thought you might be interested in some exploration. I'll jot some topics down, and you can choose any that you find intriguing. Or not.
Feel free to nuke this post.
And off we go...
perplexity.ai
There's this power tool for tracking down sources. And when you get bored, you can even have philosophical conversations with the thing. Or have it interactively write userscripts for you. It's pretty nifty. Though, it's not suitable for writing WP articles, yet, because of potential derivative work issues.
It's an AI chatbot search engine powered by several AIs woven together, with ChatGPT in the background. It bypasses most of the problems (but not all) with the big hallucination thing. By being required to formulate its answers from the webpages in the search results, it rarely makes things up out of the blue. But if you try hard enough, you can get it to space out.
I've been using it as my primary search engine since last February, and I've concluded there are 3 main benefits:
It formulates its responses to your queries/requests/commands primarily out of the webpages listed in the search results, and combines them into a coherent response to your "prompt". In that way, it allows you to home in on the answer without having to read or skim the pages yourself, which is a major time saver. It provides references so that you can verify the answers (which is a good idea, until you get used to its ideosyncrasies).
You can type at it in natural language (in pretty much any language you know), and get it to do all kinds of things: create tables, reformat tables, write programs in over a dozen programming languages (I had it write a userscript earlier today), present its responses in MediaWiki wiki text in a code block, write an essay from scratch, rewrite an essay you've written, translate from one language to another, check grammar, crack jokes, make a list of the best whatever on the Web, summarize a specific book, movie, or wikipedia article, etc. You're basically limited only by your imagination. I had it run a D&D game session, and it wasn't half bad. And it gets seemingly pretty creative when you ask it to analyze the current world situation as if it was Albert Einstein or Julius Caesar, and so on.
It remembers your prompts, and its responses at least 10 back, and refers to them to retain context in your dialog. So, if you say something like "explain it again, in terms a 5th-grader would understand", it usually guesses correctly as to what the "it" is that you are referring to. If you had it write a summary, you could refer to "that summary you wrote for me". Therefore you can work iteratively on a piece of work with it. And so on.
Oh, and it is mind-blowingly good at explaining Wikipedia policy, though not infallible. It can summarize, analyze, and debate policy. Good enough to make you go "Holy sh*t!" You and I are both smart enough to dance circles around it, but, for how long?
The most impressive thing about this technology, is that it is advancing rapidly. This thing gets better almost every week. And this team and all their competitors are working on entirely new versions. So, in a year or two, the versions they have today of this type of thing will be blown away.
Tip: have it tell you all about itself, so you know how to use it. Asking about how to use ChatGPT is even better, because it (perplexity) is powered by GPT-3 (and 4 if you opt for the upgrade), and there is a lot more material out there on the Web about that.
One of the most powerful tools for use with Wikipedia.
To use its main features (auto-page-loading, multi-page search/replace, and message prepending/appending) you got to get approved by an admin at the sign-up page.
It's with this tool that I've racked my edits up into the hundreds of thousands.
A really cool fact that most users do not know, is that you can run this program without being registered/approved. It's got lots of features that don't require you to be signed up. Like its highly versatile list maker, its list comparer, and its (Wikipedia) database scanner. The latter lets you do massive regex searches of the main namespace.
It's not that great for browsing – they probably should have named it something else, but, it is powered by an embedded browser, which inspired the name.
But for editing batches of dozens, or hundreds, or thousands of pages, that's what this baby was built for. I think it can handle around 25,000 pages in its queue.
MediaWiki
Yep, the software that runs Wikipedia.
I've got 2 instances loaded on one of my computers.
It takes a lot of different programs to be able to run MediaWiki, so the easiest solution is probably to install a Bitnami stack. I installed mine years ago, and I've read that the stacks have improved and gotten even easier to install (with "one click") since then.
It's very hard to get an offsite WP up and running—I had one, but it looked like gobbledegook—but it's very very easy to start your own personal offline wikis. Not to be confused with offsite WP readers like Kiwix and XOWA.
Why?
To be able to transfer your wiki skills.
I hardly use files anymore. I mostly create wiki pages.
Great for keeping notes, projects, personal writings, plans, task lists, custom tables (which you can build fast with the help of perplexity.ai), diary entries, stuff you pull off the Web, lists of bookmarks, etc. etc. etc.
And since perplexity.ai can write in wiki text, you can store its results in your wikis!
Also great for sandboxing WP experiments, and as an offline wikitext editor.
OMG! Just yesterday I was looking at the support pages for downloading this. I have been deleting lots of my research subpages because of the harassment by a certain editor. He goes through my private stuff and then reports me for "soapboxing" and "fake articles", even though they are clearly marked as "removed from search engines' indexes" and "This is a Wikipedia user page." If you look at my recent contributions you'll see I have used many hours doing this. It really hampers my ability to create new articles or new content. That's why I need wiki software on my PC. It looks daunting. I am not tech savvy. Tell me what to do. Maybe, with your help, I can get this to work so I can prepare wikitext on my PC. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:51, 3 November 2023 (UTC)
When I loaded it, it was free. Let's ask perplexity.ai...
how much does the bitnami stack for MediaWiki cost?
The cost of the Bitnami stack for MediaWiki varies depending on the platform it is being used on. Bitnami MediaWiki Stack is available for Windows, Linux, and OS X, and it is free to download and use. However, if you are using the Bitnami stack on a cloud platform like AWS or Google Cloud, you will be charged for the resources you use. According to the AWS Marketplace, the cost of using the Bitnami MediaWiki stack is based on the instance type and region you choose, and it will be reflected on your monthly AWS billing reports. Similarly, the Google Cloud Marketplace states that Bitnami does not charge a usage fee for the MediaWiki stack, but you will be charged for the resources you use, and the cost will be calculated in US dollars.
So, install it on Windows, on your laptop, and you'll be fine. It doesn't cost anything if you install it on your laptop. I have an older version installed twice on a very old laptop (2015). So, I don't think you will have a problem.
Here are the system requirements (which I got by asking perplexity):
This is the best onsite editor for Wikipedia, by far.
It has search/replace built-in, and supports regex.
And it has an alphasort feature, which is great for handling lists.
Tip of the day
To see it in a convenient location, place this this code somewhere on your talk page: <ref>{{totd}}</ref>
...and the daily tip will show up and hover at the bottom of your talk page, no matter how many people post you messages. Or just place "{{totd}}" wherever you want it to appear.
To search the English Wikipedia with Google, cut and paste the following customized Google search link/command to your User page, or click on it and save it as a button on your browser's toolbar:
If you use perplexity.ai to write userscripts, you're going to want this userscript manager to install and run them.
There are also libraries of third party userscripts available to supercharge your browser.
There's more, but I'm running out of steam
If you enjoyed reading about these, I'll be happy to post some more tools/tips some time.
Also, keep in mind, I love collecting new tools and tips for my arsenal. So if you have some favorites that I haven't mentioned, please tell me about them.
P.S.: If you do use any of the tools mentioned above, we could swap best practices.
I love it! I am not tech-savvy, but do use a few scripts. I can hover over links, diffs, and usernames and get info that way. I use Twinkle a little bit. Otherwise, I don't use automation, which is one reason why my edit count is only at 85,712 right now. There are some wiki-gnomeing tasks I'd like to be able to automate. I just commented above about Mediawiki software. I need help with that. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me)
If you don't have Firefox installed, I highly recommend you do so.
In fact, I would do that first. It is very useful to have 2 or more browsers, in case one doesn't work for something. (I use Firefox and Opera). Chrome records your personal data and tracks your browsing activity, so I avoid that one.
@Valjean: Here are some instructions generated by perplexity.ai, in answer to the prompt: "Please provide step-by-step instructions on how to install the Bitnami version of MediaWiki on my laptop."
1) Go to the Bitnami MediaWiki page and click on the "Download" button.
2) Choose the appropriate version for your operating system (Windows, macOS, or Linux) and click on the download link.
3) Once the download is complete, double-click on the installer file to start the installation process.
4) Follow the on-screen instructions to configure the installation settings. You can choose the installation directory, create shortcuts, and select additional components to install (such as Apache, MySQL, and PHP).
5) During the installation, you will be prompted to set a username and password for the MediaWiki application. Make sure to remember these credentials as you will need them to log in to your MediaWiki site later.
6) After the installation is complete, you can launch the Bitnami MediaWiki application from the Start menu (Windows) or the Applications folder (macOS).
7) In your web browser, enter the following URL to access your MediaWiki site: http://localhost/mediawiki. If you installed the application in a different directory, replace /mediawiki with the appropriate path.
8) On the MediaWiki installation page, click on the "Set up the wiki" link to start the configuration process.
9) Follow the on-screen instructions to set up your wiki, including providing a name for your wiki, creating an administrator account, and configuring the database settings. You can use the default settings for the database, which is SQLite, or choose to use a different database system like MySQL or PostgreSQL.
10) Once the configuration is complete, you will be redirected to your newly created MediaWiki site. Log in with the administrator account you created during the setup process.
11) You can now start customizing your MediaWiki site by adding content, creating new pages, and configuring the site's appearance and functionality through the MediaWiki interface.
Endwise, thanks for asking. I wish others would do that instead of just slandering me as TTAC often does. Read my recent comment. That should answer your question. I hold the door open and don't know if the allegation is true or not. Knowing Trump, his proven tastes in that area and his multiple lies about the allegation, the door opens wider. James Comey was a pee tape skeptic who believed the allegation was false. After Trump lied to him more than once about it, he changed his mind and opened it to the possibility the allegation was true, and he would know better than any editor here. FBI agents, and Comey was the top agent, are trained to spot lies, and lies that are unforced, especially false alibis (Trump and Cohen did that), really raise lots of red flags. Trump did it in regards to the pee tape allegation, and Cohen did it in regards to the Prague allegation. Those lies make one wonder what they are hiding. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:59, 24 August 2023 (UTC)
That was the long answer. The short version is "likely true, but we don't know." We can't say it's true or false, but there are several types of evidence that it's true and zero evidence it's false.
James Comey told George Stephanopolous that "it's 'possible' the pee tape is real":
"I honestly never thought these words would come out of my mouth, but I don't know whether the current president of the United States was with prostitutes peeing on each other in Moscow in 2013. It's possible, but I don't know."[1]
"It is also a fact that Trump and his fixer (Michael Cohen) acted as if Russian sex tapes existed and tried to find and stop compromising sex tapes from Russia." This is a persistent false or misleading statement by Valjean, as I have noted before. Bloomberg News has reported on the full exchange of texts between Rtskhiladze and Cohen, noting the relevant context: "The texts between Rtskhiladze and Cohen came a few weeks after an Access Hollywood video was released showing Trump talking about kissing and groping women without their consent, leading to speculation there were more compromising tapes to emerge. But it was before a dossier of unverified allegations about Trump and his campaign, compiled by ex-British spy Christopher Steele, was published." The exchange reads as follows:
Rtskhiladze: Stopped flow of some tapes from Russia but not sure if there's anything else. Just so u know...
Cohen: Tapes of what?
Rtskhiladze: Not sure of the content but person in Moscow was bragging had tapes from Russia trip.
Rtskhiladze: Will try to dial you tomorrow but wanted to be aware
Rtskhiladze: I'm sure it's not a big deal but there are lots of stupid people
Valjean persistently makes it sound as though Rtskhiladze told Cohen that he had "Stopped flow of some tapes from Russia" and Cohen then replied something to the effect of: "Oh, you mean the pee tape?" As the full exchange shows, that is incorrect.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 17:42, 14 October 2023 (UTC)
TheTimesAreAChanging, thanks for your observations. Also, I'm right here. Please don't speak to a third party as if I don't exist. You have previously helped me understand certain connections in various circumstances and led me to change my mind, so I AGF that you may be able to do that here. Therefore, would you please explain the timeline here? I suspect the resolution lies somewhere in that direction, and, as you have experienced before, you know I am not all knowing, and that I know that. I am therefore very open to your advice. I just need convincing. If the evidence in RS is there, I will be convinced. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:41, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
To help us understand this better and get it right, here's what we have in the Steele dossier article, with other sources that make connections between the mention of Rtskhiladze and the pee tape:
A footnote in the Mueller Report suggests that Trump may have heard that Russia had incriminating tapes of his behavior. On October 30, 2016, Michael Cohen exchanged a series of text messages with Giorgi Rtskhiladze, a businessman who had worked with Cohen on Trump's real estate projects. Rtskhiladze reported that he had successfully stopped the "flow of tapes from Russia but not sure if there's anything else. Just so you know..." Rtskhiladze told investigators that these were compromising tapes of Trump. Cohen told investigators he spoke to Trump about the issue. Rtskhiladze later told investigators "he was told the tapes were fake, but he did not communicate that to Cohen."[2]Rolling Stone reported that "Rtskhiladze's description of the tapes' content tracks with the unverified information included in the Steele dossier".[3]
The Senate Intelligence Committee Report indicated that "Cohen has testified that he became aware of allegations about a tape of compromising information in late 2013 or early 2014 ... related to Trump and prostitutes." Cohen then "asked a friend, Giorgi Rtskhiladze, to see if Rtskhiladze could find out if the tape was real". The Report added that "Cohen ... would have been willing to pay ... to suppress the information if it could be verified, but Cohen was never shown any evidence."[4]
To me, the Senate Intelligence Committee Report timeline, with Cohen himself revealing he knew of the pee tape back "in late 2013 or early 2014", which would be right after the incident allegedly happened, and that Cohen asked Rtskhiladze for help and was willing to pay to suppress the tape, is very damning.
Two and a half years before the dossier was written, and three years before it was published, Cohen had a standing order with Rtskhiladze to help stop the tapes. (Tapes, plural, because, as several intelligence agencies have said, there is more than one incriminating tape.) Apparently, Rtskhiladze kept Cohen's request in mind and finally, in October 2016, came through with the information that he had finally stopped the tapes. (Cohen was acting independently of the dossier. It had noting to do with their arrangement.) That Cohen and Rtskhiladze say the tapes were fake is just typical cover-up language, just in case anyone later learned of the incident. That is not to be trusted, especially in light of their actual testimony.
They both believed there was a real tape and acted as if it was real. First, they tell the truth under oath, but then seek to undermine what happened. That's how it appears to me. I don't see any connection with the Donald Trump Access Hollywood tape: On October 7, 2016, one month before the United States presidential election, The Washington Post published a video and accompanying article about then-presidential candidate Donald Trump and television host Billy Bush having "an extremely lewd conversation about women" in September 2005.
At that time (October 7, 2016), the dossier wasn't really on anyone's radar. The FBI Crossfire Hurricane team had just received the first memos of what became the dossier on September 19, 2016, and no one knew of this, especially Cohen. His actions were independent of the dossier and its allegation about the Ritz Carlton.
I suggest reading the Senate Intelligence Committee Report from page 658, where it is plain that long before Steele and his dossier were a twinkle in the Clinton campaign's eye, Russians were talking about an incident at the Ritz Carlton and a tape of it, and the likes of David Pecker (and others), who helped Trump hide evidence of his sexual escapades, were in the market to buy this mysterious tape. Steele found out about the same tape, possibly using other sources, and wrote that in his memos.
After reviewing the cited material from the Senate Intelligence Committee Report, I concede that there is relevant context surrounding the exchange between Cohen and Rtskhiladze that I was not aware of previously, and which serves to clarify the meaning of "tapes" in the exchange (i.e., the putative tapes were salacious/sexual in nature). (Of course, the most important question for Wikipedia is how much credibility/weight mainstream RS assign to these allegations, but I appreciate the info.)
I'm still not 100% sure how my comment here"slander[ed]" you, but moving forward I will refrain from characterizing your view as "true or likely true" if that characterization is inaccurate. Regards,TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 04:22, 27 November 2023 (UTC)
The incident allegedly occurred November 8–10, when Trump stayed at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel.
"After they arrived, Trump attended a morning meeting about the pageant at his hotel, the Ritz-Carlton... someone offered to send five women to Trump’s hotel room."[1] (According to Keith Schiller, the offer was not accepted.)
"Michael Cohen has testified that he became aware of allegations about a tape of compromising information in late 2013 or early 2014, shortly after the Miss Universe 2013 pageant and significantly prior to the 2016 U.S. election cycle. The alleged tape related to Trump and prostitutes. Cohen has testified that he discussed the allegations with Trump, who asked Cohen to find out where the allegations were coming from. Trump told Cohen that the allegations were not true."[2]
"Cohen has said that in 2014 or 2015 he asked a friend, Giorgi Rtskhiladze, to see if Rtskhiladze could find out if the tape was real."[2]
"Cohen estimated that, over the course of several years, six different people contacted him regarding the alleged tape. Cohen stated that one individual threatened to release the alleged information if the individual was not paid a large sum of money. Cohen indicated that he would been willing to pay the individual to suppress the information if it could be verified, but Cohen was never shown any evidence. Cohen has also said that individuals in the media contacted him regarding a tape of Trump."[2]
Rtskhiladze said "his friend and former business associate, Sergei Khokhlov" had overheard others discussing a tape. "Mr. Rtskhiladze sent a text message to Mr. Cohen to inform him that an individual was overheard discussing sensitive tapes of Mr. Trump's trip to Russia."[2]
This may or may not include the tape: "[David] Geovanis has claimed that, during Trump’s travel to Russia, both in 1996 and 2013, Geovanis was aware of Trump engaging in personal relationships with Russian women. Geovanis has suggested that the Russian government was also likely aware of this information."[3]
1. others discussing sensitive tapes (at least two)
2. others discussing sensitive tapes (at least two)
That's about 13 people who were aware of the tape, long before Steele began his investigation. It is obvious that Steele did not originate this incident. It had a life of its own beginning immediately after the Miss Universe pageant in November 2013.
His sources may have been privy to some of the above, or have (also) had other sources. The founders of Fusion GPS report that Steele received the "hotel anecdote" from seven Russian sources.[4]
Here's a potential short mention for the Steele dossier article. This is highly due and relevant
The Senate Intelligence Committee report documents that a story about a compromising tape of Trump began circulating shortly after the Miss Universe contest in November 2013:
Michael Cohen has testified that he became aware of allegations about a tape of compromising information in late 2013 or early 2014, shortly after the Miss Universe 2013 pageant and significantly prior to the 2016 U.S. election cycle. The alleged tape related to Trump and prostitutes.[2]
(already in for a long time)
The Committee also mentions about 13 people who had some knowledge of the alleged tape long before Steele began his investigation in 2016.[2]
Latest comment: 10 months ago2 comments1 person in discussion
Hello, Valjean. Please check your email; you've got mail! It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.
Latest comment: 10 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
The article body clearly has numerous issues across almost the whole gamut of CE.
The default parameter is actually a pretty good description of the issues with the article. Read it yourself and see!
And while I do understand the DIY point, it would be a lot of work for one person to fix all of the issues. I'm not capable of sitting down for ~90 minutes and doing it all. After all, WP is a collaborative effort…
Invitation to Cornell study on Wikipedia discussions
Latest comment: 10 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Hello Valjean,
I’m reaching out as part of a Cornell University academic study investigating the potential for user-facing tools to help improve discussion quality within Wikipedia discussion spaces (such as talk pages, noticeboards, etc.). We chose to reach out to you because you have been highly active on various discussion pages.
The study centers around a prototype tool, ConvoWizard, which is designed to warn Wikipedia editors when a discussion they are replying to is getting tense and at risk of derailing into personal attacks or incivility. More information about ConvoWizard and the study can be found at our research project page on meta-wiki.
If this sounds like it might be interesting to you, you can use this link to sign up and install ConvoWizard. Of course, if you are not interested, feel free to ignore this message.
If you have any questions or thoughts about the study, our team is happy to discuss! You may direct such comments to me or to my collaborator, Cristian_at_CornellNLP.
Latest comment: 9 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Hi,
I've virtually revamped WP:CFORK. I've tried to capture current practice. I was wondering if you would look over the changes to see if I've missed anything or overstepped. The main thing I tried to fix was a contextual schism in the guideline, where "content fork" was portrayed as a four-letter word (with the sentiment "cforking is bad"), while much of the guideline is about acceptable content forks ("cforking is good"). So, I tried to convey the sentiment of "content fork" as a neutral term, focusing on what kinds are acceptable or unacceptable. There was also a type missing, which I've added. Please look it over if you have time. Thank you. Sincerely, — The Transhumanist20:08, 2 November 2023 (UTC)
Verifiability discussion
Latest comment: 9 months ago2 comments1 person in discussion
We are supposed to (according to Jimbo) document the "sum of all human knowledge", and we do that by finding it in RS "out there" and then describing that, with its source(s), "here" in our articles. That's how we build content. All content must be "verifiable in cited" sources "here", not in "citable" sources "out there". -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:13, 3 November 2023 (UTC)
Our policy should be:
"All content that is likely to be challenged must be verifiable in an inline cited source, not just in an undefined citable source."
Here we have both definition and delimitation, what must be done and what must not be done. It's harder to misunderstand that way. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:53, 4 November 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 9 months ago7 comments3 people in discussion
Sorry I misunderstood you over there. What set me off was My focus above is the key wording: "verifiable in an inline cited source, not just in an undefined citable source.", which isn't in the policy and doesn't seem to be earlier said in that discussion. Being tired, I misread it as "online cited source", which made "undefined citable source" seem to mean "something that's hard for me to find because it's not online". I should have re-read it before posting a panic/umbrage response. Would post this mea culpla over there, but the discussion's been closed. — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 09:58, 5 November 2023 (UTC)
Hi Stanton. Welcome to my talk page! I'm pretty awed to have you here. You're a bit of a legend around here, and that you were a tech roadie for Aerosmith just effing blows my mind! How cool is that? I'm sure you could tell some interesting tales. "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing" is still one of my favorite songs.[8] At my age, Led Zeppelin was my big band. I actually made it to one of their concerts (June 22, 1972 - video), although we were way up in a dark corner of the bleachers, and I was more focused on getting stoned and making out with the chick with me. That was at the old Swing Auditorium in San Bernardino. It suffered the same fate as the Twin Towers, on the same date, but in a different year and different type of plane. (September 11, 1981) Led Zeppelin was legendary for its debauchery, but I suspect that Aerosmith trod the same path, and we commoners envied them and tried to emulate them in our own ways. "Sex and drugs and rock and roll" were not just words, but a lifestyle.
We're both old-timers here. I really am old (a youngish 72 going on 55), and you've been here about as long as I have. You don't need to apologize to me, although I appreciate the moral courage and collegiality it implies. That makes you a really good person. I did not take umbrage at your comment. Not at all. We were talking about slightly different things, and that's okay. Your input is valued, so keep up the good work. That you were considerate enough to realize that I might have felt offended is kind of you and much appreciated. Feel free to share your thoughts with me. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 14:36, 5 November 2023 (UTC)
I'm a little flustered to have someone say something like that! Honestly, I'm just a long-timer who is very opinionated; I don't hold any real sway here. Not an admin, not an ArbCom member, not holding the reins of any process like FAC or DYK. (I have some influence in MoS discussions, I guess, just because of long institutional memory about almost every line-item and why it's in there, but I still get overruled by changing consensus sometimes.) People disagree with me all the time, and sometimes I misread something and need to make amends, as in this case.The Aerosmith thing was fun, though very short term. The band were pretty much the first to try to do a "chat with the band live via the Internet after a show" sort of thing, and that's what we were setting up (and we were also typing their responses for them, because none of the band are [or then were] touch-typers, only hunt-and-peck). Steven Tyler is very amusing. Sometimes he just stops while walking through the room and belts out something like "WALK THIS WAY! WALK THIS WAY!" as vocal practice and then keeps on going as if nothing happened. I thought for the life of me that he had no idea why I was there, much less what my name was, but during one of the shows, I was in the side stand next to the amps where the staff sit when they want to watch, and he came behind the amps during a guitar solo, and put the mic behind him, and was like "Stanton! You would not believe how F'ing hot it is up here!" and went back to the show. Swing Auditorium: At least that one was an accident. Anyway, I know you've been around, too, and it's just accident that we've not chitter-chatted before, though I honestly don't do a lot of that on here unless it's about "getting the work done right". — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 14:53, 5 November 2023 (UTC)
In my day, a "chat with the band live after a show" was done by groupies. To the utter shock and awe of my group of friends, two of "our" girls, whom we didn't realize "had it in them", managed to get backstage at a Redbone concert. They were definitely not experienced groupies. They ended up doing the whole band all night long, and afterwards breathlessly told us a censored version about it. They didn't go into much detail, even though we prodded them to do so. If they were a bit naive before, they weren't after that night! They were taught debauchery by real pros. That may have been at The Mission Inn in Riverside, where I had a little apartment for one school year while attending Riverside City College. The girls were very close friends. One of them would strip for us if we gave in to her pleadings to play "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" for her, so we often used that to bribe/induce her to strip for our entertainment. She would close her eyes and get ecstatic, going somewhere in her mind as she stripped. She really got off on doing that. The other one was more uptight, at least with me. Once, when her mother was away, a group of us played strip poker in their apartment, and I ended up with her in bed. I tried unsuccessfully to get my hands between her legs, while another couple banged away beside us. Those were the days. She ended up getting pregnant from that night with Redbone and quietly moved to Texas to stay with an Aunt. We didn't know the real reason she left until she moved back and brought a baby with her. She had no way of knowing which band member fathered that child. There are a lot of such rock 'n roll offspring out there. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 15:22, 5 November 2023 (UTC)
I have no such debauchery tales from the Aerosmith gig. Back stage with them was signing stuff for VIP-pass holders, doing some interviews, doing the Internet gig, and then the guys having a quiet dinner with their wives. — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 20:09, 5 November 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 9 months ago5 comments3 people in discussion
Not all refnames were removed, just the ones which were not needed. In addition to naming the autogenerated names, I have been removing refnames when the cite is only used once. It is just bloat to have unnecessary refnames. ☾Loriendrew☽☏(ring-ring)22:43, 6 November 2023 (UTC)
I have to say I agree; I would rather have reasonably-named refs than things like name=":3". A few un-named and used-once refs isn't the end of the world. Primefac (talk) 09:14, 7 November 2023 (UTC)
Primefac, I generally agree with you, but I don't think good refnames should be removed, even if the ref is "currently" used only once. Other editors made the good faith effort to provide it, and that makes it easier to use again. It lessens the likelihood that we end up with the same source getting used with different names, and that's a problem I frequently find and fix. That's a bigger problem than bloat. This type of bloat is minor.
If you want to address a HUGE bloat problem, deal with the addition of archive links to live, not dead, refs. In one second an article suddenly grows 100,000 bytes! That should be forbidden, but it happens all the time, and the ones doing it are doing it en masse, nonstop. They add millions of unnecessary bytes. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 14:15, 7 November 2023 (UTC)
They were good faith removals, thinking it was useful for cleanup. I have no problem leaving the once-used refnames in place, but will rename some to be more in line with WP:REFNAME. There are some ridiculously long refnames in the wild.--☾Loriendrew☽☏(ring-ring)15:07, 7 November 2023 (UTC)
Lorien, I totally agree you are acting in good faith. The proper format for a refname isn't chiseled in stone here, but the MOS does rule out just numbers. I tend to favor the refnames used in official documents and scientific publications, and they are automatically provided by our Yadkard tool. I've even written a little blurb about formatting refs on my userpage.
The most unique identifiers are the author name(s) and date (the publication is too broad to be useful). On the occasions when the same author writes another article on the same date, which occasionally happens, one has to be creative, maybe by adding a 1 or 2 to the previous refname. For an article where all the refs are standardized with this method, look at Steele dossier. There is no accidental duplication of refs there because of this method. Two different people independently creating the refname will create the same refname 99% of the name. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 15:35, 7 November 2023 (UTC)
Optimum Tool Set
Latest comment: 9 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
You know all those tools I told you about above?
I've used that as a basis to start revamping WP:OTS.
Check it out. I've been gathering feedback from all the smartest editors I know, to add more tools to the set.
Featuring two dozen Atlantic writers on how a second term could shatter norms with the courts, education, the military, foreign policy, immigration, abortion rights, science, gender
The next Trump presidency will be worse.
Editor in chief Jeffrey Goldberg explains this focus in an editor’s note to lead the issue: “Our concern with Trump is not that he is a Republican, or that he embraces—when convenient—certain conservative ideas. We believe that a democracy needs, among other things, a strong liberal party and a strong conservative party in order to flourish. Our concern is that the Republican Party has mortgaged itself to an antidemocratic demagogue, one who is completely devoid of decency.” Goldberg recounts a meeting at the White House with Jared Kushner, who said of his father-in-law: “No one can go as low as the president. You shouldn’t even try.”
It's a RS I may use. I copied it from elsewhere at Wikipedia and didn't want to forget it. What's it to you? I hope you're not getting creepy or harassing. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 06:48, 5 December 2023 (UTC)
Did Joe Biden and Pozharskyi have an April 16, 2015, dinner together at a restaurant?
Latest comment: 8 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
CURRENT PARAGRAPH:
In October 2020, during the last weeks of the presidential campaign, the New York Post published an article, with the involvement of Donald Trump's personal attorney Giuliani and former chief strategist Steve Bannon, about a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden. The laptop contained an email, the authenticity of which was later verified by The Washington Post in 2022,[1] showing what the New York Post characterized as a "meeting" between Joe Biden and Vadym Pozharskyi, a Burisma advisor, in 2015, though that characterization was disputed by witnesses.[2] The veracity of the New York Post article was strongly questioned by most mainstream media outlets, analysts and intelligence officials, due to the chain of custody of the laptop and its contents, and suspicion that it may have been part of a disinformation campaign.[3][4][5]
Purported "meeting"
The New York Post's claim of a "meeting" between Joe Biden and Vadym Pozharskyi at a dinner at Cafe Milano in Washington on April 16, 2015, has been disputed by witnesses.[2] According to Biden's campaign, any contact between the two men was not scheduled or recorded, and officials who worked with Joe Biden in 2015 told The Washington Post "that no such meeting took place".[6]
Rick Leach, president and chief executive of World Food Program USA, said "that Joe Biden only dropped by briefly to meet with one of the guests, Alex Karloutsos, known as Father Alex... [and] one of the most powerful figures in the Greek Orthodox Church in the United States...Joe Biden and Karloutsos are personal friends who have known each other for 40 years."[6]
Leach recalled "that Joe Biden 'didn't even sit down. He was not part of the dinner or part of the dinner discussion.' Instead, he just spoke to Karloutsos." Karloutsos "confirmed Leach's account". Leach said that Joe Biden "engaged directly with Father Alex, who appeared to be a personal friend. I do not recall any photos being taken or whether he spoke directly with anyone else at the table."[6]
Latest comment: 1 year ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Fascinating stuff! Well worth the read.
How Conflicts and Population Loss Led to the Rise of English Wikipedia’s Credibility
Steinsson traces the change in the content of English Wikipedia over time to suggest that the combination of ambiguous institutional rules and certain editors leaving the site helped Wikipedia transition from being a source that hosted pro-fringe discourse to one that gained credibility as an active fact-checker and anti-fringe. A close examination of the content of selected Wikipedia articles, their publicly available editing history, as well as the comments made by the editors, allows Steinsson to show that a change in the interpretation of Wikipedia’s Neutral Point of View (NPOV) guideline affected the nature of content in its articles. As the interpretation favored by anti-fringe editors became popular, pro-fringe editors faced increasing challenges and began to leave Wikipedia. This shift in the balance between pro-fringe and anti-fringe editors, which was a result both of the way editorial disputes were resolved and the exit of pro-fringe editors, made Wikipedia gain credibility as a source that debunked myths and controversies and did not promote pseudoscience. Source: Political Science Now
Actually I think it is a bit more nuanced. I remember looking up some fringe theories years ago in Wikipedia and they were totally rubbish, not because they espoused the fringe theories but because anti-fringe editors made them unreadable with their crusade against them removing anything which they saw as possibly supportive so they did not even describe the theories properly. Looking again they properly describe what they are about and what people see in them as well as having the evidence against them. They are now far better and more informative artcles. NadVolum (talk) 23:19, 30 May 2023 (UTC)
The mystery of the missing binder...MINDBLOWING!
Latest comment: 8 months ago8 comments3 people in discussion
This CNN report is mindblowing! This should get its own article and be mentioned in several others.
The mystery of the missing binder: How a collection of raw Russian intelligence disappeared under Trump[1]
The reference is fully formatted, with name (do NOT remove it!), for use as is.
<ref name="Herb_et_al_12/15/2023">{{cite web | last1=Herb | first1=Jeremy | last2=Lillis | first2=Katie Bo | last3=Bertrand | first3=Natasha | last4=Perez | first4=Evan | last5=Cohen | first5=Zachary | title=The mystery of the missing binder: How a collection of raw Russian intelligence disappeared under Trump | website=[[CNN]] | date=December 15, 2023 | url=https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2023/12/politics/missing-russia-intelligence-trump-dg/ | access-date=December 15, 2023}}</ref>
I saw that headline. Haven't read the article yet, but it made my reading list. Seems like a BFD but of course let's not rush into any edits, wait for some follow-up reporting, etc. – Muboshgu (talk) 18:15, 15 December 2023 (UTC)
Absolutely. This will get wide coverage. The CNN report is great, with pretty cool graphics that morph as one moves down through the article. The last known person to have the full, 10-inch thick, unredacted binder was Meadows, and I doubt he kept it. He would have given it to Trump, and he would use it for his own, and Putin's, benefit. Trump owes Putin a lot. He may do a repeat of how Manafort repaid his debts to Oleg Deripaska by sharing polling data. Trump has something much better. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:29, 15 December 2023 (UTC)
The binder contained raw intelligence the US and its NATO allies collected on Russians and Russian agents, including sources and methods that informed the US government’s assessment that Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to help Trump win the 2016 election, sources tell CNN. What an odd coincidence. It sounds like this is relevant for the Crossfire Hurricane article, Russia 2016 interference article, and maybe the Mar-a-Lago search article. – Muboshgu (talk) 21:15, 15 December 2023 (UTC)
Top-secret Russia intelligence missing since end of Trump term[3]
<ref name="Landay_12/15/2023">{{cite web |url=https://www.reuters.com/world/us/binder-with-top-secret-russia-intelligence-missing-since-end-trump-term-source-2023-12-15/ |title=Top-secret Russia intelligence missing since end of Trump term |last=Landay |first=Jonathan |date=December 15, 2023 |publisher=[[Reuters]] |access-date=December 16, 2023 }}</ref>
Latest comment: 8 months ago4 comments2 people in discussion
The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
Never forget you are a valuable editor and human being, and we all would miss you if something were to befall you. so take care of yourself. Andre🚐02:09, 27 December 2023 (UTC)
Oh, you know there are. But I could use a little break. I've been on a tear. Hope your family and holidays are good. Andre🚐02:18, 27 December 2023 (UTC)
Latest comment: 7 months ago8 comments2 people in discussion
Recent edits of yours to the page Burzynski Clinic has an edit summary that appears to be inadequate, inaccurate, or inappropriate. The summaries are helpful to people browsing an article's history, so it is important that you use edit summaries that accurately tell other editors what you did. Feel free to use the sandbox to make test edits.
The edit summaries of your reverts just now purport to restore quotes I removed but that is false. I didn't remove quotes (and I didn't add my own opinions either) at all with those edits, as you claim. You made the same false claim on my talk page. I urge you to correct it.
Restoring and calling my removal of BLP violating content vandalism will, or at least should, result in sanctions.
I removed BLP-violating statements that weren't quotes.
I responded at the BLP thread. I mistakenly archived a couple of old threads you had commented in. I didn't notice that and will restore those threads. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 07:00, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Again, I didn't remove quotes at all with those edits, as you claim. You made the same false claim on my talk page. I urge you to correct it.You have just twice accused me of edit warring. Diffs, please, showing I repeatedly override a contribution multiple times in short succession justifying the two warnings. But first, review EW and:Please acknowledge:
[9] was not edit warring. It removed a copyright violation.
You have make a hell of a lot of false clams about my editing. You're one of the good guys (or at least you think you are) - right? So why resort to such tactics? RudolfoMD (talk) 07:44, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
There have been a lot of edit conflicts and some communication breakdowns here. Let's try to reboot, okay? You have made lots of edits and my focus is on ONE edit. Stick to that one.
You "didn't remove quotes", and I didn't accuse you of doing so. You "altered" a quote in a manner that's deceptive. That was my point. Stick to that. Don't mention anything else. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 07:53, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
Dude, I already addressed whether that was "deceptive". You just made THREE edits in a row loudly pointing to it. Again, I've already addressed it. ¶ 2.Since you're declining to provide diffs to show why you twice accused me of edit warring, and want to reboot, how 'bout you remove 'em?And again You "altered" a quote is BS. You refuse to acknowledge point 4, above. RudolfoMD (talk) 08:58, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
RudolfoMD, please use exact diffs. The link in your comment tells me the condition of the page, but not the exact edit:
Latest comment: 7 months ago4 comments2 people in discussion
You have many interesting things on your home page. I was pleased with your ordering recommendation for {{cite web}} arguments. I struggled with this for a long time - does it even make sense to have an order, if so what would that be, and why. My current best practice thinking is roughly what you have. There are good reasons to lead with last name. I think author-link should follow the last-first pairing not precede. Because it's displayed in the footnotes with last name first, it's easier to find the citation (when they are grouped together in a list at the end) by scanning for the first argument, which is the last name.
In terms of ref names, I agree with last name. I don't add dates unless there is disambiguation need ie. multiple cites by the same author. The name should be as simple and possible to fulfill its only purpose which is a unique identifier. BTW if you have not seen it, I recently came across this tool which is one the best, it renames ref-names. It's fun. User:Nardog/RefRenamer -- GreenC17:53, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
I use Yadkard. (It has recently begun to add a randomly generated number to the ref name, but I delete that.) It usually, but not perfectly every time, automatically follows the practice for scientific publications, IOW authors and date of publication. (My background is medical, so that's what I'm used to.) That way two different editors who use the same source and create a ref name will likely create the same ref name, even without consulting each other. With news journalists, it is common for them to have more than one article in the same publication in one day, so I have to get creative there and add a keyword from the title.
The important thing is to use unique ref name identifiers and avoid just numbers. That's from our MOS.
Feel free to provide illustrations/examples right here of how you'd like to see things done. I suspect I can learn a lot from you. I have already followed your suggestion and tweaked mine to place the author-link after the last-first pairing. In practice, I often don't use an author-link as the last-first pairing is sufficient. Maybe I should do it more often. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:18, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
A recent example is the Sources subsection of Kennewick Man. Only for the last-first pairing, the rest are not ordered any particular way. This where I realized the value of |last= first, since it uses Harvard-style citations. Worth noting |access-date= and |quote= are most often found at the end of citations already by unwritten convention.
I would like to see a tool that re-orders automatically, it wouldn't be too difficult technically, only time to put it together. Of course everyone will want their own custom recipe, which would make the tool more complex. Nevertheless if every cite within an article followed the same ordering, it could make life easier on future editors. Not everyone will agree, but they don't have to use the tool, and if they don't think ordering matters, they also shouldn't care if someone changed it. I dunno, maybe it could create conflict. It could have a 'terms of use': rate control, back down if someone objects, etc
I'm a big fan of bots (but no clue how to make them) that do this type of cleanup. Harvard style is good. If you know how to make such a bot, go for it. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 23:02, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
ANI
Latest comment: 7 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Around here, we have behavioral guidelines, and they are strictly enforced: Be civil, no personal attacks, and always assume good faith. You immediately violated all three, and edit warred on top of it. Bulls in China closets get executed. You may have some good points, but they never got heard because of your abominable behavior.
We use article talk pages for calm and civil discussion while we seek to reach a consensus on how to add, delete, or alter content. There is no rush, and we take time to do this. Anyone who tries to force their will on the community and treats Wikipedia like a battle ground will get blocked to prevent them from doing more damage and creating more heat than light. Now read and understand those sources I have linked. You cannot expect to be heard here until you understand and abide by them. - Valjean (talk) (PING me) 15:20, 24 January 2024 (UTC)
Okay, I get the hint I'll probably do nothing with it since there are already so many warning templates. I'll delete that redirect. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 06:23, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
I just meant that if you inform a miscreant that they are abominable, there's likley to be a lengthy back and forth that ends with you getting a trip to ANI. At least when the message is short and sweet, the more experienced recipients take heed and fixit. SPECIFICOtalk13:16, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
@Valjean If you must gain consensus on the talk page before any edit goes through, they should just full-protect the page instead of semi-protecting it, to reduce disruption and save editors' time. 123957a (talk) 18:23, 4 February 2024 (UTC)
Latest comment: 6 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hello. The picture in question is listed as an "own work" and contains no source. I could not find the original source of the picture on Google. Considering the seriousness of the topic and in accordance with the verifiability policy, the picture should go. StephenMacky1 (talk) 17:59, 4 February 2024 (UTC)
StephenMacky, unless there is doubt about it, we usually accept such images. We do this as the REQUIRED practice for images of people, and that, unlike this, is a BLP matter. You're being stricter for the picture of a railcar! I won't pursue this. It's on you. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:55, 4 February 2024 (UTC)
Please explain
Latest comment: 6 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Please explain why you are not allowing any important journalistic achievements by Natasha Bertrand - other journalists have extensive references to scoops and investigations . When an honest edit is made Valjean removes it , would appreciate explanation. 24.187.29.202 (talk) 16:46, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
You're asking the wrong person. I did not revert your addition. It was Soibangla. I do see one problem with your edit. You did not properly source it. That is reason enough to delete it. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:13, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
"Neutral" means alignment with RS, including their biases.
Latest comment: 5 months ago2 comments1 person in discussion
User:Blanked, you're right when you say: "I don’t think that we should disregard blatant bias, whether we agree with it or not, especially in opinionated pieces." Per NPOV, we should be neutral by not removing that bias. We should document it and not whitewash it. That means the article will then read like biased content, and that's as it should be, as long as the bias is from sources and not from editors. The article about a person who is dishonest will give the impression that the person is dishonest because the weight of RS say so.
Editors are "neutral" when they are centered right under the point where most RS congregate, regardless of whether that is to the left or right of center. We do not "move" or "balance" content to the center to keep an article "neutral". That would be editorial, non-neutral, interference in what RS say. Maybe you should read my essay about this: NPOV means neutral editing, not neutral content. At Wikipedia, "neutral" does not mean what you think it means. It really doesn't. It is not a middle position. It is not a position without bias. At Wikipedia, "neutral" means alignment with RS, including their biases. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 15:57, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
another version:
At Wikipedia, "neutral" does not mean what you think it means. It really doesn't. It is not a middle position. It is not a position without bias. At Wikipedia, "neutral" means alignment with RS, including their biases.
"Neutral" in NPOV does not mean "neutral" in the common sense of the word. It does not mean without bias from sources, only without bias from editors. NPOV does not require that sources or content be without bias or be neutral.
Editors should remain neutral by not removing the bias found in RS. We should document it and not whitewash it. That means the article will then read like biased content, and that's as it should be, as long as the bias is from sources and not from editors. The article about a person who is dishonest will give the impression that the person is dishonest because the weight of RS say so, and that is a very proper bias. Anything else who be dishonest. Wikipedia does not support dishonesty or whitewash it.
Editors are "neutral" when they are centered right under the point where most RS congregate, regardless of whether that is to the left or right of center. We do not "move" or "balance" content to the center to keep an article "neutral". That would be editorial, non-neutral, interference in what RS say. Maybe you should read my essay about this: NPOV means neutral editing, not neutral content. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 23:15, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
Latest comment: 5 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
You should read it. We avoid the word because it is not neutral writing, preferring "wrote", "said", "says", "according to", etc. In any case, you had a breathing exercise making a claim. Only people can make claims. Bad writing! Skyerise (talk) 20:43, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
Latest comment: 5 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
another reply to complaints about NPOV and a claim that Fox and CNN are equally bad:
[[User:blank], Fox News is uniquely deceptive for a major network. They lie in many ways, especially in politics and science. That's why they are partially deprecated here.
The reason they are deceptive is largely because of its owner, Rupert Murdoch, his history (yellow journalism), his business methods (only money counts), and its MAGA audience. It is a pusher of Trump's Big Lie of a stolen election, and pushing that lie has cost Fox News the largest known media settlement for defamation in U.S. history, $787.5 million in the Dominion Voting Systems v. Fox News Network case. That's what their deliberate deception cost them.
They knowingly pushed what they knew was a lie. Discovery (law) exposed all the internal communications between Fox employees and management, revealing that literally everyone at Fox News, from top to bottom (Murdoch to the janitors), knew and privately agreed that Trump lost the 2020 election, that he was a liar and a fool (they privately ridiculed him), that the election was fair and the safest in U.S. history, and that there was no election fraud of any significance, but because Fox would immediately lose their MAGA viewers if they told them that (they immediately started to migrate to Newsmax and OAN when Fox called Arizona for Biden), Fox deliberately continued to lie to them. MAGA people are not interested in the truth. They go where they will be told their favorite lies, and Fox News knew that the only way to keep their viewers, advertisors, and keep their stock price up, was to continue to lie about the election and Dominion Voting System's machines. That cost them a lot.
That's what happened. Right there you have full legal proof that you cannot trust Fox News. There is no comparison with any other major network, including CNN. CNN is not perfect (no media is perfect), but they do abide by journalistic ethics and have a good reputation for fact-checking. Those are our basic requirements for a RS here. It has nothing to do with their bias or political persuasion, at least not until Trump came along and perverted nearly all the right-wing media. They went down the rabbit hole with him and just lie all the time, just like he does. That is why most right-wing media are classified as unreliable here. They have become Trump media.
Latest comment: 4 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
I don't like that I felt I had to disagree with you during our most recent talk page discussions. I feel bad about it. Hopefully, my feedback was not too harsh. Lately, we've actually had some laughs right here on Wikipedia. It is good that we have been able to do this and I hope we can continue. Maybe in the future if I disagree with you on one of your pages I will just ignore it. Frankly, I think I prefer doing that. Well, if I need a quick chuckle I can go over to Doug's page. Oh, bye the way, I have an idea for your most recent page! I think Oedipus Rex will fit nicely as one the examples. I will post it soon when I have time. I have to research it a bit before I post. Regards, ---Steve Quinn (talk) 23:19, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
I have no serious gripe with you. Just a bit of disagreement, and that's okay. How else can we help each other move in a better direction? We all need help at times. You expressed your disagreement soberly and without assuming bad faith and accusing me of creating an attack page. Neither did you attack me personally, as in the forbidden usage of my political affiliations as a means to disparage me. No, we're good, and I really do appreciate this thread. It means a lot. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 23:50, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
Reference Addition to Chiropractic History Page
Latest comment: 3 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Dear Valjean,
I'm writing to you regarding a recent edit I made to the Wikipedia page on the history of chiropractic. I noticed that you removed the reference I added the History of Chiropractic.
I understand the importance of maintaining a neutral and credible Wikipedia page. My intention in adding this reference was not to promote any particular viewpoint, but rather to provide additional context and information to support the claims made on the page.
The reference I added offers valuable insights into the History of Chiropractic. I believe it would be a useful resource for readers interested in learning more about the topic.
If you have any concerns about the validity or appropriateness of the reference, I'd be happy to discuss them further and provide any additional information you might need.
Latest comment: 3 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Dear Valjean,
I'm writing to you regarding a recent edit I made to the Wikipedia page about Wrist Pain. I noticed that you removed the edit to the general description of wrist pain.
I understand that wrist pain is a generally vague topic. My intention in adding this reference was to create simplicity and disarm any alarming or harmful diction caused by the framing of the original text.
The reference I added offers a basic and informative synopsis of the symptom, and I believe it would be a useful edit to provide readers a simple explanation while removing the redundancy of information provided in other subsections.
If you have any concerns about the validity or appropriateness of the reference, I'd be happy to discuss them further and provide any additional information you might need.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
You started making that edit as an IP and then created your account and continued to try your edit, even though it had been deleted previously. That's edit warring, and we don't allow that. I also didn't think it was an improvement. The matter is now moot as it has been edited more, with the addition of good sourcing, so the content is much better. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 04:39, 6 May 2024 (UTC)
US legal status and CSA Schedule for CBD
Latest comment: 3 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Hello Valjean - I would be grateful for your thoughts on this discussion topic which started when another editor changed the long-standing infobox legal status of CBD in the US as under Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act.
As discussed in the article and FDA documents, there is an exception for CBD derived from hemp with low THC content, but this source is not a common extract and has numerous FDA-imposed restrictions to be insignificant enough to omit in the infobox.
I believe it's safe to say that every cannabis constituent (except for hemp CBD, the approved CBD drug, Epidiolex, and synthetic THC drugs, Marinol and Syndros) is included under Schedule I. The sources I listed in the discussion support this position, which should be the main detail of the infobox.
Regarding whether Epidiolex (which is CBD in limited clinical use) is under Schedule V, I cannot find a DEA announcement of the 2020 change to "unscheduled", although I do concede that the DailyMed (NIH source) says it has no DEA schedule. In further discussion at the talk page, I will admit this error.
The main point of contention is that CBD is a Schedule I substance, which is the accurate information to display in the infobox.
As a fellow Cannabis Project member, I thought your experience would be useful for this debate. Notice to Bluerasberry who also has an interest in this topic.
Latest comment: 3 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
This is my attempt to disentangle two concepts that are confusingly mixed together in the second paragraph. I have also stricken a confusing phrase in the note that becomes extraneous in my version. This is not a fully finalized wording and improvements are welcome.
The current second paragraph states:
All material in Wikipedia mainspace, including everything in articles, lists, and captions, must be verifiable. All quotations, and any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, must include an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports[a] the material. Any material that needs an inline citation but does not have one may be removed. Please immediately remove contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourced.
The policy will be much easier to understand if we disentangle the two verifiability concepts related to the (1) existence of a source and the (2) accessibility of the source for the reader:
Verifiability is satisfied by the existence of a reliable source that directly supports the content. (But that knowledge is useless to readers if we stop there.)
That source must then be made accessible to readers in the form of an inline citation placed near the relevant content.
Based on those principles, we can tweak and rearrange the current wording (above) to this:
All material in Wikipedia mainspace, including everything in articles, lists, and captions, must be verifiable using reliable sources. Verifiable implies both existence and access. The material is considered verifiable if a reliable source exists somewhere that directly supports[b] the material. As the mere existence of that source is unhelpful if a citation is not immediately accessible to readers, all quotations, and any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, must include an inline citation to such a reliable source so readers can verify the source is used properly. It should be placed near the relevant content. Any material that needs an inline citation but does not have one may be removed. Please immediately remove contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourced.
That is a bit longer, but it is also more comprehensive by providing the reasoning behind the requirement to provide an inline citation.
^A source "directly supports" a given piece of material if the information is present explicitly in the source, so that using this source to support the material is not a violation of Wikipedia:No original research. The location of any citation—including whether one is present in the article at all—is unrelated to whether a source directly supports the material. For questions about where and how to place citations, see Wikipedia:Citing sources, Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section § Citations, etc.
^A source "directly supports" a given piece of material if the information is present explicitly in the source, so that using this source to support the material is not a violation of Wikipedia:No original research. The location of any citation—including whether one is present in the article at all—is unrelated to whether a source directly supports the material. For questions about where and how to place citations, see Wikipedia:Citing sources, Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section § Citations, etc.
Comparison of original second paragraph and version 4. My changes are highlighted:
ORIGINAL
All material in Wikipedia mainspace, including everything in articles, lists, and captions, must be verifiable. All quotations, and any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, must include an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports[a] the material. Any material that needs an inline citation but does not have one may be removed. Please immediately remove contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourced.
Version 4
All material in Wikipedia mainspace, including everything in articles, lists, and captions, must be verifiable using reliable sources. The material is considered verifiable if a reliable source exists somewhere that directly supports[b] the material. As the mere existence of that source is unhelpful if a citation to that source is not present, all quotations, and any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, must include an inline citationto such a reliable source so readers and editors can verify the source is used properly. It should be placed near the relevant content.
Any material that needs an inline citation but does not have one may be removed. Please immediately remove contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourced.
Ce
Latest comment: 3 months ago5 comments2 people in discussion
Did you actually do any copyediting in this diff? All I saw was pointless whitespace removal and replacing one instance of wikitext with a local template that does the same thing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:10, 14 May 2024 (UTC)
I guess that depends on what one means with ce. It's the most minimal form of ce, i.e. wikignoming. The reflist was just a modernization of the old template. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:12, 14 May 2024 (UTC)
I just wanted to make sure that I wasn't missing anything. The wikitext parsers automatically collapse double spaces when rendering the page, so I personally wouldn't bother, especially since whitespace changes sometimes draw complaints about needlessly complex diffs. I just wanted to make sure that I hadn't missed something in the middle. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:25, 14 May 2024 (UTC)
I think that complaint usually surfaces when the diff is very long, but little of importance happens...except for that one little change that you overlooked because there was a whole lot of nothing happening elsewhere. I think it's a bigger problem for multi-edit diffs. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:49, 14 May 2024 (UTC)
Show
Latest comment: 3 months ago12 comments2 people in discussion
One reason for restoring it is that it should not be removed. Without knowing if you have been to the area or places mentioned or you know whether I have... It is relevant that Abi Carter performed at TB and about the golf course. We're not listing everywhere she sang. It's enough to put the busking and the part I have. Headtothestripe (talk) 21:36, 20 May 2024 (UTC)
That content is too much detail that's not even about her and is also a violation of WP:COATRACK. It also seems promotional. The source doesn't even mention her, and it must. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 21:51, 20 May 2024 (UTC)
You don't know which parts I mean. Of course there is more than one way to phrase something. I could explain. The golf course is by TB. She could have performed at the course for example. It is not your responsibility to delete all references on Wikipedia which could have meaning. Headtothestripe (talk) 21:54, 20 May 2024 (UTC)
It is OUR responsibility to follow our PAG, and, as an experienced editor, that's how I interpret this situation. I was tempted to delete even more, but I left a rather trivial sentence (only because the source did mention her). If you choose to edit war over this, it will get more attention, and that sentence will likely also get deleted. The article is primarily about her, not those locations. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:32, 20 May 2024 (UTC)
I don't understand your meaning of "side things". Let me remind you of WP:OWN. As the article's creator, you have a little bit of a WP:COI, so be cautious. - Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:41, 20 May 2024 (UTC)
What in heck? Now you have some person who you were telling they are making mistakes and that person is trying to make you happy by deleting information. Headtothestripe (talk) 06:22, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
I don't know what your mother tongue is, but your English communication is not good. I don't know what you mean by "show rapport" or "Show" in the heading of this section. Speak in full sentences so there is no ambiguity in what you say.
I have reverted your last change as it removes edits that are required by our manual of style. Stay on-topic. No more COATRACK violations. Don't add anything not directly about Abi. You are still a newbie who does not understand how this place works. Stop edit warring and start learning. Since you have been objecting and creating more work for experienced editors (I've been here since 2003), I am preparing to get you blocked. You have managed to offend many editors and administrators and been warned many times, so getting you blocked will be very easy. If you stop the disruption immediately, I will also stop. If you continue, then I'll take you to WP:ANI, and it won't be pretty. You will nearly certainly be blocked and possibly banned.
Now stop discussing article issues on editors' talk pages and use the article's talk page. Focus on content, not on other editors. Do NOT post here again.-- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:11, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
Refs format
Latest comment: 3 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
When you created whichever system of formatting for references for Abi Carter, there's one problem. In footnotes you should be able to still read (without having to hover over the particular ref with a cursor) the following: American Songwriter, USA Today, Desert Sun, Yahoo, Parade, etc. If you use the specific format method you're implementing can't you leave those mentions in the footnotes? Headtothestripe (talk) 05:37, 22 May 2024 (UTC)
Headtothestripe, I use official Harvard style citation format, so the author, date, URL, source/publisher, etc. should show (in the refs I have formatted). If they don't show, it's because I didn't create the whole citation, just added a proper ref name. I'll check.
Don't change them or mess with the ref names. They are unique and use the author and date, per Harvard style, per our manual of style. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 06:05, 22 May 2024 (UTC)
"Fixing" citation date format
Latest comment: 3 months ago5 comments2 people in discussion
This used to be a useful fix. Now the system normalizes all citation dates per the {{Use mdy dates}} template at the top of the article. The format in the citation template coding is unimportant, and I was tempted to revert as "not improvement" ("no harm done" is not adequate reason for any edit).
There is a lot I can learn here, so feel free to improve my understanding. The basis for my actions in this regard are largely based on Wikipedia:Citing sources#Citation style, which says "Although nearly any consistent style may be used, avoid all-numeric date formats other than YYYY-MM-DD, because of the ambiguity concerning which number is the month and which the day." For some odd reason, I hadn't noticed the "except for"...! Therefore, I may have applied that too broadly. I like consistency and lack of ambiguity, and all the other references are in the format September 9, 2016, so I was just keeping the article consistent. I hope this isn't disruptive or doing something wrong. Is it just a waste of my time, or am I being too pedantic? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:38, 26 May 2024 (UTC)
AFAIK, the guidelines about citation date formats are about formats in the rendered article, not in the coding. As I indicated, the two are no longer connected when {{Use mdy dates}} or {{Use dmy dates}} is present in the article. Before your edit, the system was doing the format conversion for us in the rendered article; you can verify this by looking at an article revision preceding your edit.Date format consistency in what readers see is important; in what editors see, not so much.Yes, it's a waste of your time. As for "doing something wrong", a "no improvement" edit is always doing something wrong, even if a very minor something. If "all" other cites in Trump use the mdy format in their coding (I haven't the time to check), it must be because one or more others don't understand the situation or think format consistency in the coding is worth their time and system resources. If you're interested in my advice, it's don't be that guy. ―Mandruss☎07:15, 26 May 2024 (UTC)
Upon further reflection, there is probably a bot that goes around "fixing" citation date formats where it isn't needed, and I just haven't noticed or have forgotten. That would explain wide consistency in the coding at Trump. These are "no improvement" edits in my opinion, but I'll probably not revert one on that basis. At the least, we human editors could leave it for the bot. ―Mandruss☎20:43, 26 May 2024 (UTC)
A strong consensus cannot prevent a RfC
Latest comment: 2 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Since the purpose of a RfC is to bring the issue at a larger scale, it makes sense to do a RfC even when you are alone against a majority, if you sincerely believe that the community at large will have a different position. Dominic Mayers (talk) 19:14, 2 June 2024 (UTC)
In principle, that is true, but "when you are alone against a majority" it is nearly always seen as a disruptive move, a sign one cannot bow to the opinions of others and will not drop the stick. That usually ends up with sanctions, topic bans, and blocks. I've seen it a thousand times and even saw a Nobel Prize laureate permabanned for such disruption. I know there is little hope you will learn from this or anything anyone else will tell you. Just don't say that I didn't warn you. When you are under about 15% support (a "snow" oppose), it's time to bow out, and do it graciously, without accusations and acrimony. When over that amount, an RfC may be the way to go. Showing "respect" for a consensus means a lot around here. It shows one AGF and is collegial. You don't have to agree, but you can stop objecting. It's usually best to move on, away from such topics. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:33, 2 June 2024 (UTC)
Abi Carter article
Latest comment: 2 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Latest comment: 2 months ago4 comments2 people in discussion
@Mandruss: I need some insight and figure you would know. In some situations I use <br> to force a linebreak, but I often see that some use <br />. Which is the proper method? What's the real difference? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:49, 12 June 2024 (UTC)
Latest comment: 2 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi Valjean,
I would kindly ask you to amend your reversion on Reiki, which seems to have included the POV tag I have added to the article. As I am sure you are aware of much better than I, it is crucial that the notification remain there as long as the discussion is ongoing on WP:NPOV/N as well as the article’s talk page.
Latest comment: 2 months ago7 comments2 people in discussion
--Dustfreeworld (talk) has hugged you! Hugs promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better (and hopefully wasn't meant as an invasion of personal space). Spread the WikiLove by hugging at someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Happy editing! This is the TOUCH from a HUMAN. PS. While I agree with our admin that there’s not clear enough consensus to remove most instances of that p* word in the article, I really can’t agree the label of “whitewashing”, with the fact that I’d never removed the first instance of that word in the article. The other instances (not the first) were removed because I thought they were repetitious and somewhat redundant and maybe in conflicts with some of our core policies / coi / sourcing guidelines. Yes we disagree. And there maybe misunderstanding as well. And the definition of that word in my language (and perhaps other Eastern languages as well) is very different from that of yours. And yes I can be wrong. Anyway, I’m quite upset to see that a civil discussion / disagreement on content would give such a result. From our limited interactions, I believe you are a reasonable person. I don’t know what you think about me. I don’t expect any reply from you. Yep, I need peace of mind. I just want to let you know that you’ll still have my respect if you stop mentioning my name from now on, forever, anywhere at WP. Respectfully, Hug others by adding {{subst:Hug}} to their talk page with a friendly message.
As long as you're much more careful around the topics of pseudoscience and alternative medicine, I see no reason for more friction. I'm not one to hold grudges, but I don't forget either. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 21:40, 13 June 2024 (UTC)
I just discovered this diff of a comment of yours. I'm sorry for not responding and reacting accordingly to it. THREE people made edits at exactly the same time then. Your edit got lost in the cloud of dust. I never saw it til now. For the life of me, I can't find it on the page! -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 21:49, 13 June 2024 (UTC)
Okay, the mystery is solved. It was immediately removed as a violation of your topic ban. Well, here you can get my apology, and I wish you well. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:02, 13 June 2024 (UTC)
I’m not asking for any apology for “not responding and reacting accordingly to” my removed comment. Before I posted that comment (which wasn’t a comment on any topic) in the hope that the “gravedancing” can stop, my name had already been mentioned at least four times by you already. I hope the reply above isn’t the fifth one. I think I’ll be well if there’s no more gravedancing. BTW, Wrg to the hug above, I want to say that, if I’m someone who is so ill and is sure to die very soon (luckily I’m not, yet), I really won’t mind paying for some services that would allow me to take a rest and relax in a spacious place, for a few hours, and have someone comfort me with their touches (well, perhaps it sounds weird, but sometimes, even a few caring letters from someone not that close can give a reason for a hopeless person to hold on). (If someone knows they will die soon, does wealth, or any claims that they will / wiil not get well by doing something, matter to them? I don’t think so. They just want better quality of life in the end stage). But I do mind, when I come home from those services, that my loved ones say to me, “Oh, you go for those (whatever potentially derogatory term, as specified by WP) sessions again?” This doesn’t cover all the situations. And I know people don’t want to hear this, but it’s just my 2 cents. Whatever. Thanks and regards, --Dustfreeworld (talk) 22:48, 13 June 2024 (UTC); --Dustfreeworld (talk) 23:57, 13 June 2024 (UTC)
Hello. In spite of "violations of normal jail procedures on the night of Epstein's death, the malfunction of two cameras in front of his cell, and his claims to have compromising information about powerful figures", do you still believe that the controversy surrounding the death of this scum are fringe and/or unserious? I'm not saying that you should believe he was killed, but is it really possible to be that confident when saying he undoubtedly committed suicide? I'm not asking about Wiki policy by the way, I'm asking about your actual opinion. Par âpre aux astres (talk) 21:18, 13 June 2024 (UTC)
I'm certainly suspicious of the circumstances of his death. He played a dangerous game. Blackmailers tend to invite retribution. But that's my opinion, not what RS say. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 21:37, 13 June 2024 (UTC)
I'm uncertain and tend to suspect murder, especially because of the irregularities that occurred. With a prisoner like him, there shouldn't have been any irregularities. I edit as if he committed suicide because that's what RS say. My obligation as an editor is to align with RS in my editing, regardless of my personal POV. NPOV is satisfied when editors align themselves with RS, which are not always in the "center" of any controversy. Sources and events are rarely "neutral", and we should document them as they are, warts and all. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 21:45, 13 June 2024 (UTC)
A brownie for you!
Latest comment: 2 months ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Thanks for taking care of stuff on my talk page, and for giving me an excuse to compliment you on an excellent username :) Perfect4th (talk) 23:44, 15 June 2024 (UTC)
User:Ironcurtain2 is now banned from my talk page
Latest comment: 2 months ago6 comments2 people in discussion
User:Ironcurtain2 is now banned from my talk page. If they keep playing their sick games, I'll seek an interaction ban or full ban, as they don't seem to be here to build an encyclopedia. This is not a social media website to play with. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 23:38, 19 June 2024 (UTC)
It started with some "cute" and rather innocent games and poking, but then got gradually much more serious and disruptive. A huge time sink. It revealed a disdain for our conventions. That's when I stopped playing along and realized these supposed "newbie" games had to stop. On user talk pages we tolerate quite a bit of banter, but this shit got out of hand. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:28, 20 June 2024 (UTC)
Latest comment: 2 months ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi Valjean, I'd like to draw your attention to the state of this article.
The reason I'm bringing this up to you rather than the talk page, is because I was involved in a frustrating discussion a while back concerning his undeniable status as one of the most influential contemporary conspiracy theorists. Some editors were adamant that the lead should be unduly focused on his short Hollywood career and largely leave out or bury in-article that for at least the last 5 years his notoriety has come from pushing right-wing, anti-vax and pro-Putin conspiracy theories and pandering to the American religious right by cozying up to Tucker Carlson, Donald Trump Jr and fellow Rumble personalities like Steven Crowder.
My main concern, however, is the "Sexual misconduct allegations" section. I've brought this up on the talk page before but didn't get much of a response.
The section's long but lacks almost any detail from The Times report including the women's accounts of the assaults. They're graphic but Wikipedia is not censored and I think excluding them downplays the severity to readers.
There's no mention of the corroborating testimony from people close to the women or people who worked with Brand, supporting documentation from the investigation, such as the text messages between Brand and the woman pseudonymised as "Nadia" (the phone number he used to send the messages was verified by multiple sources) or the letter she wrote him.
Nadia's close friend, who took her to the Rape Treatment Center at UCLA Santa Monica Medical Center the same day as the attack provided The Times with medical records. She had therapy there for the following five months, during which records show she contemplated criminal/civil proceedings.
"Alice", who Brand apparently referred to as "the child", also had a family member corroborate her account of being groomed by him to The Sunday Times.
He threatened the women with legal action yet didn't pursue libel charges against News UK, despite strict UK laws that would favor him if he was telling the truth. The foolproof measures journalists had to go before publishing the report are explained here and by The Times themselves [14])
It should also be mentioned in the "Reactions and aftermath" sub-section that Brand subsequently pushed more conspiracy theories accusing the 'mainstream media' or government of trying to censor him (sources: [15], [16], [17]).
I removed the "controversial" designation preceding the reference to Quackwatch. There is nothing controversial about Quackwatch except in the minds of those who are proponents of "alternative medicine". In fact, The Quackwatch article shows that Quackwatch is highly respected as a source of real and valid scientific information regarding health related frauds and misconduct. If you have an issue with the Quackwatch article hash it out over there. Dr. Morbius (talk) 21:32, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
I too agree, but there needs to be a guideline for how to describe such situations. Obviously any mainstream source is going to be disputed by fringe sources, but when editors label that dispute in a manner that deprecates the mainstream source, they are leaving the impression in the minds of readers that the mainstream source is somehow unreliable. How can we get this formulated properly and incorporated into our guidelines and policies? What do we have about "describing sources"? I'm trying to find something and have found these statements (emphasis added):
"In Wikipedia, one of the most common forms of violating the NPOV policy is to selectively cite some information that supports one view whilst suppressing or trivializing other information that opposes it, and describing sources in a way that gives an undue positive or negative impression of their value. In this manner, one can completely misrepresent the range of views on a subject whilst still complying with Wikipedia:Verifiability." -- [18] Note that this is NOT policy, but still interesting.
"A reliable source supporting a statement that a group holds an opinion must accurately describe how large this group is. Moreover, there are usually disagreements about how opinions should be properly stated. To fairly represent all the leading views in a dispute it is sometimes necessary to qualify the description of an opinion, or to present several formulations of this opinion and attribute them to specific groups." -- From NPOV policy
"Specifically, it should always be clear which parts of the text describe the minority view, and that it is in fact a minority view." -- NPOV:Undue weight
"Neutrality weights viewpoints in proportion to their prominence. However, when reputable sources contradict one another and are relatively equal in prominence, describe both approaches and work for balance. This involves describing the opposing views clearly, drawing on secondary or tertiary sources that describe the disagreement from a disinterested viewpoint." -- NPOV:Balance
Note that these statements aren't only about describing "sources", but about attribution. If any qualifier is added to Quackwatch, it must be framed in a manner that describes the dispute (only "from" fringe sources, not "between" mainstream sources), and that those which dispute and criticize Quackwatch are non-mainstream/fringe sources, and individuals who are known quacks, scammers, felons (Kevin Trudeau), frauds, and/or individuals who are ignorant of science and medicine, or of all sides of the underlying issues. No mainstream sources offer any serious criticisms, only minor quibbles. Quackwatch is consistently recognized and recommended as a mainstream source. One may not agree with the approach, but the POV is always consistent with the mainstream.
How can we get this formulated properly and incorporated into our guidelines and policies? Until then, the simplest way to deal with this is to simply remove such qualifiers that subtly push a fringe POV. -- Brangifer (talk) 21:48, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
It isn't POV if its consistent with the mainstream view in whatever field you're dealing with. Especially when we're talking about science. In any field where opinion and conjecture play a more dominant role such as in history, archeology etc. you can weight viewpoints based on the credibility of the source and how widely accepted that viewpoint is. Neither of these things apply in this case. In fact Abram Hoffer commits a classic crank/crackpot error by claiming that there is a conspiracy to suppress his views thereby earning himself 40 points on the Baez crackpot index. Dr. Morbius (talk) 23:09, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
I went through all mentions of QW, which is quite a few, to see if there were any non-NPOV qualifiers attached. I didn't find anything significant, but I did add the following in several places: "...the alternative medicinewatchdog website Quackwatch,..." That's NPOV, undeniable, and descriptive. That's one way to describe it that shouldn't raise too many hackles. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:10, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
"The principle on which organizations such as Quackwatch operate is the Scientific Method, and all of its umbrella principles (falsifiability, testability, the Peer Review Process, predictability, etc.) which is the method utilized to evaluate the empirical validity of scientific claims. Organizations like Quackwatch do not "bash" or have a "bias" against alternative medicine; They simply evaluate them based on whether they follow proper empirical methodologies. Personal belief systems aside, so-called alternative and complementary medicines do not have any scientific validity. Those that do aren't called "alternative" or "complementary" medicine; they just called medicine. This is a point that is not only unknown by the general public, it is also unknown by many who work in these fields, which is why they are advocated even by people with PhD's after their name. But whether someone of repute advocates an idea does not mean it has empirical validity. To argue it does is a logical fallacy called Argument by Authority.
As for unbiased, Wikipedia's policies on Reliable Sources do not, and cannot, gauge such a thing, because all sources, even reliable ones, from the New York Times to the Village Voice to FOX News, have biases. Reliability is predicated on criteria such as whether the organization in question has proper editorial controls for its content, whether its staff has the pertinent expertise, etc. Complete lack of bias cannot be a criterion, because no source exists (nor any writer working for one) that lacks some type of bias. Nightscream (talk) 04:29, 1 January 2010 (UTC)
History about deletion attempts against Quackwatch
For the benefit of our anon IP, a little history might be of interest. There have been various spurious attempts to delete this article, including this archived AfD. Those making such attempts have used claims that Quackwatch wasn't notable enough, or that it was fringe and not accepted by mainstream medicine, or any number of other weird attempts by enemies to delete the article. This forced editors to (very easily) find even more reliable sources that deal with the matter. The numerous RS easily document its notability and that it is overwhelmingly positively received by mainstream medicine, consumer protection agencies, law enforcement, insurance firms, universities, government, etc.. It's nearly impossible to find any criticism from such sources, and we've really tried!
There are a few minor criticisms which were found. Really, using such sources as criticism is scraping the bottom of the barrel in desperation to find negativity. Otherwise criticism comes from quacks, scammers, convicted criminals, and other alternative medicine cranks who have been criticized. In several of the most notable cases the critics hadn't even been mentioned or criticized by Quackwatch or Barrett at all, but launched their own vicious attacks, thus drawing responses from Barrett, the NCAHF, and/or members of the medical and scientific communities. The continued and ongoing attacks by the former publicist of Hulda Clark (now deceased from cancer) is a notable example. Likewise attacks by IR. There had been no mention of them before they launched their own attacks. Because they carried their attacks to Wikipedia and used it as a battleground and causing much disruption, they are both banned from Wikipedia. Their websites also happen to be of such deceptive quality that they are actually blacklisted!
Since you are obviously getting your information from such sources (they originated those wordings), I suggest you read this article and all of its sources to get the other side of the properly-documented story. That's "real" information, in contrast to the spin and deception put out by your sources. Quite a few of the things you mention in your now-deleted libelous BLP violation are total lies or gross distortions of fact. There are a couple items that have a very distant relationship with something true, but again they are very distorted so as to give a misleading impression. Keep in mind that your sources are promoters of very dubious ideas and in some cases stand to profit by making criticisms against their detractors.
Nearly all criticisms are published in self-published sources of poor quality without fact checking, and thus aren't considered reliable sources for use here. That leaves an overwhelmingly positive impression, and that's because RS leave that impression in the real world. That cranks and scam artists leave a negative impression in the real world and many people are fooled by them is simply proof that lies are being used in the battle waged against mainstream medicine by alternative medicine. Wikipedia doesn't get involved in that battle and it doesn't use poor sources. -- Brangifer (talk) 16:46, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
Pseudoscience ArbCom ruling
Latest comment: 13 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Arbitration Ruling on the Treatment of Pseudoscience
Serious encyclopedias: Serious and respected encyclopedias and reference works are generally expected to provide overviews of scientific topics that are in line with respected scientific thought. Wikipedia aspires to be such a respected work.
Obvious pseudoscience: Theories which, while purporting to be scientific, are obviously bogus, such as Time Cube, may be so labeled and categorized as such without more consideration.
Generally considered pseudoscience: Theories which have a following, such as astrology, but which are generally considered pseudoscience by the scientific community may properly contain that information and may be categorized as pseudoscience.
Questionable science: Theories which have a substantial following, such as psychoanalysis, but which some critics allege to be pseudoscience, may contain information to that effect, but generally should not be so characterized.
Alternative theoretical formulations: Alternative theoretical formulations which have a following within the scientific community are not pseudoscience, but part of the scientific process.
I proposed the language in the arbitration decision. The main problem was characterization of ideas as "pseudoscience" when no scientist had in fact commented on them, or even investigated them. "Obvious pseudoscience" not commanding enough attention by the scientific community for comment to have occurred, thus no source. The decision means you don't have to have a source from a scientist to describe something as pseudoscience or categorize it as pseudo science if it is obvious. Subjects generally considered pseudoscience such as astrology suffer somewhat from the same problem, as they are seldom examined or considered seriously by scientists, thus there is little or no research by scientists of the propositions advanced. Nevertheless, despite the paucity of reliable sources, they may be categorized as pseudoscience, or it may be noted that the findings and discoveries of the practice are not seriously considered by scientists. Obviously some statements by scientists have been found, but they are not, in fact, based on scientific research, but on opinion. Such opinions would not ordinarily be considered reliable sources as they are not based on actual research, but the arbitration opinion makes an exception.
The other two possibilities, questionable science and alternative theoretical formulations, are within the broad umbrella of science but lack general acceptance. The scientific discipline of parapsychology, in so far as it was carried on as serious scientific research is an example of questionable science. There was serious doubt that many of the investigated phenomena were worth studying. Nevertheless, as the research was carried on with scientific vigor it should not be characterized as pseudoscience. Even less so innovative theoretical innovations that have not yet met universal acceptance such as Einstein's theories once were. User:Fred BauderTalk03:52, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
Caleb Murdock vandalism
Latest comment: 14 years ago11 comments3 people in discussion
Can you let me know if you see any more of those Providence IPs around? Some of them are close enough for a range block, but that might just be coincidence in the dynamic assignment. Email me if you are not sure what this is about. Thanks, - 2/0 (cont.) 06:45, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I'll keep my eyes open. I wish there was a tool or template warning system, so that it wasn't necessary to go to the vandalism reporting board. Then the warning template would automatically notify the bot. -- Brangifer (talk) 06:51, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
Twinkle adds a button when you are viewing the contributions page. I am not sure that I have ever used that particular function, but the rest of the tool is pretty user friendly. IE is not supported, but it works fine in FireFox and I have not noticed any problems in Chrome or Opera. It should also be fairly simple to create a bot to monitor Category:Users in need of a good blocking and generate reports to AIV based on that. Putting a user in the category could be done by adding a template parameter - say, {{subst:uw-warn4|report=yes}} or something. Then again, I have never actually bothered to check how the current vandalism-reporting bots function. - 2/0 (cont.) 07:17, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I don't use Twinkle, and my HTML and programming skills are very limited. Someone needs to create this. Then a vandal4 tag would trigger the bot. BTW, take a look here. This shows what type of attitude I'm up against, or just look above near the end of this section. There a refusal to provide a claimed source reveals a pseudoskeptical attitude that would rather crucify than help, IOW create more disruption. -- Brangifer (talk) 07:26, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I have semi-protected this page for a month; it might need to be extended, but I generally prefer to start with a shortish period. You should also create and monitor a subpage where legitimate non-autoconfirmed can contact you. I added the rest of the IPs I have seen to your list, including some from the beginning of the month around the time his topic ban was being placed; I also found but did not list some older IPs that appear to be CM engaged in legitimate editing while inadvertently logged out. Up to you which ones you feel like tracking. - 2/0 (cont.) 15:24, 23 March 2010 (UTC)
Murdock has previously stated (before he was blocked) that he can edit from anywhere, but so far most of his edits have been from Providence, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and a few other places. He's a 60ish man who has the Seth Material as his religion and who therefore also has edited at Jane Roberts:
The behavioral evidence is also interesting. Rather than focus exclusively on the articles, one needs to notice whose edits and comments he's targeting. He targets the users with whom he's been in conflict and the admins who have blocked him:
"Wikipedia creates enemies every time it blocks an editor for the slightest reason. All I have to do to get a new IP address is to turn off my modem and turn it back on." [19]
I have imposed a couple of rangeblocks. Perhaps that will slow him down for ten minutes or so. Anyway, I see the logic of your suggestion at WP:Sockpuppet investigations/Fraberj that Caleb Murdock could be the same editor as User:Fraberj. If not, it's hard to explain the editing pattern of such IPs as 71.161.231.108. Review this set of IP edits and you'll not see much in the month of April that doesn't look like either Caleb or Fraberj. Unless he is just following around people like yourself and Guyonthesubway. EdJohnston (talk) 04:12, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
That's exactly what he's been doing. The articles aren't the subject, WE are! That explains his vandalism. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:22, 1 May 2010 (UTC)
Newer Seth Material and Jane Roberts edits and socking
These are all related to Plasma cosmology, Ruggero Santilli, and the activities and interests of User:Orrerysky (new account) and User:Wavyinfinity (much older account). There is uncertainty as to who is the real sockmaster behind this activity, but Orrerysky and Wavyinfinity are the most active right now. We are dealing with multiple real socks of one unbalanced person, and probably several meats who are various fans.
User:Wavyinfinity is obviously grossly misusing his userpage. He's using it to coordinate attacks on mainstream science and scientists.
Many IPs geolocate to Santilli's locality, and others are so ducklike (same arguments, added links, poor grammar, personal attacks, legal threats, anti-semitism, etc.) that they should be investigated.
"As for removing "clearly biased language", if sources are biased, then we are required to preserve that bias in our edits. The content is not required to be "neutral", only the editors, who are required to edit in an NPOV manner. That means that fringe subjects will cite mainstream opinions which describe them with very biased language, and we are not allowed to censor those words, whether they be quackery, pseudoscience, fringe, or other pejorative words. NPOV requires we preserve the spirit of the sources."
Relevant parts of a comment explaining RS
When it comes to determining whether a source is a RS, it all depends on how it's used. No single source (even the New York Times) is considered reliable in every situation, and there is practically no single source that isn't considered a RS for some very limited purpose (such as the nonsensical insane Twitter speculations of a weirdo, used in an article about that weirdo, for the purpose of documenting their POV).
If you will check the two places where the Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience is being used in this article, it is used appropriately for the use intended in that context. Context is everything when determining whether a source is being used appropriately. If so, then it is a RS for that purpose. Source
Message for IPs (old message which might be needed again, so saving here)
No, you're really not. You're arguing for the most sympathetic interpretation possible of the most supportive sources you can find. You are exploiting the difference between the measured tones of science and the promotional tones of quacks, to assert that the balance point lies on the quacks' side of neutral. You'll fail for one simple reason: we've seen it all before. Many times. Guy (Help!) 00:43, 29 March 2014 (UTC)source
Did you realize that you violated the BRD cycle with [DIFF here this edit?] I have reverted and would like to see your reasoning for the change explained on the talk page. Thanks.
"Neither humility nor perfection is required. But a combination of confidence and error will not persuade."[20]
Thoughts about a learning curve
I am not disputing the right of productive and collaborative editors to delete certain types of material from their own userspace (note that no one "owns" their own userspace completely), but this situation is different and battlefield behavior should not be rewarded. We can come back to this in the future, but for now it's best for the page to not be edited by this blocked editor. Also, any future edits to this page (that reveal more battlefield and recalcitrant behavior) should be met with further blocks.
We're dealing with an editor who reveals a very negative learning curve.
Let's start with a quote from Dave Mason, a great musician and entertainer:
"As for me, if I'd have known better, I'd have done better. It's all been lessons, and everybody's got their lessons to learn. I'm trying my best, and I'm certainly trying to learn from my mistakes. But I'd like to thank all the people that fucked me, because it's been quite an education."[21]
At Wikipedia it's all about one's learning curve. None of us is perfect or fully understands Wikipedia. We've got to learn from our mistakes and improve. An editor's collaborative potential and redeemability should be judged by their Wikipedian learning curve, not by exceptional and occasional displays of human frailty, that are then blown out of proportion and even distorted by their antagonists. Do they occasionally "cross the line" when under fire, which is quite human, or do they operate on the other side of the line most of the time, finding incivility and the personal attack mode to be their natural element? A look at the totality of an editor's contributions is essential before making judgments. A positive learning curve is what it's all about.
The following profound prose from User:Hoary is worth repeating here:
"Neither humility nor perfection is required. But a combination of confidence and error will not persuade."[22]
That last sentence describes this editor quite well, and none of us have been impressed or persuaded. Source
Your recent editing history at ARTICLE NAME shows that you are in danger of breaking the three-revert rule, or that you may have already broken it. An editor must not perform more than three reverts on a single page within a 24-hour period. Undoing another editor's work—whether in whole or in part, whether involving the same or different material each time—counts as a revert. Breaking the three-revert rule often leads to a block. If you wish to avoid being blocked, instead of reverting, please use the article's talk page to discuss the changes; work towards a version that represents consensus among editors. You can post a request for help at a relevant noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases, you may wish to request temporary page protection. You may still be blocked for edit warring even if you do not exceed the technical limit of the three-revert rule if your behavior indicates that you intend to continue to revert repeatedly.
I suggest you read about the BOLD, revert, discuss cycle. Your edits have been reverted because other editors disagree with them. YOU are now obligated to start a discussion on the article's talk page and justify the reasons for your edits. Your arguments will have to be based on Wikipedia policies and very reliable sources, not your own or some fringe opinion. If you can come to an agreeable solution with the other editors, then a consensus version can be added. Under no condition are you allowed to restore your edits without first attempting to get the approval of the editors who object. That would be edit warring and will only get you blocked. Good luck!
LMAO! How a troll attack leads to interesting discoveries
My short block log has some history that should be connected with it. Unfortunately it isn't possible to edit a block log or attach notes to it, so I'm doing that here.
Wikipedia is behind the ball
This comment is very insightful. It shows a good understanding of the essence of WP:NOR:
"Wikipedia is behind the ball - that is we don't lead, we follow - let relaible sources make the novel connections and statements and find NPOV ways of presenting them if needed." User:Benjiboi
"There's no difficulty proving effectiveness, unless you insist on doing it wrong. We don't double blind informational therapies. —Whig (talk) 03:32, 23 June 2009 (UTC)" (speaking of homeopathy)
"In the U.S., prior to the Copyright Act of 1976, published works needed an explicit copyright notice to be covered by copyright law. (Lack of a copyright notice on a print run of Houghton Mifflin's American publication of The Lord of the Rings allowed Ace Books to publish an unauthorized version od the trilogy.) After 1976, all published works were covered, regardless of whether they had a notice or not, and unpublished works were covered as well -- so whether a webiste explicitly claims copyright or not is totally irrelevant. Ed Fitzgeraldt / c18:00, 4 June 2009 (UTC)"
NootherIDAvailable, this article isn't written for homeopaths, nor their customers, but for everyone. It's not a sales brochure written only from the viewpoint of homeopaths. You really need to understand NPOV better. One indication that NPOV is being met is when neither side of the issue is totally happy with ALL the information the article contains, but if they are good Wikipedia editors who understand the policies here, they will be satisfied only when opposing POV have been presented factually without promotion. To be a good editor here, one has to be willing to write for the enemy. Are you willing to do that? It doesn't sound like it. If you aren't willing to do that, or at least allow it, then you will only be a disruption here and will end up getting blocked or banned. Please make up your mind. This isn't your personal website or blog. This is an encyclopedia like no other. It has its own special set of rules, and no one understands them completely since they are constantly evolving to meet new demands. Some of our policies, like those related to Pseudoscience and Fringe subjects, were developed because of the actions of editors like yourself, IOW they were made to enable the canons of Wikipedia to shoot you and other editors like you. Since you seem to be new here, I suggest that you just lay low and stay out of the sights of those canons by not making too many waves. Give it time and you'll likely get the hang of it. Edit other subjects for awhile and learn the ropes. Good luck. -- Brangifer (talk) 05:03, 29 March 2009 (UTC)Source:[26]
You say you are "not an advocate", but your writing says otherwise. That you have a POV on the subject, even an advocate's POV, is itself not a problem. We all have POV. It's when it causes you to perform original research synthesis violations, and without reliable sources, that the problem becomes evident. I have no doubt that you are trying to improve the article, but this isn't the way to do it. This is a fringe subject that is covered by our fringe theories guideline:
In order to be notable enough to appear in Wikipedia, a fringe idea should be referenced extensively, and in a serious manner, in at least one major publication, or by a notable group or individual that is independent of the theory.
Even debunking or disparaging references are adequate, as they establish the notability of the theory outside of its group of adherents.
That's why articles like this are treated differently than articles about proven ideas. In articles like this, mainstream sources (like Quackwatch) are given preeminence over fringe sources, and mainstream POV is also given preeminence over fringe POV. NPOV requires that all significant POV are presented, but fringe POV, being unsupported by scientific evidence, take a backseat to mainstream POV. Proven and unproven ideas are not given equal weight. Promoters of fringe POV should be glad that their ideas are even allowed to be presented here. It happens because Wikipedia's goal is to document the sum total of human knowledge and experience, but it must be done using verifiable and RS. If it isn't documented in such sources, and is only presented in fringe sources, then it gets very little, if any, coverage here. That's the way it works here. If you want to change that, then take your concerns and questions to the Fringe theories Noticeboard. Good luck in your future here. There's alot to learn, and learning to edit here according to our policies and guidelines is an education that will benefit you in many ways. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:13, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
"unblock-un reviewed|Ok, so I seem to have been blocked for having an inappropriate name. I apologise profusely for this, I didn't realise at the time of creating this account that it could be taken offensively. So i would like to keep my edits etc, as I have put a lot of effort and time into edits I have made. I suggest the username 'Acromantula'|2=User:Acromantula is taken; please consult Special:Listusers to search for usernames to find one that isn't taken. While we're on it, if you username had been available I would be rather hesitant to unblock you. Yes, your username is (somewhat) offensive... but you were really blocked because you are POV-pushing. Admins are generally hesitant to block for POV pushing, because it's a judgment call. But I'm firm in my judgment, that's what you were doing. No one has been buying your argument that the Cold reading article should say that it is only "claimed" that people use cold reading. Your basis of argument is your own beliefs, rather than external factors like sources. And you continue to hammer the same points regardless of how many people have opposed them. In other words, you lost the argument and you should stop; it's crossing the threshold into disruption. So, if you find an available username I'm willing to unblock, and view this block as only about your username, but this POV-pushing behavior is a serious problem and if you don't address it you'll soon be blocked again. Mangojuicetalk16:11, 20 February 2009 (UTC)Source (Bold emphasis added.)
Promises to reform: "unblock-un|Then how is the name 'machomonkey'? And i apologise if you dislike my edits, yet i have felt that they are biased towards the oppposite viewpoint. What I have done is not right, admittedly, although it is no worse than what has been done by others. If that is what is required, I shall change my ways."[27], but the edit summary says otherwise: "contested block and provided new name"
"As a professionally qualified, licensed homeopathic doctor, it was irritating for me when my patients quoted from wikipedia - and when I read the article, I realised that every statement was criticised, unlike osteopathy, chiropractic etc." User:NootherIDAvailable[28]
A collection of spinal manipulation research abstracts, news reports and other commentaries, with special emphasis on risks, plus some other interesting sources. Some sources on the related subjects of Chiropractic, Physical Therapy, Osteopathic medicine, and Osteopathy are also included. Some are of purely historical interest and others present the latest evidence. They are kept here as a resource for editing articles. This list is far from exhaustive. It is currently organized by year, for lack of a better system, which has the immediate benefit of helping to avoid duplication.
If you have any additional sources, suggestions for improvement or personal comments, please use the talk page. Thanks. -- Brangifer / talk
User:69.127.37.241 made this massive revamp of the existing Chiropractic article, leaving us with a version as only a very typical and truly deluded straight chiropractor could wish it. A very interesting object for study of the straight chiropractic mind. Believe it or not, this is classic chiropractic in 2008! Seeing this type of ignorance might be considered unbelievable to most, but for those who study the chiropractic profession, this is quite a common phenomenon. -- Brangifer / talk04:45, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
Latest comment: 1 month ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi! Some poor analysis in your answer. That doesn't make logical sense. Because, as you said, "falsehoods" includes "lies", it can be clarified that a particular falsehood is a lie, but there's no point in clarifying that a lie is a falsehood, as that is per definition. To make it easy: if I ask why an article says "fox", and the footnote says that the RS only said "animal", you cannot tell me that it's because animals includes foxes. If the RS says "falsehoods", it's not necessarily saying that it was a lie. Also, if you don't care about the concept of truth, you cannot lie. That is instead called bullshitting. 86.31.178.164 (talk) 12:15, 14 July 2024 (UTC)
Hi 86. It would be nice if you provided a quote from me, as well as the URL for the place I make the quote, IOW a diff. I'd be happy to explore this topic with you. Talk page comments often fail to do that, and I sometimes write things clumsily.
Uh oh! I've already answered there. Am I going to get into deep water there? Is there some big debacle attached to that topic? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:35, 16 July 2024 (UTC)
I consider far left to be revolutionary, most Marxists aren’t, think particularly about academics I admit but a lot of others. A lot of Communist parties take part in the democratic systems of their country, especially India where they govern some states. Not far left. Doug Wellertalk20:30, 16 July 2024 (UTC)
Latest comment: 1 month ago7 comments2 people in discussion
Hi. In response to your edit summary at Melania Trump's article, I should point out that both Template:Infobox officeholder and Template:Infobox person have TemplateData that clearly specify family members that are notable or of particular relevance should be listed in the infobox. Her father is clearly not notable enough to have his own article, so I fail to see why he should be given space in the infobox. Keivan.fTalk20:09, 18 July 2024 (UTC)
So you have to open the TemplateData and there if you look at the parameters individually you'll find that for "Spouse(s)" it asks that they be listed "if [they're] notable"; same for "Partner(s)" and "Domestic partner(s)". Now I had not noticed this before but it does not provide any descriptions for "Parents" and "Children" but I think we should follow the same rule. Keivan.fTalk20:21, 18 July 2024 (UTC)
Take a look at Template:Infobox officeholder. It's under "TemplateData for this template used by TemplateWizard, VisualEditor and other tools" which is right above "Tracking categories". It provides you with parameter "name", "description", "type" and "status". Keivan.fTalk20:39, 18 July 2024 (UTC)
Latest comment: 1 month ago2 comments2 people in discussion
I have already expressed an opinion in support of keeping the content you are concerned about. I am surprised that you chose to email me about this. I communicate by email only when I perceive a compelling need for privacy. I see no such need here. Advance your convincing, policy based arguments right here in the open. I do not engage in behind-the-scenes intrigues. Cullen328 (talk) 08:23, 27 July 2024 (UTC)
I just want someone to provide evidence of the claimed BLP violations and don't want to bludgeon the MfD. I'll go ahead and make a direct request for evidence on the talk page there. I guess that's allowed. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 14:28, 27 July 2024 (UTC)
July 2024
Latest comment: 1 month ago1 comment1 person in discussion
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