Rejecting CW Unblock Request for his username

[NovemL]

Have you guys seen this appealing request of CommanderWaterford!? This guy was banned (for good reasons) almost 3 years ago at a time when he had almost 1500 Edits per Day, one of the most active Editors at Wikipedia.

Edited since then apparently years in other Wiki projects without any issues, and now he appeals his block.
They are rejecting it for reasons which could not be more ridiculous, for example for what his username he chose. Funny enough, the only ones participating in the appeal discussion seem to be the ones who were blocking him, the same old circle of Wiki Admins like always.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedi ... an_request

[Midsize Jake]

They are rejecting it for reasons which could not be more ridiculous, for example for what his username he chose.

First of all,

Second of all, I don't know if you've read The Handmaid's Tale or watched the Hulu TV series, but that name could conceivably trigger certain people — specifically, women who have been subjected to misogynist abuse. So in this case I don't really blame them for keeping the guy blocked, even under the WP:USERNAME rationale, and of course that's one less Wikipedian for the rest of the world to deal with anyway, right?

It's win-win!

[NovemL]

Apologies, but that idea is quite sick. If we were to apply your reasoning consistently, it would mean blocking countless users, especially those with usernames linked to criminals. This could potentially include even Jimbo, considering his past involvement in the adult entertainment industry. Furthermore, should we also consider blocking usernames like 'Adolf' and 'Vladimir'? After all, these could be equally triggering to many people. IMHO people who do choose to block power editors just because of their username do need some kind of therapy.

[Catfish Jim & spd]

Apologies, but that idea is quite sick. If we were to apply your reasoning consistently, it would mean blocking countless users, especially those with usernames linked to criminals. This could potentially include even Jimbo, considering his past involvement in the adult entertainment industry. Furthermore, should we also consider blocking usernames like 'Adolf' and 'Vladimir'? After all, these could be equally triggering to many people. IMHO people who do choose to block power editors just because of their username do need some kind of therapy.

Yes, lots of users are blocked daily because of their usernames. I had to remind myself of the characters in the Handmaids Tale (only saw a couple of episodes of the TV series) and am at a loss to understand why anyone would have picked this username.

[Pelican]

CW acted like a supreme asshat basically for his entire enwiki career, and even more so once he somehow got it into his head that he was god's gift to mass editing and basically irreplaceable. I see nothing in this latest request that suggests any meaningful change in attitude. Besides, his contributions to other projects since the enwiki ban amount to 2000ish edits to the Spanish Wikipedia, and let me tell you, "without any issues" is not remotely what I'm getting from his user talk over there.

[NovemL]

Sounds like he was your personal friend Pelican. Although he might have been a contentious editor, his contributions to Wikipedia are undeniable remarkable. I just checked his XTools Statistics.

My point is that you cannot reject an unblock appeal of an editor just because you don't like his username or his face. And what do they fear? The same old incorrigible Admins (TonyBalloni, DrMies etc. pp.) revoked him all of his permissions, he could only edit at all. An absolutely ridiculous show. Anyhow, in 5–10 years no one will talk about Wiki anymore bc of AI. You see the NPP Backlog?? No one wants to patrol new pages any longer because they are 80% crap.

[AndyTheGrump]

Sounds like he was your personal friend Pelican. Although he might have been a contentious editor, his contributions to Wikipedia are undeniable remarkable. I just checked his XTools Statistics.

My point is that you cannot reject an unblock appeal of an editor just because you don't like his username or his face. And what do they fear? The same old incorrigible Admins (TonyBalloni, DrMies etc. pp.) revoked him all of his permissions, he could only edit at all. An absolutely ridiculous show. Anyhow, in 5–10 years no one will talk about Wiki anymore bc of AI. You see the NPP Backlog?? No one wants to patrol new pages any longer because they are 80% crap.

Wikipedia is dying, therefore it is essential that CW be allowed to edit it?

[Vigilant]

Sounds like he was your personal friend Pelican. Although he might have been a contentious editor, his contributions to Wikipedia are undeniable remarkable. I just checked his XTools Statistics.

My point is that you cannot reject an unblock appeal of an editor just because you don't like his username or his face. And what do they fear? The same old incorrigible Admins (TonyBalloni, DrMies etc. pp.) revoked him all of his permissions, he could only edit at all. An absolutely ridiculous show. Anyhow, in 5–10 years no one will talk about Wiki anymore bc of AI. You see the NPP Backlog?? No one wants to patrol new pages any longer because they are 80% crap.

Why didn't you just register with your wiki handle if you're going to be this obvious?

[ArmasRebane]

There's a lot of discretion given to usernames; naming your account after a villain in a book is a far sight from calling yourself Hitler. I think those are stupid reasons.

Meanwhile, there are plenty of much more obvious, pressing reasons to reject the appeal, and I'll point out that those are usually what are brought up in that appeal. The username is just the extra "I don't like you" bitch-eating-crackers addition.

[ltbdl]

..."NovemL"? seriously? you're impersonating Novem Linguae (T-C-L)?

and if it actually is you...

[Catfish Jim & spd]

Sounds like he was your personal friend Pelican. Although he might have been a contentious editor, his contributions to Wikipedia are undeniable remarkable. I just checked his XTools Statistics.

My point is that you cannot reject an unblock appeal of an editor just because you don't like his username or his face. And what do they fear? The same old incorrigible Admins (TonyBalloni, DrMies etc. pp.) revoked him all of his permissions, he could only edit at all. An absolutely ridiculous show. Anyhow, in 5–10 years no one will talk about Wiki anymore bc of AI. You see the NPP Backlog?? No one wants to patrol new pages any longer because they are 80% crap.

Why didn't you just register with your wiki handle if you're going to be this obvious?

I thought the same, but perhaps this is Novem_Linguae (T-C-L)?

[Boing! said Zebedee]

Considering there's a clear consensus emerging that the username is a bad choice, why not just say "OK, I'll change it"?

[ltbdl]

oh, i see. he's the only guy who stood up for commanderwaterford (and the only person that we can even remotely believe posted this other than cw).

Restore NPP perm. Oppose block. No comment on autopatrolled or the copyright issues. CommanderWaterford is a top NPP reviewer (he is top 10 numerically for the 7 day, 30 day, and 90 day categories) and a top AFC reviewer (he is #1 for AFC accepts/declines in the last 30 days, with 1146 drafts processed). This guy lives and breathes new page patrol. I strongly believe that his NPP qualifications should be evaluated separately of these copyright issues. Revoking one of our top NPP reviewer's qualifications for something that is arguably not NPP related (the close paraphrasing and failing to tag translation issues occurred on pages he created, not on pages he NPP reviewed) seems excessive to me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ol ... ermissions

[Catfish Jim & spd]

Sounds like he was your personal friend Pelican. Although he might have been a contentious editor, his contributions to Wikipedia are undeniable remarkable. I just checked his XTools Statistics.

My point is that you cannot reject an unblock appeal of an editor just because you don't like his username or his face. And what do they fear? The same old incorrigible Admins (TonyBalloni, DrMies etc. pp.) revoked him all of his permissions, he could only edit at all. An absolutely ridiculous show. Anyhow, in 5–10 years no one will talk about Wiki anymore bc of AI. You see the NPP Backlog?? No one wants to patrol new pages any longer because they are 80% crap.

The username issue is bad enough, but it's a red herring. CW was banned for serious conduct, competence and temperament issues. The username issue appears to have only been noticed recently and barely discussed.

[SerkaVerduchka]

Did you really think signing up with a near-admin username and posting about yourself in the third person was going to work here?

[Anroth]

Stupider ideas have been done in the past tbh.

[Vigilant]

Into the early running for "Dumbest idea of 2024".

It's a bold move, Cotton.

[nableezy]

Somebody should ask Novem Linguae (T-C-L) if they made this account or if somebody is impersonating them here. An answer either way would be worth some

[Mojito]

My point is that you cannot reject an unblock appeal of an editor just because you don't like his username or his face.

This is not correct. Only Black Kite (T-C-L) and Phil Bridger (T-C-L) mentioned the username issue, so it is not the reason that the unblock request was denied.

[utbc]

Somebody should ask Novem Linguae (T-C-L) if they made this account or if somebody is impersonating them here. An answer either way would be worth some

Asking onwiki violates OUTing, in case anyone's about to.

[Midsize Jake]

Somebody should ask Novem Linguae (T-C-L) if they made this account or if somebody is impersonating them here. An answer either way would be worth some

It looks like Mr. Linguae has just registered a Wikipediocracy account under the full name "Novem Linguae," no doubt to tell us he's being impersonated. If so, we'll ban Mr. NovemL and soft-delete this thread, and hopefully that will be that.

In the past, we've only pre-verified Wikipedia-linked accounts for "bigwigs" like Arbcom members and some of the better-known admins. (Also, anyone wearing a large wig.) We do this by asking the WPO member to use the WP account to make a minor corrective edit that we specifically direct them to (and don't worry, there's never a shortage). Anyway, assuming this was in fact an impersonation attempt, my apologies to Mr. Linguae for not considering him to be important enough to pre-verify. He was selected as "Editor of the Week" only a month ago, so I guess I dropped the ball on that one!

That leaves only one remaining question, which is whether or not the new Novem Linguae account should also be verified at some point. I'll go find an article-space typo somewhere, just in case.

[Midsize Jake]

If we were to apply your reasoning consistently, it would mean blocking countless users...

When can we start?

[Novem Linguae]

It looks like Mr. Linguae has just registered a Wikipediocracy account under the full name "Novem Linguae," no doubt to tell us he's being impersonated. If so, we'll ban Mr. NovemL and soft-delete this thread, and hopefully that will be that.

Yeap, NovemL is a joe job. I'm the real one. Proof: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... 1193313798

All part of an evil plot to get me to register for Wikipediocracy, yes?

[Randy from Boise]

It looks like Mr. Linguae has just registered a Wikipediocracy account under the full name "Novem Linguae," no doubt to tell us he's being impersonated. If so, we'll ban Mr. NovemL and soft-delete this thread, and hopefully that will be that.

Yeap, NovemL is a joe job. I'm the real one. Proof: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... 1193313798

All part of an evil plot to get me to register for Wikipediocracy, yes?

Don't worry, we won't tell.

Welcome!

tim

[Catfish Jim & spd]

They are rejecting it for reasons which could not be more ridiculous, for example for what his username he chose.

First of all,

Second of all, I don't know if you've read The Handmaid's Tale or watched the Hulu TV series, but that name could conceivably trigger certain people — specifically, women who have been subjected to misogynist abuse.

Just to underline that the user was aware of this, Someramoth (T-C-L) complained about it here diff (Primefac's closure of the discussion). Someramoth's talk page covers the harrassment she received in return, and how she was run off the project.

[Lyallpuri]

The fact that I made thousands of edits every single day gave me the misconception that I was always in the right, that I was someone more important than others. It made me kind of blatantly arrogant and know-it-all. I didn't realize then how my actions were out of line with what Wikipedia stands for—being obsessed with the edit count.

This guy was banned (for good reasons) almost 3 years ago at a time when he had almost 1500 Edits per Day, one of the most active Editors at Wikipedia.

Although he might have been a contentious editor, his contributions to Wikipedia are undeniable remarkable. I just checked his XTools Statistics.

[rnu]

It looks like Mr. Linguae has just registered a Wikipediocracy account under the full name "Novem Linguae," no doubt to tell us he's being impersonated. If so, we'll ban Mr. NovemL and soft-delete this thread, and hopefully that will be that.

Yeap, NovemL is a joe job. I'm the real one. Proof: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... 1193313798

All part of an evil plot to get me to register for Wikipediocracy, yes?

Does verifying your identity by making an edit you are told to make establish a COI?

[rnu]

They are rejecting it for reasons which could not be more ridiculous, for example for what his username he chose.

First of all,

Second of all, I don't know if you've read The Handmaid's Tale or watched the Hulu TV series, but that name could conceivably trigger certain people — specifically, women who have been subjected to misogynist abuse.

Just to underline that the user was aware of this, Someramoth (T-C-L) complained about it here diff (Primefac's closure of the discussion). Someramoth's talk page covers the harrassment she received in return, and how she was run off the project.

Well a "respected admin" - 331dot (T-C-L) - basically gave the harassment his blessing by firing the starting shot:

Someramoth I strongly advise you to withdraw this report and leave this matter be. There are any number of explanations for this username that are not offensive. 331dot (talk) 12:22, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

The fact that Someramoth (T-C-L) was more or less threatened into apologizing tells you everything you need to know about how Wikipedia is run.
"We wish we knew why there are so few women on Wikipedia. We're doing everything we can to recruit more women. It is probably because women are less tech affine."(*) Yeah right.

* Not a quote by anyone, but just a rendering of what is usually said when the issue comes up.

[eppur si muove]

I have a feeling that the first interaction between CW and Someramoth was this diff in which CW rejects an article for creation for Vancouver Collective Against Sexual Exploitation. Somerath told CW how inappropriate it was for someone with that username to reject such an article and CW immediately reverted her.diff
ZLEA (T-C-L) leapt on the chance to bully a new user with this threat diff which should be borne in mind should that user ever apply to be an admin.

[Midsize Jake]

Does verifying your identity by making an edit you are told to make establish a COI?

I would assume so, but if we're using a less "wikicentric" definition of the term "conflict of interest," then it would probably only count if I asked them to correct errors that bother me on a personal level.

[utbc]

Does verifying your identity by making an edit you are told to make establish a COI?

I would assume so, but if we're using a less "wikicentric" definition of the term "conflict of interest," then it would probably only count if I asked them to correct errors that bother me on a personal level.

It's not COI, it's PROXYing, which is bad when you do it for a random someone and very bad when that someone is blocked/banned. MEAT and EVADE come into play. Sadly, it's not very very bad in any case because Jake will/would have asked for minor edits that the editing editor would happily assume responsibility for.