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Posted by: LessHorrid vanU

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Malleus_Fatuorum/WikiSpeak/Decoding_RfA It is even better for having the stamp of truth upon it.

Posted by: Milton Roe

The longer you've been around WP, the funnier this is. Nice job.

Posted by: Eva Destruction

Don't neglect its parent page, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Malleus_Fatuorum/WikiSpeak...

Posted by: Milton Roe

Thanks.



Some of these are worthy of The Devil's Dictionary: "Uninvolved administrator; see Involved administrator"

Posted by: Giggy

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Malleus_Fatuorum/WikiSpeak&diff=225714800&oldid=225697250.

Posted by: thekohser

spam
Any article about a company or product you've never heard of. These articles can be dealt with in one of three ways:

1. If the article is unreferenced, it can be safely deleted as nobody will bother to check how important it is.
2. If the article is referenced, it can be safely deleted and the author blocked for adding external links.
3. If the article is referenced and well-written but you've either never heard of, or don't like, the author, it can be deleted and the author tagged as suspected sockpuppet of Wikipedia Review or Runcorn.

Posted by: Giggy

Iridescent is a big fan of yours, it seems

Posted by: thekohser

"referenced and well-written"... if that's my Wikipedia legacy, I'm happy.

Posted by: Cla68

I have a copy of the Devil's Dictionary somewhere in my book pile. I should pull it out and start adding quotes from it to the top of my userpage or to my signature here. Anyway, this list is funny and some of the guide points are spot on.

Posted by: Giggy

I hope you're on the lookout for a "Oppose, too quick to be involved in drama." (#21) next time you're up for RfA. I just wonder if anyone will pull a "Support per clean talkpage/block log/contribs/"

Posted by: guy

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Malleus_Fatuorum/WikiSpeak&diff=225715563&oldid=225714800

And here's Iridescent, bidding for the WR award for "Admin with the best sense of humour"

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Malleus_Fatuorum/WikiSpeak&diff=225064377&oldid=225038174

She also added the bit about Spam

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Malleus_Fatuorum/WikiSpeak&diff=215790001&oldid=215789421

but the reference to Runcorn is due to Nousernamesleft.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Malleus_Fatuorum/WikiSpeak&diff=next&oldid=220780413

Posted by: Alex

This page shows precisely what a joke RfA is. Why can't it just be a straight vote, with no comments? It would certainly remove a lot of the nastiness.

Posted by: Eva Destruction

Because then, A would vote "oppose" on B's RFA, but without giving an explanation B would then come to A's talkpage to ask why, thus spreading the incoherent ramblings across multiple pages; at least this way it keeps all the bitching and backstabbing on a single page which is auto-archived after five days. I could make a case for a secret ballot of established editors (along the lines of the WMF election), although I suspect you'd get a lot of "opposes" for really lame reasons. At least forcing people to explain their actions prevents the cabal of 12 year olds, for instance, from blatantly block-voting their buddies through.

The RFA process is undoubtedly a mess – lest we forget, it used to look like http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Successful_adminship_candidacies&oldid=1449014#Paul_A – but nobody seems able to come up with a viable alternative. (I don't include "splitting the tools" as a viable alternative; even splitting off the relatively uncontroversial rollback function has caused huge amounts of idiocy and huge chunks of valid material "accidentaly" reverted. Once you get to the "high power" core admin functions, I can't imagine any grounds when I'd trust someone to block users but not to delete articles, for instance, so we'd still need an approval process for protect/block/delete.)

Posted by: guy

Ah yes, much more civilised then. It's still like that on some of the minor wikis.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

It's amusing looking over those old admins and noting "Hey, there's Stevertigo, who got desysoped in a rather ugly way"; "Ah, RickK, the sockpuppeting sysop" (it's been conclusively proven now that Zoe and RickK are the same person, although the proof is not widely known); and of course Alex756, aka Alex Roshuk, who is well-known for leaving Wikipedia in a huff when Jimmy & Co. dememberized the Foundation.

Posted by: Eva Destruction

RickK, as in "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ARickK&diff=223836316&oldid=223832633" RickK?

Posted by: Kelly Martin

That's the one. Also known as User:Zoe. We long suspected that Zoe and RickK were one and the same, but had no proof, until recently. It's a moot point as Zoe hasn't edited since http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Zoe. If Rick is still around, he's editing under some other account that is, as of yet, not known to anyone other than him.

Posted by: thekohser

Wikipedia wouldn't serve its purpose, then, to be the world's largest revenge platform.

Posted by: Giggy

Yes, and hundreds of people would have nothing left to do.

Posted by: michael

Seriously? RickK was Zoe? How as this proof obtained? Did he admit to it, or what?

Posted by: everyking

I'd like to know more about this proof. I've always maintained RickK was one of the worst admins in WP history, but his legacy is much vaunted by some. A convincing display of evidence that he was engaged in such severe sockpuppetry would help in deflating the myth that such highly aggressive and unilateral admins can be a positive force.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

The RickK and Zoe accounts both have the same password, and that password may be readily guessed from knowing RickK's email address, which is itself can be discovered with only moderate difficulty after analyzing some of Rick's comments on the wiki.

Technically, since RickK and Zoe never overlapped editing, it's not abusive sockpuppetry as defined by Wikipedia.

Posted by: Giggy

You mean he made his password the same (or similar) to his email address? O.o

Posted by: everyking

How did you come to learn that they have the same password? Who did all this research? I don't see how this proof can be substantiated. Given my interactions with Rick, it's easy for me to believe that he was up to something like this, but given my interactions with you, it's hard for me to believe you about anything. I just realized something that makes me think you're telling the truth, though: Rick and Zoe were both extremely touchy about having Jimbo's approval. Zoe left the project over that, and I believe Rick threatened to. It may have been the reason he left as well; I don't quite remember. He claimed something about vandals being respected and good contributors being maligned, but since he constantly abused good contributors I doubt that was the real reason.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

I am not going to discuss how we found this out, or who was involved in the research. It could be substantiated by logging into both accounts with the common password, but I'm not enough of a fool to post the password to a Wikipedia admin account on Wikipedia Review, or give it to you privately.

Eventually, I would imagine, someone with a brain over in Wikiland will see this and decide to suspend both accounts as the security risk they are, but until they do...

Posted by: Kelly Martin

Thatcher emailed me asking for the password. I, of course, declined to tell him. He could try emailing RickK and/or Zoe; both accounts are email-enabled, after all (different addresses, too, which kinda surprised me, but Zoe's account is a Yahoo freebie).

Posted by: Daniel

It really didn't require a demonstration, but oh well. Both accounts desysopped and blocked.

Posted by: Newyorkbrad

Publicizing this information in this way was highly inappropriate.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

Probably. However, as Thatcher was more than willing to tell me in email, nobody in Wikiland would have believed me anyway: Tell me, Newyorkbrad, have you known me to lie?

Posted by: Newyorkbrad

No. Incidentally, that second quote is not my writing. If it's an unauthorized quotation from a private e-mail, I would consider that inappropriate as well.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

It is an unauthorized quotation from an private e-mail (from Thatcher, as the text of my post indicates, although apparently not clearly enough; I tried to make the bbcode mark it as being Thatcher but I apparently fail at bbcode), and I don't care terribly much if you think it's inappropriate, as I'm sure you are already well aware.

Posted by: Newyorkbrad

I think I am getting a taste of what life would have been like had we been in the Cabal at the same time.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

Who knows, maybe you would have talked some sense into me, or vice versa.

As I said to Thatcher: "I have no real incentive to go out of my way to help Wikipedia; you've systematically treated me like shit for long enough that you have no expectation of anything other than arms-length dealings."

Posted by: Rootology

Stupid question, but--what bit of publicized information was inappropriate, Brad? I'm assuming you mean the semi-vague instructions on how to find the RickK/Zoe password, assuming someone with a clue hasn't already changed it for security reasons, and not the fact the two accounts may be one and the same person? If it was a sock relationship why would that disclosure be inappropriate? Things like that are routinely disclosed...

Posted by: Pumpkin Muffins

Hey Kelly, I like your title 'Dangerously Abusive Bully', it's a good fit. Bullies always seem to be the biggest crybabies, you ever notice that? So after going an crying about me behind my back, I agreed to lay off you a bit. However, if you'd like some more feedback from me, by all means go and start dumping on Everyking again.

I read a book once about Bobby Fischer. In it, a psychiatrist who was a member of the Manhattan Chess Club when Bobby was a kid there said that Fischer was paranoid schizophrenic, and that like all paranoids he was incapable of lying. When Fischer says that 'so and so' has a 'world domination scheme', he really believed it. But that's beside the point.

I tried a couple of giantsrick variations but didn't get in. I only know RickK's yahoo address. After the captua came on (third try) I lost interest. Any one know RickK's non-yahoo address?

Posted by: Rootology

Relevant ANI, by the way: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard&oldid=226044532#Hello

Posted by: Newyorkbrad

I was referring to the former ... although the latter could also be considered as Not Of Any General Interest, given that neither account had edited for well over a year.

(Bonus question: Whence did I derive the capitalized expression "Not Of Any General Interest"?)

Posted by: Kelly Martin

WJBscribe apparently contemplated blocking me (oh, I quiver in fear!) for posting the information above; he feels that I should have emailed the Holy ArbCom instead with my discovery. Nonsense. First, I've known about this for months now; it's simply not been of interest to me to mention it anywhere. Second, I have no reason to believe that anyone at the ArbCom would listen to me. Thatcher's already made it clear that I am not to be taken on my word, and the only person recently to serve on the ArbCom who has been willing to do so much as share the time of day with me has been Newyorkbrad, who, as we all know, no longer serves on that comically august body.

No, If I were to notify anyone, it would be Domas, Tim, or Brion -- provided I actually wanted something done about it. And as I said above, I've been given plenty of incentive not to put out for Wikipedia.

Posted by: Shalom

If you flip the initialism NOAGI into its anagram, you get GIANO.

Posted by: Newyorkbrad

Wow -- that's a PURE coincidence.

Posted by: Castle Rock

Haha, we may be victims of a conspiracy.

Posted by: guy

Is AlisonW still an admin? Just asking.

http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=15501&view=findpost&p=75735

Posted by: msharma

Then what's the point? Frankly, I think its a bit much to call it sockpuppetry.

In any case, RickK was a pest, but Zoe was frankly pretty damn useful as an admin.

Posted by: Giggy

So where did you derive it from if not a Giano conspiracy?

Posted by: Newyorkbrad

I was the heading for the acknowledgements and related material in "The Bill James Baseball Abstract" volumes from the 1980's. One person actually PM'd me with the answer. And the irony is, this isn't of any general interest, either.