Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/User problems

From Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository
Jump to navigation Jump to search

Shortcut: COM:AN/U · COM:ANU

Community portal
introduction		Help deskVillage pump
copyright • proposals		Administrators' noticeboard
vandalism • user problems • blocks and protections

This is a place where users can communicate with administrators, or administrators with one another. You can report vandalism, problematic users, or anything else that needs an administrator's intervention. Do not report child pornography or other potentially illegal content here; e-mail legal-reports@wikimedia.org instead. If reporting threatened harm to self or others also email emergency@wikimedia.org.

Vandalism
[new report] 		User problems
[new report] 		Blocks and protections
[new report] 		Other
[new section]

Report users for clear cases of vandalism. Block requests for any other reason should be reported to the blocks and protections noticeboard.


Report disputes with users that require administrator assistance. Further steps are listed at resolve disputes.


Reports that do not suit the vandalism noticeboard may be reported here. Requests for page protection/unprotection could also be requested here.


Other reports that require administrator assistance which do not fit in any of the previous three noticeboards may be reported here. Requests for history merging or splitting should be filed at COM:HMS.


Archives
13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1
73, 72, 71, 70, 69, 68, 67, 66, 65, 64, 63, 62, 61, 60, 59, 58, 57, 56, 55, 54, 53, 52, 51, 50, 49, 48, 47, 46, 45, 44, 43, 42, 41, 40, 39, 38, 37, 36, 35, 34, 33, 32, 31, 30, 29, 28, 27, 26, 25, 24, 23, 22, 21, 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1
26, 25, 24, 23, 22, 21, 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1
72, 71, 70, 69, 68, 67, 66, 65, 64, 63, 62, 61, 60, 59, 58, 57, 56, 55, 54, 53, 52, 51, 50, 49, 48, 47, 46, 45, 44, 43, 42, 41, 40, 39, 38, 37, 36, 35, 34, 33, 32, 31, 30, 29, 28, 27, 26, 25, 24, 23, 22, 21, 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1
Translate this page
Commons discussion pages (index)

Note

  • Keep your report as short as possible, but include links as evidence.
  • Remember to sign and date all comments using four tildes (~~~~), which translates into a signature and a time stamp.
  • It is usually appropriate to notify the user(s) concerned. {{subst:Discussion-notice|noticeboard=COM:AN/U|thread=|reason=}} is available for this.
  • It is important to keep a cool head, especially when responding to comments against you or your edits. Personal attacks and disruptive comments only escalate a situation; Please try to remain civil with your comments.
  • Administrators: Please make a note if a report is dealt with, to avoid unnecessary responses by other admins.

Shizhao[edit]

Shizhao (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)

Admin since 2006, but there are some problems.

Do I need to continue digging through this history? As a note: Shizhao does good work as well, and I am grateful for that, but the good to no-so-good ratio is.. not so good. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 17:27, 20 August 2018 (UTC)

I just noticed the connection between Commons:Deletion requests/File:Opening Ceremany of a political reeducation camp in Lopnur County.jpg and File:Number of re-education related government procurement bids in Xinjiang.png. The latter is obviously PD-ineligible, for the former much greater care should have been taken before deleting it due to the censorship in the source country, but in fact, it was tagged as copyvio by shizhao before it was converted to a DR by KokBayraq. Luckily enwiki was able to recover it anyway. The PD-ineligible graph is used in the same article: w:Xinjiang reeducation camps which makes me question if that DR was politically motivated. Which would be Very Bad. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 18:00, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
It makes me a bit sad that @Shizhao: doesn't even try to defend himself here. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 13:59, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
So please specify your desires more clearly. His English may not be very good.--Jusjih (talk) 02:33, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
Neither is my Chinese. But if @Shizhao: would just acknowledge here they made mistakes, that would be a start. The number of issues is so big that the most appropriate solution would be (my opinion) to resign as admin for now, become familiarized with the policies and guidelines as they exist today (rather different from 2006) and once they have, apply for adminship again. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 16:55, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
"Jesus Christ" ? Please let Him in the Heaven, and don't involve Him with our poor things here, thanks. (Fortunately, you did not name the prophet of an oriental religion I know, or "Commons" would have risk an auto-bombing for blasphem reasons...)--Jebulon (talk) 15:46, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
No worries! Jesus is on my side. Face-smile.svg He told me.[citation needed] - Alexis Jazz ping plz 16:55, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol support vote.svg Support starting a formal de-adminship request. The user in question conducts some petty Commons busyness as if nothing happened here. Such handling of well-founded criticism is unacceptable for a user holding elevated privileges. Commons IMHO will not miss an admin hiding behind others’ backs. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 05:28, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
Sorry, I know this discussion. I just didn't quite understand what the purpose of this discussion, so I don't know how to answer it. I will check more carefully for some pictures that may have problems.--shizhao (talk) 07:25, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
About OTRS: Because I was an OTRS member in the past, and the previous Commons did not have such strict requirements for adding OTRS tags. I didn't notice this change, this is my fault. OTRS self-reverted is thinking about this change, the operation.
About Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Works of Li Mei-shu: Because a large number of images do not have an OTRS tag added. I thought it was strange after submitting the deletion, so I immediately asked WMTW. I learned that they encountered some problems when dealing with OTRS, so for a while, many images did not have OTRS tag. So I closed the delete request myself.
About Xinjiang reeducation camps images: This is only a copyright issue. I don't know why it is a political issue?

--shizhao (talk) 07:44, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

@Shizhao: additional care should have been taken for the photo, it's a special case due to the censorship. You could have asked someone (or ask on COM:VP) to check if it could be transferred to Wikipedias as fair use. So far that's just suboptimal, policy doesn't strictly require this but it would be good practice in this case. The subsequent tagging of a related obvious PD-ineligible file as "no permission" is what worries me. And why you had tagged File:Rexsee logo.jpg? Beats me. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 08:30, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
@Alexis Jazz, "logos" are generally a messy issue for us, as what is protected or above TOO varies strongly from country to country. --Túrelio (talk) 09:00, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
File:Rexsee logo.jpg not cc license--shizhao (talk) 11:48, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
@Shizhao: can such handwriting-style words in Latin script be copyrighted in the PRC? Incnis Mrsi (talk) 17:13, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
@Incnis Mrsi: "Charles Bigelow" and "Kris Holmes" sure don't sound Chinese to me.. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 15:42, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
@Shizhao: While in some cases regrettable, adding a license review to PD-mark content from Flickr is not the current practice on Commons. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 16:32, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

User:Jcb[edit]

I'm going to close this now as now as topics are floating and no problem solving in favor of the project is expectable. If there is any issue remaining, please reopen an ANU discussion on a specific topic and in an explicit civil manner. Thank you. --Krd 06:40, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

According to Commons:Administrators/De-adminship: "De-adminship requests that are opened without prior discussion leading to some consensus for removal may be closed by a bureaucrat as inadmissible". Read this just in time to prevent the request from being declined on a technicality.

So here is the text I was going to use on Commons:Administrators/Requests/Jcb (de-adminship 4):

For reference: Commons:Administrators/Requests/Jcb (de-adminship), Commons:Administrators/Requests/Jcb (de-adminship 2), Commons:Administrators/Requests/Jcb (de-adminship 3).

Thanks for all your work. Please retire now. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 13:46, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

So you disagree with a DR closure and instead of e.g. starting an COM:UDR you are attacking closing admin? First with a threatening message at my user talk page ("I'm not planning on asking twice" and then immediately asking for desysop? I have left a clear closure statement to the DR. I think my statement was more civil than the banner you posted in that DR. Are you planning to propose desysop for every admin you sometimes disagree with? Jcb (talk) 19:44, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
I will make an undeletion request. But right now, how useful will that be? You will oppose it, no unanimous support, probably no undeletion. So I start here. This was the straw that broke the camel's back. You have contributed to two long-term contributors leaving Commons. You just deleted over 1000 photos that were fine. Some had to be deleted, but most of that was already sorted out. In fact, some already were deleted due to the work I had done. And it was quite some work. It wasn't finished. I asked you to undelete, but you refused. "I'm not planning on asking twice" was no threat. I just told you exactly how it is. I wasn't planning on begging you. If you had admitted your mistake and reverted your actions, the camel's back would still be intact now. Bruised, but intact. I gave you a chance, but only one. You didn't take it. Dropping a 1500+ file deletion after weeks of silence without asking if there have been any developments is not civil, regardless of closure statement. The banner describes your action on that DR like nothing else. You just destroyed I-can't-even-begin-to-imagine-how-many hours of work, I post a banner. Didn't yell, didn't call you names. If that's not civil I don't know what is. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 20:33, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
I just looked at the delinker log and the damage is even bigger than I realized. You have bluntly removed everything, which included several verified public domain works like File:Moliere2.jpg. You didn't read before pressing your buttons. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 20:47, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol support vote.svg Support starting another request.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 02:00, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol support vote.svg Support sadly, seems to be a patten that continues and is enough to be seen as an unbecoming of a administrator. Sysop is not a right but a privilege, and one where the community will be ensuring it isn't being abused. Bidgee (talk) 02:34, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Pictogram voting comment.svg Comment Jcb is the most prolific deleter on Commons. I think this is in part because he invests a great deal of time into this project. I appreciate this and I know our backlogs will rapidly expand if he is desysopped. Unfortunately many of his deletions have been batch deletions (NASA photos, nsd, npd, etc.), undertaken without sufficient consideration. Looking at his deletion log, one can see many files deleted per minute, and no human can do this with the amount of care we should expect. We have lost good files to Jcb's carelessness. Some we have undeleted, but others are unnoticed and probably lost forever. This needs to change. I Symbol support vote.svg Support this discussion but would prefer to come to a specific agreement with Jcb about what needs to change. If he is unwilling, he should not be an admin. Guanaco (talk) 05:15, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
    • @Guanaco: Did you take the time to have a look at the supposed problems as presented above? If so, please tell me what you think that I should change. Alexis refers to several DRs from the past in which they disagree with the outcome, but they were all after a long discussion with several experienced users commenting. In most cases nobody saw a reason to start an UDR. Only in the TechCrunch case there were several UDRs, but they all failed. So although I will of course make mistakes sometimes, in the cases presented above my closures had sufficient community support after all. Regarding the issues with two different users as mentioned above, a closer looks tells that their actions were indeed problematic and that admin action was needed. Then the event leading to this AN/U-topic. This was about this 5 months old DR. In the past months I have reviewed this DR several times. In July I decided to not yet act on the DR, to give Alexis some more time. But unfortunately Alexis did not disclose/explain any of their efforts to the community, nor did we receive anything at OTRS. So in my opinion the closure yesterday was very late rather than too early. Everything that could have been said had been said months ago and no evidence was presented in any way. What followed was a message from Alexis more or less saying: "I disagree with your closure of that DR. Undo your actions immediately or I will try to get you desysopped". I really hope you agree with me that such intimidation not is the established way to handle a disagreement over a DR closure. Instead, they should have gone to COM:UDR, where everybody can voice their opinion. If in the end the conclusion of the UDR would be different from the DR closure, we can always undelete the files. Jcb (talk) 12:00, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
      • This reply answers Guanaco's question: unwilling to change. TechCrunch wasn't deleted because of consensus or anything, it was deleted because of Jcb.
"Regarding the issues with two different users as mentioned above, a closer looks tells that their actions were indeed problematic and that admin action was needed."
So you bullied them away from Commons. Good job.
"But unfortunately Alexis did not disclose/explain any of their efforts to the community,"
There were plenty. Some comments on the DR itself as well as a VP thread. The thousands of categorization edits were not exactly stored in a vault either. Either way you could have asked me if I had forgotten, was planning to continue, needed help, etc. You're not banned from my talk page you know.
"and no evidence was presented in any way."
You didn't read the DR.
"What followed was a message from Alexis more or less saying: "I disagree with your closure of that DR. Undo your actions immediately or I will try to get you desysopped". I really hope you agree with me that such intimidation not is the established way to handle a disagreement over a DR closure."
You're actually paraphrasing me here, not quoting. This isn't just about this DR. As I said, straw that broke the camel's back. Or de druppel die de emmer doet overlopen if you have trouble understanding that. I had er schoon genoeg van, that's why I started this discussion. Not just that DR.
"If in the end the conclusion of the UDR would be different from the DR closure, we can always undelete the files."
Deletion is often a one-way street: deletion is easy. Undeletion is hard, because the file is no longer visible. Whenever asking for an undeletion, I often don't even know for sure what I'm asking to be undeleted, I can only guess most of the time. And too often, consensus needs to make room for your opinion. Starting a UDR isn't too hopeful as long as you are an admin. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 21:50, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
@Jcb: I think the statement by Alexis Jazz, "For the record, I'm not planning on asking twice." is not the most friendly, but the threat is implicit at worst. We can talk about Alexis in a different thread if needed. Here is what I believe needs to change:
  • When a file has a problem tag (nsd, npd, nld), the reviewing admin should determine whether deletion is actually the correct outcome. Sometimes the source is obviously easy to find. Sometimes the specific origin of our particular copy of an image is missing, but there is enough evidence on hand to confirm public domain status. Yes, it is the uploader's responsibility to add this information, and files missing essential information are speedy candidates under F5. However, admins should use their discretion to save useful, in-scope content wherever possible. "No permission" in particular requires a fair amount of attention and consideration. Sometimes the permission is visible on the source site, but the patroller didn't see it. The tag is also often used to dispute a claim that a file is the uploader's own work, and the only way to clearly resolve it is OTRS, which is worse than useless when a file's claimed creator is a non-notable individual. When processing these categories, only rapidly delete obvious junk and copyvios. Other files should be properly investigated. If you don't want to look into something thoroughly, convert it to a DR instead.
  • I have to add that these deletions were really poor decisions. There was no reason to tag them with no source, as a source is mentioned, and even less to delete. @Patrick Rogel: who tagged them. Regards, Yann (talk) 10:12, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
  • When there is a large, complex batch DR with different authors and likely varying copyright status, either investigate it before deleting files, or let another admin handle it. If a discussion is incomplete but has grown inactive, you can comment on it rather than closing. The Huntington case goes beyond this. There were even files noted to be clearly public domain in the discussion, and other files which had been individually vetted by trusted users. They should have had their copyright information corrected, not simply deleted. The recent NASA case is another example of overly bold and destructive deletion. Stop throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
  • When a file has questionable copyright status but there is room for doubt, start a DR. F1 speedy deletion is for obvious cases only. It is improper to speedily delete such files, then direct the uploader to UDR or OTRS when they object. No, they should have had the opportunity to easily respond in a DR.
  • Most generally, you should slow down. Your deletion log reflects bot-like behavior, often deleting many unrelated files per minute. Sometimes this involves VFC. I will grant that most are valid deletions, but your false positive rate is higher than the norm and it is harmful to the project. Guanaco (talk) 23:39, 27 August 2018 (UTC)
  • User:Jcb, the above analysis and points raised by Guanaco seem reasonable, well argued, and highlight areas where there are likely problems with your actions. This is the sort of "discussion leading to improvement" that I was looking for, rather than the accumulation of votes by people who already wanted your head, which contribute absolutely nothing useful. I fully expect you to respond here and point out how you are going to improve/change and agree on what areas you got wrong. In addition to criticizing Alexis for inappropriate escalation, I also think creating a huge DR with heterogeneous files/permissions/owners that is likely to require splitting and salvaging in bits is a dumb thing to do. We can see that every other admin "barge-poled" this DR for months. Please help out the admins by doing some homework yourself and raising smaller more cohesive DRs in future. Remember that there is no rush. Jcb, if I don't see an appropriate response, I will join the others in supporting your de-admin. -- Colin (talk) 08:01, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Thanks to Guanaco and Colin. I agree fully with the posts above. Regards, Yann (talk) 08:18, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
  • So the main issue seems to be that the error rate may be higher than needed especially in the 'no permission since' and the 'no source since' category? I must say I am not a fan of these two tags, because basically they move the responsibility for telling what's wrong from nominator to processing admin. In the past I have proposed to dismantle these two processes and demand a regular DR instead for all cases. That proposal did not receive sufficient support, so that the processes remained in place. In principle I do look at the individual files when handling these cats and untag some files instead of deleting them, e.g. if they can be kept with PD-textlogo. I am willing to take more time for these cats in order to reduce the error rate. On the other hand it would be great if people could contact me at my user talk page if they think I made a mistake. We all need feedback in order to learn. Jcb (talk) 14:43, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol support vote.svg Support Too many long term repeated issues and unhappy long term community members affected by their poor sysop actions.
(Use of sysop deletions) The speedy deletion of NASA public domain photographs were unnecessary and responses overly defensive, "go to UDR" with its aggressive archive-in-24-hours is inadequate consideration or self reflection. Speedy deletions on files like File:Handicapped! Women's suffrage poster, 1910s.jpg are inappropriate sharp practice , and images like this which are available from the Library of Congress as they are the creation of an organization rather than the possible artist, should invariably be properly discussed by the community as they are not "obvious" copyright violations but have a potential rationale for a public domain status.
(Use of sysop protections) Use of sysop tools like the unexplained indefinite sysop only protection on File:Aktiva engineering.jpg should be correctly justified and accountable, not happen like the actions of secret police without edit comment or opportunity for community review.
(Use of sysop blocks) Blocks of accounts like the one month block of User:Darwish203 are required per COM:BP to have both warnings and a block notice, yet in that case Jcb has never edited the users talk page. Jcb appears to routinely skip policy required steps which is a direct misuse of sysop tools.
Overall Jcb's responses to problems and complaints is defensive and dismissively arrogant, this is a direct failure to comply with COM:Administrators per "Administrators are expected to understand the goals of this project, and be prepared to work constructively with others towards those ends. Administrators should also understand and follow Commons' policies, and where appropriate, respect community consensus." Sadly, despite several desysop proposals on AN/ANU and long tedious discussions about Jcb's unacceptable behaviour, I know of no other non-confrontational way properly and credibly to hold Jcb to account than a desysop discussion and vote, even though such a vote is unlikely to result in any other outcome than entrenchment of behaviours. --Fæ (talk) 12:42, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  • In “undefinedinsource:huntingtontheatreco” Jcb indiscriminately deleted 1729 files, some (such as File:Moliere2.jpg (hist • logs • abuse log)) clearly over objections. Can anybody press for undeletion of those images which were deleted unambiguously by mistake? Incnis Mrsi (talk) 12:51, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
@Incnis Mrsi: you know where COM:REFUND is. I just don't feel like I can right now. Issues like these are too much for me. And Jcb has seen this thread. He has seen my message above. He didn't undelete Moliere2.jpg himself. That tells the whole story right there for me. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 20:24, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  • I support troutwhacking User:Alexis Jazz for initiating de-sysop procedures (combined with collecting past issues so we can all get a chance to bitch) rather than initiating a discussion on the case he is personally upset about. This is nothing less than a revenge de-sysop and should be speedy closed by the 'crats. We need to stop these wargames, because it is disruptive and harmful to the project to keep attacking each other all the time, and for admins to have to keep defending themselves against not only the issue-at-hand, but also all prior complaints, all the time. By all means start a discussion on the deletion of these files and keep it on that topic. If, at the end of that discussion, there is a consensus (not a fucking vote!) that Jcb has made a huge mistake and does not appreciate that or does not agree to change, then escalate things. But the alternative that the DR was complex and we could do with learning lessons constructively about how to improve procedure or behaviour or communication of all participants.
The DR Alexis is upset about was created by Alexis in April and the images deleted in August. I ask Alexis why they couldn't have done the homework to determine which of 1729 files were legit, prioritising those in-use on Wikipedias, prior to creating a DR. Or that the intervening months were sufficient for Alexis to have done this? Do you think other people should do this work? If they haven't, why are you only blaming Jcb? -- Colin (talk) 19:49, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
I had categorized most of the files in ways that allowed selective deletion. I won't dignify the rest of your message with a response. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 20:09, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose I don't see a pattern of behavior that requires immediate desysop at this time. One would wonder why Alexis did not file a UDR but a de-sysop request and why they felt it does more good than harm to Commons to desysop Jcb. If you disagree with a sysop action, there are better ways to resolve it than to request immediate desysop. For example, you could bring the issue to the attention of other admins or the community. I am not happy that what follows your query on Jcb's talk page is a desysop request. I now understand why you wrote I'm not planning on asking twice on Jcb's talk page and why they perceived it as a threat. I am sorry but I have to oppose this request at this time. T Cells (talk · contribs · email) 20:18, 26 August 2018 (UTC)

Pictogram voting comment.svg Comment @Alexis Jazz: How many admins have you brought here in the last weeks? I can count three at least, but they're possibly more. --Discasto talk 21:19, 26 August 2018 (UTC)

Cookie erred on a license review (reviewing something that was likely laundered) and the issue couldn't be resolved on her talk page, but I admit I had erred as well on a detail. The license is still most likely laundered and Cookie needs to be more careful when reviewing. That was all. Again, I had erred myself on a detail so not all of my words in that report still reflect how I feel about the case. Shizhao is more like a Fanghong-light. Shizhao became admin in 2006, when becoming admin was easier. If Shizhao requested adminship today, they would never get it. Shizhao's lack of response so far means a desysop request will possibly follow, but such a request requires "some consensus for removal" and so far nobody has responded to it yet. The third admin is Jcb, this thread. If there is a problem with any of these reports, please tell me. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 21:50, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose per User:T Cells - UDR is the correct venue for this, Desysopping over something so trivial as this is laughable at best, I suppose I'll be dragged back here later on!, I'd suggest closing this as "Wrong venue". –Davey2010Talk 22:20, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol support vote.svg Support, per all the above. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 23:24, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol support vote.svg Support per above. This isn't the first incident, and it won't be the last. -FASTILY 01:09, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol oppose vote.svg Oppose per User:T Cells Ronhjones  (Talk) 16:50, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
  • GA candidate.svg Weak support regretfully, i do not think this admin wants to collaborate. we desperately need a standard of practice enforced, especially when you think you are right, the culture at commons is more important than any one deletion or individual. Slowking4 § Sander.v.Ginkel's revenge 00:19, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
  • *Symbol oppose vote.svg Oppose As mentioned above, Jcb is one of the hardest-working sysops on the site and has the courage to stand up to administrative corruption when he sees it. His critics should clean up their own acts before filing frivolous complaints over such clearly trivial matters. AshFriday (talk) 04:43, 2 September 2018 (UTC)
    • comment with that error rate, i wish he would work less hard. certainly an uploader with that error rate would be blocked. Slowking4 § Sander.v.Ginkel's revenge 21:12, 2 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol support vote.svg Support So, so many problems with Jcb, and regularly over the same issues. Most recently, once again he refuses to recognise {{PD-UK-unknown}} (on a clearly >100 year old image) File:990 official photo.jpg / Commons:Deletion requests/File:990 official photo.jpg.
Also, you can imagine how unimpressed I am with his use of the monkey selfie (which anyway ought to be deleted under COM:PRP) to troll Bob Vila [1]. Why are admins permitted such things, which would promptly rsult in blocks for regular editors? Andy Dingley (talk) 01:26, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
A Wikipedian Andy Dingley accuses somebody of bad conduct in some obscure Bob Vila incident while having habits to write such things as “Incnis Mrsi is one of the worst sort of destructive trolls” and edit-war over keeping it online. I have no idea how serious is the problem with PD-UK-unknown mentioned in the paragraph above, but all the “troll” part should be entirely dismissed if only because of its origin. My preference is strongly with Jcb with all his shortcomings rather than the rampant Wikipedian hypocrisy. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 08:49, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Grudge much? Andy Dingley (talk) 09:00, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
  • So, the DR having closed with a clear consensus to keep it, against Jcb's wishes, we immediately see this: [2] If a non-admin did this, it would be called trolling and there would be blocks. Andy Dingley (talk) 14:50, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
    I doubt it, and in any case most escapades by Commons sysops are a nuisance compared against institutionalized practice of double standards and authoritarianism in Wikipedia. As for this specific edit in File:990_official_photo.jpg #fileinfotpl_src, it is perhaps ill-advised but not a thing that could cause me to deem an admin incompetent. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 15:23, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
  • And now we have this: User talk:Tyler de Noche
An error: typo / 'bot, whatever has led to a lot of useful images (flooding on the Missouri) getting uploaded here from Flickr, checked by FlickrReview and then accidentally the tag getting deleted during a cat change. They then get flagged automatically into Category:Media without a license: needs history check. Note the name here, needs history check – nearly everything in here is a valid file which has had a valid licence accidentally lost. They need restoration, not questioning their veracity or deleting them.
So what does Jcb do? He tags them for immediate deletion.
We've been admonished here for "wasting company time" with this deadmin request. Yet how much time does this careless deletion waste? Let alone if it goes further and they do actually get deleted?!
We do no need another admin here whose operating principle is to simplistically find things that he might get away with deleting, rather than fixing whatever the real issue was. Andy Dingley (talk) 09:21, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Oh for crying out loud, Andy, would you stop wasting our time with this? A user, a human being, not a bot, using VisualFileChange, removed the CC licence template. That's the error here and it was made by a person, not some bot as you claim. Sixteen hours later, the US Army template is added, and all is well. No files were lost. The user who made the mistake, and fixed it, has not complained to Jcb, or anyone else. You make an issue of it and first mention of the issue is here. You also falsely claim the category they were put into. It was actually Category:New uploads without a license which just requests the admin look for "easy to fix typos, already added license templates or problem tags" before adding the {{No license}} tag that Jcb added. So he followed written procedure. If you think that procedure should additionally require the admin to search the description/categories to see if, by some chance, there's a licence they could guess would apply, then by all means open a discussion on that. They can't, for example, restore the removed CC licence, since the material is in the PD and so cannot be CC licensed. -- Colin (talk) 11:53, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
  • I have "without a license: needs history check" watchlisted, maybe Jcb was watching them on "New uploads without a license". Either way, there are plenty of them.
A good admin would realise that they're bulk-tagging images from the same uploader and would look deeper to see if there was an underlying reason. Otherwise they shouldn't bother doing anything, they should let a 'bot do it. We don't need admins to do mechanistic stuff without judgements. This reason is obvious, and it's uncontentious. Your claim that admins are somehow prevented from looking deeper is crap. As is your contention that the CC- licence is inapplicable because you think the material ought to be PD (besides which, Jcb is busy deleting PD material that's Flickr sourced too, because he is one (sadly of several) who disagrees with how Flickr annotates this - a separate question).
A competent admin would not turn an obvious and easily fixed typo into a series of deletion requests. A good admin might even restore them themselves, although that's onerous. Jcb is a bad admin - he just sees an excuse to get his deletion on, because that's Serious Admin Bizness. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:18, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Andy, I based my comments on the first image that appeared on the user talk page at the time which was this file. The file has now been tagged by the uploader as "PD-USGov-Military-Army". I take no view as to whether this is correct, so your claim above ("you think the material ought to be PD"), isn't fair. I'm just AGF that the uploader is correct on this matter. I see you also wrote "Colin seems to want them deleted as they shouldn't be CC-by" which is a very odd claim I'd like you to strike please. What appears to me to have occurred is that the uploader mistakenly tagged them CC, meant to replace that with the PD-US tag, but accidentally removed all copyright tags. My comment about CC was merely that any admin can't/shouldn't just revert the edit that removed licence tag, because as it turns out, that licence tag was wrong and cannot be used for PD images. I agree that many times Jcb appears to do less investigation than an ideal admin would do, and many people would wish he did more and took more time. But the template spells out the required admin steps, and Jcb followed them. If you want admins to be required to do more, on pain of losing their bit, then open a friendly civil discussion at the appropriate forum, and the admins can all agree on documenting "best practice". This would benefit not only Jcb but also every other admin, including newbies. From the above, all we can see is you are upset and have an axe to grind, and are making mistakes yourself when it comes to understanding/reporting what other people have said/done. The above scenario you link, where everything worked out fine, and the only person who got upset is you (a third party), is not going to convince anyone here. -- Colin (talk) 14:07, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
  • since the material is in the PD and so cannot be CC licensed. is your claim, no-one else's, that material in the PD cannot be licensed under CC.
Why not? It's not necessary, but that's not the same thing. I know of no reason why someone cannot CC license PD content for which they hold the rights (and being in the PD doesn't mean that one loses all rights to it, particularly not moral rights to be identified as its author). That's not to say either that anyone else can't still come along and use it as PD (ignoring the CC-by).
But what we don't do on WP is to mess with the originator's expressed licence, unless there's a damned good reason.
Besides, this is a digression. The point here is about Jcb.
Should an admin, who encouters a trivial technical glitch, and then turns it into a series of automatic deletion requests instead, still have an admin bit? If they were a 'bot script, we'd either fix that or withdraw their 'bot permissions. Andy Dingley (talk) 14:57, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
The CC license (which, as would be immediately obvious from the license review) is there on Flickr. And it's a worldwide license, so it shouldn't be removed. It is valid for any country which is not certain to recognize PD-USGov. It is also valid in case the work turns out not to be covered by PD-USGov for any reason or if PD-USGov would be retracted in the future. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 15:03, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Well it turns out to be nuanced. "May I apply a Creative Commons license to a work in the public domain?" I am correct that you cannot apply a CC licence to material that is in the public domain, but the nuance is that that is "worldwide PD". CC point out that the "U.S. government works" => PD is a US law and not necessarily applicable elsewhere. For works that really are PD worldwide, adding a CC tag could be considered to be copyfraud, and not acceptable on Commons. I note that our template states "As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the public domain." and does not warn it is only PD in the US. I'm interested in investigating this further but will ask on another noticeboard. I don't think it is at all reasonable to speculate that "PD-USGov would be retracted in the future" with retrospective effect.
Coming back to the case. Our Commons:Deletion policy clearly states "If there is some licensing information missing, then the file gets tagged as missing information and the uploader is informed and given 7 days time to correct the problem.". Notice, as always, the onus is on the uploader to demonstrate the file can be legally hosted here. It goes on to say "Files missing source or licensing information should be tagged with one of the following messages. " and lists several templates including the "No license since" one Jcb added. Contrary to what Andy said above, this is not "tagged for immediate deletion", but the start of a 7 day process that is absolute written in our policy. There is no requirement or even suggestion in our policy that such images must be investigated thoroughly by the admin before tagging, or even for that matter, before deleting. If the uploader, after 7 days, has not supplied the information, "After this period the file can be deleted by an admin on sight without further debate, if the information is indeed missing.". We could debate what "indeed missing" is intended to imply, but the point is these files did not reach that stage. If you wish to place more burden on the admin at any point in that procedure, go get the policy wording changed. The procedure, as documented in policy, worked perfectly and the uploader fixed the missing licence information within a day. The point of all this is that you guys are making this out to be yet another reason why Jcb should hang, when in fact, this is very much an example where things just worked fine. Now, go and do something more useful instead. .. -- Colin (talk) 17:58, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Statistics and analysis to illustrate patterns of behaviour[edit]

Deletions in 2018[edit]

In 2018 Jcb has deleted 50,620 files. The largest in a day was on 2018-07-09 with 2,515 deletions with the mathematical average being over 200 files per day. There has been no day in 2018 when Jcb has not deleted files. The monthly summary: 

+----------+--------+
| Deletions| Month  |
+----------+--------+
|     5670 | 201801 |
|     7906 | 201802 |
|     6013 | 201803 |
|     6750 | 201804 |
|     7781 | 201805 |
|     7327 | 201806 |
|     6501 | 201807 |
|     2672 | 201808 |
+----------+--------+

Restorations in 2018[edit]

Numbers of file restorations per month of files deleted by Jcb in 2018, but later overturned:

Restoration
not Jcb		 Restoration
by Jcb		 Month
264 374 2018-08
250 640 2018-07
374 37 2018-06
89 61 2018-05
258 13 2018-04
139 566 2018-03
Not sure what you want to tell with this. I guess the majority of these files (granted that the numbers would be correct, which I doubt), are files for which we receive OTRS permission after deletion, so that they are restored by an OTRS agent. Jcb (talk) 21:22, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
You appear to be missing the more common event that rather than changing your mind, users have to go to an full undeletion request and some other administrator then reverts your deletions. At the time of writing this, the table is not yet complete, there will be six months showing both files you restore and those that others have to restore.
As for the numbers, these are straight off the Commons wiki database, others can check my SQL if they want to. --Fæ (talk) 21:25, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
Maybe, but these numbers a. are clearly too high (and the numbers in the deletion table clearly too low), so probably you use the wrong query and b. say nothing. And also your statement about the 'full undeletion request' is mistaken. Most active OTRS agents are admins. They undelete the files without going to UDR, often even without giving the files a final clearance, many undeleted files are in Category:OTRS received, because a permission came in via OTRS but it was not (yet) sufficient. Most undeletions probably do not mean at all that the original deletion was wrong. Jcb (talk) 21:34, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
I have no reason to doubt the database. I know how OTRS works thanks, I volunteered there for 2 years. User:Faebot/SandboxJ --Fæ (talk) 21:38, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
It's very easy to check for everybody that your numbers are incorrect, e.g. by checking the history of Commons:Database reports/Users by log action. Jcb (talk) 21:46, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
Then no doubt Steinsplitter can highlight why the differences exist. Amongst other things, the data that Steinsplitter tabulates cannot be used to calculate a count of files that you have deleted and others restored, nor does the deletion count limit itself to files, or files that appear in the filearchive table with unique values rather than, say, counting multiple deletions or revision deletions. --Fæ (talk) 21:58, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
@Fæ: The script is just counting logs (from the logging table). Basically what you find on Special:Logs. --Steinsplitter (talk) 15:13, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
Thanks, this was my presumption. Unfortunately it is easy for folks to confuse log_actions such as deletion with naturally understood things like file deletions. I recall an old WMF dev d/b scheme which was how I started to understand how the underpinning structure worked, but it is hard to imagine a non-technical user making much sense of the descriptions on MediaWiki simply in order to interpret local handy metrics. --Fæ (talk) 15:20, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
Does your script correctly filter files that I deleted after restoration instead of before restoration? Jcb (talk) 22:11, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
You can read the SQL, the bit that goes u.log_timestamp<l.log_timestamp means that others are restoring the file after your deletion. --Fæ (talk) 22:14, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

The numbers of restorations this month (so far) is quite interesting. Jcb deleted 5,670 unique files this month (based on the filearchive table). Though most people will find this is an impressive number, one has to question if it is a good thing that also within the same period, 11% of that total have been undeleted and 4.6% undeleted by other administrators. That looks like a lot of "premature" deletions create work for collegiate uploaders and fellow administrators. A more positive approach for pending OTRS tickets or simply encouraging meaningful discussion before bureaucratic deletion for non-obvious cases, especially for uploaders with good track records, could avoid much of this work creation. --Fæ (talk) 08:35, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

Fae the numbers alone do not tell us much, and are contested by Jcb. A DR of 500 images with the same problem requiring deletion and a DR of 5 images with the same problem requiring deletion are just two DRs and may require similar time to analyse, yet the former appears as 100x more in your stats, equivalent to an admin performing 100 DR deletions each of 5 files. Jcb claims there are legitimate per-process reasons for some files to be undeleted by him and others. One cannot tell, from your queries, whether these undeletions were due to a problem with Jcb's original deletion. For that, you need to work out why each of the files were undeleted, and you may have to ask an actual human being to find out, and to collate files into the DR batch they came from rather than counting them individually. Bare numbers are useless: there are some users here who exceed my yearly edit count in an hour simply by using automated tools to move files around the categories. -- Colin (talk) 09:06, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

Account blocks over the last 6 months[edit]

Analysing the most recent six months of Jcb's use of the account blocking tools, removing anonymous IP blocks and changes to existing blocks, shows that Jcb has blocked 73 different named accounts out of a total of 90. The pattern demonstrates that Jcb never gives the required block notice, a step clearly required by Commons:Blocking policy.

Cases where the account is a newbie, more often than not there has never been a warning or block notice with Jcb never having made any edits to the user's talk page, e.g. User:Intisar Ali was blocked but despite the block log showing the block was given after warnings, Jcb has never edited the user's talk page, there was no block notice and the only "first stage" notices that are not the standard warnings that a block may be forthcoming. This appears to be an extreme form of biting the newcomer.

Other cases where the user is a long time contributor such as User:WPPilot who contributed since 2009, there was no block notice, nor any advanced warning for the one-week block of their account. This incorrectly processed block led to an escalation of debate with the user marking their account as inactive a month later.

In some cases the user has appealed the block and Jcb has responded to that, even though it is bizarre that there never was a block notice that explains the rationale of the block that the user can sensibly respond to in an appeal. E.g. User:Rbworld528 was blocked and then had a lengthy appeal discussion, but none of that discussion was based on any block notice. The initial unblock decline was based on previous notices, but the block itself was not defined as being based on these, naturally becoming a source of confusion as shown by the blocked user's first question "Why did you guys block me again?".

In a small minority of cases the absence of any warning or block notice can be justified as the user is clearly a sock account of a long term abuser, e.g. User:Liza Veniza Wiki Fucker, where the creation of a talk page would be redundant. This does not excuse the poor application of sysop tools against required policy on the significant majority of blocked accounts.

List of 6 months of named accounts with new blocks by Jcb
  1. 27 August 2018 LuizLuz (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  2. 25 August 2018 Aiolos78 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  3. 23 August 2018 Afia Bi (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Disruptive edits after warning)
  4. 18 August 2018 Homa007 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  5. 18 August 2018 Truerockstar77777 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Disruptive deletion nominations after warning)
  6. 15 August 2018 VV2310 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  7. 11 August 2018 John Roland Mew (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  8. 11 August 2018 Intisar Ali (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  9. 22 July 2018 Truerockstar77777 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Disruptive deletion nominations after warning)
  10. 20 July 2018 Darwish203 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  11. 17 July 2018 Kokomo Lesotho mounted (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (vandal)
  12. 12 July 2018 Lapinboxeur (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  13. 11 July 2018 שבלול חמוץ (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  14. 8 July 2018 Helsing90 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  15. 5 July 2018 Yankee Doodle Dandelion (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (vandal)
  16. 5 July 2018 Majosoes (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  17. 4 July 2018 Please 'em all (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (vandal)
  1. 2 July 2018 Rbworld528 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  2. 29 June 2018 Johnnpaultubig (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  3. 26 June 2018 The Unknown Horror (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  4. 26 June 2018 Fhsig13 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  5. 23 June 2018 ZangyPineapple (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  6. 22 June 2018 Rbworld528 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  7. 22 June 2018 Lizia Veniza fjuck TegeI tengil and Oleg3280 porn00 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked, email disabled, cannot edit own talk page) (vandal)
  8. 22 June 2018 Jcb changed block settings for Liza Veniza Wiki Fucker (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked, email disabled, cannot edit own talk page) (vandal)
  9. 22 June 2018 Liza Veniza Wiki Fucker (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (vandal)
  10. 21 June 2018 Spremi (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  11. 19 June 2018 Womennns (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  12. 18 June 2018 Zhxy 519 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 day (account creation blocked) (Disruptive edits after warning)
  13. 15 June 2018 Onan peyon (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Adding out of project scope content after warnings)
  14. 12 June 2018 T-Houda86 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  15. 9 June 2018 Mohammad Mujibul Hoque Khan (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  16. 7 June 2018 Kiko Juncaj (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  17. 7 June 2018 金鹰泰 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Adding out of project scope content after warnings)
  18. 7 June 2018 ZangyPineapple (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  19. 5 June 2018 AYTgraphics (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  20. 1 June 2018 Oolonga (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  21. 1 June 2018 Umeyou (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  22. 29 May 2018 Bololabich (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  23. 27 May 2018 Henrik Boy2 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  24. 27 May 2018 Sourlemoning (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  25. 26 May 2018 Ckck (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Disruptive deletion nominations after warnings)
  26. 22 May 2018 Thimoty Freick (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  27. 19 May 2018 Мой Псевдоним (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  28. 18 May 2018 The Ringits (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (Vandalism-only account)
  29. 17 May 2018 Вы не можете остановить коровий вандализм (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (vandal)
  30. 6 May 2018 Michaelaleo (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Disruptive edits after warning)
  31. 3 May 2018 Sourlemoning (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  32. 29 April 2018 WPPilot (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked, cannot edit own talk page) (Removing warning after clear instruction to not remove warning)
  33. 29 April 2018 Nina07011960 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (vandalism at [[COM:UDS])
  34. 29 April 2018 Wilsoncleveland (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  35. 27 April 2018 Kiko Juncaj (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  36. 26 April 2018 Philippe Simard (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  37. 25 April 2018 Sagnickacharya (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  38. 25 April 2018 Wiklib14 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  39. 25 April 2018 Jacksuck (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Adding out of project scope content after warnings: also copyvio)
  40. 22 April 2018 Mezhin (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  41. 21 April 2018 Mohammed Amine Bourkadi (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  42. 21 April 2018 Eulucasmateus (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  43. 13 April 2018 Ckck (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Disruptive deletion nominations after warnings)
  44. 13 April 2018 SockPuppetry INC. (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked, email disabled, cannot edit own talk page) (Apparently a sock of an LTA)
  45. 13 April 2018 AcaPetrina1775 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 day (account creation blocked) (To stop upload bot)
  46. 9 April 2018 Bilal Barbon 1997 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  47. 7 April 2018 Henrik Boy2 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  48. 7 April 2018 Editors34 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  49. 6 April 2018 DreamShooter7 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  50. 5 April 2018 Vandãlism Beetle (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (Vandalism-only account)
  51. 4 April 2018 Olsen24 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (Vandalism-only account)
  52. 3 April 2018 T-Houda86 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  53. 2 April 2018 DanielFreitas (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  54. 1 April 2018 Ckck (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Disruptive deletion nominations after warnings)
  55. 31 March 2018 BearSatterstrom (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (Vandalism-only account)
  56. 29 March 2018 CrossYourself (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked, cannot edit own talk page) (Vandalism-only account)
  57. 29 March 2018 Sandulacki (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  58. 26 March 2018 Achmadmaulanaibr (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Violations of COM:OVERWRITE after warnings)
  59. 24 March 2018 Henrik Boy2 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  60. 23 March 2018 GabrielStella (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 year (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  61. 14 March 2018 Vishwajeet ratoniya (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  62. 13 March 2018 Abolfazlmb98 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  63. 13 March 2018 Fabriciofffs (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Disruptive edits after warning)
  64. 12 March 2018 EnzoLopes01 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  65. 10 March 2018 Eulucasmateus (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  66. 10 March 2018 Dipanshu Kalyan (Student) (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of indefinite (account creation blocked) (vandalism/spam only account)
  67. 7 March 2018 Tunghoanhzz (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  68. 7 March 2018 LeAnMeFa (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  69. 5 March 2018 Wil13 (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  70. 5 March 2018 Yarheli JG (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 3 months (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  71. 4 March 2018 Taenarra (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  72. 4 March 2018 Angeljihoon (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 week (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)
  73. 4 March 2018 Magnus Aukland (talk · contribs · logs · block log) with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Uploading unfree files after warnings)

Thanks --Fæ (talk) 12:10, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

This report is inaccurate. In principle, before I block there has been a clear warning at the user talk page, normally containing the word 'warning', consistent with the block reason. While I did not check the whole log line by line, I did check several from the list above and found no errors. A look at User talk:Intisar Ali, explicitly mentioned above by Fae, shows that this one is no exception. Different from the Fae statement, a clear warning was (and still is) present at the user talk page here, saying: "Consider this your last warning. Continuing to upload copyright violations will result in your account being blocked." - Not sure what could be ambiguous in this message. Jcb (talk) 14:32, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
Actually there are plenty of cases in this list of blocked accounts where you never edited the user's talk page. This case is one of those.
In the case of Intisar_Ali, you have never edited the user's talk page, either to add notices of any kind, nor has the user ever received a block notice despite being blocked for a week. The notice you refer to here was left by IronGargoyle (talk · contribs) a month before the block was given and Intisar_Ali challenged that judgement at the time, but nobody bothered to talk with them about it. There are later notices about other files, but no other warning notices. By failing to provide a warning and not being bothered to add a block notice, you have failed to meet the most basic requirements of COM:BP and failed to act in a courteous manner for this user.
The fact that you never use block notices for the user accounts you block is both surprising as this is a firm requirement on all administrators, and should be justification to remove your use of these sysop rights in the light that you fail to see this is a problem, nor seem willing to change or improve your behaviour. --Fæ (talk) 15:20, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
@Jcb: for the case of AcaPetrina1775 (talk · contribs) you never produced an appropriate notice in spite of my explicit request to do so. You neglected to place the message and, worse, you evidently don’t care about events on the user_talk in dereliction of the blocking policy. It is sad to read for you, but Jcb isn’t a popular person on Commons despite a great performance with admin actions; because the quality of said actions is questionable. If you lose sysop (now or on next similar incident), then you will not get it back in a foreseeable future. Therefore, if you want to retain a position on this site, then you must carefully follow the policy and hence avoid attacks on formal pretexts. Please, change your attitude at last. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 15:35, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

While there may well be something amiss from Jcb's blocking practice, it would be helpful if several admins commented here, rather than just one user with a grudge and too much free time presenting spurious numbers and demanding removal of Jcb's bit.

I think there are probably no admins who follow our blocking policy correctly. I know of one crat who thought Commons has "cool down blocks" despite the opening paragraph of our policy clearly stating it doesn't. I know another admin who edit warred to restore text added by a globally banned user and then blocked the user he was edit warring with, with no warning, and I remember Fae being very very very upset when WMF removed that admin's bit. I do think Jcb's block of User:WPPilot was incorrect, and have had a similar situation where a random admin demanded they be acknowledged and responded to personally, and blocked out of anger -- so there are probably a lot of admins who get a god complex at times, and think that the peasants must respect and talk to them or else lightning bolts and plagues.

If all the admins agree that leaving a block template after blocking is necessary then presumably that's something Jcb could agree to. Do all other admins do that themselves in all cases? -- Colin (talk) 08:09, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I think that a block template after blocking is necessary. We discussed recently about this, and IIRC, the template should mention how to request unblocking. Regards, Yann (talk) 10:08, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
@Yann:, Do you have a link to that recent discussion? I have missed it. I am not against using such a template if there is some consensus that it would be needed. As far as I am aware it's a recent tendency to use these templates, in the past is was hardly done. I have never used it till now, because it was IMHO not adding anything. The system clearly shows the block reason to the blocked user and a warning with the same reason was always already present at the user talk page. And instructions how to request unblocking, are they no longer in the system block message? Jcb (talk) 14:52, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
@Jcb: I had to dig among archives of 3 different boards. It is clearly mentioned in Commons:Blocking policy#After blocking, and it was discussed at length in July, which resulted in this proposal: Commons:Village pump/Proposals#Proposal to add additional language to existing block templates. See also Commons:Village pump/Proposals#Are there enough admins to handle a change in the process. Regards, Yann (talk) 19:20, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

Comparison with other administrator working practices[edit]

In the previous week (22 August through to 28 August inclusive) there were a total of 39 account blocks for accounts that were not filtered out based on the block comment as spambots, open proxies or were on IP anon accounts. Breaking these down by the blocking administrator and checking talk pages for block notices shows:

  • Achim55, 2 blocks, all pages have block notices
  • Elcobbola, 15 blocks, all pages have block notices
  • EugeneZelenko, 1 block, has a block notice
  • Guanaco, 2 blocks, 1 missing block notice, 1 sockpuppet template. User:Manhumirim Lew is identified with a sockpuppet notice and Eportal is logged as spam-only
  • Jcb, 3 blocks, no block notices. Aiolos78 no notices. User:Jonny84 previous block notice about a block by a different sysop. LuizLuz a discussion thread but no block notice
  • Jdx, 1 block, has a block notice
  • Krd, 1 block, no block notice. Hkyhjurt is logged as abusing multiple accounts, but there is no sockpuppet template or other link to evidence
  • Magog the Ogre, 4 blocks, 3 block notices and 1 sockpuppet template. Two blocks in the 7 days were on the same account, each block has a block notice. Cnsmrsshp is marked with a sockpuppet template. Erineu Pedro Manuel has two block notices, one from the last 7 days.
  • P199, 1 block, username block notice
  • Rodhullandemu, 1 block, sockpuppet template
  • Ronhjones, 3 blocks, 3 block notices
  • Steinsplitter, 1 block, has a block notice
  • Taivo, 1 block, has sockpuppet template
  • Túrelio, 1 block, block notice given
  • Yann, 2 blocks, both have block notices

The conclusion from this reasonable sample over a week, is that Jcb is unique as an administrator that chooses to ignore the required Blocking policy and never uses the block notice for accounts that are not known to be spam accounts or sockpuppets. As a courtesy, pinging mentioned admins @Achim55, Elcobbola, EugeneZelenko, Guanaco, Jcb:@Jdx, Krd, Magog the Ogre, P199, Rodhullandemu:@Ronhjones, Steinsplitter, Taivo, Túrelio, Yann:. --Fæ (talk) 11:05, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

Most if not all of my user blocks are based on CU findings. I have to admit that some LTA cases rendered me a bit uncareful with block notices and sock templates, but I agree there is nothing against acting professional and following the rules even if the affected user may not earn that in one or another case. Thank you for pointing out! --Krd 11:46, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
On the topic of certain LTA cases: some LTAs see accumulation of tags and notices as tantamount to scoring points in a game, and create more and more accounts to that end. In these instances, declining to tag can play a positive role in dissuading future abuse (logic of DENY). I'm not a fan of writing policy to deal with fringe cases, so I hope there is an understanding that there exist (quite rare) circumstances in which strictly following COM:BP could be counter-productive. Эlcobbola talk 15:30, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
It was for this reason I filtered blocks where the comments made it obvious we were dealing with socks and spambots. Certainly I agree that there is always some discretion in the administrator role, however the responsibility to act as transparently as possible and to be prepared to respond to questions about sysop actions in good faith will remain.
It would not hurt to consider a slight improvement to COM:BP better to reflect common working practices when handling socks with existing SPI cases or obvious LTA socks. These may be an exception to the policy to leave block notices, however leaving breadcrumbs such as the sockpuppet notice for other contributors, or later administrators handling or analysing related cases, is probably an unavoidable requirement. --Fæ (talk) 15:40, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
It is a pain to find the right block template and copy and paste it to the user's talk page, but I do try and keep to it. I just wish we had a similar system that I use on en-wiki, where the block and correct template are added in one action (with Twinkle) - this would kill this problem dead. Ronhjones  (Talk) 13:52, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
It's not pain for me, because I use only 1 block template and I know its syntax from head. Taivo (talk) 07:18, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
Personally, I use the Notify Gadget, where 3 options are available: 1. Simple block, 2. Indef. block for copyvio, 3. Indef. block for other reasons. Regards, Yann (talk) 14:15, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
I recommend it also to non-administrators, who perform maintenance. --EugeneZelenko (talk) 14:17, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
Good point, I use it occasionally to save time for standard notices like file overwrites. However, unlike Twinkle on en.wp which varies depending on your user groups, I had forgotten that I could leave formal looking notices like indef block notices even though I have no access to sysop tools. Probably better not to flag that unless we start to see misuse. :-) --Fæ (talk) 15:28, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
FWIW, I haven't read this thread, but it was only recently brought to my attention that it is against policy not to provide a notice. I have since started providing notice to all accounts I block other than blatant vandals, spammers, and socks. Magog the Ogre (talk) (contribs) 23:56, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
The above comment is a perfect example of how discussing, agreeing-on, and alerting admins to areas where they could improve or where policy has changed or where best practice has changed, could easily be done in a non-confrontational manner. I have looked over the last year on Jcb's talk page, and cannot find where Fæ raised this issue with Jcb. Perhaps it has occurred on another noticeboard. Surely it would be reasonable to leave a message on Jcb's talk, with a friendly reminder that policy requires a block notice, and a request to please add one in future? Instead here Fae has taken a discussion on deletion practice by Jcb into a tangent on his blocking practice, conducted his own private investigation, and dumped it here presumably because he thinks doing so adds weight on a desysop request that clearly isn't going anywhere.
Is it about time that Commons, for longstanding users who are in good standing, required that complainants demonstrate some attempt to resolve matters directly before coming to AN/U and certainly before requesting a de-sysop. Anyone not doing so, and making a practice of not doing so, should face sanctions. This whole topic by Alexis, and continued by Fae is a farce. From the "I requested these files be deleted and they were boo hoo" complaint to the "I'm going to dump random numbers regarding deletions and make huge leaps of logic to assume they mean what I want them to" nonsense further up. There are certainly areas where Jcb could improve, slow down, take a holiday, etc, etc, but I see absolutely no reason why the issue of requesting block notices could not have been done respectfully between users, rather than confrontationally as part of a de-sysop demand and silly vote. Of course, I'm expecting User:Jcb to confirm he'll be following this policy practice, where appropriate, in future. -- Colin (talk) 07:39, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
I nominated all the files from The Huntington because small DRs for random files were being created. Randomly those would be kept or deleted, so I centralized the discussion. Your refusal to read and understand this DR was the straw that broke the camel's back, to keep pretending it is my only complaint, it's just not appropriate. That is not the word I would prefer to use, but I try not to let you drag me down to your level. The same for your comment earlier:
"I also think creating a huge DR with heterogeneous files/permissions/owners that is likely to require splitting and salvaging in bits is a dumb thing to do. We can see that every other admin "barge-poled" this DR for months. Please help out the admins by doing some homework yourself and raising smaller more cohesive DRs in future."
Oh yes, I should do my homework. When the DR created, there was no realistic way of splitting the DR in any sensible way. I have made many thousands of categorization edits since. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 17:53, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
Do you think any admins are encouraged now to pick up a complex DR created by you? Do you think it fair for any admin to operate under conditions where every mistake risks thermonuclear war? It is ironic that Fae complains that Jcb isn't perfectly following block policy by adding block template (and unblock instructions) as a courtesy on the blocked user's talk page, yet does not himself do Jcb the courtesy of discussing this issue with Jcb on his talk page, but rather goes straight to an desysop discussion with some data lists he's spent the afternoon compiling. It is ironic that you are complaining about an admin deleting files you sent to DR. Yes, I know DR doesn't have to result in a deletion, but it makes for a very poor example with which to make your case that you are a reasonable sort of person and they are a bad sort of admin. This tactic is not constructive or encouraging. -- Colin (talk) 21:44, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
@Colin: when there is a serious problem with files, a mass deletion request is created to discuss the matter. It is the discussion (not the nomination itself) on which a good administrator should found the decision. As for Colin’s nitpicking wrt Fæ… why should they inform Jcb explicitly when the user_problems thread is already underway? Alexis left a notice first and it is enough. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 08:10, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
Incnis Mrsi the issue Fae raised (block notices) was not raised by Alexis. It was brought here purely to serve as "and another thing Jcb does wrong" to pile onto a desysop request. I have concerns about Jcb, but each time we see the same old grudge-merchants here, their behaviour is troubling. Here, Fae is complaining about etiquette but I'm sure no admin here would like it if issues with their actions were used as ammunition in a desysop rather than first discussed with them on their talk page. As for "nit picking", well block templates certainly fall into that category. I can see no reason why good faith editors and admins could not have resolved that issue outside of a desysop vote. Look, the current approach is not working. Jcb is doing things that piss off other users and admins and a lot of us (myself included) have lost patience with him. But this game of playing nuclear war each time is unhelpful and just causes a polarised vote and an opportunity for accusations to be made with no or faulty evidence. It is creating a really bad atmosphere and I'm sure contributes to Jcb not being as engaged in the discussion as we would like. It forces people to list all the mistakes made rather than examine their record as a whole and note the positives. It frequently brings up crap stats like the deletion numbers above, which serve no useful purpose. An alternative approach would be to open a discussion on specific issues, one at a time, and deal with each one in a respectful and non-confrontational manner. I can't see User:Jcb's response to the block notice discussion. It would be very helpful to have Jcb acknowledge the community view and that their practice will change in future. I appreciate the topic was raised in a most uncourteous manner, but we're here now, and it does not seem reasonable for him to ignore. -- Colin (talk) 09:30, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Colin, lemme see if I got the above right: You say it’s bad to bring to this discussion about Jcb matters concerning Jcb, but it’s okay for you to use this discussion to once more flaunt your bizarre obsession with Fæ… You dig from your thesaurus phrases like "crap stats" and yet you harp about a «respectful and non-confrontational manner». It will never change, will it? -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 17:37, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
I have no obsession with anyone here, and evidence shows I'm pretty dam critical of just about everyone. I even popped over to Wikipedia earlier this year to stir up some trouble over 300 sponsored medical training videos that a big-name-admin had inserted into the lead section of our top articles. Made me rather unpopular with a few people, though I got a fair number of thank-yous too. Anyone who wants to present "crap stats" about how bad someone is can enjoy the output from my thesaurus. Fae's a frequent offender when it comes to making outrageous pseudo-statistical statements, so you know, it can change if he stops doing that. And I've been just as critical of the opening poster, and pretty critical (see my talk page) of Jcb too. In fact, based on his comments on my talk page, I'm about done arguing to his benefit. -- Colin (talk) 18:44, 31 August 2018 (UTC)

Bob Vila[edit]

While looking for something else I ran into https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log&page=File%3ABob_Vila.jpg.

It would look like Jcb redirected/replaced File:Bob Vila.jpg (Bob Vila is an American home improvement television show host) with File:Macaca nigra self-portrait large.jpg (the famous monkey selfie). As it would seem, in an attempt to annoy a sock farm. In general, I would strongly disapprove of such methods. If simply deleting and blocking doesn't work, I would have no problem with replacing the image with something random like a map of Peru or a photo of a hairbrush. That would make any article using it or website deeplinking it look stupid without offending Bob.

If this wasn't a one-man action but coordinated with several admins who thought this was a good and acceptable idea, okay. But there is no proof of that (all I could find) and Jcb, after I asked him for it, said he is "not going to find that out. I have better things to do.", but maybe someone here knows where those elusive discussions are? - Alexis Jazz ping plz 14:50, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Alex Shih, Barek, Ivanvector: who were involved in that short enwiki AN/I thread and might know more. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 14:52, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
Alexis Jazz, can you finally stop stalking me? Jcb (talk) 14:58, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
It's kind of hard to tell from the deletion log here what exactly happened but the entry where Jcb suggests "Let's see if we can discourage this continued abuse. Free file from File:Macaca nigra self-portrait large.jpg" does seem like they were trying something like that. I don't think it's something that enwiki admins would have suggested - it seems like a poor approach when admins here can just protect the title from uploading, and if you were going to replace it with some kind of neutral unrelated image I wouldn't have chosen one so obviously fraught from a copyright perspective. But maybe it was worth a try, I don't know, it doesn't seem to have worked anyway. That's about all I can offer. Ivanvector (talk) 15:11, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
I agree with Ivanvector's comments. I am not exactly sure what is being suggested here, as I have simply closed a discussion about obvious disruption. Alex Shih (talk) 15:22, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
Pictogram voting comment.svg Comment I protected again this page for one month. Regards, Yann (talk) 05:33, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
If Jcb did use the well known monkey image as way of trolling someone, especially when the image claims to be about a famous Cuban-American so any comparison to monkeys is bizarrely offensive, then this would be a misuse of sysop tools directly in contravention of the requirements of Administrators. If the only statement from Jcb when asked to confirm the facts is going to be "I am have better things to do", then the community must presume that Jcb is deliberately evading reasonable questions about their sysop actions. If as it appears in this thread, Jcb feels that reasonable scruitiny of their sysop actions is "stalking" then they should hand back the mop. @99of9: as recently commenting bureaucrat diff.
@Alexis Jazz: thanks for blowing the whistle on this case, your questions have been perfectly reasonable to ask and expect an answer. --Fæ (talk) 05:54, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
On reflection, I believe it should be required of @Jcb: to confirm this was not a deliberate racist joke, to replace a portrait of a Cuban-American with a monkey. Failing properly to respond with a credible detailed explanation, can and should be treated as serious incident. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 10:26, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
  • I strongly discourage User:Jcb from responding to the obvious trolling wrt "racist joke "above. The image replacement choice seems odd, but AGF would suggest it was an image that popped into his head at random, and I suspect Jcb doesn't even know or care who Bob Vila is. Is there any reasonable evidence to suggest that Jcb, when dealing with a sock farm, might think of making a racist joke? This seems to me yet another example of Fae inventing something to get offended with. At this point, the only AN/U action I see justified is a block or topic ban from AN/U to both users who are now trolling this board. -- Colin (talk) 10:50, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
  • @Colin: so open a thread for me and Fæ here. I dare you. Replacing/redirecting an image that is supposed to show any person to a photo of a monkey is not acceptable in my book, no matter their descent. Although it's even worse if racism plays a role. And Jcb is not willing to explain what brought him to do this or even admit it was insensitive. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 16:39, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Alexis, perhaps you didn't spot the year in those logs you "just happened to find". September 2017 is a year ago. Wrt Fae's mention of User:99of9's comment to Jcb, I wasn't aware that it required the use of a TARDIS. Since the 'crat decision is already that there are "not grounds for opening a de-adminship discussion", I urge that this section be closed. Currently, it seems to be a placeholder for those with a grievance to keep digging for historical edits that they openly confess to not understanding. This seems little more than an attempt to turn this into a "sticky thread", which really isn't what AN/U should be about. -- Colin (talk) 07:56, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Wrapping up[edit]

I have the impression this discussion is near it's limits, thanks to all contributors, but I'm not sure how about the conclusion. Could anybody please summarize his interpretation of the above (in as few words as possible)? Thank you! --Krd 17:07, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Note: I started this thread, so very obviously involved.
That's leaving out the accusation of stalking and refusing to explain Bob Vila.jpg.
I want to see a de-adminship request. We shouldn't need a certain outcome to start such a request. If the outcome is that Jcb has sufficient community support to continue, I'll accept that, but why can't we have a request? - Alexis Jazz ping plz 17:53, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
I see consensus that Jcb has had a pattern of bad admin actions which must not continue. We are more split on whether Jcb should have a chance to improve or should be desysopped now. Of those who want to desysop now, there is some long-term conflict and irreconcilable differences of opinion in how Commons should be administered. I agree with Alexis Jazz that we can't predict the outcome of a desysop vote. Guanaco (talk) 21:40, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

It's clear that there are a substantial number of editors who support a desysop request. A formal discussion should absolutely be initiated. -FASTILY 06:27, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

  • It is clear there is no consensus for a formal discussion. A handful of users support it, essentially those with previous grudges, but an almost identical handful of users oppose it. On several points raised, there was no serious good faith (or any) prior attempt to discuss and resolve the issue with Jcb. The stats on deletion reversals are useless without additional information. A huge poll, which is what a de-admin becomes, is not a productive way for the community to resolve issues, nor a collaborative way to help Jcb improve, change or stop doing things that piss people off. -- Colin (talk) 08:03, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

The summary would be that though the thread could have opened in a more civil manner, and has been unnecessarily poked by tangential and unpleasantly personal point scoring, the consequent discussion of Jcb's use of sysop tools has remained civil, and is supported by a verifiable series of cases, evidence and unbiased measurements that are of general concern. These demonstrate that rather than an individual case, Jcb's misuse of sysop tools and position is systemic and has persisted for years, entirely in disregard of endless good faith questions, requests and complaints as can be clearly read in Jcb's talk page history. Even while discussion has progressed, Jcb has failed properly to respond to valid questions about their actions, such as their as yet unexplained but apparently deliberately offensive redirect of a photograph of a notable Cuban-American to a photo of a monkey log, a shocking act of apparent vandalism that would see non-admins blocked on sight, and has persisted with the same disruptive behaviour of using speedy deletions out of process, by ignoring existing consensus on copyright in the example yesterday of File:990 official photo.jpg diff. There is sufficient community concern and genuine alarm at Jcb's use of sysop tools, and a pattern of being fundamentally unable to change behaviour in the face of years of feedback from distressed users, an unending series of complaints on this noticeboard, and a previous desysop vote, to accept that a desysop vote is required right now in order to either remove Jcb's use of the tools until they run another RFA, or the community can agree with Jcb's active involvement as to what changes are required for Jcb to continue to wield the mop.

As has been previously mentioned in "pre-desysop" discussion on this noticeboard, the current complex procedure has become an entrenched Super Mario effect, where administrators have special double protection by forcing the community to have a de facto supermajority vote in order for a bureaucrat to then act as gatekeeper and "allow" a desysop vote to run, which then bizarrely works on a simple majority vote. It is worth noting that bureaucrats making a decision to proceed to a vote is a recent invention, Commons:Administrators/De-adminship only includes bureaucrats closing out of process desysop votes, nothing else, so the discussion and decision to start a desysop vote is entirely within the authority of the wider community, no bureaucrat required. A reasonable external viewer would judge that we are attempting to run a broken process that is guaranteed to be ineffective at properly governing trusted roles, and so instead guaranteed to cause frustration and inflame debate due to the unnecessary force needed to make this move when the case is anything less extreme than a rogue administrator being demonstrably and persistently guilty of gross negligence. --Fæ (talk) 08:37, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

@Jcb: Possibly we cannot avoid to do now what should have been done much earlier, getting in tuoch with the defendant: Jcb, what do you think, what do you suggest? --Krd 09:05, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

There are several things that Jcb needs to change. But the amount of hostility here prevents everyone to discuss all these issues in a constructive manners. So first stop the attacks, then we can start have a useful discussion. Regards, Yann (talk) 12:35, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
I agree with Yann here.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 12:50, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
I completely agree with Yann. The level of hostility here is the exact reason I decided not to comment further on this issue. T Cells (talk · contribs · email) 12:58, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
@Krd: Although this whole thread was difficult to follow because it was flooded with irrelevant and false information (luckely some readers did check the facts and often identified false claims even before I came online again, credits for checking the facts go mainly to Colin), I did try to extract something useful from it being:
  • Guanaco formulated concerns about how well two specific queues were handled (npd/nsd). I promised 28 August in this thread to take more time for files from these two queue. It's visible that I did, because both queue are backlogged now, they were not 28 August.
  • Attention was drawn to the recent tendency that most admins paste a template to the user talk page of blocked users, even copyvio only accounts. (Most admins did not, until recently). I told 29 August in this thread that I have no problem with following community concensus for such a thing.
If there are any other concerns, my user talk page is open as it always has been. Jcb (talk) 15:13, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Thanks Jcb for your message. It could help if you recognize that files like File:990 official photo.jpg have a valid license, and that your handling of File:Bob Vila.jpg was not appropriate. Regards, Yann (talk) 16:05, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
I do not agree with you regarding File:990 official photo.jpg. The license template clearly states: "This tag can be used only when the author cannot be ascertained by reasonable enquiry. If you wish to rely on it, please specify in the image description the research you have carried out to find who the author was." There is no explanation why this condition could somehow be ignored. The PD-UK-unknown template is often being misused to change the UK copyright term from PMA+70 into creation+70 for anything of which we cannot find the authorship information with Google, which is inappropriate of course. Regarding File:Bob Vila.jpg, this is too long ago, I don't remember exactly what was going on there. Jcb (talk) 16:15, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Sometimes it's ok, regardless of the context, to admit you made a mistake in handling something in an indelicate way. -- Sixflashphoto (talk) 16:23, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
The actions taken in the Bob Vila case are easy to understand, the log is open for anyone to view. Jcb redirected the photograph of a notable non-white person to a photograph of a monkey, and later deleted the page using their sysop tools. This was a highly remarkable thing to do, twice. It should remain of wide concern that the question about this case was originally refused on Jcb's talk page and is now given as "I do not remember". No administrator has so far come up with a potential good faith explanation of why creating a "monkey redirect" and then deleting it from view, might be considered a valid use of sysop tools. This was a year ago, but it should be obvious to anyone reviewing the evidence as to why this is deeply concerning. --Fæ (talk) 16:43, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Everybody can check that your description of how I responded at my user talk page is inaccurate. Jcb (talk) 16:49, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Thanks for the correction, in reply to Alexis Jazz you said "[...] It must have been documented somewhere at EN" and "[...] I have better things to do." As per your advice there, in an attempt to circumvent any drama, I did some background research and contacted @DMacks: off-wiki as they appear in the deletion history of this file, and though a Commons sysop is primarily a Wikipedian. DMacks was unable to provide any positive rationale for your repeated "monkey redirect" actions, nor point to any explanation on Wikipedia. Your action to choose to direct a non-white person's photograph to a monkey seems entirely your personal tastes, and appears to have no possible positive rationale such as being a mistake. Occam's razor must apply as to exactly why you made this extremely offensive redirect.
Addendum It may help jog your memory that this was no mistake to check the logs of File:Bob Vila Signature.jpg and File:Host Bob Vila.jpg where you chose to make the same offensive redirects to File:Macaca nigra self-portrait large.jpg even though these events were days apart. --Fæ (talk) 17:15, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
I will not respond anymore to any of your comments in which you suggest that I would be a racist. I do not need to accept such accusations. Jcb (talk) 17:29, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
I have no idea what you are, and unless meeting in person am more comfortable knowing little or nothing about fellow contributor's personal lives. Your actions on this project are what I am asking about. The evidence, and your transparent and accountable use of sysop tools are of concern to the Wikimedia Commons community as per COM:Administrators. If you are unwilling to be accountable for your use of the tools, please voluntarily request a RFA to clear the air. --Fæ (talk) 17:39, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Fæ, Occam says: "When presented with competing hypotheses to solve a problem, one should select the solution with the fewest assumptions". You have assumed Jcb knows Bob Vila is a "non-white person". Since Jcb is from the Netherlands and Bob Vila is a US TV presenter on home improvement shows, I would think the fewest assumptions would be that he doesn't know who the guy is. I googled him and found this video. I don't know about anyone else, but other than when he describes his parent's background and states "as a Latin American..." I wouldn't have immediately classed him as a "non-white person". He looks, and sounds, pretty white American to me. Further, we all know the monkey selfie is a fun image, which lots of people (regardless of skin colour) use as an avatar, and has a big history on Commons wrt copyright. If Jcb had substituted some obscure ape portrait, then one might wonder "why did he search for a photo of an ape" rather than the more obvious explanation that this was just a well known fun Commons image. We all know that people should be extra careful not to cause offence even by accident, but I don't accept your repeated claim this is "a deliberate racist joke". You've got the wrong razor. Hanlon's razor says "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity". -- Colin (talk) 18:31, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Changing approach or policy[edit]

It seems to me that the current approach to resolving issues with Jcb is not working. It is notable that none of the very active 14 admins pinged above went on to vote (one had already voted). I think all admins would prefer to see better good-faith civil attempts to discuss and resolve issues before escalating things here and calling for the admin's head. Perhaps even that should be required by policy.

I suspect one reason Jcb is not visibly satisfying complaints here is because of the uncivil and unreasonable behaviour. It could also just be because he's a stubborn bastard who won't admit when he gets things wrong. It is hard to tell.

When the issue has been that Jcb's practice is not similar to other admins, or considered "best practice", or even considered "careless", I seldom see efforts to document the desired best practice in our guidelines or policy. I think that would help.

Most de-admins have occurred because of serious misuse of tools, or where the community strongly feels they have behaved outrageously shamefully or acted deliberately against known community consensus. The individual "crimes" levelled against Jcb over the years have not tended, on their own, to be sufficient to sway community feeling, particularly when weighed against the very high level of activity that is presumably good and gets ignored. Perhaps our de-admin policy wording is only focused on big crimes? How do we judge "acting against policy" when it is a few editors disagreeing about how to judge copyright in a 70 year old work, or disagreement about what "no source" means wrt the effort expected of an admin prior to deletion. Lots of things admins do are not explicitly decided in policy. And lots of admins do things that are explicitly against policy (cool down blocks, blocking established users without prior warning, etc).

Based on previous discussions regarding Jcb that edged towards de-adminship, it seems to me that such a formal request should be initiated by one or two clearly independent trusted users, who have the time and ability to present Jcb as an admin in his entirety, good and bad, rather than angry users who want revenge of a recent upset, or to cherry pick historical issues (some of which they don't even understand), or users who like to make up stats or invent things to be offended about. We all know that when a poll is initiated by someone who is highly biased, much of the heat generated is by those arguing about how bad the opening arguments are and what an outrageous lies we have been told. We don't really seem to have any policy about how such a de-adminship page should be presented or written and by whom. It doesn't tend to matter if the reason is "He deleted the main page" but does if your argument is more statistical and long-term behaviour/attitude/ability. -- Colin (talk) 08:03, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

An idea[edit]

This topic seems to have become particularly nasty, and I can't support these allegations of racism. The ape/person of color thing is chiefly American by my understanding, and I've never heard of this trope targeting non-black people. The macaque redirect looks like an attempt to solve a problem where conventional methods had failed. I don't see the racial implications, but others do, so it's best to simply ask Jcb to pick a different image next time.

Anyway, I see he's taking steps to improve regarding the other complaints. This is what we want, but I know many here won't be satisfied without some kind of follow-up. I propose that we table this for three months. In December, we start a new thread and ask of Jcb's performance from a neutral perspective. If he's generally doing a good job and is responsive to advice and criticism during these three months, we award him a barnstar for his dedication and hard work. If his adminship is shown to be a net loss, we start the formal vote. Guanaco (talk) 17:58, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

With regard to the classic trope, "macaca" is specifically used across Europe as derogatory term against immigrants from Africa and calling black people monkeys is nicely illustrated in the article racism in association football by the large number of countries where throwing bananas at black football players is documented as primary evidence of racism, not just America. Whether Jcb intended this as a joke, or for some other reason has yet to be stated, but the choice of this image out of 33 million alternatives was not an accident. --Fæ (talk) 18:07, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

@Guanaco: the ape/color thing is sadly also known in The Netherlands. "Een deel van het ADO-publiek maakte afgelopen zondag oerwoudgeluiden als Bazoer in balbezit kwam." ("A part of the ADO-supporters made jungle sounds last sunday whenever Bazoer had the ball.") Racistische idioten in Spakenburg (36 seconds of "Racist idiots in Spakenburg" on YouTube, nice compilation) Vitesse-fans maken apengeluiden naar Ajax-doelman Onana (9 seconds of "Vitesse-supporters make ape sounds to Ajax-goalkeeper Onana" on YouTube). As to suggestions from Colin that Jcb didn't know who Bob Vila is, he would have seen a photo of Bob Vila, assuming that is what the socks were uploading. I don't know which one, on some photos his Cuban descent is more visible than others. I'm personally not accusing Jcb of racism, but I would equally disapprove of redirecting a photo of Jimmy Wales or Arnold Schwarzenegger to a picture of a monkey. This is what Jcb had to say about it:

“As far as I remember, there was a case for vandalism at EN wiki going on for weeks. Several admins were involved at EN and Commons. When the vandal or vandals could not be stopped, a strategy was tried to discourage them instead. It worked, the vandalism stopped within a few days. I don't remember all the details. It must have been documented somewhere at EN.”
—Jcb

No links could be produced to provide any evidence other admins were "involved" (unless deleting a copyvio is considered as "involvement") and even less so that this wasn't a one-man action. Yann asked Jcb to admit it was inappropriate, which it was, regardless of racial implications being involved or not. Jcb's reply can be found below. To the suggestion to see if things will improve in 3 months, I suggest looking back 7 years instead. Here is some suggested background music while reading. Miss Shirley Bassey.

Saibo in 2011 vs Guanaco in 2018:

“Yes, I know (extrapolated since I really do not like to dig in your deletion log) that you do a big amount of work - mostly good work - but I would rather have a DR open for six month than have them closed with no or a not useful decision”
—Saibo in 2011
“Jcb is the most prolific deleter on Commons. I think this is in part because he invests a great deal of time into this project. I appreciate this and I know our backlogs will rapidly expand if he is desysopped. Unfortunately many of his deletions have been batch deletions (NASA photos, nsd, npd, etc.), undertaken without sufficient consideration.”
—Guanaco in 2018

Geo Swan in 2011 vs Alexis Jazz in 2018:

“Seeing administrators mock and bully newbie always disturbs me. I hope it disturbs enough of you that we agree that further mockery should trigger Jcb's resignation.”
—Geo Swan in 2011
“This was just insulting a fellow Wikimedian, contributing to D Ramey Logan no longer contributing photos to Commons. The way he handled Chaddy drove a 13-year contributor away from Commons. It didn't have to be that way.”
—Alexis Jazz in 2018

Jcb in 2011 vs Jcb in 2018:

“I don't remember the exact context, but also I don't think it's relevant to keep focussing on things from April or May, even far before the (unsuccessful) previous procedure.”
—Jcb in 2011
“Regarding File:Bob Vila.jpg, this is too long ago, I don't remember exactly what was going on there.”
—Jcb in 2018

Jcb in 2011 vs Jcb in 2018: (partly bolded)

“I'm not taking back this, be aware of that. So if you want to keep the possibility to communicate with me at this user talk page, you will have to stop spamming the page with your 'you forgot something' botlike messages. You're wasting my time a lot, thus harming Wikimedia Commons, because you waste admin capacity.”
—Jcb in 2011
“I follow the discussion, but I also do what I can to minimize the waste of time it causes for the community as a whole.”
—Jcb in 2018

Jcb in 2011 vs Jcb in 2018: (partly bolded)

“The fact that Saibo threatens with de-admin requests to enforce his continued abuse of my user talk page, feels like pure intimidation.”
—Jcb in 2011
“What followed was a message from Alexis more or less saying: "I disagree with your closure of that DR. Undo your actions immediately or I will try to get you desysopped". I really hope you agree with me that such intimidation not is the established way to handle a disagreement over a DR closure.”
—Jcb in 2018

Jcb in 2011 vs Jcb in 2018:

“When I started to deal with DRs this way, a lot of DRs were very old, up to one year. Now we have only three DRs older than one month. I didn't do all that work alone, but if you're honest you will probably admit that without my effort, the backlog would be way more than it's now.”
—Jcb in 2011
“Guanaco formulated concerns about how well two specific queues were handled (npd/nsd). I promised 28 August in this thread to take more time for files from these two queue. It's visible that I did, because both queue are backlogged now, they were not 28 August.”
—Jcb in 2018

Please note that his "promise" was actually "I am willing to take more time for these cats in order to reduce the error rate. On the other hand it would be great if people could contact me at my user talk page if they think I made a mistake". This was a promise? Oh. But who knows, maybe in 3 months things will happen that didn't happen in the past 7 years. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 22:14, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Propose block and AN/U topic ban of Fae[edit]

Could an admin please block Fae or topic ban him from AN/U.

Repeatedly claiming Jcb made "a deliberate racist joke" and that the choice of image for a "non-white person" was "not an accident" when Fae has not a shred of evidence is nothing less than harassment.

  • Fae has not established that Jcb knows who Bob Vila is. Since Jcb is from the Netherlands and Bob Vila is a TV home improvements presenter from the US, this seems very unlikely.
  • Fae has not established that Jcb is even aware that some might class Vila as "non-white" (he certainly looks white in this interview, and most certainly would not be classed as "black").
  • Fae has not established that Jcb was deliberately choosing an ape photo vs using a fun happy image that appears all over the web as an avatar for people (of any skin colour) and is is well known to Commons folk as the monkey selfie that sparked a copyright battle and much foolishness from PETA.
  • Fae has not established that Jcb, in all the years we have known him, has ever indicated racist inclinations, which might suggest to us this was motivated.

We have seen this before with Fae's repeated claims that editors are homophobic. Years of harassment and never any evidence. Just crap stats and podium lectures. Fae becomes determined to only see the worst in a situation when a far simpler and harmless explanation is the easiest explanation. Is this "the famous monkey selfie" or "a racist trope"? Yes Jcb was careless to use this image, but that's all.

Time for this harassment to end. Either Fae strikes his allegation, apologises to Jcb, or is blocked for harassment and topic banned from AN/U. -- Colin (talk) 19:09, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

  • Oppose. Cherry-picked, out-context allegations. Simply ridiculous. Colin's hatred of Fae is a well-estasblished fact, and this is a clear attempt to flamewar. As a matter of fact, I would support banning Colin from Commons/ANU. -FASTILY 19:37, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Agree with Fastily. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 19:41, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol oppose vote.svg Oppose, per Fastily. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 21:07, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol support vote.svg Support Unwarranted allegations of racism are completely unacceptable within this community. AshFriday (talk) 00:53, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
So are unwarranted allegations of support of child pornography.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 01:26, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
  • IMHO the interaction ban is not far ahead. Colin (without Fæ around) is a reasonable person with great contributions in photos, whereas Fæ is a powerful watchdog who can alert us about abuse. But when Colin discusses Fæ, nothing good comes from it. Note that Fæ deliberately avoids crossing Colin’s path. Seriously, a proposal of restrictions against Fæ submitted by their archenemy may not serve a foundation for the community decision. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 06:08, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This needs to be reopened. Krd’s argument for closing is preposterous and way, way below of what I’d expect from this admin. Topics are floating? Of course they are! Jcb has been messing up as an admin in many areas, and the discussion above “floated” (some of) them around. A de-admin procedure focusing on a specific topic would never be significant on its own (regardless of its outcome), as one could always argue that yes, on this particular topic this admin is terrible (or terrific) but in every other aspect s/he’s terrific (or terrible). A wide perspective needs to be considered and that’s what was being done (distractions aside) in this discussion. Better reopen it now and let the process run its course, or further degrade the collegiate environment here in Commons. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 18:52, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

@Tuvalkin: Also note Srittau shredded the comment I added in which I said I'm not strictly against the proposal to re-evaluate later. I also suggested in that comment to let @Guanaco: decide over this thread. I wouldn't have reverted him because I know he wouldn't close it like this, killing off any possible follow-up. Now, my user page is fun and I have requested an indefblock. WPPilot, Chaddy, Alexis Jazz. Who will be Jcb's next victim? - Alexis Jazz ping plz 19:21, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

Мөнхзориг[edit]

Мөнхзориг (talk · contribs) Every single upload by this user is copyvio. --Patrick Rogel (talk) 12:35, 3 September 2018 (UTC)

✓ Done Blocked for 2 weeks, all files deleted. Yann (talk) 14:04, 3 September 2018 (UTC)

User:Popthemop27 ‎[edit]

Despite already having every file uploaded to Commons deleted as a copyvio, Popthemop27 ‎still doesn't seem to understand COM:L. Their latest upload of File:Seizo Oh Baby.jpg has just also been tagged as a copyvio. An attempt to explain the types of files Commons accepts was made at User talk:Popthemop27#Why are you trying to delete my pictures? and en:User talk:Popthemop27#Uploading files to Commons, but that didn't really help things. I'm not sure if a block is needed at this time, but perhaps an admin could add a {{End of copyvios}} to their user talk page, or post a more friendly personal warning to advise this editor to continue this type of thing. -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:29, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Hi, Anyone can send a warning because of copyright violations, but ✓ Done Yann (talk) 08:02, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
@Marchjuly: the wording of {{End of copyvios}} has been changed a while ago at my request to make it more suitable to be used by both users and admins. - Alexis Jazz ping plz 08:09, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
Thanks for doing that Yann. I'm aware of that recent change Alexis Jazz, but figured I'd ask another to do so in this particular case since I've not had much luck reaching this editor with previous posts. Moreover, their last post on their Wikipedia user talk page sort of indicates that they don't really understand quite a number of other things in addition to COM:L. -- Marchjuly (talk) 08:13, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
Sometimes people need a big red warning. Sad, but true. Hopefully it will work with this user. Regards, Yann (talk) 08:24, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Bacavima (talk · contribs)[edit]

Probable block evasion of Gm924 (talk · contribs) (check the contributions of the later to :es:wiki), who is seemingly back to business uploading copyvios.--Asqueladd (talk) 10:22, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Exclude my block[edit]

Леонид Макаров (talk · contribs)

I was blocked for 6 months [3]. I believe that this blockage was unreasonably long - 6 months! Please exclude this block from my Special:block/Log.--Леонид Макаров (talk) 15:23, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Hey Леонид Макаров. Someone can correct me if I'm mistaken, but I do not believe it is technically possible to remove the entry from your block log. By this I mean that it's not an issue of finding someone with advanced user rights, but that there is no functionality in the software that would allow anyone to do this, regardless of the level of access they have. GMGtalk 16:10, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • I guess what Leonid means is revision deletion. Revdels can be made by administrators even in the block log, but a block will still be shown in the target user's record. Only the reason will be hidden. Therefore I don't see why this request should be granted. A complete removal of the blocking event from the log is not possible for technical reasons as GMG wrote. De728631 (talk) 16:32, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Agree that visibility should not be changed; for example: 1) the request is not timely. The block was in 2015 and there's no evidence the log entry has been a hindrance or disruption; 2) the request is only related to duration, implicitly acknowledging the block reason was proper; and 3) the issue was discussed with the blocking admin with no contemporaneous reference to a concern about duration or request for shortening. Эlcobbola talk 16:42, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • You're right. But blocking a newbie for six months is actually an exception to the project, isn't it? Why the first the blockage on six months? I can't find the answer--Леонид Макаров (talk) 16:56, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • The admin was not right undoubtedly. So I'm asking for the deletion of this record, it's ethical.--Леонид Макаров (talk) 16:59, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • No, it's not an exception. There is no requirement that first blocks be a certain length; per COM:BLOCK: "As blocks are preventative rather than punitive, use a block duration that is proportional to the time likely needed for the user to familiarize themselves with relevant policies and adjust their behaviour. Also consider the user's past behaviour and the severity of the disruption." This is really a question for Sealle; apparently his judgment was that six months was the time required (a possible measure of "past behaviour": at the time of the December block, you had warnings as for back as August--ca. 5 months.) One wonders why you've not discussed the duration choice with him. Эlcobbola talk 17:05, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
* Because this is the pattern of behavior of the administrator Sealle. To block on Commons and to remove for the same flags in the Russian Wikipedia. His behavior causes some friction among the participants in the Russian Wikipedia in relation to the project Wikimedia Commons.--Леонид Макаров (talk) 17:12, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Possible? Yes. Ethical? Not at all. Here’s one example. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 16:35, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
    • Ah, yes. The crat toolbox comes with some more items in it. De728631 (talk) 16:45, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
      • Wait, so crats can remove entirely or just redact the text like sysops can? GMGtalk 16:55, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
        • Seems I was wrong. Actually you need to be an approved oversighter, so this feature is not automatically included in the crat status. Anyhow, it is technically possible to suppress entire revisions. De728631 (talk) 17:22, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
          • Well I'll be. Today I learned. Anyway, it would still be subject to meta:Oversight policy, and this situation does not seem to be covered by that. GMGtalk 17:36, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
Symbol oppose vote.svg Oppose Seems to me that the block was reasonable due to copyright violations. And it was in 2015. Requesting to hide it just now -- seriously? --A.Savin 18:26, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Savin: I don’t try to pass as friendly, at all, so your “exposing” of my bluntness is frivolous. As for the matter at hand, you claim that your asking (and achieving) for your block to be hidden is completely distinct from the o.p.’s. Well, it is, I’m sure, because you enjoy the advantages of cronyism and the o.p. does not. Which proves my point: Why are you entitled to have your past blocks expunged from the records while refusing the same to others? Also, @Odder: What’s your position on this request? (To be clear, I think no blocking records should be expunged, ever.) -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 16:04, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
  • I object to your allegations of cronyism, @Tuválkin. Unless you have any evidence to the contrary, I would like you to withdraw this statement. I judged @A.Savin's request to suppress that block log entry—with agreement from other oversighters—not to fall under any criteria of the oversight policy, and I said so in the linked diff. As a courtesy to A.Savin, however, I decided to hide the log entry reason using RevisionDeletion, particularly given this post. As any administrator can confirm, the log entry was subsequently revdelled as a whole by @Revent who was the blocking admin. As far as this request is concerned, I agree with A.Savin that the situation is completely different (for one, the block reason is entirely factual) and I would not grant this request. I do, however, welcome this additional scrutiny of my actions from 2016, even if it's a little late. odder (talk) 08:34, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Symbol oppose vote.svg Oppose Absolutely not. Unless it is one of the reasons listed on COM:REVDEL any modification of the logs outside of that approved scope is simply an attempt to cover something up in my mind and should never be done. And yes, I can read, and I know that it says that list is "not exhaustive". But covering up a valid block is certainly not something we should be approving. At all. --Majora (talk) 20:39, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
 Not done This is technically possible for any admin (use "Hide target and parameters"), but it simply is not supported by current policy. Although blocks are preventative rather than punitive, there is some level of stigma associated with being a formerly blocked user. I would be open to considering a policy proposal whereby block logs can be redacted after some months or years of good behavior. This would not truly cover up the fact of a past block, as there are usually block notices in the user's talk page history, but it would show a clean record to non-admins who glance at the user's block log. Admins can see revdeled log entries, so we could still consider the full block history when applying new blocks. To propose such a policy change, I recommend Commons:Village pump/Proposals. Guanaco (talk) 21:03, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Sounds like a terrible idea. Record keeping is the cornerstone of the whole wiki editing philosophy. Old blocks may be a stigma, but they also can be a showcase of one’s personal growth and improvement, or of unfair treatment. Opening this kind of glaring hole in publicly available records props only some people’s vanity and serves no useful purpose. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 22:50, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
    @Tuvalkin: the topic starter is from ru.Wikipedia. Some notorious members of it managed to force sysops to hide their block log, as a show of influence over that diseased community. On the other hand, the very idea of “unfair treatment” is alien to modern ru.Wikipedia – almost all users who could make such cases emigrated, are exiled, nearly inactive, or silent. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 13:25, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Symbol oppose vote.svg Oppose - I see no valid reason to revdel or modify the block log, Block logs can be amended (as evidenced by my own block log) however this would be for error reasons IE an admin hitting the wrong block reason - In this case the reason was correct and as such should remain as is. –Davey2010Talk 13:13, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

User:Mugnezz[edit]

They keep overwriting File:Iron Wolf (Six Flags Great America) 01.JPG. They have not engaged in the discussion (see their talk page). They have overwritten several files over past years and have been previously warned by User:Túrelio on their talk page [4]. 4nn1l2 (talk) 15:31, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

I reverted the upload and blocked Mugnezz for 3 days for edit warring. De728631 (talk) 16:38, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Maybe it could be explained to Mugnezz (talk · contribs) that additional images, possible replacements in Wikipedia articles, can (indeed: should) be uploaded as new files, instead of overwriting? Seems that’s what this user’s trying to do, not just plain nihilist vandalism. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 22:54, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
✓ Done by colleague De728631. --Túrelio (talk) 07:50, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Hassanamin994[edit]

  • User: Hassanamin994 (talk · contributions · Move log · block log · uploads · Abuse filter log) block user
  • Reasons for reporting: The user regarding is not frequently uploading copyvios or doing other things wrong, but instead uploads a lot of files with insufficient information (eg.1) and distorted format(eg.2). I believe these are some good-faith editing, but helping to cleanup every of his uploads is quite tiring. I have also tried to contact the user(See User talk:Hassanamin994), but the user regarding seems to ignore these advice (probably language barrier?). Can an administrator explain the situation to him?

廣九直通車 (talk) 09:15, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

廣九直通車: You should inform a user when you open a thread here. I did it for you this time, and I added a warning about copyright violations. Regards, Yann (talk) 04:52, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Why are these flagged?[edit]

I uploaded these eleven public domain images:[5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14] and I think this] is the best.

Immediately these eight came up with false positives for some Flickr deal: [15][16][17] [18][19][20][21] and [22]. I posted "This image was copied from a PDF of the cited Army Technical Manual by me in the last week." on some but have no idea how to correct it.

I contacted the talk page the bot directed me to and got this.

After showing diffs for false positives I was referred to some board that I have no understanding of. After posting "Even if I had any idea of what that link means" and "I don't understand" I got a completelnonsense (to me) reply, apparently blaming me for some initials.

"Read the diff again" and "to someone who can't read diffs"? I wrote the diffs to specifically show the problem. They show a

X mark.svg This image was originally posted to Flickr by at https://flickr.com/photos//. It has been reviewed on 2018-09-04 02:48:38 by FlickreviewR 2, which could not determine what the Flickr source image was.
dumping a dramatic red cross on the image.

Upload eleven, eight are flagged, no explanation, no fix. Sammy D III (talk) 21:44, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

This looks related to Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive 70#Possible problems with User:FlickreviewR 2 bot?, though the problem was supposed to have been resolved already. The warning is there because the UploadWizard put the template {{Flickrreview}} on the files and the bot that reviews such files couldn't find a Flickr link. Since these files were never on Flickr, the warning can be removed, leaving only {{PD-USGov}}. Also, if you haven't done it already, you could upload the entire PDF to Commons as well, which would be useful for showing the provenence of the images you extracted from it. clpo13(talk) 21:52, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Why would anyone delete something for failing FlickrReview, when there's no Flickr link? It's either a 'bot failure or (as here) was never even on Flickr. Any competent human admin should recognise such, not plough ahead and delete it, just for the lulz. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:15, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
I undeleted the image, seeing no valid reason for deletion, especially speedy. Guanaco (talk) 22:25, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Pictogram voting comment.svg Comment You can just remove the warning, and add {{own scan}}. Regards, Yann (talk) 04:43, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Thank you people. I think it looks exactly like: Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive 70#Possible problems with User:FlickreviewR 2 bot?. This is being worked on at a higher level?

I have used Yann's "{{own scan}}". I don't think I have ever touched any flag before but this seems to be a specific failure and not any judgment call. I have "Edit summary"ied my changes as such.

Again, thank you all. Sammy D III (talk) 12:21, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

It is still doing it [23]. That image was a test from this morning. Fail. I hope some bot-repairman notices this. Sammy D III (talk) 02:53, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Hi, Well, since there is no link to Flickr, it is quite normal that the bot adds a failed review. Regards, Yann (talk) 05:52, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
It shouldn't do that. Maybe tag it into some other category, but not the same category (leading to deletion) as a false claim of a Flickr licence. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:10, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
I made an account at a bot-repair board, they knew about this. I showed them what was happening to me, maybe something will get fixed. Broken bots are just so stupid so fast. This one has me spotted, 100% failure now. No big deal, I'll come back and pick up the pieces later. Thank you. Sammy D III (talk) 02:49, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
The problem is the Upload Wizard, not the bot.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 02:53, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

deletion for copyright infringement[edit]

Already at Commons:Undeletion requests/Current requests, so there is no need to duplicate this. Also, this noticeboard is for serious problems you encountered with other users, not for generic help requests. De728631 (talk) 21:07, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Hi, The image[[24]] that I have uploaded was deleted claiming "This file is a copyright violation for the following reason: non-free film poster" I have uploaded the image with a permission from the owner. And there is no copyright violation. The poster is made public and was declared "no commercial value, only for cultural purpose" by the copyright owner. In this case, what can I do to undelete the image, I would also like to provide valid sources and copyright documents so that the image is not deleted again. I would really appreciate your help in this matter. Sincerely, A

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Retrieved from "https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commons:Administrators%27_noticeboard/User_problems&oldid=319284038"