It's not been through a full 5 day deletion debate, but yes, it has been to MfD and was "Speedily Kept". On 28/01/2008, Nathan <nawrich(a)gmail.com> wrote: -- Nick http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Nick

On Jan 28, 2008 6:03 PM, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell(a)gmail.com> wrote: I wouldn't really call that a CSS hack, considering they could have also done it using a magic word ({{DISPLAYTITLE}}). It doesn't seem to be using Wikipedia as a web host, more like using the domain to make a parody page in userspace more amusing/realistic.

On Jan 28, 2008 6:10 PM, Peter Ansell <ansell.peter(a)gmail.com> wrote: Other sites have to ask permission to link to us, now?

Gregory Maxwell wrote: I'm not so sure. Would it be different if, instead of an instantaneous redirect, their URL led to a page with the text "click here for the main page on Wikipedia?" They're simply automating the process of clicking, IMO. And how about tinyurl.com? I'm sure there are thousands of links to Wikipedia that come in via tinyurl redirects. As long as the page that's on Wikipedia is compliant with the requirements to allow that page to stay on Wikipedia - and since this Bathrobe page has been through MfD and survived, it appears that this is the case - why should we care _how_ people get there?

Gregory Maxwell wrote: I don't get the impression from the page itself that it's targeted at an outside audience. The entire raison d'être of the page appears to be to have fun at Wikipedia-related subjects, things that an "outsider" wouldn't have any awareness of. A random non-Wikipedian would have no idea what "RfAs" or "1RR" were, or why the goal of "Promot[ing] IPs to adminship" was funny. If someone were to do something like this with a page about their internet florist shop or a fan site for some sports team or what have you, then sure, that's clearly a case of using Wikipedia for non-Wikipedia-related purposes. This, however, is clearly Wikipedia-related and I don't see how a redirect hosted by some external site changes that. I don't pay attention to MfD, but if it routinely deletes stuff no more off-topic than this then IMO there's a problem with MfD's standards.

On 30/01/2008, Rory Stolzenberg <rory096(a)gmail.com> wrote: People keep referring to a discussion that only lasted a few hours as evidence that the community supports the idea, as opposed to a few admins who were alerted to the page, including the participants who purchased the domain to use with wikimedia hosting. Wikipedia Cabals are, perhaps surprisingly to you, totally irrelevant to the purpose of the encyclopedia. If wikipedia is going to host websites for people it might as well say it instead of proclaiming the no free web hosting statement as policy (except when its an admin who gets special treatment). If this is meant to be simply ignored because its a joke then it isn't succeeding. Peter

If folks are worried about Wikipedia being used as a webhost for external purposes, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hashim100 that is more the type of thing to be concerned about. NAthan

On 30/01/2008, Rory Stolzenberg <rory096(a)gmail.com> wrote: Okay, the most humourous WIkipedia space page that I have agreed with so far is [[WP:ROUGE]], and even then not without extensive discussion as to its relevance for giving people a view on the real reasons admins have to do some things. That is relevant, cabals (true/untrue), or discussions about them, are a totally irrelevant artifact that doesn't help wikipedia at all. If there wasn't a cabal to keep irrelevant cabal articles in wikipedia they would be subject to the WP:NOT guidelines like other pages, but catch 22 says you can't see the forest for the trees in this case. All of [[Category:Wikipedia humor]] is irrelevant IMO. But there are enough people who want an exception for humour to keep it in, and still avoid telling most people that in WP:NOT a free webhost/social network. I am not trying really to point this out as a case that should be deleted while others in either WP:LOC or the humour category, are kept. Wikipedia is about the encyclopedia first, and only community for collaboration, not for making up clubs for people to join. Why was it that Esperanza was deleted? (Not to bring it up as a specific example relevant to this discussion of humourous cabal jokes, but it was a big precedent for WP:NOT IMO) If Esperanza had been a humourous cabal then it would have fit as a precedent of course, but it was too transparent for that to occur by definition. Peter

On 30/01/2008, Nathan <nawrich(a)gmail.com> wrote: If they leave because a userspace page, which was not promoting collaboration on wikipedia articles, was deleted then they were *not valuable* to the encyclopedia. Its not like the encylopedia would be practically affected by a deletion of a social networking user page. It could however be affected if others figure out that admins aren't consistent and chuck a fuss because their Userspace pages were deleted for the same reason that page was kept in a shortened discussion. Too soon for another MfD, you would just get the creators of the page voting Keep again and possibly pulling in loyalty votes as such. Maybe once discussion had died down here it would be reasonable to try again. Peter

On Jan 29, 2008 10:45 PM, Steven Walling <steven.walling(a)gmail.com> wrote: Thank you for your kind words. The airline redirected the URL to a long pre-existing article. They thought it was their pre-existing webpage. (After all, it was all about them! :) ) ...which has absolutely nothing to do with Wikipedia. By 'maintained by a devoted Wikipedian' do you mean 'kept in a protected state to inhibit editing by others'? So, as far as you're concerned I can setup some joke page entirely unrelated to Wikipedia on Wikipedia. Redirect a domain name to it. Use CSS hacks to overwrite the user interface. .. and keep it protected to prevent unapproved people from modifying my website. Did I get that right? If not, please spell it out for me, because that sounds like what you're claiming.

I didn't know it was protected - that is probably taking it a bit too far. Nathan On Jan 30, 2008 9:13 AM, Earle Martin <wikipedia(a)downlode.org> wrote:

So, as far as you're concerned I can setup some joke page entirely unrelated to Wikipedia on Wikipedia. Redirect a domain name to it. Use CSS hacks to overwrite the user interface. .. and keep it protected to prevent unapproved people from modifying my website. Did I get that right? First off, I didn't know it was protected. That is inappropriate, and makes no sense. But the Bathrobe Cabal isn't just a joke page. It's a humorous page that is a community building tool for admins and a resource for non-admins to find help from a friendly and knowledgeable set of sysops, which is far useful than a lot of the off-topic userpage stuff that gets let alone. I do not understand that logic of attacking an obviously useful page just because someone has bought and redirected an outside domain to it. It's more than just "no harm done". There is a palpable benefit to the page. On Jan 30, 2008 11:36 AM, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen(a)shaw.ca> wrote:

haven't seen any low-status editors making jokes about cabals. i wonder why. how would you define "low status" Non-admins? I don't think heirarchy on the wiki is that concrete. I'm not an admin or "high status", and I find the Cabal humor page uplifting. It defuses my urge to assume bad faith. On Jan 30, 2008 2:41 PM, David Goodman <dgoodmanny(a)gmail.com> wrote:

I seem not =to have had an adequate sample. On Jan 30, 2008 5:46 PM, Nathan <nawrich(a)gmail.com> wrote: -- David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG

Steven Walling wrote: What CSS hacks? It looks like a perfectly ordinary Wikipedia page to me, complete with all components of the standard user interface. I do notice now that the text "Welcome to the Jungle!" has been inserted above the horizontal rule at the top of the page, in a spot that's normally blank on other pages, but this hardly seems like a reason to freak out. I oppose protection unless there's a good and ongoing reason, as a general rule. But that's been taken care of too. So yeah, I really don't see what the problem is. I didn't write that, I responded to it. On Jan 30, 2008 3:20 PM, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen(a)shaw.ca> wrote:

On Jan 30, 2008 6:20 PM, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen(a)shaw.ca> wrote: The actual page name [[User:LaraLove/Bathrobe Cabal]] has been intentionally obscured and the text www.bathrobecabal.org made to look like the actual title. -- Chris Howie http://www.chrishowie.com http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Crazycomputers

Appears the redirect from the mailing list has been disabled anyway. Not really necessary, in my opinion, but apparently they decided to react to complaints anyway. Sounds like conduct we might expect of productive and dedicated administrators - which is just the reason they should be allowed to keep it the way they had it. On Jan 30, 2008 6:39 PM, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen(a)shaw.ca> wrote:

Nathan wrote: It seems I was actually the first person to go to the talk page in question and point out to the bathrobe people that this subject was being discussed. That should probably have been the _first_ thing to be done, the assumptions of bad faith would have been disposed of straightaway.

Peter Ansell wrote: The page is protected again last I checked, but rather than wheel war over it it'd probably be best to discuss the matter on-wiki and then if that fails take it to [[Wikipedia:Requests for page protection]] to get a fresh outside view on the matter. In my own personal opinion the protection isn't that big a deal either, even though I'm opposed in principle. Might as well let it slide until the bad blood dies down.

Peter Ansell wrote: As you noted at the time, it was irrelevant to the subject at hand. Ignoring it completely was probably the best response to hope for.

On 31/01/2008, Luna <lunasantin(a)gmail.com> wrote: I apologised, but as yet the entire incident has turned into a firestorm I have only ever heard about in american politics. Poor Aussie isn't used to being attacked. Still not taking back the essential comment about GFDL childrens pictures posted on the net. I am passionate about keeping all possible avenues for exploiting children closed. It is illegal to post pictures of someone elses child on the net in Australia, and I naturally assumed that they saw the risks I guess, mostly because of the emphasis on bathrobes I think. I would appreciate even simple comments about how badly things could be taken, as I had not noticed the veracity of the statement until I was brought back to it again. The crux of the statement shouldn't be attacked though even if I expressed it in a bad way. Peter

On 31/01/2008, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen(a)shaw.ca> wrote: If the pictures were never posted to a public place then there would be zero risk of them being vandalised by a paedophile. That was the real issue. Is a child not worth zero risk? From the sounds of the posts it seems like the complaint was about her and not the child. Wikipedia editors should understand the GFDL as a prerequisite though, including the revocation of any right to sue a person who modifies a photo in any way as long as they attribute its authors correctly. Still, given the wikipedia review topic about the recent issue with commons having a "Category:Lolita" and the vandalism of scout photos, there is an issue. Its a shame that freedom of speech outweighs child safety in Florida, US. It is a completely different culture in which people both get annoyed quickly and try to make scandals out of a few words, and in which parents are ultra-sensitive about their parenting styles. Thats the Australian part I was trying to get at. If someone here had thought to tell me that it could be offensive then I would have retracted the comment then and there. Now that I have thought about it I think the point of the comment, child safety considerations, is relevant still. If Florida doesn't give a stuff then I hope Wikipedia has a conscience to care outside of what is explicitly needed by law. Peter

On 01/02/2008, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen(a)shaw.ca> wrote: It is almost a coincidence that this thread still has the old subject header, sorry for not correcting that. I *didn't* first try to take the thread there, it was a clear aside comment which was purposefully not trying to take the thread there! If someone releases text under the computer-program-documentation-focused-GFDL then they had better know what they are doing because there are a lot of complicated provisions that must be adhered to. If it is not illegal to modify photographs in the US then they are not lawfully doing anything wrong. There is no difference between the safety of children and the safety of the photographs. Otherwise a paedophile could use this defence for swapping images that they did not take. We were talking about that... I brought the issue of the angry AN/I posting about me up again here as a basically separate thread. It just had the same subject header for ease of reference back to the disputed statement. Peter

On 31/01/2008, LaraLove <laralove(a)bathrobecabal.org> wrote: You must have missed this in your hurry to get me assassinated at AN/I . http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=15438 Peter Ansell

On Jan 31, 2008 7:48 AM, Nathan <nawrich(a)gmail.com> wrote: Completely seconded. My first thought when I read Peter's comment was, "Hey, that sounds ridiculous. No point blowing up about it, though - it's not exactly earthshaking that someone else has a completely different opinion from my own." The ANI clusterfuck was completely pointless. In other news, if we're going to continue on this subject on the mailing list, some restraint with regard to personal attacks/assumptions of bad faith would be nice. Explicit accusations of character assassination, if continued without more than vague evidence will probably be grounds for moderation. Johnleemk

On 01/02/2008, John Lee <johnleemk(a)gmail.com> wrote: I would have retracted the comment straight away if I thought it would offend a specific person, but everyone thought the same thing I guess and didn't want to provoke further discussion about it. Oh well. Sorry, I am prone to rash statements such as that and the original statement that caused this fiasco. The character assasination reference basically comes from their lack of restraint in not asking me first (and waiting for a response) before telling the community what a bad person I have been. Won't happen again. Peter

Whats being hidden? On Jan 28, 2008 5:55 PM, Peter Ansell <ansell.peter(a)gmail.com> wrote: