You know when you're proud of something and you tell it to someone and they always find something to nitpick while also saying good job. That's what this feels like. It's very unnecessary. Time and a place
For example:
I’m a big fan of Wikipedia. I spent countless hours writing articles in my early twenties. I stopped because the environment got more hostile as the site grew in popularity. I think that might have been necessary to address the influx of drive-by editing, but it still meant I stopped enjoying being a contributor. I don’t appreciate the constant asking for money — as far as I understand, they’re well off without donations.
There.
I think the misconception here is that criticism has to be mean and personal. As someone who celebrates the project’s ideals, giving criticism is an act of love.
They are, by and large, a bunch of horrible bullies and losers - many Wikipedians don't actually care about articles creation or actual content, they fiddle about with URL fixes and categorisation. There was one horrible human being called BrownHairedGirl who did all these things and almost destroyed the place before they got indefinitely banned also.
What did she do on Wikipedia?
She "fixed" barelinks and did categorization work. On the former, she wrote a script that utterly buggered up links to the extent they were being cleaned up long after she was banned. On the latter, she was so toxic that she was eventually blocked for her actions on categories.
She was a toxic editor who did virtually no editing of content on the site.
Ta bu shi da yu created the citation needed template: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template:Citation... (I remember that account name from Kuro5hin. Much respect!)
He edited under several accounts, all of which are permabanned: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Aussie_Article_Writer
Why? Because he'd earned an interaction ban (IBAN) from engaging with BrownHairedGirl, and he breached the ban: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log&type=...
Whatever he said, it's been fully scrubbed, but it appears to have been commenting on BrownHairedGirl's not-yet-submitted Request for Adminship: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=1039021442#Piotrus...
How'd he get the interaction ban? Because another account of his and BrownHairedGirl were squabbling, and the admins have working eyes and brains, they could see he was doing the instigating: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=980273295#Proposa...
You're not meant to wind up or troll your fellow Wikipedians, even if they are combative dickheads who need taking down a peg.
What was the beef? That he was creating small subcategories for each suburb of Brisbane, and BrownHairedGirl goes off her nut at small categories.
BrownHairedGirl was eventually taken out by being needlessly combative about - of all things - Wikipedia's "small categories" policy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests...
> what stops you from creating a new account?
Wikipedians inevitably go back to their old stomping grounds, use their normal tone in discussions, repeat their same old habits and basically don't change. When they do that, they're very recognisable to the people they already spent 20 years interacting with. They out themselves as a sockpuppet of the original banned user, and they get banned again.
I can assure you, I was not doing the instigating. Though I did comment on her RFA, not realising it was not yet submitted. There was never an appropriate review of my one-way IBAN, and nobody has been able to explain why this was done given her vile and ongoing obnoxious comments about myself. unless you consider her accusing me of "whining" to have been acceptable, something not a single person commented on. Also, I had been asking them not to comment on my talk page and had taken it to WP:AN/I. Not sure why you consider this to have been something that I was not allowed to ask for review about?
I had no part in the scrubbing of that page. That was the ArbCom, for reasons only known to themselves. Probably instigated by then-arbitrator Beeblebrox, who was later suspended from ArbCom for disclosing ArbCom matters on an external anti-Wikipedia site.
Also: I was not doing any editing of Brisbane categories. I don't know where you got that from.
Furthermore, I have not edited Wikipedia since I was banned. If you are implying otherwise, then you are wrong.
Yes: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=980273295#Proposa...
Your fellow Wikipedians had had enough of your and BHG's squabbling, and they decided it was primarily you needling her. And yes, even in the brief exchange in the thread there, BHG comes off like an absolute prick. In no way does BHG's awful behaviour allow you to excuse your own.
See also your own words "Upon reflection, that was indeed a needlessly inflammatory comment I made. I apologise for that."
Perhaps you can accept you've made more than one needlessly inflammatory comment towards BHG?
* Here you made a snide little comment exclusively about BHG where she'd see it: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Adminis...
* Here you accused her of gaslighting: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Wi...
* BHG then made a thuggish and threatening post on your user page: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Chris.s...
BHG later characterised this like "oh but he was trolling me and I merely asked him one time on his talk page to stop (which is allowed)", which is bollocks because the "one time" is a long, angry screed written in a menacing tone. But if you want to go no-contact with someone who's clearly bad for you to be around, go no-contact -- don't ever mention them again. Don't interact directly with them. Don't comment on things they're involved in. If you're in something and they join in, politely recuse yourself.
That you didn't, is the reason why your fellow Wikipedians decided to issue the one-way IBAN.
> Also: I was not doing any editing of Brisbane categories
OK, that was not quite right. What happened was: BHG relisted a bunch of small categories for Australian city suburbs (starting with Brisbane), then you commented with unhelpful snark on several of them, and then deleted all your commentary minutes later: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Categor...
That's a classic tactic for needling someone watching the page, then playing innocent afterwards, as I'm sure you know. Bonus points for referring to her as "the nominator" rather than by name, for a further level of deniability.
> I can assure you, I was not doing the instigating
Per Beeblebrox: https://wikipediocracy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=11595&p...
"AAW was actually doing good, quiet work for some time. Then he decided to let the committee know that it was him and he was doing a "clean start" and of course our only option was to inform him that he was not qualified for a clean start because of the interaction ban with BHG."
"And then he did the only thing he was not allowed to do, and did it like six times in a row on several different pages (and there was a seventh time that nobody had noticed on his user page like a week earlier). I don't think there's any coming back from that, and ArbCom has taken over the block"
If you had simply not interacted with BHG after coming back, until the point that she was finally banned, you'd still be editing today. Instead, you got perma'd for violating your IBAN with impunity. And honestly, would you really want to have your IBAN reviewed, maybe even removed... for what? So that you could go back to needling her, and having her bully you right back? WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO DO THAT? IT'S VERY CLEAR NO GOOD COULD EVER COME OF THAT.
> I have not edited Wikipedia since I was banned.
I never said you did. I was explaining to the other HN user how Wikipedians know that banned users have come back under a sockpuppet. Essentially, it is very obvious when the banned users come back and start doing the same things they were banned for, which decloaks them.
Also I don't think it's necessary to call people names.
Citation needed.
I did find some of the vandals, and became good friends with a few. Some of what they write is side splitting humor, but also the alt-right has an amazing amount of power they are using to rewrite history.
I would never give them a thin dime.