Wikipediocracy

Discuss.

Unfortunately the creating of fictitious articles and online persona's is a long one and not particularly unique to Wikipedia. There have been countless fictitious articles and some have made it all the way up to nearly FA status before being discovered. Some where there for years before being found out. One, Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia/Gaius Flavius Antoninus (T-H-L) existed for ten years. Another example is Olimar the Wonder cat, Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia/Olimar The Wondercat (T-H-L). Still though, my favorite is still Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia/Upper Peninsula War (T-H-L). A seemingly well written article about a nonexistent battle between Michigan and Canada.

WPO Blog post wrote:Henry had a long history of making things up in real life, too. After a violent physical attack on a female student in December 2004, he invented all kinds of stories to avoid blame. He split the woman’s head open with the heavy end of a pool cue, with such violence that the cue shattered, but his attitude throughout the legal process was to deny everything, or to make up excuses. He claimed that the girl had attacked him with a knife after he had declined her advances, that he was forced to defend himself with the pool cue, which he claimed was already broken. She had not suffered “serious bodily injury”, he said. The defence was rejected. The woman had required eleven stitches for two lacerations on her head. How hard do you have to hit someone over the head in order to shatter a pool cue?

The ends don't justify the means. You cannot in good conscience justify the pummelling a man close to death and say "I did it for his own good, he needed to learn". AfadsBad needs to be sanctioned and harshly for the means she employed. Just saying "but there are inaccuracies that need to be fixed" offers no excuse for her savagely wielding a bloodied cudgel.--ColonelHenry (talk) 9:18 am, 12 April 2014, Saturday (9 days ago) (UTC−4)

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =603874530

Query: Will the folks over at Wikipedia will be more in denial about:

1. the socking
2. the violence
3. the promotion of inaccurate articles

My guess would be #3.

Zoloft wrote:Query: Will the folks over at Wikipedia will be more in denial about:

1. the socking
2. the violence
3. the promotion of inaccurate articles

Yes.

I love it when this stuff gets into the ‘real world’ and is then cited as a reliable source. In this edit on 3 April, he cites the article “4 secret societies you probably don't know about” by Stefanie Becker (The Week, March 18, 2013. But that article in turn was sourced from the Wikipedia bogus article by a lazy reporter.

Peter Damian wrote:I love it when this stuff gets into the ‘real world’ and is then cited as a reliable source. In this edit on 3 April, he cites the article “4 secret societies you probably don't know about” by Stefanie Becker (The Week, March 18, 2013. But that article in turn was sourced from the Wikipedia bogus article by a lazy reporter.

It's getting harder to find anything "original" online that hasn't been tainted by Wikipedia.

See Eric's thread about this conundrum:

viewtopic.php?f=21&t=4426

And 'Colonel Henry' is blocked, by Risker (T-C-L).

That didn't take long. Socking is the worst, and the best of crimes.

[edit]The problem of detecting and cleaning up the nonsense he has added will, of course, take second place to the block.

Checkuser block of ColonelHenry and socks

This is to advise the community that I am about to block the following accounts indefinitely for sockpuppetry:

ColonelHenry (talk • contribs)
Hierophant443 (talk • contribs)
Raebodep1962 (talk • contribs)
The accounts were brought to my attention by an experienced user with sufficient evidence to run a check and carry out additional investigations. The following findings should be reviewed more closely by the community:

Five instances where the ColonelHenry and Hierophant443 accounts both participated in the same AFD[26]; administrators encouraged to review the results and determine if consensus would have been altered.
Edit(s) by Raebodep1962 - a new account created only 4 days ago - required suppression due to severe BLP violations of poorly sourced libellous allegations
Serious questions about the veracity of the article Order of the Bull's Blood
ColonelHenry, on creating the account, confirms that he had a prior account. This account has been identified, and was associated in its earliest editing with another hoax article in 2004
Because of this, it is important to review at least all article creations by these editors, as well as edits to BLPs. This is a lot of editing to review, and the community's assistance is really needed here.

Note that I will be going offline shortly; however, my findings have been verified by another checkuser and shared with several others. Risker (talk) 07:40, 21 April 2014 (UTC)
ANI 21 April 2014

Peter Damian wrote:And 'Colonel Henry' is blocked, by Risker (T-C-L).

That didn't take long. Socking is the worst, and the best of crimes.

Huzzah! We should probably add this new development to the blog post?

Risker, I'd be glad to go, no complaints...but could you oversight the AN/I post...because it could easily result in my public outing. I will respect your block, please respect my real life privacy. And out of courtesy, blank my user page.--ColonelHenry (talk) 09:16, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

And if she does respect that (I think she should), what about other users whose real life privacy has not been respected by the Committee?

Peter Damian wrote: And if she does respect that (I think she should), what about other users whose real life privacy has not been respected by the Committee?

Perhaps the others need cue in how to approach said committee.

It looks like Jimbo is not permitted to learn about his billiard-cue-wielding minion.

Poof! Away it goes!

Kumioko wrote:Unfortunately the creating of fictitious articles and online persona's is a long one and not particularly unique to Wikipedia. There have been countless fictitious articles and some have made it all the way up to nearly FA status before being discovered... Still though, my favorite is still Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia/Upper Peninsula War (T-H-L). A seemingly well written article about a nonexistent battle between Michigan and Canada.

Wow, that one must have taken a *lot* of work. I think hoax articles are hilarious and while those that spot and sound the alarm on them are doing the responsible thing, I don't think hoaxsters should be treated as wiki-criminals. They should be slapped on the wrist, given some time off with temporary blocks, and thanked for probing Wikipedia's disinformation safeguards.

The Bicholim Conflict (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia: ... m_conflict) is a classic example of a fake war one. It was "assessed as a good article," persisted for five years, and was only found out when nominated for "featured article" status. I guess the holy grail for a Wikipedia hoaxster is featured article status and being published on the front page. That and the "Reich Corps of the Trombone" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia: ... e_Trombone) are among my favorites.

The "Order of the Bull's Blood" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_t ... %27s_Blood) is an article whose verity has been called into question by former arbitrator Risker because of "Down the Rabbit Hole" the latest of Wikipediocracy's cutting-edge and award-winning-like reporting. It's supposed to be a Rutger's University secret society active since just after the America Civil War, no wait since even earlier, since 1834. Risker (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?tit ... _and_socks) says that one of Colonelhenry's socks is in the thick of the article. Is it a hoax? I think almost certainly, based on ten minutes looking at the references. To the hoaxster's (hoaxsters'?) credit, the New York Times reported on Order of the Bull's Blood based on his or her or their work: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/16/educa ... tion=&_r=1&. The Times is stupid and sloppy (esp. in the early 2000s in which it actually employed hoaxsters Judy Miller and Jayson Blair). It actually attempted to verify the membership of famous individuals said to be in the Order, fair enough, but when those they called said it's all a fiction, does the Times repudiate the article? No. They leave a question mark there in the Times report which says "clandestine clubs remain active around the country" in its introduction.

I did find this silly but apparently genuine reference which is cited but not linked by the Wikipedia article: http://web.archive.org/web/200405300250 ... nt_id=4272. It's by Spencer Ackerman who writes about his porky Rutgers classmate nicknamed "Uncle Toby" who sought to draft him for the Order. That casual piece, silly though it is, is the only sourcing I've found that is checkable on the Internet. The other stuff is in accordance with Eric Barbour's theorizing about so-called "reliable sources" in the actual media that actually are swallowing, half-digesting, then regurgitating the Wikipedia content, and then the Wikipedia editors go anew and cite the regurgitated stuff as validation.

thekohser wrote:It looks like Jimbo is not permitted to learn about his billiard-cue-wielding minion.

Poof! Away it goes!

Reverted without explanation by Favonian, who reverts mass quantities constantly. The guy or gal is like some robot in terms of the sheer numbers of reverts, blocks, and such. Then he or she The IP blocks the IP on an evasion charge without further explanation. Does he think it's you, Greg? It could be any number of people including some of Wikipediocracy's participants and readers that are not blocked, thus not evading, and only seeking not to paint targets on themselves as connected to the site.

The Joy wrote:

WPO Blog post wrote:Henry had a long history of making things up in real life, too. After a violent physical attack on a female student in December 2004, he invented all kinds of stories to avoid blame. He split the woman’s head open with the heavy end of a pool cue, with such violence that the cue shattered, but his attitude throughout the legal process was to deny everything, or to make up excuses. He claimed that the girl had attacked him with a knife after he had declined her advances, that he was forced to defend himself with the pool cue, which he claimed was already broken. She had not suffered “serious bodily injury”, he said. The defence was rejected. The woman had required eleven stitches for two lacerations on her head. How hard do you have to hit someone over the head in order to shatter a pool cue?

The ends don't justify the means. You cannot in good conscience justify the pummelling a man close to death and say "I did it for his own good, he needed to learn". AfadsBad needs to be sanctioned and harshly for the means she employed. Just saying "but there are inaccuracies that need to be fixed" offers no excuse for her savagely wielding a bloodied cudgel.--ColonelHenry (talk) 9:18 am, 12 April 2014, Saturday (9 days ago) (UTC−4)

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =603874530

Says the expert on bloody cudgels.

No one at ANI was paying any attention to him, really. In fact, no one at ANI or en.Wikipedia, admin-wise, seems much capable of paying attention. No one not tainted by Wikipediocracy that is.

Triptych wrote:

thekohser wrote:It looks like Jimbo is not permitted to learn about his billiard-cue-wielding minion.

Poof! Away it goes!

Reverted without explanation by Favonian, who reverts mass quantities constantly. The guy or gal is like some robot in terms of the sheer numbers of reverts, blocks, and such. Then he or she The IP blocks the IP on an evasion charge without further explanation. Does he think it's you, Greg? It could be any number of people including some of Wikipediocracy's participants and readers that are not blocked, thus not evading, and only seeking not to paint targets on themselves as connected to the site.

Who knows?! The only way to really find out would be for an editor in good standing to restore the content, then see what happens.

As for the IP address -- it geolocates to Newark, Delaware. I can honestly say that I haven't been in Newark, Delaware in at least several weeks.

Zoloft wrote:Query: Will the folks over at Wikipedia will be more in denial about:

1. the socking
2. the violence
3. the promotion of inaccurate articles

My guess would be #3.

I think everyone knows my guess.

I should name him.

He might even think its me. I am the favorite enemy of the project at the moment.

Back on topic, does anyone actually think Colonel henry Won't create a new account?

The Joy wrote:

Peter Damian wrote:I love it when this stuff gets into the ‘real world’ and is then cited as a reliable source. In this edit on 3 April, he cites the article “4 secret societies you probably don't know about” by Stefanie Becker (The Week, March 18, 2013. But that article in turn was sourced from the Wikipedia bogus article by a lazy reporter.

It's getting harder to find anything "original" online that hasn't been tainted by Wikipedia.

See Eric's thread about this conundrum:

viewtopic.php?f=21&t=4426

That's why my dead horse remains important. Cwmhiraeth rewrites science, it appears on the main page, it gets copied by Wiki mirrors, and it pushes down the real science she mangled in Google results.

DYK and the en.Wikipedia contests taint real knowledge. Wikipedia is not gathering knowledge, it's a bunch of crazies taking a dump on it.

Everything online is becoming tainted by bad Wikipedia articles.

Kumioko wrote:He might even think its me. I am the favorite enemy of the project at the moment.

Back on topic, does anyone actually think Colonel henry Won't create a new account?

Lol. And you're the one asking?

I suspect he has a handful undiscovered already.

Lol, I'm sure. Every good sockmaster has a few in reserve for a rainy day. I know I do.

At least one hoax article has been dismantled (by Scott). And so good work has been done.

Or has it? I have another question for you. Are the Wikipedians likely to hate us more, or less, o/a of this? On the one hand, we have uncovered sockpuppeting, bogus articles, generally bad behaviour. On the other, we are clearly causing disruption to Wikipedia – getting users banned, lowering morale at team GA, creating the risk of ‘outing’.

Which?

Peter Damian wrote:At least one hoax article has been dismantled (by Scott). And so good work has been done.

Or has it? I have another question for you. Are the Wikipedians likely to hate us more, or less, o/a of this? On the one hand, we have uncovered sockpuppeting, bogus articles, generally bad behaviour. On the other, we are clearly causing disruption to Wikipedia – getting users banned, lowering morale at team GA, creating the risk of ‘outing’.

Which?

Yes, we will be the bad guys, because social aspects of en.Wikipedia trump idiotic policies like Wikipedia:Verifiability (T-H-L).



And, now for something completely different, enwikibadscience's :

Well, I'm disrupting en.Wkipedia by trying to make Cwmhiraeth have to edit all her articles (I know she can't). Adding extra reference, indeed.

BTW, thanks.

Peter Damian wrote:Are the Wikipedians likely to hate us more, or less, o/a of this?

The same.

Peter Damian wrote:Are the Wikipedians likely to hate us more, or less, o/a of this?

Wikipedians should admire us more for this particular blog post.

Wikipediots, on the other hand, will only hate us more, as is the case with anything we do.

Peter Damian wrote:At least one hoax article has been dismantled (by Scott). And so good work has been done.

Jeez! I should have looked at this subforum first today.

Thanks. Yes, complete nonsense - a tissue of lies and misrepresented sources.

thekohser wrote:

Peter Damian wrote:Are the Wikipedians likely to hate us more, or less, o/a of this?

Wikipedians should admire us more for this particular blog post.

Wikipediots, on the other hand, will only hate us more, as is the case with anything we do.

That's a good summary.

The places the blog post led me to show an utterly disgraceful person. You'd want to shower and scrub after you read that if you ever interacted with them.

But, as the 'ediots will explain to you, what folks do in the real world isn't important in the context of the "game". (Think about that for a while.)

Hex wrote:

Peter Damian wrote:At least one hoax article has been dismantled (by Scott). And so good work has been done.

Jeez! I should have looked at this subforum first today.

Thanks. Yes, complete nonsense - a tissue of lies and misrepresented sources.

How many other of his articles are? Remember, he claimed to have read the sources on the imaginary-time-travelling geologic formations, the imaginary formations he wanted to remain a "Good Article." I did some reviewing on a currently queued article of his, the Geology Hall (T-H-L) one, but backed off when I realized something was wrong and I didn't care. Never looked further. (Incompetence concerns, nowhere near thinking a meat-puppeteering hoaxer.)

Lol. The Good Article review was by Dr. Blofeld.

Henry, with an IP sockpuppet 66.171.124.70 (T-C-L) and his original account, created another hoax article about a secret society in September 2004, Brotherhood of the Golden Dagger (T-H-L).

Brotherhood of the Golden Dagger was a secret society at Rutgers University, which was active from 1895 to 1948. It was largely comprised of [sic] members drawn from Rutgers University athletic teams.

Someone turned it into a redirect in August 2005, and that got deleted the following November (RfD).

Hex wrote:Henry, with an IP sockpuppet 66.171.124.70 (T-C-L) and his original account, created another hoax article about a secret society in September 2004, Brotherhood of the Golden Dagger (T-H-L).

Brotherhood of the Golden Dagger was a secret society at Rutgers University, which was active from 1895 to 1948. It was largely comprised of [sic] members drawn from Rutgers University athletic teams.

Someone turned it into a redirect in August 2005, and that got deleted the following November (RfD).

Should I look forward to Geology Hall being on the main page?

Does en.Wikipedia ever learn? Verifiability, but here comes the Colonel claiming to have an unnumbered number of graduate degrees and access to obscure off line sources, and all his poetry articles are suddenly FAs. Verifiability, but Cwmhiraeth is editing in good faith, and ....

I'd like to thank checkusers Risker and DoRD for the job they've done here, as well as Scott for cleaning up the "Bull's Blood" article. Is there any futher investigative work that can be done to uncover the full extent of abuse over the past several years? Kurtis (talk) 16:41, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Yup, great job WO.

But, but, but, but ... what about all those FAs and GAs that good ol' Deputy Dawg had lined up?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... _and_socks

Kumioko wrote:Unfortunately the creating of fictitious articles and online persona's is a long one and not particularly unique to Wikipedia. There have been countless fictitious articles and some have made it all the way up to nearly FA status before being discovered. Some where there for years before being found out. One, Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia/Gaius Flavius Antoninus (T-H-L) existed for ten years. Another example is Olimar the Wonder cat, Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia/Olimar The Wondercat (T-H-L). Still though, my favorite is still Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia/Upper Peninsula War (T-H-L). A seemingly well written article about a nonexistent battle between Michigan and Canada.

There is only one Olimar that can be mentioned on Wikipedia: the Pikmin and Smash Bros. character.

Peter Damian wrote:

I'd like to thank checkusers Risker and DoRD for the job they've done here, as well as Scott for cleaning up the "Bull's Blood" article. Is there any futher investigative work that can be done to uncover the full extent of abuse over the past several years? Kurtis (talk) 16:41, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Yup, great job WO.

+1

Jim wrote:

Peter Damian wrote:Are the Wikipedians likely to hate us more, or less, o/a of this?

The same.

At this point i would have to say who cares if they hate us....which they almost certainly do. They call themselves a community and the hate each other.

Discussing the Colonel and past accounts.

I think it would be highly appropriate for that to be done. What ColonelHenry did is, by far, the worst thing one can do to damage Wikipedia. Vandals add "penis" and "poop" to articles, and our readers will be annoyed, but they know it's not supposed to be there. However, a hoax article which looks well-documented is a direct stab at our credibility. If I can indulge in a bit of hyperbole, creating well-made hoax articles should be considered to be our equivalent of High treason, and the perpetrator deserves no sympathy or quarter from us. We don't do punishment, but we do protect the project from damage, and tracking what this person did and under what names will certainly help in protecting the project from him in the future. To me, he went away a little too easily to believe that there aren't still other accounts connected to him that are operational, which is good reason to indef block the throwaway accounts from the hoax: User:LoyalSon, User:Lodge443 (in the Daily Princetonian article, "Lodge443" is given as an alias for the supposed secret society), User:ResearchRU and User:Anonymous1900. Beyond My Ken (T-C-L) (talk) 20:01, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

This is what I am accusing Cwmhiraeth of. Because of the fake documentation, the appearances on the main page, the GA and FA seals of approval, the articles appear to be the best of en.Wikipedia. But they are made up, the references don't say what is written in the article, and they are being copied all over the web. No one is protecting the project from damage.

(A dead horse with a name, WikiCupBeenRannethOverByAnImaginaryCar.)

For posterity:
Click for full glorious size.

I invite journalists to use the image however they please.

What's the rationale for not naming this guy? Seems WO fluctuates on this. It's not like it's hard to find his name after reading here. Just curious if WO has some policy on this.

Otherwise, great job on the investigation and blog post.

TungstenCarbide wrote:What's the rationale for not naming this guy? Seems WO fluctuates on this. It's not like it's hard to find his name after reading here. Just curious if WO has some policy on this.

Otherwise, great job on the investigation and blog post.

I don't know what the policy is, but I don't see the benefit. I don't think there is an anti-outing policy here, anti-outing of en.Wikipedia editors at least. I'm okay with learning what the WO policy is, also, though.

And, again, yes, good job and thanks for the blog post.

Other possible socks.

I'm voting for XXSNUGGUMSXX.

The story is about the disfuntionality of wikipedia, and Henry was only a part of it. I think the idea was to present the info, and let wikipedians out him, which has now happened. The irony in that is delicious.

I agree that its some pretty cool irony. As much as they hate this site, they probably would not have found that any time soon if it hadn't been brought to their attention. That has been the case several times in the past as well. Gotta love being bad!

tarantino wrote:The story is about the disfuntionality of wikipedia, and Henry was only a part of it. I think the idea was to present the info, and let wikipedians out him, which has now happened. The irony in that is delicious.

I can see that that would happen.

And, that is why I am against outings in general, and really, my focus on Cwmhiraeth was out of desperation, because neither she nor ColonelHenry are the problem; it's the community that creates them.

enwikibadscience wrote:

tarantino wrote:The story is about the disfuntionality of wikipedia, and Henry was only a part of it. I think the idea was to present the info, and let wikipedians out him, which has now happened. The irony in that is delicious.

I can see that that would happen.

And, that is why I am against outings in general, and really, my focus on Cwmhiraeth was out of desperation, because neither she nor ColonelHenry are the problem; it's the community that creates them.

Cwmhiraeth is a 73 year old woman who needed a hobby and found one in wikipedia. I think she generally means well, but she's just not competent.

tarantino wrote:

enwikibadscience wrote:

tarantino wrote:The story is about the disfuntionality of wikipedia, and Henry was only a part of it. I think the idea was to present the info, and let wikipedians out him, which has now happened. The irony in that is delicious.

I can see that that would happen.

And, that is why I am against outings in general, and really, my focus on Cwmhiraeth was out of desperation, because neither she nor ColonelHenry are the problem; it's the community that creates them.

Cwmhiraeth is a 73 year old woman who needed a hobby and found one in wikipedia. I think she generally means well, but she's just not competent.

She means well at least until you cross her. Unfortunately her writing is bad enough that my complaints were not the beginning and won't be the end. And another big battle is in the future for the community against the next person who crosses her.

enwikibadscience wrote:

Kumioko wrote:He might even think its me. I am the favorite enemy of the project at the moment.

Back on topic, does anyone actually think Colonel henry Won't create a new account?

Lol. And you're the one asking?

I suspect he has a handful undiscovered already.

Yes, that's why he was so polite and agreeable after Risker blocked him, because he was already switching to his alternate accounts.

I notice that a couple of people in that AN thread thanked the checkusers and the editors who have cleansed a couple of his hoax articles. Yet, no one there thanked WO for brining this to their attention in the first place. I don't see a single mention of our site in that thread.

Cwmhiraeth (T-C-L) could do valuable work, if she had a clearer understanding of her limitations.

A lot of identification of species was done 100-200 years ago, ie not copy-righted anymore.

I looked at a few of her articles: Pandalus montagui (T-H-L) (Leach, 1814) and Prodajus ostendensis (T-H-L) (Gilson, 1909) Periclimenes yucatanicus (T-H-L) (Ives, 1891) …where the time of first description is more that 100 years old. Virtually all of these articles/books are available on the net, some, if not most have wonderful detailed drawings.


She would not need to "close paraphrase" sentences, as they are all out of copy-right.

I am pretty sure that Leach, Gilson and Ives made the best description of the above species, but these descriptions are not used, or linked to.
Why not use them?

The Adversary wrote:Cwmhiraeth (T-C-L) could do valuable work, if she had a clearer understanding of her limitations.

A lot of identification of species was done 100-200 years ago, ie not copy-righted anymore.

I looked at a few of her articles: Pandalus montagui (T-H-L) (Leach, 1814) and Prodajus ostendensis (T-H-L) (Gilson, 1909) Periclimenes yucatanicus (T-H-L) (Ives, 1891) …where the time of first description is more that 100 years old. Virtually all of these articles/books are available on the net, some, if not most have wonderful detailed drawings.


She would not need to "close paraphrase" sentences, as they are all out of copy-right.

I am pretty sure that Leach, Gilson and Ives made the best description of the above species, but these descriptions are not used, or linked to.
Why not use them?

She can't use multiple sources, it confuses her. Biologists at that time (19th c.) had their species descriptions used to lump together many later found species (early to mid-20th c), and probably only well-trained and experienced biologists could get away with using an older description. Cwmhiraeth cannot bring together the new into her mid-20th sources; frequently she uses the old and ignores what has changed, or she picks phrases out of the old and the new, thus inventing an entirely unique species. She also does not understand the limitations of her describing a species from its drawing or image, and other editors have caught her out on this--it is OR.

enwikibadscience wrote:

The Adversary wrote:Cwmhiraeth (T-C-L) could do valuable work, if she had a clearer understanding of her limitations.

A lot of identification of species was done 100-200 years ago, ie not copy-righted anymore.

I looked at a few of her articles: Pandalus montagui (T-H-L) (Leach, 1814) and Prodajus ostendensis (T-H-L) (Gilson, 1909) Periclimenes yucatanicus (T-H-L) (Ives, 1891) …where the time of first description is more that 100 years old. Virtually all of these articles/books are available on the net, some, if not most have wonderful detailed drawings.


She would not need to "close paraphrase" sentences, as they are all out of copy-right.

I am pretty sure that Leach, Gilson and Ives made the best description of the above species, but these descriptions are not used, or linked to.
Why not use them?

She can't use multiple sources, it confuses her. Biologists at that time (19th c.) had their species descriptions used to lump together many later found species (early to mid-20th c), and probably only well-trained and experienced biologists could get away with using an older description. Cwmhiraeth cannot bring together the new into her mid-20th sources; frequently she uses the old and ignores what has changed, or she picks phrases out of the old and the new, thus inventing an entirely unique species. She also does not understand the limitations of her describing a species from its drawing or image, and other editors have caught her out on this--it is OR.

That depends on what field you are in. The area I know best, (North Atlantic marine Crustacea) was quite well covered a hundred years ago, and a lot of those descriptions are just as valid today. (But I also agree: you have to be a pretty experienced biologist....or working with one...to know which descriptions are still valid, and which are not.)

However, Cwmhiraeth does not see her limitations, one can virtually feel the frustrations from the biologist who tries to argue with her. Which is to be expected, when she has been applauded for years by a group of people with no understanding of science.
Like our "Henry".

I assume it is quite human to believe everything when people flatter you, and nothing when they criticise you.....

BTW, I just loved the way that you ( AfadsBad) have criticised Cwmhiraeth for making up facts in an article...just to be strongly criticised by ColonelHenry (T-C-L) ...who turns out to have made up whole articles!

You couldn´t make this s...t up.