Wikipedia backup / User:George Dance talk page

If you want to begin a discussion with me, or to comment on a discussion I'm having with someone else, then please start a new section. That makes it more likely that I will be able to find your message for comment later. George Dance (talk) 19:16, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

If you wish to make a comment to someone else, then please do not do so on my talk page. Thank you.George Dance (talk) 19:16, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

16:14, 26 May 2011 Tedder (talk | contribs) blocked George Dance (talk | contribs) (account creation blocked) with an expiry time of indefinite ‎ (Disruptive editing: pointy/WP:STICK removal of external links)

Added by James Watson, August 4, 2011:
You have been blocked indefinitely from editing because you've been asked by several individuals, both nicely and in stronger terms, to discontinue pointy mass removal of external links from an article. You have continued to do so. Note an indefinite block is not an infinite block. Indefinite means you control if and how it ends. In this case, that probably involves showing an understanding of WP:STICK and especially WP:EL policy. If you would like to be unblocked, you may appeal this block by adding the text, but you should read the guide to appealing blocks first. tedder (talk) 16:19, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Use of talk page while blocked
The purpose of allowing a blocked user to edit their own talk page is so that they can request an unblock, and take part in constructive discussion concerning the block. Please don't use this page for other purposes while the block is in force. If you do so you may find that your talk page access is removed. Also, please do not remove the block notice or the declined unblock requests while the block is in force. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:39, 4 August 2011 (UTC)


 * As long as you have my account blocked, James, it's impossible for me to correct errors in Wikipedia (the way I was doing for years) when I find them. All I can do now, when I spot an error, to get it corrected is to post about it on Wikipedia in the hope that another editor will see it and be able to correct it. Obviously it has to be posted to my talk page, because that's the only page on Wikipedia I can post to right now. That's the content that you just erased from my talk page - that you didn't bother correcting - and that you're now threatening me, with removal of my talk page, if I post any more of it. What would you like me to do instead? Would you like me to post about such errors off Wikipedia? Or just keep quiet about them? Or would you rather simply unblock my account so that I can make such corrections myself? (George Dance (talk) 14:46, 4 August 2011 (UTC))


 * Oh, and by the way, James, please, let`s stick to the truth: Please do not make up any stories about me removing anything from my talk page. For the record, the only people who removed content from this talk page were Ronhjones and you. (George Dance (talk) 14:46, 4 August 2011 (UTC))


 * George, if you request an unblock, addressing the concerns that are described in the block notices, you may very well see that your account will be unblocked, and that you can make the corrections yourself. --Dirk Beetstra T  C 15:03, 4 August 2011 (UTC)


 * 1) Sorry if my note seemed like a threat. It was intended to be advice to you as to what was likely to happen, to help you avoiding that outcome.
 * 2) This edit and this one both look to me remarkably like you removing content from this page. JamesBWatson (talk) 16:40, 4 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Well, James, assuming that you want to help me "avoid that outcome" of you removing my talk page, why are you evading the questions I asked you. You've decided that I'm not allowed to use my talk page to point out errors I find in Wikipedia; what do you want me to about them instead?
 * (I don't see any reason to debate whether I've ever removed content from my talk page's archives. None of them have to do with the current page, which I took care to mention, and none of them have to do with "remov[ing] the block notice or the declined unblock requests while the block is in force," which you took care to mention. George Dance (talk) 17:02, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
 * WHAT?? Both of them removed both the block notice and the declined unblock requests. 80.168.173.172 (talk) 19:10, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

So let's get clear on this: making an edit that removes everything from a page, and 'undoing that edit immediately afterward, are what you and "James Watson" call "removing both the block notice and the declined unblock requests." You guys will say or do anything to win, won't you? OK, fine, have it your way - you win. George Dance (talk) 15:19, 6 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Followed immediately by a removal again. George, I am sure that you did not know that you should not have removed the block notices and declined unblock requests, or you may not have noticed - we'll just en up wikilawyering who did what when.  Lets drop this discussion, shall we, and work towards an unblock.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 15:53, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Unblock request
"What it looks like to me, and to everyone else, is that[....] That sort of petty, childish behavior is not welcome here, and if you can't own up to it I'm afraid you will have to remain blocked." Leaving aside the name-calling (since like most of the insults here that's most likely meant to get me to reply in kind, and so 'justify' shutting down this page, too), I'd have to say that this is the clearest statement of the clique mentality yet. "I agree with everyone here, and everyone here agrees with me (that you were doing X), and if you you don't agree with us (that you were doing X), we'll keep you from working on Wikipedia." Turns out this latest round "unblock" wasn't a total waste of time, after all. George Dance (talk) 15:19, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

George, you were first blocked after 3 editors mentioned to you concerns about link additions. One of them, me, left a warning, but you continued because you did at that time not care about the concerns expressed to you. It is not about right or wrong, there, maybe your link additions were fine, the point there is, people expressed concerns, and if someone expresses concerns, you first talk about it, you don't go on pushing. This is a collaborative project, but until now you have not managed to convince others about the additions, not even after a block.

After said block, you continue by removing the majority (or was it all?) of links from an article. That looks very much like: "I am not allowed to add my links, so others are not allowed to have their links there either". George, again, your links may very well be wanted, but we want you to discuss them when people have concerns. Just as the other links, editors may very well have discussed them, or they were not added by one editor, but by many, and especially not by editors who were connected to the site that was added (if you can show that the editors who were adding them are connected to the sites, we can talk about that then, maybe that editor needs to be talked to then). That removal of links, after you were reprimanded for link additions, looked very WP:POINTy. The way forward was to discuss the links that you wanted to include, and to show that you actually have consensus inserting those links.

To go forward, I want you to reconsider your statement "I certainly understand what I've been blocked for: writing and rewriting articles on Wikipedia, and in the process adding links another or others didn't want, and taking out el's another or others wanted" - because that is not why you were blocked the first time, and also not why you were blocked the second time. Please try to understand why you were blocked, and base your unblock request on that. --Dirk Beetstra T C 15:53, 6 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Dirk, I was first blocked because two "editors" (stop trying to lump maria in with your group; she had different concerns) "went on a spree of removing any links [they] decided shouldn't be there" in articles I had contributed to and you two hadn't - and I undid some of those deletions. (Admittedly, you blocked me only for 30 hours, so that you could finish your 'spree' without interruption.) But it was the same as this new block, based: Edit the way we tell you to, or we won't let you edit at all. (And please don't try to spin that into an AGF violation: I'm sure your entire group thinks that getting your way is the best thing for Wikipedia.)


 * Then, as soon as one administrator wins his "discussion" over links I've added, another one picks a new fight over links I've been removing. You can't remember the details of the "mass removals" that he actually blocked me for? Well, here it is: a removal of a link that is already in the article's "References" section more than twenty times. Do you want me to tell you what blocking me for removing that link "looks very much like"? No, I don't think either of us wants to go there again.


 * Instead, I'll reconsider my statement. Was I blocked because I made any edits that aren't allowed here? No: every policy that an administrator has quoted to me (even things you swore were carved in stone, like putting external links in the body of an article), has allowed exceptions. So, what was it? I was blocked because I got into a content dispute with "Spanglej" - and Spanglej had friends who were administrators, while I didn't. I was bitten.


 * So, let's go forward. I don't contribute to Wikipedia. That wasn't my decision; but it's one I have to accept. I made my final offer to contribute yesterday - I won't write anything, but just confine my contributions to correcting typos and such - and that was rejected. Maybe Wikipedia itself didn't make that decision, but it did enable those who made it. And given their terms for my being allowed to contribute - "You can do the work, but only if you do it the way we tell you" - then it's probably for the best. George Dance (talk) 17:23, 6 August 2011 (UTC)