Wikivoyage talk:How to handle unwanted edits/Archive 2014-2017

• See also Wikivoyage talk:How to handle unwanted edits/Archive 2004-2013

Deletion

This passage had been in the article for a long time:

User bans are a last resort for us. They are embarrassing, because they are an admission that our community is not strong, patient, and professional enough to deal with unwanted edits using the simple freedom built into the Wiki way. In addition, they make an enemy out of a potential friend. Our project is enough of a challenge; we don't need enemies.

I deleted everything after the first sentence, because I think it's mostly nonsense. It's not the least bit embarrassing to ban spambots and very disruptive vandals. If you all feel strongly that there's a good reason to revert my edit, go ahead, but I think we have to move on from the time when we thought we could just reason everything out. Some accounts exist for reasons other than to contribute to a travel guide, and we might as well just recognize that. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:11, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

As I said in my reversion, the passage is referring primarily to contributors, not to vandals. Speaking of "banning" a vandal doesn't really make sense because they were never really a contributor. Powers ^(talk) 00:40, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

I see your point now. However, I also don't think we should feel so embarrassed if we have to ban contributors for really strong reasons. Ikan Kekek (talk) 00:46, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Can we just re-write that paragraph to make it more relevant? As Ikan notes, it dates from a time before spambots, back when blocks were never used and we would literally spend hours reverting vandals rather than blocking them (example: Special:Contributions/67.172.63.59). That is no longer reality, so the policy page should be updated to reflect the change. How about:

In most cases a user ban should be a last resort that should be used in only the most extreme cases. Before even considering a user ban, exercise patience and professionalism to try to work with the user who is making unwanted edits; doing otherwise might make an enemy out of a potential friend, and our project is enough of a challenge even without enemies.

-- Ryan • (talk) • 01:01, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

I like your rewording. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:50, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

I'd drop the last phrase about the challenge altogether. Let's not sound so down-beat about the project. And, just for readability, too many "shoulds" in the first sentence. Better "... should be a last resort that is used ...". Nurg (talk) 09:32, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

You're right, Nurg. Your suggested edits would improve the phrasing further. Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:43, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

I'm fine with Nurg's suggestions. -- Ryan • (talk) • 15:00, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

I think he removed the wrong "should": "... are a last resort that should be used ..." would be better. Powers ^(talk) 20:09, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

Done -- Ryan • (talk) • 20:40, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

Why did we change longstanding practice when dealing with vandals? Perhaps we should return to what worked so well for so long. Powers ^(talk) 20:09, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

Because you're now part of an English-language Wikimedia project, which gets a lot of en.wikipedia's vandal overflow too, and because this project would be overrun very quickly. --Rschen7754 20:11, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

There are a number of discussions above and elsewhere indicating that people felt that the status quo wasn't working. I would be very opposed if there was a proposal to go back to the days when we wouldn't block anyone and would instead spend hours filling up article histories and recent change logs with revert messages - I'm here to write travel guides, not to babysit bored schoolkids, and I very much agree with the efforts that have been taken to make life easier for frequent editors by allowing blocks of vandals, hotel marketers and trolls. -- Ryan • (talk) • 20:21, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

Well, what changed to make such actions no longer embarrassing? I would also like to suggest we restore that word; I think it really helped to get across how rare these things should be. Powers ^(talk) 23:54, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

Why should we be embarrassed about someone else's behavior? We can't choose for them to behave differently. Ikan Kekek (talk) 00:09, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Trust me, there is much more that one can do on Wikimedia that is much more embarrassing than banning people who are not here to collaborate, or who are simply incapable of doing so. --Rschen7754 09:08, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

It's not their behavior that's embarrassing to us, Ikan, it's ours. It's embarrassing for exactly the reasons mentioned in the text you deleted. I'm honestly not sure how much more clearly I can put it. Powers ^(talk) 14:12, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

I simply disagree. That seems like a martyr complex to me. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:23, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

I also don't find it particularly embarrassing. It's like saying we're embarrassed that we can't magically turn 100% of trolls into useful contributors, which is impossible, so why be embarrassed? What would actually be embarrassing is to let the trolls walk all over us and do nothing about it. Texugo (talk) 20:26, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Yep. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:46, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

That's a false dichotomy and you know it. There are not just two options available, those being immediate indefinite bans and complete acquiescence. Powers ^(talk) 23:29, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

You're the only one who's advanced such a dichotomy. The rest of us feel unembarrassed when we draw a conclusion that a ban is essential. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:32, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Obvious vandals - registered accounts & IPs

At the bullet point for "Blocks of obvious vandals" it says "Registered accounts of malicious editors may be blocked indefinitely, while IP addresses should be blocked for shorter periods ...". When looking at the blocking functionality I saw the option to "Automatically block the last IP address used by this user, and any subsequent IP addresses they try to edit from". I couldn't figure out how one could block the registered account indefinitely, but only block the user's IP address for a shorter period. Hence I left the recent vandal on a short block. On re-reading the point I now realise what is meant. I propose clarifying the wording to:

Registered accounts of malicious editors may be blocked indefinitely. IP addresses of anonymous editors should be blocked for shorter periods, which can be successively increased if the malicious editing re-occurs. Nurg (talk) 09:19, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

I may have misunderstood, but I think it's OK to block spambots or really egregious (e.g., very high-volume and disruptive or/and extremely offensive) vandals for 1-3 months if they're IP users. Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:25, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

First, the "automatically block the last IP" functionality applies an autoblock, which has a different duration (24 hours I believe). Checking that box will not indefinitely block the IP address. Second, the wording you've proposed seems fine to me. -- Ryan • (talk) • 14:55, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

As a note, that would also include obvious troll-only accounts. I'm perfectly fine with that, for the record. --Rschen7754 19:04, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

This looks very strange

Swept in from the pub

Saqib blocked a spambot called User:Johnmartindavies earlier today plus deleted a spam page this user had created. I noticed the talk page link was blue and out of curiosity went checking how many times he had been warned before. Well, this most definitely doesn't look like some vandal's talk page nor does his contributions record. I don't find it very likely that a normal Wikivoyager suddenly would start spreading spam?

Is something like this going on again? ϒpsilon (talk) 15:50, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Good catch. The user page User:Johnmartindavies was edited with spam by an anonymous IP (Special:Contributions/5.248.83.233) and it looks like the Johnmartindavies user account was then incorrectly blocked. I've removed the block on Johnmartindavies and applied a three month block on the spambot IP 5.248.83.233. -- Ryan • (talk) • 16:00, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks! Relieving to know that nothing serious is at large. ϒpsilon (talk) 16:06, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Thank you YPSI. I was so foolish. It was a big mistake from my side and I apologies for it. --Saqib (talk) 19:30, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Mishaps happen to everyone now and then. :) ϒpsilon (talk) 19:39, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

But I'm really very embarrass over this foolishness. Actually I'm not active these days on-wiki so I was in hurry to delete and block the spammer. --Saqib (talk) 19:48, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Second opinion requested

I removed a listing from Skomer as I felt referencing a business that only has things about the place and is not actually located there was not appropriate. It has however been re-added by the owner of the business. Does not seem right to be linking to a web site selling posters but cannot actually find any policy that states such website should not be listed. Would appreciate a second opinion on this before I leave a message in the users talk page. --Traveler100 (talk) 15:28, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

I would accept the listing since the posters being advertised are photos of Skomer. However, the banner which the same user inserted has a visible copyright notice; that must go. If he or she wants to put it, minus the watermark, on Commons with a CC-by-SA license then we can use it, otherwise no. Pashley (talk) 15:59, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

I absolutely would not accept such a listing. Guides to localities are specifically for people who travel to those localities, not people who sit at home and want to buy posters. For those who want to stay at home, there's the Commons website. And an analogy is the webcams that show people anywhere in the world what a place looks like - those have been routinely deleted when posted as listings on this site. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:19, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Traveler100 and Ikan Kekek. As far as I know, the general guideline for Sleep listings and car rental listings has always been that there has to be a physical address in the given city at which to pick up the keys, etc. I don't recall this question ever coming up for Buy listings, but I feel very strongly that the spirit and rationale of that guideline extends to all listing types. Just as we don't link to other guides or hotel/restaurant aggregator sites, we don't need general merchandising sites selling souvenirs for an aggregations of places either, especially when there isn't any physical store to shop at when you're actually at the destination. Texugo (talk) 20:46, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

I propose that this listing be deleted within 24 hours, unless there is further objection. Anyone object? Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:45, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

Further changes to Wikivoyage:How to handle unwanted edits#User ban

It appears that the laughable language about user bans being "embarrassing" has been excised from this page per a recent thread on this talk page. I'm extremely heartened to see that. However, in my opinion, the result doesn't go far enough. Pursuant to a recently archived userban nomination, I'd like to suggest further changes.

Keep in mind that what I'm proposing is not a change in the way we actually do things at Wikivoyage. Instead, what I am suggesting is that we conform our written policy to the reality of an already-existing evolution in the way we implement userbans, which occurred organically over time and which already has broad consensus behind it.

Here is my proposed new wording of Wikivoyage:How to handle unwanted edits#User ban. Note the removal of the second paragraph of the current section (mitigated by the addition of "despite all our best efforts" in the first), and the addition of material regarding trolling-only accounts that's been proposed by User:Rschen7754 and others and has already been used uncontroversially in various recent userbans.

"It may occur that a contributor lets us know that they're not interested in our goals, and/or not interested in compromising or working with other Wikivoyagers to achieve those goals. If they insist on continuing to edit articles against the Terms of Use despite all our best efforts, we may resort to using a MediaWiki feature that bans that person's username or IP address from editing Wikivoyage.

If there is a need for a user ban, the user or IP address should be nominated for banning on Wikivoyage:User ban nominations, and also place a notice on the nominated User's Talk page. If the proposed ban is supported by two administrators, and there is a broad consensus for the block, after 3 days the ban will go into effect.

Bans made without a vote and without an understanding of the gravity of this action (and not covered by one of the exceptions listed below) are considered abuse by the administrator.

Exceptions to the user ban nomination process include:

• Blocks of one day or less when used as a discretionary tool for administrators. These blocks are sometimes used in slowing high-volume unwanted edits or in getting the attention of a user who is editing in unwanted ways. In general such blocks should be applied for very short periods (two hours or less) and only increased in length if the unwanted edits persist.
• Blocks of obvious vandals. An obvious vandal is someone who is clearly here to edit maliciously, such as those who add racial slurs to articles, individuals who add obscenities to multiple articles, or individuals with clearly malicious user names such as "User:I AM GOING TO VANDALIZE!!!!!" or "User X is a NAZI!!!!!!". Registered accounts of malicious editors may be blocked indefinitely, while IP addresses should be blocked for shorter periods, which can be successively increased if the malicious editing re-occurs.
• Blocks of accounts which have clearly been established for the sole purpose of trolling. However, because the question of when a user's conduct crosses the line into trolling is quite subjective, this should only be considered an exception to the usual process in the most obvious of cases. If there's any doubt about the user's intentions, you should nominate the user at Wikivoyage:User ban nominations as usual.
• Blocks of users or IP addresses that are blocked for vandalism or other malicious editing on other Wikimedia projects. If a user or IP address has been blocked on another Wikimedia project and makes a similar malicious edit on Wikivoyage, the same block settings that have been used on the other project may be applied here.
• Blocks of automated spambot scripts. Automated scripts that add spam to Wikivoyage are typically blocked for a period of three months. Note that if the IP address being used for spam has also been used to make legitimate edits then a shorter block should be applied since some IP addresses are shared by large pools of users.
• Blocks of Doppelgangers, which are user accounts meant to mimic another account for the purposes of causing confusion. For example, "Joel" and "JoeI" look the same, but the second version uses a capital "i" instead of a lowercase "L". Doppleganger accounts may be permanently blocked without any need for a ban nomination.
• Blocks of user accounts created by spambots. Some of the more advanced spambots are actually capable of creating user accounts. These accounts should be permanently blocked as soon as they are identified as being spambot accounts.

If there is any doubt as to whether a nomination is needed before blocking a user, admins should err on the side of caution and add a nomination to the Wikivoyage:User ban nominations page."

Please comment with your thoughts. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 15:34, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

It's a bit tough to tell what changes are proposed, so I created Wikivoyage:How to handle unwanted edits/Draft - a diff showing your proposed changes is at [1]. I don't think that the sentences about "exercising patience and professionalism" should be removed. Bans should still be fairly rare, and users should always be given the benefit of the doubt until it is clear that they simply aren't interested in working civilly and/or cooperatively. -- Ryan • (talk) • 16:58, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

What about repeated edit war/touting? I've been imposing increasingly long bans on determined touters after a few warnings. These bans haven't been controversial. But the point here isn't just that these users tout but that they also disregard edit summaries and user talk page messages and edit war. So that's arguably covered under the language about a lack of cooperation above, but though I always post to Wikivoyage:User ban nominations to inform everyone about a block of 3 days or longer, no-one has disagreed that I can remember. Should edit warring and/or touting be mentioned specifically? Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:57, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

I would also suggest another bullet point to cover continued block evasion with reasonable suspicion. The case in point being the Telstra user who has been unresponsive and just changes IP address every couple of days, but also some of the touts as well. Andrewssi2 (talk) 07:16, 19 November 2014 (UTC)

Touting

Since touting is one of our most common forms of "unwanted edits" I added a short Wikivoyage:How to handle unwanted edits#Touts section. I would hope that this isn't controversial, but if anyone disagrees please revert and let's discuss. Please also edit what I've added to make it clearer, more concise, more verbose, or whatever is needed. -- Ryan • (talk) • 21:34, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I think the section is fine, but I'm curious why you put it under "Harder cases". It would seem to fit better under "Simple cases", with vandalism and copyvios, don't you think? Powers ^(talk) 02:13, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Moving that section would be fine. My thinking when trying to figure out where to put the sub-section was that touting seems to me more like excess baggage or trolling (both cases in which some analysis of the edit is usually required) than does is like vandalism or a spambot (edits which anyone can immediately tell are unwanted). -- Ryan • (talk) • 03:02, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

True, but copyvios are the same with respect to requiring analysis, and they're listed under "Simple cases". I think the intent of the division was no so much to describe the difficulty of identifying the edits, but rather the difficulty in dealing with the editors involved. Powers ^(talk) 15:48, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

User:Rodrigo Tetsuo Argenton

A one-day block was applied for this user with Wikivoyage:How to handle unwanted edits#User ban being cited as the reason. I realize that the block was applied in good faith, but I don't think a block was warranted here - the user wasn't given any warning, wasn't edit warring, wasn't being "intimidating" as far as I can tell, and was limiting his comments to responses to others in an existing thread rather then forum shopping or trying to create drama elsewhere on the site. I understand why there is value in allowing fairly broad discretion in use of user blocks, but given the discretion allowed I unblocked the user based on my concerns - if others feel strongly then please override me here, but despite the fact that we have become (justifiably) more lenient about using blocks, I don't think one was warranted in this particular instance. -- Ryan • (talk) • 05:57, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

It can be difficult sometimes to avoid misusing admin tools when someone disagrees with you but I do think censorious edits like this should be both deprecated and reverted lest they bring this site into disrepute. Removing other editor's questions and comments in the Pub is hardly the Wiki way. --180.191.114.64 11:48, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

For what it's worth, the comment Andre deleted, and the one above, appear to either be from Ttcf (who was blocked as a sockpuppet of the already-blocked 118.93nzp) or from someone impersonating that user. A user block, and especially one that has gone through multiple successful nominations, means that user's contributions are no longer welcome here, so deleting continued contributions from a blocked user is absolutely appropriate, assuming there is a very high likelihood that the user has been properly identified. -- Ryan • (talk) • 17:27, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm not aware of any provision in policy for immediate one-day bans for good-faith users. The only provision that could possibly apply (the first bullet point) specifies a two-hour block as the initial benchmark, not 24 hours. Powers ^(talk) 22:02, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Urdu Wikivoyage

Swept in from the pub

Everyone, please deal with Usman Khan Shah. He wants to create Urdu Wikivoyage despite the fact, there's no editor nor he's experinced. My concerns raised at meta:Requests for new languages/Wikivoyage Urdu. And now he's asking me to remove the comments that I made (on Meta-Wiki, on his talk page as well on my talk page) so that he get the Urdu Wikivoyage approved which will surely tarnish and damage the credibility of Urdu Wikivoyage under his administration. I don't know how to deal with him so I leave it to you guys! --Saqib (talk) 20:36, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

It's a bit hard because most of us can not assess the stuff in Urdu, so we have to rely on your opinion. I don't mind to add my oppose vote on Meta if you think it is important, but I am not sure the issue is very critical. Copyright violations is something that stewards and WMF should worry about. Regarding the quality, well, we already have several dormant language versions (Swedish, Romanian, Vietnamese), we have Spanish Wikivoyage that went a bit rogue at some point and disregarded some basic common rules, we have Hebrew Wikivoyage that tags very brief articles as stars. What can we do about that? Nothing. --Alexander (talk) 21:31, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Actually I wasn't clear. I don't want community to add oppose vote to Meta page. I'm already dealing myself there since I know Urdu. Why I made this request is request you guys to convince Usman that he don't need to take it personal and keep asking me to remove the messages that I made.It was kind of harassment. But Anyway since I've blocked him. We can close this discussion. --Saqib (talk) 21:38, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

From what I saw of his contributions here and the proceedings at Meta, it seems like this user is inexperienced and a bit of a bull in a china shop, but I would hesitate to draw the conclusion that he's acting in bad faith just by what's transpired thus far. I think that in dealing with this user's ignorance of talk page etiquette and extraordinarily thin skin, we also have to be careful not to cross the line into biting newbies. I also saw your nomination of this user at Wikivoyage:User ban nominations and, unless there's some unambiguous demonstration of bad faith that I may have missed in his contribution history, I'm afraid I'm going to have to oppose such a ban on the same grounds. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 21:48, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Andrew. Honestly speaking with you. To me the bull in china shop seems not in good faith to me. To me it look like that he's having fun by making comments. Some comments he made in Roman Urdu were somewhat political as well which I ignored. --Saqib (talk) 22:17, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Well, per thr langcom's policy on new wikis, new wikis are only created when there is active community on Wikimedia Incubator. (For same reason, Korean Wikivoyage is on Incubator :<) So unless he has active Wikivoyagers community, his request will be queued there until there is active community. — Revi 16:25, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

How to prevent spam that has no URL

As you can see here and in several other articles about Indonesia, a couple of IP users and User:RAMDANIA have all been spamming touty entries for a car service and ignoring user talk page messages and edit summaries. As it's a pain to serially block dynamic IP addresses, is there a way that the terms "SAVAWA", "staywithus22@gmail.com" and "+6287739518019" could be subjected to a spam block? Ikan Kekek (talk) 03:55, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Any term can be added to the blacklist, just be careful that the pattern isn't so simple that it will catch things it's not meant to. In this case, adding "6287739518019" or "staywithus22" is probably fine since it's unlikely that either of those would ever be used by anyone but this specific business. -- Ryan • (talk) • 05:14, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Would the term just be put up with \ following? I don't know how to put anything other than a URL on the blacklist, never having done it before. Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:18, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

The blacklist uses regular expressions, which is a special syntax for pattern matching. In this case you want to match the exact text (not a pattern), so just add "6287739518019" or "staywithus22" with no other characters - see the triple-a-limos pattern (I can't type it here because it's blacklisted) that's on the blacklist already for an example. Note that once you blacklist these patterns we'll have to update them in this thread so that people aren't blocked from editing this page. -- Ryan • (talk) • 15:42, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. In view of that, I'll wait until they are put up once more, because perhaps the spammer may have tired of having their edits all reverted. Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:46, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Article on "Firing low-quality users" in open source software projects

Some of the issues this article discusses are relevant here. Pashley (talk) 23:58, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

I like some of the ideas of linking available functionality to 'good contributions'. (e.g. building up some articles will give you the ability to create new articles, or contributing to a country level article such as United States would require contribution work on a city level article first). Not sure how much of this would be allowable under the Wikimedia foundation. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 02:31, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

Err.. that would surely be a break from Wikimedia tradition and would make "plunge forward" an empty quote. Frankly, I also don't believe contributions would necessarily be better if people would start in city articles. In any case, I'd be very much opposed to any such limitations on editing. Discouragement for good faith editors is the last thing we need and learning steps of well-intending editors have never been the real problem. JuliasTravels (talk) 09:27, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes, you are right. I didn't say it would be possible under WikiMedia, but nice to be able to theoretically speculate about what could be done to increase quality edits.

If we would be permitted some 'blue sky thinking', then the gamification referred to in the article and practiced in sites such as stackoverflow.com would be interesting. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 09:36, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

I have no objection at all to brainstorming about possible solutions, regardless of what would be possible under the Wikemedia umbrella. As long as we keep the few main principles we have at heart :-) JuliasTravels (talk) 09:53, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

Neither outright vandals (just revert edits and block accounts) nor new user mistakes (revert if needed, use talk pages to bring them up to speed) are really a problem. Where it gets hard are users that both make useful contributions and do thoroughly annoying things. if we block them, we lose the contributions and if we don't we get the annoyances.

I've been editing a lot in the Philippines & there are questions I'd like to ask a Filipino but our most active editor from there, User:Alice has been banned. I recently did some merging based on discussion at Talk:Sibulan and I'd like the opinion of the person who started that discussion, but he or she (Special:Contributions/222.127.76.207) is also blocked. The blocks may be necessary, but this is enormously frustrating for me.

I'm not sure there is a really good solution for such cases, but it is certainly worth thinking about. Pashley (talk) 11:03, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure about the blocking reasons for either person, but unless they are prevented from edited their own user page then why can't you just leave a message there? Andrewssi2 (talk) 00:41, 12 March 2015 (UTC)

The first message I would want to leave for Alice would be "Can you comment here: Talk:Bisaya phrasebook?" since I think she's a native speaker of the language. She could not reply, and anyway it seems a bit of a stretch to ask her to contribute after an indefinite block. Pashley (talk) 02:11, 12 March 2015 (UTC)

Again, I couldn't comment as why why she had in indefinite ban since I was not involved. But given she has one then yes, I be surprised if they would want to be engaged in any way. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 20:55, 12 March 2015 (UTC)

A new Telstra user-like user?

Here's a typical edit — All Initial Caps. And now, we're starting to get this kind of edit — a long list of names with no description, address or contact information. Complete list of user contributions here. The user has so far ignored his/her user talk page. Do you suggest posting a block warning? How soon? Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:08, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

I think we can expect more of this kind of thing as the site becomes more popular. If their edits are of low quality and they don't respond to the talk page then reversing the edits should just be OK?

Telstra was hopefully an edge case, since they were contributing high volumes of useless edits, and kept changing their ip to avoid blocks. I hope we don't see another pattern like that. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 05:23, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

So the strategy for now would be to revert as needed, not to warn the user that they must reply to talk page messages or block them for any length of time. I'm fine with that as long as the volume of edits isn't really high. It could get old quickly, though. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:17, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Another IP. I wrote a warning on the user's talk page. --ϒpsilon (talk) 16:52, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

The user's edits turned to pretty clear vandalism - top level headings for stores that closed years ago, while simultaneously breaking templates, repeated across numerous articles. Talk page warnings, reverts, and increasing length blocks seems like an appropriate response to any further edits. -- Ryan • (talk) • 19:45, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

This would be highly atypical vandalism. Much more likely it's simply incompetence. Powers ^(talk) 15:05, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Incompetence is still vandalism, even if the motivation is not malicious.

I was hoping the user would move on after the first couple of days. Seems not... --Andrewssi2 (talk) 16:33, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

This doesn't look like a case of incompetence to me - starting out with edits that have minor issues and increasingly pushing the envelope is a pretty common pattern for vandals. This user's recent edits aren't anything that a normal user would be adding to a travel guide, and combined with the fact that he is ignoring talk page messages, and even escalating the behavior based on those messages, seems like a pretty clear-cut case to me. -- Ryan • (talk) • 16:40, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Both IP's so far are from a British provider called btcentralplus.com . In the absence of communication ( like the Telstra user ) we could range block for a week and hope they find some other of the internet to amuse themselves with? --Andrewssi2 (talk) 17:12, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

(indent reset) Pinging Ibaman who currently is reverting similar edits from a third Birmingham IP. ϒpsilon (talk) 18:41, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

That edit is also from the btcentralplus provider. Shall we put in a 1 week range block? --Andrewssi2 (talk) 21:38, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

I created an initial filter that will tag edits coming from the IP ranges used already. Please note that they will not be blocked at the moment, and also that more potential ranges need to be added. Andrewssi2 (talk) 22:00, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

The filter didn't catch any new edits the past few days. Let me know here if they are spotted again. Andrewssi2 (talk) 23:37, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

The user has been active the past few days - see Special:Contributions/86.130.227.75 (adding lists of airlines including the apparent favorite Thomas Cook charter to the "Eat and drink" section of Manchester Airport) and Special:Contributions/109.148.68.58 (adding closed attractions to Walt Disney World and duplicate lists of airlines to Orlando International Airport). -- Ryan • (talk) • 23:50, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

This is going to be hard, since this provider has a lot of IP ranges (116 of them) . I'm updating the filter and now blocking themAndrewssi2 (talk) 00:24, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure that a block is the right move at this time - it seems a pretty wide net to cast given the large range of IPs, and the user's edits are fairly easily identified. Wouldn't a tag be the better option for now unless things escalate? -- Ryan • (talk) • 00:41, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

Changed to tag + warning Andrewssi2 (talk) 01:18, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

OK, some good hits today (sorry, only visible to Admins I think)

I reversed some of the pointless airline listings Andrewssi2 (talk) 09:20, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

They are back and very keen to write updates on Manchester Airport. Can we do a longer term semi-protect? --Andrewssi2 (talk) 00:29, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Latest edit. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:13, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Problem user to watch

I post this here, rather than in Wikivoyage:Userban nominations, because it's premature to propose a userban, and I hope it will be unnecessary, but do look at this edit. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:25, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

The edit comment is childish and inexcusable . Their history indicates that they are not collaborative by nature --Andrewssi2 (talk) 22:41, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Indeed. I've posted a fairly friendly message/warning (in my opinion, at least) on the talk page. If that doesn't convince them to change their tone, we'll need to take other steps. Such comments are simply intolerable. JuliasTravels (talk) 09:49, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I think it's a safe prediction that your post will be deleted from the page and called "abusive" or something similar. Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:52, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I have no illusions about that either, and I don't mind, but then it's just the more a clear case and any moderator can proceed without much debate. But well, who knows! :-) JuliasTravels (talk) 10:45, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

One-click mass rollback tool

Hi, everyone. I just blocked a vandal's account, but as far as I can tell, I had no choice but to manually rollback each of his contributions separately. There is a "mass delete" button that enables mass deletions of vandalism pages, but there doesn't appear to be any mass rollback button. Can you imagine if an admin hadn't been able to take care of this clown within 4 minutes and there were dozens of vandalistic edits or more?

Is "mass rollback" a feature that can be developed? I don't create software, but it certainly sounds like a programmable macro to me. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:20, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

You could use the script linked from w:Wikipedia:New admin/Rollback#Mass rollback. However, even in cases when a vandal has managed to hit several dozen pages it usually doesn't take more than a minute to revert everything, so this tool would most likely be useful in cases of automated vandalism where hundreds or even thousands of pages were changed. -- Ryan • (talk) • 21:08, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

Can we add a link to this script to the default admin tools or somewhere else where most any admin will easily remember where to find it while we're in the thick of things? It's best for us to be prepared. Vandalism seems to be increasing on this site. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:43, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

Message to a range of IP addresses

Swept in from the pub

Is there a way to send a message to a range of IP addresses when someone edits with it? Over the last few months there has been pages added containing only a little introduction text from Wikipedia. For example recently Bullyard, Degilbo, Vogan, Volegno and Viseisei. Nothing wrong with the content but would like to ask the contributor to add a little more details such as see, sleep and eat listings. Do not want to discourage a new writer but guide them in the right direction. --Traveler100 (talk) 06:20, 6 October 2015 (UTC)

As far as I know, there is no such feature. Only feature to alert IP range is block the ranges in CIDR format with the comments. — Revi 09:43, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

I did think about blocking ip range but seemed a little drastic. It is not that the contributor is doing anything wrong, just they are not been very constructive. Although coming from the same sub-domain they are constantly changing IP so no point in leaving messages against addresses already used. --Traveler100 (talk) 09:53, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

See Wikivoyage:User ban nominations/Archive#Telstra vandal; I'm pretty sure these were all created by the same user. -- Ryan • (talk) • 14:09, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

New edits by our multiple page-creation friend

Please see User talk:124.149.30.113 and Wikivoyage:User ban nominations/Archive#User:117.120.16.132 - Telstra using a different network. Now that this user has been blocked, what should we do about the user's contributions? Perhaps someone would like to redirect them for now? Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:38, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

This user is mostly focusing on Queensland for the moment (I suspect that they live there given all the IP reports). I check the Wikipedia town entry to see if the town is a valid destination, usually using the sleep test. If it isn't then a redirect to the closest town or parent region is probably fine. Andrewssi2 (talk) 11:03, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

Yes, I think the user does live in or near Brisbane, most likely. Thank you for handling the redirects. Ikan Kekek (talk) 11:51, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

See User talk:125.253.60.60, user contributions. Not multiple page creations but trivia and now edit warring. It was inevitable, wasn't it? Ikan Kekek (talk) 04:08, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Confusing user ban section?

If you look under the last resorts section, you will notice there are two sub sections called 'escalating user blocks' and 'user ban'.

I find this confusing since they are both trying to get at the same thing.

We have gotten into some arguments recently about the appropriateness of certain block actions. Can we look to simplify and present one approach for future ban nominations? --Andrewssi2 (talk) 01:32, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

I think you may be misreading the policy. This page seems to differentiate between "user blocks" and "user bans", with the former being of finite duration and the latter being indefinite. Current policy says "escalating user blocks" are to be employed in all cases except in situations described in the "User ban" section, when that procedure is automatically superseded in favor of an immediate indefinite ban. Perhaps it would be good to retitle the subsections in a way that makes the difference between these two things clearer. As for the controversy you address above, though, in my view that's a result of a deficiency in the policy itself, not the wording of this page. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 05:43, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Are you saying you unilaterally made your own policy? Mind you, I don't think we'll miss the user in question since you permabanned him, rather than giving him a longer block, but what exactly are you saying? Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:54, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

I'm confused as to what prompted you to think I unilaterally made my own policy. Andrewssi2 said he was confused about the wording of the page; I agreed with him, then tried to break it down for him according to my reading of this document. Then, at the end, and completely independent of anything else I said in the above comment or any action I took against the user in question, I shared my opinion that if policy had been stronger there would have been no controversy about the permaban. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 14:35, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Because you said the controversy is in your view the result of a deficiency in the policy, I didn't understand what you meant. Thanks for clarifying. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:37, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

(response to Andrewssi2) I made an attempt to clarify the difference between a ban and a block, and to note that the escalating user block process is an alternative to a ban nomination (Special:Diff/2952599/2952638). As always, please revert or update if there is disagreement with this change. -- Ryan • (talk) • 18:58, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the edits Ryan . Just to be clear, I didn't raise this as a way to pass comment on a specific user ban action but rather try and define the process somewhat clearer so that the risk of differing interpretations of policy could be lessened in future. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 06:33, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

As someone who hasn't really had any reason to look at this policy page before; isn't the "4. Indefinite block for user accounts." mentioned in Wikivoyage:How_to_handle_unwanted_edits#Escalating_user_blocks exactly the same thing as a User ban, mentioned in the section after? If it is, wouldn't it be better to have the User ban section as a subsection of Escalating user blocks? ϒpsilon (talk) 10:35, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Obvious vandals revisited

The original discussion on allowing blocks of obvious vandals is at #Obvious vandals. Per Wikivoyage:User ban nominations#2016-03-04 incident there was disagreement over whether this guideline was applicable in a recent situation, so I've updated the wording with the portion in bold that follows: "An obvious vandal is someone who is not here to create travel guides but is instead here to edit maliciously" (Special:Diff/2934306/2952599). Hopefully that is clearer and not controversial, but let's revert and discuss if it is. -- Ryan • (talk) • 16:57, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Mt. Rinjani spam/touting

Please help. See Mount Rinjani history, Senaru history, User talk:180.249.162.10, User talk:36.83.177.99, User talk:36.83.182.85, User talk:Beresin, and the Deletion Log, showing how this touter is now using multiple sockpuppets to tout in user talk pages. I think a filter is needed, because this user has a dynamic IP. Ikan Kekek (talk) 03:38, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

P.S. No filter seems to be needed for now, as the user in question has paused his/her editing for now. Eventually, though, a filter will probably be a good idea. I'll post to this thread again if the problem recurs. Ikan Kekek (talk) 02:50, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Or in this case, wanted edits

I don't know how to explain to this IP user that these edits aren't actually being labeled as harmful. It's a problem, though, that innocent users can read these warnings and quite understandably are offended by them. If someone could please help explain the reasons for them to the new user, that could help. Ikan Kekek (talk) 00:29, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

Not so innocent, it is tagged as a potential BTCentralPlus edit. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 01:21, 22 December 2018 (UTC)

What to do about persistent Biharinath Tourist Point touting

Please see the revision history of Biharinath and Baranti, and please give some advice on what to do. We've had problems with Biharinath and Baranti Tourist Point since 2013. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:07, 28 March 2016 (UTC)

A quick look at their IP suggests that they are on an India wide broadband network, so blocking the IP is probably not a good option. We could just block anonymous edits with the term "Biharinath Tourist Point" ? --Andrewssi2 (talk) 20:59, 28 March 2016 (UTC)

I didn't know there was a way to do that. I think that could be helpful. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:38, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

TrustedStay Service Apartments spammer

User:122.178.137.113 was initially blocked for 1 day, now extended to 3 days because of block evasion via User:122.178.136.25 (also blocked for 3 days). It looks like we may have trouble with a game of Whack-a-Mole with a dynamic IP spam-touter, so please be on the lookout. Ikan Kekek (talk) 10:35, 27 June 2016 (UTC)

Should we add an edit filter for "TrustedStay" or "Trusted Stay"? We could either block the edits or just tag them for easy reference. Powers ^(talk) 20:32, 27 June 2016 (UTC)

Has there been more spam from this company since last night? If so, yes, a filter would be a good idea. If not, no reason to do anything unless the problem crops up again. Ikan Kekek (talk) 01:18, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

I have no idea; I just thought it would be an easy way to "be on the lookout" as you requested. Powers ^(talk) 19:23, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

Much appreciated. We'll revisit this if the spammer returns. Ikan Kekek (talk) 03:24, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Problem coming to a head

Please note Talk:Jordan#Zionist nonsense and the edit war here. Also note User talk:Makeandtoss#Edit warring. If a block is required, the first will be for 1 day. If another is required after that, there will be a post to Wikivoyage:User ban nominations. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:52, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

And...we worked through things effectively. So at this point, it doesn't look like there's any problem anymore. Ikan Kekek (talk) 12:17, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

Is there a technology available to ban invite links for e.g. uber?

Swept in from the pub

Seeing this edit (unfortunately it's nontrivial to revert, as it is "buried" under somewhat useful edits), I am wondering, is there a way to ban such "invite" links before they happen? I know they are against policy, but so is touting and it never kept anybody from trying... Hobbitschuster (talk) 12:50, 12 April 2016 (UTC)

@Hobbitschuster: If this is still an issue: there is a thing called AbuseFilter. Commons admins seem to use it quite frequently for similar tasks … --El Grafo (talk) 15:21, 27 April 2016 (UTC)

How to deal with users making the exact same edit here and on that other site?

Swept in from the pub

Maybe we should have some guideline for dealing with edits like this. If you look it up on that other website (I was somewhat suspicious due to the amount of redlinks), you see immediately that a user under the same name did the exact same edits over there. Now I have posted a thread on the talk page of the British Virgin Islands article, but this is likely to be a recurring issue and I would like some guideline as to how to deal with it in general. If I understand our current (lack of) policy correctly, we do not prohibit it as there are no things in CC by SA that prohibit it, but we discourage it due to SEO concerns and encourage the authors to instead focus their edits here, correct? Maybe we should write an essay or something to point users to to maybe convince them? Hobbitschuster (talk) 22:04, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

I don't think we should do anything, other than be glad we have a new contributor, welcome him and fix the wikilinks you mentioned on the talk page. Acer (talk) 22:21, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Notwithstanding my earlier comments, this is one case in which I think "lateral SEO edits" may be desirable. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 22:27, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Well it is quite possible that a significant number of the editors to whom this applies are unaware of our history and even some of those who have a passing knowledge of it might not know about the whole SEO thing. Maybe we should have/create something more in depth to link to rather than Wikivoyage and Wikitravel as nowadays the "editor active here and on that other site" is the commonest cause for us to talk about them in the first place and the cases of "someone asks us about that other place of their own volition" have greatly decreased. Hobbitschuster (talk) 22:42, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

We could make a customized welcome template for people coming over from WT with a link to the history. I just don't think we should require any specific behavior from them, such as not making duplicate edits in both sites (since I think being able to do that is an incentive to start editing here. If they have to rewrite they might balk at the extra work and just stay there instead). Acer (talk) 23:01, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

We've had a significant number of negative experiences on this site in the past with editors who were active on both sites stirring up trouble here, so I hope my reaction to this issue is not colored by that. I think it's fine to drop such users a friendly talk page message explaining why we frown on duplicate content from WT, but I don't think we should hesitate to edit the WV text accordingly, and I don't think we should show a whole lot of tolerance towards repeat offenders. Frankly, I'd love for policy to be changed to explicitly prohibit duplicate WT/WV content (except insofar as there remains some pre-fork material on our site), but given the amount of mountain-moving that's necessary to gain consensus on policy changes here, I think that may be a bit too much to hope for. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 22:51, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

It should be noted that while it is seemingly logical that the same text on both sites will penalize our SEO rankings, there is no concrete evidence to suggest this actually happens. It probably does, but no way to know for sure. Additionally, I assume (not knowing for sure) that a high proportion of text on WV is still the same as WT, and therefore a few paragraphs of similar content, although possibly unhelpful, is not likely to do much harm by itself.

Also should we get new contributors to 'buy in' to our historical dislike of WT? It probably isn't a good first impression.

I would go with the principle that 'anyone can edit', and if someone does add similar content then other contributors can enhance by adapting i so that it becomes sufficiently different. Andrewssi2 (talk) 01:51, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Not to hijack this thread, but regarding the statement that "there is no concrete evidence" that duplicate content affects search engine rankings, that is not true. Duplicate content issues are a well-known challenge in search engine optimization and indisputably affect how a site is ranked - there are reams of articles describing the issue online, and they explain why it may cause a site to be filtered out of search results or rank lower. For just one example, see this page from Google, which explicitly states that Google excludes results when content is too similar to another result. -- Ryan • (talk) • 02:00, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Regarding the last paragraph of Andrewssi2's comment, that's precisely what I suggested doing in the first place. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 02:02, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Ryan , I was saying that duplication probably does cause a SEO issue, but it is not possible to determine the impact of one new article of duplicated content except to say that reading Google's guidance it would likely lower our ranking score. I'm thinking how this might be explained to a new contributor. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 02:34, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Range block?

Look at this history of vandalism by 3 IPs. All are currently blocked for 2 months, but it looks like this is a dynamic IP vandal. User:178.48.229.120 has previously been blocked for 1 day, 3 days and 1 week for vandalism, and User:80.98.132.185 has previously been blocked for 1 day for vandalism. Both also have user talk pages. User:88.199.232.34 has only one edit, to vandalistically edit war, for which it was blocked for 1 day. I've reblocked that user for 2 months as one head of the now 3-headed vandal. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:16, 24 December 2016 (UTC)

Also, we've had a bunch of Telstra vandal edits by users with BrendanJ in their username. Can we have a range block for that name? Ikan Kekek (talk) 10:32, 25 December 2016 (UTC)

Apologies, been out of action past few days. Has the user tried to edit again? --Andrewssi2 (talk) 10:39, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

No problem; I hope you enjoyed your Christmas! The 3 IPs I mentioned at the top of this section haven't tried to edit again, to my knowledge. As for the Telstra vandal, they may have taken a day off, but I think we should watch very closely, keeping the latest username pattern in mind. I would support indefinitely blocking any new BrendanJ names on sight, without waiting for any edit. Ikan Kekek (talk) 11:55, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, I hope you did as well! It is feasible to block new users with the name BrendanJ. I would propose just tagging new edits for the next step, and then consider upgrading to a block later? --Andrewssi2 (talk) 19:57, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

Whatever you think best. We shall see how long this lull lasts. Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:37, 28 December 2016 (UTC)

So are we agreed on blocking any BrendanJ user on sight? User:BrendanJWilliams111 has one edit now. Ikan Kekek (talk) 12:28, 28 December 2016 (UTC)

I created Special:AbuseFilter/29 to tag BrendanJ posts. If successful and doesn't make false positives then we can change to a block. Andrewssi2 (talk) 04:08, 29 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, Andrew. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:16, 29 December 2016 (UTC)

We has 11 hits the past few days. I can turn on. Andrewssi2 (talk) 17:30, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

It seems extremely likely that this long-term Telstra user will immediately switch to a different username or go back to editing anonymously the second the filter goes live, so can you be sure to turn off the filter in a week or two after he has changed his pattern so that we don't eventually block valid users? -- Ryan • (talk) • 17:36, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

I will.

Just a thought... it has been rather tiresome to track this user via their various IPs. If they would just keep using that username then it would at least make it easy to see all their edits and rollback the bad ones? Andrewssi2 (talk) 18:04, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

They seem to have given up this method on January 2nd. Downgraded to a tag rather than block. Andrewssi2 (talk) 02:49, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the consensus approach on this should be now? Currently active User:BrendanWilliams2016, User:BrendanJW2017 and User:Brenjwill200 are obviously the same person. I can't say his edits are all that disturbing, but the principle of making multiple user names does go against the spirit of this website to start with. JuliasTravels (talk) 14:29, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

And the big problem is that since Mr. Williams (if that's his real name) refuses to discuss anything, it's hard to know which edits are reliable. Ikan Kekek (talk) 14:57, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Re: JuliasTravels "I'm not sure what the consensus approach on this should be now?" - It no longer matters whether he's making good edits or bad. This is a case of evasion of a preexisting indefinite block which, even absent any other misconduct, is a blockworthy offense in itself per Wikivoyage:How to handle unwanted edits#User ban. Ikan is correct that his refusal to address messages on his talk page isn't helping his case, but frankly, the time for him to start doing that would have been long ago, before we lost our patience and started simply blocking him on sight. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 15:30, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

If he ever made a decision based on the idea of "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" and wanted to engage in a dialogue, I'd be happy to do so, guardedly, but let's cross that bridge in the unlikely event we ever come to it. Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:32, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

No objections here, but opinions seemed to differ, considering that this user received a welcome message and some of his edits were simply reverted, even by admins heavily involved in the Telstra story before. There was also no response yet to Andrewssi2's suggestion to consider leaving him with a user name to make reverting easier. Without reading the full history of the Telstra edits, I would say that there is also at least a change in editing behaviour. The original Telstra "vandal" edits included lots of empty See-bullets and such. Without proper research, I wouldn't feel 100% sure that this is the same person as that original user, 4 years ago. Regardless, however, I do think that anyone who starts making multiple user names is up to something - I was searching, but surprisingly, we don't seems to have any policy against that. JuliasTravels (talk) 15:41, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I was very surprised by the welcome messages to someone who's obviously the Telstra vandal, and so described here. Talk about pointless. But as for empty, unnecessary subheadings, I've seen and reverted them - such as "History" subheadings for entire "Understand" sections. Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:23, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Well, don't be too surprised :) This user is only "obviously" "the" Telstra vandal to those heavily involved in the Telstra story. Not everyone follows this page: note that we're on a policy talk page, not on Wikivoyage:User_ban_nominations (where, according to policy described on this page, any range block longer than a day should typically be discussed). The edits of this user are always so mixed that it's easy enough to encounter a few good or acceptable ones on your watchlist, and post a welcome message as you would with any new user. JuliasTravels (talk) 11:08, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

It looks like Brendan is now editing again. At this point I'm just inclined just to tag their edits and revert the bad ones. Andrewssi2 (talk) 08:51, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Montreal as DotM

Swept in from the pub

I've suggested on WV/de to improve the Montreal article and present it as a Dotm in August during Wikimania. We can also have it linked it on the Wikimania websites. What do you think? -- DerFussi 08:24, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

It's currently Usable and therefore ineligible for consideration at en.voy. Improvements would have to take place before it can be nominated here. Ikan Kekek (talk) 14:53, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I thought we had that debate before and ultimately concluded that the mere fact of Wikimania is not by itself enough reason to feature a certain city? Hobbitschuster (talk) 15:29, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Your memory is correct. Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:33, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

It might still be interesting to upgrade that article and link it from the Wikimania page, if we have a few people with knowledge of the area willing to join the effort. The reality is that featuring an article typically generates between 1000 and 2000 extra page views for that articles in a month. Wikimania had 1200 attendees last year. The chances of a good number of those Wikimedia enthusiasts checking out the page would be relatively good, and the changes of any of them joining the editing process are much better than with a regular feature. JuliasTravels (talk) 15:53, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I definitely believe that the page should be linked on multiple Wikimania-related pages.

I think that there are practical reasons to coordinate with Wikimania, even if that doesn't lead to a DotM. Last year's Wikimania organizers did a major expansion on the article about Esino Lario. Attendees should be encouraged to expand and improve the article for the city they're visiting and well as the article from their home city. It'd be interesting to see a mini edit-a-thon for Wikivoyage, or stickers to reward Wikimania attendees who edit here, perhaps saying something like "I improved Wikivoyage" or (if you want to be a little funny) "I told Wikivoyage where to go". WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:50, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I vividly remember the edits related to Esino Lario, and while many of them definitely helped, it would be great if Wikipedians were referred to Wikivoyage:Welcome, Wikipedians and especially Wikivoyage:What is an article? and asked to please focus on updating and adding content to existing Montreal district articles, and the main Montreal article as appropriate. Anyone is welcome to create itineraries or travel topics that aren't easily covered as part of single listings, introductions to sections or the "Understand" section of a destination article, but we had problems with people creating encyclopedia-style articles about things like how to use a scholarly archive in Esino Lario that was specially open to Wikimania members for only one day. See Talk:Esino Lario#Unhelpful though well-intentioned articles for some background on some of the problems. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:51, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Maybe it would be wise to write a bit especially for Wikimania about what we do and who we are and how to avoid common pitfalls as seen last year? This way we might reduce frustration on all sides and get more out of it. Hobbitschuster (talk) 20:17, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

That's a great idea. Where would you suggest we put the Introduction to Wikivoyage for Wikimedians, and should it be in one place in its early stages and copied to another place later? If it's a good enough article, we could ultimately include it in our links for new users. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:20, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Not to sidetrack the discussion too much, but ever since the initial launch as a Wikimedia project I've been thinking we need a better way to handle "unwanted" edits. Editorial consistency is important, but it's also true that this project desperately needs a larger, healthier editor community. Perhaps the solution is to revisit the WV:Article status system to make it more granular and not solely focused on formatting - for example, allowing a range of status to indicate whether an article meets WV:WIAA or might be a merge candidate, to reflect the quality of the article's formatting, the quality of the travel content, etc. Or maybe there is another solution that would allow easier integration of what are today "unwanted" edits. In any case, it seems that a fear of edits from well-meaning contributors indicates a potential problem in how Wikivoyage is set up to handle those sorts of contributions. -- Ryan • (talk) • 20:33, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

The Wikimania site might be a good place to start. We could start with a few hints, links to all the language editions, and an invitation to attendees who are familiar with Montreal to help out the people who've never been there. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:33, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

A guideline for Wikipedians would be nice. Should be part of a poster presented in Montreal. We presented a kind of poster with differences between Wikipedia and Wikivoyage. It depicted a Wikipedia article and a Wikivoyage article on each side and explained the differences.

Besides I would like to improve our article about Montreal. Is there any chance to resolve your district discussion concerning the Montreal article in a short time? The districts are the first parts I would start with. And import and translate some district articles. -- DerFussi 06:12, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

Wikivoyage:Welcome, Wikipedians seems to be the central source of information about differences between Wikipedia and Wikivoyage. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:19, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

I am a long-term Wikipedia editor, and a relatively new Wikivoyage contributor. I have poked around and learned about the differences, and am still learning, but I think a guide for Wikipedians would be very useful. In Wikipedia there is a "welcome" template that an editor can post on a new contributor's talk page that (a) welcomes and encourages them, and (b) introduces them to the five pillars of editing in Wikipedia (with links they can follow). This is a useful tool for teaching and retaining new editors, especially if you've had to revert their first edit, which can be discouraging. Ground Zero (talk) 18:46, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

As WhatamIdoing said, the page you're looking for is Wikivoyage:Welcome, Wikipedians. If you believe it can be improved, please post your thoughts on that article's talk page or just plunge forward and make any presumably non-controversial changes yourself. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:54, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

Somehow I missed his post, and now I see it right there above mine. I'll check it out. Ground Zero (talk) 18:57, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

[edit conflict, and I believe WhatamIdoing is a woman, but I could be wrong]: Just to follow up on this, I think a separate brochure-style article specifically directed at the Wikimania participants is a good idea, but that's not because there is no page currently directed toward Wikipedians on Wikivoyage. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:58, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

Thanks. My apologies to Ms WhatamIdoing, if appropriate. I do know better than to assume things like that, but I slip up occasionally. I found the "welcome message" for Wikivoyage here. It can be copied and pasted easily. Ground Zero (talk) 19:07, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

I am a woman. There are a couple of scripts around if you want to make a habit of checking for disclosed gender, but I think that most people don't mind the occasional wrong guess. (In addition to userinfo, I can also recommend Hoo man's scripts, which make it easy to see which wikis another editor is active at; see m:User:WhatamIdoing/global.js for the exact code needed to import them into all your accounts.)

Perhaps of more immediate use, there is also Template:Welcome here. It's short, simple, and includes a link to this page and to the information page for Wikipedians. If you wanted to make it sweet as well, then you could insert an image of your favorite dessert along with it.  :-) WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:46, 6 January 2017 (UTC)

I'm pleased to make your acquaintance. Coming from Wikipedia, which is plagued by a lack of female contributors, I am aware of the problems that are created when a project lacks gender balance. Thank you for pointing me to the template. That will be easier to use. Regards, Ground Zero (talk) 13:16, 6 January 2017 (UTC)

"Unwanted" edits (for lack of a better term)

Now I think what Ryan says above is actually quite a longstanding issue/conflict here. How broad do we want to be. In the relatively short time since I joined a whole bunch of travel topics have been created and many of them had a lot of buzz for about a month or so before being mostly forgotten in a state that cannot be called "finished". I am not sure we are overextending our relatively small community, but on the other hand, I love going on a tangent of a tangent and many of our travel topics are good places to draw new contributors and keep them motivated. So yes, having "unwanted" edits in any form might indicate a design flaw, but being an overbroad "wiki of everything" is also unwise. First we do not have the resources for that and second, Wikipedia is much better at that. Now there are some fields we currently do not cover but conceivably could or should in the future, but I fear there will always be well-meaning newbies who try to add content which just does not belong here. Similarly, there are WP articles that are much too focused on tourism. Better cooperation across projects certainly seems a good area to work in and should be raised at Wikimania by those who'll be there. Hobbitschuster (talk) 21:04, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

This isn't exactly cost-free (in terms of our time), but I think we should consider these two things as priorities:

• Making sure people know where to ask for help: One key way to keep contributors is to make sure that they can find a friendly human when they don't know what's going on. We're small enough that we probably don't need a w:WP:Teahouse, but we could perhaps make it clear that this page is a great place to ask for help. Do we have enough redirects pointing here, from the usual "Village pump" names for the major wikis? Are editors from other wikis consistently getting {{welcome}} messages (which has a link to this page)?
• Trying to expand/build upon whatever's done. If they add something perhaps "unwanted" but not actually dreadful or spammy, then can we leave it for a bit? Can we trim it, re-arrange it, split it to a different article (with a clear edit summary/note on the editor's talk page), or do something that looks collaborative? For example, if someone adds information that's Wikimania-specific shortly before Wikimania, does it really urgently need to be removed before the event's over? Or the point made above about the archives: Perhaps could it have been moved (at least temporarily) to something like Historical travel as an example of something that sometimes happens. People do check back to see whether their edits "stuck", and if they don't, then they give up (and complain to their friends). So to the extent that we can reasonably preserve or collaborate with their first efforts, we may convert a one-time give-it-a-try editor into a long-term contributor.

I don't want to suggest that these will always work. I don't even want to suggest that these would be radical changes to normal behavior. But they're two of the most successful ways to retain editors, so I think we should practice them deliberately. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:33, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

Wikivoyage as chatroom

How do you feel about this? User contributions for User: Fitzgeraldhc, user contributions for User:Cgr811, history of User talk:Cgr811. My feeling is that we should indefinitely block these folks without further notice; note this warning and read the reactions to it if you feel like. Ikan Kekek (talk) 17:49, 11 March 2017 (UTC)

Not to mention their reaction to the above comment. I took the liberty of blocking these two fools. I don't know, nor do I care, what their purpose here is, but clearly it's not to help build a travel guide. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 19:21, 11 March 2017 (UTC)

The above links are largely dead. Can anyone fill me in? Powers ^(talk) 00:32, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

You're an administrator, right? Then you can simply view their (by now deleted) contributions. It was just random chatting, which they continued after explanation and warning that this is a travel guide, and talk pages are not meant to have completely unrelated chatsessions. The ban seems fine, since there was clearly no intention to contribute anything useful. JuliasTravels (talk) 22:13, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

It was random chatting at first, followed by name-calling and other hostility when admins politely asked them to take their conversation elsewhere. The userban was by no means the first resort. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 22:41, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Edit warring in the Debrecen article

2 IPs and one registered user so far have made unexplained deletions of the same listing. Please help. Article history here. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:00, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

It is conceivable that there are legitimate reasons for those edits. For example, the monument might not exist (any more). There might also be more sinister motives behind it. The monument might be a symbol of some political or ethnic group or identity that the person(s) in question dislike. Given that there is too little information contained in the listing, we cannot be sure either way. Of course it may just be someone who wants to troll us, but until and unless they branch out, I wouldn't be too sure. The user contributions seem to be not indicative of any hypothesis. Keep in mind that edit summaries are only read by a minority of newbies. 19:21, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

Adding this: this edit and this edit seem somewhat problematic, but the rest of them are perfectly ordinary and the user does not seem to be very active here. Has the account been active on other wikis? Hobbitschuster (talk) 19:25, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

this page history might also be of some interest. Quite frankly, I am not sure what we're dealing with here. Hobbitschuster (talk) 19:27, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

I've posted to the user talk pages of the two IPs and one registered user in question, so this is about more than not reading edit summaries. We can't know what someone's motives are if they never give any indication of them, and that makes the point that perhaps there's some good explanation for their actions moot. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:38, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

I doubt that the monument is where we are saying it is. I could not find much info online about it, except this newspaper article which didn't translate that well - if I picked this up right there are plans to move the monument, and it is or was (when??) inside a military barracks. AlasdairW (talk) 21:30, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

I found this within my first few web search results.

We need a range block. I can block IP addresses, but it will be in vain because 3 different IPs have been edit warring. User:Andrewssi2, can you help? I will post to WV:Vandalism in progress, too. Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:11, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

Done : Special:AbuseFilter/30 Andrewssi2 (talk) 08:52, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

Thank you. Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:58, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

How effective are IP blocks? With most internet users using DHCP, block them now and tomorrow/next visit they are using a different IP address. Being in the UK with a government holding snooping in higher priority than privacy, I use a VPN and it is a trivial inconvenience when I sometimes get that WV has blocked my IP (or rather my VPN server's IP) and I just change server. So were I a vandal or something IP blocking would be ineffective. PsamatheM (talk) 09:03, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

They are not effective against a skilled vandal (and useless against some), but most people just use the IP address they happen to get, accepting the block. Also those that know how to get a new address may not bother. --LPfi (talk) 09:36, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

IP Blocking Issue -> Duplicate Listing (System Bug ?)

I've just found an issue with the IP blocking system. Being in the UK with its "anything allowed" snooping I access the internet through a VPN and some of my VPN service servers are on WV blocked IP addresses so sometimes I have to switch servers to "publish" anything. I just added a listing through the listing editor dialog thing (using the "Add Listing" link next to the Level 2 title rather than through the "edit source" link). Entered details, pressed publish and got a geo block message, and it re-displayed the add listing form (all fields still complete), I thought OK, changed VPN server and "published" and looked at the page and the listing was there twice! Despite the reported error and block it seems the listing was published anyway. Does not bother me but I thought some admins somewhere might be interested. the 1st listing (blocked but added by the system anyway) did NOT appear in the "recent changes" page, only the 2nd and the subsequent connection I made to remove the duplicate. But if I look at he the page history it looks like both listings were added by the same change (which is not possible as it was done through the listing form thing where you can only add one listing at a time). Page: Alençon, change 14 April 19:38 (blocked one shortly before). PsamatheM (talk) 19:53, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

Happened again so I experimented. Adding a listing from the destination age (add listing link to get form) (this time Norwich) and on pressing publis got the error message "Error: An unknown error has been encountered while attempting to save the listing, please try again: globalblocking-ipblocked-range". Before doing anything, in another browser take I checked the Norwich page and listing had NOT been added. So pressed publish again, same error and still no listing addd to Norwich page on other tab. so changed my IP address and pressed Publish again and listing appeared 3 times on Norwich page (because I had pressed publish 3 time, and the site rejected it twice!). PsamatheM (talk) 22:45, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

How do you look up what ISP a user is using again?

I'm not yet sure this is another iteration of the Telstra vandal, but he/she seems to be creating articles for tiny villages (again?). I'm not certain yet that we don't want those articles, but I sure am suspicious. Ikan Kekek (talk) 00:08, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

From the pattern it is them. They are adding tiny hamlets in central Europe, as well as their favourite towns on the east coast of Australia. Andrewssi2 (talk) 07:04, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

There used to be a way to look up what ISP someone is using. I guess there still is, but I forgot how. Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:30, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Currently, User talk:Glorynets has a template stating that s/he is blocked, but s/he is not blocked. Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:32, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

I think you are looking for the Wikivoyage:CheckUser function that most Admins don't have. We did discuss its use with regards to SockPuttetry a few years ago. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 08:40, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

No, I'm looking for a function that any admin could access (and perhaps non-admins, too, but I'm not sure). I guess I'll block Glorynets if s/he still isn't blocked. Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:46, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

To my knowledge an IP address is protected for privacy reasons when a User Name is assigned. Maybe someone else knows more? --Andrewssi2 (talk) 09:02, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

There was a way to look up geographically where a user was, and sometimes their ISP would also be mentioned. I think you were the one who told us how to do that. Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:09, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

I did? This is trivial enough to do when you have their IP address (in either IP 4 or 6 format), but really not sure how to do if you only have their user name to go on.

There is an option when blocking users to prevent creation from the same IP address, so there must be something available in the backend somewhere. Andrewssi2 (talk) 09:24, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps someone else did, not sure. Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:26, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

How long to block

Fellow admins: I was just looking through the block log. I am very surprised to see people described as "spambots" blocked for 1 day. What's the point in that? If you're sure a user is a spambot, the block should always be indefinite except in case of IP users. I was surprised to see an indefinite block of an IP. To my knowledge, we do not block IPs indefinitely because IPs can be used by more than one user. Are there exceptions to this policy? My policy has been never to block an IP user for more than 3 months. Is that erroneous? Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:08, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

This describes perfectly what I thought policy was. If it's not being followed, please adjust accordingly. Powers ^(talk) 01:50, 2 May 2017 (UTC)

Flareup on Kashmir

Hi, everyone. Please watch User:Wikigura‎'s edits to South Asia, where this user has now deleted the map three times for partisan reasons, citing an Indian law that apparently now requires that all maps in India show all of Kashmir as part of India, rather than depicting actual de facto borders, on pain of a fine. See article history, User talk:Wikigura, User talk:Ikan Kekek#South Asia Image. I think if s/he deletes the map once more, his/her posting privileges should be blocked, initially for a day. Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:02, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

Also see Talk:South Asia, where ideally, this dispute could run its course. Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:11, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

Major proliferation of Telstra edits

Lots of different sockpuppets. It's getting so that it seems like too much work to post talk page messages, even with the template. I think we need to have the filter block edits at this point. How reliable a filter is it at this point in terms of avoiding false positives? Ikan Kekek (talk) 02:29, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

BTCentralPlus user warning message

Hi, everyone. When's the last time we had a spate of vandalism from BTCentralPlus users? Can we get rid of the "BTCentralPlus user - potential vandalism" warning message, which has offended some constructive users in the past? Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:55, 31 December 2017 (UTC)