Wikiversity:Request custodian action/Archive/5

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Threads related to the Moulton affair

See: Threads relating to the Moulton affair and related issues.

I've moved out 53kb of threads relating to Moulton. The current discussion is mainly on the colloquium and the reqiests for deletion page, as we are now at the stage of clearing up in the aftermath of the affair. The request to protect his user pages is still active and has been left below. --McCormack 08:28, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Review requested on recent behavior of JWSchmidt

I'm really concerned about some things John's been doing that I've come across and/or read about lately, and I'm frankly not at all certain what should be done about it (but I strongly feel something should be done). John is one of our "founding fathers", and has played an important role in shaping Wikiversity's growth over the past 2 years, but that's what makes it such a big problem: his actions of late have been distorting that shape in a very negative way.

Over the past week or so he has done the following:

Created the sockpuppet Trout of Doubt (talk • email • contribs • stats • logs • global account) as a parody account of Salmon of Doubt (talk • email • contribs • stats • logs • global account). He says he did that only in order to rib a bit at Moulton (talk • email • contribs • stats • logs • global account), but it should be no surprise that Salmon of Doubt took offense.
Salmon of Doubt's state of being offended was unfortunately justified by an edit made this morning [1], which was beyond inappropriate given the history between these three users.
This, and the related issues that led up to the thread, is absolutely atrocious behavior.

I strongly urge some sort of formal review of this behavior, and request careful attention by all custodians to the developing situation between JWSchmidt, Moulton, and Salmon of Doubt. Our well is being poisoned. --SB_Johnny ^talk 16:56, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Before this gets out of hand: I will write them on their talk pages to meet in chat to talk about this. ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 17:43, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User talk:SB Johnny#Did you talk with JWS before writing ...: anyone is invited - let's see when people have time ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 17:50, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I really think this discussion should be on the wiki, but an irc chat would be a nice informal compliment to it. --SB_Johnny ^talk 18:13, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

JWSchmidt is online in chat now and will at least be available tomorrow also, ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 21:43, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Folks, Whether we like it or not, sometimes it is important to set the tone right even before the start of a discussion.
Johnny, It is quite clear that John Schmidt has been involved in disputes. It is possible that he has not remained cool. However, with so many edits (and possibly with much misunderstanding at many points, for people often don't realise that everybody talks differently, use different words, and take offence at completely different matters, and sometimes in opposite ways), before a complete reading, it is premature to talk about who is right/wrong/good/bad, or who exhibits "absolutely atrocious behavior". Let us focus on the fact first; opinions can come later.
Instead of using the slightly metaphoric term of "founding father", I would rather say that John Schmidt has been involved deeply with and know much about wikiversity.
I think it is more productive to talk directly to John Schmidt and also to the other wikiversitians in the dispute. They are humans, not events.Hillgentleman|Talk 18:47, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hillgentleman, this is a situation that has become a community issue, and I would not have brought it up here without thinking about it a good bit beforehand. I did talk to John briefly, and suggested that simply apologizing and moving on would be the best course in one of the situations. My impression was that he thought that was a good idea, but he went in the opposite direction this morning, so there's no sense talking one-to-one.

This is pretty serious stuff: if I were a Wikipedian looking to contribute here and saw this kind of behavior from a checkuser, I would not contribute here. If John wants to experiment with parody usernames and forced drama, he should request his rights be removed on meta and "play on a level field". --SB_Johnny ^talk 19:56, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia tends to often apply the "it's ok if you get caught doing bad if have contributed a lot of good," yet that isn't fair to someone that tries to actually do good and gets wrapped up in an act of an admin "doing bad" and subsequently being justified good by "lot of previous good contributions." It doesn't put people on an equal ground, and it's not fair to all. It's MMORPG thinking; where one can earn points and spend those points on doing bad, but still able to maintain karma. One shouldn't be able to earn points in order to do bad here on Wikiversity. It also tends to create scapegoats; where others that actually did bad will passively look good when any scapegoat is picked out of a group and forced away (leads to "outing" and "out-groups"). If one wants to truly be different than how Wikipedia has been managed, I suggest an action more aligned with recovery psychology.

To find a cure, I did a search for anything related to the topic of theatrical arts here on Wikiversity, and I found none appropriately structured into a proper hierarchy. Parody, in a collegial manner, best fits under a hierarchy of Topic:Theatrical arts as a typical collegial division. There are now a lot of resources and talk pages that have parodies left on them, and I suggest those entries be appropriately filed under Topic:Theatrical arts. If that parody material really is needed to learn or understand, then link from the non Theatrical-arts to the Theatrical arts resources. (You follow?) This recommendation here is a pill to cure the Pathological Normality Syndrome that SB Johnny has pointed out. Dzonatas 00:04, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Go to Colloquium "Civility" thread and search in page at the bottom of the thread for "Thespis". See also the reference to the "Bardic Arts" in Cerberus Rising. —Moulton 00:35, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that a review might be useful. For those who are interested I've provided some information about recent events here. --JWSchmidt 22:58, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have expressed my feelings on this situation, but just to make it clear: I believe that Moulton's and JWSchmidt's actions towards Salmon of Doubt are inappropriate. If Salmon baited them, harassed them, or anything, the only appropriate way to deal with it is to ignore it, or simply try to move on. Instead, they went on the offensive, which undermined any of their cause. This does not mean that I can see a reason for Salmon of Doubt being here besides an obvious past history between Moulton and he. I really don't know what to do. I tried to welcome Salmon into sharing his views on a situation in a page that I created that attempted to not talk about individuals nor personally attack people. However, I was criticized for being biased. I really don't know how to approach Salmon of Doubt, nor do I know if such a thing is possible. Ottava Rima 15:33, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ottava, if it were only catcalls, I could ignore it. SofD came in and began dismantling content in the Ethics Project, erasing content, archiving active talk page discussions, moving questions associated with one case to another case where the questions were irrelevant, forking pages, and otherwise making a mess. You cannot ignore it when someone comes to a construction site and begins dismantling it and hauling away the building materials. Salmon of Doubt claims he and I have "no substantial" past history on Wikipedia. I consider Salmon of Doubt to be the source of an ethical conundrum that exceeds my pay grade at ethical reasoning. Perhaps if we put our heads together, we could devise an efficacious ethical practice when dealing with the likes of a vexatious character of his caliber. —Moulton 17:31, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't realize that ethical reasoning was limited by pay grade. The Jade Knight 02:56, 11 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Alas, not all of us are in the same league as Rambam. —Moulton 09:50, 11 September 2008 (UTC).[reply]

Indeed, but does that excuse us from ethical behavior? The Jade Knight 13:39, 11 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ottava Rima: I'm puzzled by your use of the description, "went on the offensive". In your view, what is the correct response to someone who creates a user page like this? "their cause" <-- can you explain what this is? --JWSchmidt 18:37, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Returning in kind is a concept that makes me feel queasy. Ottava Rima 04:30, 12 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Me too, so I spent a long time trying to talk it out first". I do not think what I did was exactly "in kind"....it was similar, but significantly different. --JWSchmidt 21:07, 12 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. JWS did not return in kind so much as return in model (e.g. allegory, parable, parody), where the reflection is dramatically attenuated in intensity or effect, whilst preserving the recognizable structure of that which is being modeled or reflected. There is a long and historic tradition for this method which reaches it highest level of artistry and perfection in the Parables of Jesus. Alas we do not rise to that divine level of talent. (Not that it would diminish the calls for crucifying whoever had both the temerity and the talent to employ the Jesuisitic Method of Parables). —Moulton 12:22, 13 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A page of "evidence" has been posted

Upon JWSchmidt's request, an "evidence page" has been created via a collaborative effort by a few concerned users. Please review the details here: Wikiversity:Request custodian action/Review of JWSchmidt. --SB_Johnny ^talk 23:08, 14 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It is false to claim that this is what I requested. I asked you and others to talk to me, you refused to talk to me. --JWSchmidt 16:30, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Page size warning

Some of my social psychology (psychology) students have been concerned by receiving page size warnings on their user pages, i.e., "WARNING: This page is 35 kilobytes long; some browsers may have problems editing pages approaching or longer than 32kb. Please consider breaking the page into smaller sections.". I've assured them that its no big deal, just keep going, and also suggested subpages and transclusion as options. Does it matter? Do we need this warning? It is confusing for newcomers and if its not really relevant, then how can we remove or increase the limit? -- Jtneill - Talk - c 01:26, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Some web browsers impose a maximum limit on how much text can be edited or contained in text boxes/fields. These limitations aren't something that can be removed or increased by Wikiversity. This warning can also be a hint that the page might be slow to load for dial up users. I think using smaller pages is the way to go. Providing both smaller pages and an all-in-one page can be helpful for both broadband and dial up users, and users using different web browsers. As you probably already know/figured the all-in-one page can be done through making use of transclusion. --dark

lama 02:41, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks DarkLama, appreciate as always your quick responses - out of curiousity - do you know which browsers have this problem? I realise also you're reminding of the dialup speed issue which is independent of browser. But, I guess I'm wondering also then whether the message is customisable perhaps to be more user-friendly, e.g., with a link to a page with some suggestions and how-tos. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 03:01, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Which browsers may be affected: see Wikipedia:Browser page size limits#Web browsers which have problems with long articles.

The local message for this wiki is here: MediaWiki:Longpagewarning ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 18:04, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Erkan. From the 1st link you provided (Wikipedia:Browser page size limits#Web browsers which have problems with long articles), I get the impression that perhaps the browsers affected by editing over 35kb are rather antiquated and not much used, i.e., in practice I'm wondering how often would the warning actually be relevant in terms of browser limitations. The dial-up/speed issue I suspect is more relevant. I don't really have an agenda here other than to wonder whether we have a legacy warning which is increasingly less relevant and unnecessary. I also tried the local message link. It doesn't look editable to a custodian, so perhaps it requires a bureaucrat. I haven't got to the point of suggesting new wording, but it seems this could be possible? -- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:30, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

New wording: yes, why not ? We could have a look how other wikis did this (also at the talk page of the mediawiki message there). Would you mind asking the students who saw the msg what their initial reaction was ? So we can also express this in the message. I can edit the message btw. ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 17:14, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Erkan (I mostly got email from User:Jenny O (but also see on her talk page: User talk:Jenny O#Re: Advice on page overload) who was genuinely concerned about the warning for her user page - she is good at raising appropriate questions that other students tend to keep quiet about (or not notice); Darklama has since worked some "usability" magic at: MediaWiki:Longpagewarning which I think is spot on in terms of being informative and user-friendly. The surrounding box, though, in Firefox, cuts into the text? Also, the page now appears as editable to me. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 22:59, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Large pages can be very slow to load for those who can not afford a modern, fast computer and it is desirable to make our content available to all. There is also the issue of limited mobile devices. Large pages can crash a browswer running on a cell phone. --mikeu ^talk 17:20, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Change protection level for User:Moulton user page

I was about to unilaterally protect Moulton's user page per the current Jimbo edit but changed my mind. My intention was to protect the page from further disruption, and to protect the community from further disruption in relation to it. I have checked Jimbo's edit and I have found nothing on there that could be damaging to Moulton, so there cannot be a criticism that an "unfair" version would be protected. However, I thought it would be best to bring it before the community and have some agreement on this action. I believe it would be best that there will be no possibility to fight over the content of this page while Moulton is blocked. However, I would like to know what others thought, and have all intention respecting what the community agrees on upon this matter. Ottava Rima (talk) 05:23, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree to protect this page. I also agree that I'd like to see at least one bureaucrat agree on this as well before we actually do it - i.e. gather a little more consensus first. Moulton is not going to use his user pages constructively. --McCormack 07:57, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Would this stop him from engaging in your project, then? The Jade Knight 09:33, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No, he can still edit his talk page as long as the talk page isn't also protected (oddly enough, he can't edit his own userpage while he's blocked). If Moulton wants it protected, I say absolutely. --SB_Johnny ^talk 10:06, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
With the current situation it's probably best to have Moulton's pages fully protected from editing, though with his talkpage we should leave it un-protected so that users could still speak to him, at least by doing that Moulton will be able to respond to any Custodian questions. DarkMage 10:17, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here are User:Moulton's concerns about his userpage (copied from [2] by --mikeu ^talk 04:24, 17 September 2008 (UTC))[reply]

A vandal has tampered with the biographical sketch on User:Moulton. I am the author of that biographical sketch, which sets forth my bona fides in academia. Unapproved edits which distort my credentials have a corrosive and corrupting influence on the integrity of academic records which other scholars rely on to familiarize themselves with the background, interests, and publications of their fellow scholars.

If it becomes necessary to protect the User:Moulton page from continued vandalism and unauthorized tampering, then I request that the protected version be one that I have approved as authentic, accurate, and germane to my participation here. At this time, this version is most appropriate.

Moulton 04:16, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Unless there are any concerns or negations, after 12 hours (16:23, 16 September 2008 (UTC)), can we have a Bureaucrat protect Moulton's user page (and only user page for this time being). Thank you. Ottava Rima (talk) 16:23, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Y Done But, Moulton's request above should be discussed. He should be given the opportunity to request changes or to ask that the page be blanked if he does not feel that it adequately represents him. --mikeu ^talk 04:33, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Recent changes to Moulton's talk page

Note: User:Centaur of attention is now blocked. --mikeu ^talk 12:17, 18 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

After Moulton was blocked, I asked for community consensus to set Moulton down a series of tasks to focus on definitions and policies in abstract ways. This cannot be construed as "an attack" nor could it be construed as anything but trying to guide Moulton to craft arguments and topics without attacking others.

User:Centaur of attention deleted the task here. This was a task deemed acceptable by many custodians, regular users of this project, and even those who Moulton has had disagreements with in the past. It is also to allow a trial set up of a possible Peer Review process.

I do not see what justifications there can be for such a thing. Nor do I understand what justifications there can be to deleting the link to Moulton's archives. Perhaps this is a mistake on Centaur of attention's part. However, Centaur of attention has also unilaterally decided to blank many pages instead of waiting for the community's deletion process to finalize. I have not found a contribution by this user except to perpetuate such a thing.

I would recommend at this time that this user is blocked for a period of 36 hours, based on not knowing when this user is active during the day, so that they are prevented from continuing this deletion cycle during this time. If they continue, I would ask that this user is blocked until they recognize the harm that can come from blanking topics while labeling them "trolling" or "attacks", which is one of the definitions of vandalism on Wikipedia.

I wish that it would not come down to this, but I have not seen anything from this user that has shown awareness to the possible trouble that could come from blanking many pages while relying on such summaries. Ottava Rima (talk) 20:46, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User:Centaur of attention is in a long-running argument with Mouton. Jimbo's intervention at Wikiversity has made CoA bold. I'm not sure this is the time to get into a major fight over the methods of CoA. I reversed CoA's unilateral blanking of one page that I believe does not fall under Jimbo's directive. Lets take this one page at a time and keep CoA in the loop. --JWSchmidt 20:54, 16 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am inclined to agree with Ottava that Centaur needs to stop blanking pages without prior discussion. I think a short block would be appropriate if he continues. --mikeu ^talk 00:11, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This edit here needs to be considered. I thought for awhile about what to do after it was posted, and I dismissed several options. I figure there is one of two conclusion each one can come to: 1) I acted in bad-faith, or 2) I'm being threatened. Please, I ask those here to decide. Dzonatas 00:23, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If he blanks the page again, I would support a short block on Centaur of Attention. The Jade Knight 06:36, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I left a warning. I suggest he be blocked 2 weeks if he does this again, to allow the community time to discuss. --SB_Johnny ^talk 10:05, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Was Jimbo justified, or fair, in warning me for reverting the very same user who's now on warning himself? Dtobias 12:03, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, Centaur has two types of reverts - those that deal with Moulton's personal blog, and those that don't. I think Jimbo (in warning you) was mostly concerned with the first type (but that is not to say that he isn't further concerned about other pages in addition to those that have a link to his blog). Ottava Rima (talk) 13:28, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Removal of JWSchmidt's custodian status

With great regret, we inform the community that a decision has been taken to remove checkuser and custodian status from JWSchmidt. This decision was taken after consultations at many levels of the community and the foundation, and we feel this to be in the best interests of Wikiversity at this time. In particular, we intensely regret that it was not possible to more closely involve the community as a whole, but we felt that the issue was already damaging the community so profoundly that we had to act quickly to minimize further community damage. This decision can, in any case, be reversed by the community at a later date if JWSchmidt decides to stand again for office and is successfully elected. The reasons can be found in full detail in the review, posted for community discussion several days ago. This decision was taken in concert by three bureaucrats (SB_Johnny, Mu301, and Cormaggio) in consultation with the fourth (Sebmol) and with the support of Jimmy Wales, and was implemented after approval by a Wikimedia steward.

In coming to this decision, we took into account JWSchmidt's willingness to apologize for his actions, but we also saw a failure on his part to change his behaviour, evidenced almost immediately by his return to teamwork with Moulton and encouraging Moulton to transfer his "work" to beta.wikiversity.org, a project which was already under threat of closure and where Moulton's activities would have been even more harmful.

At the same time we would like to pay tribute to some of JWSchmidt's positive contributions to Wikiversity, including:

Helping formulate, define, shape, and set up the project during 2005 and 2006.
Prompt and thorough action against vandals.
Unwavering support of an experimental vision of Wikiversity's educational potential
Creation of a rich variety of multimedia resources to encourage different types of learners

As a part of the same set of decisions regarding JWSchmidt and Moulton, we also wish to state categorically that the recent "learning projects" on Wikimedia users and other Wikimedia projects do not, in their current form, fall within the scope of Wikiversity's mission, and do not represent the level of scholarly ethics that all Wikiversity projects should adhere to. We therefore strongly recommend a moratorium on such projects until the community has ample time to discuss how best to proceed with projects of this nature.

We owe the community a more detailed explanation of the decision-making processes. In the first of the two Moulton-crises (July 2008), a deliberate decision was taken at Wikiversity to try to accommodate Moulton and steer him towards positive community involvement. This approach was painful and exceptionally time-consuming for those who dealt with Moulton at the time, but the approach seemed to be working at the end of July and beginning of August. During August, JWSchmidt became involved with Moulton and we quickly escalated into the second and more serious "Moulton-crisis". Internally, the JWSchmidt side of this crisis was very much more serious than the Moulton side and led to a near-breakdown of internal communication and "management". When Jimmy Wales blocked Moulton, we saw this as a solution for one side of the case, but not sufficiently dealing with the full range of problems Wikiversity has been facing, particularly in the past month.

It has been an extremely difficult for us to address the issues because our time is limited. Wikiversity is very important to us, but our time is limited because we have jobs, families and other pressing real-world commitments which limit our ability to give as much time as we would like. It is also particularly difficult to go up against one of our own co-founders, who we all love and respect. It is a challenge to our principles at Wikiversity, where we have always deliberately set out to be the most tolerant Wikimedia project. After much thought and consultation, it has become clear to us that our community is still simply too small to absorb this kind of behaviour, and that we had to take assertive action to prevent the situation from devolving any further. We regret that our hesitation to act has allowed things to worsen, but it is not in our natures to take these measures.

We hope that this goes towards explaining to the community any perceived shortcomings and inconsistencies in our actions, but we invite community discussion and reflection at this difficult time. We are confident that this community can and will rebuild an environment in which Wikiversity and its many ideals and visions can grow and flourish. We urge the community to help ensure that an action such as this will never be repeated, which we can do by developing and clarifying our policies, guidelines, and management structures. We also hope that JWSchmidt will eventually find a mentor and join us again as a member of our staff. (The preceding unsigned comment was added by SB Johnny (talk • contribs) 21:29, 19 September 2008.)

JW is currently indefinitely blocked - pending clarification of some guidelines? (I think) - I've dropped a note off on his talk page. I'm scrambling to get up to speed with goings on, but just in general would like to ask, for the sake of a healthy community, that discussion move 'on-wiki'... please! :-) Privatemusings 22:46, 19 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why is JWSchmidt blocked? I would like to see him unblocked as quickly as possible. The Jade Knight 02:16, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We see JWS's block as a temporary measure, in order to provide some breathing space for participation from the wider community, and to gauge consensus for the issues that have been raised during this period. We see these issues as centred around 1) user behaviour (civility, and related guidelines), 2) permitted scope and type of Wikiversity learning projects, and 3) site governance. We would like to open a community discussion around these themes, in which we want to use the recent past as an opportunity to collectively define what we are about as a community, and how we deal with community issues. This latter point relates directly to the third theme - governance - about which none of us feel has been ideally managed. If we can use this experience to build a more robust set of policies and guidelines, we can hopefully ensure that we will never have to go through such an experience again.

John's ban from the irc channel will be lifted, under the condition that he does his part to maintain a congenial and constructive atmosphere on the channel. We further ask that any discussion of the "problems of Wikipedia" take place on another channel (apparently there is a channel called #Moulton which has been used for this purpose). He may be kicked or banned without prior warning by any op if these conditions are not met.

John's block on the wiki will be maintained until the community has time to reach at least provisional consensus on policies and guidelines that can be relied upon to help prevent the problems that led up to this situation. These should include at least the following:

Wikiversity:Respect people, Wikiversity:Privacy policy, and Wikiversity:Civility (and possible ammendments) -- these need to be shored up to prevent further outbursts.
Wikiversity:Appropriate Venues -- needs a lot of modification, but the idea is that main namespace content pages and Wikiversity namespace community discussion pages should not be used as part of a dispute resolution tactic.

Other discussions we should have as soon as possible include these (but might be fine to do after an unblock):

Wikiversity:IRC guidelines
Deletion and blocking policies, and perhaps formal dispute resolution protocols

--SB_Johnny ^talk 12:51, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Johnny, What do you mean by "governance"? 119.14.25.196 13:48, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Essentially: when to say "stop" and "no", and when to take measures to enforce that. --SB_Johnny ^talk 14:10, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, "governance" refers to how Wikiversity is managed. Decisions in a wiki are usually taken by consensus - but what we've seen here is action taken by Jimbo, and then the bureaucrats (myself included), when it had not been explicitly consensually agreed by the community. This is not, usually, the "wiki way". So a focus on governance would be a focus on the role of bureaucrats in these actions, in an attempt to ensure that future actions happen in as wiki-like a way as possible. Cormaggio ^talk 09:41, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Governance requires carefully crafted continuous and proportional measures to regulate a dynamic system. Harsh and abrupt measures are a contra-indicated practice, long deprecated and eschewed in the secular, mathematical, and theological literature dating back some 3500 years. —Barsoom Tork 12:09, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Update on IRC channel status: After careful review of and much debate over what has been going on on our main irc channel (#wikiversity-en), we have decided that both JWSchmidt and Moulton will be banned from that channel until next Saturday in the hopes of holding constructive discussions and beginning the process of restoring Wikiversity to its normal functioning. Both JWSchmidt and Moulton are welcome to use #wikiversity-en-projects to discuss the future of the ethics project and any spin-off learning projects. This is by unanimous consent of the 'crats. --SB_Johnny ^talk 18:33, 21 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Binding, gagging, and kicking scholars is hardly a civil or professional way to treat fellow scholars. It only compounds the problems. —Albatross 12:09, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Let's bring this up at Wikiversity:Unblocking or Wikiversity:Blocking, or wherever those redirect to. Emesee 05:37, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Moulton's talk page protection

I've added a review about Moulton's posting of personal information at Wikiversity:Request custodian action/Moulton's talk page. Please read and comment. Cormaggio ^talk 19:19, 23 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ranges

Verizon Boston DSL is 141.154.42.0 - 141.154.87.255 and 68.160.128.0 - 68.160.191.255 You can block that with

141.154.42.0/ 23
141.154.44.0/ 22
141.154.48.0/ 20
141.154.64.0/ 20
141.154.80.0/ 21
68.160.128.0/ 18

Blocks should be anon-only talk page OK. Salmon of Doubt 15:18, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Outing

I am disturbed to read that Wikiversity, the most "tolerant" of Wikimedia Foundation projects, is subject to fiat from on high. Who exactly is "tolerant" here? I guess I am, if I put up with such authoritarianism.

I am still more disturbed to read that chronic "outing" was going on here, without appropriate response from this community. That is utterly, totally unacceptable. I can only conclude that fiat, however anti-wiki, was necessary. The problem with outing is not only revealing what is true but that the outed person did not wish to reveal; the problem is also "revealing" lies. A community that would permit pseudonymy simply cannot allow outing. A pseudonymous person cannot defend against such outing except by self-outing. --Una Smith 05:05, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please be aware that "Montana Mouse", a.k.a. Moulton, is the one who has been blamed for doing the "outing". He is currently blocked, but has chosen to disrespect the block (you'll notice he's posting from an anonymous IP—he uses several).

I think many of us dislike Wales' decision to get involved in this case, though many individuals apparently felt it was necessary. I am not an administrator, and there's little I can do about this other than talk. There was major disruption (and "tension", as some have called it) in the Wikiversity community which reached a sort of boiling point, I suppose. The Jade Knight ^(d'viser) 06:35, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Una, I'm relatively new here, but I think a lot of what's going on relates more to some internal issues. Some of the people have been a bit idealistic, and Moulton took advantage of that. Outing, on the other hand, has been oversighted when attempted here, in my experience. I agree that it's very unethical to "out" anyone in a community that allows pseudonyms.

As for Moulton's above post, don't worry. He just tries to turn things around on anyone who makes any comments about him that he can't refute. Sχeptomaniac^{χαιρετε} 06:03, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Moulton, as 68.160.135.134 (talk • email • contribs • stats • logs • global account) continues to try to out people, see his recent edit summaries. His anonymous sockpuppetry to evade his indefinite block belies any claim he makes about participating here in good faith and respecting the community. The lack of response from Wikiversity admins is sadly predictable and is what led to Jimbo be forced to taken action to reign him in the first place. 71.202.65.147 16:02, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also, here's some more of his anonymous sockpuppet accounts: 68.162.240.191 (talk • email • contribs • stats • logs • global account) 68.160.173.250 (talk • email • contribs • stats • logs • global account). He's been also signing his comments as "Caprice", "Albatross", "Barsoom Tork", etc. to throw people off. 71.202.65.147 16:08, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

He's now editing as Original Spin. Salmon of Doubt 01:12, 8 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note: Wikiversity quickly removed any personal information. Wales blocked moulton for other reasons. --Hillgentleman | //\\ |Talk 10:09, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

True, but it was taking a lot of time and effort to keep track of his posts, because as many times as he was told not to do that, he continued to do so. --SB_Johnny ^talk 12:19, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Censorship

Emesee has been removing all sorts of comments relating to his recent behavior here. Please see this, and then review the edit history of Wikiversity:Community Review; it seems impossible to engage in any sort of discussion over there while Emesee is constantly removing comments. The Jade Knight ^(d'viser) 07:52, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you would be civil about your dialogue and just post facts with out attached opinions then it might seem a bit more balanced and fair. Emesee 07:55, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Appreciate you letting this post stand, Emesee. I'd really like the community to get to see what's been going on. The Jade Knight ^(d'viser) 07:58, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Initial Resignation

I have become aware that Emesee resigned his sysop bit, and then withdrew the resignation. Geo.plrd 08:33, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Emesee requested removal of all flags on his accounts, and asked not to be flagged CU. Then he reverted the request. Stewards then removed admin access for account User:Emesee and put his CU request on hold. Please note that his User:Remi and User:Remi0o accounts are still active as custodian. --mikeu ^talk 10:07, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Page history merging

If anyone remembers how to do a history merging, could you merge Topic:Electronic engineering with School:Electronics. I was trying to clean up redirects and thought I deleted the wrong thing. Turns out, I didn't. What happened was someone decided to copy and paste entries over instead of moving. So, before the one page is deleted the history should be merged over. Gah. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:06, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Erm... the histories should be merged to School:Electronics, right? And what about the talk pages? – Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 17:20, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I never figured out the history merging process so I wouldn't know the details. However, the redirect page (Topic) contains the first history of the current page (School). I never checked the talk pages, but I would assume so. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:37, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

OK, well I've merged the content pages. But we now have Topic talk:Electronic engineering and School talk:Electronics which I guess should be merged too? Someone familiar with the content of the talk pages should probably do that (& I can do a history merge on that once it's done). – Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 18:45, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I want to upload a photo to my wiki page

Please tell me how and can i do this;)Thank you.You can post me at User:Lilia or at my e-mail: kudjooo@abv.bg .Thanx in advance;)

Image deletion

deletion of Image:Wikipedia-logo.png existing in Commons.Crochet.david 16:32, 4 November 2008 (UTC) Y Done --mikeu ^talk 17:02, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Unified login

JoliePA is the unified account of Jason O; whom has been active here for two months+ as Jolie. I have decided that it is easier to maintain a JoliePA account on wikiversity than to continue to change 'identities' everytime I go to wikibooks.

I would have gladly unified jolie, if I could but apparently somewhere in the wikimedia foundation someone else is using that username (jolie).

so thus the odd notice that I am a sock puppoet of mascotguy is incorrect. I will immediately log in as Jolie and confirm this notice. apologies if I'm putting this in the wrong place.--JoliePA 14:58, 13 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am confirming that I just wrote this moments before as the user JoliePA. since JoliePA is a unified account I would like to use exclusively. --Jolie 15:00, 13 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Right so I guess I will be Jolie for the day (at least here on wv). I've been having alot of computer problems and that has apparently raised red flags. --208.15.226.2 15:06, 13 November 2008 (UTC)..--Jolie 15:09, 13 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well now I'm (Jolie) have been told I am a suspected sock puppet of mascotguy as well this is bizarre! and who is Kewpie5000, anyway?--Jolie 15:55, 13 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Kewpie5000 indefblocked, reverted, and most of his pages deleted. Sorry Jolie... I'm sure it's nothing personal (he's just a plain ol' vandal, being silly). A few more "faux userpages" still need deleting, see Special:Contributions/Kewpie_5000 (gotta run!) --SB_Johnny ^talk 16:13, 13 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

delete and protect

Storyboard Artwork Project/w/wiki/Talk:Storyboard Artwork Project/ - delete and protect works now? — Preceding unsigned comment added by emesee (talk • contribs)

Moved from colloquium, deleting. --SB_Johnny ^talk 11:54, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The spambot gets cleverer. Or stupider, depending on one's POV. – Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 05:24, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

They haven't been active here for a long time, actually. --SB_Johnny ^talk 12:16, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that was the point of my comment. They had been stopped effectively on all Wikimedia wikis, Wikia wikis, and a good portion of the third-party wikis running MediaWiki. Updates needed... *adds to to-do list* – Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 07:14, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Rename request

Hi, I havent found a desk of bearoucrats so asking here. I would like to request to rename me from Juan to Juandev. I have found out, that under the name Juan would be difficult to SUL me. I also use the alternative name Juan de Vojníkov, but that one is with diactritics. Dont know how much edits I have - tool server is of. Thanks.--Juan 08:23, 31 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Done --SB_Johnny ^talk 09:59, 31 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks.--Juandev 21:46, 31 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]