User talk:JzG

Note to admins reviewing any of my admin actions (expand to read).

I am often busy in that "real life" of which you may have read. Blocks are the most serious things we can do: they prevent users from interacting with Wikipedia. Block reviews are urgent. Unless I say otherwise in the block message on the user's talk page, I am happy for any uninvolved admin to unblock a user I have blocked, provided that there is good evidence that the problem that caused the block will not be repeated. All I ask is that you leave a courtesy note here and/or on WP:ANI, and that you are open to re-blocking if I believe the problem is not resolved - in other words, you can undo the block, but if I strongly feel that the issue is still live, you re-block and we take it to the admin boards. The same applies in spades to blocks with talk page access revoked. You are free to restore talk page access of a user for whom I have revoked it, unless it's been imposed or restored following debate on the admin boards. User:DGG also has my permission to undelete or unprotect any article I have deleted and/or salted, with the same request to leave a courtesy note, and I'll rarely complain if any uninvolved admin does this either, but there's usually much less urgency about an undeletion so I would prefer to discuss it first - or ask DGG, two heads are always better than one. I may well add others in time, DGG is just one person with whom I frequently interact whose judgment I trust implicitly. Any WP:BLP issue which requires you to undo an admin action of mine, go right ahead, but please post it immediately on WP:AN or WP:ANI for review. The usual definition of uninvolved applies: you're not currently in an argument with me, you're not part of the original dispute or an editor of the affected article... you know. Apply WP:CLUE. Guy (Help!) 20:55, 11 April 2014 (UTC)

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This user is an administrator on the English Wikipedia. (verify)

This user has been editing Wikipedia for more than ten years.

This editor is a Looshpah Laureate of the Encyclopedia and is entitled to display this Book of All Knowledge with Secret Appendix, Errata Sheet, and Author's Signature.

This user is one of the 800 most active English Wikipedians of all time.

This user is a
Rouge admin.

This user has been on Wikipedia for 20 years, 3 months, and 4 days.

This user has been an admin for
18 years, 10 months, and 7 days.

This user resists the POV pushing of lunatic charlatans.

This user believes WP:AGF is not a suicide pact.

• In science, any compromise between a correct statement and a wrong statement is a wrong statement. Thanks, user:Stephan Schulz.
• My activity level is 53mKo (milli-Koavfs).
• Sad now. Special:Contributions/Geogre.
• My Last.fm profile
• vGuyUK on Twitter | SceptiGuy on Twitter

You can sway a thousand men by appealing to their prejudices quicker than you can convince one man by logic.

— - Robert A. Heinlein

Obligatory disclaimer

I work for Dell Computer but nothing I say or do here is said or done on behalf of Dell. You knew that, right?

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About me

JzG reacting to yet another drama

I am in my early fifties, British, have been married for over quarter of a century to the world's most tolerant woman, and have two adult children. I am an amateur baritone and professional nerd. I do not tolerate racism, or any kind of bigotry. I sometimes, to my chagrin, mention that I have been an admin for a long time: some people think this is me invoking admin status in order to subdue dissent, actually it's just me as a middle aged parent of young adults saying "oh no, not this shit again". I am British, I have the British sense of humour (correctly spelled) and I absolutely do not have an accent, since I went to a thousand-year-old school. Everything I do or say could be wrong. I try always to be open to that possibility. If you think I am wrong, please just talk to me nicely, and it can all be sorted out like grown-ups. Guy (Help!) 23:49, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

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RfC and other closes

I am am making a good faith best efforts attempt to close backlogged RfCs and other debates from Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Requests for closure. These are mainly backlogged because there is no obvious consensus, so any close will undoubtedly annoy someone. I invite review of any such close on WP:ANI, where there are many more watchers than my talk page. I am happy to provide clarification of anything either here or on ANI, please ping me if it's at ANI - that exempts you from the ANI notice, IMO, and I prefer a ping to a talk page notice as the latter tends to spread discussion to multiple venues, which is a nightmare. Feel free to use "email this user" if I am not responding to a request (but remember I live in UTC, soon to be UTC-1). Guy (Help!) 23:29, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

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Yes

You are spot on here.

Unfortunately it seems there's a lot of WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT going around with regard to what is and is not WP:RS in that arena.

Good job, and good luck,

— Cirt (talk) 16:36, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Perhaps also consider the amount of weight given to Conspiracy theories at the much larger article, the WP:GA rated page, September 11 attacks. — Cirt (talk) 17:05, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

There we have the benefit of historical perspective. I am confident that in ten years time - if "clockgate" is remembered at all - the racists will get a bad press overall. Guy (Help!) 17:09, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Perhaps, I mean I haven't look into the talk page history at September 11 attacks -- but there were probably some interesting back-and-forth to successfully keep out the batshit-crazy stuff, right? — Cirt (talk) 19:13, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Many. These articles were worse than e-cigs, GMOs and global warming put together, back in the day. Guy (Help!) 22:22, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Yup...and thanks to assholes like me and many other editors (who aren't assholes like DHeyward, Tom harrison, JzG and Acroterion to name a few), CT batshit-crazy stuff in 9/11 articles is virtually zero.--MONGO 17:10, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Crop circle wibble

It was an ignorant comment made somewhat aggressively by an IP user, but none of those are reasons to immediately WP:REFACTOR a comment away, least of all by hatting it equally aggressively as "wibble" and then re-hatting and archiving it when another editor objected to you doing so. --McGeddon (talk) 10:48, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

It is entirely worthless to the improvement of the article. Some random IP wandering past and bitching that we still follow reality-based sources is a thing we can and should ignore. I have no idea why you would want to give any prominence to the ravings of cranks. Guy (Help!) 10:51, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

No objection to someone like the "saucer nests" guy being hatted, but this IP was laying out a clear objection to the fact that the scientific consensus for hoaxing was sourced only to Skepdic. There was some wibbly posturing around it (which made me ignore it as the old "ahh, only 'most' scientists, so there is not a consensus!" thing at first glance), but it's a fair question. If we can swap in a stronger source, that improves the article, informs our readers and reduces the scope for future wibbling; if no stronger sources exist, we can explain WP:PARITY and have a useful archive thread to point at next time. --McGeddon (talk) 11:19, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Clear, but specious, and non-actionable, and clearly stated from under a tinfoil hat. Guy (Help!) 11:28, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Okay, and now you're repeatedly rehatting it with your "wibble" jibe in the archives despite WP:REFACTOR's clear "If another editor objects to refactoring then the changes should be reverted." Even if you are genuinely baffled by me disagreeing with your refactoring, it should stay unrefactored. --McGeddon (talk) 17:32, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Why on earth would you want to preserve that tinfoil hattery? I find your attitude to this worthless trolling comment to be utterly inexplicable. Guy (Help!) 18:28, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Like I say above, despite being wrapped in tinfoil it suggested a reasonable and actionable question - why are we quoting Skepdic when mainstream sources presumably say the same thing? (I replaced it with a simple BBC source very easily.)

Shunting a tinfoil-phrased post to archives and mockingly hatting it as "wibble" might successfully scare off a lone, irredeemable troll who would otherwise have wasted our time by arguing the toss but taken it no further. But doing the same to anybody either side of that - a potentially productive editor who was arriving at Wikipedia in the wrong tone of voice, or a rabid loon who is even now writing a 5000-word blog post about their proof that the Wikipedia Skeptic Cabal shuts down and conceals legitimate questions - can only harm the project. --McGeddon (talk) 10:53, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Why?

I just don't get it. Each time I try to clear the detritus out of the fountain, you come rollerskating down the sidewalk and dump another pile of fresh-raked leaves right back in. Please - upload a bit of audio of one of your best performances so we can be happy again. I've got too much freaking work to do to waste time toasting stale bread. My time on WP is far more pleasant when I'm not forced to butt heads with those I truly do like and admire but the sentiment is beginning to wane. I don't want that to happen any more than you do, so do us both a favor and save the hogwash for the hogs. Atsme^📞📧 21:16, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Heh! You are, I think, missing the point. In arbitration cases you get some people who claim that user X is the spawn of Satan, some people claiming that they are Mother Teresa and Gandhi rolled into one, and some people who say, yes, this person has some issues, and a strong POV, but it is not material to this case and here's why. I think you need to be removed from that case. Arbitration cases are bruising and horrible for the parties, and frankly I don't think you need or deserve this one which will be particularly long and full of angry mastodons. As I have said before, I like you. I don't think much of your mate DrChrissy, but that's another matter. Guy (Help!) 15:46, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

"Mate"?...followed by a big Scooby Doo "Huh?" [1] The translation for mate in American English is the same as what biologists consider them. Where humans are concerned, a mate is thought of as one's significant other. While I think DrChrissy is a delightful person, (1) we've never met and (2) our purposeful interactions on WP are/have been limited to TP fun-puns via text, some collaborative editing on a few animal articles, and some random intersecting at the occasional AN/I and/or RfC. Just want to make that very clear. I'm not sure if you realize it but some of your innuendos (well intentioned or not) can be far more damaging to my reputation than any case at ArbCom. Merciful Minerva!! 🙀 Atsme^📞📧 18:00, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

See the notice at the top re British English. Guy (Help!) 20:58, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Cereologists

I put something on the talk page of Crop circle for the matter. -- Andrewaskew (talk) 23:12, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Edit counts

Earlier at ArbCom you mentioned it would be nice to have a list of edit counts to measure involvement. I put together some tables here. I'm not 100% sure if or how I'll be including it yet, but I won't be getting my evidence section up until this weekend probably. Feel free to reference it in the meantime though or let me know if you think anything should be changed/added that could potentially be useful. Kingofaces43 (talk) 06:32, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Great stuff, thanks. That is quite illuminating. Guy (Help!) 15:43, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Guy, what did you use to illuminate? A flashlight? . Great work, KOA - thank you for devoting the time to get that done. It should prove extremely helpful for those of us with overpopulated memories that lack any semblance of organization. Atsme^📞📧 18:28, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

What topic ban?

What topic ban are you referring to in your comment? --DHeyward (talk) 16:17, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Closure of Administrator's Noticeboard request

I note that you closed my request on the Administrator's Noticeboard.

With respect, this closure may have been technically correct according to the rules- and the request may have been better placed elsewhere- but it wasn't particularly helpful.

I'd noticed vast amounts of what (in all probability) was misinformation and/or nonsense vandalism being added to several articles and was looking for a way to track down and fix it myself, or have someone better-placed do it.

You closed the request because it the vandalism wasn't ongoing right now. Unfortunately, this doesn't remove the drivel that's already likely been added to several articles. It's clear that some of the vandalising edits had been there for a long time and had become "baked in", i.e. become a part of the article with less chance of being spotted, and harder to remove as subsequent changes were built around them in the intervening months.

Given that the vandalism mentioned above took place over many months, it's quite possible that this will be ongoing in future. Given the use of dynamic IPs, it makes tracing all edits to all articles carried out by this person manually tedious and slow, especially since- as I mentioned- subsequent edits have been made that reduce the possibility of simple reversion without destroying legitimate content by others.

I'd hoped that I'd either receive some helpful suggestions (tools, techniques) to combat this, or that administrators might have access to tools or powers that made this task easier for you than for me. Instead, I got no real acknowledgement of the problem I was trying to fix, nor any attempt to provide some pointers before the request was closed. This was disappointing.

Ubcule (talk) 18:05, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

I appreciate your point - I would suggest you repost to WP:COIN. This does not require admin action (and a non-admin may have better tools for helping). ANI is a drama pit and best suited to straightforward things - we could semiprotect or block, but we don't do cleanup, really, at least not from ANI. Guy (Help!) 18:26, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your response; as I said, I wasn't 100% sure that ANI was the ideal place for it- though I did search elsewhere beforehand- but I'd assumed someone would say "thanks, but that question would be more appropriately asked (wherever)" if it wasn't.

I'm not clear why it belongs on COIN though, as I can't see the clear-cut "Conflict of Interest" that would suggest it goes there..? Ubcule (talk) 18:39, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

That's just one place I go to find editors adept at rolling back large-scale twaddle. Guy (Help!) 18:41, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the info. I'll take a look at that when I have time. All the best! Ubcule (talk) 20:21, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Evidence size

If I give you an extension to 1000 words, would you be able to cut 300 words to get down to it? --Guerillero | Parlez Moi 18:19, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

I will have a go, sure. I can move some to Workshop, perhaps. Guy (Help!) 18:24, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

BLP discretionary sanctions

This message contains important information about an administrative situation on Wikipedia. It does not imply any misconduct regarding your own contributions to date.

Please carefully read this information:

The Arbitration Committee has authorised discretionary sanctions to be used for pages regarding living or recently deceased people, and edits relating to the subject (living or recently deceased) of such biographical articles, a topic which you have edited. The Committee's decision is here.

Discretionary sanctions is a system of conduct regulation designed to minimize disruption to controversial topics. This means uninvolved administrators can impose sanctions for edits relating to the topic that do not adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, our standards of behavior, or relevant policies. Administrators may impose sanctions such as editing restrictions, bans, or blocks. This message is to notify you sanctions are authorised for the topic you are editing. Before continuing to edit this topic, please familiarise yourself with the discretionary sanctions system. Don't hesitate to contact me or another editor if you have any questions.

Template:Z33Brustopher (talk) 20:21, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Mate, I wrote the standard response to BLP subjects at OTRS and I was fighting to protect BLPs before WP:BLP was even written. Please don't treat me like some clueless n00b. Guy (Help!) 20:30, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

I'm not treating you as a hopeless noob. You need to notify someone of sanctions if you intend to bring them to WP:AE. Given your current actions (the whole implying Hari is a serial liar, who's trumped up claims of harassment against herself), I believe this is an option which needs to be kept open. Brustopher (talk) 20:41, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

And now you are putting words into my mouth. Hari's problem is that she apparently believes her own PR: I am certain she sincerely believes she has been harassed, just as she sincerely believed when she wriote her article on air travel that aircraft cabins were pressurised to greater than sea level pressure. There is an enormous difference between being confident in your belief about something, and that thing being true. It would be vastly more compelling if she were simply to acknowledge her gaffes, correct them and move on. My biggest problem with people like Hari is that they abuse the results of science (chemical analysis, careful tests of toxicity and so on), using them to confer apparent legitimacy on their statements, but they entirely lack the essential scientific attribute of being prepared to admit when you're wrong. I am an engineer not a scientist, but I try really hard to swallow my pride and admit when I'm wrong. When pride is pretty much your brand, that's a lot more difficult, but it's also a lot more important. Guy (Help!) 20:56, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Apologies, for some reason I thought "trumped up" meant exaggerated as opposed to fabricated. Bad wording on my part. Brustopher (talk) 23:15, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

It's all good. I am confident we will come to a point of violent agreement in the end, or at least grudging mutual respect. Your determination to be fair does you credit, and I freely acknowledge that I have no time for vainglorious promoters of claptrap, so the angels are probably more on your side than mine. Guy (Help!) 23:19, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

I have to say I do like this gritted teeth violent agreement idea. But I seriously need to stop getting so easily outraged over Wikipedia stuff, and dial down the jerkiness a bit. To clarify, I don't think anyone's up to any foul play on purpose here. In fact the worst thing included in the article (a false claim that Hari thinks Baking Soda is dangerous) seems to have been the result of an editor trying to cut down on a massive rant an IP was trying to include without paying close attention to what was written in the source. But I 'do' think the generally negative attitude of the editors working on the article, allowed for the claim to remain in the article without being questioned. There seems to be a general viewpoint amongst editors that Hari has done bad things and must be held accountable for these bad things. This is correct to an extent, but I think due to the general disdain with which Hari is held people are going above and beyond what is appropriate to highlight her worst moments/aspects. Brustopher (talk) 23:57, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

I am sure you are right. I certainly am more inclined to correct an edit with a POV I recognise and oppose, in all areas related to pseudoscience, quackery, crank ideas, fringe nonsense and - well, pretty much everything else on my watchlist. And that makes me a bad man, and I feel a bit guilty for it. Guy (Help!) 00:00, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Paul Mc Kevitt

Consensus was clear to delete there, so you should have deleted it rather than userfying. Because it is userfied, it now meets criteria U5 of speedy deletion, but because there was consensus to delete, it should have been normally deleted instead. --TL22 (talk) 11:40, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

WP:BITE. Guy (Help!) 11:54, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Recordstraightsetter

You recently blocked Psts1st as one of the likely sockpuppets that have descended on Frank Gaffney. Could you also review Recordstraightsetter who is also a brand new editor who only made that change [2]? The backlog at SPI has left a number of his other socks floating around indefinitely so I thought it might be easier to just make a direct request. (For the record, for reasons based on off-Wiki knowledge, I believe there will be a coming deluge of newly minted editors attempting to make this change.) LavaBaron (talk) 20:03, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

I take exception to this note. This user reverted a large amount of information by multiple editors made, apparently when the editor was on vacation. See these diffs: [diff1] [diff2] [diff3] [diff4] [diff5] These edits removed language that added balance to these pages that were discussed on the talk pages. I regret there was no effort made to discuss this editor's massive changes on the talk pages. After these reverts were reversed several times, this editor started filing false SPI, SPA, meat puppet and other charges against me. This editor also has been complaining about me on multiple Wikipedia pages. I have posted this note because I don't want this editor's false comments to go unchallenged. I have backed out of making any further changes to these pages since I am tired of the bickering and I don't want to be involved in an edit war. It is my hope that other editors and admins will fix these pages over time because they have such obvious POV and RS problems. Perhaps my extensive talk comments on the Gaffney page will help. I have nothing to do with these alleged sock puppets and I resent this person continually making false charges against me.Zeke1999 (talk) 07:42, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

I will continue to block your sockpuppets, and if you continue then I will also block you. Bye. Guy (Help!). Warning: comments may contain traces of sarcasm. 09:23, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Please do block any accounts you think are sockpuppets. I've tried to follow Wikipedia rules. Users who break the rules to create accounts to delete text from articles I have been disputing aren't doing me any favors. I value my Wikipedia account and I'm not going to jeopardize it by doing something stupid. Best wishes.Zeke1999 (talk) 10:41, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Your removal of EL

Guy, the links in those articles were already cleared as RS, other editors were involved and aware of the self-cite and the links are useful. What exactly are you attempting to do? Do you really believe you're helping to improve the encyclopedia with what you're doing? Atsme^📞📧 20:55, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

They are self-published. So: yes. Guy (Help!). Warning: comments may contain traces of sarcasm. 20:56, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Excuse me, sir but you are mistaken. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Alligator_gar/Archive_1 for the Gar article. Also see the TPs of the articles you're removing links to important information for no reason. Your motives are not made in GF and are certainly not helpful in improving the encyclopedia. Atsme^📞📧 21:01, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

And I checked the website. The page describing the editorial board? There isn't one. Guy (Help!). Warning: comments may contain traces of sarcasm. 21:03, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

I have replaced the external links. In my view as an editor of animal behaviour content, they benefit the encyclopaedia. Guy, this really is not a good idea considering ArbCom.DrChrissy ^(talk) 21:06, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

And painting yourself as a neutral arbiter is a good idea? Feel free never to post here ever again. Guy (Help!). Warning: comments may contain traces of sarcasm. 21:14, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Guy, there was an editorial board when the documentaries were produced, and every bit of that information was reviewed by renowned biologists and academics. The credit roll on the programs confirm it. The programs were televised internationally, and in the US on PBS affiliates. The PBS documentaries also serve as WP:V the same way any information in a transcript from any other PBS program would be WP:V. The fact that the website has the informaiton available in text simply made more sense to cite the text. Your actions are unwarranted, and certainly not helpful to WP. Why don't you just go ahead and remove all the video footage from those articles, too. I really don't care anymore what you do. You've proven to me now who you really are and what your motives are, and that is a major heartbreak for me. Atsme^📞📧 21:22, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

I will have a closer look. Frankly, you need a new web designer. Guy (Help!). Warning: comments may contain traces of sarcasm. 21:38, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

I bet they wouldn't turn down any friendly volunteers...(hint, hint). Atsme^📞📧 21:39, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Guy, what do you think about creating a whole new media section in Wikipedia where we can upload free educational programs on encyclopedic topics? Do you think something like that would fly? Do you think it's worthy of me making a proposal to WMF? I can probably wrangle up some volunteer voice talent to read articles for us, too. It could be like a free version of Kindle, so to speak. You're the computer guy - what do you think? Would they go for it? Atsme^📞📧 22:20, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Sounds like Wikiversity to me. Guy (Help!). Warning: comments may contain traces of sarcasm. 07:11, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Glyphosate

You probably have more knowledge in these matters, but since the ArbCom case is open, do you think it would be better to mention at the case's talk page the recent spat of edit warring at glyphosate (as opposed to AN3)? I'm wondering if it's just better to lock down the page until the case is over. Kingofaces43 (talk) 18:25, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Notice of Edit warring noticeboard discussion

Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion involving you at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring regarding a possible violation of Wikipedia's policy on edit warring. Thank you.