Talk:Requests for comment/2013 issues on Croatian Wikipedia/Evidence/Archive 4

Archives

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1, 2, 3, 4, 5

New development!

This morning, Frano Milić started a vote to de-sysop SpeedyGonsales, Kubura and Zeljko. But, SpeedyGonsales locked the voting page! There is a heated debate in community portal and I see a lot of pressure to stop the vote from some admins that haven't been mentioned in previous complaints. I believe we should keep this line open, since we are in the middle of something big and we shouldn't stop gathering evidence in the middle of it.

Could we just close the evidenca gathering for missuses before let's say October 15, and keep the door open for recent developments? --Argo Navis (talk) 12:32, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Thankfully Sokac unblocked the page in 3 minutes.

I agree that evidence gathering on irregularities on hr.wiki suffers from an overabundance of data, but I don't think we should limit the time period to one so short. If there should be a limit on how old is too old, IMO it should go back to 2009-2010, the time of the ArbCom disaster and of issues discussed in the 2010 RfC. But there are circumstantial bits that go back much further and belong, if not in direct evidence, in discussion about it. GregorB found an old quote that legitimizes tag teaming, and I've run into this -- not evidence of mistreatment, but surely grounds to question this person's objectivity about practically anything. Miranche (talk) 17:36, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Recent Speedy's actions are nail in his wiki coffin. A steward perhaps can help. -- Bojan  Talk  15:25, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Let's keep an eye on what happens next in the hr wiki voting. If the three admins in question do get desysopped, I guess we might as well wind this down and end it by 15 Nov, if not sooner (perhaps focusing more on the content and possibly other admins).

My guess is that the three in question won't go quietly into the night. I'd like to see this handled by hr wiki, but other solutions may be necessary. Let's see what happens, and watch for obstructions. GregorB (talk) 17:49, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

I think you're right that they won't go easily. Also, since it took so long for something to even start happening on hr.wiki, and since we don't know how far it will go, I think it's good to have this evidence trail regardless of the new developments. I agree we should keep these pages open until Nov 15 at the earliest, and perhaps revisit a possible extension a few days before then.

There are a couple more issues regarding the structure of these pages I'm bringing up in a separate section. Miranche (talk) 18:48, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Right now there are attempts to stop the vote. GregorB (talk) 12:06, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

The vote is still going on, but sitenotice shows it crossed out. Miranche (talk) 16:56, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

Should now Jimbo and WMF step in? -- Bojan  Talk  12:48, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

What is happening right now is "Plan A" we have been talking about. I was not an optimist when I talked about it and I'm not much of an optimist now. Jimbo/WMF involvement is definitely an option, but let's see what happens. As I said: they won't go quietly into the night, and they're not dumb either. GregorB (talk) 14:30, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

If there's a way to do so, I think that's a YES. Miranche (talk) 14:24, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

The vote was not stopped outright, so I believe the current strategy is to declare it invalid. Since at this point its outcome would be adverse for the admins in question (2/3 supermajority against them), they probably see it as the only way out. I wouldn't recommend it though, because if the vote gets "annulled", Jimbo and/or WMF will find out, and heads are going to roll. It might end not just in desysopping, but possibly indef bans. They are in a sticky situation. GregorB (talk) 19:53, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

Site notice has been removed now, but the vote was not stopped. There may be off-wiki lobbying now, which is not how it's supposed to work. GregorB (talk) 08:09, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

If the vote is successful, stewards will have to be the ones who remove admin, crat, and/or CU rights; bureaucrats cannot do that on hr.wikipedia. So stewards will be performing the final check as long as anyone makes the request. --Rschen7754 08:38, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

This changes things considerably. I was afraid of the scenario in which a there is a successful desysopping vote, with the bureaucrats refusing to implement it. So if I understand correctly, hr wiki bureaucrats can grant, but not take away admin rights?

BTW the site notice has been restored (in a somewhat more neutral form too). GregorB (talk) 08:52, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

See hr:Special:ListGroupRights. Sometimes the stewards will wait to hear from local bureaucrats, but in a situation like this it might be ignored. I have also brought up the issue about the warring over the sitenotice at SN; technically that is a wheel war as it is a MediaWiki: space edit, but I don't know if stewards would do anything as it's not like they were warring over the block button. --Rschen7754 08:57, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

The plot thickens: Vodomar invents new eligibility rules on the spot. This is a serious offense.[1] GregorB (talk) 13:33, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

I suspect the rule was created to exclude SveroH, who is "ineligible" and thus crossed out despite having a total of 7600 edits.[2] GregorB (talk) 13:37, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

Also, Vodomar made Ljubuski78 eligible for the voting, despite fact Ljubuski registered less then a month ago, so he has ho right to vote. Mistake? Not, his name was already strikethroughed. -- Bojan  Talk  14:08, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

Vodomar crossed out a number of votes claiming "canvassing",[3] despite the fact the hr wiki AFAIK does not have an anti-canvassing guideline, and that hr wiki voting rules do not say anything about it. GregorB (talk) 14:19, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

Croq now launches this. With some strings attached.[4] GregorB (talk) 18:37, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

User Croq has started to vote only as against stroke everyone who voted to remove administrator privileges to the following users: SpeedyGonsales, Kubura and Zeljko. Croq does not know how to restore their rights some administrators. --Kolega2357 (talk) 19:30, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

One more critic is silenced [5] Shall we open new sections on Vodomar and Bracodbk? -- Bojan  Talk  23:51, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

I may try talking to Vodomar, but by all means, please go ahead and do whatever you think is appropriate. Miranche (talk) 04:01, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

hr.wiki mirror & aggregate data

Two observations + suggestions regarding tweaks to the basic structure of these pages

1. I'm actually quite glad hr.wiki mirrored this page, and I think we should give some prominence to that.

   Suggestion: integrate hr.wiki mirror pages into these pages:

   1. move Kubura's "This is local wiki issue" sections, along with discussions, to this talk page;
   2. provide prominent links to the hr.wiki mirror pages in the lead section (greenish background) of each evidence page;
   3. regularly (1-2/week) copy all new discussion from the mirror pages over to these pages, with a note "copied from hr.wiki mirror".

2. There's aggregate data that reaches beyond any separate incident, indicating how skewed the situation is on hr.wiki. As far as conduct goes, Bojan provided an insightful analysis of how often people are blocked on hr.wiki compared to sr.wiki; as far as content goes, one look at the article counts in subcategories of the category on WW2 crimes in ex-Yu is enough to notice things are badly off. This data is "harder" than what goes under "Unsorted submissions" but doesn't concern specific incidents & pages as current entries under "Sorted submissions".

   Suggestion: Open "Sorted submissions" to submissions related to aggregate data. Distinguish aggregate data e.g. by including "(multiple articles)" or "(multiple admins)" in the subsection title. Require explicit links to pages, searches, or statistics that reflect the data.

Miranche (talk) 03:48, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

If there are no objections I'll start working on this in a day or two. Miranche (talk) 22:24, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

No objection. The additions may prove useful. Sorry for ignoring this, I got engrossed a bit by recent events in hr wiki. GregorB (talk)

Understandably so :D. Thank you! Miranche (talk) 16:22, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Btw I doubt BokicaK & Kubura will continue their discussion in section 7 (which I successfully suppressed an urge to mediate), and I also doubt Aradic-es will respond my piece of mind in section 10 or Gregor's in section 13. If there are no objections I'll archive sections 2 through 14 on Friday. Miranche (talk) 23:24, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

October 28 desysopping vote by Croq

(Archived from the Conduct talk page. Miranche (talk) 22:56, 21 January 2014 (UTC))

Croq has started a vote to desysop some admins (Lasta, Dalibor Bosits, Mario Žamić, Saxum and MayaSimFan) who supported desysopping of SpeedyGonsales, Kubura and Zeljko. He probably did it to avenge his "team members". He also didn't warn those admins that he started this vote, so I did it. --31.147.19.122 09:45, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

The user Croq here works for himself, but has a protection some administrators. --Kolega2357 (talk) 13:25, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

This is probably done to invalidate the first vote, to desysop User:Zeljko, User:Kubura and User:SpeedyGonsales. Since apparently hrwiki has no firm rules on desysoping, closure of the first vote as having the positive outcome, and subsequently leading to the demotion of the trio will then be construed as "hypocritical" unless it simultaneously leads to the demotion of the other five sysops. Then they can all fit it in some nutty conspiracy theory of commies and Serbs plotting to take control of the imagined sovereignty of hrwiki... This would all be avoidable if hrwiki had a rule that all of the sysops have to be reelected every year with e.g. two-thirds majority - there would be no issues with inactive accounts (would not get elected), and long-term abuse. At any case, I'd advise the community not to ignore the second vote, because I don't think it was started in revenge - User:Croq was probably instructed to do so by User:SpeedyGonsales after his initial attempt to close the first vote failed. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 10:19, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

It is true that some administrators play in the conspiracy theory that the victims Yugocommunists conspiracy. Nobody does not believes these 3. administrators: SpeedyGonsales, Kubura and Zeljko.

They are much much make damage on Croatian Wikipedia. Administrators of Croatian Wikipedia does not accept criticism of their work because everyone block for no reason but of course that these new users. --Kolega2357 (talk) 10:31, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Any objections to moving this discussion to the talk page? It'd be helpful if we could keep the evidence page to evidence submissions. Thank you! Miranche (talk) 18:11, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Questions from non-Croatian former Wikipedian -- 1. Were blocked users free to vote? 2. What about users whose edit count did not reach the required number because blocks were preventing them from editing? 50.129.98.71 03:54, 14 November 2013 (UTC)

No on both. Miranche (talk) 06:50, 14 November 2013 (UTC)

Indeed, "no" on both. Two remarks here:

1. While I normally wouldn't expect blocked users to vote (that's the point of being blocked), since the recall proposal is about the abuse of admin privileges, the absence of blocked editors distorts the outcome.
2. What possibly distorts the outcome even more is the fact that some editors have left the hr wiki and are simply not coming back. They feel they've had enough of the stress. And I know, this happens everywhere, but hr wiki is an exception in that, when one hears the complaints of such editors, it's always the same group of admins. GregorB (talk) 10:08, 14 November 2013 (UTC)

Counter-proposal

hr:Wikipedija:Administratori/Prijedlozi za ukidanje ovlasti/Lasta, Dalibor Bosits, Mario Žamić, Saxum i MayaSimFan

Should we worry about this? It's 3-0 in favor at the moment. Defeating the proposal outright would be the cleanest solution; arguing that the proposal itself is irregular might prove tricky, even if those irregularities are quite blatant, such as:

1. Absence of any meaningful prior discussion
2. Rather apparent punitive nature of the proposal
3. Failure to provide a site notice invitation (unlike any other previous vote of the same kind)
4. Invention of new voting eligibility criteria on the spot

What - if anything - would be the best course of action? GregorB (talk) 16:30, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

IMO #4 is enough to render the entire exercise a sham. The new voting criteria have been demonstrably invented by a partisan to the first vote and do not seem to be rooted in any prior discussion in the community. Also, #1-#2 means the vote almost certainly violates WP:POINT, #3 means there is no proper notification, and #4 arguably violates WP:BITE as it reinforces the absurd hr.wiki seniority norms which regularly seem to get voiced instead of actual counterarguments to chase off critical newbies. So at best it is a consultative vote of established editors. Although I may change my mind, personally I'm ignoring it as long as the eligibility rules are in place because I think they render the vote demonstrably illegitimate. But I am partisan, and it would be good to get an opinion from someone uninvolved. Rschen7754?. Miranche (talk) 16:59, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Don't feed the trolls...It's sooo obvious. I mean, soooooooooo obvious what it is. Kubura probably lost it and then, in a moment of fury, ordered his pal Croq to take revenge on all the admins that voted against Kubura. "Take that! Now I've showed you!" This brings back memories from kindergarten...

Let's take a quick analysis: the de-sysop vote was hastly copy-pasted from the first one involving Kubura and the other two admins. The evidence? When Croq realized that the five admins had Zero complains on meta, he quickly changed the reason for de-sysoping from "Due to long-term complains" to "Due to inactivity on Wikipedia". Really? Mario Žamić and Saxum just recently became admins, two weeks ago. Wow, I wonder how they managed to be so inactive for so long in just two weeks? I guess if you go on vacation for a couple of days, you are already out according to Croq?

Maya was active all year [6] while Dalibor is more active now, in 2013 than he was in 2012 [7], but, imagine that, there was no de-sysop vote against him in 2012. Strange, 'ey?

But at least you can see the fundamental difference between the three and the five admins: Maya, Dalibor and co. never went on to stop the vote or to ask all the admins to vote if the vote is legal or to panic and insult anyone. That's dignity.--Seiya (talk) 17:53, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

All good points, Seiya. They are doing the right thing by ignoring it - the vote is clearly invalid. I'd say that #4 is the strongest argument. Since the text in effect instructs otherwise eligible editors not to vote, contrary to established rules, the outcome is necessarily tainted, and is therefore null and void. The bizarre reason ("inactivity") doesn't help its cause either. GregorB (talk) 18:01, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

#3 and #4 are eliminated now: the new rules are gone, and SG added the invitation to the second discussion to the site notice. I have a feeling they have been following this discussion and adjusted their strategy accordingly. (Yeah, I suppose we have to be stupid, because we work and discuss in the open.) However, I also have a feeling this is not going to help them. GregorB (talk) 20:53, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Yup. However, what these five admins stand accused of is, as of yet, both unsupportable as a reason for desysoping and unsupported by evidence. I expect that the next step in this farce may be an attempt to drum up such evidence. Miranche (talk) 04:46, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Unfortunately, "unsupported by evidence" - as true as it is - is not a rock-solid refutation here. This is essentially a vote of confidence, where proposing editors may list their reasons for starting the vote, but voters may vote for or against for entirely different reasons (same as any wiki vote, actually), or no reason at all (hr wiki allows this). There are cleaner ways out. And judging by the recent goings-on (page reset by Croq), your hunch seems to be spot-on. There is going to be a "regular" vote on this. GregorB (talk) 07:33, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I forgot to say the most important thing: that is not going to help them either. The more regular this vote is, the less chance it has of succeeding. GregorB (talk) 07:40, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Whatever is done, the proposer has to be able to sell it to the stewards who may know little about the situation and who are concerned about getting a true and fair representation of consensus. I haven't looked into any of the claims myself and doubt that I will have time to; however, I did see the sitenotice warring, and that by itself is bad in my opinion. But I don't think stewards are going to act on it as compared to warring with the block button, it's relatively minor. --Rschen7754 09:48, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for your comment. The rubber meets the road with stewards, which is unfortunate because they are both unfamiliar with the situation and (if I'm not mistaken) unable to understand Croatian. Each side in this dispute will attempt to prove one vote is valid while the other is not, and things might get very messy.

Personally, while I can't wait to see the arguments why the first vote would be invalid, while the second one would not, proving the opposite may be difficult too. While I said it was OK to ignore the second vote, I'm not so sure now, and I hope the people in question know what they're doing.

I saw Croq's blanking edit to the second voting page in the morning, but now it is gone. Was it oversighted? This needs to be checked. GregorB (talk) 11:13, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

You have no local oversighters, and there was nothing in Special:Log/rights about stewards using oversight on hrwiki. Thus, it had to be revision deleted. --Rschen7754 17:54, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

That's correct. It had to be revision deleted, and it had to be an admin. However, this log is also only visible to admins. I'd like to see this investigated - this morning it looked like ordinary section blanking, which is not a valid reason for revision deletion. However, blanking of votes is a serious offense, so I suspect the only reason for revision deletion was to protect the perpetrator. Miranche (or anyone?), could you post this question (who deleted the revision this morning, and why) in Kafić? (I can't, it is locked for IPs.) The answer, if I understand correctly, should be here: hr:Posebno:Brisanje izmjene. GregorB (talk) 18:42, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Certainly, but I'd like to know more details about what happened, ie. which section/sections Croq blanked out and about when, etc. I figure the best way to avoid me serving as the communication bottleneck is if you can compose a question on my talk page here or on hr.wiki and I can post it in Kafić. Thanks. Miranche (talk) 23:16, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Croq put the "criteria" back in... Miranche (talk) 23:59, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Good grief... Anyway, I'm really reluctant about sticking your neck out about something you're not familiar with (even my resource is rather unreliable: my memory, which tells me Croq deleted all the votes and other content, but kept the section headers). It is not really proper. I'm rather busy today IRL, though, so I'll get back to you in the evening. GregorB (talk) 07:54, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, I've been sticking my neck out quite a bit so this is relatively minor, and I don't think it would entail saying anything that would get me blocked. But you could also ask directly one of the less compromised admins to look up the info for you. Miranche (talk) 18:34, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, I was planning to do that, but I'd like to keep it simple. "GregorB" is already taken there but I think I should be able to usurp it - in the meantime (in fact, very shortly) I'll register there as GregorB2 and post the question. GregorB (talk) 19:18, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Had it checked, no foul play involved - I might have taken a look at a wrong page, there were three voting pages at one point. GregorB (talk) 23:43, 2 November 2013 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────┘
Yes, well, it's easy to jump the gun under high pressure like this.

Unrelated, the versions of these pages at hr.wiki are probably less confusingly called "fork" than "mirror" (and I've been having an exchange with Joy about them here). But how to say "fork" in this context in Croatian? In software development it's just the same, "fork". Miranche (talk) 04:09, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Manipulating with first edits for increasing number of votes

(Archived from the Conduct talk page. Miranche (talk) 22:56, 21 January 2014 (UTC))

I'm 100% sure that first edit by User:Nesmir Kudilovic occurred at September 16, but last night his first edit was changed to February 7 so according to the voting rules which demands at least two months of activity, user got right to vote. Of course, he voted against desysopping of disputed administrators. --Orijentolog (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

• This was his first edit, originally from September 16 or shortly after criticism in media. Now, edit date has changed to June 25. Kubura's answer has also been changed to June 26, he's speaking about media issues three months before it started. We should ask User:Joy about it, he has replied to Kudulovic's accusation above shortly after (September), but his edit has also been moved to July 31. --Orijentolog (talk) 07:53, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

I fail to see what you're saying here. My complaint about the Nesmir Kudilovic slandering me has indeed happened in late July 2013. Why are you saying this happened in September? --Joy (talk) 13:41, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps you forgot the precise date, it's confusing that since yesterday some comments related to media campaign are dated three months before it even started. --Orijentolog (talk) 14:42, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Sadly, no. I was alerted to the abuse (which had nothing to do with the media campaign) by an e-mail from someone called "Kolega 2357". Likewise, someone called "Orijentolog" sent me e-mails alerting me to this, too. I have no idea what you all are up to, but I don't like it. --Joy (talk) 22:16, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

• I'm also sure that User:Flopy remembers he made this redirect on the same day (October 10) as Kudilovic made this one (date changed to July 27). Here's printscreen of all manipulated edits. --Orijentolog (talk) 08:09, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

• Another example: from evidence of new users you can see all of them got bot generated "welcome" in matter of 24 hours after first edit. However, after manipulations by account User:Nesmir Kudilovic difference is almost five months. --Orijentolog (talk) 08:38, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Great Scott, he leaped back in time!

Great observation, Orijentolog. There is definitely something wrong when Kubura is talking about the media campaign three months before it started, however, we need more to clarify this. Honestly, I am confused. I still remember that Nesmir called SH Wikipedia "SHit Wikipedia", but I do not know exactly when: according to SH Wikipedia's own record, I sent you this message on the 25 June. --Seiya (talk) 11:18, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Internet Archive has a capture^[8] of that talk page dated to March 11th this year, where User:Nesmir Kudilovic made the disputed edit timestamped to February. So that that edit alone is probably not a manipulation/glitch in the Matrix... BTW he's a new sock of our old pal User:Bugoslav/Imbris ;) --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 11:54, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Don't forget Goran. :) Seiya, something is very confusing here, I can not remember user name from your June message. --Orijentolog (talk) 12:31, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

BTW, voting has been stopped once again. --Orijentolog (talk) 13:00, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Nobody of the users can be sure to confirm that the user Nesmir Kudilovic it is someone sockpuppet. Nesmir Kudilovic of his first changes was suspicious user, all this is true that the manipulator, provocative acts with all. --Kolega2357 (talk) 13:48, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

@I.Š. Wayback Machine isn't reliable tool for this case, we need stronger proof. @Kolega2357, his behaviour isn't issue here, neither is one vote, real issue is possible misusing tools for fabricating various contributions. --Orijentolog (talk) 14:19, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

I've reviewed the issue in question, and: a) I don't see any proof of tampering with the edits, b) to the best of my knowledge, while admins can delete revisions (I suspect this has actually happened yesterday in the voting subpage), there is no way of changing the content of revisions and its metadata. Even if such a thing were possible, this would require multiple alterations: e.g. NK's edit was C&P-archived by Kubura on 1 July,[9] which is fully consistent with the timeline presented in the talk page content. GregorB (talk) 15:10, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Any objections to moving this discussion to the talk page? It'd be helpful if we could keep the evidence page to evidence submissions. Thank you! Miranche (talk) 18:11, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Nope, move it. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 20:07, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Jutarnji list taking note

http://www.jutarnji.hr/sramotna-hrvatska-wikipedia-zadrzala-pro-fasisticke-admine-ekstremni-desnicari-zadrzali-/1137207/ GregorB (talk) 16:50, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Like nothing happened

(Archived from the Conduct talk page. Miranche (talk) 22:56, 21 January 2014 (UTC))

Croq (same guy who said that anti-fascism is a mental disorder) has made article on Hate groups and put those who dare to criticize Croatian Wikipedia on same level with KKK. I mean, WTF?! -- Bojan  Talk  10:29, 4 November 2013 (UTC)

Croq has just been banned for sockpuppeting. More on that in the main page. GregorB (talk) 09:13, 14 November 2013 (UTC)

First aid

Language tabs on the en.wiktionary for the word "jam"

Until the situation on CW settles down, it would be desirable to provide our readers, if not objective information about contentious issues, then at least the diversity of views on these issues.

This could be done by the use solution applied on en.wiktionary, as shown. I am talking about the simultaneous display tabs that link to the article on the Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian and Serbo-Croatian wikipedia. As en.wiki says: Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian are mutually intelligible and separate languages only for political reasons“.

It will provide us with more time to peacefully come up with better and more permanent solution. Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf (talk) 23:44, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

Actually, Croatian and Serbian are different more than Hindi and Urdu, and due to similarity and one state in which Croatians and Serbians lived during 1918-1990 (Kingdom Yugoslavia till 1939, SFR Yugoslavia till 1990) there were some chance of unification of this two languages, but that slim chance was destroyed by political difficulties in these states which were not democratic, not first as 6 January 1929 Dictatorship showed real face of first Yugoslavia, and 2nd Yugoslavia, totalitarian communist regime had maybe even more chance to unite languages as state had more control of its citizens, but even Miroslav Krleža, maybe greatest Croatian author of 20th century and communist, personal Tito's friend in 1967 opposed forced unity of two languages, and hence 5 years later status of Croatian language entered also in Constitution Amendments.

In short, Croatian and Serbian are partly mutually intelligible, and therefore were political ideas to unite them - which failed miserably. SpeedyGonsales (talk) 23:06, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

There is virtually zero chance hr wiki is going to accept this. Also, I've come to believe - newspaper articles notwithstanding - that hr wiki's true problem is personal conduct of just a handful of people, rather than content. (The content is actually not that bad across the board, save for a limited number of extremely problematic articles.) Unfortunately, there are no easy solutions here... GregorB (talk) 13:21, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

There is virtually zero chance either hr, sr or bs would accept this. Croatia renamed name of its mothers language in schools and universities faster then Serbia, but also Serbia removed Serbocroatian or Serbo-croatian from its schools and universities eventually. They did that not out of spite, but because linguists argued there is a reason to do so. BiH just earned its language and is currently in process of strong vitalization of its national interests, so I presume that linguists in BiH would strongly oppose against some new unification with either Croatian or Serbian language. Personal conduct? Yes, I see problem with personal conduct of users when users are talking about something without any real proof, just using pressure and hoping that truth will not show eventually. SpeedyGonsales (talk) 23:20, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

This could be carried out on any of four Serbo-Croatian wikipedias, preferably on sh.wiki.

The root cause of the problem of personal conduct on the hr.wiki is this: three parallel wikipedias founded as a national project.

I am pretty sure that WMF would never tollerate parallel projects in languages spoken by large number of speakers, i.e. British, American and Australian wikipedias, or Austrian and German, or Spanish/Mexican/Argentinian etc.

Now we have four wikipedias in the same language promoted by three nation-based (or nationalist-oriented) groups, and one group of language-oriented editors (sh.wiki).

Even if you manage to dismiss the present cabal of admins on hr.wiki, it is reasonable to expect that on their places would come some slightly less nationalist-oriented and slightly less authoritarian admins.

I know, it sounds pretty pathetic, but: the seed of the current events on the hr.wiki was sown on the day the WMF allowed three nationalist spin-offs from sh.wiki. Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf (talk) 22:43, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

To be quite honest, the worst moment I had during the recent hr wiki admin recall vote was not when I saw the proposal was defeated (I had some hopes for it, but I was not too optimistic beforehand) - it was when I had a strange suspicion that it's simply useless, even if succeeds, as things would continue in more or less the same vein, only with slightly different people in charge. Of course, this view is too simplified: just because it is not possible to instantly fix all problems doesn't mean one should simply give up.

I think unified "central-south Slavic" wiki is unworkable, though. I don't think that e.g. hr wiki is inherently nationalist: it will get nationalist when pretty much everyone else is driven out, as is the case at the moment. GregorB (talk) 09:34, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Fused display of content

I share your opinion that the biggest problem is not the misconduct of cabal of admins, but the silent majority of two dozen other admins who tolerate and thus enable their misconduct.

I'm not suggesting any real fusion of four wikipedias or consolidation of four wikicommunities into one, but simply fused display of content. My thoughts on this type of display began when I discovered that there is an article on raspberries on the hr.wiki and an article on blackberries on the sr.wiki (i.e., no article on blackberries on hr.wiki and no article on raspberries on sr.wiki :) ).

IMHO, fused display of content from four wikipedias would not hurt anyone's feelings (even national ones :D ). Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf (talk) 10:41, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

The "silent majority of two dozen other admins" - glad that you've mentioned it... Again, things are a bit more complicated than that: in hr wiki, there is institutionally no way to discipline an admin or override his or her decision. (There was a way, with ArbCom, but it was eventually sabotaged.) So what we have is status quo. Note that if the silent majority of admins misbehaved, there would be nothing substantial the cabal could have done about it either: if you're an admin, you're essentially immune, as simple as that. And no use of speaking up - everything has been ignored thus far, exactly for the same reason: I'm an admin, I can do what I want. The system is broken and it needs to be reset - if you ask me, that's what comes next. GregorB (talk) 12:42, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

We had Wikipedija:Zahtjev_za_mišljenje_administratora, and we still have it. Real problem is when some administrator, or group of administrators are misbehaving, ignoring majority of administrators expressed opinion (which happened). Majority of users are peaceful, and dislike decisions like longterm or permanent blocks for any reason, or removal of status for no reason, but sheer (not existing) majority. That sometimes can be seen as problem, sometimes as solution. Wikipedia is not an experiment in democracy, or at least should not be, but any opinion substantiated with quality arguments is welcome on Croatian Wikipedia. SpeedyGonsales (talk) 23:32, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

WP:ZM is not binding. (Quote: Mišljenje administratora ne obvezuje članove da postupe shodno njemu.) So, what if an editor complained against an admin, and the conclusion of WP:ZM were that the admin in question should receive a ban? Well, nothing: 1) this is not a decision but rather a piece of advice that can be safely ignored by everyone, as it is not binding, and 2) hr wiki admins can't be banned under any circumstances anyway. It is clear that this doesn't do wonders for accountability. Now, that is the real problem. GregorB (talk) 18:13, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

Rules, roles, structure & outcome

If you deconstruct (restart) the hr.wiki and then you rebuild it of the same elements and with the same structure, in a year or two you will have the same situation as today. At least, some rules should be changed: as in the RL, admins should be elected/reelected for a term. Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf (talk) 12:02, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

You're absolutely right: reset is useless if everything continues in the same way as before. Some anti-status quo provisions (described in Project restarting process): 1) upon reset, all non-expired bans become void, 2) upon reset, all admin, bureaucrat, and CU privileges are revoked, 3) no admin elections at least 3 months after the reset, no CU elections at least 6 (or 12?) months after the reset, 4) admins need 2/3 of the votes to get elected, CUs need 70%. (These are just the most important points - I hope to expand the existing proposal along these lines soon...)

The limited term is also a good idea: whoever becomes an admin (at least in the first year after the reset?) has a 12-month term and needs a 2/3 approval to keep his or her admin status after that.

However, even all this is by itself not enough. Hr wiki needs a body such as this: 1) all administrators are its members (by default), 2) this is the "court of last appeal" for conflict resolution and conduct issues, including bans, 3) its decisions are binding, 4) admins (i.e. its members) can be disciplined too (up to and including bans; perhaps even desysopping). (It may (or may not?) be wise to allow the community to override any decision of such body with a 2/3 supermajority vote.) Okay, in effect this is the ArbCom: the only difference is that it avoids the error of being a more narrow body than that of the administrators, which was the mistake of hr wiki - such bodies are then invariably torn apart by power struggles involving non-member admins.

While I have at least some faith in the project reset, unfortunately I don't have too much faith in the necessary restructuring of hr wiki. The former will come from the outside, while the latter will have to come from the inside. Do they understand the necessity of it all? GregorB (talk) 16:22, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

It is really interesting to watch two users from other projects discussing what to do with third project. If you want to help some project come and edit articles on that project, and stop wikilawyering somewhere else - which seems to me to be the case here. SpeedyGonsales (talk) 23:37, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

Everybody is happy with the status quo

Internal restructuring of hr.wiki has been completed several years ago by relocation of rebellious editors to the sh.wiki. Now we have steady state that can last forever: nationalists/conservatives editing (i.e. promote their POV-s) on the bs., hr., sr.wiki, and libertarians editing on the sh.wiki.

Yesterday I made an experiment: on Pijaca (sh.wiki Village pump) [[10]] I proposed the fused display of content from four wikis in Serbo-Croatian language. As I expected, no reactions so far :) . Everybody is happy with the current status quo.

We should also have to consider the option that Google puts sh.wiki at the top of search results instead hr. or sr.wiki. At least, this would make their biased POV-s less visible (and less embarassing for the Wiki-movement in general). Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf (talk) 10:53, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

What about your POV bias? You will tell Google that hr or sr wikipedia are biased, and sh wikipedia is better? And substantiate that with what? Your word? SpeedyGonsales (talk) 23:41, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

Improved googling for 4 Serbo-Croatian wikipedias

Good point. For any search on any variant of Serbo-Croatian language the Google should display results from all four of wikipedias, and prioritize them so that the most recent article is on the top. Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf (talk) 11:28, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

Extension or finish?

I'd like to keep the submissions open for at least another week, possibly two. This is primarily because there is info I'd like to add personally and haven't got around to because of obligations on planet Earth. I see there are still some submissions trickling in, so this may be prudent anyway. Thoughts? Miranche (talk) 07:00, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

Same situation here: even if the submission deadline(s) seemed generous at first, the sheer volume of content, hr wiki admin recall drama of late Oct/early Nov, as well as RL pressures, made the task of keeping up with everything very hard. (I'm rather wiki-exhausted and RL-exhausted now, which is not easily achieved - e.g. a month with 500 edits is normally a very slow month for me.)

Anyway, since I'm quite far from finishing what I had in mind (both creating and evaluating submissions), I'd like to see this extended to Nov 30. I see no major reason not to. GregorB (talk) 11:13, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

OK, so if no objections come in during the next few hours I'll go ahead and extend to Nov 30. Miranche (talk) 16:34, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

GregorB, did you get a chance to add the submissions you wanted? I'm just getting to it now, and assuming we're working on UTC, I'd like to suggest a 36 hour extension -- until 12:00 UTC / 13:00 CET on Monday 2 December. This would extend the process until the end of the weekend in all the world's timezones. Miranche (talk) 22:58, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

Well, "wanted" is a funny word in this context: I'm rather exhausted by the whole thing now, and I had a rather busy two weeks in RL. I might still add a thing or two, but I'd say there's nothing major missing. I'm fine with the extension. GregorB (talk) 23:15, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. I was referring to your mention that you were far from finishing what you've had in mind -- but I understand that in terms of what one may wish to include in these pages they are a bottomless pit. Miranche (talk) 23:54, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

Done?

I am done, mostly on the Content page, and Argo Navis had some important last minute additions to the Conduct page.

If noone requests an extension, the first order of business is to change the notice. I gather we're still taking comments -- for how long? till end of December? Miranche (talk) 10:30, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

What about Evidence/Conduct#Unsorted submissions - Nerazvrstani podnesci? --Argo Navis (talk) 15:52, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Good question, any suggestions? I would like to see them turned into "razvrstani" and I did so with a few that were (almost) in the right format, but it's a prohibitive amount of work. Miranche (talk) 18:40, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

I would extend it for a day or two. It doesn't. have to be in the perfectly right format, we just need to add a link here and there. I'm hoping that Wikimedia or stewarts might find someone neutral (maybe Wikimedia employee or associate) who speaks or at. least can read croatian, and can investigate things beyond what is translated here. That's why even badly formated sections are ok. They are a good start. And, You can always ignore it if it proves useless. --Argo Navis (talk) 21:30, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Ok. Would you like to suggest how long? Alternatively, we can change the notice and say that the collection is ongoing pending discussion on the talk page.

The two things on my wish list I haven't done yet, that I would like to get to, are (a) enter links to relevant Fb posts into the Unsorted section, and (b) link to (in the Unsorted section) or copy over (in the sorted section) the remaining discussion (in other words, Kubura's monologues) from the forked pages. But RL obligations mean it'll be difficult for me to work on this before Dec 15. Miranche (talk) 22:41, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Changed notice -- info gathering ongoing, closure pending this discussion. Miranche (talk) 05:17, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

End result

(Archived from the Conduct talk page. Miranche (talk) 22:56, 21 January 2014 (UTC))

The end result of abuse on Wikipedia by conduct is this:

1. SpeedyGonsales and Kubura are tied with 13 incidents and share the infamous first place (Kubura would have been the champion hadn't some users managed to justify his 14th incident regarding CrnoGlav)
2. Zeljko has 7 incidents listed (scroll down to include block of BokicaK, as well)
3. Ex13 has 3 incidents listed (including trying to stop the vote to de-sysop 3 admins)
4. Roberta F and MaGa have 2 incidents listed

There is probably more, but this sample should be enough to warrant review of conduct.--Seiya (talk) 14:03, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

I agree, Seiya. Argo Navis has suggested here to keep data collection going for a few more days, but we should see if it's possible to get some kind of action started on the data that's already submitted. Miranche (talk) 22:45, 3 December 2013 (UTC)