Requests for comment/Global ban for Kubura
The following request for comments is closed. The request for comment has been resolved by enacting a global ban.
Request for comment/Global ban for Kubura
About
As many of you may know by now, my name is MJL.
This is my second global ban RFC, and I seriously spent several hours compiling, drafting, and reviewing this report. The levels of poor-faith disruption from this single user ascends everything I have ever seen on Wikipedia entirely, so I am merely going to scratch the surface here. Make no mistake though; this disruption is blatant, systematic, and severe.
Major recognition deserves to go to the team of editors who helped draft what you see today. This would not have gotten done without their support.
Credits
The following users contributed to this report:
- MJL, lead coordinator.
- Translation help and feedback:
- Srđan
- GregorB
- ImJustThere
- Other anonymous users
- Blablubbs, coordination assistance.
- DraconicDark, administrative support.
Criteria confirmation
- The user demonstrates an ongoing pattern of cross-wiki abuse that is not merely vandalism or spam.
- Not vandalism: Aye
- Nor spam: Aye
- The user has been carefully informed about appropriate participation in the projects and has had fair opportunity to rectify any problems.
- Warnings from admins: Countless.
- Time given to change: 10 years.
- The user is indefinitely blocked or banned on two or more projects.
- English Wiktionary: Check 1
- Wikidata: Check 2
- Meta Wikimedia: Check 3
History
- Kubura (talk • contribs • block • xwiki-contribs • xwiki-date (alt) • CA • gblock • ST • lwcheckuser)
Kubura2 (talk • contribs • block • xwiki-contribs • xwiki-date (alt) • CA • gblock • ST • lwcheckuser)
I. Opening statement
Kubura is a long time POV pusher, problematic Croatian Wikipedia admin, and cross-wiki sockpuppeteer. His abuse on several of our projects is both pervasive and systematic, yet nothing has been done to prevent this major project-level disruption. I intend to illustrate, that without any doubt, the only effective way to deal with Kubura is to implement global ban against him.
Other options were critically contemplated in the drafting steps for this RFC. However, the evidence against Kubura was simply so severe, so unbelievably overwhelming, I would not feel comfortable moving forward with anything less than a complete ban for someone who consistently causes irreparable harm to the Wikimedia movement.
II. Early edits
With his first edit being on 29 June 2005, Kubura has been a fixture of hrwiki for more than 15 years now. In just his 14th edit on Wikipedia, he already began inserting the phrase "Greater Serbian forces" into the article on Bosnia and Herzegovina.[1] Bear in mind, this was not an isolated edit; Kubura followed this up several times. While he would make these kinds of edits variously throughout the years; the most notable one worth sharing right now is when Kubura wrote that following the dissolution of the Yugoslavian Army, Serbs turned to crime and terrorized Croats (to implicitly justify the oppression against them by the Independent State of Croatia).[2]
Still despite protests from users like Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf for being too nationalistic, Kubura was made an admin on 25 September 2009.
On another note, Kubura once tried adding Sexual disorders to the article on "Same-sex sexuality". His edit was reverted twice, however.[3] That of course did not stop him from making this edit nearly a year later though.
III. Defense of the Krk airport
Due to the 2013 controversy, an abundance of evidence was compiled against Kubura and other admins. It is thanks to that effort I can definitely state that Kubura wrote the article Obrana zračne luke na Krku (Defense of the Krk airport).
So what was the article about? Apparently, much like the deleted Special war against Croatia (circa 1995–2012), it never actually happened. The article mostly just described what could have occurred if the Serbs invaded that airport during the Croatian War of Independence. Hence, why a hrwiki admin deleted the article in December 2013.
Seven years after that, Kubura restored it on the article's talk page. Yes, you read that right. He waited seven years to partially restore his own hoax article. Kubura understands community burnout, and he knows all he has to do is wait to see the results he desires.
IV. First de-sysop
In a surprise to no one paying attention at the time, Kubura misused his tools while an admin. You can read the details of his conduct here.
To give a quick summary of that discussion, WizardOfOz was blocked for his participation in this global rollback request. There were other things that Wizard had done to get on Kubura's bad side, but that was the stated reason.[4] Kubura did not support the global rollback request for fellow hrwiki admin Dalibor Bosits who was among those opposed Kubura's adminship for WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior.[5]
What might surprise a good many people is that a Steward actually took the extraordinary steps of intervening following Argo Navis's comment explaining the situation. Still, Kubura was reinstated a few months later even over the many concerns of several hrwiki editors.[6]
V. 2013 controversy
In 2013, Croatian Wikipedia's many problems were brought to the attention of a much wider segment of the global community. Kubura defended it, and a lot of evidence was collected. Despite actual press articles being written about hrwiki at this time, nothing was done that actually fixed the underlying issue.
For example, Tritomex was blocked for removing unsourced POV content from Ustaše.[8] Despite consensus that Tritomex's edits were correct and properly explained, they still remained blocked by Kubura.
The RFC closed after six months with no obvious way forward. While a de-sysop proposal was put forward locally, it was blocked on procedural grounds.
VI. Consolidates power
Fast forward, and in 2017 Kubura is appointed to be a bureaucrat by a vote of 21 to zero. Kubura's critics have, at this point, pretty much given up trying to speak out on wiki. Many were blocked and others just simply afraid to speak out.[9] That is, more or less, the situation in the Croatian Wikipedia today.
100% | 0% |
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When Kubura ran for admin, 6 users voted neutral and 5 opposed outright. In 2010, 5 users spoke against Kubura when the community was deciding whether to return the admin tools to him. In 2013, 40 users supported desysopping him again, yet by 2017 the critics and the impartial have been removed from the conversation altogether.
Kubura did not want to change himself, so he changed the community.
VII. Tool abuse
User | Kubura's reason | Their edit |
---|---|---|
DraconicDark | Foreign provocation / silencing Croats | [25] |
Čačvina | Removing "Greater Serbian aggression" | [26] |
ImJustThere | Cyberbullying | [27] |
Mosorska gušterica | Gaming the system | [28] |
(A) The blockades
Over the years, Kubura has blocked a lot of users for blatantly terrible reasons in order to enforce his will on to the Croatian Wikipedia community. I have made a table showing some block highlights. It is just a small sampling though because Kubura's tendency to block productive users has been discussed at length elsewhere.
In the case of DraconicDark, they were blocked after having only a single edit on Croatian Wikipedia. Interestingly, Kubura made sure it was clear that DraconicDark knew the real reason was for this edit on Meta.[10]
(B) The cover-ups
Under the guise of "cleaning vandalism", Kubura deleted 27+ revisions to the page Razgovor sa suradnikom:Mateo K 01/Pismohrana1 (Mateo K 01's user talk archive).[11] As any Steward can confirm, Mateo K 01 had actually wrote some rather.. positive comments there about Ante Pavelić.[12]
(C) The protections
One might imagine that Kubura would be awfully trusting with the local hrwiki community, but in reality Kubura prefers to shut down the local community from having control very often. For example, there was a discussion to revert Kubura's 2014 full protection of {{Novosti}}.[13] Still, Kubura maintained it would be a terrible idea because sock puppets and vandals could then be able to edit the page, so he decided to keep it fully protected despite community consensus to do otherwise. Naturally, Kubura has over a thousand edits to that page and likely does not want other people having the ability to change it against his specific wishes.[14]
VIII. Sockpuppetry
Now we finally come to the reason I wrote this request and why I believe nothing less than a global ban will prevent Kubura from causing further harm to Wikimedia. Thanks to the work done by Lasta, it has been shown that Kubura is a long time sock puppeteer.
Stale:
If we just use the accounts listed in the "likely" category, then we can easily say that these sock puppets definitively tipped the balance in Stewards/Elections 2020/Votes/~riley. Were it not for Kubura, ~riley would be a Steward right now with an 81.97% support ratio.
It isn't like Kubura lacked a motive for doing so. ~riley helped the hrwiki Meta RFC process a bit,[15] and he actually supported some of the proposals.[16] The same socks of course had an obvious tendency to interfere with the meta RFC.[17]
That is not to mention these are just the accounts we know about. Most of them have history going back years. Here is one of the socks voting to retain Kubura as admin. Here is one with over a hundred edits to Croatian Wiktionary (where Kubura2 is a sysop). Here is one transcribing Ustaše propaganda on Croatian Wikisource.
Further reading
Thank you for reading this if you have. This report represents only a small fraction of the abuse that has been documented on Croatian Wikipedia over the years. If you would like to read more, please see the list below.
Meta RFCs
- Requests for comment/Croatian Wikipedia-misuse of admin tools by User:Kubura (English)
- Requests for comment/2013 issues on Croatian Wikipedia (English)
- .../Evidence/Conduct (English)
- .../Evidence/Content (English)
- .../Evidence/Conduct (fork) (Croatian)
- .../Evidence/Content (fork) (Croatian)
- Talk:Requests for comment/2013 issues on Croatian Wikipedia/Evidence/Archives (multiple languages)
- Requests for comment/Consistency and bias across different language Wikipedias (Holocaust example) (English)
- Requests for comment/Administrator abuse on the Croatian Wikipedia (English)
- Requests for comment/Site-wide administrator abuse and WP:PILLARS violations on the Croatian Wikipedia (English)
Checkuser information
- Steward requests/Checkuser/2020-11#Kubura@hr.wikipedia (English)
- User:Lasta/CU38 (English)
- Wikipedija:Zahtjev za provjeru suradnika § 38 suradnika (Croatian)
Croatian Wikipedia pages
- Wikipedija:Administratori/Prijedlozi za administratore/Kubura Vatrena Ptica Ifa Bracodbk Fraxinus § Kubura (Croatian)
- Wikipedija:Kafić/Arhiv 71 § Kuburin administratorski status (Croatian)
- Wikipedija:Administratori/Prijedlozi za ukidanje ovlasti/SpeedyGonsales, Kubura i Zeljko § Kubura (Croatian)
- Wikipedija:Administratori/Prijedlozi za administratore/Kubura (Croatian)
References
Citations |
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Kubura's statement
- Transcluded from User talk:Kubura:
Survey
- Support. As requestor. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 21:21, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support. As co-requestor. Blablubbs (talk) 21:35, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support for essentially the same reasons as Requests for comment/Global ban for Poetlister. A few additional thoughts: 1) other global and local bans should certainly be considered for other primary editors on Croatian Wikipedia (I don't think it's fair to blame the entire situation on Kubura) 2) Blocks could be considered on English Wikipedia as well, but because the rules are more complicated on abusing multiple accounts there, more time to analyze the evidence is required. --Rschen7754 21:45, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support: per abuse evidence provided in the RfC. --Aca (talk) 21:47, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per the evidence here for egregious sock-puppetry and abuse both in content and in our internal processes. An interesting case could be made that should this GBAN be authorised, an additional Steward userright should be granted. Nosebagbear (talk) 21:56, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support: the evidence provided above (and in many other RfCs) is damning and definitely earns Kubura a ban. He is not a constructive editor and is overall very rude to fellow editors and people who don't have the same opinions as him. User:Imjustthere 21:58, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support: the examples given show a clear pattern of deeply problematic behavior and I agree that the only course of action here is a global ban. --Arnel (talk) 21:59, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support. As RfC contributor. – Srđan (talk) 22:04, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose: From my perspective I see no reason whatsoever for a global ban. Kubura has made some edits on Lithuanian Wiki, I have reviewed them all after this forum post, all of them seemed to be done in good faith and while some of them weren't stellar, none of them were even close to being ban-worthy. So, we never had any problem with this user, and in the unlikely event we ever will, we are perfectly capable of banning him ourselves. As for the other „charges“ many of them seem to be really unconvincing to me and more like a personal vendetta. I might very well be wrong since I have no deep knowledge on these situations, but that's again an argument for a local ban at worst, and not a global one. --Nomad (talk) 22:05, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- I am changing my vote to strong oppose convinced by all this dogpiling and attempts to pressure, that there's something shady going on here. --Nomad (talk) 01:03, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Moved to talk. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:30, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support: Sockpuppetry affecting steward elections is particularly egregious and would already justify a global ban. I also agree with Rschen7754's comments above. Nsk92 (talk) 22:11, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support The main account was also indefinitely blocked for POV pushing on German Wikipedia in 2007. He was unblocked after 10 years on request to give him another chance but made no local edits since then. This egregious abuse of sock puppets can not be tolerated. --Count Count (talk) 22:13, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Kubura is no longer a positive for this movement. He is a net negative, and his presence here is making contributing considerably less enjoyable for many people. Kubura needs to go. Giraffer (talk) 22:45, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support as RfC contributor. The behavior described above has been so blatant, so harmful in multiple ways, and so persistent, that global ban is the only option. GregorB (talk) 22:51, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support - global ban is justified by the puppetry regarding steward elections, if nothing else. Best, Darren-M (talk) 23:16, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support - sockpuppetry, persistent POV problems, and extensive abuse of admin access. Normally I would hesitate to ban a user unblocked on their homewiki, but in this case that is hrwiki, so no issue. – Ajraddatz (talk) 00:22, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose on the principle that this user is supported by their community, whether I agree with this person or not, or aspects of that community's approaches. You need to find an alternative means to restrict them to their home wiki(s)—my comment from another failed RFC ban discussion stands that our binary position, that we have globally blocked or not, is too simplistic. I would vote for xwiki community restrictions. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:41, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
Debates |
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- @Billinghurst: The global ban should be for the gross abuse Kubura has done elsewhere, i.e. his sockpuppeting on Steward elections - that on its own deserves the global ban. What his self-selected buddies on CW think of Kubura should not have any bearing on that. I personally think global bans are justified as the ultimate penalty for any gross abuse, even if that abuse is confined to a single sub-wiki Thhhommmasss (talk) 03:51, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Thhhommmasss: and you are entitled to your opinion. That are slapping it on top of mine, I find troubling. — billinghurst sDrewth 09:08, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Billinghurst: The global ban should be for the gross abuse Kubura has done elsewhere, i.e. his sockpuppeting on Steward elections - that on its own deserves the global ban. What his self-selected buddies on CW think of Kubura should not have any bearing on that. I personally think global bans are justified as the ultimate penalty for any gross abuse, even if that abuse is confined to a single sub-wiki Thhhommmasss (talk) 03:51, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Kubura has played the wiki community and wiki rules for long enough. Decisive action needs to be taken to send a clear message that this kind of behaviour will not be tolerated. --Ivi104 (talk) 00:58, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support As the evidence presented here has shown, Kubura is clearly incompatible with the goals of the movement. To any observer, it should be shocking that he has been able to get away with such flagrant abuses of power for so long. Kubura's persistent cross-wiki sockpuppetry and suppression of normal wiki community processes where he is admin both clearly illustrate that his behavior is not a problem that can simply be locally handled, and thus warrants a global ban. DraconicDark (talk) 05:10, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose--Ceha (talk) 05:39, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Disrupting a Steward Election causing a steward candidate to fail via vote pandering is something that cannot be accepted. Since steward elections involved the whole Wikimedia Foundation wikis (as stewards have rights across all), although SE is held in meta alone, a meta alone policy cannot work. This vote fraud cannot be accepted as there are proven sockpuppets voting multiple times to fail a candidate, which is very reprehensible and abominable for anyone to do. This clearly unacceptable behaviour cannot be allowed on, and I do not trust the local hr community can handle their desysoping / blocking as since they can interfere with SE (which is with so much more scrutiny), they can surely interfere with hrwp issues. Given hrwp aside, there is no other viable project, hence, global ban is proper. Thanks MJL and all the other fliers for this, the hard work is much appreciated. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:02, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support You have no idea what is going on hr.wiki, this is just tip of iceberg. Even when Kubura get what he deserve, how many of his alts remain, and what is stopping people like Roberta who are man behind man to bring just one alt of him back? Kanikosen (talk) 10:00, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support the sockpuppetry alone would do Sargoth (talk) 10:03, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Long overdue. --Randykitty (talk) 10:24, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support The socking evidence from Lasta is compelling, and socking in a steward election is enough to support a global ban. I understand Nomad's reluctance to GBAN someone who has the "apparent support" of their home wiki, but it seems like that's actually part of the problem here. Valereee (talk) 11:06, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support, I have been following the last RFC since it has been created. I've seen the arguments of one side, and whatever answers Kubura, his allies and puppets tried to create. We as a community should not turn a blind eye on such actions, especially that Kubura and his little helpers have been playing with our rules for more than a decade, creating one of the most toxic communities and one of the most unreliable Wikipedia project. Even if we put aside his actions on hr.wiki and destroying its community, tampering with steward elections is more than enough to deserve a global ban, for him and for all the puppets he ever operated and we have discovered. A sincere thank you to all that worked hard in order to collect enough evidence to create this case (including, but not limited to Srđan). I just hope, that Kubura, his puppets, and his other boogeymen won't try to interfere with this RFC and won't target people voting against him (what happened to some of the contributors to the last RFC). Cheers! Nadzik (talk) 11:24, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support: As much as it might hurt me to vote so, I have to. Per evidence in the RfC. Back when I rejoined hr.wiki in 2020, at some point I was not even editing by my own conscience anymore, just because I wanted to be left alone and not dragged into disputes. Some admins like Roberta F. or SpeedyGonsales believe that they can even work against the will of the community. I know that Wikipedia is not a democracy, but it is also not an admin-dictatorship. People have the right to ask questions! [29] --Koreanovsky (Ča–Kaj–Što?!) 11:29, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Koreanovsky: This is about Kubura, the other admins issues can be dealt elsewhere. This is not another hrwp RFC, so if your points are towards Kubura will be more helpful. Thanks. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 11:33, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support. The user has enacted the far-right infiltration of the Croatian wikis, and did not hesitate to break the rules to defend their sorry state of affairs. If Croatian wikis cannot get rid of him and his ilk on their own, we should help them wholeheartedly in that, not shy away from our responsibility to upholding NPOV, FRINGE, and other important policies. This ban will be a right step in that direction. stjn[ru] 11:47, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support now Kubura is sending blatant sockpuppets (or meatpuppets) to disrupt this RfC (Mateo K 01, Ceha) and I am sure more will come over the next few days. If this, the Steward Election socking and the overall record on hrwiki are not enough, then I don't know what is for a ban. JavaHurricane 11:54, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
Ceha is indeed very suspicious. They voted no for WizardofOz, participated in hr RFC in the form of the rest of the Kubura socks (similiar behaviour) and here opposing.Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 11:57, 15 November 2020 (UTC)- Stricken per further thinking. Ceha is unlikely to be a sock. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:00, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- @JavaHurricane: Mateo K 01 is an established hrwiki user and isn't a sockpuppet of Kubura. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 16:36, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Has had a long-time tendentious presence on English Wikipedia; the abuse on Croatian Wikipedia is blatant, and if there's also cross-project socking that's just the icing on the cake. Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:16, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
Neutral Honestly, I saw all of the evidence that user MJL brought here. I originally wanted to support. However, the intense scrutiny by MJL at Nomad's stance raises some question as to the motive of the scrutiny.--Jeromi Mikhael (talk) 13:36, 15 November 2020 (UTC)- Really? "Intense scrutiny by MJL at Nomad's stance"? MJL made a single post in response to Nomad, to say that: "I have literally never interacted with Kubura before in my life, so it seems kind of impossible for me to have a personal vendetta here." Nsk92 (talk) 14:17, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Nsk92: After MJL failed to convince Nomad in this page talkpage, MJL moved to Nomad's talkpage, and saying that Nomad is "not taking my reply seriously". --Jeromi Mikhael (talk) 14:26, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Really? "Intense scrutiny by MJL at Nomad's stance"? MJL made a single post in response to Nomad, to say that: "I have literally never interacted with Kubura before in my life, so it seems kind of impossible for me to have a personal vendetta here." Nsk92 (talk) 14:17, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support per explanations on here and here. Overwhelming evidence. Jeromi Mikhael (talk) 22:48, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support an editor who uses socks in the way editor has, including to try and significantly influence elections, is unwelcome on any of our projects. Nil Einne (talk) 14:45, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Kubura is part of the group of admins, together with SpeedyGonsales, Roberta F. and Zeljko, who practically kidnapped croatian wikipedia long time ago. They chased away so many valuable editors. Kubura's mindset is total opposite of everything Wikipedia stands for. --Dean72 (talk) 15:05, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support A disruptive editor who is distracting our community from reaching our goal should not be here. —Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 15:44, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Per evidence we collected in 2013-2014. The user has a systematic track record of abusive trolling. He has interpreted the role and privileges of a Wikipedia admin as a carte blanche to cyberbully to a degree that can without exaggeration be considered sadistic. Miranche (talk) 16:36, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support The whole history of Kubura's work is the history of the systematic vandalization of the Wikipedia project. Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf (talk) 16:40, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support The use of sockpuppetry to affect steward or admin elections is immoral and totally unacceptable! Therefore, a global ban is completely justified. Maestro Ivanković (talk) 16:47, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Basically as Ivi104 and Maestro Ivanković already wrote. Also for VII. Tool abuse - I have experienced it myself. --Mark7747 (talk) 16:58, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I've lost a will for doing contributions to wiki due to Kubura, and people like him Vedran V
- Support--AnToni(Talk) 18:19, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support and given the decade-long history of abuse and violation of core WP principles by Kubura, documented above plus in previous CW RfCs, a public discussion is much needed as to why this has been allowed to go on for so long, and to see what can be done to ensure that such gross violations do not go unpunished again. Also, even a global ban may not stop bad behavior, either from Kubura or like-minded associates he has been able to gather on CW, thus additional steps are need (e.g. better abuse reporting and addition of a couple of additional temporary Admins/Checkusers on CW, drawn from CW participants who've sought to address issue) Thhhommmasss (talk) 19:52, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per GregorB and Dean72. Also there was pettiness and a need for control where he used socks to control what Featured articles were selected. This went on for years. He also controlled the "In the news" section and would single-handedly add items that he thought were deserving. I shook my head in disbelief when he recently blocked several users on the basis of "his suspicion" that they were socks without any CU investigation or request. This has been long overdue. --Mhare (talk) 22:06, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support the issue of cross-wiki socking to evade scrutiny is so severe that a complete ban, including on hrwiki, is necessary. power~enwiki (talk) 22:27, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose. Since the main reason of this RfC seems to be sockpuppeting, there is at least one reason why it cannot be supported: Acording to technical data (Steward requests/Checkuser/2020-11), there is neither evidence, nor proof of sockpuppeting, i.e. no user is marked as „confirmed“ sockpuppet, but as „likely“, „possible“, „unlikely“, „unrelated“ or „stale“. And all the supporters start from a standpoint that those users are „confirmed“. What could a neutral observer conclude? --Silverije (talk) 22:45, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Even if we were to say that the socks aren't Kubura's, that is but one section in a detailed RfC that goes far beyond allegations of sockpuppetry. The concerns about repeated tool abuse are valid and very serious on their own. The fact that local Checkuser Vermont was willing to block the suspected sockpuppets here on meta also hints at the fact that while they may only be likely from a technical standpoint, they are likely enough when combined with behavioural evidence. On a related note: If Kubura's sockpuppetteering was fully confirmed, would you support this proposal? Blablubbs (talk) 23:00, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- (Edit conflict.) Although they are not 100% confirmed to be socks: If you look at their centralauths, you can see that those "likely" accounts are blocked based on being sockpuppets of Kubura on hr.wiki and meta. Also, see
Sotiale'sSakretsu's comments regarding Kubura's socks here in this checkuser request which was posted recently. There is evidence that supports the notion that the accounts listed under "likely" are sockpuppets of Kubura, although not 100% confirmed due to "a lack of meaningful data". —Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 23:02, 15 November 2020 (UTC)- Note: Not Sotiale but Sakretsu. CM-Public (talk) 23:20, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Whoops. Got them confused. I've changed my comment accordingly. —Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 23:23, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Note: Not Sotiale but Sakretsu. CM-Public (talk) 23:20, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- (Edit conflict.) Although they are not 100% confirmed to be socks: If you look at their centralauths, you can see that those "likely" accounts are blocked based on being sockpuppets of Kubura on hr.wiki and meta. Also, see
- Even if we were to say that the socks aren't Kubura's, that is but one section in a detailed RfC that goes far beyond allegations of sockpuppetry. The concerns about repeated tool abuse are valid and very serious on their own. The fact that local Checkuser Vermont was willing to block the suspected sockpuppets here on meta also hints at the fact that while they may only be likely from a technical standpoint, they are likely enough when combined with behavioural evidence. On a related note: If Kubura's sockpuppetteering was fully confirmed, would you support this proposal? Blablubbs (talk) 23:00, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose I don't see anything that could be compromising for Kubura. I think that he is one of the advocate of Wikipedia criterias. I also don't see reason why is this disscus is on meta because there is a long debate on Croatia Wikipedija and discuss on meta is meanless.--Kraljnnm (talk) 23:10, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- This problem can't be fixed from the inside of croatian wikipedia because of other admins (primarily SpeedyGonsales and Roberta F.) who harras anyone who dares to question their total power. I'm not blocked only thanks to the rule that admins can't be blocked without opening a local RFC. But, when I darred to start a vote to revoke CU rights from Vodomar (gone missing for 60 days when he needed to do a CU check for Kubura) and Ex13 (explicitelly refused to do a CU check on Kubura), SpeedyGonsales opened a local RFC asking other admins to support his idea of blocking me for merely being suspicious about the reasons behind sudded dissapearance of *both* local CUs when they were most needed. Local discussions on hr wiki about anything related to Kubura, SpeedyGonsales, Roberta F. or Zeljko are met with completely invented accusations of breaking AGF. This can't be solved from the inside. It's highly unlikely you didn't notice this by yourself. --Lasta (talk) 14:16, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Lasta you are delusional and a false accuser. You are an admin and you have this continued hate and zeal to drive users into the ground. You think that people don't have lives outside Wikipedia (think issues in relation to people's health and wellbeing and lively hood) and what you have insinuated is narcissistic and self-centered. You conflate correlation with causation, and if you look at making accusations and perform investigations in general you need to go in-depth and not just take some inflated balance of probability on a dynamic IP range with non-matching UAs, in your case the UA and IPs matched but this correlation was not causation. You are hell-bent in your obsession and prosecution of Kubura and accusing others of collusion that this delusional trip that you are spreading shows that you are not rational in your pursuit and that this is nothing but an egotrip of getting back to a user on a hr.wiki and that what you have said here so far will be just an overture in the cancel culture/kangaroo court witch hunt that will be unleashed as others who are in your cross hairs will be pursued and driven out as they do not conform to your view of the world. Vodomar (talk) 01:14, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- This exchange at your Talk page, under Side-by-side_comparison subsection, regarding the subject matter and Lasta's concernes, is more than illustrative of who could be delusional and a crook or not: User_talk:Vodomar#Side-by-side_comparison--s a n t a | t a l k | p i t 14:34, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- Lasta you are delusional and a false accuser. You are an admin and you have this continued hate and zeal to drive users into the ground. You think that people don't have lives outside Wikipedia (think issues in relation to people's health and wellbeing and lively hood) and what you have insinuated is narcissistic and self-centered. You conflate correlation with causation, and if you look at making accusations and perform investigations in general you need to go in-depth and not just take some inflated balance of probability on a dynamic IP range with non-matching UAs, in your case the UA and IPs matched but this correlation was not causation. You are hell-bent in your obsession and prosecution of Kubura and accusing others of collusion that this delusional trip that you are spreading shows that you are not rational in your pursuit and that this is nothing but an egotrip of getting back to a user on a hr.wiki and that what you have said here so far will be just an overture in the cancel culture/kangaroo court witch hunt that will be unleashed as others who are in your cross hairs will be pursued and driven out as they do not conform to your view of the world. Vodomar (talk) 01:14, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- I suggest reading the RfC then. 𝟙𝟤𝟯𝟺𝐪𝑤𝒆𝓇𝟷𝟮𝟥𝟜𝓺𝔴𝕖𝖗𝟰 (𝗍𝗮𝘭𝙠) 13:48, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support has nothing lost here, -jkb- 23:14, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose--Rovoobob Talk 00:08, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support: I'm baffled as to how this has been allowed to continue so long. This is one global ban/desysoping that would be 100% justified. Kudpung (talk) 00:24, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Kudpung: We have several opposes...so let us wait. The decision hasn't been settled yet. Jeromi Mikhael (talk) 00:53, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Kudpung was implying that if this request were to pass, it would be 100% justified (would: indicating the consequence of an imagined event or situation). —Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 02:17, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Jeromi Mikhael: I note that you have also supported this RfC. Would is a Modal Verb, a feature of Germanic languages that bahasa Indonesia possibly does not have. Kudpung (talk) 02:54, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Understood, thanks. I thought Kudpung advocated for a SNOW close. Jeromi Mikhael (talk) 03:44, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Jeromi Mikhael: If I may also help clarify: of the oppose votes that have been cast:
- Nomad and Billinghurst are uninvolved with hrwiki and Kubura.
- Mateo K 01, Ceha, Silverije, Kraljnnm, Rovoobob are all hrwiki users who have sided with Kubura and the other POV-pushers in the past.
- Mateo K 01 has been perma-blocked on de.wiki for POV-pushing.
- Ceha has a topic ban and 7 blocks on enwiki, for editwarring, POV-pushing and using multiple accounts.
- Silverije has voted the same as Kubura in all the votes concerning admin status grants/revokes on hrwiki.
- Silverije and Kraljnnm have been furiously defending Kubura from the sockpuppet accusations on-wiki, and still hold the standpoint that he is being unjustly prosecuted and that the 19 accounts are not actually his.
- To further prove my point, take a look at these canvassing reports involving Kubura, Ceha, Mateo K 01, Silverije, among others. Most of these oppose votes believe Kubura is right to break the rules in this way, and will support such behaviour and Kubura, regardless of the evidence or the rules. Should such oppose votes be taken into serious consideration? To be perfectly clear, I'm not advocating for a quick close, take all the time you need, I'm just trying to put the oppose votes into perspective. --Ivi104 (talk) 10:24, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I am the first (but certainly not most active) admin and bureaucrat of the Croatian Wikipedia. The Croatian Wikipedia is deeply divided, and Kubura has been one of the most aggressive members participating in this division. I have the hope that with Kubura's ban a healing process in the Croatian Wikipedia community may start. --denny (talk) 03:12, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- I respect that you are the first admin and and bureaucrat of the Croatian Wikipedia but this does not give any weight in your argument. No, the Croatian Wikipedia is not deeply divided, it is as much divided as any other wikipedias. Edit wars are quite common on many Wikipedias https://www.researchgate.net/publication/51917633_Edit_Wars_in_Wikipedia. From my own experience the hr.wikipedia it is much better than it was in 2011 or 2013 especially after there was a concerted government and media attack on admins and users https://www.jutarnji.hr/vijesti/osnivac-wikipedije-govori-za-nedjeljni-srbi-i-hrvati-ne-smiju-imati-odvojene-wikipedije-1069487 . Performing a global ban on Kubura will be just the start of a campaign to chase anyone they please if conformity of thought is not adhered to. denny thanks for popping up on the hr wikipedia after such a long absence and chipping in your five cents. Vodomar (talk) 21:55, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- If there is, as you say, no division, then there is obviously no need to worry about such a 'campaign'. If the division you describe were not real, Kubura's usage of sockpuppets to interfere with the re-election of a Steward is still sufficient for me to support the ban. --denny (talk) 22:04, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Since in your statement you said that "The Croatian Wikipedia is deeply divided" then there is a certainty that a new purge/cancel campaign will occur. Thank you for clarifying that. Vodomar (talk) 03:18, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- No, @Vodomar:, this will, hopefully, become a fine precedent for chasing and hunting down anyone who knowingly violate "Five Pillars", mandated by Wikimedia, and who almost privatises small projects like hr.wiki, or imposes such an arbitrariness and administer self-imposed rules based on personal whim to the extent rarely seen in Wikipedia projects, all the while turning project into Internet outlet for all kinds of historical revisionism, most noticeably regarding WWII and nazi's puppet regime of NDH and Ustasha apologia and whitewashing. By the way, you are partially right - hr.wiki isn't that divide actually, most of the time maybe not at all, which makes it almost completely free of edit-wars - certainly nothing of sort and of scope often seen on English project. Division, however, exist between those who can edit and those who can't; between those who comply and/or conform to administrative arbitrariness, and those who get blocks or simply run away. One more remark, regarding your lecturing to Lasta somewhere above - if Lasta is delusional and self-absorbed egocentric, hell-bent on chasing ghosts and fulfilling some personal vendetta, is that means that rest of us, some one hundred plus, are naive suckers or participants in global conspiracy against this fine lad Kubura and his pals Zeljko, Speedy and Roberta, and that we want to spoil if not outright destroy entire hr.wiki project.--s a n t a | t a l k | p i t 01:02, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
- Since in your statement you said that "The Croatian Wikipedia is deeply divided" then there is a certainty that a new purge/cancel campaign will occur. Thank you for clarifying that. Vodomar (talk) 03:18, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support: the witness and evidences cited so far (and in many other RfCs) are intending and directing Kubura a ban. He is not a constructive editor and is profoundly hoarse to fellow editors and people who don't have the same opinions as him. Conclusively, pretty indecent even aft warnings. SHISHIR DUA (talk) 05:04, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I don't see how the user can be more compatible with the community and projects. What has been reported is very serious and I see no other way out (especially after the fact of the steward elections). --Superpes15 (talk) 08:07, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support - long overdue. One of the most corrosive personalities I've met on the project, whose power trip has been left unchecked for way too long. He has made an immense harm to the Croatian and international Wikipedia community and brought the site into disrepute. No such user (talk) 08:14, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support per the evidence presented. Majavah (talk!) 09:41, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support and inform the WMF too for a double ban. MER-C (talk) 11:06, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose:Makes apsolutely no sense. No evidence, nor proof of sockpuppeting. Without a proof, that´s nonsense! --Croq (talk) 11:28, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Croq: Didn't you got banned on wiki.hr for using socks in same way Kubura did now? [30] Kanikosen (talk) 12:00, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Kanikosen, I got blocked on German Wikipedia because of thi https://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Fausto_Veranzio&diff=prev&oldid=152629563 (just to show what up on Germn speaking Wikipedia) and on Croatian Wiki because of Socketpuppets. But what does this have to do with Kubura? --Croq (talk) 20:53, 16 November 2020 (UTC) Kubura is one of the most productive usters in this project! ---Croq (talk) 21:00, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
Croq, Kanikosen is refering to your block on croatian wiki. See: [[31]]. --Mark7747 (talk) 21:05, 16 November 2020 (UTC) Ok, but that has nothing to do with this subject?--Croq (talk) 20:57, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Yes, he is... because he has eliminated almost everything that looked like competition. He also fails the nondiscrimination resolution adopted by the WMF, so this alone is a reason to boot him out of all WMF websites. I mean he practiced ethnic discrimination openly and defiantly. Now it is the time to pay for his sins by getting globally banned. Tgeorgescu (talk) 14:32, 26 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support: unacceptable actions --Mtarch11 (talk) 11:30, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support: per the evidence presented. the cross wiki socking is unacceptable. --Asmodea Oaktree (talk) 11:41, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support. For more then 10 years, Kubura has been sistematically undermining core WP principles on croatian wikipedia. He permanently blocks people who merely wrote something didn't like, and refuses to unblock them when proved wrong. See user talk:Kubura#I was blocked without proper reason where Čačvina explained in detail what happened. Kubura just replied with "NPOV" is a term often misused to relativize the fact. and ignored all calls to unblock Čačvina.
- Regarding his sockpuppets, I repeatedly asked him, publicly, to stop using them. My last proposal on hr wiki was to block all of his sockpuppets and leave Kubura unpunished, despite massive violations od basic principles. He just wasn't ready to back up, even for a millimeter. He is a POV-pusher with messianic complex. His mindset is lightyears away from core wikipedia principles. No argument works for him. He is beyond repair. --Lasta (talk) 13:56, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support overwhelming evidence provided demonstrates unacceptable activity that cannot be remedied any other way --DannyS712 (talk) 14:16, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support As a longtime user and ex-admin (for a very short time) on croatian wiki I strongly support global ban for Kubura and removing all his admin tools. Unfortunately banning just him won't solve ongoing problems on croatian wikipedia, as other admins such as SpeedyGonsales and Zeljko (who btw blocked me indefinitely because of one joke [32]) share the same mindset as Kubura. With their behaviour they have chased away many long time users, myself included, everything had already been said on the last RFC --El Diablo (talk) 15:27, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
Arbitrary break
- Support It is very hard for me to evaluate evidence that is at hrwiki, but tampering SE2020 seems to be proved. That alone is enough for me to justify a global ban. Steward elections are global elections, impacting all Wikimedia wikis. Arbitration Committees are willing to locally ban users tampering elections or otherwise abusing socks – and I see no reason why the global community should behave differently. --Martin Urbanec (talk) 15:30, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support per evidences. Although the wikis might be a little "bias", that's more than a bias apparently. That's unacceptable and the thing I don't understand is, why is this happened so long and nobody discussed on here before? (because this is an ongoing behaviour since 10 years as far as I understand)--Ahmetlii (talk) 16:17, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose As far as I noticed there are some conflicts or disagreement on hr.wiki between them or some administrators, so it is my opinion that this conflict or disagreement should end there among editors and administrators who know the situation, not here. --Mikola22 (talk) 19:36, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Mikola22: ~riley is not an admin on hr.wiki, and his denial of fair election for Steward effects more than just Croatian Wikipedia. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 19:52, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Mikola22: Did you miss use of sockpuppets and for what they where used? What is your opinion about one man being 20% of all active users on HR wiki and sabotaging elections here on meta? Kanikosen (talk) 20:01, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Mikola22's edit history here on Meta is quite telling, including this astonishing missive about the Jasenovac concentration camp. Nsk92 (talk) 20:06, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Kanikosen, I see that source for "Sockpuppetry" information are from administrator Lasta. If there exist any problems then it had to be solved on hr.wiki. There was also some RfC. If one administrator has support there, then we must respect the will of the majority. That's my opinion. If that majority supported some administrator and they shouldn't, then they are also wrong or guilty. --Mikola22 (talk) 20:24, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Mikola22: That is not true. Lasta gave names to check, and people from here found that Kubura is naughty boy, after checkuser Vodomar and Ex13 betrayed trust of the hr.wiki people. So no, Lasta didn't do anything but pointed real checkuser to real socks. Kanikosen (talk) 20:37, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Answer of editor Nsk92 is proof that this procedure is a continuation of the action against certain administrators or hr.wiki.
- And as for my answer, everything has been told. I have not looked at these authors or hr.wiki(with this subject) since then, otherwise I haven't followed it and before because I'm not interested in this subject. But if there is any review that refutes their works or books, feel free to present them and I will start changing everything which is controversial, if information's from these authors exist on hr.wiki. --Mikola22 (talk) 20:45, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Kanikosen, I say that for me, the procedure is possible against any admin on hr.wiki, if possible violation has been committed there. If it was made elsewhere I don't think it's okay to punish someone with access to the whole Wikipedia, etc. --Mikola22 (talk) 20:54, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Mikola22: That is not true. Lasta gave names to check, and people from here found that Kubura is naughty boy, after checkuser Vodomar and Ex13 betrayed trust of the hr.wiki people. So no, Lasta didn't do anything but pointed real checkuser to real socks. Kanikosen (talk) 20:37, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Kanikosen, I see that source for "Sockpuppetry" information are from administrator Lasta. If there exist any problems then it had to be solved on hr.wiki. There was also some RfC. If one administrator has support there, then we must respect the will of the majority. That's my opinion. If that majority supported some administrator and they shouldn't, then they are also wrong or guilty. --Mikola22 (talk) 20:24, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Mikola22's edit history here on Meta is quite telling, including this astonishing missive about the Jasenovac concentration camp. Nsk92 (talk) 20:06, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Mikola22: Did you miss use of sockpuppets and for what they where used? What is your opinion about one man being 20% of all active users on HR wiki and sabotaging elections here on meta? Kanikosen (talk) 20:01, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Mikola22: ~riley is not an admin on hr.wiki, and his denial of fair election for Steward effects more than just Croatian Wikipedia. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 19:52, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
Strong oppose--He edits on hr.wiki, there is absolutely no need for global ban. Lordluka99 (talk) 21:10, 16 November 2020 (UTC)Striking sockpuppet comment. Vermont (talk) 22:07, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- Lordluka99 Didn't you got banned on wiki.hr for using socks in same way Kubura did now? --Mark7747 (talk) 21:19, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
Oppose--I dont know much about it but i think it is too radical. Macak87 (talk) 21:16, 16 November 2020 (UTC)Striking sockpuppet comment. Vermont (talk) 22:07, 16 November 2020 (UTC)Strong oppose - Kubura mostly edits on the hr wiki and a global ban is unnecessary and unwarranted. This action overreaching and is also an example of callout and cancel culture which is so endemic across Wikipedia as a project in general. This callout/cancel culture is really shown with the recruiting and coercion of user from other wikipedias which have no real connection with the hr.wikiepdia project, nor have contributed much to the hr.wikipedia project mainspace. The hr.wikipedia like many others has their own issues, culture wars, warring between different editors admins and so on, and as a project it should represent a diversity of opinion. This is no different to the main Wikipedia project https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/wikipedia-ban-editor-culture-war, https://www.wired.co.uk/article/wikipedia-culture-war and certainly this "intervention" which reeks of neocolonialism and interventionism is only shown with the votes that come from outside the hr.wikipedia project. The level of civility or incivility in many online communities is a problem and this private war between Lasta and Kubura has not been something to be proud of by we have here a case of two diametrially opposed admins who don't like each other very much, but were still able to continue to exist in the space for a long time. Lasta as a admin and user did not really contribute much in terms of direct edits (except categorisation and talk) where as Kubura spend a lot of time in editing and adding new content. A global ban will only show that the Wikimedia will show bias towards one person in a feud which has spanned over many years, banishing one user who has written and added so much content to the hr.wikipedia project in the manner as displayed here will open the floodgates of cancel culture and prosecution which has started from 2013 from outside of the hr.wikipedia project with doxing, false media report, personal attacks and so on. Vodomar (talk) 23:23, 16 November 2020 (UTC)- Striking double vote. — regards, Revi 10:53, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vodomar, Kubura sockpuppeted Steward Elections - that goes way beyond hr.wiki, and this action alone deserves a global ban. And there can be no diversity of opinion with respect to applying core WP principles like NPOV, Reliable Sources and so on. In the CW RfC discussion Kubura and others repeatedly asserted their right to push their self-proclaimed POV-agendas, and block people who dare mention Reliable Sources that go against their POV-agenda. So they are the ones practicing and enforcing a cancel culture against those who disagree with them, and have been blocking and driving such people away, as many former CW participants have attested here. If you want a forum where NPOV, Reliable Sources and other rules do not apply, start a blog or get a Facebook page (although even on the latter some current CW Admins will be banned for Holocaust-denial) Thhhommmasss (talk) 00:11, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose all such issues can be resolved at the home wiki, this level of intervention and interference is unnecessary and becomes a precedent for many other wiki projects. This overreaching intervention can also bed classified as cancel culture and a way of creating conformity of thought and opinion. Vodomar (talk) 23:45, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vodomar This is just silly, cancel culture? And double voting, I expected a lot more for a person that spend the entire last decade on wiki.hr as checkuser before you lost your rights for protecting Kubura and making joke of the entire Checkuser policy on hr.wiki. So now I have few questions for you, first one being how did you manage to find nothing on Lasta request [33] after you gone missing for 2 full months after you did check on Kubura (one your friend Ex13 refused to do, and also gone missing?). How did checkusers from Meta found what you missed? And why did you constantly attempted to make Lasta suspect for puppets in vain attempt to protect Kubura, when you personally did check on Lasta and found nothing [34]? Kanikosen (talk) 16:20, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Well with Lasta he had the same fixed IP addresses and equal UA with 3 other users, but the edit times were different but in some cases, some of the edits of other users were morning/afternoon. It is not that I have "gone" missing, I had some issues with health and family problems which prevented me to focus on the investigation at hand. So your assumption of some kind of collusion or bias is insulting, degrading and demeaning. No, I did not protect Kubura, the double vote was an error. If the Meta checkusers have found something above I did, then table the evidence in full on this page as concrete evidence of the users wrong doing, otherwise, this is just an overreaching neocolonical cancel culture kangaroo court. No cancel culture is live and present in Wikipedia, well documented by many well respected media outlets. All of the issues can be resolved on the local Wikipedia, you are just taking sides with one site of a culture war, straw clutching on pointed arguments and writing more into it then there is evidence. This outside intervention just shows that there are so many overlords out there who are only trying to push their view of the world and own biases to make other project be and fit the way they imagine the world should be Vodomar (talk) 21:44, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- That is nice, as your buddy Ex13 did the same. I am sure both of you got the same illness that allowed 15 Kubura socks to turn cold, so spare me your insulting defence. What are odds that both of you disappeared without trace for 2 months, and returned day after you got voted out of your checkuser rights? And after you chased, blocked everyone that is not with your little group of usurpers, you have audacity to play victim, after your stormtrooper Kubura who abused everything Wikipedia should represent caught right-handed? That is rich. Kanikosen (talk) 23:19, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- What buddy are you talking about, rightwingery you just make things up as you go. You are accusing me of things that I have not done and would not have done. First dehumanisation, false accusations, inferences of malpractice, collusion, conspiracy. I would say very rich from your part!. So one can't It just shows your malevolence and bias in true cancel culture style. What doesn't fit your state of mind or imagination which you make as "fact" then you just go and slander and pillar people. I would say shame on you, but you have no shame at all. What connection do you have to the hr.wikipedia at all, is it just randomly throwing rocks as part of a pile-on/pitchfork mob Vodomar (talk) 00:57, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- More victimisation? Honestly I expected lot more from you. Well let's stick just to technical data as you can't take criticism. Explain to me how did checkuser on meta got different results than you? Where was Ex13 all that time, why did you publish results just after after you got voted out (and why did you placed random people in it, so you can try to murky the request?), and why was problem to write when you accepted this task and situation changed (sorry for not believing you one second) that you are sick, so more competent people from meta can do your job? Kanikosen (talk) 01:40, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- More mudslinging from you. Where is the full analysis from meta in tabular form with a full breakdown blow by blow? So if there is no such analysis then where is the evidence. Also my table is available why not have a side/by/side comparison. Ask Ex13 not me if you want to know where they were. Are you a prosecuting judge? As for stating that I was obfuscating, incompetent, procrastinating or taking sides - that you would not believed me even if you had infinite time Vodomar (talk) 03:18, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- What buddy are you talking about, rightwingery you just make things up as you go. You are accusing me of things that I have not done and would not have done. First dehumanisation, false accusations, inferences of malpractice, collusion, conspiracy. I would say very rich from your part!. So one can't It just shows your malevolence and bias in true cancel culture style. What doesn't fit your state of mind or imagination which you make as "fact" then you just go and slander and pillar people. I would say shame on you, but you have no shame at all. What connection do you have to the hr.wikipedia at all, is it just randomly throwing rocks as part of a pile-on/pitchfork mob Vodomar (talk) 00:57, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- That is nice, as your buddy Ex13 did the same. I am sure both of you got the same illness that allowed 15 Kubura socks to turn cold, so spare me your insulting defence. What are odds that both of you disappeared without trace for 2 months, and returned day after you got voted out of your checkuser rights? And after you chased, blocked everyone that is not with your little group of usurpers, you have audacity to play victim, after your stormtrooper Kubura who abused everything Wikipedia should represent caught right-handed? That is rich. Kanikosen (talk) 23:19, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Well with Lasta he had the same fixed IP addresses and equal UA with 3 other users, but the edit times were different but in some cases, some of the edits of other users were morning/afternoon. It is not that I have "gone" missing, I had some issues with health and family problems which prevented me to focus on the investigation at hand. So your assumption of some kind of collusion or bias is insulting, degrading and demeaning. No, I did not protect Kubura, the double vote was an error. If the Meta checkusers have found something above I did, then table the evidence in full on this page as concrete evidence of the users wrong doing, otherwise, this is just an overreaching neocolonical cancel culture kangaroo court. No cancel culture is live and present in Wikipedia, well documented by many well respected media outlets. All of the issues can be resolved on the local Wikipedia, you are just taking sides with one site of a culture war, straw clutching on pointed arguments and writing more into it then there is evidence. This outside intervention just shows that there are so many overlords out there who are only trying to push their view of the world and own biases to make other project be and fit the way they imagine the world should be Vodomar (talk) 21:44, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vodomar This is just silly, cancel culture? And double voting, I expected a lot more for a person that spend the entire last decade on wiki.hr as checkuser before you lost your rights for protecting Kubura and making joke of the entire Checkuser policy on hr.wiki. So now I have few questions for you, first one being how did you manage to find nothing on Lasta request [33] after you gone missing for 2 full months after you did check on Kubura (one your friend Ex13 refused to do, and also gone missing?). How did checkusers from Meta found what you missed? And why did you constantly attempted to make Lasta suspect for puppets in vain attempt to protect Kubura, when you personally did check on Lasta and found nothing [34]? Kanikosen (talk) 16:20, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support The two proposers have made a strong & convincing argument for this global ban. -- Llywrch (talk) 00:06, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support per compelling evidence presented that this editor is causing severe, chronic global harm. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 01:31, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Weak support
I would like to wait on adding my support until after Kubara has posted a response.It sounds like the Croatian Wikipedia has big toxic-environment problems that justify Meta stepping in, but ideally Meta would step in in a way that allows hrwiki to police itself again rather than policing it directly. 1) Some of these accusations are not merited. The fact that Kubara wrote an article that was rejected and then re-submitted it seven years later is not a big deal. Consensus can change. I am a firm believer in Verifiability-Not-Truth. MLJ says the content of the article was not true, but that is not misconduct. Was it unsourced or were the sources unreliable (as Breitbart in English)? If there are lots of sources that meet hrwiki's reliable source criteria but they say things that aren't true, then it's possible that we're tempted to scapegoat Kubara for a systemic problem, whether it's that hrwiki needs better crtieria or whether there are too many published sources that lie. 2) That being said, MJL has made the case that Kubara abused admin tools and social power. The blocking of DraconicDark for something DD wrote on another project alone is enough to merit a sanction. If Kubara had a problem with what DD wrote on Meta, they should have filed a complaint on Meta. Admins violating policy to block people who disagree with or criticize them is very bad. MLJ makes that case that if Kubara's admin tools are taken away, the hrwiki community, which MLJ says Kubara has pruned of his critics, will just re-add them. So why not take them away and bar Kubara from re-seeking adminship for a period of several years? Per Ivi104's comment on the talk page, this would also mean hrwiki could ban Kubara if they continue to act wrongly, so it could scare Kubara straight. 3) The socking... That's a big deal right there, per CamouflagedMirage. But I'd like to hear what Kubara says about whether it's true. Darkfrog24 (talk) 02:07, 17 November 2020 (UTC)- @Darkfrog24: Regarding "were the sources unreliable (as Breitbart in English)" - Kubura has added hundreds of reflinks to narod.hr, which is a far-right news portal. Regarding the question of why this cannot be handled locally: Kubura has been blocked on multiple Wikis for cross-wiki sockpuppetteering and other misconduct, see e.g. Count Count's statement or his dewiki block log. Given the socking issues as well as his history of tool abuse (i.e. blocking people who disagree with him), it is also unlikely that local discussion would lead to an untainted examination of his conduct. Blablubbs (talk) 03:05, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Thank you for answering my question about sources, Blablubbs. It is the pruning of communities to remove his critics and create a self-reinforcing problem that raises the most concern for me. Project Wiki could benefit from a procedure for interfering in small Wikis when that happens. Because it's clear this lock is going to happen no matter what I say, so I might as well wait to hear from the accused. Darkfrog24 (talk) 04:10, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Blablubbs makes the case that Kubara has added improperly sourced information to hrwiki and Ivi104 has established that hrwiki cannot punish him for it. We must strike a balance between the way the system should work (hrwiki policing its own users), and the way it does work (hrwiki is broken and cannot police itself), so I support a Meta-induced punishment as a temporary measure pending action to correct hrwiki. My first choice would be to block Kubara from hrwiki in a way controlled here from Meta, but I don't think the technology supports that. Darkfrog24 (talk) 05:26, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Thank you for answering my question about sources, Blablubbs. It is the pruning of communities to remove his critics and create a self-reinforcing problem that raises the most concern for me. Project Wiki could benefit from a procedure for interfering in small Wikis when that happens. Because it's clear this lock is going to happen no matter what I say, so I might as well wait to hear from the accused. Darkfrog24 (talk) 04:10, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support per the evidence. No one should engage in such misbehavior. -- Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 03:31, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support The evidence presented here is more then enough to ban this user. More over, tempering with Steward elections is sufficient reason for a global ban in and of itself. — The preceding unsigned comment was added by Ido66667 (talk) 05:24, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support. Because of him, this is the reason why Croatian Wikipedia got so much problems right now. This needs to end, seriously. SMB99thx 08:46, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support. I cannot, in good conscience vote anything another than this: strong support for a ban. I have seen the name Kubura countless times in the past, mostly associated with POV-pushing AND administrator abuse. The creator of this RfGb has compelling evidence that this user has disrupted, has continued to disrupt and probably also will continue to disrupt WMF projects. As commented before, interfering with the Steward Elections and with sockpuppeting preventing getting someone elected is in my opinion enough to warrant a global ban on it's own. It's time to put a stop to this: enough is enough. --Wiki13 (talk) 09:39, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Even if we ignore the sockpupets, there is plenty of other evidence of his abuse. This is not the first time I read about this user but I sincerely hope it's the last one. Josecurioso (talk) 09:42, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose I am a contibutor on enwiki and hrwiki and I've seen worse on enwiki. Also it seems MJL has some ulterior motive, personal agenda. MJL mentiones "he already began inserting the phrase "Greater Serbian forces" into the article and " Serbs turned to crime and terrorized Croats (to implicitly justify the oppression against them by the Independent State of Croatia)." He just pulls things out of context to suit him (look bad for Kubura) in the first two paragraphs, which is ludicrous. "Greater" = bigger in number; Haven't anyone ever heard of a sintagm "greater forces". "implicitly justify the oppression" - when and where was this oppersion of Serbs by Croats proven?? (This is where I should open a request against MJL as he did if I go by the same logic he did.) MJL also highlighted "once tried adding Sexual disorders to the article on "Same-sex sexuality" ". I guess that was to court gay community that will also vote here. But the thing is there are sources that claim that, so it's not like Kubura is a biggot. Finally, likely (sockpuppetry) is not proven. This request has major problems - about half is conjecture and one third also happens on other wikis. Also, editors get banned on non-home wikis all the time for minor and weird things, so to pinpoint one edit like that of Croq on dewiki is beside the point. 185.18.61.44 09:45, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- You've seen worse than attempting (indeed, succeeding) to rig the Steward elections on en-wiki? I suppose we did have an attempted rigging of the arb elections, except the key difference is that was actually dealt with. But putting that aside, the whole point of a Global Ban is that multiple wikis have blocked the individual. So "worse matters on other wikis" doesn't really matter - as an en-wiki contributor I imagine you're aware of other stuff exists - this is the conduct equivalent. Nosebagbear (talk) 10:10, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- If you are "a contibutor on enwiki and hrwiki" as stated, please log-in and sign this edit properly. Best --Mark7747 (talk) 10:14, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- You've seen worse than attempting (indeed, succeeding) to rig the Steward elections on en-wiki? I suppose we did have an attempted rigging of the arb elections, except the key difference is that was actually dealt with. But putting that aside, the whole point of a Global Ban is that multiple wikis have blocked the individual. So "worse matters on other wikis" doesn't really matter - as an en-wiki contributor I imagine you're aware of other stuff exists - this is the conduct equivalent. Nosebagbear (talk) 10:10, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @185.18.61.44: I'm not a guy. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 15:39, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support The findings presented in this RFC are highly disturbing and make me believe that a global ban is a reasonable step to prevent further abuse. Sintakso (talk) 17:16, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support for global ban and complete reset of hrwiki. MBH (talk) 17:17, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support The use of sockpuppets to influence the process of a stewards’ election is a reason enough for a global ban. --——d—n—f (talk) 17:21, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support per the evidence. — MarinaSimic (talk) 21:49, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Long overdue. Chaoborus (talk) 21:55, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I suppose it's about time --Edgar Allan Poe (talk) 22:15, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support It would be a strong support if there is a way to ban the person, not the user account. THIMC, please feel free to copy and paste my vote in the future if the proposal will have become inactive. --Conquistador (talk) 23:21, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Conquistador: Bans are always for the person and not just the account. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 02:34, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support. And thanks to those who have led this inquiry and presented it here. Zetud (talk) 00:18, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support considering the evidence presented. Silver hr (talk) 00:49, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support It's not possible to accept sockpuppetry, ever. Even considering that he did not vandalize the Wikipedia which I collaborate most, using sockpuppets in other Wikipedias to influence results must never be acceptable. Wikipedia community has already had enough problems with other recidivist sockpuppets. Joao Xavier (talk) 00:58, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support, per the proposers. This behaviour is intolerable. Sorry! Em-mustapha User | talk 05:34, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support as it seems obvious that existing HR 'community' can not (self)manage. Zblace (talk) 08:30, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support, per the evidence. Elserbio00 (talk) 08:41, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support presence of SP also here testifies it's mandatory--Shivanarayana (talk) 09:57, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support --Dave93b (talk) 10:18, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Users like this shouldn't belong here -ArdiPras95 (talk) 10:24, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Both me and others have had multiple revisions of mine reversed for no reason, while they were correcting false and nationalist claims (either WW2 or CWoI). I knew the situation was bad, but I really didn't know it was this bad, so I highly support this as it ruins the already bad image Croatian wiki even more - ScruffyFox (talk) 10:32, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per evidences. I don't read croatian so I can't check all evidences, but evidences regarding stewards election abuse are enough to justify a global ban. I also took the time to understand the case of WizardOfOz block in March 2010: blocking someone for a disagreement on another project–Meta (thanks, Google Translate) is a patent abuse of sysop tools. I also took a look to some other blocks listed there in 2013: it seems like abusive blocks for new users little mistakes. Regards, — Jules Talk 10:43, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support As someone who is part of the Croatian Wikipedia project, I can only say I am tremendously relieved to see this issue finally being addressed. The evidence is more than damning, and their actions have aided in compromising the reputation and quality of Croatian Wikipedia. I hope their abuse will be put to an end. --ArianJD (talk) 13:58, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support --ΞLCAIRØ♭ 14:25, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support As much as I'm happy to see that something is actually being done about this, I'm afraid the damage that has been dealt to hr.wiki (both as a Wiki and as a community) over the last decade by Kubura will take years to heal.--Saxum (talk) 14:45, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Sorry for jumping in between Saxum, but I do not think so. On hr.wiki is already much easier to contribute. Fresh wind is in the air. I am more than confident that - as soon as we ged rid of that weight - hr.wiki will heal much sooner. Best --Mark7747 (talk) 15:31, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Wikisaurus (talk) 16:15, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose I am banned from Croatian Wikipedia for several years now, because I was oposing mad claims in some uninportant article, that some parts of Croatia were freed from Turks by Serbs in 17th century, although Serbia didn`t exist back then, nor did Serbiam forces in Habsbourg army. I was blocked for life by some guy from Serbia, and all Croatian admins supported his ban. I am not a nationalist, just a scientist with 2 degrees which non of the people that banned me have. I have realised that there is some hidden reason for that madness and I am now proud to be baned in such a wrong way. The only person which have tried to be a mediator was Kubura, although he took side of the evil mob in the end. The meaning of my vote is humanistic, although it seems that there won´t be any use of it. But that is not inportant. I don`t want to be un-blocked by those people who gave life bans only to worst spamers and me. I think that they are sad and I am proud to be banned for life by them and for that cause. - Ante Vranković (talk) 17:04, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- I am native croatian speaker Ante Vranković, understand also a bit of English language, but frankly I don’t have a single clue what you wanted to tell our community here. Best, --Mark7747 (talk) 19:52, 18 November 2020 (UTC) (accidentaly loged off on meta - sry)
Dear Sir, I have described my experience with this Kubura guy, which proves that he was constructive in my case. Still, it also shows that political corectness is, in my expirience, far more important than scientific truth or even then common sense. That shows oportunism and very serious deformation of character of many contributors. They have banned me, to prove that they are politically correct! I know what they would have done in 1940-ies! I also think that Wikipedia is often misused and used by trolls and by seriously sick people. In my experience Kubura is not a troll, as he was acused by some. That is all. . - Ante Vranković (talk) 05:33, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
INPORTANT! Dear Sirs, I went to the talk page of this Kubura guy, and there is (his) statement that he is blocked and can`t respond to this accusations against him. (link: https://hr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Razgovor_sa_suradnikom:Kubura#Obavijest_o_prijedlogu_za_globalnu_blokadu) In that case this is execution, not a "trial". He will bacame a martyr and possibly even a saint, and will have chance to show ass all as Nazis. I think that all of that is wrong, and I can`t take responsability for anny further curse of events after this. - Ante Vranković (talk) 09:22, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
- Ante Vranković Please see User talk:Kubura#Global ban proposal notification and this interaction on Wikidata. Kubura has repeatedly been made aware that he can participate here if he chooses to. Blablubbs (talk) 22:14, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose, previše je dao za wikipediju, po člancima ga još godinama mnogi neće stići, ako ga i stignu ikada. Sve se ovo temelji na možda, znači možda je, a šta ako nije. Radite grijeh --Zeljko (talk) 19:31, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- po čemu je to grijeh Željko? Pojasni nam to malo, rado i na hrvatskom jeziku.--Mark7747 (talk) 19:49, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Translation: He [Kubura] gave too much to Wikipedia, many won't reach his new-article-count for years, if ever. This is all based on maybe, maybe it [the accusations] stand, but what if they don't? You are sinning. --Zeljko
- why is it a sin, Zeljko? Please elaborate, and freely do it in Croatian. --Mark7747 Sig: --Ivi104 (talk) 20:41, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I stayed neutral until now because I wanted to see whether the opposers (Here I am talking only about Croatian Wikipedia users, since they edit the Croatian Wikipedia and are more familiar with Kubura's work) would address any of the points made by MJL and others. So far, I see nothing, just nonsense arguments and people trying to change the subject. Using sockpuppets, especially on Meta, should definitely be sanctioned with a global ban for Kubura.Croxyz (talk) 20:04, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose - neocolonialist framing with political purging. This is elimination of the most prolific users, backed by poor analysis. 188.99.201.242 21:25, 18 November 2020 (UTC)zuzini 18.11.2020.
- Oppose Dear all, how are you today. I was blocked from Kubura two weeks because some my mistakes. Two time I was blocked because admin missunderstanding word difference but we solve out ignoring that problem. And one time I was blocked by Fraxinus because I was worried about me, my family and country. We can say Kubura make the most new articles across hr.wiki. with his first official account, Kubura is very communicative with new users (including me) and his communication skills inspires me and some other people to continue spend a free time work on hr.wiki. He block users whem they are rude, constantly make a mistakes and talk about politics on main page against Croats. That's positive. I like history and geography, so I worried about historical facts about Serbs and Croats. If you read sr.wikipedia.org you can see that they support Radovan Karadžić, Ratko Mladić and other war criminals from 1, 2nd World, and Homeland War in Croatia and BiH, and call Homeland War a Civil War or War in Croatia, otherwise. I am soory Serbs but that it what it is. In Second World War in Yugoslavia was intergenocide between Partisans (Comunists), Ustase, JVuO (Četnici) snd other so say that just Ustase made genocide is stupid especially because Chetniks and Partisans both did.
If you read Serbian media you can see read articles where they attacking Croatia, Great Britain, and USA. If you can see propaganda YouTube channels from Serbia which is 2 time larger teritorially and by population (88,000 km2 and 8 000 000 people) who says "Swedens are Serbs", "Celts are Serbs", "Hidden Serbian History", "Croats are Serbs", "Globally War Against Serbia" and that can just scare Croats, 56 648 km2 country and 4 000 000 people and trait to overreact like that. Let's go in First Yugoslavia, can we? So Serbian king, one of many Karađorđevićs make a Yugoslavia, but war general Dušan Simović (loyal to king) says that Dalmatia, Slavonia, Lika, Kordun belong to Serbia because in First World War Serbs was killed by 1 million, ignoring historically facts about Croatian Kingdom, Banska Hrvatska, Triune Kingdom, etc. Serbian King first 2,5 years of Yugoslav existence ruled without "Ustav", then Constitution, Vidovdanski Ustav and Obznana banned Croat people to feel a free and demokracy, later Roma and Rappal Treaty when Serbian diplomacy sold parts of Croatian Coast to Kingdom of Italia, Serbs are in Yugoslav Parliament abort votes by minority to votes by majority against interest of Slovenes and Croats (Serbs make was majority in entire Yugoslacia), "Oktroirani ustav", then they take from us 4 Austrian Crowns for 4 Serbian Dinar even if values of both was 1 dinar = 1 crown, atentats (Radić in Palianent 1928. and later Marseille), "Šestosiječanjska diktatura", unfinished Land reform when Serbia take Croat lands to Serbian soldiers from Solun battlefield. After Second World War it's happen by Serbs many massacre worser than Jasenovac like Bleiburg, Krizni put, Massacre in Odessa, no court for many Ustase, most Partizans and Chetniks was released from court as free citizens. And read this article (this is possible true) and this article to understand entire situation on hr.wikipedia.org about Second World War.
<copyrighted material redacted> By first article. Best regards, Uspjeh je ključ života (talk) 21:52, 18 November 2020 (UTC)- What are you talking about? --ΝικόλαςΜπ (talk) 12:05, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Please spare us from your rants and fringe viewpoints (mainstream for some circles present here) and focus on topic. Sadko (talk) 01:11, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support I'm first to admit that I do not shy away from a good argument. In fact, I love arguing. That is the only reason I stayed on hr.wiki after the initial confrontation with Kubura and other admins belonging to the POV pushing cabal. However, the reaction of the average user is to run away because usually people do not like to waste time fighting the windmills alone. In my opinion this was the whole plan of the cabal from the start - to make life on wikipedia unbearable for the average user who do not share their POV in order to secure the majority which will push their POV. For the purpose it wasn't enough just to harass the users fighting about content, because the content can be disputed. Instead, to ensure that their POV will survive objective scrutiny they had to have administrative power to enforce their POV by bullying independent users into submission/autocensorship or (preferably) into exile/abandonment. For that they needed majority of admins. For admins, they needed majority in votes. For the majority in votes they apparently needed the sockpuppets. The consequences are well documented by now. The problem is that Kubura is only the enforcer and the executor. The brains of this conspiracy are other admins which proposed and elected him to his admin status and protected him from the shadows for years, not exposing themselves too much if not neccessary, runining the hr.wiki project in the meantime. The whole thing illustrates how a small but organized group of malevolent actors can ruin not only the Croatian wikipedia but the whole project if the right mechanisms are not introduced in time to prevent this kind of behaviour. Because otherwise, it's just a matter of time before the same problem manifests itself elswhere, maybe even within your favourite wikipedia. Imbehind 22:07, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- The above is an excellent summary of why wikis that have been taken over by a clique cannot police themselves, and why instead active, effective outside oversight is required, something that has been unfortunately woefully lacking with respect to hr.wiki, which in turn has allowed the responsible Admins to reinforce themselves and even spread their abuse, not only on hr.wiki but to Steward elections, etc. I also thought it was very revealing that many hr.wiki participants finally spoke up only after they saw the removal of Kubura and other Admins was indeed imminent, perhaps showing a lack of trust in the prior RfC process where they did not speak up, since they saw the lack of real RfC action to solve the problem, and knew that speaking up would only result in retaliation from the largely unpunished, and still present Admins. This problem must be addressed, so that wikipedians are not held hostage and in effect terrorized by abusive Admins because of the failure to provide adequate oversight Thhhommmasss (talk) 20:04, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Behaviour compromising the functioning of local processes is exactly what the global ban procedure is intended for, in much the same way as it is futile to hope for someone tampering with elections to be voted out of office. --Matthias Winkelmann (talk) 00:33, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support. I hope the same for his Va Kozali morčić (compare [35][36] plus [37]) and numerous other sock-sleepers, once used for promoting failed ideologies. Orijentolog (talk) 05:03, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I was blocked by Kubura for no reason, and he refused to unblock me even after I explained the situation in detail. See my previous edits on Meta. --Čačvina (talk) 06:07, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose: No clear evidences for use of sockpuppetries, just admins' wars and diasagreements, and some kind of "hunt for witches". Kubura is long-term user (since 2005) and admin of Croatian Wikipedia and one of two top editors, with a variety of themes he dealt with. Also helped to manny users (including me), regulary writeing on users' talk pages and adviceing them. Losing him, hr.wiki will lose it's the most versatile user and admin. Cybermb (talk) 06:58, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support massive abuse. --Icodense (talk) 08:24, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support: I was a longtime contributor, patroller and (for a while) administrator on hr.wiki, which I left mostly due to the aforementioned events of 2013 and 2014. The voting proposal for Dean72, Argo Navis and Conquistador to become administrators was not accepted, and it was Kubura's (now proven) sockpuppets that made a close difference. Kubura and some of the above-mentioned contributors poisoned the atmosphere on hr.wiki for over a decade, putting one agenda above the very essence of wikipedia's existence, labeling contributors with different opinions as unpatriotic, badgering established contributors so countless left the project (and that was the purpose), maintaining the status quo, scaring off new contributors and generally privatizing the project. I am very disappointed with a global community that it took so long to intervene. If there is such a thing as too much evidence, this would be it. Kubura deserves a global ban, but even if that happens, it is still far from fixing the situation on hr.wiki. - Mario Žamić (talk) 08:22, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support as a longtime admin from Serbian Wikipedia and former Stewart, I've seen firsthand the extent of Kubura's abuse and the detrimental effect that it had on hrwiki community and its legacy. Many constructive community members were driven away by his actions or implicit or explicit support of his actions, so removing him from the community would be a net positive. --FiliP ██ 09:38, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support for the actions he did, but it seemed that it may override local desysop process. If this is true, it can be treated as cross-community bullying (read: global community bully a smaller community) if this is done multiple times. Considering the actions done by him to literally transform the whole hrwiki community to effectively his control, much more should be discussed for movement governance. (e.g. project trustees that can be selected by the WMF? for wikis that have 10000+ articles). Just replying from some opposing votes: being blocked indef on 3 wikis at the same time with reasons clearly indicate something wrong there: either your understanding to the user, or the understanding of the movement itself. I do not agree on any members of a community being indef'd (which is reviewed) can retain advanced rights on other roles. Also, this sockpuppetry means that the 2020 stewards elections should be looked and investigated onto.--1233 (T / C) 10:13, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support As requestor and co-requestor--Pierpao (talk) 10:29, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Tampering with global steward elections is big "no no" in my book. --OC Ripper (talk) 10:38, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Kubura is the bully of an extreme right-wing project that destroyed the Croatian wikipedia. Administrator SpeedyGonsales, who cooperates with extreme right-wing associations in Croatia, took the reins from Denny, the founder of Hr.wiki, and became a bureaucrat. Together with Roberta, he started a conflict in 2009, after which almost half of the active contributors left the Croatian Wikipedia, and then he appointed extreme right-wing administrators such as Kubura and Željko. During this period, new rules were adopted which strengthened their ‘authority’ and turned Hr.wiki into a kind of monster that we are witnessing today. The daily patrolling and harassment of rare associates who are not on the ultranationalist line SpeedyGonsales left to Admin Kubura.--DobarSkroz (talk) 12:06, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I have to take this chance to show my strong support, as I've recently been publicly called out by Kubura in his list of undesireables. [38]. I don't feel safe on hr.wiki. --Koora (talk) 12:25, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Neutral Dispite presented arguments are not in his favor, I would like Kubura present his defence. I don't want this to end up like a witch trial. Only then I would be willing to state my decision towards this case. Walter9 (talk) 12:34, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Walter9 I can help you there. This is Kubura response to this mess [39]. Kanikosen (talk) 19:23, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support I am convinced by the evidence that there is a long-term pattern of disruptive behaviour, tool abuse, and socking. BegbertBiggs (talk) 14:59, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support I'm appalled by the evidence against Kubura. --Governor Sheng (talk) 15:30, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support When looking at the accusations and the presented evidence provided by Lasta there is no other way but to describe this as a clear case. But taking aside the purely technical nature of this RfC this case against Kubura bears another dimension and it concerns the hr.wiki project itself which is dominated by like-minded POV abusers of power who outright denied and deny users who don't agree with their POV the right to contribute, especially when backed by trustworthy sources. I hope this is the beginning of a community backed deep and thorough catharsis of the whole hr.wiki project which will help restore its quality and neutrality. ValterUdarnik (talk) 16:33, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I gave up on HrWiki because of Kubura and his circle. If HrWiki is cleaned of such bullies, I would reconsider that decision. --Hatzivelkos 17:40, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
Arbitrary break 2
- Strong support Very biased and agenda pushing, one of the reasons Croatian Wikipedia has a bad reputation --MarkoOn 18:51, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support I'm a former admin and ArbCom member of croatian wikipedia. This is my first edit after 4 years. I left because I was unsatisfied with situation on croatian wikipedia. I support the proposal because I believe hr wikipedia needs a fresh start. Maybe, just maybe I come back then. --Flopy (talk) 19:26, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Question: @Flopy: I do see a value in a fresh start, though wouldn't that involve all admins losing their rights and resubmitting to elections after a short period? Or for all administrators to be going through a confirmation process? I have commented above that I have issues being a defacto push to a fresh start. I would hope that a fresh start would be a push both internally and externally for the wiki to consider, especially in light of global concerns. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:33, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose, and maybe support. There are three major reasons given for the global ban proposal:
- POV-pushing. Quite frankly, I do not think that the global community has the ability to determine this. Certainly not better than the local community, regardless of its issues. If POV-pushing becomes a valid reason to globally ban someone, we will have a giant mess on Meta with people trying to overrule local decisions (on every wiki) by appealing to those on Meta, and then we might even have the "neocolonialist" issues being claimed by some in the above discussion. We will certainly have increased the difficulty for local communities to deal with their own problems. I'd throw out this reason entirely.
- Croatian Wikipedia rights abuse. Per User:Billinghurst, if the user is supported by the local community, it does not matter how they've been using their tools. The local community can make their own judgements, and we may not overrule their decisions arbitrarily.
- Socking. This basically comes down to whether the analysis at User:Lasta/CU38 is correct. I do not have the ability to determine this, as I'm insufficiently familiar with how Checkuser data and such works. I'd appreciate it if someone who does understand these things could comment on its validity. Afaict, there has been zero discussion so far about its validity.
If it is valid, and the user has been defrauding global elections and using socks to fake local consensus, I think that would be enough reason to support a global ban, independent of the other issues.
- Most of the support !votes above are based on the first two issues. I oppose instituting a global ban based on either of the first two issues. If the socking accusations are correct, and the user either does not have the support of their local community (and has simply been faking support by means of socks), or has been manipulating global elections, I would support a global ban for that alone, and only for that alone. --Yair rand (talk) 23:13, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Yair rand: See User talk:Vodomar#Side-by-side comparison or speak to Sakretsu. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 00:01, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Yair rand, speaking purely about the checkuser investigation, your understanding as noted here is flawed. Lasta’s analysis was evidence they compiled to request a check. The check itself was preformed by Sakretsu and made note on the connection of the involved accounts. Your comment is basically saying that the validity of a CU investigation’s result is contingent on the person who requested it. This is not factual. The actual results were obtained using private data gathered through the checkuser tool, as is the nature of checkuser investigations, and thus cannot be discussed publicly. Sakretsu publicly delivered the results of their investigation here, after which the accounts deemed likely were blocked on hrwiki (so much for community support), and after my investigation, on metawiki as well. It does appear you are not the only person with this misunderstanding; Kubura has been writing on Sakretsu’s hrwiki talk page saying various things about how Lasta is untrustworthy and otherwise trying to attack the evidence of him abusing multiple accounts to flip a steward election and his attempt to flip the hrwiki RfC. Well, unlike some former hrwiki checkusers, stewards don’t fabricate data, and the results of the CU investigation are independent from Lasta’s request. Hope this helps, Vermont (talk) 12:32, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- In addition, with regard to Croatian rights abuse, do you really think that hrwp community will be able to solve this. If they can tamper with SE to fail one single candidate, can't they do the likewise on hrwp to prevent desysop, feign community consensus to uphold their abusive blocks or not to block some users etc. The user may seems to be supported by their community, but how much of that community is created by them using socks / meatpuppets? This is the key issue. I have no comments on POV issues as well as CU issues. Just to comment on your 2nd point. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 12:41, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vermont: @Camouflaged Mirage: Sakretsu wrote this in his report: "Just to be clear, it cannot be confirmed that these users are indeed socks. What I can say, however, is that there is concrete technical evidence supporting the suspicion of either sockpuppetry or meatpuppetry." With cannot be confirmed and there is suspicion and Likely and Possible he delivered a result that he's not sure.--Rovoobob Talk 09:24, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- " Given that the deceptive use of such a large number of accounts may well undermine the usual community processes, it is my recommendation that especially all the above users who are likely to have a connection with Kubura be treated accordingly." please do not omit this. I am amazed you @Rovoobob: and Kubura made this same statement (this is Kubura statement). I am very inclined to treat you as best a meatpuppet with this behavioral evidence. Although by pointing out this 2nd part, I sounds really like @Rschen7754: so by my logic I can be a meatpuppet with Rschen7754. Hence, I will not be characterizing you as such but with behaviour of community members like you here so balantly wrongly analysing a CU result delivered by a steward where he himself had analysed in the same result, I am very little confident that hrwp can take care of hrwp issues itself w.r.t. Kubura. Hence, my faith that there should be a global ban/desysop of Kubura increases. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 10:32, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage: again likely. Will somebody just write down are they or are they not his socks for us not thechnicaly good? On that me being meatpuppet thing, you're first inclined, then not, with your behaviour like that no wonder people get blocked on meta for suspicion.--Rovoobob Talk 10:52, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Do you exactly know what I am talking about? I am concerned about you putting out such a statement that almost mirror Kubura statement word-for-word. By alluding to myself being a meatpuppet, I am just using hyberbole and extreme caution. With this extreme caution in place, you alluding to us blocking people on meta by mere suspicion fails by itself, where the real case is that we take very deep consideration in our blocking. I will note that even if 2 users is technically indistinguishable, they can still be socks / meat, judging of socks or not doesn't really only rely on technical knowledge, there's always a need to consider behaviour. I think this even your now removed CUs Ex13 and Vodomar can agree to. What we have here is a CU on meta, Vermont compared the technical details of Kubura, and the socks, alongside behavioural edvidence, to issue a check-user block. There are edvidence of Kubura socking, that's undeniable. The more denial the community gives, the harder the community can be trusted to resolve their issues locally. I won't respond anymore. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 11:31, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage: I never saw his statement until you posted it here. I won't respond to you either anymore.--Rovoobob Talk 11:52, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Do you exactly know what I am talking about? I am concerned about you putting out such a statement that almost mirror Kubura statement word-for-word. By alluding to myself being a meatpuppet, I am just using hyberbole and extreme caution. With this extreme caution in place, you alluding to us blocking people on meta by mere suspicion fails by itself, where the real case is that we take very deep consideration in our blocking. I will note that even if 2 users is technically indistinguishable, they can still be socks / meat, judging of socks or not doesn't really only rely on technical knowledge, there's always a need to consider behaviour. I think this even your now removed CUs Ex13 and Vodomar can agree to. What we have here is a CU on meta, Vermont compared the technical details of Kubura, and the socks, alongside behavioural edvidence, to issue a check-user block. There are edvidence of Kubura socking, that's undeniable. The more denial the community gives, the harder the community can be trusted to resolve their issues locally. I won't respond anymore. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 11:31, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage: again likely. Will somebody just write down are they or are they not his socks for us not thechnicaly good? On that me being meatpuppet thing, you're first inclined, then not, with your behaviour like that no wonder people get blocked on meta for suspicion.--Rovoobob Talk 10:52, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- " Given that the deceptive use of such a large number of accounts may well undermine the usual community processes, it is my recommendation that especially all the above users who are likely to have a connection with Kubura be treated accordingly." please do not omit this. I am amazed you @Rovoobob: and Kubura made this same statement (this is Kubura statement). I am very inclined to treat you as best a meatpuppet with this behavioral evidence. Although by pointing out this 2nd part, I sounds really like @Rschen7754: so by my logic I can be a meatpuppet with Rschen7754. Hence, I will not be characterizing you as such but with behaviour of community members like you here so balantly wrongly analysing a CU result delivered by a steward where he himself had analysed in the same result, I am very little confident that hrwp can take care of hrwp issues itself w.r.t. Kubura. Hence, my faith that there should be a global ban/desysop of Kubura increases. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 10:32, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vermont: @Camouflaged Mirage: Sakretsu wrote this in his report: "Just to be clear, it cannot be confirmed that these users are indeed socks. What I can say, however, is that there is concrete technical evidence supporting the suspicion of either sockpuppetry or meatpuppetry." With cannot be confirmed and there is suspicion and Likely and Possible he delivered a result that he's not sure.--Rovoobob Talk 09:24, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- In addition, with regard to Croatian rights abuse, do you really think that hrwp community will be able to solve this. If they can tamper with SE to fail one single candidate, can't they do the likewise on hrwp to prevent desysop, feign community consensus to uphold their abusive blocks or not to block some users etc. The user may seems to be supported by their community, but how much of that community is created by them using socks / meatpuppets? This is the key issue. I have no comments on POV issues as well as CU issues. Just to comment on your 2nd point. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 12:41, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Yair rand, speaking purely about the checkuser investigation, your understanding as noted here is flawed. Lasta’s analysis was evidence they compiled to request a check. The check itself was preformed by Sakretsu and made note on the connection of the involved accounts. Your comment is basically saying that the validity of a CU investigation’s result is contingent on the person who requested it. This is not factual. The actual results were obtained using private data gathered through the checkuser tool, as is the nature of checkuser investigations, and thus cannot be discussed publicly. Sakretsu publicly delivered the results of their investigation here, after which the accounts deemed likely were blocked on hrwiki (so much for community support), and after my investigation, on metawiki as well. It does appear you are not the only person with this misunderstanding; Kubura has been writing on Sakretsu’s hrwiki talk page saying various things about how Lasta is untrustworthy and otherwise trying to attack the evidence of him abusing multiple accounts to flip a steward election and his attempt to flip the hrwiki RfC. Well, unlike some former hrwiki checkusers, stewards don’t fabricate data, and the results of the CU investigation are independent from Lasta’s request. Hope this helps, Vermont (talk) 12:32, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
Strong oppose this is witch hunt.— Preceding unsigned comment added by MMMagnazza (talk) 23:28, 19 November 2020 (UTC)Either sock/meat puppetry - first edit globally. --Martin Urbanec (talk) 18:45, 25 November 2020 (UTC)- Interesting first edit on any WMF site. --Rschen7754 01:28, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Keen to strike this out, ideas? @Rschen7754 Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 12:37, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- I think I will just strike and state meatpuppetry/Single-use account.--1233 (T / C) 14:25, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Is it interesting because it's my first edit or because i oppose? Yes, first edit, and scrolling threw unfinished books. My statement is clear: strong oppose to the witch hunt. You are trying for no reason and based on insinuations to bring down a man who is doing a good job. Just because this is my first edit, doesn't mean I'm not following the situation.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by MMMagnazza (talk) 06:48, 21 November 2020 (UTC)- I don't care if you support or not, I am just caring it is your 1st edit globally. This is a textbook example of en:WP:SPA and yes, more canvassing / etc that some may call but I will just say such votes aren't credible at all. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 10:35, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Interesting first edit on any WMF site. --Rschen7754 01:28, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support + a side note on how canvassing and meatpuppetry could be used for deliberate and concerted defense of Kubura, or any of his local project associates, in attempt to influence an outcome, that could come from hr.wikipedia or through other means (email, phone, close living/working proximity) - from personal experience → Solicitation of assistance & support at Croatian lang.wiki--s a n t a | t a l k | p i t 00:50, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support per behavioral evidence at User:Lasta/CU38 and refutation of the opposing CU data at User talk:Vodomar#Side-by-side comparison. Wugapodes (talk) 05:52, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support — I cannot read Croatian, but I have read all his English comments from Requests for comment/Site-wide administrator abuse and WP:PILLARS violations on the Croatian Wikipedia, most of them are either paranoid, or biggotted, or discriminatory, or a combination of these. Kubura is one of the major supporters of homophobia and Holocaust denialism at hr.wiki. Tgeorgescu (talk) 10:08, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support If there is anything stronger than a global ban, this should be administered, including anyone from that same group who arguably worked hard to deteriorate the credibility of Wikipedia in Croatia and globally. This person was one of the main agents of sowing discord, one of the most vicious hypocrites and abusers that I know about, not only on Wikipedia but in general as well. It was him, Speedy, Roberta F and Željko who made me drop any idea about correcting/editing. The writing on the wall was very clear: We own the place and we shall wield it for our agenda. I just could not make myself have anything to do with a project that produced such a toxic environment in spite of dozens of decent hard-working contributors. I could not make myself get exposed to their cynicism and hypocrisy and Wiki was over for me before I even started. I hope that one day we will organize some sort of a concerted effort and try to undo the damage they have done. Last, but not least: Knowing how aggressive they can be, I was quite reluctant to write this comment. I think that many others may feel the same way and that their bullying discouraged many users from stepping forward. --Tomislav Patarčić (talk) 10:11, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support: If you need evidence of Kubura's leanings (and methods of work) here's just a simple example: this is hr.wiki page for a recently deceased Croatian war criminal Tomislav Merčep. The page has been locked for editing by Kubura in order to make it impossible for anyone to write that the guy was, in fact, a war criminal. He tortured and killed civilians. He was sentenced for war crimes and imprisoned (only to be released earlier this year due to his bad health). The first sentence of the article says that "Tomislav Merčep was a Croatian politician and a war commander." No mention of war crimes. The second paragraph in the article is titled "Accusations of war crimes" so that anyone who reads it is inclined to think that those were just accusations and not real war crimes. Only at the very end of the paragraph there are two sentences which acknowledge that he was in fact sentenced as a war criminal. Why is Kubura so intent on blocking anyone from editing this article? Because Merčep was Croatian and among Croatian right-wingers there's a steadfast adage that no Croatians could've commited war crimes. I mean the article itself is a fantastic example of whitewashing where unknown, marginal and insignificant sources are given the same weight as established names and publishers; where the majority of text is dedicated to narrative which excludes any fact that could throw the subject in negative light, and only brings truth where it is impossible to avoid it. If anyone in Croatian academia needs for their students an example of how media whitewhashing works, they don't have to look any further.--Barry Jive and His Uptown Five (talk) 14:27, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Corrected, thank you! Imbehind 20:37, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Thank you. But we both know that that's only the first step in the right direction. Many more to come. --Barry Jive and His Uptown Five (talk) 08:59, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support He acted like a dictator, oppressing those who opposed his intolerable behavior..--EnzoEncius 18:52, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support. The criteria are more than satisfied in my opinion. I do have some thoughts below. Wumbolo (talk) 23:51, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
Comments by Wumbolo |
---|
The wording "Greater Serbian forces" (velikosrpske snage) actually still enjoys consensus and is present on the live page, fifteen years later. If this continues to be the established NPOV version, this is an argument in favor of Kubura. Should the consensus change, well we aren't going to ban everyone who has tolerated this wording for fifteen years. This is not an elaborate or deceptive hoax, these are just two words.
With regards to the Yugoslavian Army and the ISC, the provided diff shows the text being added in a comment, as a draft version, but here is a diff where Kubura inserts the text into the article prose. |
- Support While it's rare that a global ban is the least restrictive means of dealing with these situations, I am convinced that this is one of those cases. The problems here cannot be resolved on the home wiki because its institutions have been rigged. In such a situation, the global community must intervene, if only to defend the WMF's reputation. The sockpuppetry and the meddling in steward elections puts this beyond dispute: grievous harm is being done to the very concepts of equality and collaboration upon which this project is built. While I don't reach this conclusion lightly, I feel that a global ban is necessary. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 04:52, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Suppression of a community because of mere disagreements is something that should not be tolerated under any circumstances. Attempting unduly to influence or alter election results across other Wikimedia sites so as to suppress specific voices also should not be tolerated under any circumstances, especially where functionaries with a global role are affected by that action. Hence, I believe that this behaviour warrants a global ban -- Sau226 (talk) 06:35, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support The amount of bad behaviour is striking. Taylor 49 (talk) 08:55, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support I don't often vote in RFCs this large and controversial. However, the English-language evidence here alone against Kubura is so overwhelming that it would feel wrong to not take a stance in favor of strong measures against his conduct. Glades12 (talk) 13:23, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support I think I last observed this embarrassment in 2013, and it's utterly ridiculous it's still going on. --Joy (talk) 19:02, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose This is not OK. I disagree with blaming unconnected persons, especially when blaming is based on confirmation bias.Vrtleska225 (talk) 22:54, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vrtleska225: Would you please elaborate a bit on "blaming unconnected persons"? It appears to me that this RFC is targeting Kubura only. H78c67c (talk) 04:19, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
- @H78c67c: I did mention another user in "The cover-ups". That could possibly be it, so it is not an unreasonable oppose vote if that is the case. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 05:33, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vrtleska225: Would you please elaborate a bit on "blaming unconnected persons"? It appears to me that this RFC is targeting Kubura only. H78c67c (talk) 04:19, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I haven't really delved into the checkuser process before or the problems with small-wiki governance (other than being aware of the general issue of capture), so I came to this fairly low-information. After a bunch of reading through the evidence and the discussions Wugapodes linked, though, I'm persuaded enough that the sockpuppetry allegations are valid and the bias issues are real to cast a !vote here. Seeing a bunch of users I trust expressing support above (including Denny, who has ties to Croatian Wikipedia) also helps persuade me that there's no witch hunt here or other reason that the clearly prevailing view might turn out to be somehow wrong. Don't give my !vote too much weight as I'm somewhat muddling my way through this space, but after doing my best to seek out the case for Kubura's defense, I cannot find anything exculpatory. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 05:16, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support. It is important to have a chance to stop persistent wrongdoing in a certain wiki through intervention of the global community of Wikipedians. Andrei Romanenko (talk) 12:18, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support - based on the evidence above, I see no reason to allow this user to continue their wrongdoing across Wikipedia(s). MrConorAE (talk) 19:01, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support The sockpuppetry allegations are concerning, and the blatant POV pushing is unacceptable; what makes me support a global ban is how he uses his admin powers in genuinely reprehensible ways to suppress dissent. It simply goes against the cores values of Wikipedia. Zoozaz1 (talk) 22:37, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per evidence. The very detailed report above proves far beyond any reasonable doubt that Kubura has systematically acted in contrast with the Wiki*edian principles of good faith, search of NPOV, proper use of sysop/bureaucrat rights. Even if some of these issues should have been primarily ascertained at a single-project level, they have produced effects both at Meta level (sockuppeting in elections) and in terms of damage of the external reputation of Wikipedia. --Nicolabel (talk) 00:41, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support This ban should just be the first step in the direction of cleaning up the infamous hr.wiki. He/she deserves it on so many levels. Sadko (talk) 00:45, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support I crossed my path with Kubura in 2007 and concluded that writing unbiased free encyclopedia that anyone can edit doesn't concern Kubura at all. Then in 2009/2010 came Dalibor Bosic and WizardOfOz cases and after them Kubura was elevated to rank of sysop. Even then (2009/2010), there were rumors that he has alternative account(s), but allegedly he didn't use them at time in illegal activities. But I wonder, why an user would make additional account(s) that do(es) what original account does - did he intend to use it/them in case of some emergency? Anyway, I foretold than that he would use his new powers to impose his will, he rarely (or never) did something more advanced such dealing with copyrighted images and cleaning and improving templates, gadgets... He even now uploads copyrighted images, although a free alternatives can be maden (example screenshots hr:File:Knežev dvor u Pridvorju 6. studenoga 2020., snimak zaslona, HTV.jpg (Freedom of panorama exists in Croatian law), hr:File:Rasadnik lješnjaka kod Daruvara, HRT, snimak zaslona, 30. rujna 2020..png (photo of a hazelfield under fair use) and this for example hr:File:MORH 28. kolovoza 2020. - 50279417352 b3ba0421aa o.jpg - how something can be in same time under Fair Use and Free (The latter example is not Kubura's personal fault, it is fault of whole hr.wiki community, but I brought this issue to illustrate that is beyond his interests/knowledge. And it is used in article on MiG 21, as if Commons doesn't have a shitload of images) Back to topic. In 2013 we had this unresolved soap opera Requests for comment/2013 issues on Croatian Wikipedia. Nothing was done then, and now we are here again. It is sad that 7(+3+1+2) years, dozens of sockpupets who rigged hr.wiki sysop and steward elections were required for wider community to understand with what problematic user(s) we were/are dealing with. -- Bojan Talk 03:55, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support This user’s impact has been worse than any vandal or CoI editor could ever be. Embarrassing they weren’t banned 7 years ago. SK2242 (talk) 10:21, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Have seen very little but detrimental behavior from this user, and their influence on the development of hrwiki (among others) has been strongly negative. Setting aside their repeated POV-pushing in the service of apologia for war crimes (which, ugly as it is, might not be a matter for meta to deal with), there is no justification for their sockpuppetry and misuse of admin tools. Vorziblix (talk) 16:49, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
Strong oppose - one of the most active hr.wiki users. It will be pity to ban him. 78.0.6.144 20:59, 23 November 2020 (UTC)Striking comment of CU-blocked user. Vermont (talk) 21:53, 23 November 2020 (UTC)- Support. The editor under examination has engaged in historical negationism, strategically placed improper blocks on other editors, and used sockpuppets to disrupt a steward election. Additionally, all of the criteria for a global ban are met. — Newslinger talk 05:56, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Evidently corrupt, extremely right-wing POV and is not bettering the movement. Seemplez (talk) 10:28, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support POV pushing account crosswiki. HurricaneTracker495 (talk) 13:55, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support Many reasonable users talked enough regarding this, I do not believe I need to add more reasons to the plate. Users like Kubura shouldn't be tolerated, let alone authorised to hold major permissions like sysop. He imposed his terror on the wikis he edited, and this shall not stand. --Anderlaxe (talk) 02:01, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support --Lunna X (talk) 11:19, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support: I hope this will be the end of Commedia dell'arte called Croatian Wikipedia.--Vitek (talk) 11:46, 26 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support Tbiw (talk) 20:28, 26 November 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support It's time to end this. Sannita - not just another it.wiki sysop 22:28, 26 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support I was banned and bullied by the same person on several occasions, mostly because of my nickname and the fact that my language wasn't "Croatian enough". His actions are against everything that Wikipedia stands for and those actions should be put to an end. After Kubura gets banned, other numerous problems on the infamous hr.wiki should be revealed as well. Soundwaweserb (talk) 14:20, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- Soundwaweserb, Kubura did lot of damage on hr.wiki. More than enough. No doubt about it.
- But (and frankly) your single edit (as well as your "show" on hr.wiki) long time ago was inappropriate. Just for the record.
- Please be so kind and don't use this more than difficult situation for your own profiling
- Thanks in advance --Mark7747 (talk) 14:39, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support A sysop using a dozen accounts to change the balance in a steward election or to vote for himself is something absolutely not acceptable in any conditions. I am not in a good position to judge if his positions on Croatian history are mainstream or marginal in Croatia, people with a knowledge of Croatian history should judge. Political or historical views might be a sensible topic, sockpuppetry at this scale is a thing that cannot be accepted in any case and must result in a ban — NickK (talk) 15:41, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support * Pppery * it has begun 22:42, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
Correction for section "The cover-ups"
I was working on a shared computer. Then a colleague made this stupid "joke". I don't want to be associated with it anymore. Please respect this. Furthermore, this sentence makes no sense, since I have added that Ante Pavelić was a dictator (w.wiki/mpj). Finally, I would like to emphasize that I am against any totalitarian ideology and I hope that the majority of the editors are as well (unfortunately, you can always see many who do not think so). --Mateo K 01 (talk) 00:49, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- I will highly encourage no one to respond to this. This is an RFC about Kubura and his actions, and at the end of the day Kubura lied about the reasoning for deleting the revisions. Whether Mateo K 01 had failed to keep his account from being compromised or is perpetuating a lie to save face really does not matter in the grand scheme of things. Kubura shielded Mateo here from accountability. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 05:34, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
Further discussion
- Getting the elephant out of the room, if this ban is sucessful, does it mean that Kubura rights in hrwp will be removed? Or like we don't remove rights from indef-blocked users when they are blocked, as they can be unblocked just as Kubura can be community unbanned? Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 16:49, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage: I have to imagine that Kubura would be allowed to keep his rights since that's still technically a local issue which remains unaddressed in this RFC. However, he won't be able to log into his account if this gets passed since it will be glocked, so it won't actually matter. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 17:00, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- @MJL I am thinking of a subsidiary RFC or one more question of the rights issues since there are serious abuse concerns above, but yes, a globally locked user won't be allowed to use the rights and AAR will kick in 2 years to remove the inactive rights. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:05, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- I believe Ajraddatz is working on that as part of the hrwiki RFC. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 17:08, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- I was always wondering what we would do in that type of situation which you've just described. Nothing has been noted at Global locks what to do, but as ML said it probably doesn't matter as the user can't log into his/her account anyways. It might just look weird to see a sysop that is globally locked. —Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 17:08, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- WMF generally does remove all sysop+ rights when they ban and I don't see why stewards wouldn't do the same. As far as the enwiki rule, we do remove rights when a user is globally banned since they are most likely not coming back. --Rschen7754 17:10, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Rschen7754: I am not particularly referring to enwp policy, at zh we also review the rights of blocked users before removing them. But true, community bans should not deviate from foundation ban in terms of rights removal. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:21, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- Rights would be removed as redundant on the implementation of a global ban; yes it is implicit, but it should be self-evident. Stewards would get to make the decision and any wiki is able to document that however they may so choose. — billinghurst sDrewth 03:49, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Rschen7754: I am not particularly referring to enwp policy, at zh we also review the rights of blocked users before removing them. But true, community bans should not deviate from foundation ban in terms of rights removal. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:21, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- I believe Ajraddatz is working on that as part of the hrwiki RFC. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 17:08, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- @MJL I am thinking of a subsidiary RFC or one more question of the rights issues since there are serious abuse concerns above, but yes, a globally locked user won't be allowed to use the rights and AAR will kick in 2 years to remove the inactive rights. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:05, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage: I have to imagine that Kubura would be allowed to keep his rights since that's still technically a local issue which remains unaddressed in this RFC. However, he won't be able to log into his account if this gets passed since it will be glocked, so it won't actually matter. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 17:00, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
I have no opinion either way on the ban, but it looks to me like every single "oppose" vote above promptly triggered a response questioning the rationale. Nothing similar seems to be happening to "support" votes. Is this a fair process? Doesn't this discourage "oppose" votes? - Jmabel (talk) 16:41, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Jmabel: I have been working on telling users not to be so responsive to oppose voters. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 16:53, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Jmabel Well, there is no opposition in responding to support votes. I myself supported but also did query other supporters. This needs to be both ways, supporters willing to be questioned why they support; opposes should be willing to explain why they oppose. The consensus will be much stronger if both sides have been given chances to voice all doubts. If anyone feel that they are being badgered or they might be, don't worry, oppose / support all you like, be willing to get questioned about your points and if they hold water, your points will be valid. If there are serious badgering, meta sysops can act and anyone can request a review on RFH. Regards, Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:04, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Support votes are easy to justify: those editors accept the evidence described above. An opposer will have to explain why they don't accept that evidence. So, yes, there's an inherent difference in how suppose and oppose votes have to be justified. --Randykitty (talk) 17:08, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- I am just curious: Does Meta have any substantive conduct rules? Or is it complete free-for-all around here? E.g. the 'oppose' comment by 185.18.61.44 contains a missive arguing in favor of classifying Same-sex sexuality under Sexual disorders. On most wikis that kind of thing would be considered hate speech and dealt with accordingly. Nsk92 (talk) 23:21, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
- Yes, this filing does raise some issues. I didn't see anything about hate speech in WM's terms of use [40]. I realize that most Wikiprojects are WX:NOTCENSORED, but in the rest of the world there's an understanding that this doesn't include hate speech. At the same time, I'm confused as to why the filer doesn't just say "He's a Nazi and he's promoting Nazi views." It's not like there aren't rules against promoting political POVs, WX:NEUTRALITY for just one. But if someone outside this conversation hadn't told me this was about Naziism, I'm not sure I'd have figured it out. Jmabel, that may be why the oppose views got responses. Darkfrog24 (talk) 00:04, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Darkfrog24: I probably could have done a better job making this request clearer for people who aren't aware of the political history of the Balkans. I kind of take that understanding for granted for the most part. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 02:33, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- I get it, though, it's touchy. On the one hand, Wikipedias' core concept is "no idea is forbidden so long as it is sourced and treated encyclopedically," but "Oh, wait, right, Nazis." I don't mean to say it's okay for someone to be a Nazi so long as they follow all the sourcing and neutrality rules so much that if they did follow sourcing and neutrality rules, we wouldn't be able to tell they were a Nazi. Darkfrog24 (talk) 03:30, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Darkfrog24: I probably could have done a better job making this request clearer for people who aren't aware of the political history of the Balkans. I kind of take that understanding for granted for the most part. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 02:33, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Yes, this filing does raise some issues. I didn't see anything about hate speech in WM's terms of use [40]. I realize that most Wikiprojects are WX:NOTCENSORED, but in the rest of the world there's an understanding that this doesn't include hate speech. At the same time, I'm confused as to why the filer doesn't just say "He's a Nazi and he's promoting Nazi views." It's not like there aren't rules against promoting political POVs, WX:NEUTRALITY for just one. But if someone outside this conversation hadn't told me this was about Naziism, I'm not sure I'd have figured it out. Jmabel, that may be why the oppose views got responses. Darkfrog24 (talk) 00:04, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
Systemic problems on hrwiki
Your comment intrigues me, @SMB99thx:. Do you really think removing Kubara will fix hrwiki's problems? The impression I get from this filing is that he's the symptom, not the cause. Still, it's possible for one user to dominate a wikiproject if it's small and they get rid of people who don't play along with them. Hrwiki needs fixing. Darkfrog24 (talk) 00:04, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Yes. Removing Kubura will help getting hrwiki ultimately fixed and probably start the purge of POV-pushers in hrwiki. If not for Kubura, hrwiki probably will not become the problematic Wikipedia we know today. SMB99thx 00:08, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Well that would be good. What do you think caused all this to happen in the first place? Darkfrog24 (talk) 00:15, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- What are the systemic problems that are affecting the hr.wiki project? List the top 10 issues. Vodomar (talk) 02:50, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- The matters raised in the signpost article: factual inaccuracy, POV-pushing (nationalism), and bias by omission. Darkfrog24 (talk) 03:32, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Vodomar probably wasn't actually asking, Darkfrog. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:40, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Possibly, but Vodomar's not the only one to whom I was speaking. Darkfrog24 (talk) 03:50, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- With all due respect the article is 2 years old and the Wikipedia has moved along as a project. Many of the sort of reporting that Jutarnji did was a fishing exercise and creating scandal. Yes, I do agree many articles had issues, and many have been corrected. This is not an isolated issue of the hr.wikipedia:
- https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jul/29/the-five-wikipedia-biases-pro-western-male-dominated
- https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/10/how-wikipedia-is-hostile-to-women/411619/
- https://journal.media-culture.org.au/index.php/mcjournal/article/view/315
- https://www.researchgate.net/publication/317788264_Persistent_Bias_on_Wikipedia_Methods_and_Responses
- https://evolutionnews.org/2017/12/wikipedia-co-founder-calls-wikipedia-entry-on-intelligent-design-appallingly-biased/
- https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3041021.3053375
- http://www.lcii.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/A.-Kerkhof-J.-M%C3%BCnster-Coverage-bias-on-Wikipedia.pdf
- https://theprint.in/india/biased-anti-hindu-campaign-begins-against-wikipedia-after-it-urges-indians-to-donate/472980/
- https://www.gesis.org/institut/mitarbeiterverzeichnis/person/claudia.wagner
- With all due respect the article is 2 years old and the Wikipedia has moved along as a project. Many of the sort of reporting that Jutarnji did was a fishing exercise and creating scandal. Yes, I do agree many articles had issues, and many have been corrected. This is not an isolated issue of the hr.wikipedia:
- Possibly, but Vodomar's not the only one to whom I was speaking. Darkfrog24 (talk) 03:50, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- Vodomar probably wasn't actually asking, Darkfrog. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:40, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- The matters raised in the signpost article: factual inaccuracy, POV-pushing (nationalism), and bias by omission. Darkfrog24 (talk) 03:32, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
- The list can go on. I was instrumental in driving at one stage in the improvement of articles. Vodomar (talk) 03:06, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vodomar: Croatian Wikipedia, alongside my own Scots Wikipedia, was recently listed by Gizmodo as one of the most controversial language versions of Wikipedia (alongside Cebuano and Azerbaijani). It cited "The Curious Case of Croatian Wikipedia" from just last year. Also, there is no comparison between "English Wikipedia doesn't have enough biographies about Women" and "Sometimes Croatian Wikipedia articles make apologies for literal fascists and occasionally promote anti-LGBT propaganda." –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:46, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @MJL: the Gizmodo article is quoting the Signpost article which is just a regurgitated piece which is quoting information from articles that were written by Jutarnji list (tabloid newspaper involved in many examples of questionable journalistic practices) which also quotes Balkan Insight which is quoting the same Jutarnji list articles, which really makes the Signpost article a regurgitation of the Balkan Insight article (regurgitating Jutarnjih list) and Jutarnji list, articles from Jutarnji list from 2013, as well as quoting an article which is more of an essay rant from Jutarnji which names the hr.wiki as an instrument of neo-Nazi with no reference or substance. The whole signpost article is just a regurgitated piece which has no substance of its own as it deconstructs the writing of others, combining translations of the Jutarnji articles and offer very little. The Gizmodo article like the Signpost article offers very little but POV of other journalists. Point specifically which articles now are problematic on the Croatian Wikipedia at this moment and like previously. Here are a few more references:
- @Vodomar: Croatian Wikipedia, alongside my own Scots Wikipedia, was recently listed by Gizmodo as one of the most controversial language versions of Wikipedia (alongside Cebuano and Azerbaijani). It cited "The Curious Case of Croatian Wikipedia" from just last year. Also, there is no comparison between "English Wikipedia doesn't have enough biographies about Women" and "Sometimes Croatian Wikipedia articles make apologies for literal fascists and occasionally promote anti-LGBT propaganda." –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:46, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- https://thecritic.co.uk/the-left-wing-bias-of-wikipedia/
- https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2872427.2883085
- https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/asi.21577
- https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0894439317715434
- http://wikipediocracy.com/2013/05/17/anonymous-revenge-editing-on-wikipedia-the-case-of-robert-clark-young-aka-qworty/
- https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/acp.3329
( the list can go on)
In a journal article (https://bib.irb.hr/datoteka/685399.Wiki_vs_HE_OK_PS.pdf) published in 2011 which examined the hr.wikipedia the researchers marked the encyclopedia as satisfactory in 85% of the articles in respect to mistakes reviewed by researchers. The researchers also found that 92% of articles in the hr.wiki were informative.
Continuously pointing to the hr.wiki as a wicked and detestable place is just plainly: wrong. Vodomar (talk) 08:41, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Jutarnji list is not a tabloid, at least not in the usual sense of the term. In Croatia, Jutarnji list belongs to the mainstream daily newspapers, as well as Večernji list, Slobodna Dalmacija or Novi list. I do not believe that Jutarnji list is „involved in many examples of questionable journalistic practices“, at least not to a greater extent than similar papers. I am afraid that such accusations are motivated by the fact that Jutarnji list is profiled mainly as a social-liberal newspaper, belonging to minority and sometimes opposition in an environment where nationalist attitudes prevail and where there is a strong revisionism about the Second World War. If Jutarnji list was as described in the previous post, it would not include as its autors internationally renowned writers such as Predrag Matvejević, Slavenka Drakulić, Miljenko Jergović, Jurica Pavičić, or Ante Tomić. I'm surprised that @Vodomar: doesn't find a more convincing argument than slandering Jutarnji list. If a discussion needs to be opened, I can offer a long list of examples of non-encyclopedic articles, without citing sources, ideologically marked, etc, both in hr.wikipedia and in sr.wikipedia or bs.wikipedia. However, the problems which are dicussed now and here do not concerbn those 85% percent of hr.wikipedia, belonging to sciences etc. They concern some articles on recent history, politics, churches and/or biographies, nothing else. But those minority articles make a difference, marked ideologically as alt-right. Of course, my opinion is not neutral. My name is Inoslav Bešker and I write for Jutarnji list. --Inoslav Bešker (talk) 03:31, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Thank you for elaborating on this Inoslav. Maybe professionally you are not neutral but these arguments are solid and shared standpoints among most of population in the region. Zblace (talk) 11:08, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- Jutarnji list is not a tabloid, at least not in the usual sense of the term. In Croatia, Jutarnji list belongs to the mainstream daily newspapers, as well as Večernji list, Slobodna Dalmacija or Novi list. I do not believe that Jutarnji list is „involved in many examples of questionable journalistic practices“, at least not to a greater extent than similar papers. I am afraid that such accusations are motivated by the fact that Jutarnji list is profiled mainly as a social-liberal newspaper, belonging to minority and sometimes opposition in an environment where nationalist attitudes prevail and where there is a strong revisionism about the Second World War. If Jutarnji list was as described in the previous post, it would not include as its autors internationally renowned writers such as Predrag Matvejević, Slavenka Drakulić, Miljenko Jergović, Jurica Pavičić, or Ante Tomić. I'm surprised that @Vodomar: doesn't find a more convincing argument than slandering Jutarnji list. If a discussion needs to be opened, I can offer a long list of examples of non-encyclopedic articles, without citing sources, ideologically marked, etc, both in hr.wikipedia and in sr.wikipedia or bs.wikipedia. However, the problems which are dicussed now and here do not concerbn those 85% percent of hr.wikipedia, belonging to sciences etc. They concern some articles on recent history, politics, churches and/or biographies, nothing else. But those minority articles make a difference, marked ideologically as alt-right. Of course, my opinion is not neutral. My name is Inoslav Bešker and I write for Jutarnji list. --Inoslav Bešker (talk) 03:31, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Inoslav Bešker: Like all ideologues, particularly Balkan ones, Vodomar claims the “questionable” rest-of-the-world is conspiring against their “truths”. Thus in the CW RfC Kubura and the others railed not only against Croatian mainstream media (like Jutarnji list, a leading daily with solid journalistic standards), but also against German television channels, the Austrian right-wing government (for cancelling the Bleiburg commemorations due to extremism), Croatian and western historians, Croatian and international linguists, “Jewish sources”, “Serbo-Croatists”, “neo-Yugoslavists”, Holocaust Museums, the official Croatian encyclopedia and Croatian dictionaries (with whom they disagree on Croatian language usage to further distort history), they even reverted citations of Croatian Supreme Court rulings against Croatian war criminals, since that too goes against their POV-pushing agenda. And while Kubura and other Admins have reverted and blocked people for daring cite above Reliable Sources, they not only cite, but insist that Holocaust-denying convicted-fraudsters have the only “truth”, or as Kubura insisted in the CW RfC, that anonymous authors on Croatian 1990s War Veterans’ websites should be the deciding voice regarding how hr.wiki WWII articles are titled, not official Croatian memorials, Croatian encyclopedias or dictionaries (i.e. their insistence on calling Jasenovac a “collection-camp“ instead of a “concentration-camp”). Those who note they haven’t heard from Kubura, can go to the CW RfC and search for his name, to read his POV-pushing, anti-Reliable Source railings Thhhommmasss (talk) 21:02, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Thhhommmasss: If you refer to sabirni logor, it is a concentaracion camp, and that is the only way to translate it in English. Namely, koncentracioni logor, koncentracijski logor, sabirni logor and sabirni tabor are synonims. The question is another: whether Jasenovac was a concentracion camp (like Dachau, for instance), or an extermination camp (like Auschwitz-Birkenau). According to the elements I learned, I should say that it had both functions. Maček or Hebrang or Jakovljević were there not to be killed, at least not immediately (some communists survived till the last attempt to break out of the camp), but great number of Roma, Jews, and Serbs were brought there to bi killed, or die because of starvation). I suppose that iz is up to historians to judge. From my pont of view, it was a concentration camp (sabirni logor), as well as an extermination camp (istrebljivački logor). --Inoslav Bešker (talk) 11:04, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Inoslav Bešker: Like all ideologues, particularly Balkan ones, Vodomar claims the “questionable” rest-of-the-world is conspiring against their “truths”. Thus in the CW RfC Kubura and the others railed not only against Croatian mainstream media (like Jutarnji list, a leading daily with solid journalistic standards), but also against German television channels, the Austrian right-wing government (for cancelling the Bleiburg commemorations due to extremism), Croatian and western historians, Croatian and international linguists, “Jewish sources”, “Serbo-Croatists”, “neo-Yugoslavists”, Holocaust Museums, the official Croatian encyclopedia and Croatian dictionaries (with whom they disagree on Croatian language usage to further distort history), they even reverted citations of Croatian Supreme Court rulings against Croatian war criminals, since that too goes against their POV-pushing agenda. And while Kubura and other Admins have reverted and blocked people for daring cite above Reliable Sources, they not only cite, but insist that Holocaust-denying convicted-fraudsters have the only “truth”, or as Kubura insisted in the CW RfC, that anonymous authors on Croatian 1990s War Veterans’ websites should be the deciding voice regarding how hr.wiki WWII articles are titled, not official Croatian memorials, Croatian encyclopedias or dictionaries (i.e. their insistence on calling Jasenovac a “collection-camp“ instead of a “concentration-camp”). Those who note they haven’t heard from Kubura, can go to the CW RfC and search for his name, to read his POV-pushing, anti-Reliable Source railings Thhhommmasss (talk) 21:02, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
Threaded comments in the survey
Please just don't. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:38, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
Participation should be confined to auto-confirmed, signed-in users
I see no reason to allow people to comment/vote from anonymous IP addresses, some of which could be duplicate socks, others appear as provocateurs Thhhommmasss (talk)
- I'd been going to say "but there don't seem to be any votes from IPs," but then I saw this edit. An IP posted it and signed it as User @Ogi:. Has anyone contacted Ogi to see if this really is him or her? The most likely explanation is that it is a user commenting from a public computer or a member of hrwiki who doesn't want to establish a presence on Meta, but it could also be impersonation. Best to ask. But yes, since socking is one of the things the accused is accused of, taking extra steps to prevent might be best. Darkfrog24 (talk) 02:47, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Hm, this non-userpage looks odd, but then I didn't use any diacritics. Darkfrog24 (talk) 02:51, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- There's also the post from 188.99.201.242, so one IP voted for, the other against. Both contained empty sloganeering, plus IP-Ogi posted his vote, vandal-style, at top of Survey, not at bottom. I suspect the vandalism removed from this page by Admins also came from IP addresses. On the CW RfC IPs were almost exclusively used for vandalization, including the most obscene hate-speech attacking ethnicities and LGBT folks.
- Hm, this non-userpage looks odd, but then I didn't use any diacritics. Darkfrog24 (talk) 02:51, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Can anyone give a single example where a post from an IP address was used productively on any RfC, and where this at the same time could not have been accomplished via regular Log-in? Thhhommmasss (talk) 04:46, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- On en-wiki some of the general policy RfCs sometimes have participation from stable IPs who specifically don't want accounts, and they can be helpful. That doesn't mean it's beneficial here, just that as a theoretical occurrence, it does happen Nosebagbear (talk) 10:14, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- I agree with Nosebagbear. But I see sketchiness from IPs here in this case, so I can support implementing the restrictions you suggest, Thhh. Darkfrog24 (talk) 18:07, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @nosebagear – perhaps some easy way could be found to exempt the stable-IPs you mention, although it seems that it applies to a small number of cases. The downside we’ve seen from the IPs is extensive – vandalization, disruption, having to read the vulgar sewage of sick minds, Admins having to invest time to hide vandalization, etc. It seems often WP goes out of its way to accommodate a few edge cases (and I wonder how many of the stable-IPs are based on valid concerns, instead of someone’s quirky preferences), at big costs to everyone else. So some thought should be given as to how truly important is such stable-IP participation is, compared to the huge downsides everyone else must bear
- I agree with Nosebagbear. But I see sketchiness from IPs here in this case, so I can support implementing the restrictions you suggest, Thhh. Darkfrog24 (talk) 18:07, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- On en-wiki some of the general policy RfCs sometimes have participation from stable IPs who specifically don't want accounts, and they can be helpful. That doesn't mean it's beneficial here, just that as a theoretical occurrence, it does happen Nosebagbear (talk) 10:14, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Can anyone give a single example where a post from an IP address was used productively on any RfC, and where this at the same time could not have been accomplished via regular Log-in? Thhhommmasss (talk) 04:46, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Btw, given serious sockpuppeting, I also think only autoconfirmed, named accounts which have existed for some time prior to the posting of the RfC, should be allowed to comment/vote. Perhaps with even further restrictions on minimum number of edits, etc, so that only views of substantive contributors are counted on these important issues, not canvassed, random, last-minute parachutists or socks. Exceptions might be made for people who request and can make a valid case on RfC Talk page to meta Admins for participation
- Speaking of suspicious named-accounts which are voting, here is the Global Account info on a user who just voted with a Strong Oppose:
- Username: MMMagnazza
- Registered: 22:49, 19 November 2020 (83 minutes ago)
- Total edit count: 1
- Thhhommmasss (talk) 19:19, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Speaking of suspicious named-accounts which are voting, here is the Global Account info on a user who just voted with a Strong Oppose:
- On the CW RfC there were probably at least a dozen votes, all against, from accounts with no wiki edit experience, obviously a case of canvassing or additional sockpuppeting, on top of Kubura’s established 12 socks who voted. Don’t know to what extent such abuse led to failures to address this issue via multiple previous RfCs, by giving an exaggerated impression of support for the abusive Admins (although enforcing core WP principles should never be a popularity contest). In any case, this should not be allowed on RfCs, even the odd, legit first-time-edit accounts should not be voting/deciding key RfC policies. Nor should comments/votes from IPs be allowed, although exceptions can always be made by people on RfC Talk page requesting of Admins to be allowed to participate (e.g. newbie accounts who've experienced abuse, constructive, stable IPs, etc.)
- Second, quite a few people participating on the CW RfC were hit with repeat, obscene hate-speech vandalization on their own Talk pages, mostly coming from a sick mind with Split, Croatia-area IPs. Such vandalization continues, both on this RfC page and people’s personal Talk pages. I suspect this happens elsewhere too, thus consideration should be given to disallowing postings on personal Talk pages from IPs, and perhaps even from non-autoconfirmed accounts. This could eliminate a lot of the abuse (people might have option to turn on messages from IPs on their Talk page, if they so wish, but as default this would be set to off) Thhhommmasss (talk) 00:03, 22 November 2020 (UTC)
- Note: I had started a discussion at the meta admin noticeboard for protection of this page to address the issues brought above, there is consensus against protection of this page. Hence, this page will be open still for anons / non autoconfirmed users to participate in. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:41, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- However, we will revert clear vandalism, sock puppetry / meat puppetry will not be tolerated and we will strike out those comments. Hate speech and etc might be met with sanctions, any users are free to seek admin assistance at RFH when there are these issues to address. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:43, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
Vote manipulation issues (and the larger problem) by Kubura
Vote manipulation issues first: The socks he used (where he didn't defend at all (give me links if he did)) had topped global and local wiki elections. This should not be the case at all, and though the elections confirmed, we are leading to the dilemma of confirming the results of a rigged election. Yes. We're doing it live right now. There should be something done to reverse (or to amend) the outcome of the latest steward election at the very least.
The larger problem: I'm bring my own experiences in the Chinese Wikipedia: An admin clearly abusing his power had rallied his supporters (through messaging apps) to keep his sysop rights while not apologizing or adequately explaining the reason behind. He then just did something controversial again and skipped half year for a break, without providing any reasons, and return as to evade any desysop polls (well, two desysop polls must be at least 1/2 years in between). He even got a scholarship to participate in Wikimania that year. It seemed that vote weighting should be somewhat considered (e.g. weighing per vote, maybe something log scale, etc.) but that brings a huge amount of issues. Connections built for the betterment of Wikipedia are used in its darker ways than it should be (e.g. rallying and meatpuppetering). This should not be the case, and there should be something done to deal with it.
Communities are unique in the sense that they are, at the same time, national in a lot of languages (not English nor Spanish). This means a community that can be, in some cases, easily manipulated if the majority of the contributors come from one side of the political spectrum. The Kubura case seemed to have taken that problem to the center of the stage, particularly on some opposition votes stating he is (similar to) 'very important to the hr.wiki community'.--1233 (T / C) 13:06, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @1233 Can we focus on Kubura on this alone, "An admin" {{citation needed}}. This is messy enough, if you want to talk about zhwp issues that's another RFC. I know what you are talking about, but this seems not the correct platform. We just need to decide ban / not ban Kubura, other issues on wiki governance, yes they are important, is another RFC scope. Hope you understand, Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 13:11, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage yeah I know I'm just pointing a larger problem, that's why I put it in a completely separate section. One thing to be sure is about his socks' inteference in Steward elections and how to correct that. That's why I single it out at another paragraph, too.--1233 (T / C) 18:06, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @1233 I clearly agree that socks interference in SE is an issue, we have to ensure SE 2021 doesn't fall prey to these issues. It can be socks voting together to pass a candidate this time around, so it might be much worse than to fail a candidate as this candidate might have access to CU/OS and etc sensitive privileges which can be very scary. I hope the electcom for SE can take this into consideration. The reason why I want to say don't raise up any unrelated / tangentially related topic is I really wish this RFC is focus on course, on Kubura. There is enough sidetracking in the hrwp RFC, so I don't want this to be sidetracked too. I will welcome anyone raising related topics to better put it on the hrwp RFC (if it is related to hrwp) or a new RFC / Wikimedia Forum etc. Hope you understand where I am coming from and I thank you for your inputs and clarifications. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 18:32, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage yeah I know I'm just pointing a larger problem, that's why I put it in a completely separate section. One thing to be sure is about his socks' inteference in Steward elections and how to correct that. That's why I single it out at another paragraph, too.--1233 (T / C) 18:06, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- As long as we're doing this, could we also resolve the following:
- this RFA from 2014. involving three users was decided negatively purely by sockpuppet interference from Kubura and Croq. If the socks weren't present, the three users would be elected as admins.
- revocation of rights for Speedy, Kubura and Zeljko, also decided by sockpuppet interference. If the socks had not intervened, the users in questions wouldn't be admins now. --Ivi104 (talk) 13:21, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Ivi104 Like we can't solve the SE vote for ~riley, we most likely cannot rectify these errors. What we can do is to start new processes to get right these issues. Sadly but these evidences seems to point to a stronger point for the global ban as we cannot rely on hrwp to settle the issue with Kubura. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 13:26, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Is there a way to include these issues in the next RfC about Speedy and Zeljko and have them both resolved at the same time? All these issues are connected and would qualify under Kubura's abuse of socks - Speedy and Zeljko are still admins even though they should not be, and the three users are not admins, even though they should be. I don't believe any of these issues can be resolved locally. Ivi104 (talk) 13:54, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Let's wait for the next hrwp RFC I guess, these are important points to raise then. @Ivi104 Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 13:56, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- Is there a way to include these issues in the next RfC about Speedy and Zeljko and have them both resolved at the same time? All these issues are connected and would qualify under Kubura's abuse of socks - Speedy and Zeljko are still admins even though they should not be, and the three users are not admins, even though they should be. I don't believe any of these issues can be resolved locally. Ivi104 (talk) 13:54, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
I am curious as well on this general topic. If he is banned because of his previous actions concerning users, are we going to unblock "all" the users that he blocked locally (maybe not the ones who are blocked on other non-hr project)? Probably not, we need some "surgical" approach. Sending maybe a message by mail (if they have one) or in talk pages on some platforms to all users who were active and not blocked on other Wikipedias stating that they can request unblocking on meta and get their cases revised one by one? Are we revising all procedures regarding established users where he was involved locally?
It's not the first time I am thinking about this issue, because border-line situations of group of users attacking single users one by one are not so uncommon on other wikis or in specific portion of them, within some "institutional approach" you don't notice them too much but they are there "border-line". It's not the first toxic profile put on a pedestal I see around.
I noticed how previous RfC for global ban did not focus on this scenario, they were mostly focused on single user, but sometimes users are at the center of huge dysfunctional dynamics, both the cause and a product of them. They are accepted by their local communities, but they are not wiki. In this case, deciding what to do with the overall situation of the platform is complicated, because you want to interfere in a limited way but if the problem is there, certainly removing one person will not fix it. I assume there might be local sysops or active users who oppose this ban right now, and if the problem is there, whatever made this possible will evolve but not disappear. I don't see users coming back under this scenario, unless you take a drastic action to change the local balance in a short amount of time. it's really complicated.--Alexmar983 (talk) 01:08, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Alexmar983: I think that, following the second global RFC (and the removal of all problematic admins), it is best to let the local community to decide these things for themselves. There are more than a few admins (or soon-to-be admins) that I would trust to unblock users previously blocked by Kubura under dubious reasonings. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 05:37, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- User talk:MJL I think that a "minimal" intervention might not solve the core issue who created this situation. Not that I expect a more critical intervention, or I think it is fair per se, it's just my personal opinion. If a community accepts a certain situation or does not provide structured reactions against it, similar processes will occur again in a lighter way. They kinda happen somewhere else probably with lower intensity, so it's fine not to care too much in general. Still, I suppose we really need to get rid of this formal assumption that "2 CUs are enough", even three are not enough. You need a more transparent process for CU locally, with clear data and uniform cross-platform archives. Let's discuss about that at least, it's useful in general. I have collected over the years enough stories of local CUs not spotting the obvious or sysops blocking wrong people for sockpuppeting. I mostly find it funny but there is some improvement there to do.--Alexmar983 (talk) 08:56, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- My two cents are that en:WP:NONAZIS should be declared mandatory policy for all WMF websites. But that is a step that needs to be taken by the board of the WMF. I mean, Facebook already does this, Wikipedia is lagging behind Facebook. Tgeorgescu (talk) 09:32, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- This is not about the content, which IMHO per se it is not the real long-term problem here, it's the social dynamics. That unbalanced content is why you might spot it clearly after some years, but this is not an uncommon social dynamics (even if with a lower intensity). For example if they accepted a certain ideological pressure in a subgroup of articles in exchange of a different attitude in other parts of the encyclopedia you would have an apparently overall "balanced" scenario (there is no apparent ideological tilt) with a perfectly unbalanced and toxic result in any case. If they did so, the people on both side would have attacked whoever had noticed that, leaving him or her alone in the specific discussions to deal with it or targeting him or her exactly the same way. Our platforms are full of people who harass users for different aspects (even an interpretation of a guideline), create their own "territory", but even if they strongly disagree they consider themselves pals and ignore the toxic or border-line actions on the other side and maybe tell themselves regularly how great they are in public discussions, how an example is the way they respect themselves despite their differences while simply, they agreed to let the whole system pay the prize of their dysfunctionalities. The trick is never to be in the critical discussions where the different practical or ideological visions might collapse or collide. Probably they are even delusional and they think this is "balanced" and whoever tries to point out how terrible this is for the contents and the growth of the platform is a "troll". This happens when you confuse a strong "consociative" behaviour with a healthy community dynamics. If you perform a limited "purge", you probably still have the core issue acting, just disguised in a more subtle way. it's still something, of course.--Alexmar983 (talk) 19:45, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- Actually the Universal Code of Conduct/Draft review bans hate speech and discrimination. I hope that it is (a) adopted (b) declared mandatory for all Wikipedias and (c) enforced swiftly (I suggest that a snitch line should be created for this purpose). Tgeorgescu (talk) 08:07, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
- This is not about the content, which IMHO per se it is not the real long-term problem here, it's the social dynamics. That unbalanced content is why you might spot it clearly after some years, but this is not an uncommon social dynamics (even if with a lower intensity). For example if they accepted a certain ideological pressure in a subgroup of articles in exchange of a different attitude in other parts of the encyclopedia you would have an apparently overall "balanced" scenario (there is no apparent ideological tilt) with a perfectly unbalanced and toxic result in any case. If they did so, the people on both side would have attacked whoever had noticed that, leaving him or her alone in the specific discussions to deal with it or targeting him or her exactly the same way. Our platforms are full of people who harass users for different aspects (even an interpretation of a guideline), create their own "territory", but even if they strongly disagree they consider themselves pals and ignore the toxic or border-line actions on the other side and maybe tell themselves regularly how great they are in public discussions, how an example is the way they respect themselves despite their differences while simply, they agreed to let the whole system pay the prize of their dysfunctionalities. The trick is never to be in the critical discussions where the different practical or ideological visions might collapse or collide. Probably they are even delusional and they think this is "balanced" and whoever tries to point out how terrible this is for the contents and the growth of the platform is a "troll". This happens when you confuse a strong "consociative" behaviour with a healthy community dynamics. If you perform a limited "purge", you probably still have the core issue acting, just disguised in a more subtle way. it's still something, of course.--Alexmar983 (talk) 19:45, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- My two cents are that en:WP:NONAZIS should be declared mandatory policy for all WMF websites. But that is a step that needs to be taken by the board of the WMF. I mean, Facebook already does this, Wikipedia is lagging behind Facebook. Tgeorgescu (talk) 09:32, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
- User talk:MJL I think that a "minimal" intervention might not solve the core issue who created this situation. Not that I expect a more critical intervention, or I think it is fair per se, it's just my personal opinion. If a community accepts a certain situation or does not provide structured reactions against it, similar processes will occur again in a lighter way. They kinda happen somewhere else probably with lower intensity, so it's fine not to care too much in general. Still, I suppose we really need to get rid of this formal assumption that "2 CUs are enough", even three are not enough. You need a more transparent process for CU locally, with clear data and uniform cross-platform archives. Let's discuss about that at least, it's useful in general. I have collected over the years enough stories of local CUs not spotting the obvious or sysops blocking wrong people for sockpuppeting. I mostly find it funny but there is some improvement there to do.--Alexmar983 (talk) 08:56, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
How to end this RFC
Very practical question: How to end this RFC considering the amount of input already now? Question put forward, proposal of fixing all the issues are being also put, but now how to enforce it and when to enforce it?--1233 (T / C) 19:48, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
- If 3-5 days passed without a single vote or user response (comment), I think that'd be a good time to close the RfC. That'd mean that the RfC is no longer in full swing. --Aca (talk) 00:23, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- I'm curious if the global ban support votes keep coming, and that is surely the case. How to deal with that though, as it may just prolong the period without any constructive feedback.--1233 (T / C) 06:17, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- Stewards will make that determination when they believe there is consensus. Generally that is at least a few weeks. --Rschen7754 07:18, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- I'm curious if the global ban support votes keep coming, and that is surely the case. How to deal with that though, as it may just prolong the period without any constructive feedback.--1233 (T / C) 06:17, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- According to Global bans: "Discussion should be open for at least two weeks, but no more than one month. Stewards may extend the discussion in exceptional circumstances. [...] Requests can be closed after an extensive discussion when no consensus is likely to be reached." --Count Count (talk) 07:49, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
- @1233:, @Aca:, @Count Count:, it's been two weeks. There is a clear consensus. You can sum up. Vova WIFI (talk) 09:16, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vova WIFI This needs a steward to close and none of the users you pinged are one. If you want a closure, seek it at SN but I will not ask as many of them are actively monitoring this page. Anyway, the bare minimum right needed to close RFC in metawiki is sysop, and sysops can't close things that will have global impact (i.e. global lock) Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:35, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- No, I just answered the question. Vova WIFI (talk) 09:43, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- ??? Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:44, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage: «but now how to enforce it and when to enforce it?». Vova WIFI (talk) 13:12, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- A global ban RFC can be opened for as long as a month – two weeks is a bare minimum. Many stewards actively monitor this RFC, there is no need to rush. Sincerely, Martin Urbanec (talk) 13:44, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Camouflaged Mirage: «but now how to enforce it and when to enforce it?». Vova WIFI (talk) 13:12, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- ??? Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:44, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- No, I just answered the question. Vova WIFI (talk) 09:43, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vova WIFI Since the rule states "at least two weeks, but no more than one month" and this RfC has started on 21:21, 14 November 2020 (UTC), it follows that it should be closed no sooner than 21:21, 28 November 2020 (UTC) and no later than 21:21, 14 December 2020 (UTC). We are not within that time interval yet, it should take at least one more day until this RfC can be closed according to the above stated rule. 109.60.38.31 19:26, 27 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Vova WIFI This needs a steward to close and none of the users you pinged are one. If you want a closure, seek it at SN but I will not ask as many of them are actively monitoring this page. Anyway, the bare minimum right needed to close RFC in metawiki is sysop, and sysops can't close things that will have global impact (i.e. global lock) Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:35, 27 November 2020 (UTC)