Comprehensive coverage of the SlimVirgin scandal
Wikipedia Review has the most comprehensive up to date coverage of the SlimVirgin scandal anywhere on the web. If we’re missing anything, please let us know! This is really long, with just a handful of comments, and is primarily web links that prove to the reader what is really going on. Judge for yourself.
Proof that Linda Mack and SlimVirgin are the same person
Link: [Wikipedia Review: Hey Linda, you forgot about Archive.org!] by Daniel Brandt
Notice how a mouseover on the mailbox reveals the email address in the status bar.
Try it yourself while it lasts. Here’s the URL again (be patient, it might be slow):
Wikipedia founder Jimbo Wales admits that Pan Am Flight 103 (Lockerbie bombing) article edits made by SlimVirgin were oversighted
Wikipedia Review proof that it was oversighted by Jayjg
- ["All evidence of SV's prior edits about Pan Am and her nasty views about terrorist have been deleted. Each one of these deletes are the same ones I used and posted here...... All done by her fuck buddy Jayjg. Can we say GFDL violation?"] (7 June 2006, in a members-only forum, you must register at http://wikipediareview.com/ to view)
Media
- [OhMy News] (26 July 2007)
- [Slashdot] (27 July 2007)
- [Reddit] (27 July 2007)
- [Digg] (28 July 2007)
- [Wikipedia Signpost] (30 July 2007) (very brief mention - doesn’t say who the Wikipedia administrator is)
Reaction on Wikipedia
- [User Kylu informed SlimVirgin] [before it was sneakily deleted by Jayjg] (Comments made by Kylu [1][2] [3] [4] [5] [as documented in Wikipedia Review] [have been deleted])
- [User Hexrei asks a question] [before it is deleted] [and the user is blocked for 24 hours] (27 July 2007)
- [Anon IP asks a question] [which is deleted] [and the IP address blocked for 1 week] (27 July 2007)
- [Administrator ST47 asks the same question] [which is also reverted] [then he brings it up to the Administrator's noticeboard] [before that too is deleted]
- [Sceptre also asked about it] [but this was deleted] [and he wrote on the Admin noticeboard too]
- [Administrator Crum375, who had performed the deletions, complained to fellow admin ST47] [who then defended himself] [before Crum375 tried to pull rank] [and ST47 replied that that's not on]
- [Crum375 deleted all but 16/85 revisions of SlimVirgin's talk page from history] (11 & 19 June 2007) which in the wake of the scandal led to comments [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] From [NathanLee], [Android Mouse], [MONGO] and [ElinorD] [before the whole thing was "archived" by SlimVirgin] ([yet does not appear anywhere in her archives])
- Linas made [a post to the Wikipedia Signpost Newsroom] about the SlimVirgin story, which Enoclau [responded to] before [Ral315 suggested that they downplay it], and [Enoclau suggested that because it involved Daniel Brandt then it was not noteworthy] before [Sr13 removed the whole thing]. Linas [nonetheless posted it again (with more links)] and [it eventually ended up in the signpost for 30 July 2007].
- Linas also [commented in WikiProject Mathematics], which [Pmaedran], [KSmrq], [Oleg Alexandrov], [KSmrq (again)] and [Iamunknown] replied to. [Arcfrk suggested that anywhere else it would get oversighted], with more comments by [David Eppstein] and [Iamunknown] [before the whole discussion was deleted by ElinorD], only to [be restored by Jitse Nelson], who [commented to explain himself]. This argument was [agreed to by Paul August], [Iamunknown] and [Oleg Alexandrov] before [KSmrq suggested getting rid of it] with [more comments from Paul August], and [a reply from the original poster Linas], with [another comment by Oleg Alexandrov], before [a final summation was made by KSmrq to explain the whole thing to everyone].
- [Linas wrote to Crum375 to ask why he had protected SlimVirgin's page], [with an addendum] before [Crum375 deleted it with the title "wrong"]. [Linas then requested for Hexrei to be unblocked] [which Andrevan responded to by unblocking]
- [Android Mouse had also tried to ask Crum375 why he was censoring SlimVirgin's talk pages], and in response [Crum375 deleted (censored) Android Mouse's question about censorship!]
- [ElinorD threatened to block Linas] [who responded on her talk page about it] [and directly below ElinorD's threat]
- [SallyForth123 wrote to SlimVirgin in a humorous James Bond tone] [which was deleted by Crum375] which led to [ElinorD asking her to e-mail SlimVirgin instead] and [Crum375 threatening to ban her over it]. After [SallyForth123 tried to argue that it was old news], [ElinorD sneakily deleted it and replaced it with a "final warning"], which led to [SallyForth123 making an odd response], and the matter was ended.
- [Pedant asked SlimVirgin the same question everyone else had], which, the same as for everyone else, [was promptly deleted] without being answered, which led to [a warning from John] and [advice from ElinorD], somewhat less severe than their reaction to others…
- [Anon IP asked SlimVirgin why she is deleting and archiving so much in addition to asking about the story] [which was deleted] [before the Anon IP re-added the info] [which was deleted a second time] [before being restored by a different user] [before being deleted (unread) a third time] [before being re-added by the Anon IP a 4th time] [before being deleted again] [who then protected the user page for a week] [writing a message to say why] [which led to an apology from the non Anon IP who had restored it]
- As a result of this, N, who had first deleted the Anon IP’s message, [wrote him a warning on his talk page] [which led to him responding to N] [who then deleted the message on his talk page too] [which led to a comment from another user that N was wrong to delete it] [and another comment from the Anon IP to N] [and a comment by Iamunknown that he was being discussed on the admin noticeboard]
- The Anon IP [received another warning from a different user] [as well as a 3rd warning from N] [and a 4th warning from N] [and a response from the Anon IP that it was inappropriate to threaten him]
- The Anon IP [posted a message on the Admin noticeboard talk page asking why N was behaving like this] [which was posted to the Admin noticeboard by Kurykh] [which led to a comment that N was not an admin, and is allowed to ignore someone] [and an explanation from he Anon IP that he was a newbie] [which led to an attack by User Mr Z-Man], [mocking by Chairboy] and [PsychoSamurai agreed with the AnonIP], [with a comment by J Smith] before [Crum375 announced that he would block the AnonIP]
- Because he had restored the Anon IP’s comment, [Videmus Omnia was warned by AnonEMouse] [who apologised], and [a comment from SlimVirgin herself]
- John, who had protected SlimVirgin’s page, also [received a thank you from SlimVirgin].
- As a result of the post to the Admin noticeboard, Crum375 [blocked the AnonIP for 3 days] and PsychoSamurai who had supported him was [blocked for 1 week by Persian Poet Gal]
SlimVirgin’s Editing since the scandal broke
Ordinarily SlimVirgin is an extremely regular editor of Wikipedia, editing for on average 10-15 hours per day, as many as 200 edits per day, one of the most prolific editors on Wikipedia. Since the story broke, however, there have been times when SlimVirgin has not edited very much.
- SlimVirgin’s last edit before the story broke was at [10:21am on 26 July 2007, archiving her own user page], which for the past 2 months have simply been deleted.
- Her next edit was 18 hours later, at [06:09 on 27 July 2007, a minor article edit]. This suggests that SlimVirgin may have been waiting to see how people would react to the story, and whether she would need to leave Wikipedia, or hide a lot of things.
- About this time, the Slashdot story broke. The result of this is that from 07:12 on 28 July 2007 to 06:58 on 29 July 2007, a period of basically 23 hours 46 minutes, SlimVirgin did not edit Wikipedia.
- At 06:58 on 29 July 2007, SlimVirgin ended her absence with [a vote of support on a Request for adminship]. This was the only edit in this session.
- For 13 hours more SlimVirgin did not edit (In the 37 hours since the Slashdot story broke, SlimVirgin made only 1 edit). Then at 19:59 on 29 July 2007, [SlimVirgin made a minor comment in Wikipedia:Verifiability].
Other than that SlimVirgin has edited relatively regularly.
Reaction on Wikipedia mailing list
On Friday July 27 2007 at 21:26:10 (UTC) SPUI [wrote to the Wikipedia mailing list informing them that SlimVirgin had been mentioned by Slashdot]. This generated [over 80 different responses in the last 4 days of July] and [over 200 different responses in the first 3 days of August].
Some of the more notable responses include:
- ["It's only outing if it's true, and apparently it isn't."]
- ["Do we have an article on Pierre Salinger syndrome yet? The term certainly has enough references in print."]
- ["It says things were permanently removed from the database (sounds like oversight, which I don't think SlimVirgin has), when the article says nothing of the sort, it just says its been 'surpressed' (reverted and protected as far as I can tell - since unprotected)."] (note that [WR evidence] demonstrates that Jayjg oversighted the edits, on request from SlimVirgin)
- ["Something was removed in early June 2006."]
- ["…I think a more likely explanation is that the regular deleting happened first, and the oversight came later."]
- ["Those deleted revisions I can see, and they are discussions regarding personal information that was published on Wikipedia Review. I see nothing untoward about them being deleted."]
- ["I actually suspected that oversight was a brand new feature based on the logs. But I'm through speculating for now."]
- ["I went and found the old Signpost where it was reported. The feature (Oversight) was first used near the end of that May - about a week before the deletions took place."] (proving that it could easily have been oversight)
- ["I counted the number of viewable revisions prior to 19:50, 3 June 2006. There are 1,109, which is equal to the number restored by Musical Linguist. If 'Musical Linguist deleted the article and restored all but one revision (or possibly a handful) to remove personal information (I'm guessing that's what PI stands for), and then the next day Jayjg restored that revision(s) too', then the number of revisions would be greater than 1,109. So it appears something *was* oversighted."] (proof that it was oversighted)
- ["I agree, that's definitely something." "Might be easiest just to ask an oversighter to check the logs…"]
- ["If one looks on Wikipedia Review, there is a thread there around the time the oversight took place. As it turns out the oversight logs were made public in the early days of oversight, and 'Lir' noticed the oversight of revisions from the Pan Am 103 article and posted a link to them (on June 7th)."] (referring to [this post])
- ["Yes, information has been oversighted to protect the personal identities of many people, both Wikipedia editors and members of the general public. The reasons include inadvertantly revealing personal information as well as the deliberate posting by trolls of personal information. This is policy and will continue to be policy."] (Jimbo Wales)
- ["…while that's a great reason not to take the Ludwig De Braeckeleer article at face value, it's also a great reason not to take your comment that there are massive factual errors in the article at face value."]
- ["From his take on the Lockerbie situation in 1, I think it's safe to say that a) he has a minority view, and b) he's not got the NPOV thing quite down."]
- ["Then why has Slim's entire clique always been so desperate to suppress all mention of it? This seems to have been a primary motive of the whole idiotic 'attack site link' policy, for instance."]
- ["Ironically, it's the suppression of all mention of it which is the only reason I started paying attention to it in the first place."]
- ["One way of dealing with the various outings of SV would be for everyone to go to his favorite blog site to out her as well. Naturally, each person that does this would 'out' her as a different person. With enough of these out there, who could possibly know which is the correct identification. :-)"]
- ["It occurs to me that if one is concerned about remaining anonymous on Wikipedia, the best way to encourage that is, if someone thinks they've identified you but is in fact wrong, to protest that identification very strongly, to appear to be really concerned about it and try to get it suppressed. That way, everyone will follow the red herring and not look any further."]
- ["I am not talking about including this in articles. I am talking about people removing any mention of this from talk pages, not just the link to the attack site, nothing, nothing at all containing the words 'SlimVirgin' and 'news' is allowed to stand."]
- ["A single, simple statement on Slim's user or talk page, saying that the rumor is false, would be much better than all this rampant reverting by ElinorD, Jayjg, and Crum375."]
- ["I would rather that they heard about these ridiculous allegations from Wikipedians on Wikipedia, rather than on some other website because self-righteous Wikipedians decide any mention whatsoever of the claims is ridiculous."]
- ["The only reason for hiding the truth is the fear that it might be damaging." "Had we not concealed, this discussion–which is now permanently recorded– also would not have occurred. So the net result is that we have multiplied the effectiveness of the Slashdot story."]
- ["Rather than discuss the merits of this particular 'outing', I think it would be more productive to discuss ways of encouraging people to edit under their own names rather than anonymously."]
- ["I'd rather there wasn't an 'attack sites' policy, but if there is one, it needs to be applied consistently, rather than just against sites that certain admins happen to dislike."]
- ["…for the current issue at least, there is a de facto ban on links to Slashdot. All sorts of random editors, at least some of them presumably innocent and well-meaning, are asking questions about the Slashdot story, and those questions are being methodically removed without a trace."]
- ["But one has to ask just how long Slim should be enabled by her friends to take her her 'damsel in distress' position, where her tender, delicate sensibilities are being cruelly assaulted by all those evil trolls and attackers."]
- ["I went and looked at the Slashdot discussion. It's not about the kooky accusations, but about significant issues. Our users would find the discussion interesting and it would help if they weighed in. I think we are shooting ourselves in the foot removing links to the Slashdot page. It's certainly an initiation into the kind of nonsense we've been dealing with privately for the last two years. Time everybody got baptized."]
- ["I, like many others I guess, am admittedly envious of that Aston Martin full of neat little gadgets which a position with the secret service affords, but SlimVirgin doesn't constantly rub it in my face, so I'm willing to forgive her for that."]
- ["Please leave. All of you. The project is more important than your pride, and you are dragging it down; this situation is never going to improve unless someone walks away."]
- ["Wait a minute, so 3 different editors removed a total of 8 questions. Out of curiosity, exactly how many did I remove during that "rampant reverting"? No need to reply, the answer is one."] (Jayjg trying to suggest that he is the victim here)
- ["This incessant cacophony of personal drama is drowning out useful conversations actually relevant to the building of the project. It is causing stress and emotional pain for many of us. It's completely unnecessary, and is within your power to stop."]
- ["It's actions like this that make Wikipedia Review a better news source about what is happening at Wikipedia than Wikipedia itself. It's very useful too that they link liberally to Wikipedia, so you can get both sides of the story just by following WR alone."]
- ["Go and read some of the conspiracy stuff at WR; Jimbo's use of the term "lunatics" is not an exaggeration! Is that really who you want deciding what goes on at WP?"]
- ["If someone asks 'hey, this link 1 says you're a secret agent who blew up Locherbie, what's with that?' Just give a plain answer explaining how the article's written by a loonie with an axe to grind. Dollars to donuts most people will go 'oh, okay' and move on. Using all this mysterious 'Oversight' and 'Attack Sites' stuff to wipe the question from existence only makes things worse."]
- ["And characterising it as 'appeasement' just further polarises the situation. The fact that someone we don't like would be pleased (or smug, perhaps more accurately) does not stop the fact that the project would be better off for it."]
- ["I'll second everything Bryan says. I don't agree that Jay, ElinorD, et al, ought to take a wikibreak, but we do need to take a step back and chill out. These accusations are ridiculous, but are we responding to them appropriately?"]
- ["What would make the most sense is if Sarah just switched to a new account. Her hope for remaining pseudonymous using User:SlimVirgin is quickly dwindling to nil, and the vain attempts to change this situation are doing nothing but cause problems for the project."]
- ["Where do you think all this drama is coming from in the first place? The lunatics at WR have been trying to get wider attention for their conspiracy theories for several years. So you're unwittingly playing into their hands, and in fact, your 'please leave' message is already reproduced at WR as the start of a new discussion thread."] (this guy is clearly hoping to get in to the cabal)
- ["I don't see any good coming from giving into trolls and stalkers. The fact that a bunch of disgruntled, mostly banned ex-Wikipedians like to spin conspiracy theories, and occasionally disrupt Wikipedia, should simply be ignored. Not discussed on Wikipedia, not discussed here, just ignored."]
- ["User:SlimVirgin is outed. That's the reality of the situation. You can call the people anything you want, but calling people names doesn't change reality."]
- ["I note this thread began because a debate about Slim's identity, and the massive efforts gone to to conceal edits associated with her, was on the front page of Slashdot. (Slashdot. Not Wikipedia Review, or Encyclopedia Dramatica, or anyone else; Slashdot, perhaps a classic example of our "natural supporters".)"]
- ["Wikipedia Review is not monolithic, of course, any more than Wikipedia is — you're making the same mistakes that people made about Wikipedia for years. Some people on WR are completely insane; others are just deeply misguided and paranoid; a few are rather sensible. There is no cabal."]
- ["If they are sensible, then why are they on Wikipedia Review? While the sensible are not responsible for the insane and paranoid, if they willingly choose to participate in a forum where the insane and paranoid plot their attacks, what does that say about how sensible they supposedly are? Wikipedia blocks its trolls, and if WR's defenders (and by defenders I mean both WR-ites and people who say 'eh, they have some good people in the mess' or 'they come up with the intelligent critique now and then') want people to take it seriously and not view it as an insane attack site, then WR should do the same."]
- ["You see, the WR people have come after us before, and they will come after us into the foreseeable future. With a few notable exceptions (like their driving Katefan0 off the project, or calling the cops on Phil Sandifer), we do ignore the mountains of crap they generate; we only respond when clear lines of behavior have been crossed. We didn't start eradicating links or redacting mentions on behalf of any of those editors; were they somehow less worthy of protection? No, what is different about this mess is the inability of certain participants in the fracas to leave well enough alone."]
- ["Jay, the 'who, me?' attitude you are taking is getting tiresome. Do you really not realize the damage you have done to your own reputation, and the project's?"]
- ["The person who Sarah is claimed to be is actually notable (has been written about in a number of books), so if we're sure the allegations are all nonsense then maybe Wikipedia should have an article on that other person"]
- ["I am truly depressed by the lack of support SlimVirgin is receiving from certain individuals on this list, but at the same time, not surprised. Victim-blaming has a long and horrific history. When it happens to rape victims, it is called 'the second rape' to victims of assault, 'the second assault' or, to cover all situations, victim-blaming or secondary victimisation."] (posted by Jayjg, because the person themselves couldn’t post)
- ["If you recall, we were talking about how people on-wiki were trying to completely eradicate questions about the allegations - questions from people acting in good faith. Believe it or not, not everyone on Wikipedia knows who SV is or her storied past of abuse by WR, Brandt, et al, and there is no reason to assume everyone asking about this is a bad faith shit-stirrer trying to rile us/her up."]
- ["If I knew nothing about SV and her Wikipedia history, I would at least expect my n00b question of 'SV, what's this on about you supposedly being some sort of spy?' or my n00b statement of fact like 'SV, there's this silly thing on about you being a secret agent' to be responded to civilly, with at least a brief explanation, rather than having them being removed from the talk page without a trace, and people going around asking for revisions with my question to be oversighted."]
- ["If Wikipedia Review started alleging you were a pedophile, do you imagine you respond civilly to questions of 'John, what's all this about you being a pedophile'?"]
- ["Well, I would certainly laugh it off as the usual bullshit stunts these people pull. I would not demand that we salt the earth as if nobody ever made such allegations."]
- ["BTW, first there was a comparison to appeasing the Nazis, now we've got a comparison to rape. This is a bit over the top, IMO."]
- ["Maybe they're there to find a forum where they can speak their mind without being labeled a 'troll' for it? Maybe the absence of the cliques and taboos of Wikipedia are sometimes considered to be a positive thing even by people not sharing the ideologies of the nutters in that site?"]
- ["This is an absolutely appalling and inappropriate analogy that is incredibly insensitive to actual victims of rape." "As a man I'm embarrassed and ashamed that someone would trivialize rape in this manner."]
- ["Please stop this; it is just petty. You are the only person who seems to not understand what I mean when I mention your involvement and discuss the SlimVirgin backstory, etc, as an ongoing drama. Perhaps you cannot see the wood for the trees?"] (to Jayjg)
- ["Dang. I knew the 'blaming the victim' card was going to be played soon enough, but I didn't imagine we'd be getting rape analogies already."]
- ["…and this is talking about an email which directly compared my comments to being a wilful apologist for rape. It is six o'clock in the morning. I first recieved a copy of that charming email at two. I have been unable to sleep because of it. It is monstrously insulting, it is at best tangential, and it is completely inappropriate."]
- ["Repeatedly telling people they should leave Wikipedia because stalkers and crazies are saying nasty things about them cannot help but be confrontational, no matter how many times you put the word 'Please' before 'leave'."] (from Jayjg)
- ["You're seriously being an asshole with your offensive comparison. ArmedBlowfish's 'rape' analogy is trolling, pure and simple and Jay should stop posting this troll's comments immediately."]
- ["Continuing his behavior after he's been told that how and why his actions are offensive is trollsome. The analogy is deeply offensive and for Jay and AB to continue after this has been made clear is unfathomable."]
- ["The stalkers and crazies are saying mean things about person A. Person or Persons B makes the situation, likely without meaning to, many times worse. It is reasonable, in this case, to ask Person or Persons B to leave. Therefore, I, and others, are asking you, Jay, to leave."] (asking Jayjg to leave)
- ["John, with respect, you don't know the facts. I did not ask for any discussion about this to be oversighted, either directly or indirectly. I'm aware of one request that was made to oversight something (I believe a link or a name, but I don't recall exactly) made in good faith, but not made to David Gerard, and not made by any of the editors you and others have named on this list. I learned about it after the fact, not before. If there were other requests, I don't know about them."] (by SlimVirgin)
- ["I should point out, for accuracy, that it appears that SlimVirgin didn't actually request any of this. It appears it was spontaneously decided on by others."] (yet she’s not complaining, is she? Nor have they stopped…)
- ["All I can do is make a request to you, which of course you're free to ignore, and it's that you refrain from saying anything else that might hurt somebody, whether it's me or any of the other editors you're accusing"] (by SlimVirgin)
- ["Can you specify what you think Jay has done to make the situation worse?"] (Jimbo Wales, clueless)
- ["As I read Armedblowfish's post (from memory), he compared this situation to rape, violence, OR harassment, and his point was one about people being attacked for being attacked. It would make more sense to take that point, rather than focusing on a provocative word."] (SlimVirgin, defending Armed Blowfish who everyone else thought was a troll)
- ["That is not to equate what happened to me, or to SlimVirgin with rape. It's just to note that both are traumatic events that involve one's privacy and life being violated. Theories that explain one have a place in explaining the other."] (Phil Sandifer, who last year had campus police contact him in relation to [a blog entry that he wrote where he said that he was going to murder people.] As it so happened that school had had 10 unsolved murders the year before. Phil Sandifer [ claimed that it was police harassment] and stalking and [that Wikipedia Review were responsible] because [Orthagonal], someone who he had banned from Wikipedia just a week beforehand, [had posted his murderous blog entry in Wikipedia Review] just a week before. Phil Sandifer, by the way, insists that the blog entry was pure fiction, even though he hadn’t said so at the time)
- ["This thread is stunning! It presents to a number of profound problems at the very core of the Project - all involving it's people. Is it going to be taken seriously by the leadership? Or, as one person stated, he was waiting for the thread to burn itself out, so he could focus on other threads!"]
- ["Huh? I've consistently 'advocated' the 'practice' of removing stuff from SV's talk page? Where have I done this? And you think I should leave Wikipedia because you disagree with opinions that you apparently have invented for me?"] (Jayjg takes playing dumb to the extreme)
- ["SV, quite frankly, you were sloppy and made mistakes. You used a pseudonym that could be linked to you in real life. You edited articles that you were connected to in real life in an obvious way. You left a trail. Yes, it's too bad you were outed but it's not rape and it's not violence. People shouldn't be saying that it is and you shouldn't be encouraging them."]
- ["We have all established: - SlimVirgin's handling could have been better/worse/should be oversighted/should not have been oversighted/we need to hire ninjas to settle this/her MI6 handler is ready to wage a nuclear war James Bond style. - Jayjg's time here has come to a close and he should give it up or go into hiding."]
- ["Sarah, I honestly think it's in your own best interests to close the SV account and start again. Choose a new name that isn't connected with your real life identity in anyway. Stay away from a few tell-tale topics. You might even want to have an alternate account so you can "segregate" eg use one account of animal rights type work, another for your other interests, in order to lessen the chances that your enemies will detect you."]
- ["As for limiting the damage: what people have been trying to tell you -- and what some people just don't seem to get -- is that the measures being taken *aren't* limiting the damage. For one, the outing itself is already done; the worms can't be stuffed back into the can. Beyond that, though, the people whose questions are being silenced are *not* the ones you need to be defending against. The people who would harass SlimVirgin over this are not watching her talk page for news about this; they have rather more effective methods of finding such things out. The people who *are* asking, on the other hand, aren't doing so out of malice, and lashing out against them accomplishes nothing useful."] (It’s always amusing when Wikipedia Review has an open forum, yet people on Wikipedia refuse to join it or to comment about it there, and continue to bash people who have nothing to do with it. Perhaps they like to give us more members?)
- ["One of the few amusing things about all this is that even though I've explicitly disclaimed interest in SlimVirgin's actual identity and the various ridiculous allegations that came out along with it, I've had no less that two respected editors send me unsolicited private emails in the course of this debate that provided all the gory details. Both ofthem are on the "keep it quiet" side to varying degrees."] (Interesting. Care to tell us?)
- ["Let's get serious. Slim Virgin has not been outed. A loony has tried pushing some kind of conspiracy theory and for some bizarre reason he's got a lot of otherwise sensible people trying their best to outdo the loony."]
- ["Here's one (message redacted by me) who was. Quick Questions Hello. Is your name now or has it ever been ________? Are you living in ________ under the name of ________? Have ypu even been employed by a government intelligence agency? Just wondering. Kisses!
~~~~"] (Silly ElinorD, its still in history (you forgot to oversight it!) - and we have already quoted it correctly [here]) - ["I am also wondering why it's fine to discuss potential outings on the list, but not on SV's talk page. Since both are public fora, if we delete good faith discussions from SV's page, should the list mods now be placing whoever originally brought up this topic on moderation?"] (that’d be SPUI)
- ["Stalking to the point of revealing someone's personal information to the world, making them vulnerable to further stalking goes beyond mere trolling."] (from Armed Blowfish, the guy with the rape analogy that everyone hated. Do you even have any idea what kind of pain stalking can give? For SlimVirgin or Snowspinner to even suggest this is related to stalking is horrendous.)
- ["Yes, AB. And stalkers, abusers, and harassers don't survive very long in an environment where the noise they are making doesn't get the reaction they need to thrive."]
- ["If we've come to the conclusion that Jayjg's time here has come to a close and that his continued presence harms wikipedia's reputation perhaps a community ban would be in order?"]
- ["But what happens when Slim and her friends, acting in "solidarity" as encouraged by that ruling, become persecutors themselves, ganging up on people who are critical of or opposed to them, or otherwise are perceived as "enemies"?"]
- ["For your information, in my position as an Adoptive Father, allegations of pedophilia would be much more worrying to me than anything to do with being some sort of Secret Agent, but happily I am comfortable that neither is true (although some of that stuff Q makes would be kewl)."]
Wikipedia relevant links
- [Deletion log for Pan Am Flight 103] (Lockerbie bombing article) {web citation}
- [2005 version of Pierre Salinger] (with SlimVirgin and SlimV as contributors)
- [Deletion log for Pierre Salinger] (person who worked with Linda Mack)
- [Deletion log for User:SlimVirgin] (user page)
- [Deleting log for User talk:SlimVirgin] (user talk page) {web citation}
- [Pre-deleted version of User:SlimV]
- [Deletion log for User:SlimV] (SlimVirgin’s former username) {web citation}
- [Pre-deleted version of User talk:SlimV]
- [Deletion log for User talk:SlimV]
- [SlimV's addition to Mordechai Vanunu] (as discussed on Wikipedia Review)
Wikipedia Review research prior to breaking news
Note: Some of these links may be in members-only forums, and you may need to register at WikipediaReview.com to view them.
- [SlimVirgin Redux] (15 March 2006)
- [SlimVirgin explains No Original Research] (15 April 2006)
- [Stop me if you've heard this - Wikipedia and the CIA] (23 April 2006)
- [The SlimVirgin thread] (12 May 2006)
- [SlimVirgin's lost edits] (6 June 2006)
- [SlimVirgin's Email to Me] (8 June 2006)
- [SlimVirgin editing, publicity stunt ended] (8 June 2006)
- [SlimVirgin: Agent of Influence?] (25 June 2006)
- [What is she afraid of????] (26 July 2006)
- [Kelly Martin vs. SlimVirgin] (23 September 2006)
- [A SlimVirgin Encounter] (26 September 2006)
- [A new SlimVirgin smoking gun] (4 October 2006)
- [SlimVirgin and "archiving"] (24 November 2006)
- [My email to SlimVirgin] (25 December 2006)
- [A picture of SlimVirgin] (4 March 2007)
- [Desperately seeking SlimVirgin] (27 May 2007)
- [My latest suspicions about SlimVirgin] (27 May 2007)
- [SlimVirgin - the smoking gun] (27 May 2007)
- [When does SlimVirgin sleep?] (21 June 2007)
- [Interesting SlimVirgin Trick] (30 June 2007)
Wikipedia Review reaction
- [Wikipedia Review in the news] (26 July 2007)
- [Wikipedia Review blog post] (27 July 2007)
- [SlimVirgin gets slashdotted] (28 July 2007)
- [SlimVirgin's missing edits] (30 July 2007)
- [I Solemnly Swear: Book with a lot of Info on Linda Mack, DEA Agent gets slimed, and Linda Mack plays a hand?] (30 July 2007)
- [Is SlimVirgin's middle name Elena?] (30 July 2007)
- [Linda helped suppress info on PanAm 103, Former journalists don't do this sort of thing] (31 July 2007)
- [SlimVirgin in black] (1 August 2007)
- [Hey Linda, you forgot about Archive.org!, Busted for the umpteenth time] (1 August 2007)
- [Andrew Gray: Leave, all of you] (1 August 2007)
- [What we know about SlimVirgin - A quickie summary] (1 August 2007)
- [Is she "notable" yet?] (1 August 2007)
Other relevant web pages
- [Wikipedia and the CIA; Fake Wikipedia Biography of Patricia Cornwell] (15 April 2006, similar issue)
- [Chip Berlet, SlimVirgin, and Wikipedia] (date unknown)
- [A Peek into the mind of Wikipedia's SlimVirgin] (27 September 2006, by AntiSocialMedia)
- [Investigating a Wikipedia administrator, She's might be someone's agent of influence] ( 17 October 2006, by Daniel Brandt on The Education Forum)
- [Encyclopedia Dramatica's article on SlimVirgin] (First created 3 July 2007, updated constantly, includes info on current scandal)
- [Wikitruth article on SlimVirgin] (13 July 2007, does not include any info on current scandal)
- [Another Wikipedia Troll Caught Editing Quotes To Smear 9/11 Truth] (28 July 2007, similar issue)
- [AntiSocialMedia wiki article on SlimVirgin - highlights oversighting] (Created 29 July 2007)
- [Much Furor about SlimVirgin] (30 July 2007, by former administrator, arbitrator and CheckUser Kelly Martin)
- [How to stop the drama] (1 August 2007, by Kelly Martin)
- [Wikipedia to Jayjg: Please leave] (1 August 2007, by Kelly Martin)
The list might look a bit better with proper bulleted lists (<ul>), just an idea.
Nathan
2 Aug 07 at 6:52 pm
There is an option to do that, but then it irritatingly makes you type in each entry one at a time and won’t go away until you’ve entered them all. Or I could do it by hand which is also really annoying. As it stands, its ready to go in to a Wikipedia article with a simple copy and paste (with credit attributed, of course). Or if someone wants to go through and fix it up then they can. It took me so ridiculously long to do all of this…
blissyu2
2 Aug 07 at 7:44 pm
If you view my blog post, you can copy the HTML from that - should save you some time.
And Linda Mack Schloff is not Linda Mack.
Nathan
2 Aug 07 at 10:40 pm
Okay I did that. Thanks for that. Note that I’ve updated this post with more links since yours, so I had to re (ul)/(li) those links. Thanks just the same. It does look prettier, you are right.
blissyu2
3 Aug 07 at 2:33 am
Could someone set Kato straight about the Zionist bias here? I’d do it myself, but that (expletive deleted) Selina banned me for suggesting that Jayjg might be paid to promote Israel on Wikipedia.
Dillinger
3 Aug 07 at 1:46 pm
This blog post doesn’t mention Zionist bias. I think that alleging bias is one thing, stating it is fact is another. Are you banned from Wikipedia Review, Dillinger? Do you want to plead your case? This isn’t exactly the right place to do it, but heck give it a shot.
blissyu2
3 Aug 07 at 2:35 pm
Actually, I was referring to Kato’s ill-informed comment (http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?s=dbf101170d4b954573ec9df6d5fe6c52&showtopic=10905&view=findpost&p=40440).
Not really interested in participating normally in WR as it is now set up: it’s too likely that Selina would sell the required disclosures to someone who might use them to track me down and do me harm. (Which other contributers here out to think about, too, by the way.)
Dillinger
3 Aug 07 at 2:48 pm
Okay well I am not sure if Kato writes to this blog, and he’d probably be a bit offended if I wrote to him about your comment. People make ill-informed comments all the time. You’ve noted it here, so I guess that’s it.
Anyway since I don’t know who you are (obviously someone who was banned from WR, and doesn’t like Selina) then I don’t know if I can help you. You could be Hushthis, Sgrayban, Grace Note, probably not Malber as you are far too polite, but hey. Or you could be Igor Alexander, Blu Aardvark or perhaps Qwerty even. And of course I missed a big period, so maybe there’s more people you could be. I’m not quite sure who doesn’t like Selina. I think her number 1 enemy was Malber, but he’s a bit psychotic, so I don’t think that’s you.
Anyway Selina is on holiday right now. She has had long absences a lot for a while now. And I quite like Selina myself. I think that she, like me, makes a very bad administrator. But I think she makes a good root admin. She was never meant to be an administrator and I wish she’d give it up, and just have root access like she was meant to have. But anyway I guess people do what they like and don’t always listen to you. The best laid plans of mice and men, as they say.
The thing is that I am sure that many WR admins abuse their power. So too do many Wikipedia admins. So too did most bosses I’ve ever had. So too do admins on most internet sites. It’s just a fact of life that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. If our criticism of Wikipedia was purely that some admins let the power go to their heads, then we wouldn’t be going very far. That happens anywhere. It probably happens less on Wikipedia. However, on Wikipedia they are a bit less transparent. At least on WR, you know full well that if you don’t get along with Selina, you’re banned :). And indeed if you don’t get along with me, I’ll ask for you to be banned, although they don’t always agree with me. If you don’t get banned then either we make up or I’ll harass you until you quit. I think that most of the admins on WR do much the same thing. And why not? At least you know what to expect.
blissyu2
3 Aug 07 at 5:47 pm
“At least on WR, you know full well that if you don’t get along with Selina, you’re banned :).”
Are you sure Kato knows this? And does he know the corollary information, e.g., that going very far in criticizing Jayjg counts as “you don’t get along with Selina?”
Anyway, it’s just kind of sad that this is about the only place on the web dedicated to criticism of Wikipedia, and it’s really a f^%ked up place: most of the criticisms of WR that are made on WP, sadly, have quite a bit of purchase.
It’s funny, I just did a search of “HushThis” as a keyword, and got lots of posts referencing or copying things that look like a forum member named “HushThis” must have written, but it clearly cannot be true because no “HushThis” is listed among the members, and a search for comments by user “HushThis” gives no results. It’s like trying to find Leon Trotsky in old pictures from the Soviet Union. But if “HushThis” is Trotsky, then who must the person who arranged for his erasure be?
Dillinger
3 Aug 07 at 6:15 pm
Apparently Hushthis protested about something by deleting all of his own posts. I don’t know if this is true as I wasn’t there at the time. Alternatively, he was banned for some reason, and they then decided to ban his posts along with the ban. I don’t know.
As far as I am concerned, Hushthis was a very good user, as was Sgrayban, and if they did anything wrong in the meantime, I have not been informed of this, and I am greatly saddened by it. There was one point where we were going to give the whole thing over to Hushthis for a while, so that’s all really sad.
As I’ve said many times, the best thing to do is to create a new place that offers the same kind of ideas, but with different administration etc. Or, if one already exists, then encourage that one. Wikipedia is sufficiently huge to warrant 2 different critic sites. Many people will go to both. I am sure that I would, at least for a while.
My rule is no stalking. If Wikipedia Review ever became like LJ Drama was (or even like Encyclopedia Dramatica), I would quit on the spot, pack up my bags, and never come back. I made that very clear, especially as there was a point early on when I thought that there might be some stalking. This wasn’t my rule as owner, this was my rule as a participant.
I would not consider shutting it down while there is no other meaningful alternative.
Grace Note at one point talked about setting up an alternative, which he was going to call “The Wikipedia Report”. Then suddenly Wikitruth was created, and Grace Note shut up about the whole thing. Perhaps you could talk to Grace Note about it?
Seriously, that is the most sensible thing to do. Don’t focus on fighting WR. Focus on making something better.
blissyu2
3 Aug 07 at 6:49 pm
That’s very sound advice, Blissy.
I had been, in the past, rude to you, Blissy. I was not at the time the the mental impairments under which you function, which would explain completely the matters over which I was frustrated with you. I’m sorry for that. I see now that, whatever burdens you bear, you are a good person, which is the highest compliment I give.
I’ve looked at Wikitruth, but it seems to be on the world’s slowest server, and so it is basically unuseable.
Anyway, as partial atonement for my past rudeness to you, I bring your attention to this:
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/08/03/in-taipei-wikipedians-talk-of-fundraising-and-wikiwars/#comment-10280
Dillinger
3 Aug 07 at 7:58 pm
Um I don’t know who you are so don’t know if you’ve been rude to me or not, so its probably best not to apologise unless you are willing to divulge who you really are.
I do not consider myself to be mentally impaired. High-functioning autism, aka Asperger’s Syndrome, is a condition, not a disability. In many ways its a good thing to have it, because it means that once you learn something, you learn it really well - it is just a bit more difficult to learn things, and you obsess a lot, and so forth.
Anyway, perhaps now comments in this thread can be about the actual topic? And while I understand you felt the need to write this, I can also understand if, in time, these off-topic comments will be deleted.
blissyu2
4 Aug 07 at 2:54 am
Excellent aggregation of the relevant material. Don’t let anyone dissuade you from continuing your good works, and remember to keep your ego out of it as you have been, or else we will be back down in the hole with the rest of the slaves.
Aaron Schoeffler
4 Aug 07 at 4:21 am
Blissy, I should have used a word other than “impairments,” but in any case I am glad that you view it as you do.
On Kelly Martin’s blog, I saw that you had indicated that Linda Mack deleted your collection of evidence regarding actions in the PoetLister banning. I have also encountered interference with evidence from her, and in my case it seems that someone used house elf magic or perhaps oversight authority to make it completely disappear from history.
Perhaps it would be a good idea to encourage people who are preparing complaints against Linda Mack on Wikipedia to store their evidence here somehow, given how Wikipedia so often “misplaces” such things.
Dillinger
4 Aug 07 at 5:52 am
I am actually really ill right now and taking all kinds of fun drugs to cope with the pain etc, so I am having various really weird hallucinations. Hence I felt it best not to write too many opinions, and this is mostly a link farm. But this issue is one where people really need some link farms to understand it properly.
Perhaps I should put on the top a big title:
“Wikipedia administrator lying about important historical articles, changing policy on Wikipedia to suit lies, doing so as a secret agent - Wikipedia is controlled”.
I mean that’s the point of the whole thing. The point isn’t what her real name is (that’s just Wikipedia’s little lie to try to distract from it). It isn’t even about her being a secret agent. If she was a taxi driver that was doing this, then it’d still be just as important, just that we would be saying “And why on earth are we taking a taxi driver seriously?”. But as a secret agent, instead the reaction is “This demonstrates that this is no tiny accidental change of history - it is deliberate, controlled, and insidious”. But of course, that is up to the reader to decide.
blissyu2
4 Aug 07 at 11:19 am
User:Zordrac/Poetlister was deleted by SlimVirgin (not oversighted). It was incredibly obvious that she did it to justify a ban. It needs to be undeleted before Poetlister, Runcorn etc can be unblocked.
blissyu2
4 Aug 07 at 11:32 am
Looks like Kato and Jorge are figuring out the editorial policies of this site. Well, Jorge at least.
It is somewhat bewildering how Poetlister can so summarily block discussions of Israel that have arisen out of disagreements about whether Wikipedia is biased in favor of Israel or not - how can Jayjg’s actions at Wikipedia, for example, be considered for abuse without agreeing on whether he protecting the truth from anti-Israel propaganda or protecting Israel from the truth?
I think I read somewhere that Selina and Poetlister are the same person, and I’m beginning to think that it might be true. Perhaps another “night of the long knives” is imminent?
Dillinger
5 Aug 07 at 11:06 pm
Um Poetlister is much prettier, they live in different countries, and Selina is much younger, and their personalities are very different. Can you please say things related to this post?
blissyu2
6 Aug 07 at 3:02 am
Hello blissyu2, I was reading through the blog and noticed my name pop up under your analysis for my block of Psycho Samurai. Just wanted to clarify why Samurai was blocked. Refer to this link as an example: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Natalie_Erin&diff=prev&oldid=149408781 . Unfortunately he was posting alot of personal attacks and was having major incivility issues. All you have to do is browse through his contribution history. He’s pretty much more concerned about the “Criticism of Wal-Mart” article on Wikipedia than that post on the Admin noticeboard.
PPG
8 Aug 07 at 6:54 pm
Thanks PPG, and your opinion is noted in the comments here.
Nonetheless, whenever someone is blocked, there are always various explanations as to “really” why it happened. As we noted, they made a comment about SlimVirgin, and then soon afterwards were blocked. It is up to the reader to determine whether the two are related.
blissyu2
8 Aug 07 at 10:25 pm
Fair enough, appreciate the response. I read lots of the Wiki blogs that critique, praise, inform about, degrade, and pretty much have anything about Wikipedia. Keeps one open-minded. I was a surprised to see myself appear in one for the first time.
PPG
9 Aug 07 at 12:04 am
I gather you’re the blocking admin. Mentioned in passing somewhat.
blissyu2
10 Aug 07 at 5:22 pm