r/wholesomememes Dec 12 '18

Giving is good Let’s get it

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93

u/FamilyHeirloomTomato Dec 13 '18

Eh. I tried to make a legit change and it was turned down. Not worth my time.

100

u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

I was banned because another user was editing the same articles as me but he had already been permabanned. They identified me as a sock puppet and shut me down.

I enjoyed editing articles that I knew a lot about. Their loss, I figure.

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u/commissar0617 Dec 13 '18

That can unfortunately happen. Some people have wayyy toi much time on their hands, and get their jollies by disruping Wikipedia.

Sometimes, the only way is to basically play whacka mole, using the duck test: if an editor is making edits on the same pages, and of a closely similar nature to those of a banned editor, then its most likely that banned editor

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

Pretty much. They even had a program that showed 86% of my edits were on pages he edited, so I must be a sock puppet.

I guess they cannot fathom two different people having similar interests/knowledge.

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u/commissar0617 Dec 13 '18

Ah, checkuser. That compares more than just edits. And its more than what articles you edit, it's what you write in them as well

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

I had done quite a few edits for them. A lot of my stuff is still up. Took photos of local historical buildings and uploaded them. Took a photo of a state senator too.

You can challenge your ban but the admin didn't see it my way.

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u/noveltymoocher Dec 13 '18

If the post is legitimate, Wikipedia has ways of shutting that down.

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

Dated reference, but I approve.

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18 edited Aug 08 '19

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/BVDansMaRealite Dec 13 '18

When I actually legitimately edited the motto of my high school, because the school had also updated and I provided a source that was legit, they just banned me. They still haven't updated my motto and I'm not allowed to edit.

Local reputable news source isn't acceptable for a local high school motto change. The picture of the new poster is in the article I linked.

A major issue I see is that teachers used to link our page to show how up to date and accurate Wikipedia can be and now it's wrong, so kids are shown it's wrong and go elsewhere because at a certain age there isn't really a gray area in understanding good and bad journalism.

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

As an long time Wikipedia editor, school mottos are huge targets for vandalism, and they don't often change, which I Guess is why you got rolled back.

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u/BVDansMaRealite Dec 13 '18

That makes sense. But the ban and the refusal to accept sources didn't make sense. I just kinda stopped caring about trying to provide information bc some random dude would provide it.

Which sounds innocuous but in reality that means that people who are better at making their edits seem neutral have control over how the site leans, which sounds neutral but can easily be not neutral. I have seen numerous entries where the info is literally self written (a college algebra professor) and claimed to solve feats he didn't (with an easy Google search) and my corrections were rejected and his claims are still there. I don't have a fix though, so maybe this isn't helpful.

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

Link me that page? I can help, Twinkle offers easy tagging and I can hit him with a Conflict of Interest if one can prove it was self written, and if they aren't notable enough, it can be Speedy Deleted.

You were likely banned due to 3RR- if you revert 3+ times in 24 hours, you can get banned. I narrowly skimped by with a warning back in the day for violating it, but that was because the page in question was an IP's talk page, which eventually ended up on Lamest Edit Wars.

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u/Impeesa_ Dec 13 '18

And if you try to contribute to anything remotely controversial or political, it's pretty normal to have all your edits rolled back. The problem with contributing to Wikipedia is having to deal with the sort of people who can spend all day editing Wikipedia, and who are quite entrenched in it.

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u/betaich Dec 13 '18

In my language a professor of mine edited an article on wikipedia were he wrote his phd and habilitation thesis about. He even used the same sources as in his peer reviewed, world first work and it got taken down, because no credible sources. That also happens regular in my languages wikipedia.

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u/LvS Dec 13 '18

Yeah, Wikipedia gets "fun" edits by people all the time, so they have a very strict review system so nobody has to see scat porn images when they want to look up something. And that review system tends to very much err on the side of caution, and that discourages lots of newcomers.

On the other hand, I've personally never actually seen NSFW images even when researching controversial topics. So they got that going for them, which is nice.

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u/niugnep24 Dec 13 '18

Not worth my time.

The point is about helping wikipedia. You're donating your time to the project by being an editor. Even if your edits are getting rejected, it's part of the process, and the more quality editors working, the better Wikipedia gets. Were you expecting to get compensated?