Wikipedia talk:Lamest edit wars/Archive 1

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Please keep this page, I like it. silsor 03:55, Feb 25, 2004 (UTC)

Humm Verry intresting. I never new sutch little lame things could cause sutch a problem "Keep up the Good work" NN,, my annutils / computer name

Anthony: Oh you're such a curmudgeon :) Fuzheado 03:57, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Protected due to Pakaran edit warring with hymself. silsor 04:23, Feb 25, 2004 (UTC)

nice to get a good laugh once in a while :) Kingturtle 04:24, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I think the page should be unprotected, or Pakaran should be banned. If nothing else, it should be reverted to my last version, with a protected header added. Thanks. Pakaran. 04:38, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I think that the evil Pakaran has finally learned his lesson. But watch yourself! -- BCorr ¤ Брайен 14:46, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

is it alllowed to edit while protected?

Cramped my cheeks. -- Cimon Avaro on a pogostick 06:24, Feb 26, 2004 (UTC)

Come on, this is BS - considering some of the actually rather interesting pages that have been deleted recently I can't see how this is notable in any way. Please delete it, for the sake of wikipedia's credibility...88.105.100.18 14:21, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

No. Pobbie Rarr 02:16, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

The Clinton war and whimsy

Anthony DiPierro has removed this entry:

• Bill Clinton - edit war over which picture of him to use, when the photos are virtually identical except one is slightly darker and the other is 5 times as big.

citing the reason this page is dedicated to whimsy, and not to document real, contentious edit wars. Now, I'm hardly going to war over this, but I wonder about that guideline. Every single edit war listed here was a real, contentious edit war to someone. I, personally, found the Clinton one to be simply amusing when I looked it up in the article's history. How are we to settle these issues? Bryan 15:35, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

This issue has IMO just come up again, Netaholic removed a series of template edit wars that he was himself involved in. It seems to go without saying that an edit war wouldn't seem whimsical to one of the people who's actually involved in it, so perhaps a good guideline would be to allow addition/removal to this page only by uninvolved participants? Or perhaps put some sort of "statute of limitations" so that only edit wars where the participants have had time to cool off or forget about them go here? Bryan 00:28, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Jimbo Wales

I've removed the comment

Note that that edit was made anonymously. Guanaco 21:44, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

because inspection of the history of that page reveals that the anonymous edit was that before the one changing the date and that the sysop doing the reversion must have gotten confused (no names no packdrill :-) --Phil | Talk 07:15, Sep 22, 2004 (UTC)

To be fair, the date was changed by an anon a minute before Jimbo edited. Jimbo has forgotten to log in, and had to claim his edits, before. His own edit was the one mentioning that one link is to an outdated list. Pakaran. 17:11, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I'm removing Jimbo entirely, because, quite frankly, a single revert does not an edit war make. Snowspinner 22:55, Sep 22, 2004 (UTC)

<whimsical> Jimbo was the one who named it a revert war, and how much more lame can you get? <Nigel Tufnel> none more lame! </Nigel Tufnel></whimsical>--Phil | Talk 07:25, Sep 23, 2004 (UTC)

Yay! The one revert war I've been in is on this, assuming it didn't happen before without me knowing... Kiand 17:26, 20 Oct 2004 (UTC)

A candidates in the making

1. The great The Great Game vs. Great Game naming controversy is probably another good candidate. 4.232.141.203 09:22, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Writing from a neutral point of view

"Though, to be fair, the Agatha Christie novel would be even less interesting."

I removed the sentence from the section on "Charles Darwin", since it appears to be a personal opinion and as such violates NPOV. If someone can provide a reference for it and re-write from a neutral point of view, though, I would be open to having it put back. --Carnildo 22:18, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Is NPOV applicable on a non-articel WP: namespace humor page? 68.39.174.238 01:25, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Nancy Reagan

"was she born in 1921? Or 1923? After days of editing, does anyone really care THAT much? Woman is old."

It seems that this is supposed to be trivial...I thought accuracy was important on Wikipedia. Brianjd 11:14, 2005 Jan 29 (UTC)

It should be a trivial matter of looking up the facts -- this isn't the sort of thing it should be possible to dispute. That's what makes it a lame edit war. --Carnildo 20:43, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Richard Neustadt

Actually, both are wrong. He's Harry S Truman. The S didn't stand for anything. :) Luigi30 17:56, 8 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Both are also right. Techincally, it should be "Harry S" rather than "Harry S.", but even Harry himself frequently included the dot when writing his name. --Carnildo 20:17, 8 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Potato chips

Should potato chips be flavored or flavoured?

I honestly don't see why this is here, since Canadians, who primarily use -our spellings, also call them potato chips. --/ɛvɪs/ 01:49, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)

The dispute wasn't over whether to call them potato chips, it was over whether to use the "-our" or "-or" spelling for "flavored". Yes, it's a lame argument - that's why it's listed here. :) Bryan 03:25, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Lame indeed. Why use the word at all if it can be avoided? I'ts not even necessary, just call them BBQ Style Potato Chips or Sour Cream and Onion Potato Chips.

The issue had nothing to do with specific flavours, but to do with the invention and process. Which happened in a Commonwealth English speaking country...

The problem is this: the United States, where the "true" potato chip was invented, is not a Commonwealth English speaking country. In Commonwealth English, a "potato chip" is a french fry!

And we descend into it again. Lets just drop it... its a listed edit war, leave it at that. --Kiand 14:17, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

You are wrong. It's as simple as that. In this context, in commonwealth English, a "potato chip" is NOT a french fry. As far as the argument goes, this is ENGLISH wikipedia, so the ENGLISH spelling should be used. "Flavor" is not a word. "Flavour" is.

Using specific flavour names wouldn't have been workable in the slightest--Kiand 12:37, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Issues with WP:LAME

If this page is dedicated to edit wars with lame or silly causes, and not to exhaustively documenting all the real and contentious edit wars, then why isn't there a page that documents contentious edit wars?

Why should there be such a page? What's the point of a public pillory like that? We try to forgive and forget. —Charles P. ^(Mirv) 01:35, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Because it's awesome.

And no, we shouldn't forgive and forget. We should keep reminding people, so they realize how futile and pointless it is and don't do it again. - Omegatron 01:44, Apr 25, 2005 (UTC)

Is this sarcasm? I honestly can't tell. If it isn't, you do realize that such a page would be an endless source of strife, as every edit warrior would list everyone with whom they've ever had a disagreement, and every other edit warrior would edit war to remove the edit wars, and so on, until the entire page dissolved in a blast of seething rage. I hope you were joking. —Charles P. ^(Mirv) 01:49, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I'm not joking. - Omegatron 02:17, Apr 25, 2005 (UTC)

Then I hope nobody agrees with your idea, which is terrible. —Charles P. ^(Mirv) 03:21, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

There already is documentation for most of the real and contentious edit wars in the Wikipedia, although not labeled as such, in the archives and page histories for WP:RFC, WP:RFM, and WP:RFAR. BlankVerse ∅ 06:28, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Fossil fuel for reciprocating piston engines equipped with spark plugs

I think once it's settled, Gasoline/Petrol has to go on here. Nickptar 23:21, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Agreed, so I'm adding it now. That talk page is priceless. Lisiate 02:18, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Don't hold your breath! Looks like it's going to be filibustered. Time to bring out the Nuclear option! ℬastique▼^talk 23:52, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Other lameness on WP

If we're going to have this, why not have lame VfDs or the like? I won't name any names, but I'm sure a lot of you can think of some. (There seems to be at least one at the moment.) Nickptar 18:32, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I think lame VfDs may be too "easy" to be worth commemorating. A lame VfD can be slapped together in a few minutes, whereas a truly lame edit war requires days or weeks of solid effort fighting the good (lame) fight. I suppose it's possible that there are a few VfDs of epic lameness, though; I don't read VfD much so I may not fully appreciate the full breadth of VfD culture. Could you link to the example you had in mind? Bryan 03:07, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Some examples are VfD, Wookiee, and the current one I was talking about: Race and intelligence. But you're right, a VfD nomination is easy to make whereas an edit war is more drawn-out and painful.

But since this is my favorite page by far in the Wikipedia namespace, I feel like there has to be something else worth commemorating in this fashion. Perhaps "most prolifically annoying people" (User:Mr. Treason and the like), but that would be much closer to personal attack than this. Nickptar 18:33, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Incidentally, I think Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Wookiee is a very good example of a non-lame nomination. The user was genuinely misguided about what Wikipedia should and shouldn't include, from the majority's point of view. That's not something that should be ridiculed. It's so easy for us to call that lame, but we already know the drill. JRM · Talk 22:39, 2005 Jun 11 (UTC)

Mmm. A good example of a lame VfD would possibly be the transuranic elements - someone put Ununbium and a lot of the following entries for systematically-named elements up for deletion. (I believe the reason given was "sciencecruft"...) - I still boggle when remembering those. Shimgray 22:56, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

A billet-doux to the editors

God bless you all. Even the VfD one, as without the VfD, I never would have known about this hysterical museum of the incroyable. Live long and prosper. --Mothperson 1 July 2005 17:15 (UTC) (and may god protect me from becoming an exhibit, because I can just see myself falling in)

Moth, I like your description - this is like a Ripley's Believe it or Not museum for Wikipedia. It's weird, amusing, instructive and a warning, all at the same time. Fuzheado | Talk 6 July 2005 02:34 (UTC)

Yeah, well - I am feeling a little silly about having words with someone about Sprinkles, not that I wasn't perfectly justified. I have to keep reminding myself not to go there, thereby ending up here. --Mothperson 6 July 2005 16:32 (UTC)

Comment from ?

I don't really agree with the point- 'The Balkans-no one does ethnic fighting like us,' it is a very sensitive subject Albert Einsteins pipe

VFD results

This article has survived a VFD nomination with the result of Keep. --Allen3 ^talk July 7, 2005 21:55 (UTC)

WP:LAME template?

I think we should have a template to place in the talk page where the lame edit war occured, sort of like "this page has undergone one of the lamest edit wars in wikipedia. Visit WP:LAME for the full list."Borisblue 12:03, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Here's an example:

File:Head to head clowns.jpg

This article has undergone, or is undergoing an extremely lame edit war.

Borisblue 03:25, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

LOL! Great idea! :D -asx- 02:55, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Edit warS

An edit war on the page describing edit wars?

I knew it. You are all suckers for irony.

Wink-wink.

/Wik-E

Autofellatio?

If we're going to include the feces photograph war here, should we not also include the autofellatio photograph war, which is in some cases even sillier than the feces one, to the point where it has become a giant in-joke on WP?

Bring In the Clowns

Whoever thought to put that clown picture on this article is a freaking genius. I'll be laughing at that for days... :D -asx- 02:54, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Bring in the Queens

A couple of the participants in the Queen Victoria revert-fest are trying to remove any mention of it as lame. It's lame. The battle rages over whether she should be called Her Highness or not; what format the dates should be in, whether British, American, wiki or non; and what the Queen's surname is supposed to have been. The same participants are doing the same things over a range of deceased monarchs and popes. This is about as lame as it gets. Pete 08:52, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, I know. But mentioning it here might be just a tad over the edge at the moment for those Wikipedians - after all "lame" is somewhat of a diminutive intensifier in English. I'd sit back and wait, and let everthing calm down first. --HappyCamper 13:01, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

It seems pretty lame to me, too. And I sure as heck don't see any reason to let the participants decide if it's lame or not. This list would be empty if we did that. Advice to the people who keep reverting it off this list: Keeping your own edit war off this list looks really petty. How about clicking "Unwatch" instead? -- Coneslayer 17:21, 2005 August 1 (UTC)

I agree with you 100%, but I would hate to set this page up for protection or an edit war because of this...it just seems to defeat the instructive purpose of this article. --HappyCamper 17:24, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

If the fighting continues much longer, we can just list the edit war over whether or not the battle of Queen Victoria is lame on the page. --Carnildo 18:42, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

Some background. A vote decided to use styles at the start of articles on royalty. (I voted against.) Users implemented the policy. After a couple of months a couple users unilaterally then began removing them. A bitter edit war resulted, and a cakhanded attempt at a vote to decide the issue that became a farce. An agreement was finally reached to stop the war; those articles with styles would keep them for the moment. Those article without them would not have them put in, for the moment. When tempers had been cooled, the issue could then be discussed calmly. The user above, Skyring, had been banned for one month from Wikipedia for harrassment of users; I was one he stalked. Because I was one of those who enforced the stopping of the edit war by ensuring that styles were neither added in nor removed, Skyring under a series of illegally used sockpuppets to circumvent the ban, deliberately removed the styles to try to start off the edit war again. I simply reinstated them to stop him causing the whole farce of edit wars on all royal articles to break out again.

As part of his game plan he placed a special (now deleted) template on the page, posted personal abuse, and this link here. Skyring has now been banned again, this time by Jimbo, while the ArbComm decides how long to ban him for. In the meantime, expect new sockpuppets from Canberra IPs to wage wars to delete the styles on the articles again. It is just a game by him to try to reignite a bitter Wikipedia-wide edit war. If you see him doing it under his sockpuppets, revert the changes, block the sockpuppets and inform the ArbCom of what he is up to. This is not a lame edit war. It is a stunt by a twice-banned user. But lest anyone think otherwise, maybe this discussion should be left here so that people know just what Skyring (aka WrongAgain, aka HisHoliness, aka other identities) is up to. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 19:09, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

Dude, get over yourself. You're certainly providing ample evidence why it ought to be listed here.

One of the funniest bits was the revert war over the dates, whether they should be, say,

• 24 May 1819, or
• May 24 1819

with one side insisting that the former was absolutely required and the other reverting to the latter. --Calton | Talk 01:31, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

In my opinion, this should be listed as lame war already because of two camps so entrenched in such a petty issue DECIDED to leave everything "not to be touched". And - The degree of lameness is not influenced to one iota by some story of battling sockpuppets or banned users. Actually, such story makes this even lamer war. (If the battle against "enemies" becomes more important than assessing any edit by merits, it IS very lame.) 217.140.193.123 21:30, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

Skyring, the creator of the problem on the page, and who using sockpuppets continued triggering edit wars on the topic, has been banned by the ArbComm for one year from Wikipedia. As he breached the ban within 3 days, the year long ban has been reset and runs from today. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 00:55, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

Regardless of whether the person who actually posted it here is banned, I think the edit war does belong on the list of lame edit wars. *Dan* 01:07, August 15, 2005 (UTC)

It was anything but a lame war. A bitter Wikipedia-wide edit war had erupted over the use of styles. A truce was agreed, which was to leave those articles already with styles with their styles in tact for the moment (to keep the pro-styles lobby quiet) and ensure no more styles were added in anywhere (to keep the anti-styles lobby quiet). Then once tempers had cooled, revisit the whole issue calmly. (That by the way is now being done and a solution may be only days away.) Skyring was banned from Wikipedia for Wikistalking. He used sockpuppets to get his revenge by trying to reignite the edit war. To stop either side jumping in a group of us rigidly enforced the compromise. Styles added in were deleted. Styles deleted were added back in. It worked. The style war did not erupt again and now an agreed solution acceptable to both sides is being finalised, with 95% agreement. There was no lame edit war on the page, just a strict enforcement of the truce to prevent either side thinking the other had broken the truce, so triggering off round 2 across up to 100 articles. Eventually to stop the sockpuppet attack, lest it succeed it starting the whole damn war across up to 100 articles, a whole batch of articles ended up being protected. Because the sockpuppets then could not get their way and trigger off the style war they insisted that the enforcement of the truce was a lame edit war and pasted it here, as well as creating a now deleted LAME template. Users removed it, only to have yet another sockpuppet appear again and put it in again. (BTW if it was such a lame edit war, why were they waging it??? The reason was simple: it was a game of revenge on Wikipedia, and that is why it was stopped. The person waging the game has been banned for their general behaviour here (which means probably more sockpuppets trying to trigger off edit wars to get revenge and cause chaos on Wikipedia. Watch and see new anons appear here to reinstate the lame war nonsense, etc.) FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:26, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

Hah! While I was typing the above another anon appeared, found an unlocked article with a style and deleted it. Another user, enforcing the truce, reverted it. Curious how that anon only edited one page out of nearly 700,000, twice — the one with a style. Now do you see what is going on? (Now how quickly will that revert be added in here by an anon as another supposed lame edit war?) FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:32, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

Multiple independent editors, with registered accounts, demonstrably not involved in the issue itself, have now declared this to be a Lame Edit War, and I agree with them. Jtdirl, the more you insist this was really a sensible struggle between a Right and a Wrong party, the more people are going to be convinced it was a Lame Edit War. You're missing the vital point that it doesn't matter who did it or why there was edit warring. For heaven's sake, this doesn't refer to anyone by name at all. Stop taking it as a personal insult.

You're dangerously close to starting a lame edit war over this page (but that already happened once, of course, so we're not going to add it...) Please, just consider looking away and accepting that you know what really happened, while the rest of us draw our own conclusions. JRM · Talk 14:55, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

Bwahaha. Jtdirl is continuously waging the weighty revert war on inclusion of Queen Victoria's alleged surnames in the introductory paragraph of that article. See edit history http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Victoria_of_the_United_Kingdom&action=history
It seems that Jtdirl is not satisfied that issue about Victoria's surnames is explained in a latter part of the article (under subheading Style and Arms) and also with a footnote, no, Jtdirl wants surnames also in introductory paragraph, despite of at least 3 other editors having opposed it. See also the LONG long "discussions" and particularly writings by Jtdirl at the Talk:Victoria of the United Kingdom/Surname (at this time, in the end of that talk page)... I believe the said warring is further deserving more deserved mentions here. Would in be advisable to create some conveyable title of "Lame Edit Warrior of the Year" or something like :) Arrigo 04:01, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

Yet again, more Arrigo personal attacks. (Any chance you might devote some of the time you spend attacking me all over the place to untangling the mess you have left the Japanese emperors in, with double, treble, and quadruple directs, like having Empress Meisho redirect to Meisho which redirects to Meisho Tenno. You have created a mess but seen to want as usual to leave it to others to clean up.)

For the record: 1 user unilaterally deleted factual information on the basis of a personal POV. I reinstated it because (i) the location for the that factual information in that article should be no different to where it is contained in all other royal articles, indeed where it is in hundreds of thousands of all biographical articles on Wikipedia; (ii) All the information is independently verified in detail (8 geneological references, 1 biography, 2 encyclopædias, PBS, The Sunday Times, Buckingham Palace, the Royal Archives, the College of Heralds, etc) and was further done so in a footnote. Stan himself called the version I returned the page to the "settled consensus".[1] By all means debate removing it. But removing it with no more justification than I disagree with it, so there is not NPOV. The accuracy of the information is verified in detail. All John and Astro have said is that they think the facts wrong, but they have consistently been able to produce any sources for their statement, just their unsourced claim that it is wrong. BTW if it is such a supposedly lame war, how come you, Arrigo, jumped in to take part? You proclaiming an edit war you are involved in as being lame has about as much independent credibility as George Bush senior endorsing George W. Bush in an election. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 05:24, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

"Stan himself" here. The "settled consensus" in my revert referred to whether her family name was Wettin instead of Hannover. It was not referring to whether the style or family name should be in the lead, because those items were undergoing vigorous discussion and no consensus had been reached on those matters. --StanZegel 06:55, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

This discussion has officially crossed the line from self-parody into the realm of the bizarre. Using this talk page to rehash arguments from another talk page about reverts on a even more removed page smacks of the obsessive attention to detail which is the single most attractive part of Wikipedia. Jburt1 00:48, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Numbers that are always odd

Has any version of the "List of numbers that are always odd" article that's mentioned here been preserved anywhere online? I am incredibly curious about it. 68.226.239.73 3:12, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Or is there any archive of the debate surrounding it? I want to see grown people getting worked up about the dumbest list ever. ~~ N (t/c) 05:12, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

According to the deletion log, List of numbers that are always odd was deleted on February 28, 2004 by Meelar. Even with my sekrit admin powers I can't retrieve the contents anymore, however, nor VfD at this period, which suggests both are gone from the current database. Sorry. You'd need a developer to fish the contents from an old database, which is probably more trouble than it's worth... JRM · Talk 15:01, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

If you're in luck archive.org will have a copy. Thryduulf 07:26, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

Or we could use Google and find: User:ConMan/List_of_numbers_that_are_always_odd ;-) --DragonHawk 04:36, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

accuracy isn't lame!

I'm going to remove the entries that deal with an article's accuracy. e.g. getting Nancy Reagan's age right is important in an encyclopedia, and so is getting the title of Queen Victoria right. WP:LAME is getting big enough that we don't need this stuff as filler.Borisblue 07:50, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

I'll wait till we get cosensus on this. I feel that since we have more articles now, our standards of "lameness" should be tougher. (like the FAC)I say remove all accuracy-related disputes. Discuss?Borisblue 07:53, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

You're missing the important point. Ensuring accuracy is a noble goal, but edit warring over it is not an acceptable means to get there. There's just no excuse for edit warring, ever, no matter how vital you think it is that, e.g., Nancy Reagan's age is correctly given in her article.

I'll repeat that more strongly: edit wars have no justification. Wikipedia's accuracy is always in flux; insisting that your idea of what is correct is instated "as soon as possible" or "permanently", while ignoring the need to reach consensus, is just not a workable approach. You can be right a hundred times over, but if you can't convince others you are, you're still not being a good editor.

All edit wars are by definition lame. But some are lamer than others. Showing that you cannot behave rationally and work towards a conclusion over what single year is correct or with what title a person ought to be honoured, for example, is extremely lame. The lameness of an edit war is inversely proportional to the size of what's being disputed and the conduct of the people involved, not on how important it is to get the disputed thing right. There are a lot of ways to resolve disputes—edit warring till one or all of the parties involved drop is the lamest solution available.

Besides, all edit wars are accuracy disputes to the participants. Getting the name and nationality of Gdansk right might seem like a political or ethnic dispute to the rest of us, but to the people involved it's only about accuracy. By the yardstick of "accuracy is important", we might as well justify all edit wars.

I do agree that the "Date" section is getting repetitive. Once you've seen one date-related edit war, you've seen them all. They're so lame that it's not even interesting to see what they were about. Since there's only four of them, though, I don't think trimming is important yet. JRM · Talk 13:46, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for responding. Hmm, you raise some good points. Looking at the list I guess most of them can be categorized as "accuracy disputes". However, there are some edit wars which patently are NOT about accuracy, such as whether it is worth mentioning that Darwin and Lincoln have the same birth date. These disputes, IMHO are a great deal more pointless than ones dealing with accuracy. You have to admit that the site as a whole is getting a bit bloated and that sooner or later we have to restrict those which aren't really that lame. Maybe we should create a Wikipedia:Lame Edit War Candidates a la WP:FAC?

I also have to dispute that lameness is an inverse porportion to size. For one thing, how do you define size? I propose that lameness is an inverse porportion to importance, ie the less necessary it is for a reliable encyclopedia to get the information right, the more important it is. Only trivial edit wars are truly lame. I realise that this is a subjective criteria, but it can be used to determine, ie the Hong Kong dispute is lamer than the Nancy Reagan one. Borisblue 14:32, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

You're right, not all disputes are about accuracy; most of the remaining ones are disputes over whether something should or should not be mentioned, and in what way (which often masks a hidden NPOV or notability dispute).

Apologies for being snarky, but how do you define importance? Lord knows VfD never succeeded. Sure, some things are more important than others, but not many people would agree that how the city some know as Gdansk is named is not important, for example. It made for a supremely lame edit war, though. Sure, what is and is not really one of the "lamest" edit wars is always debatable. Personally I can't really get worked up about it; if it makes for a good read, I'd like to see it here. If it doesn't, I don't really care whether it stays or goes. A separate nomination page, I dunno. Wikipedia:Unusual articles does pretty well without something like that, but of course "unusual" is a less contested label than "lame".

Sorry I can't be of more help in hammering out criteria. :-) JRM · Talk 15:16, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

POV-based edit wars can also be not really about accuracy. I've been in one or two where everybody agrees that both versions being warred on are technically accurate, but one is NPOV and the other is POV as hell. ~~ N (t/c) 21:10, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

I thought this site was funnier when I first visited it and there were fewer entries. Some of the stuff here reminds me of the filler tracks on music CDs, you know the 13 useless songs you put up with in a CD just because you want to listen to 1 or 2 good tracks. I'd remove all the date ones, maybe the templates as well. Borisblue 19:28, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

I'd like to put the original (?) phrasing back in, as "Was she born in 1921? Or 1923? After days of editing, does anyone really care THAT much? Woman is old." That was long one of my favorites on this page; I cracked up when I first read it. And let's face it, this page is mostly for humor-value. --DragonHawk 04:34, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

wars in other Wikipedias

Francis Schonken submitted a war from Swedish WP. Ethnic feuds:

Collaboration of the week on June 2005 over the Sweden-Norway article [2] on Swedish Wikipedia [3]

...turned into the revert war of the month between adherents of the Swedish and the Norwegian point of view. Since it is unthinkable that any of the warring camps were in wrong in their contentions, it must have been the NPOV policy that is faulty.

I understand that many readers here are not in command of Swedish language, to read by themselves about the battling. However, this article is nowhere explicitly limited to being that of wars in English WP. (Perhaps such explicit definition should be made somewhere.) The warring reviewed above was actually very foreseeable - I am not sure whether anyone wants actually to read all of it, as "one seen, all seen" is rather true. It was highly funny, from outsider's perspective. Actually, Sw WP being apparently a small place, there was only one full nationalist (Swedish) warring on one side, and a small handful of editors trying to make the artice NPOV (the other side). Of course they got accused of being Norwegian sympathizers and worse... As far as I can determine, there were actually no (full and obvious) Norwegian anywhere in that battle. One of problems in that battling was that the said "extreme nationalist" was one of the longest-resided Wikipedians of Sw.WP - having received adminship a long time ago. Accusations flew of improper blocks and suchlike. Later, one of those who were, at least by their own opinion, doing NPOV in this case, left WP totally frustrated in the behavior (also in other issues) of the said "lone warrior". 217.140.193.123 07:33, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

Its on the English Wikipedia, so it is of course limited to edit wars on the English Wikipedia. If it was on Meta, then it could be for all. But its not. --Kiand 13:51, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Again, possibility of edit war erupting over items in this article

A few hours ago, an apparent participant of a move war (William of Orange) where also I was, had attempted to remove the item from this page. As several times stated, there is no reason to let the participants decide if their war was lame or not. "Advice to the people who keep reverting it off this list: Keeping your own edit war off this list looks really petty. How about clicking "Unwatch" instead?". Of course, warriors trying to remove their war from here are usually in that way providing ample evidence why it ought to be listed here. And, of course, if an edit war erupts about the item remaining or being removed from here, it provides a nice additional mention of the lameness. OK, of course it is always between Right and Wrong party, and I fully support the Right party I belong to - but there is an instructive purpose of listing petty causes and questionable behavior here (including mine, if I ever behave questionably or have petty causes :))). Arrigo 12:27, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

By the same token, shouldn't it be bad form for a participant in an edit war to add it to this article? Perhaps it would be best if both additions and deletions were done by "objective" nonparticipants. *Dan* 13:44, August 28, 2005 (UTC)

Afaik, the username who added it here, was (at least then) not a participant in the revert war which was the war in question. Besides, everyone is entitled to comment, isn't it so? Arrigo 14:07, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

As an additional comment, I'd say that if a participant wants to point out that his own "side" in a lame edit war is lame, then let him - it's healthy to admit that. The thing we only have to look for is whether the write up is biased towards one side, i.e. if there's a NPOV problem. It's akin to self-incriminating statements; they're generally better evidence than exculpatory ones. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 14:23, August 28, 2005 (UTC)

Well, a good prediction ("edit war erupting over items in this article"), though the edit war a couple of hours ago was not William of Orange, but of Meta Lameness (see below:) 217.140.193.123 08:41, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Meta Lameness

Wikipedia:Lamest edit wars ever

Edit war over what edit wars should be on this page (oh, the irony). - see Recursion; see also tail recursion. Most recent warring: William of Orange (see below).

What is the point of this ridiculous edit and who the heck keeps adding it in. It is one thing to list edit wars once, but adding in listings a second time with a see below tag is just taking the piss on the page. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 04:48, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Actually, I think it's quite pertinent, as it refers not to the William of Orange edit war but someone who is edit warring to keep the listing off this page. Hence, irony. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 07:36, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Just to inform that User:Jtdirl has nominated the redirect [4] for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion 217.140.193.123 07:33, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Congratulations. The page has survived the delete nomination by receiving Speedy Keep [[5]] - further details available at the Wikipedia:Non-main_namespace_pages_for_deletion/Wikipedia:Lamest_edit_wars_ever. Arrigo 11:39, 29 August 2005 (UTC) Thank you, User:Jtdirl, for showing us the value of this page.

The most recent should again be changed. Now it is the recursion itself. Thanks to Jtdirl. 217.140.193.123 07:46, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Macedonia

Anybody been following the edit wars regarding Macedonia? Seems the major bone of contention arises from whether or not the word "Macedonia" should be immediately followed with the Greek etymology of the word at the beginning of the article, or whether that information is redunant given the "Etymology" section further along in the article. It strikes me as very, very lame. Extreme Unction 18:56, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Already more than the traditional four Macedonian Wars??? if so, we should send a warzone reporter, to collect sufficient details... :) Arrigo 21:35, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Some preliminary drafting:... Balkan has always been a region of vigorous community feeling (read: ethnicity). As Macedonia has the joy of being claimed by Bulgarians, Greeks and a certain Slavic people whose appellation is disputed by almost any neighbor, the usual pattern of two nationalities pushing their respective POV has been elevated into multi-source fighting. There also exists an Albanian (or do we dare to call it by such name?) minority in what desires to be called as republic of Macedonia. Therefore, anything that has the awesome name Macedonia, gets immediately fought over. Our reporter, sent to the warzone (actually, there were multiple warzones, between multitude of parties) thought to introduce "Macedonian Potato Chips" into picture, but then understood that doing that, none of the food will remain edible... not that it has enough time to get stale, sooner it gets destroyed. All in all, Macedonia is continuously a goods place to take a look at if one wishes so-called rapid exchange in life. Archiving fairies probably get the material sorted by, say, 2009, after which they may go on to easier tasks, such as archiving Talk:Armenian Genocide. Oops, forgot that in Macedonian issues, new material is continuously generated. Sorry, Armenians, the fairies will not have time ever ever for your relatively small bunch of talks. -drafted by Arrigo 15:22, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

Elisabeth of Bohemia

I see that User:Jtdirl had added the quarrel over those articles to the war page. I would also like to get it added, though imo it was not a proper edit war. Could we make an exception and accept a quarrel of another sort? The quarrel is somehow documented (unintentionally) at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents, thread: "User:Deb abused admin powers, by deleting a page without AfD" (hope I wrote the link correctly, it is so full of special keystrokes) where imo Deb's "protectors" attempted to create some diversion imo to cover her wrongdoing. The "warring" was more of the sort to have a deleted page returned, finding some admin intervention to correct Deb's doings. (As you can see, I have been involved in the case, so you others decide)... Arrigo 00:08, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

No. If there were constant reversions, that would be perhaps different, but this was just a blip, not even on the scale of the others. It's not that it wasn't lame, mind you, just that it wasn't an edit war. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 00:52, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for agreeing with me, in both questions. I found particularly lame those attempts to create diversions to the problem at hand by certain admin individuals, trying move irrelevancies such as "...was just a disambiguation page"... "...continues with his attitude..." ...."...personal campaign of attacks..." and Deb herself "misrepresenting" the move history of disambig page and its original location. Very interesting ways to handle a request to bring back an improperly dleted page. Then, seeing certain individual's speculations about causes of world hunger, of rain-soaked washings and of crashed websites, I can feel sadness in face of apparent paranoia (or what diagnosis corresponds) seemingly causing figurative foaming... Actually, mental health problems imo are not lame though they are sad. Arrigo 02:08, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Arrigo moved a page to a controversial new location without proposing it. An admin correctly moved it back and asked him to follow correct procedure. He escalated it (as is his tendency) to a different page, accused her variously of lying, abusing powers, etc. He made wild allegations that the history of the page moved clearly disproved and was shot down by everyone. Escalating his personal vendetta by alleging an admin abused her powers when she clearly didn't, onto a page on 'incidents' certainly was an edit war, even if not one on the original page. This page doesn't require everything to happen on one page. Dragging the community into his personal vendetta against an admin because she dared to do her job and not let him away with what he wanted certainly qualifies as a lame edit war, indeed a patently nutty one even by Arrigo's perverse standards of behaviour. It clearly belongs on the page here. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:21, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

How many actual, conflicting edits were there? An edit war is a back and forth reversion or actual changes in content. This was just a couple of moves and an editor whining about them. It's a storm in a teacup, and you're the one making this personal. Let's not get into this again. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 01:38, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

This is ludicrous. How can an excision be an entry? If it makes you feel any better, I am taking the edit upon myself. --01:41, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Try reading the rules of Wikipedia. I quote

All edits by a banned user made since their ban, regardless of their merits, may be reverted by any user. As the banned user is not authorised to make those edits, there is no need to discuss them prior to reversion. We ask that users generally refrain from reinstating any edits made by banned users. Official Policy of Wikipedia on banned users

FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:46, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

generally refrain. Again, you can't be all that rigid. I agree that if the edit is disruptive, yes, but that doesn't mean that any and all edits are bad. Say a banned used reverts vandalism - does that mean we let the vandalism stand? --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 02:10, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

The policy is simple: all edits of banned users are reverted on sight, irrespective of content or quality. If they are banned then they are not allowed under Wikipedia rules to so much as type a period in an article. Individuals like DW, Michael, Lir and others had everything they touched wiped automatically. It has long been the standard policy. A ban means a total ban. Re vandalism, any changes they make are indeed reverted also, on the basis that they had no right to do them. DW himself under one of his sockpuppet identities once intervened to stop another vandal. Though everyone agreed that the vandalism had to be stopped, his correction of it was deleted by users. Indeed when he created a page under one of his sockpuppets the entire page was wiped from Wikipedia records and a user who tried to reinstate it as his got bitterly attacked over it. He was told nothing of DW's was allowed to be added. The policy is quite rigid. Otherwise a ban would be worthless if on the one hand Jimbo or now the ArbComm bans someone completely and then we say "we'll let you back again by letting you edit if you do good edits". When that was tried before it broke down because banned users sneaking back almost invariably returned to their old ways days, sometimes hours, after being allowed to edit. So bans are strictly policed. If they are banned for a period of time and come back during that time to do a secret edit the ban restarts from the start again. Even if say a month-long ban was imposed and the user came back one day early, under ArbCom rules the ban starts again and runs for one month from that edit. The particular gobshite trying to break the ban here has so far used 23 sockpuppets in less than 1 month of his 12 month ban. Every time his ban restarts. His edit today means that he is banned for one year from today, not from early August when the original ban started. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 02:36, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Actually, no. Edits by banned users may be reverted on sight but any user is allowed to reinstate them as long as they are willing to take responsibility for them. --fvw* 02:39, September 1, 2005 (UTC)

User:Jtdirl's attempted contribution

Jtdirl attempted to add:

Elizabeth of Bohemia

"A user unilaterally moved the page with raising it with anyone. An admin reinstated it and asked him to go through the usual channels in proposing the controversial naming. Instead he then went to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents to report her, against whom he had been making increasingly wild allegations for weeks, for supposedly abusing her powers in having restored the page to the least controversial location and having asked him to move propose its move the normal process everyone else uses."

another explanation: "The quarrel is somehow documented (unintentionally)..(at) thread: "User:Deb abused admin powers, by deleting a page without AfD" where imo Deb's "protectors" attempted to create some diversion imo to cover her wrongdoing. The "warring" was more of the sort to have a deleted page returned, finding some admin intervention to correct Deb's doings."

and: "an old disambiguation page.... Deb decided to delete it - according to Deletion log, by doing "21:12, 31 August 2005 Deb deleted "Elisabeth of Bohemia" (Deleted to make way for move)". No AfD. She obviously wanted to move another article to that placement, leading in that case also to POV (see current Talk:Elisabeth of Bohemia) endorsing a royal pretension from era of religious warring in Germany. I think Deb has sort of proprietary attitude to certain articles and names, including this one. I cannot remember all contents of the old page, and anyway its GDFL history should be preserved, so it is incorrect to write a new similar page which does not credit earlier contributors. Request the deleted page to be brought back."

It's a bit sad that you're having the lamest edit war ever on a page called lamest edit wars ever. If you have to do this, take it somewhere else. Please. Guanaco 02:17, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

We can now include a recursive-entry mentioning Elisabeth of Bohemia... yeah. Arrigo 02:54, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

updating this page

• Kyiv is now a redirect to Kiev. so, the sentence and in the end they won is now false ;D Alvaro

Oh.My.God

I didn't think it was possible. But I guess I was wrong... I thought wikipedia was all 'enthusiastic' and 'intelligent', but this page.... I honestly really don't see a need for it. 'Lamest edit wars ever'... more like 'Lamest page ever'

Uh, you OBVIOUSLY havn't seen the tasteless humor section on my userpage, LOL! Ryan Norton ^{T | @ | C} 09:08, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

List of numbers that are always odd

I know this has been asked before, but does anyone know where I can get some kind of record about the "list of numbers that are always odd" article? At very least the vfd? It sounds so hilarious I just have to have a look for myself. Borisblue 02:39, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

Unfortunately, it's too old. Very old pages cannot be undeleted, which makes things harder. Using Special:Whatlinkshere, I found Wikipedia:Protection log/Archive 1, which has some interesting lines:

• 04:27, 25 Feb 2004 Bcorr protected Wikipedia talk:Lamest edit wars ever
• 04:20, Feb 25, 2004 Silsor protected Wikipedia:Lamest edit wars ever
• 03:28, 25 Feb 2004 Fuzheado protected List of numbers that are always odd

which is probably the consequence of a lame edit war on this project page ☺.

Another link from Special:Whatlinkshere sent me to User:Anthony DiPierro/Everything else, where the target sits next to List of numbers/Deletion, which does not exist, but has a talk page, which leads me to Talk:List of numbers/Deletion/archive1, which might be related, and shows a bit of the surrounding issues (the way number articles should be wasn't already very defined at the time, it seems). On that page we see some copied VfD discussions; before the current system, the discussions were copied to the article's talk page (or a subpage) after they ended.

Trying to find the discussion on the VfD history, I ran into a loop: the earliest revision of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion (the page formerly at Wikipedia:Votes for deletion) is a redirect to Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Temp — which has always been a redirect, as far as the log shows. This confusion is easy to understand if you remember the whole page was later deleted and restored, which would restore some "junk revisions" from the history. A few revisions later, the real move is shown — the history is in fact at Wikipedia:Votes for deletion archive September 2004.

Tracing again through the move maze, I find Wikipedia:Votes for deletion archive May 2004. Here it is: the last revision with the VfD, the closing diff, and some related sillyness (found on the same VfD page). --cesarb 04:17, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

And, last but not least, I somehow managed to find a mirror which is so out-of-date that it still has a version of the article, how it was more than a year ago: List of numbers that are always odd. --cesarb 05:22, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

Úbeda/Ubeda

I wrote a pargraph on the edit war currently raging at Ubeda, trying to imitate the style of some other entries here. I'm not sure if it's just lame enough, though. It doesn't reach Gdańsk proportions yet. But the fight is lamer than that one in the sense that Gdańsk, at least, is a much better known city.

Úbeda/Ubeda : A six months long move/revert war with no end in sight on the most appropriate title in English Wikipedia for a Spanish geography stub. According to the article the town "is best known for its association with Antonio Muñoz Molina and Joaquín Sabina". Neither of those, it seems, is well known enough to have an article here yet. Is the fact that diacritics are sometimes omitted from capital letters in Spanish relevant? Or is the fact that the Spanish Royal Academy does not condone such usage? And how about the fact that the initial vote for moving the page took place during Semana Santa, "when half the Spanish-speaking population of the world is either in Church or at the beach"?

(Feel free to edit/rewrite mercilessly of course.)

Maybe some of the regulars here can check this out and measure the lameness. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 19:56, 18 October 2005 (UTC)

However, the debate between Danzig and Gdansk is hardly lame? It was a complicated topic with strong opinions, Consider the advanced solution at Talk:Gdańsk. // Fred-Chess 03:11, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Malaysia

Despite the mind-boggling length of the discussion in the talk page, I would like to note that there were no edit wars during the course of the debate. You can check the history of the article dated July 27, 2005 (pretty long ago, isn't it?).

Therefore I request that the entry for the article be removed. Thank you. Andylkl ^(talk) 10:23, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

Well, I think it deserves to keep its place on account of its extraordinary lameness, even though it never actually became an edit war. If cosensus is to remove, I'm fine with that. Borisblue 14:09, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the removal. :) I'm sorry to say this but I'm going to have to disappoint you for not stirring up any more lame edit wars or disputes in the near future. :P --Andylkl ^{(talk) (contrib)} 19:24, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

How long does an edit war need to go on to be included here?

I was debating an anon a few weeks ago about whether or not Criss Angel's real name and birthday should have been included in his article. It seems to fit right there as a lame edit war, but I'm not sure if it went on long enough (about 2 weeks and several cycles of reverts) to be included here. Any thoughts? --Idont Havaname 15:35, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

Definitely, especially if it's especially entertaining or enlightening. Deco 01:05, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

It's not so much time, as notoriety that is important. Has it been mentioned in the Signpost, has there been an l-o-n-g RFC filed, has it shown up at WP:AN or WP:AN/I, or has there been an RFAR that involves the edit war? ^BlankVerse 19:19, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Nomination: Jeremy Clarkson

I nominate Jeremy Clarkson to the list, due to the pointless bickering over whats exactly controversial about Clarkson, and what is nothing more than rantings of a blowhard madman. The listing inclusion as thus:

Define "Controversial."

Jeremy Clarkson and Talk:Jeremy_Clarkson

We all know Jeremy Clarkson of the BBC2 programme Top Gear speaks his mind out, much to the chagrin of others. But which actions of his are controversial and what are ones that are pointless rantings of a madman? And what exactly did Clarkson mean when he called Americans "barely have the brains to walk on their back legs."--Cantthinkofausername 12:54, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Having had a cursory look at the page, the edit war seems more about whether or not the NPOV tag should be in the Controversy section than whether his actions are controversial. Perhaps the write-up should be on the lines of:

"An ongoing edit war over whether or not a {{npov-section}} tag should be placed in the Controversy section. Is the section controversial, or is it Clarkson, or is it both? And does one matter more than the other? Repeated calls to specify exactly what is POV have gone unheeded, with one side going, "'tis!" and the other going, "'tisn't!" with equal vagueness. Meanwhile, the cleanup of the rest soldiers on..." --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 13:20, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Yours is better. --Cantthinkofausername 21:40, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Ha

I just have to say that this article was an excellent way to pass time. Much fun was had out of the redundance. Kaiser Matias 21:39 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Not sure if it is lame enough for this page YET but you might want to keep an eye on

Moldovan language almost everyone agrees as to the facts (that Romanian and Moldovan are for all pratical purposes the same language) but cannot agree at all about if it should be called its own language or not in the article. Personal and nationalistic attacks are not uncommon on the talk page and at least one RfC has been related to the dispute. The present discussion is largly happening under the heading What is the purpose of an encyclopedic article? Dalf | Talk 01:04, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

Seriously, why is this here?

Isn't articles like this the reason why we have Uncyclopedia?

No. No, it isn't. Uncyclopedia is a different kettle of fish entirely. One might stretch so far as to claim Encyclopaedia Dramatica as the perfect place for articles like this, but I think we're better off having it here. It's good to be able to laugh at ourselves at times. fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 23:05, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Joan of Arc

Can we please add the Joan of Arccontroversy over why she wore pants. It isn't over what she wore or what happened to her when she wore them. But what motivation did she have in wearing pants. In my opinion that is a VERY silly edit war. It is still ongoing on her talk page. Hdstubbs

While that debate has been over for a long time, it was actually substantive because it concerned the law that put her to death: that law recognized a few exceptions based on motivation. The matter also relates to modern arguments about whether she was gay or transsexual. Durova 16:59, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Holy crap I may have a new champion.

See Template:User aspie. Minor formatting issues, including font size changes between 10pt and 14pt and line breaks in code that's never even visible lead to accusations of vandalism. This has got to be the dumbest edit war ever. Night Gyr 12:10, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Looks like this edit war has been over for about a month. --causa sui ^talk 19:29, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Most of the edit wars on this page are much older, but that doesn't detract from their lameness. Indeed, the older ones have stood the test of time. :) Bryan 19:57, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Suggestion

With recent events in mind, I am beginning to think that we should consider Wikipedia:Lamest wheel wars ever. The Pedophilia userbox wheel war tops the list, IMO, but it wouldn't exactly be appropriate to include it here. --Blu Aardvark | ^{(talk) | (contribs)} 04:53, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Or if not, the war over userboxes in general clearly belongs here under Templates. I'd put it there now, but emotions are probably still too raw, and I'd be accused of insensitively fanning flames. Steve Summit (talk) 19:21, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Having stumbled into the article on Jalaladdin Rumi (no I can't spell it) I'm wondering if it's beginning to be a candidate for lame ethnic rivalry. As far as I can make out, he was born in a Persian-speaking part of the Muslim world, wrote in Persian, but travelled a lot and died in Anatolia (in modern Turkey), so some people seem to want him to be Turkish (or try to say he's 'Anatolian'). Well, Byron died in Greece and Shelley died in Italy... Myopic Bookworm 18:42, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Category:Hong Kong literature

Edit war over whether the category should be subcategorized under or merely linked to Category:Chinese literature. Resulted in repeated multiple reverts that led to violation of the three revert rule.

To label this type of dispute as 'lame' seems insensitive. An awful lot of people in Hong Kong don't want to be part of China. Hong Kong is constitutionally entitled to a high degree of autonomy. Only national defence and diplomatic relations are responsibilities of Beijing. The people of Hong Kong are fiercely independant. The Chinese are fiercely nationalistic. There's bound to be conflict. If Category:Hong Kong literature is subcategorized under Category:Chinese literature, that implies Hong Kong is merely an area of China trather than a country. To call this issue lame indicates that those who run this page lack empathy for it's Chinese & Hong Kong editors. Does labelling this lame have any positive impact on wikipedia? Veej 00:28, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I think edit wars are always lame regardless of what the conflict is. I really don't like seeing pages locked because an editor refuses to cooperate. I don't believe labeling the Wikipedia edit war is insensitive, just the conflict itself. - Hbdragon88 22:33, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Russian architecture

New candidate: the NPOV tag on Russian architecture first appeared in October, about 160 edits ago. Its presence and the precise wording of the explanation appear have dominated the edit history ever since, and things are working their way up to a crescendo. —Michael Z. 2006-03-31 00:34 Z

Is there anything that makes this edit war stand out as being particularly lame? Edit wars over NPOV tags happen all the time. --Carnildo 06:54, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Xeni Jardin

Xeni Jardin and Talk:Xeni Jardin: should xenisucks.com, a critical site, be included in external links? Edit warring, possible violations of 3RR, name-calling, etc. Discussion was messy. --Christopherlin 18:09, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

List of numbers ...

Just in case the sole remaining mirror disappears, I have copied the list of numbers that are always odd to a page in my user space. I'd also like to point out that Googling for "list of numbers that are always odd" gives a few interesting results in the form of mirrors of WP: space. Confusing Manifestation 14:21, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Example insulting article name

What about changing the example name in the speedy deletion page to Jeff K.?--69.196.212.30 18:53, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

use of "lame"

"People who would never use the ‘N’ word to refer to an African American think nothing of calling some one a ‘retard’ or ‘cripple.’ If one student trips, another is quick to laugh about the person being “a spaz,” perhaps not even aware of the derivation of the insult from “spastic” (a type of hypertonicity associated most often with cerebral palsy).

Someone who is not doing anything productive is said to be “vegging out” extending the association of “vegetable” and mental retardation. Even our everyday expressions and phrases are full of unexamined stereotypes about the capacities of people with various categories of disabilities: “blind leading the blind,” “falling on deaf ears,” “crippled by defeat,” “making a lame excuse.” How can we expect the full acceptance of children with disabilities into our classrooms if we allow such stereotypes in our thoughts and language to go unexamined?"

source: http://www.urbanschools.org/publications/on_point.html scroll down the right hand side to: On Infusing Disability Studies into the General Curriculum and search for "lame"

this is just one source on the topic of "lame" Skipper53 20:00, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

You do make a point. I suggest we can rename this article to Wikipedia:Unnecessary edit wars or something else that one may suggest. I can change the title immediately if no one objects. — CRAZY`(IN)`SANE 21:10, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

I object. Lame is a fine adjective and the reference to the "n" word is completely irrelevant. --Yath 21:43, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

I also object. All edit wars are "unnecessary." It's only the ones that are also lame that are funny. Bryan 06:54, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Political correctness rears its ugly head... --Carnildo 22:59, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

And here I always thought the term was referring to "a thin metal plate, especially one of the overlapping steel plates in medieval armor."[6] Bryan 06:54, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

LOL. This discussion reminds me of the bash.org April Fools 2004 where they deemed that "bash" was too violent and were going to rename it "funny-in-a-friendly-way.org" as a result. Hbdragon88 04:10, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

If "lame" really is considered as offensive to disabled people as "nigger" is to black people — and I couldn't say whether that's the case or not — then this page could be retitled "silliest edit wars ever". "Silly" is more apt than "unnecessary". TacoDeposit 16:50, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Near edit war

I nearly had an edit war with Kelisi concerning Helmuth Hübener's adoptive father. Luckily, I pointed out the evidence to Kelisi before one began. Starhood` 22:55, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

But Star, you later turned out to be a somewhat less than sincere contributor. I took your word for it that you had read about Hübener's father in a book, but then you went too far and wrote a ridiculous stub article about him, which I then speedied. I also undid all your edits as I had been given cause to view them with suspicion. Kelisi 01:37, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Vandal edit war

In case anyone doesn't know, a vandal started an edit war on Cornelius Vanderbilt. People afterwards were arguing over whether Cornelius was nicknamed "The Ass" or not. The edit war was partially my fault because I missed that vandalism from the vandal. Luckily, a good contributor without a user name put in a comment that stopped the edit war. Starhood` 14:48, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

I missed it when looking @ the history of that page. About when was the vandalism? 68.39.174.238 02:46, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

The Vandalism was made by 67.1.85.14 on January 18, 2006 at 17:44 (UTC). Starhood` 14:54, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Dizzying

This page is, to say the least, "Dizzying". Makes me wonder whether "i is the square root of negative unity" or "i am the square root of negative unity". -Ambuj Saxena (talk) 16:32, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Wii

Two parallel edit wars have taken place over the article Wii, over both whether it is the "Wii" or the "Nintendo Wii", and whether references should be made to urine. Should either of these go in and where (under names, misc or both)?

Sounds pretty appropriate to me. I'd say put it under names, and a note on the parallel urine-related edit war to the entry there. --Jfruh 18:20, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Anarchy Rules

Have a look at the Anarchism discussion page. I'm unable to definitively categorise it as lame, given that not a single sentence of it makes any sense to this humble reader, but it does run to thousands of impressively vitriolic lines. Far Canal 08:29, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Suggestion: provide links to the actual edit war

Linking to the subject only isn't very helpful - the edit war could have been thousands of diffs ago. Could we try and provide links to the rough start and end of the edit war, or edit wars? Stevage 17:28, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree. I know that the software can list certain blocks of dates - I use Kate's editcounter to see the edits I made on a month-by-month basis. But I don't know how the damned system works so I can't actually block off certain dates for some of these edit wars. Hbdragon88 05:12, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Second opinion please...

Talk:2006_Atlantic_hurricane_season/Archive_1#Zeta_and_the_Timeline, Talk:2006_Atlantic_hurricane_season/Archive_3#Zeta_revisited, Talk:2006_Atlantic_hurricane_season/Archive_4#Zeta_and_Timeline, Talk:2006_Atlantic_hurricane_season#Vote_to_delete_Hurricane_Zeta and most of the talk page below that... A recurring argument over whether or not Tropical Storm Zeta, which formed in late December 2005 and dissipated Jan 6th 2006, should even be included on the 2006 Atlantic hurricane season page. "As it formed in 2005, is it actually part of the 2006 hurricane season? As it lasted into 2006, and spanned both years (only the second time this has ever happened) does it deserve a mention on both anyway?" Regardless of the outcome, it is quite minor really and has been on and off for over 6 months now. Quite lame... - JVG 09:31, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree that's a lame one, its mainly only a talk page argument but it has had some edit warring in the article. However it is a massive talk page argument, bad enough it got its own archive.--Nilfanion (talk) 19:23, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Rory Gallagher

This sequence of edits over at Rory Gallagher made me laugh, and there is no sign of it ending. Gimmetrow 13:56, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Skanderbeg

I don't know about the rest of you but I like the first archive of Skanderbeg's talk page... 69.17.67.11 14:48, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Organization

Currently the organization of the entries is very messy, anyone have a better idea for the categorizations? 68.39.174.238 01:28, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Is there a template for this category?

Is there a template for this category? If not, I will create one for all of the articles' talk pages. Travb (talk) 23:03, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

No, there isn't, and for good reason - it isn't comprehensive, and the criteria seems rather subjective. It's also more of a warning than an actual attempt to document edit wars with lame causes. I think this would encourage more people to try to edit war to get their entries up into this list. Better to keep it as low-key as possible. Hbdragon88 08:07, 11 August 2006 (UTC)