Forum:Permaban Rolandius open comments

Forums: Village pump → Permaban Rolandius open comments

This is an open comment forum page for Forum:Permaban Rolandius?.

Since the above forum page is protected from editing by non-admins, asking for comment from non-admins seems kind of silly, so this page is for non-admin comments. --Beware the sneaky smile! Fandyllic (talk · contr) 3:40 PM PST 20 Jul 2009

Why should non-admins comment?--SWM2448 23:27, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Why put it on the forum? --Beware the sneaky smile! Fandyllic (talk · contr) 9:46 AM PST 21 Jul 2009

Good question, allthough votes are democratic, sites such as this need meritocracy for votes to work. Let the admins sort it out between themselves. But...that's just mho. TherasTaneel (talk) 00:20, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Since the rules were changed on how this proposal becomes ratified, what is the rule on how this proposal becomes rejected? Is it open for a year? A week? Rolandius (talk - contr) 02:55, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Active admins who have not voted: Starlightblunder (Foxlit) (seen July 17), Mikk (absent since July 14), Gryphon (absent since July 9, intermittent in June), Tekkub (absent since July 3),Varghedin (absent since May 26), Montagg (absent since May 21), Sancus (absent since Feb 27), User:Hobinheim (absent since Nov 28)

It would be reasonable to close the vote in the usual fashion (IE give a week to change minds) once it is evident that the remaining admins are not going to register a vote. IMO, the admins above should be prodded to vote or abstain, to ensure that if they don't vote, it is by choice, not simply missing that it was happening. --Eirik Ratcatcher (talk) 19:03, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Why should non-admins comment? - for the same reason you call your congressman. 'The people' have opinions, and those opinions have relevance to the decisions made by 'those in power'.

My opinion is that Rolandius contributes greatly in pointing out inconsistencies in the wiki. (And sometimes in policy, or the application thereof.) In 'being bold' his edits irritate many who view them as erroneous at the time. Cleaning up the same takes effort, and many of the admins are tired of doing so. He engages in disputes with admins, and calls them on it when they are inconsistent. Many admins are tired of this too. Both parts. (Admins are only human, remember.)

I am not, myself, "tired of cleaning up after him", but I can empathize with those who are. On the whole, I would regret his being booted from the wiki. He looks at things differently than most people do, and I value that. It comes with a cost, though, that I do not, alone, pay. --Eirik Ratcatcher (talk) 19:03, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

The main problem that I find is that sometimes he does mistakes (like most people including me) but he made them in 10-20 articles in a single hour. You may not be tired of correcting this mistakes but you haven't been here as long as the admins, that's why they are tired. Benitoperezgaldos (talk) 19:36, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

You want my thoughts? I think not everything Rolandius does is bad. In fact, I have found a few of his edits useful (as opposed to just 'fine'). I think he honestly wants to help. He is not a vandal, which is where the controversy about banning him is rooted. The problems he has mainly stem from comprehension and relevance. He does see things differently than most people do, but it seems he sees things differently than everyone else alive. This allows him to point out inconsistencies that no one else sees, but he also points out problems where there are none. Also, whenever he points something out, he is an arse/ass about it.

Whenever he corrects something on a page, he will correct the same thing over several pages, and these corrections are often wrong (but not always). Such a volume of edits (bot-worthy) would be impressive if they did not have so many minor and stupid issues hidden within. Hidden even more so by the fact that (Corrected spelling/grammar) can mean anything when he uses it. Following his contributions becomes tedious to anyone who does it for extended periods. When confronted about any errors in his edits, Rolandius refuses to understand or heed the advice, and often starts a fight. These fights may have been augmented in ferocity by what I meant when I mentioned "irony" in the mentorship review.[1] What I meant was, he often sounds (for lack of better words) "rude", "snotty", or "snide" in his responses/comebacks, but as tone is difficult to carry through text, I, and others, may have misinterpreted his comments (it would need to have been a lot of misinterpretation).

Does Rolandius even see what he is doing wrong, or does he dismiss it as "I can't win, everyone else is just mean and crazy"? At one point I was pretty sure his actions could be described as "Rolandius thinks at the end of the day, he is still right".

I have thought about it (mainly thanks to Eirik[2]), and agree that certain issues may have been handled in a was that was unnecessarily rude by both sides, and that things may have gone down a much different path if more initial patience was given. I disagree, however, with Fandyllic's policy of "Rolandius was treated in a way that is not perfectly proportional to his offence, so all offences are negated". Perhaps Fandyllic thinks each minor mistake and rude comment by Rolandius is not a bannable offence on its own. They aren't, like that one thing Adys cited[3] (which was just the final straw), but they add up. "Whatever" is not a good defense.[4]

The biggest problem? I could have said the most of the same things about his first bans if I was there and put my heart in it. Little to no change.

In a perfect world, I would like to keep Rolandius on the wiki and try to fix his problems due to the beneficial things he does, but his problems are recurrent and annoying, and Rolandius has shown that his problems will not go away, despite the attempts of many users. There has been way too much controversy. My vote is: End the madness. The method used to do this is up to the Administrators.

--SWM2448 20:46, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

What Sandwichman said is mostly true, he has little to no improvement since his first ban and, actually, he comes back more resented for the actions before the ban. I would also like that Rolandius stay but, as Sandwichman, his edits often use "Corrected Spelling/Grammar" as a description but also do another thing, such as removing or adding a category, and I'm also tired of checking all his edits whatever the description given to verify if his edits are correct. Benitoperezgaldos (talk) 22:08, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

you haven't been here as long as the admins - more appropos, I haven't been following up on Rolandius as long as the admins have. I suspect there are one or two admins I predate... :) But yes, at the end of the day, it is not I who has borne the brunt of correcting the errors. And thus I limit the breadth of my approval.

at the end of the day, he is still right - and the difference with me is "I accept that I have not prevailed, without (much) further argument". Another part of why I sympathize with Rolandius.

I'm thinking, from what you two have said, that the problem is largely one of scale. (With a will, one can put a hat over the arguments and ignore them.) That is, Rolandius hasn't developed sufficient reflex to ask "I see this recurring problem, I would like to correct it in this way (see sample page XXXX), is that correct/acceptable?" despite mentoring. Anyone (Rolandius too) have any suggestions on how to make that happen? SWM, consider this an action that can be taken while the Permaban is still in the air, with perhaps more immediate positive results. --Eirik Ratcatcher (talk) 22:24, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure if you predate some admins but your archived talk page says you were welcomed the "2 January 2009"[5], while Rolandius was welcomed the "10 May 2008"[6], that's why I told it. But whatever I don't want to go too much off-topic. Benitoperezgaldos (talk) 23:29, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

You should go by the contrib page, not his talk page... Eirik was actually around before me. Sssssssssssssssssssssssss For Pony! (^Sssss/_Slithered) 01:12, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

he comes back more resented for the actions before the ban. - Interpretation question: "Rolandius is more resented after the ban, for things he did before the ban", or "Rolandius is more full of resentment after the ban about things he did before the ban"? Who is doing the resenting? --Eirik Ratcatcher (talk) 23:33, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Every time I say something I end up making someone mad, so hopefully I can avoid that in the following comment. By the way, I tend to write a lot in my comments so this will be long. I agree with a little of everything from the comments of users. I do know I have made mistakes but no where near "vandalism". Like some people pointed above, I edit a lot but I don't see how that is bad overall when I have created so many articles that did not exist yet. With edit summaries, I do write "corrected s/g" a lot because that is what I usually am doing. Sometimes I forget to write more because 80% of my edit will be correcting spelling/grammar and the other 20% will be something else and I edit a lot. The thing is, I actually write something in the edit summary. Some people write zero comments so I don't see how you can just point to me because I write only a "few" comments. Like Coobra said, just look at my contributions. I have tried to expand my comments in the edit summary of my edits. If I correct spelling/grammar mostly then I am not sure what I should write in the edit summary besides "corrected s/g". I also have created many NPC/mob articles that did not exist, like I said above, and just in these past few days I created more than 20 I think which were missing. The "Broken links / Wanted pages", I noticed, has more than 1000 (it won't go further) red links. The top thirty of those are Warcraft III type articles and the Warcraft III template is 50% red links. No one has said much about that, and I tried pointing it out, but I make a red link here or there and people get mad at me. I am sure you can see why I am confused about things I get blamed for when it is happening everywhere else. If someone asks me why I did this or that I try to explain to them. When I ask certain people why they did this or that they just ignore me or tell me "because I said so". I also have gotten in trouble for many crazy reasons. For instance, I made some articles for NPCs that were then deleted. The reason was that the NPCs "are not important" but I don't see how I would know that. Aren't all NPCs sort of important and should have an article on WoWWiki? Another time some people argued with me trying to say I had confused my mentor and they wrote it up as another "bad" thing I did. Later, my mentor commented on the talk page and said "Rolandius did not confuse me". As you can see, it goes both ways. I have been said to make little corrections which make people mad but then on the other side people have found problems with me that don't exist. I have tried to correct my "problems" and I think I have improved a little more than some think. I have followed the advice on how to improve and still gotten in trouble. I have been blocked during times I didn't even edit any of the main pages. I was just in my sub pages of my user name. Also, one suggestion was to make articles in my sub pages to see if they could get approved. I did this. Many of my articles were approved and of course many were not approved so I had to let them stay in my sub pages. Lo and behold, a lot of my denied articles have shown up on the main page of WoWWiki. I, of course, don't mind this but am a bit confused on the whole thing where I was denied the ability to make the article but then another user could make it. If my article was so bad or whatever then why is it okay for another user to make the same thing, sometimes with even less info then my article had? I guess, like Eirik said, some of it is because of scale. I think I have the most contributions by a non-admin so there will be a few bad, some average, but a lot of good edits in my opinion. Another thing I noticed by some user comments is that they don't agree with how everything has been handled but just want this over with. I don't see why all the blame would fall on me for this and be a reason to permaban me. Like the saying goes "don't throw the baby out with the bathwater". Well, just look at my contrib page and you can see how either bad, good, or in between I am as a user. Rolandius (talk - contr) 02:46, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

The "Every time I say something I end up making someone mad" is a defeatist attitude. It is true most users do not often write edit summaries, making it somewhat hypocritical, but you were specifically asked to expand on them, both because they are often wrong, and because it would have made your edits easier to keep track of. You did not really follow this repeated[7][8][9] request much. That Warcraft III issue is new, and I do not think you have been scolded for creating any pages related to {{Warcraft III units}}. The status of the template itself is another issue. You did point it out, and it is getting done hopefully/eventually.[10] Your "red links" were a different and much larger issue.[11][12][13] Not all NPCs need a page.[14] I have no idea about the confused mentor thing. Sometimes these "denied articles" show up because some were a lot less denied then you think, and it is easier to shrug off a trickle than a flood.[15] It is a bit because of scale (I do not know if that word is being used in the same way by all users here), but do not think you are the only user that gets pages he makes deleted. If you can expand on a page in a way that makes sense, then do it. Most of these issues were attempted to be fixed in the past, but both sides failed at noticeable improvement.--SWM2448 18:26, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

I am trying to expand on my edit summaries though. Once in awhile, I even fill up the edit summary box so that it won't let me add anything more. I was just pointing out that I have gotten in trouble for making a dead link here and there. Compare that to Special:WantedPages where the top 37 articles are Warcraft III related, and that is not counting the links to each one. "Raider (Warcraft III)" has 120 links, Banshee (Warcraft III) has 120 links, Abomination (Warcraft III) has 120 links, etc. Multiply that by 37 articles and that is more than 4000 links that are affected just having to do with Warcraft III. So to me it looks like "Hey Rolandius you made this red link" look a bit overstated. You said "...it is easier to shrug off a trickle than a flood." but if I make for example 10 articles that get denied and 5 other users make 2 articles each and they get on WoWWiki then I don't see the difference. It looks like an enviroment where it is discouraged to make a lot of edits or articles. It is saying "just make a few edits but don't contribute too much" it seems. Unless this is just the policy for me as a user. I would think it would be encouraged for a user to make as many edits/articles as they can like 10 instead of just two. I don't mean bad edits/articles either. I mean edits/articles that are going to end up on here anyway. Pretty much, and I have been told this verbatim so I have proof, some admins want me to just stick to my user sub pages and let other users make the edits that I was going to make in the first place. Or permaban me if they can. I don't see how that is right. Rolandius (talk - contr) 03:31, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I think that you're probably right re some admins. And other admins simply want a chance to see what you're up to and prompt corrections before the affected page count skyrockets. Not much can be done easily about the former, but the latter can be worked on. The latter is also why I let some of my edits sit for a day or two before echoing those changes to other related pages, and why I come to the forums with things quite so irritatingly often. --Eirik Ratcatcher (talk) 17:51, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, this whole page is really just for musing, since a bunch of admins are determined to ban/block Rolandius permanently. I'm glad that some discussion can take place at least before it happens. This all kind of reminds me a little of the Iranian election. --Beware the sneaky smile! Fandyllic (talk · contr) 7:06 PM PST 23 Jul 2009

Your analogy is laughable and insulting to Iranians. Everyone here appears to be agreeing with the fact that Rolandius at least needs to be dealt with except for you and Rolandius. The admins have given Rolandius plenty of opportunity to shape up. It is nothing like Iran. --PcjWowpedia wiki manager (TDrop me a line!•C207,729 contributions and counting) 02:14, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Small note. Everyone here appears to be agreeing that I can improve in some places but that some admins also need improvement, yet there is nothing they can do about that part, so they want it all to just end. They are hoping that the aforementioned admins can improve themselves though because they would like for me to stay on WoWWiki. Rolandius (talk - contr) 02:29, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

This vote is not about the admins, it is about you. I believe the admins have overall been more than fair even though I admit some of us have been rude at times. --PcjWowpedia wiki manager (TDrop me a line!•C207,729 contributions and counting) 02:41, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

This vote is about me. The admins are the ones voting. So it is six of one and half a dozen of another to me. Rolandius (talk - contr) 02:45, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I'll let the "insulting to Iranians" pass, as inappropriate to fasten upon as the original analogy. The vote will say something about the admins, as they are doing the voting. What it says, is different for each viewer of the events. And both parties are reflecting upon it, and amending their behavior in light of it. --Eirik Ratcatcher (talk) 19:21, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, ever since this vote started, I have noticed Rolandius is trying harder to improve... since talk, mentors, and reviews didn't seem to do much for him, perhaps something like this was needed to kick him in the rear and get his attention. Sssssssssssssssssssssssss For Pony! (^Sssss/_Slithered) 21:28, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

This may well have helped, but I thought I had seen improvement beforehand. If nothing else, it kicked over the status quo. --Eirik Ratcatcher (talk) 21:48, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Helped or hindered, is there some kind of actual date when the voting closes? I already know it closes "effective immediately" if it is ratified. What about the "rejected" angle since it has been more than 7 days since it began? I was just wondering because I am contributing on WoWWiki, yet any day now I could be permabanned. Rolandius (talk - contr) 02:40, 25 July 2009 (UTC)