Vegaswikian

[EricBarbour]

For years, I've been wondering if administrator Vegaswikian (T-C-L) was working for the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce, local government, or a local casino/resort or other business in Las Vegas. VW's focus (okay, fixation) for most of his WP history is Las Vegas in particular and Nevada in general. A very intense focus, in fact, until recently.

At present, Vegaswikian looks like just another "gnome". But he/she (very secretive about real identity) has put a lot of work into certain articles, mostly prior to 2010. Below are just the top 8. Virtually every casino, hotel or other business with headquarters or significant business operations in Las Vegas received "special treatment" from Vegaswikian at one time or another. Look at the talkpage for McCarran International Airport (T-H-L), VW practically pwns this article.

Top eight articles edited by Vegaswikian
-----------
728 Las Vegas
454 McCarran International Airport
366 Las Vegas Valley
363 US Airways
300 Las Vegas Strip
244 List of casinos
204 Wynn Las Vegas
199 Clark County School District

I suspect that 69.68.204.34 might be an IP address Vegaswikian used in the past.

Look at the talkpage for US Airways (T-H-L). There's Tutelary, fighting with VW and others over a scandal. Predictably VW doesn't want it mentioned. So far as I've been able to find, Vegaswikian has never added negative, scandalous or unpleasant information to any articles.

Vegaswikian is responsible for Rawson-Neal Hospital (T-H-L), a pathetically short article with little detail for the only public psychiatric hospital in the state of Nevada and one of that city's biggest recent embarrassments. The two Sacramento Bee reporters who broke the story were finalists for a Pulitzer Prize this year. You won't find a link to their story series on Wikipedia. Nor will you find anything comparable about Rawson-Neal in Las Vegas news media, which is typical of that town. Rawson-Neal, and the now-closed county clinic that preceded it, were famous for being the "dumping grounds" for tourists who had breakdowns in casinos while gambling, a subject the casinos would like very much to keep quiet. This explains why Rawson-Neal was also "dumping" discharged patients in other cities, a commonplace and time-honored practice in Western cities.

Prove me wrong about Vegaswikian.

[Vigilant]

First edit as a named user...
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?tit ... d=11242554

Previous IP
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Co ... 41.248.221
http://whatismyipaddress.com/ip/65.41.248.221
http://whois.domaintools.com/65.41.248.221

Another IP
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Co ... .41.215.30
http://whatismyipaddress.com/ip/65.41.215.30

And another
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Co ... 40.244.254

And another
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Co ... .41.213.66

I find very, very few edits outside Vegas commercial interests.
Started out utterly focused on McCarren airport.

Morphed into all things Vegas
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?tit ... egaswikian

Look at the rate of editing...
Nine and a half years...
http://tools.wmflabs.org/xtools/ec/?use ... ipedia.org

That's some crazy focus.

[thekohser]

That's some crazy focus.

I seem to remember a Wikipedia editor whose sole stated focus was on Bulgarian recreational vehicle parks. Randy from Boise seems to have given that editor a "thumbs up" because he's helping to improve Wikipedia.

[Randy from Boise]

That's some crazy focus.

I seem to remember a Wikipedia editor whose sole stated focus was on Bulgarian recreational vehicle parks. Randy from Boise seems to have given that editor a "thumbs up" because he's helping to improve Wikipedia.

See, Smallbones, this is how it is done...


t

[Poetlister]

That's some crazy focus.

I seem to remember a Wikipedia editor whose sole stated focus was on Bulgarian recreational vehicle parks. Randy from Boise seems to have given that editor a "thumbs up" because he's helping to improve Wikipedia.

Well yes, if Wikipedia is the sum of all knowledge however trivial, he's improving it.

[thekohser]

That's some crazy focus.

I seem to remember a Wikipedia editor whose sole stated focus was on Bulgarian recreational vehicle parks. Randy from Boise seems to have given that editor a "thumbs up" because he's helping to improve Wikipedia.

Well yes, if Wikipedia is the sum of all knowledge however trivial, he's improving it.

What if it was a prank, though?

[Vigilant]

That's some crazy focus.

I seem to remember a Wikipedia editor whose sole stated focus was on Bulgarian recreational vehicle parks. Randy from Boise seems to have given that editor a "thumbs up" because he's helping to improve Wikipedia.

Well yes, if Wikipedia is the sum of all knowledge however trivial, he's improving it.

What if it was a prank, though?

If that's a prank then I feel humbled.

[EricBarbour]

No one else has anything to say about Vegaswikian? C'mon, someone on this forum must have noticed him at one time or another.

PS: ya know who else lives in Vegas? Jpgordon. From VW's first talkpage archive, is this bizarre exchange:

LV WPers

Hi, are you physically in Las Vegas? I think we're getting enough locals to make a little club now, perhaps get together in person at some point. Stan 23:12, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I live in Vegas, I suppose that a club could be set up. Don't know how much interest there is. Maybe it could be used as a way to get some people interested in adding material to some of the pages. I know I have created a lot of pointers and almost empty pages, but I keep running in to other pages that need fixing. And then I created a reasonably complete Red Rock Casino page and had it recommended for deletion almost as soon as it was created. Talk about frustrating!

Don't let it get to you. Usually we consider things that are "coming soon" not, in general, to be proper subject materials for articles; this generally constitutes things like "Ashleigh Simpson's upcoming album", "the next episode in Final Fantasy", or "The 2012 Elections". This is because such articles are generally either completely speculative, based on rumors, or press releases. Red Rock Station (isn't that it's real name?) could be reasonably thought to be in that category, as can Wynn Las Vegas; you'll note that the VfD on Wynn was shouted down immediately, and the Red Rock VfD is going to fail as well. Don't take any of this personally. Anybody -- anybody -- can list something on VfD; and quite often the consensus of the community is "what the hell did you list that for?". --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 23:52, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I understand that. Now. The Crystal Ball clearly talks about publishing and not structures. I'm thinking about a VfD for the Metropolitan page since that seems to be serving no purpose since it was created. I have also been moving things off the Vegas page that clearly, to me anyway, belong on another page like the Clark County one or the airport. I also just raised a question about where the MGM fire should be talked about. Kind of odd since it has its own page. The correct name for the red rock casino is "Red Rock Resort Spa and Casino" according to the stations web page.Vegaswikian 00:03, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

One thing I've noticed is that it works better for new people to edit content within the existing framework of articles for awhile, then branch out into reorganization projects later; gives you a chance to get familiar with what logic there is. A lot of the organization has been painfully hammered out over the years, and it's become all too easy to step on someone's toes. Funny about VfD for Red Rock Station, I'm literally looking at it as I type - pretty solid-looking for a hypothetical... :-) Stan 01:36, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Hi, I'm also a Las Vegas-Wikipedian (Just so happened to see some of your edits) --Comrade Nick @)---^-- 07:10, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[thekohser]

No one else has anything to say about Vegaswikian? C'mon, someone on this forum must have noticed him at one time or another.

I noticed him and began to dislike him when he voted to delete one of my first articles on Wikipedia.

In his defense, though, he was pushing deletes about 80% of the time on AfDs, so that's just his "way".

[EricBarbour]

I noticed him and began to dislike him when he voted to delete one of my first articles on Wikipedia.

That's actually a remarkably "pure" example of Wikipedia insidership and deletionism. And I'd forgotten about Slowmover (T-C-L), one of those perpetual annoyances in AFDs prior to 2007.

[Poetlister]

It's a clever name. At first glance it looks like a supporter of some obscure Indian cult.