User talk:Masem/Archive 15

Hello Masem I would like to ask permision to edit the minecraft page to add the following details, resoulution, crafting, urban legends from within the the game maybe more specific information on the dates already there -Respectfully BlazeKeenen

Thank you

I'd like to thank you for your dedication to trying to keep the Gamergate article neutral. Regardless of any difference in our personal opinions on the matter (my understanding is you are on the "anti-" side) I honor the fact you try and uphold the principals of Wikipedia. In the wake of the arbitration decision bad actors on both sides have been removed and hopefully those with more level headed approaches will be able to make the article less of a mess than it is now. The suggestion you've made on the talk page to reorganize the sections would be a great first step. Here's hoping it is adopted. Cheers, 96.52.57.75 (talk) 04:07, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

Two questions

Given that the GamerGate article is extremely hard to digest when read as a whole, and deferring to your experience at WP:VG, I am hoping to hear from you on two issues... 1) which parts or sections of the article do you feel are the least impartial? and 2) is it really that there are no RS within Talk:Gamergate controversy#List of relevant sources concerning the ethics in gaming journalism perspective? Thanks for your time. starship.paint ~ regal 14:33, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

On #2, there's only one site that is really good as an RS, that's the Columbia Journalism Review (CJR), then a weaker source is CinemaBlend. The rest are not really reliable, particularly for a controversy article. --MASEM (t) 15:50, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. I'll look into CJR. starship.paint ~ regal 05:37, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

Hi again Masem, I saw that you generally agreed with Totlmstr's trimmed version of GamerGate. Since then, NorthBySouth has created his own Talk:Gamergate controversy#Working draft and is actively pushing for it. If you think Totlmstr's version has its merits, I was thinking that we should actively push for it ... as the main draft? Or combined with NorthBySouth's draft? I thought this should better be settled before NorthBySouth's draft gets too advanced. starship.paint ~ regal 12:26, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

This is completely acceptable process to create a draft like this; you're free to do your own, and I know of at least one doing another. It's when they come to say "Okay, now can we make this one the main article", that's where consensus should start. --MASEM (t) 16:36, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

I acknowledge that there's no wrongdoing in creating your own draft. I was just thinking, that the more delayed the decision on which will be the main article, the more conflict there will be. starship.paint ~ regal 01:36, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko photo

Hi Masem,

I see you uploaded the image of the 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko comet used in the article on the Philae lander. I was really curious how big of an area the image represented and looked it up and found it is 857x857 meters [1]. Do you think we could add a scale line, such as commonly seen on maps, to the image (presumably along the top of the image which shows space rather than the comet)? I'm not sure if editing the image like that would be appropriate, nor whether to upload it over the existing image or as a separate image.

Some guy (talk) 23:32, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

@Some guy: It is a CC-BY license so it is available to be built on. So you can freely add a scale measurement and then (recommended) upload as a new image to Commons, making sure to note it is a derivative of the one I uploaded, and definitely to make sure to site the original statement where they mention the size to explain how you got to that (to avoid OR). The resulting upload would still need to be CC-BY, but that's it. I would not replace the image on Commons (but you can on the Philae page with the new one), as both versions are useful downstream to our end readers. --MASEM (t) 23:35, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

Hey, been a long time

I saw Jimbo Wales' post on Twitter in response to GamerGate, and a suggestion for a neutral article...giving it a shot, though to be honest the lead is turning into the hardest part. I haven't done this in a long time. Anyway I'm letting you know because I'd like you to proofread, because you're one of the cooler heads in all this. Would you be up for a copyedit once I get it pulled together?--Kung Fu Man (talk) 02:25, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I would be happy to. I have a good idea where our article ought to sit. --MASEM (t) 04:53, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

@Kung Fu Man: You may want to check here (gamergate dot me blacklisted) for possible sources (the link was noted earlier on the GG talk page). --MASEM (t) 16:56, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

Yeah not going to lie while there's a lot useful in there I wish it'd focused on some core things better. That said it's very hard not to show Quinn as an aggregator here when she is pretty deeply tied to a lot of the actions. I need to add more references to a few of the statements and fix a thing here and there, but got the origin pretty much down. I'll be at my place of work the next few hours so if you can give what I have up currently a onceover it'd help. :\--Kung Fu Man (talk) 20:29, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

I am fully aware Quinn's role is questionable when you look at what evidence from the GG side presents - but there's still ways to handle the situation in a neutral, clinical manner instead of assuming guilty parties out the door. --MASEM (t) 20:31, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Oh no I agree actually, even noted that much of this is allegation some of which having been debunked. The fact both sides let it escalate to this point is what I was trying to capture here, and as a whole what led up to the GamerGate outcry as a whole. If I went too far one side or the other with some points though gimme a shout, would love to fix them now before building on them further.--Kung Fu Man (talk) 20:45, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

67P/C-G picture

Hi Masem, regarding the filename of File:Philae approach to comet 67p prior to landing.jpg, you seem to be suggesting that Philae took this image rather than Rosetta. It was definitely Rosetta and I'll be fixing the filename, but I'm curious what led you to think otherwise. Cheers! — Huntster (t @ c) 03:00, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

@Huntster: My bad, I think I misread the ESA description in uploading. --MASEM (t) 04:52, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

Gotcha. No problem, I'll rename it after it finishes its main page tour. — Huntster (t @ c) 06:04, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

New TAR Clue Format and Summaries

Hey, I'd like to see your opinion about this subject here. Thanks! Gsfelipe94 (talk) 22:57, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Feedback on RfC wording about non-free SVGs

Greetings, I am leaving you this notice because you participated in the discussion about non-free SVGs at WT:NFC. I have received a response from WMF on the matter, and they told me that this is a decision that has historically been left to the community. In order to get some clarification, I would like to run a widely-advertised RfC, but since I obviously have an opinion on the matter, I would prefer it if other editors could give me some feedback on the neutrality of my wording before I actually make the RfC. You can comment on the proposed statement here. Thanks! 0x0077BE ^{(talk · contrib)} 17:41, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Gamergate Arbcom

Please note the instruction for your statement in the Gamergate request for a case:

Without exception, statements (including responses to other statements) must be shorter than 500 words.

Your statement is at 794 words, so is over the limit. I see that you already trimmed, but note that the limit applies to your responses as well. I see several statements are over, and I am contacting anyone who is over 500. Please recall that this statement is not intended to be a full exposition of all evidence, which occurs at the next step, but simply a statement requesting a case. Please trim back your statement. For the arbitration committee --S Philbrick(Talk) 20:11, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

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The Amazing Race 25

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Question

I feel, that to create a better article on such a controversial topic, GamerGate, it is essential for deep analysis of all involved parties. Since all the facts are still shrouded, and WP:OR is somewhat preventing research of this, "unique" controversy/movement/???, we as Wikipedia's should work together to determine facts from opinion, as well as get a better understanding of GamerGate. However, WP:FORUM has stopped quite a few discussions on the talkpage, so I'm unsure of what to do to get quality discussion going. I also propose this to ease tensions; a moderated forum of discussion would allow people to make cases for both sides. --DSA510 Pls No H8 00:28, 19 November 2014 (UTC)

"Shirtstorm"

If you're up for it, the newly created Shirtstorm and Matt Taylor (scientist) articles could likely benefit from your attention. Iamcuriousblue (talk) 03:09, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

You've got mail!

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Avono (talk) 19:48, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

That 4chan image

(can't remember my old login so i can't post this on that one talk page which should not be named, so sorry if it is out of place)
Regarding the whole "rape" semantics maybe it would be worth to note somewhere that, as far as online gaming communities go, the definition of it is more akin to what urban dictionary uses for it, or to the oxford's dictionary second verb meaning. As such, there is usually no sexual connotation when using this word gaming wise (wether as a threat, joke, or just as a term to describe events), and any attempt to do so would horribly change the context of the phrase where the word is included in. It kinda reminds me of that southpark episode and the word "fag". Language evolves after all.

As for VJ's color pattern, though, i kinda seem to remember it was more related to the intention of expressing the opposition would be "butt hurt" (hence the sodomy imagery, the "butt cancer" charity donation, etc.) than to express an intention of forcing oneself sexually on someone. I have been unable to locate a proper archive for this though... .-Fighterdoken (talk) 14:39, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Breitbart as a Reliable Source

Hi there. I missed the discussion about the use of Breitbart as a source for the GGC article. Given the quality of the other sources (tabloid journalism as a whole), is it not reasonable to broach this topic again, particularly given the latest article about this IGDA blocklist fiasco, [2]. I would think so. The reference section needs consolidation and this discussion could be an opportunity to do so. I'd suggest this on GGC Talk page but the previous discussion about BB as a RS may well be closed. In any case we both know that such a suggestion will be labelled as proGG bias and it'll get vetoed immediately. Cheers. Jgm74 (talk) 23:43, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Brietbart is generally unreliable due to past demonstration of poor journalism across all topics. Not that I am saying Milo is lying here, but unfortunately, there's going to be no way to clear Brietbart's overall reputation to try to add proGG sourcing here. I have watched the IGDA blacklist issue, and if it is as big as some proGG'ers/Milo argue, we should have other sources to support it. --MASEM (t) 01:54, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

Ok, I can understand that. But are Gawker et al. better sources? The bar seems to be set very low for the article. Jgm74 (talk) 09:13, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

On the topics of Forum Shopping and Kangaroo Courts

Is my topic ban valid? I'd like an opinion from an admin who isn't in on the tagteaming. --DSA510 Pls No H8 23:47, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

You can't ask another administrator to overturn your topic ban. You need to go to WP:AN. Under community sanctions, only with AN consensus can a topic ban be overturned. RGloucester — ☎ 00:51, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

Is opinion=unban me pl0x, the same way green+purple=rape now? --DSA510 Pls No H8 01:01, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

I can't really answer as involved (in addition to what RG said), and I do have to agree that the evidence supporting the ban is rather hard to ignore, in light of what the GG general sanctions demand. If it was an article clearly not under sanctions it might TROUT behavior, but not on the GG page. --MASEM (t) 01:51, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

Sanctions

In a few minutes, I expect tp create a section on your recent GamerGate edits at [[3]]. I'm afraid I don't understand the template system for this and hope either this notification will suffice or that you (or some passing traveller) will replace this with the proper template if that is needed. MarkBernstein (talk) 17:38, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

GS/GG/E

Statements must be limited to 500 words. Please ensure that you comply with this rule. I've been making people aware of it. RGloucester — ☎ 00:05, 25 November 2014 (UTC) @RGloucester: Done, and thank you. --MASEM (t) 00:12, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. GS/GG/E is not supposed to be a place for endless walls of text, as one of the administrators noted. If this was AE, the clerk would've been more strict about it, which is one of the limits of our ad-hoc general sanctions enforcement system. I've been trying to make sure people understand that. RGloucester — ☎ 00:13, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

@RGloucester Just as a note, there might be a need to ask editors to limit case statements to the specific elements that the case was opened if you are trying to keep all statements, including those accused, to under 500 words. This one against me is diverting into other complaint areas that Mark did not originally identify (though related), and thus for me, to defend against different positions, can make it difficult within the word limit. Not that I can't handle the additional complaints otherwise, just that it might not be possible to address all the side complaints as they build up from separate editors within a fixed word space. Unless something changes drastically in this case, I'm not asking for any special measures at the moment for myself, but something to consider in future cases and/or handling other general sanctions. --MASEM (t) 00:22, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

What's supposed to happen is that the uninvolved administrators are supposed to assess the evidence for themselves. You're not supposed to need to refute everything everyone else says, and an administrator has already made note of the walls of text. Let your actions stand, and make sure comments are about providing evidence, not about rebuttal. I fear that most people are doing nothing more than digging their own graves by bringing battleground behaviour into the sanctions enforcement page. RGloucester — ☎ 00:55, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

What started Gamergate

I noticed on the Gamergate Controversy Talk page that you said you didn't know how Gamergate started. Fortunately, this question can be answered because we have the IRC chat logs that were helpfully provided by the folks who started it, <redated to avoid any issues>

The problem of course is that if there's a way to make an anonymous chat log into a WP citation, I don't know what it is. But unless you think those IRC chat logs (over 3700 pages of them!) were fakes, you can quite clearly see the harassment campaign later christened "Gamergate" being organized and set into motion. I hope this will help clarify for you what Gamergate is all about as you seem not to have grasped some basic things about it. ReynTime (talk) 03:35, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

I'm well aware of the chat logs (Which I have only redacated as potentially BLP violating, I've read through them myself long ago), but as you say, how reliable these are, we don't know, and no other RSes (which have had access to those) have used them to make the claims they make. (If there were sources that had reviewed them and come to said conclusion, then we'd be right there for that, they're not "secret" so they've been there for any RS to make the claim to that point, but none have) As such, we cannot say what started GG. --MASEM (t) 03:43, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

We can't say anything at WP because there's no good way to source IRC chat logs, but given that the only way for these to not be an accurate reflection of what started GG would be for someone to create over 3000 fake pages of IRC babble, I think you can probably see why reliable sources are reporting this as definitely being all about misogyny and harassment. No reporter worth his or her salt is going to look at those IRC logs and go "Oh, maybe these are faked...." They're going to go, "Yep, this is what started it, right here," and then report accordingly. Basically, everyone who's paying attention to GG and casting a critical eye on it is quite clear on what it's all "really" about, so if you're trying to argue that GG is something other than this -- a glorified 4Chan troll attempt that found a small amount of footing after the failures of "EndFather'sDay" and "Freebleeding" and similar ginned-up "controversies" -- you aren't going to make any headway. Just because the IRC chats aren't sourceable in WP doesn't mean that any individual has to disregard them. We can all read them and draw our own conclusions as to what GG is about, and you can do the same, if you are willing. I'm curious as to what your stance is on what GG is "all about" -- do you personally think those IRC chat logs were fakes? ReynTime (talk) 06:54, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

I have read the logs, I agree they are unlikely to have been faked to that degree, and that it does raise many suspicions of what really started this; what's happened has taken a life of its own, with some semblence of a valid effort to talk about ethics + journalism, but still tainted by the initial events, and what those logs imply. Even with the logs, the timeline is very muddy, nor one I really want to investigate for accuracy, given the lack of any in the RSes (my research would not be appropriate for WP); the best we can go with it the call to ethics and the harassment aspects started near enough to be simultaneous. --MASEM (t) 07:33, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

That's not correct, though. This same group had been harassing Zoe Quinn for months before the "ethics" cover story was devised. This is why her ex knew to post his diatribe where these folks would see it -- he was hoping they would do exactly as they did and attack her, because they had already been doing so and just needed another excuse, which he provided. The "ethics" thing is not, and has never been, anything more than a transparent cover for the actual purpose of GG. What activities have they pursued that, in your opinion, show evidence that the folks who started this have any genuine interest in ethics? Also, what reason is there to credit the notion that "ethics in game journalism" is even a real issue, given that games journalism is an enthusiast press about a commercial product? Would it make any sense to talk about ethics in Shoe Fanciers Monthly or Cigar Aficionados Quarterly or Hello Kitty Adventures? The "ethical" issues in the games industry are topics that would be covered by the general press, such as the terrible labor practices that are endemic, or the use of video games by the military to promote themselves to potential recruits. The only purpose of "games journalism" is to sell, and celebrate, video games. The notion that a game reviewer might be influenced to give a positive review of a game, thus causing someone to spend money on a product he or she then doesn't like, is hardly an issue that calls for harassing anyone in any way, let alone via the issuance of death threats via Twitter and reveals of private information. It sounds like you think GG has some kind of legitimacy and I'm really wondering what you are basing that on, because there has not been a single indication that the group has any real interesting in ethics whatsoever. What exactly have they done or said that you find so convincing? ReynTime (talk) 08:13, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

It is no so much any specific argument, but the response by games journalists that agree they are far too close with publishers at the AAA level to be impartial. But as pointed out GG has no been targeting the AAA relationships when to me suggests they might have the right message but the very wrong way of going about it. Harassment is absolutely not a way to do this, but I do keep in mind that those engaging in harassment are not necessarily the same people wanting to engage in ethics discussions, though can't dismiss that there are some working both sided there. Just that as WP editors we must bed careful in presu!ming guilt when it is no it clear by RSes. --MASEM (t) 10:58, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

The problem with "what started GG" is that both you can't source it due to being an unorganized headless movement heavily rooted on social media and forums (neither of which is nor probably should be a reliable source for wikipedia standards), and that it is a multi-layered movement that people started supporting for diferent reasons. Gamergate origin is not a single event, but a series of events that either happened or were made public, each of which pushed the situation futher. I think the sucession of events was something like (including both sides): "The boyfriend rant"(pro) → "Harrassment of ZQ"(anti) → "Mass censorship of CoI discussion"(pro) → "Tropes vs Women last issue"(anti) → "TFYC vs ZQ issue"(pro) → "10+ Gamers are dead articles in 24 hours"(pro) → "Harrasment of AS"(anti) → "GameJournosPro reveal"(pro). Everything else came when the GG gears were already in motion. .-201.186.177.13 (talk) 17:36, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Has a Renaming or Splitting of the Gamergate Controversy Article been proposed?

Howdy. I'm really new to Wikipedia, but have been following this page a bit and I wanted to ask a question/propose an idea. I'm starting to wonder if it might not be possible to create an entirely "neutral" article under the current title of the article. Basically, when you're referring to the "controversy" of something, rather than the something itself, it has different connotations. For instance, there is a separate page for the Church of Scientology versus the Scientology_controversies. And while there is a subsection on the controversies in the original article, it is not the the focus of the article.

Basically, I'm wondering if the current title of the Gamergate article is actually a hindrance to its neutrality. If you are focusing on the controversy surrounding a thing, and not the thing itself, it will (at least, based on the evidence of the article presented) focus more on the biased reporting of the surrounding controversy and not of the movement itself.

As such, I wonder if either changing the name of the article to something more neutral or targeted at the actual thing "the movement" if you will, whether it is called "GamerGate Movement" or something else, or splitting the current article into two separate articles, one for the "GamerGate Movement" and the other for the "GamerGate Controversy" perhaps would lead to more neutral articles without as much infighting. (I don't think "GamerGate" is available, because that's an ant by that name). Ries42 (talk) 14:36, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

On splitting - yes, this has been discussed and it is very strongly suggested we don't. The present article is too long (the major editors all recognize it) and there's ways to trim it down, and realistically there's no good way to split it even after that due to the fact there's little sourcable aspects of the the "movement". And there have been offers to rename it, but there are a couple issues with that; it is, for all good reasons, going to be at some "controversy" because of the harassment angle, which has overwhelmed anything from the movement/ethics side.--MASEM (t) 14:58, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Interesting

The template for hatting says to take the advice of WP:REFACTOR, which says additionally Refactoring should only be done when there is an assumption of good faith by editors who have contributed to the talk page. If there are recent heated discussions on the talk page, good faith may be lacking. If another editor objects to refactoring then the changes should be reverted. This may be relevant to the hatting edit wars on the talk page. This is in relation to your post on the enforcement for GamerGate page. Tutelary (talk) 20:47, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

I have no interest in getting into edit wars on hatting convos, particularly under light of sanctions; as such I'm just asking for how the uninvolved admins how they would handle this. --MASEM (t) 20:48, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Oh I know, and I commend you for that. The template also says: This template should only be used by uninvolved editors in conjunction with the talk page guidelines and relevant advice at refactoring. It should not be used by involved parties to end a discussion over the objections of other editors. So your concerns of it being used by involved editors would be correct. Tutelary (talk) 20:50, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GamerGate opened

You were recently listed as a party to a request for arbitration. The Arbitration Committee has accepted that request for arbitration and an arbitration case has been opened at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GamerGate. Evidence that you wish the arbitrators to consider should be added to the evidence subpage, at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GamerGate/Evidence. Please add your evidence by December 11, 2014, which is when the evidence phase closes. You can also contribute to the case workshop subpage, Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GamerGate/Workshop. For a guide to the arbitration process, see Wikipedia:Arbitration/Guide to arbitration. For the Arbitration Committee, Ks0stm ^{(T•C•G•E)} 22:26, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

GG evidence statement

I know you say you're adding diffs later, but there's only one right now in a statement that's almost at the 1000 word limit. Just a friendly pointer that you may need to refactor away some of your supporting argument in order to make more claims as you get evidence ready. 76.64.35.209 (talk) 03:54, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

I'm aware of the lenght - the diffs will add no new text beyond links. --MASEM (t) 05:05, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Looks like everyone's going way beyond length anyway. Poor arbs. Incidentally, don't know how this happened, but your signature appears to have gotten corrupted when you made this Workshop edit. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.64.35.209 (talk) 16:45, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Probably I added or forgot a tilde in the signature. Thanks. --MASEM (t) 16:56, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

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Your post at WP:GGE

Is there anything more to do at Wikipedia:General sanctions/Gamergate/Requests for enforcement#In regards to involved editors closing/hatting discussions? If so can you say what action you are requesting? Do you want the thread unhatted? It's unlikely that there will be any agreement that only admins should hat threads. Thanks, EdJohnston (talk) 20:25, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

@EdJohnston I don't want the thread unhatted, I just want commentary from the uninvolved admins participating if hatting threads by any involved (read: those already notified of the sanctions) editor is really appropriate given the nature of the page. If you don't think editors hatting threads is a problem, then a statement to this effect would help to be clear, as well as the recognition that unhatting by other editors is generally acceptable practice as long as it doesn't turn into a edit war over hatting (eg no re-hatting, that's where if the thread should be closed editors can ask admin help). --MASEM (t) 20:37, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

It would be more practical if you could ask for something specific. The question of who can hat threads is murky and I can't make a great pronouncement on it. You may be asking for a policy change; no request to change policy goes unpunished. EdJohnston (talk) 21:16, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

@EdJohnston As someone noted above to me, WP:REFACTOR under normal conditions describes that anyone can hat a discussion, and a user can fairly unhat that discussion if they feel the conversion needs to continue. At that point, where we might vere into new area, is that in light of GG/GS any further hatting attempts of the same discussion should be something brought to the GG/GSE page to prevent talk page edit wars. --MASEM (t) 21:27, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

These things are arguable though I'm not persuaded. Unless you want to add something more to the thread I'll probably close it as inactive. EdJohnston (talk) 21:28, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Gamergate evidence limits

The arbs are leaning toward a doubling of the usual limits on evidence for this specific case. I am still waiting for final sign-off, but it seems likely that most participants will not need to trim evidence. Three relevant points:

• Given the substantial increase in limits, the usual acceptance if counts go a bit over will not be granted. Treat the limits as absolute.
• The limits apply to both direct evidence and rebuttal to others.
• Despite the increase, it is highly desirable to be as succinct as possible. For the arbitration committee --S Philbrick(Talk) 17:58, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Just wanted to give you thanks

Hey Masem. It's LoioshDwaggie. I just wanted to compliment your excellent work over on these contested pages, and with you posts to the ArbCom. It's unfortunate how strongly people are fighting on both sides, but you've been doing a masterful job trying to help. LoioshDwaggie (talk) 18:54, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

I'd like to chime in here and say thanks for your persistence and level-headedness on ArbCom. Your work is inspirational, a model for other Wikipedians to follow. DPRoberts534 (talk) 21:46, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Straw Poll

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Ralph H. Baer

Yeah I saw talk about Ralph Baer earlier. Not exactly sure if its true or not. Saw a source from Examiner.com for example. Was gonna show it just it seemed to be blacklisted. But still, the source mentioned that Wikipedia mentioned him dying. GamerPro64 20:24, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

All I'm going to do now is bolster the sourcing of the rest of the article, as this is a clear ITN recent death nomination. --MASEM (t) 20:26, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

Well, I guess if it turns out he hasn't died yet, at least the article will look a little more presentable. GamerPro64 20:28, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

Source on Target GTA ban & GamerGate link

Hi Masem, I follow the GG page but I'm not able to post to it as I'm a new user, thought I'd leave this source on your page (This is the first time I've ever edited wikipedia so apologies if I'm doing it wrong!

This article from news.com.au gives pretty neutral coverage to the Target GTA5 banning, and the response by GamerGate. http://www.news.com.au/technology/home-entertainment/grand-theft-auto-fans-call-for-ban-on-sickening-bible-in-fightback-after-attack-on-the-game/story-e6frfrt9-1227145911622 - Thanks! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.219.6.98 (talk) 22:57, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

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GamerGate arbitration case: evidence and workshop

In the interests of making this case more easily manageable, it is likely that we will prune the parties list to limit it to those against whom evidence has been submitted. Therefore, if anyone has anything to add, now is the time to do so.

See the list of parties not included in the evidence as of 8 Dec 14.

Please note that the purpose of the /Evidence page is to provide narrative, context and all the diffs. As diffs can usually be interpreted in various ways, to avoid ambiguity, they should be appended to the allegation that's being made. If the material is private and the detail has been emailed to ArbCom, add [private evidence] instead of diffs.

The /Workshop page builds on evidence. FOFs about individual editors should contain a summary of the allegation made in /Evidence, and diffs to illustrate the allegation. Supplying diffs makes it easier for the subject of the FOF to respond and much easier for arbitrators to see whether your FOF has substance.

No allegations about other editors should be made either in /Evdence or in the /Workshop without supporting diffs. Doing so may expose you to findings of making personal attacks and casting aspersions.

Also, please note that the evidence lengths have been increased from about 1000 words and about 100 diffs for parties and about 500 words and about diffs for non-parties to a maximum of 2000 words and 200 diffs for parties and 1000 words and 100 diffs for non-parties. For the Arbitration Committee, Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 06:09, 10 December 2014 (UTC) Message delivered by MediaWiki message delivery (talk)

DYK for Mandatory Fun

Mike V • Talk 19:00, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

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Gamergate and Newsweek's published data analysis

I like your work on the GG piece so far, fighting hard to maintain Wikipedia's NPOV.

I added a piece to the GG talk page about a little-noticed aspect of the body of gamergate tweets. According to Brandwatch, the analysts hired by Newsweek, they were only able to detect negativity in a small fraction of GG tweets. The vast majority were labelled neutral. I'd like to know if, as an experienced editor, you think this might merit inclusion. I'm new to this game, and advice from established experts like yourself would be most appreciated. Bramble window (talk) 14:44, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

As a supplement to this there were two sets of independent analyses done as well, if that's something that can be included, not really sure coming from Everything2 which is more lax and has far less rules about sourced data and the like. So long as it was provable one had appropriate credentials/experience in the field then it was A-Ok to append. Ihadurca Il Imella (talk) 21:16, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Scribblenauts

Hi there, I'm pleased to inform you that I've begun reviewing the article Scribblenauts you nominated for GA-status according to the criteria. This process may take up to 7 days. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you might have during this period. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of GamerPro64 -- GamerPro64 (talk) 01:21, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Laurent Lamothe

Can you help me update this article? Some hostage situation in Sydney has become part of the ITN. --George Ho (talk) 18:06, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Barnstar of Diligence
	You've been an astounding administrator and editor in more topics than I've ever seen. I always see you around; helping, aiding, caring. You're doing great work. Tutelary (talk) 21:26, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

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hacking altblurb

If you'll support it, I have added this: which is short and sweet, as an altblurb II: The FBI blames hacking by North Korea for bringing Sony Pictures to cancel release of The Interview and production on current projects.

Template:Did you know nominations/Sony Pictures Entertainment hack

No need to nominate it for ITN yet. I've created the DYK nomination for you before I closed the ITN discussion as withdrawn. --George Ho (talk) 22:42, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Seasonal Greets!

Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2015!!!

Hello Masem, may you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Sending you a heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New Year 2015. Happy editing, starship.paint ~ ¡Olé! 03:36, 20 December 2014 (UTC) Spread the love by adding {{subst:Seasonal Greetings}} to user talk pages with a friendly message.

Your GA nomination of Scribblenauts

The article Scribblenauts you nominated as a good article has been placed on hold . The article is close to meeting the good article criteria, but there are some minor changes or clarifications needing to be addressed. If these are fixed within 7 days, the article will pass; otherwise it may fail. See Talk:Scribblenauts for things which need to be addressed. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of GamerPro64 -- GamerPro64 (talk) 17:20, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

Los Angeles Times article on Sony Pictures Entertainment hack

I found this article rebutting claims against NK. Should it be included? --George Ho (talk) 21:19, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

If there was additional commentary from others doubting the NK claims, that would be worthwhile to include alongside. --MASEM (t) 21:32, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

Have you read the article yet? --George Ho (talk) 21:46, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

Wait... here's another: CBS News. --George Ho (talk) 21:51, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

I read the article, it's just one voice, which is why if more voices said a similar thing, it would be worth including. --MASEM (t) 21:58, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

AP on security guards, The Guardian, one local station. Shall I search for more? --George Ho (talk) 22:11, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

PC Mag too. --George Ho (talk) 22:31, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

Look, I don't think North Korea is that capable of doing a sophisticated hack. What prevents an inclusion of these analyses and opinions? --George Ho (talk) 01:03, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

All I was saying that if it was just one paper with that opinion, it would be FRINGE to include. But with those other sources now, it's a significant viewpoint (that NK likely couldn't be behind the hack) to include. --MASEM (t) 01:08, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Well, can you or I include these opinions? --George Ho (talk) 01:10, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Yes, they can be added now. --MASEM (t) 02:28, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Done. Now help me improve info more. --George Ho (talk) 06:56, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

DYK for I Won't Let You Down (OK Go song)

Harrias ^talk 12:01, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Awesomenauts article issues

Sorry to disturb, but from the edit history for Awesomenauts it looks like you're something like a main contributor. I'm currently trying to improve the article in question and I obviously noticed the multiple issue template. It was added in March 2013 (almost 2 years ago!) and since I am kinda new, I was wondering if you could help me out and answer a couple of questions. What does "incomplete" mean? Should it include more sections or the current sections simply needs expanding? I have no idea what else could be included in the page, any ideas? What's the present content discouraged by the guidelines? Thank you very much! Heinerj (talk) 12:00, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

We really would need more development information (what was the idea/inspiration, etc.), and clearly a reception section. I'm not sure what content is being considered 'excessive' in the current article, but we do need to avoid things like listing all Awesomeanuts, etc. --MASEM (t) 21:06, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

I have a question

For images from the mid 1800s to 1923 that have not been previously published until the 1990's, are we clear of any copyright issues for upload? We have a number of photos from the Hawaiian digital archives that have no publication history until the archives published the photos in the mid to late 1990s. Since many of these images have no photo attribution and the copyright holder of the image at that time would be unclear what issues should I look for (if any) to be sure the images are in the public domain? Any assistance is much appreciated.--Mark Miller (talk) 22:04, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Per [4] if we have no sure prior publication (as defined by the copyright office), then the first publication in the 1990s means that these are copyrighted through 2047 (yes, welcome to the insanity of copyright law). --MASEM (t) 02:16, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

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Sony Pictures Entertainment hack

There are too many opinions on the cancellation of wide release, which are to me worthless and valueless and no longer encyclopedic. Perhaps the "Reaction" section should be trimmed down. --George Ho (talk) 08:39, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

It's been almost a week. Shall you or I trim down the section? --George Ho (talk) 19:13, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

Go ahead, we don't need every quote. --MASEM (t) 21:37, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

What about "Threats surrounding The Interview" section? I don't know which is most insignificant, so I can't trim it down yet. --George Ho (talk) 08:00, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

That section is fine. That's what made this really notable. --MASEM (t) 15:26, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

bioshock infinite

Before Bioshock Infinite released there were various trailers with the Vox Populi well before occupy became a "thing." Ken Levine said in an interview with mother jones it was mostly inspired by the red shirt army german group. Even on the wiki page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Army_Faction it states that vox populi was directly influnced by that group. I'm trying to find the video but ken said that the vox wasnt even close to occupy wallstreet. I think stating that he was looking at the occupy to get input for the vox is very innacurate. The e3 2011 trailer was released months before occupy even existed. CyberBob0002 (talk) 07:47, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

It is not that Occupy was the inspiration for the Vox, but that per the Washington Post article that the attitudes and methods used by the Occupy movement influenced how he wrote out what the Vox Populi did. They were definitely already created by the trailer (and before Occupy) but the story still would be developed and he took inspiration from Occupy and the Tea Party to adjust some of the basics. That's exactly what the lead says - it does not say that the Vox was based on Occupy as you're arguing. --MASEM (t) 07:51, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

Also see Development of BioShock Infinite, we do note, as you say, that the Red Army Faction was the inspiration of the Vox, but he tuned the story with the behavior of the Occupy movement. --MASEM (t) 07:53, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

I think the red shirt army should be placed in their somewhere. Ken has said on numerous occasions that was his main inspiration for the vox populi. CyberBob0002 (talk) 07:55, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

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The WikiProject Video Games Newsletter, Q4 2014

The WikiProject Video Games Newsletter
Volume 7, No. 4 — 4th Quarter, 2014
Previous issue | Index | Next issue

Project At a Glance
As of Q4 2014, the project has:

• 188 Featured Articles
• 67 Featured Lists
• 9 Featured Topics
• 20 Featured Pictures

• 42 A-Class Articles
• 749 Good Articles
• 13 Good Topics

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Content

• Changes to Featured and Good content
• News items and announcements

• Feature: Refmining – Another side of WikiGnoming
• Interview: Marasmusine

---

Project Navigation

• VG Project Main pages

  • Main project – talk
  • Project category – talk
  • Portal – talk

  VG Project Departments

  • Assessment – talk
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  • Reference library – talk
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To receive future editions of this newsletter, click here to sign up on the distribution list.

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2 questions

For some reason the "thank" button disappears randomly. I noticed it while browsing my watchlist (on my phone) that it was gone, despite being there yesterday. Would there be any reason for this? --DSA510 Pls No RE 18:57, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Previously, I had written an article on the BoingBoing lunacy at Uncyclopedia. I was told it doesn't violate my topic ban, I assume as it is only tangentially related to that which shall not be named. However, I've decided to parody the article on that which shall not be named directly, since with each revision it becomes more absurd, and I am one to take things to their logical extremes. I probably should have asked if a wholesale parody of the article would violate my topic ban. So... does it? --DSA510 Pls No RE 18:57, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

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Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey

Masem, I understand your concern with the section I added, however, there was discussion on the talk page that rumors could be added if the sources were coming from people directly involved with the show, which amounts more than just third-party rumors, the fact that both Seth and Neil tweeted "teases" about a second season lend credibility to the fact that it more likely than not, that there will be a season two, otherwise I highly doubt they would bother saying so. I would like to include the section, and maybe change the wording from "rumors" to something else, but didn't want to engage in an edit war, which is why I am coming to you first, but these appear to be substantiated from what I can tell. War wizard90 (talk) 03:59, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

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Gamergate hashtag

Thanks for your work at Draft:Gamergate controversy. I took a look at your recent addition and noticed that it was in a rather amorphous section called something like "Gamergate hashtag", whereas really it would probably fit better in the "further harassment" section. Or maybe there should be a section on "reactions to harassment" or something which details all the different initiatives such as Twitter/WAM thing, the industry condemnation of the harassment, etc.

What are your thoughts on this? --TS 13:33, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

The stuff about Twitter and other aspects in that para can likely go down with the industry reaction section. --MASEM (t) 16:44, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

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• MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:13, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

Ignoring people who bother you is bad behavior

Could you explain why ignoring people who bother you is poor behavior, exactly? Hipocrite (talk) 21:07, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

WP is built by consensus which means everyone's opinions should be taken in appropriately for proper consensus to develop. You're free to ignore editors, but it is very much commonplace that editors will refer back to other editor's comments to build on, and so to say "well your argument is not valid because I'm not reading that other person's opinion" is basically a WP:NOTHERE violation as a battleground aspect. --MASEM (t) 21:10, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

I didn't say that his comments were invalid, but rather that I didn't want to go back to read more from the person that I dislike reading. I wanted you to explain whatever argument you think R42 was stating in words that someone who actually edited wikipedia broadly, like we both have, would use. I'd appreciate you withdrawing your comment. Hipocrite (talk) 21:12, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

Can you review this edit you made?

Please take a look at this edit [5] and then cross reference against what the source says. Shouldn't the statement been attributed?--Two kinds of pork^Makin'_Bacon 08:05, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Honestly, I'm not seeing a specific problem against the source [6] but please let me know what you think might be an issue. --MASEM (t) 16:00, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

"longstanding harassment of women on the internet" is said as a statement of fact. Now I'm not saying that isn't true, however the source doesn't say that. It is quoting Friedman.--Two kinds of pork^Makin'_Bacon 19:40, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

No, that's fair - it doesn't state "long-standing". I've adjusted the draft article to make that "general" (the WAM thing was not just made due to harassment from the GG situation but from other points, is the point). --MASEM (t) 20:46, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

The move, while in the wake of the Gamergate harassment, was due to X suggests the source is saying twitter teamed up with WAM due to X. But the source doesn't say this. It really says that twitter claims they partner with various orgs to respond to abuse. Two kinds of pork^Makin'_Bacon 22:19, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

That might be overly exacting, but another source is more clear it is tied with harassment in general [7]. --MASEM (t) 22:24, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

On the contrary, to cite properly is not overly exact, it's Wikipedia's prime directive. Two kinds of pork^Makin'_Bacon 04:05, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

BTW, I'm not trying to make some sort of statement here. I certainly come down on the side of the mainstream in condemning the harassment. However I just don't like it when people take create license with sourcing. Two kinds of pork^Makin'_Bacon 05:33, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Template:Did you know nominations/Sony Pictures Entertainment hack

I have trouble writing a hook; can you help me? --George Ho (talk) 06:16, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

You've got mail!

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Your GA nomination of Scribblenauts

The article Scribblenauts you nominated as a good article has passed ; see Talk:Scribblenauts for comments about the article. Well done! If the article has not already been on the main page as an "In the news" or "Did you know" item, you can nominate it to appear in Did you know. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of GamerPro64 -- GamerPro64 (talk) 03:01, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

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What bias?

Please explain how it is "bias" to clearly represent what the reliable sources are stating. [8] -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 18:50, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

It preloads the sentence that implies the RSes are "right" about how they view the movement, which we as a neutral entity cannot take as a tone. Presenting the gg point, and then presenting the counterpoint without any other swaying language avoids attempting to put one view as "right" over the other and keeps the language impartial. --MASEM (t) 18:53, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Well, yes, per WP:V and WP:RS and WP:OR and WP:FRINGE the sources are "right" and it is not "impartial" to craft the article otherwise. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 20:25, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

No, we can't assume that. Per NPOV "Avoid stating opinions as facts. Usually, articles will contain information about the significant opinions that have been expressed about their subjects. However, these opinions should not be stated in Wikipedia's voice. Rather, they should be attributed in the text to particular sources, or where justified, described as widespread views, etc. For example, an article should not state that "genocide is an evil action", but it may state that "genocide has been described by John X as the epitome of human evil." That's exactly the situation with GG. --MASEM (t) 20:29, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

And your sentence reverted an attribution of claims to the very respected sources from which they came and inserted an unattributed claim about GG. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 00:05, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

The attribution towards the sources remains, and the claim about GG being about ethics is very much attributed. However, when you write a statement like "A says X, but B says A is not about that", or "B claims that A is not what A claims", that's imposing a bias we cannot write. It makes the stand that the press is "right". While it is not factually wrong, it is not how we write a neutral article. --MASEM (t) 00:09, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

More images for Grim Fandango

Hey Masem, I think both you and I are being productive today, in GF (You doing more than I). Could I direct your attention to another section in GF's talk page, where I am suggesting the addition of two more images, under the Fair Use rationale? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Grim_Fandango#Use_image_to_compare_before_and_after_remastering . Please let me know what you think. Thanks! (talk) user:Al83tito 21:25, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GamerGate closed

This arbitration case has been closed and the final decision is available at the link above. The following remedies have been enacted:

1.1)

(i) The community Gamergate general sanctions are hereby rescinded and are replaced by standard discretionary sanctions, which are authorized for all edits about, and all pages related to, (a) GamerGate, (b) any gender-related dispute or controversy, (c) people associated with (a) or (b), all broadly construed.

(ii) All sanctions in force when this remedy is enacted are endorsed and will become standard discretionary sanctions governed by the standard procedure from the moment of enactment.

(iii) Notifications issued under Gamergate general sanctions become alerts for twelve months from the date of enactment of this remedy, then expire. The log of notifications will remain on the Gamergate general sanction page.

(iv) All existing and past sanctions and restrictions placed under Gamergate general sanctions will be transcribed by the arbitration clerks in the central discretionary sanctions log.

(v) Any requests for enforcement that may be open when this remedy is enacted shall proceed, but any remedy that is enacted should be enacted as a discretionary sanction.

(vi) Administrators who have enforced the Gamergate general sanctions are thanked for their work and asked to continue providing administrative assistance enforcing discretionary sanctions and at Arbitration enforcement.

1.2)

Uninvolved administrators are encouraged to monitor the articles covered by discretionary sanctions in this case to ensure compliance. To assist in this, administrators are reminded that:

(i) Accounts with a clear shared agenda may be blocked if they violate the sockpuppetry policy or other applicable policy;

(ii) Accounts whose primary purpose is disruption, violating the policy on biographies of living persons, or making personal attacks may be blocked indefinitely;

(iii) There are special provisions in place to deal with editors who violate the BLP policy;

(iv) The default position for BLPs, particularly for individuals whose noteworthiness is limited to a particular event or topic, is the presumption of privacy for personal matters;

(v) Editors who spread or further publicize existing BLP violations may be blocked;

(vi) Administrators may act on clear BLP violations with page protections, blocks, or warnings even if they have edited the article themselves or are otherwise involved;

(vii) Discretionary sanctions permit full and semi-page protections, including use of pending changes where warranted, and – once an editor has become aware of sanctions for the topic – any other appropriate remedy may be issued without further warning.

The Arbitration Committee thanks those administrators who have been helping to enforce the community general sanctions, and thanks, once again, in advance those who help enforce the remedies adopted in this case.

2.1) Any editor subject to a topic-ban in this decision is indefinitely prohibited from making any edit about, and from editing any page relating to, (a) Gamergate, (b) any gender-related dispute or controversy, (c) people associated with (a) or (b), all broadly construed. These restrictions may be appealed to the Committee only after 12 months have elapsed from the closing of this case.

4.1) NorthBySouthBaranof (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely restricted per the standard topic ban.

5.1) Ryulong (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely restricted per the standard topic ban.

5.3) Ryulong (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely banned from the English Language Wikipedia. They may request reconsideration of the ban twelve months after the enactment of this remedy, and every twelve months thereafter.

6.2) TaraInDC (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is admonished for treating Wikipedia as if it were a battleground and advised to better conduct themselves.

7.2) Tarc (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely restricted per the standard topic ban.

7.3) Tarc (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is strongly warned that should future misconduct occur in any topic area, he may be banned from the English Wikipedia by motion of the Arbitration Committee.

8.2) The Devil's Advocate (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely restricted per the standard topic ban.

8.3) Subject to the usual exceptions, The Devil's Advocate (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is prohibited from making any more than one revert on any one page in any 48-hour period. This applies for all pages on the English Wikipedia, except The Devil's Advocate's own user space. This restriction may be appealed to the Committee only after 12 months have elapsed from the closing of this case.

8.4) Subject to the usual exceptions, The Devil's Advocate (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely prohibited from editing any administrative or conduct noticeboard (including, not not limited to; AN, AN/I, AN/EW, and AE), except for threads regarding situations that he was directly involved in when they were started. This restriction may be appealed to the Committee only after 12 months have elapsed from the closing of this case.

8.5) The Devil's Advocate (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is strongly warned that should future misconduct occur in any topic area, he may be banned from the English Wikipedia by motion of the Arbitration Committee. Further, the committee strongly suggests that The Devil's Advocate refrains from editing contentious topic areas in the future.

9) TheRedPenOfDoom (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is admonished for treating Wikipedia as if it were a battleground and advised to better conduct themselves.

10.1) The Arbitration Committee endorses the community-imposed topic ban preventing Tutelary (talk · contribs) from editing under the Gamergate general sanctions. This ban is converted to an Arbitration Committee-imposed ban. Tutelary (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely restricted per the standard topic ban.

12) The Arbitration Committee endorses the community-imposed topic bans preventing ArmyLine (talk · contribs), DungeonSiegeAddict510 (talk · contribs), and Xander756 (talk · contribs) from editing under the Gamergate general sanctions. The topic bans for these three editors are converted to indefinite restrictions per the standard topic ban.

13) The Arbitration Committee endorses the community-imposed topic ban preventing Titanium Dragon (talk · contribs) from editing under BLP enforcement. This ban is converted to an Arbitration Committee-imposed ban. Titanium Dragon is indefinitely restricted per the standard topic ban.

14.1) Loganmac (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely restricted per the standard topic ban.

15) Willhesucceed (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely restricted per the standard topic ban.

18) The Arbitration Committee urges that knowledgeable and non-conflicted users not previously involved in editing GamerGate-related articles, especially GamerGate-related biographies of living people, should carefully review them for adherence to Wikipedia policies and address any perceived or discovered deficiencies. This is not a finding that the articles are or are not satisfactory in their present form, but an urging that independent members of the community examine the matter in light of the case.

For the Arbitration Committee, Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 00:46, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• Glad to see you weren't sucked down with the sinking ship, Masem! What a snarly mess! -Thibbs (talk) 02:06, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Recent GamerGate Revision Issue

The material I added is from the same source already used in the material edited. I would simply be doubling the source reference for the same entry. This is readily apparent by reading the source in question. Leaving this information out would require a POV assertion that part of the source is reliable and another part is not.Calbeck (talk) 02:12, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) The speculative sourcing on who issued the DMCA based on a tumblr blog is not enough to get it over our BLP barrier - beyond the fact that the edit itself really focused on the minor foibles as opposed to the central issue. If you want to effect lasting change on the article, you'll either need to make edits that you think people who disagree with you would find acceptable or just try to reach consensus on the talk page. Hipocrite (talk) 02:16, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

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Alternative game news sources

Heya Masem. One thing I have noted in the Gamergate article as long-time observer and occasional discussion participant is that there indeed are "pro-GG" sources available, but discussion usually concludes with a consensus that they do not qualify per WP:RS. Then again, as an admittedly new editor very much trying to avoid SPA sanctions, I have to admit I cannot understand WP:RS very well, at least in how it combines with WP:V to disqualify some leading "pro-GG sources".

The three most notable of these alternative sources are:

TechRaptor

Nichegamer

and Gamesnosh

My question to you is, how or what would it take for these sources to be included? Are there are any specific things that would have to change among these sources?

Additionally, searching for "Techraptor", "Nichegamer", and "Gamesnosh" returns results where articles from these publications have been used in other wiki articles. It would appear they are acceptable to use as sources in some regard on Wikipedia, or... maybe not? Should their citations be removed, or are they only prohibited from usage on the Gamergate article specifically?

Lastly, though these publications lack a wiki page of their own, other newly-created gamergate supporter-frequented communities such as 8chan do. How does one justify creating an article for these alternative sources that clears Wikipedia's criteria? I would be interested in doing so, but only if it stands up to scrutiny.

Sorry if this is too long. Camarouge (talk) 06:23, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

The difficulty is here is that in while they would be okay in a less controversial topic (such as about a video game itself), in the context of GG, and being aware that these are GG friendly sources, there would be a huge issue in using them as sources. This is partially why we're trying to avoid any video game journalism sources except where needed on the article since that's a decisive area about the topic. --MASEM (t) 06:27, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

The Swapper thematic genre

That means the thematic genre seen on Halo: Combat Evolved page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo:_Combat_Evolved) - military science fiction - should be deleted as well. Or maybe it should be placed in the Gameplay section below instead? _{(User talk:BartSmith85) 30 January 2015 (UTC)}

Or in the first sentence of the second paragraph: "Halo is a military science fiction story set in ...". Be aware it is an older FA article, so the standard of avoiding the genre like that is somewhat newer. --MASEM (t) 06:50, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

To be clear, what the thematic theme is should still be mentioned, but in terms of video games, the gameplay genre is more important. --MASEM (t) 06:51, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

So I'm not allowed to use "science fiction" term at all in The Swapper article? That's surprising, considering that all other video game articles have thematic genres. If they wouldn't be allowed, someone would delete them long ago. _{(User talk:BartSmith85) 31 January 2015 (UTC)}

No, it can be said, it just shouldn't be said in the first sentence alongside side gameplay genres. There are other places it can go in the lede.--MASEM (t) 13:17, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Goat Simulator

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Your GA nomination of Goat Simulator

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DYK for Sony Pictures Entertainment hack

Harrias ^talk 14:42, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

GameFAQs

Hi.

There is a discussion about the deletion of {{GameFAQs}} template in Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2015 February 8 § GameFAQs. It is relisted, so I though I'd be good idea to publicize by calling people who work in the relevant field, such as yourself. I guessing having so much experience in WP:GA and WP:FA of video game articles means your opinion is very important; plus, you are an admin and know relevant policies by heart. Just for the record, this template generates an external link to GameFAQs.com in External links sections of articles.

One minor request: The closing admin was a little bit, shall we say, disenfranchised by the unrelated discussions like the merit of using GameFAQs link anywhere other than the EL section. So, I'd appreciate if such discussions were either totally avoided or kept to a bare minimum. Thanks a lot.

Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 04:07, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

Gawker, Coca Cola, GamerGate and advertisers - Gawker page updating?

Hey Masem. Together with strolling through the gamergate.me archives (keeping up with a few older things I remembered and didn't know how it ended) I hit upon the Gawker vs Coca Cola social media incident. I pulled up a RS source on it (http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/feb/05/coca-cola-makeithappy-gakwer-mein-coke-hitler), went to the Gawker page and also noted the fact missing there that Gawker already had lost a lot of money post half year due to GamerGate's targeting of advertisers (and, IMHO, Gawker's stupid response on it which cost them even more). If I can dig up an RS without value judgment, would it be permittable you guess to make an addition to the 'Gawker incidentlist' so to say where those two get each an little explanation in a combined paraghraph? Considering they're both with a severe impact on the ad incomes (or are so to be expected in the case of that prank vs Coca Cola), it seems it would be noteworthy. (Or should I ping one of the admins about it?) Cheers, MicBenSte (talk) 04:19, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

DYK nomination of Goat Simulator

Hello! Your submission of Goat Simulator at the Did You Know nominations page has been reviewed, and some issues with it may need to be clarified. Please review the comment(s) underneath your nomination's entry and respond there as soon as possible. Thank you for contributing to Did You Know! Constantine ✍ 21:48, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

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1rr

Are you in violation of 1rr on the gamergate controversy page? Hipocrite (talk) 22:58, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

Need to Know Proper Forum

So, recently I was put up for an Enforcement Request on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#AnsFenrisulfr and no matter which way the votes goes, I am gonna need to know where to file something.

If it succeeds, and I am topic banned, I need to know where to go to appeal. If it fails... I am going to be blunt, I want to know where to and how to report JzG. I tried my best to assume the best faith possible, but this was just... wrong. Making things up and submitting it as evidence, outright insulting me (I am part of a Cult apparently), and asking I at the very least be topic banned for... nothing. Sure, I can see him being angry over my ER for NbSB (Something I apologized to NbSB for, since it was ME who was in the wrong there, I had not understood BANEX as well as I thought I did), but that is hardly something to ask for my head over, and of course the aforementioned apology.

Any help is appreciated, thank you. AnsFenrisulfr (talk) 07:34, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

(talk page stalker)Hey you don't need to file a separate report against JzG. You can instead argue for a WP:BOOMERANG in the report he made against you. However, I don't know how productive that will be. Maybe he'll get a caution against making comments that could be construed as personal attacks? Can't imagine much more than that though. What are you looking to get out of reporting him? As for ban appeal, in that case you're unlucky. Arbcom bans can only be appealed 6 months after the ban is placed. I hope you don't get discouraged, and carry on editing if you get topic banned. You're picking up the rules very fast (in a trial by fire sort of way), and you're a lot less rude than a lot of people who charge headfirst into the Gamergate topic, which is pretty impressive when you consider how raised the tensions are on that talk page. Bosstopher (talk) 16:23, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Would rather carry over an argument into another report, to be honest. Allows me to be much clearer in why I think it necessary, while also not being as restricted by the character limit. As to being dissuaded... bit late for that. After being outright attacked by an editor, then being insulted by an admin, then having THIS admin file a report based on specious evidence. If this is how new editors are treated, then I am surprised Wikipedia gets anything done. AnsFenrisulfr (talk) 00:46, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

ARBCOM Clarification Request & WT:BLP Discussion

Based on this edit [9], you may be interested in an ArbCom Clarification Request and/or the discussion at WT:BLP. Please review the request at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification and Amendment#Editing_of_Biographies_of_Living_Persons and, if you wish to do so, enter your statement and any other material you wish to submit to the Arbitration Committee. Additionally, the Wikipedia:Arbitration guide may be of use.

Thanks. - Ryk72 ^'c.s.n.s.' 14:25, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

Hi Masem, you may be interested that I've closed and archived this arbitration clarification request to the Editing of Biographies of Living Persons case talk page. For the Arbitration Committee, --L235 (t / c / ping in reply) 18:17, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Would you take a quick look?

Would you look at this upload and see if I did it correctly? Thanks! JodyB _talk 19:13, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

@JodyB: it looks fine - you could use the template {{Non-free use rationale logo}} for the rationale instead, but it's not required. --MASEM (t) 19:34, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Great, if you think its ok I will just leave it alone and use the template you mentioned next time. I came to you because I saw your name on the boards and figured you had some expertise in that area. Thanks for the fast reply! JodyB _talk 20:23, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Protect Crackdown 3

I request this as it seems like the anon is not getting the point of not writing anything until it has a proper title. Thanks. Zero Serenity ^{(talk - contributions)} 22:25, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

If they start pushing on it more, maybe, but it's too low activity to really do well. (And while I'm watching for news, if there is something legitimately to add, we'd want people to expand if they can). --MASEM (t) 22:36, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

I just see this as a constant thing going on by one anon since December. I really hope it gets a title or something soon. GDC is coming in a few weeks and E3 is in June. Zero Serenity ^{(talk - contributions)} 22:41, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

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Relax duplicate linking rule (again!)

Hi Masem, you might be interested to see that I'm reopening the issue of duplicate links at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Linking#Relax_duplicate_linking_rule. --Slashme (talk) 21:33, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

SOTC (band)

Thanks for seeing it my way a bit, and to reenforce the band's notability, check our their Facebook with nearly 30k likes. If this was some garbage demo band that did their shit on Reaper with only a couple Bandcamp songs, then I would agree with their place not being deserved mention on the article. But with two full length albums, and a huge following in the deathcore scene with members coming from Fate and Molotov Solution being included in the band, I would say these dudes are pretty damn worthy of an honorable mention on the article for a great video game that they created their whole musical being around. Just my take on it. Second Skin (talk) 13:37, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Orphaned non-free image File:TopChef-logo.jpg

⚠

Thanks for uploading File:TopChef-logo.jpg. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

Note that any non-free images not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described in the criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. Stefan2 (talk) 23:25, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

DYK for Goat Simulator

— Coffee // have a cup // beans // 00:03, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Recent edit to Guitar Hero

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ITN/C for net neutrality

Did you mean to reply to me or to Mamyles? I'm not clear on whether you support the "including" part or not. Isa (talk) 22:49, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, I meant to Mamyles, and have fixed that. --MASEM (t) 22:54, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

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Gamergate source and discussion

Hi there, I can't edit the page/talk myself yet (not that I any desire to except to correct this particular mistake), but I have a relevant piece of information for you in the gamergate talk page.

Editor strongjam is using an article in the talk page (and presumably the main page):

" We do actually have a peer-reviewed source that calls it a conspiracy. "Over the months of August and September in 2014, an independent game developer by the name of Zoe Quinn and her friends have found themselves the target of an equally misogynist backlash by a coordinated conspiracy. While originally labelled under the hashtag ‘#quinnspiracy’, it evolved into a collective movement known as ‘gamergate’." – Heron, Michael James; Belford, Pauline; Goker, Ayse (2014). "Sexism in the circuitry". ACM SIGCAS Computers and Society (Association for Computing Machinery) 44 (4): 18–29. doi:10.1145/2695577.2695582. ISSN 0095-2737. — Strongjam (talk) 18:30, 27 February 2015 (UTC) " -strongjam

Saying that it is a 'peer-reviewed source.'

ACM SIGCAS is not a peer reviewed journal. It is a Special interest group's newsletter (SIGCAS stands for 'special interest group - computing and society'). Here is the issue in question in which this article appears: http://www.sigcas.org/newsletter/latest-issue (this link will cease to be up to day when they release their next issue, only the most current issue is available for free). The organization's page on the newsletter, explaining what it is however http://www.sigcas.org/newsletter explicitly states that this newsletter is not peer-reviewed.

Tookoolforskool (talk) 07:49, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

WP:FFD

Just so you know I'm adding a lot more images. Please feel free to check each one if you think I've been hasty. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:31, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

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Talkback

Hello, Masem. You have new messages at Talk:The Binding of Isaac (video game).
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

--82.136.210.153 (talk) 08:02, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

File:Apple Pay promotional hero.jpg

If I can solicit your copyright expertise, File:Apple Pay promotional hero.jpg was recently flagged for failing NFCC1. I argued that it's invalid since there's no way to get a free use representation of Apple Pay. Then I received a talk page message that a straight screenshot of the app would be "WP:FREER", which makes little sense to me, as Apple owns the copyright to both the app and our promotional image. (Additionally, a screenshot would not show both its representation on both iOS and Apple Watch.) Wanted to see what you thought. czar ⨹ 17:17, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Since this is an Apple produced image to show an Apple product (as opposed to , say, Chase providing the image), this is equivalent to the idea of using a montage provided by the copyright owner to allow multiple images to effectively be used. Your image should be fine. --MASEM (t) 17:46, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

This is not an image from a press kit - it's an image from Apple's website. If it were an image that Apple had sent out to media organizations with their express or implied permission that it be used in coverage of Apple products, then this would be "equivalent to the idea of using a montage provided by the copyright owner". Per WP:NFCC#3, we incorporate the minimum non-free content possible and a screenshot without the creative photography work better complies with that requirement. A screenshot that incorporates only PD-ineligible credit cards would comply with it even better. --B (talk) 18:54, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Breaking it down, there's 3 copyrightable elements here:

1. The photo of the phone and watch - due to nature of lighting effects and such, whomever took this photo is the copyright owner on that. As it is from Apple's website, it was likely a work for hire and the copyright belongs to Apple.
2. The screenshot(s), ignoring the logos, are Apple's property, since it is their software and UI.
3. The individual bank logos and workmarks - where PDtext doesn't apply - are copyright of the respective banks.

Now, in considering 1 and 2, as long as it is a photo from Apple's website, then the montage idea works fine, and the copyright issues of 1 and 2 are simply a single copyright issue. We don't require the image to be from a press kit to be an allowable montage, only that the montage in some way we can affirm that it came from the copyright owner that owns all the elements of the montage.

There is the possibility of getting a free screenshot that only uses PDtext bank logos and wordmarks, but the UI aspect from Apple's side will still be there. However, this would require a user that only uses cards that only have PDtext elements for their parts, and I don't think that's a currently reasonable expectation, given that most of the major vendors that are supporting Apple Pay have non-PDtext logos and wordmarks. If we can get one, great, but it would only be FREER, not free. If we do get that, then the other thing to suggest is that to show how Apple Pay works would be to show a phone or watch being swiped at a register, with the screen tilted off enough to put the graphics in de minimus , which would then be a completely free image. --MASEM (t) 19:04, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Now at FfD: Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2015 March 7#File:Apple Pay promotional hero.jpg czar ⨹ 19:36, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Little Syria, Manhattan

Take a peek at "Little Syria, Manhattan" and let me know what the optimal image setting should be. Like you, I believe in the default dynamic sizing rather than a fixed value. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 05:43, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm not seeing any particular need to have the second and third image at non-thumb sizes. The lead image, yeah, that's fine (though I would suggest something like "upright=1.5" to use dynamic sizing if the other two are at default thumb sizes). --MASEM (t) 06:19, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia defining history - Masem the enforcer

Unbelievable that you called a piece published in 2015 a reliable source, long after wikipedia had that garbage in it - and you're an admin. Your actions are proof that WP:V in Wikipedia has jumped the shark. The Dissident Aggressor 18:44, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

No, first - it's well established that Hein's the originator - is there doubt to this (google shows no one else making that claim). We allow recent sources to document past events, but I found a 2002 source that affirms the same information. --MASEM (t) 18:51, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

No, it's not well established - except by heim himself: [10] and [11] are a couple of examples.

Recent sources documenting past events, repeating poorly sourced crap on wikipedia is downright dangerous. Then to use that repetition as a reliable source is laughable. WP:CIRCULAR much?

do not use ... publications that rely on material from Wikipedia as sources. Content from a Wikipedia article is not considered reliable unless it is backed up by citing reliable sources. Confirm that these sources support the content, then use them directly.

Of course nobody would ever claim something, publish it on their website then add it to wikipedia - validating a self-created myth. Nor would anyone use wikipedia for self promotion. The Dissident Aggressor 19:17, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

Given that there's no question he created the site, there's little question he's the one that worked on the term. Also I added a 2002 source which predates WP, so there's no issue with any possibility of WP being the source for that. There is no other source that makes a counterclaim that it wasn't him that created this, and per policy, we'll stay with what RSes say. --MASEM (t) 19:21, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

How would you possibly connect the creation of the website with the first use of the term? Did the guy that created http://whataglasshole.com come up with the term? How about the guy that came up with http://bigboobs.com/ come up with the term? Of course not. The Dissident Aggressor 19:53, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

If there were conflicting reports, we'd identify them. There aren't any, so there's nothing to challenge. Further with the number of RSes reporting on this (and we're talking quality RSes) you would expect them to try to validate if his claims were false before publishing. So no, there's no issues here. --MASEM (t) 19:59, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

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Date consistency

Hi Masem; regarding our recent edits to dates in the Cities: Skylines article, I'd like to note that MOS:DATEUNIFY permits a different style between the article prose and the citations--so long as they are each internally consistent. Hence why I did not change the article body, which to my eyes was already consistent. Knight of Truth (talk) 15:32, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Heads up

Looks like someone nominated an article you created for deletion, but didn't notify you (yet?) - List of Humble Bundles. I was looking through the history to try to determine my stance on it, and just happened to notice this. Thought I'd let you know, as it didn't appear to be something you've recently been active in maintaining, so I thought maybe it was off your radar. Sergecross73 msg me 16:39, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

@Sergecross73 - Thanks, we've had some discussions on the main HB about redoing the approach now that this going in a weekly manner, so I've addressed that at the AFD. --MASEM (t) 17:40, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

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ITN

Hi Masem, I was hoping you could give me advice on future ITN nominations so I can better distinguish between those that are significant enough to post and those that aren't, something I am obviously not very good at doing now. Everymorning talk 03:01, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

The key thing to keep in mind is that the goal of ITN , as "in the news" implies, to focus on articles - existing or new - that are in the news. When we have breaking events, one needs to consider if WP would have an article on it, which WP:NEVENTS provides guidance on. Something like a housefire in NYC, while tragic and a human interest story (hence why its getting far and wide coverage in the short term) is not going to meet NEVENT and to that end, the article would not be ITN for our purposes. There's a grey line in some cases, but this is one that would not fall in that. --MASEM (t) 03:17, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Platform order

Hello, I was wondering if you could give me the exact page where it instructs to list platforms in "computers, consoles, mobiles/handhelds, if they all have roughly equivalent release times" order. I wasn't aware that a consensus was reached regarding platform ordering. Moreover, in cases when platforms aren't released at approximately the same time, what then? Should platforms be listed alphabetically like Grand Theft Auto V or in order of release date like Batman: Arkham City. Also, regarding the Tales from the Borderlands infobox, you mentioned to list platforms in "computers, consoles, mobiles/handhelds" order, but what comes next? Should Xbox One be listed above Xbox 360 because of release order, or vice versa because of alphabetical order? It may seem trivial but it does bother me that PlayStation 3 is listed above PlayStation 4 while Xbox One is listed above Xbox 360. --User:Wrath X (User Talk:Wrath X) 05:48, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

Technically, GTAV is in the platform order I've suggested (it just so happens it's also alphabetical). But I know we've talking about this on the WT:VG pages, and could have sworn there's general agreement for that ordering of consoles, but can't find where we've said that. Alphabetic seems to be the more standard approach, so that's probably okay then. --MASEM (t) 06:04, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

So alphabetical order then, thanks for responding. --User:Wrath X (User Talk:Wrath X) 06:24, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

Template:File category

Hi.

I have created {{File category}} template, hoping it would supersede {{file template notice}}. But also, I did a bold change and implemented it in {{Category game screenshot header}} because the latter had a dangerous bug. I am traversing Category:Screenshots of software sub-categories and things are looking very good.

But all in all, I think someone needs to vet things, even if it is some light vetting. So, I thought perhaps calling you would be a good idea since you have worked in both images and video games area. Do you mind if you take a look?

Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 09:57, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

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Where can I find free images for Steam Machine (hardware platform)?

I have tried to contribute to the page by adding two images; however, you took them down for valid reasons. After reading why, I have edited the information for the images to make them appear to be "free", but you took down my WP:Good faith edit just as before for a valid reason: they are copyrighted. Since we cannot afford to use my images, where can I find the more appropriate, free images? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gamingforfun365 (talk • contribs) 03:03, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) Usual place to start is https://www.flickr.com/search/?q=%22steam+machine%22&l=commderiv&ct=0&mt=all&adv=1 czar ⨹ 04:37, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

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The WikiProject Video Games Newsletter, Q1 2015

The WikiProject Video Games Newsletter
Volume 8, No. 1 — 1st Quarter, 2015
Previous issue | Index | Next issue

Project At a Glance
As of Q1 2015, the project has:

• 192 Featured Articles
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The Signpost: 01 April 2015

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Humble Bundle

Looking at the bundle parent article, there is a good cause for a size split. Reviewing the List it does seem that this was the intention. In it's current form it really meets deletion criteria, however giving consideration to the position that it could be fixed, I think that much of the material related to the individual bundles could be moved over and combined with some of the list related information. What are your thoughts?-Serialjoepsycho- (talk) 04:22, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

ITN credit

ThaddeusB (talk) 14:12, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

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Just a note regarding the "collusion" post.

This is just a minor note here, and while it would not change the writing on the GamerGate page, I thought it worth mentioning. You said that the Shadows of Mordor issue of paid advertisements went unnoticed, and while this is partly true; it's not due so much to the members of Gamergate not caring. Rather, there was a previous incident which overshadowed it. In Jan of 2014, Microsoft made some serious waves when, as part of their Xbox One roll out, they sought several highly regarded (or at least followed) youtube personalities aligned with the group "Machinima" (as well as others outside that organization) and offered to pay them to post videos which were at the very least neutral on the system. Ideally, the videos would be supportive. The whole affair created a serious scandal, one which it could be argued helped lead up to Gamergate. Perhaps the most intriguing point in this, was the fact that anyone who joined in on the promotion, were bound by contract to keep their association secret. Some details of the contract leaked, and included statements like: "You agree to keep confidential at all times all matters relating to this Agreement, including, without limitation, the Promotional Requirements, and the CPM Compensation, listed above." As well as: "may not say anything negative or disparaging about Machinima, Xbox One, or any of its Games." Long story short, the whole affair started players and viewers asking questions, and as PC World says "This type of promotion is a betrayal of hard-earned trust. YouTube personalities gained sway largely because they were seen as trustworthy and "one of us" by fans, without the taint of advertising dollars. Revelations like this potentially hurt the credibility of not just those few personalities who took advantage, but the entire platform." The scandal involving Shadows of Mordor has largely been lumped into this previous issue with Microsoft, though indirectly since the company which produced Shadows, has nothing direct to do with Microsoft. Kitsunedawn (talk) 07:33, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

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On the GamerGate page

I have had the GamerGate article watch listed for some time and I want to say I'm amazed at how you managed to put up with the insanity on there. Not exactly a real positive place to have a discussion, imo. Example Given. But I must say that your work on there is admirable. Just wanted to let you know that. Cheers. GamerPro64 02:19, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Steam (software) edits

Hello, I have re added my edit but I've removed all of the reddit links. I also rephrased some of the text, is it okay now? --Anarchyte (talk) 04:00, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

The problem with sources like change.org and steam forums is that they are also user-created content and can't be used as sources for WP. --MASEM (t) 04:23, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be good to contain a change.org link that is legit and is not "bait"? It shows the main thing this update has created and that shouldn't be denied.--Anarchyte (talk) 04:30, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

DYK for Rock Band 4

Panyd^{The muffin is not subtle} 23:32, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

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Gamergate on 1RR

Hey! Just a friendly reminder that the Gamergate article is under a 1RR restriction, allowing you to only make one restriction per 24 hours. Cheers! PeterTheFourth (talk) 03:07, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Crap, yeah, even if it is a poorly sourced claim. My bad and I've undone that. (Presumably someone else who sees that addition as questionable can deal with it). --MASEM (t) 03:31, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Wannabe TRM

Thanks for the revert. Don't worry to much about rev-del or anything, these twats need to be exposed. Unless, of course, I'm in NEW YORK right now, and editing anonymously? Nah, home with the family.... The Rambling Man (talk) 19:37, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

@The Rambling Man: It's more the BLP-leaning insult towards the royal family that I was concerned about. --MASEM (t) 19:40, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

Of course. Then I would request you no longer mention me in your revdel edit summaries if I am such comparative irrelevance. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:42, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

And it would be courteous if you would acknowledge my request. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:47, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

I won't include you again if that comes up in a revdel. --MASEM (t) 02:42, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

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Syntax Error

Hi Masem. Please understand that "predominate" is a verb, not an adjective. The word you want is "predominant." I've been reading your posts for 8 months and this misuse is really annoying, because otherwise you express yourself clearly. Have a great day. 98.210.208.21 (talk) 11:44, 8 May 2015 (UTC)

Could you take another look?

You previously commented in the Mark Twain ITN proposal that you would require a stand-alone article to evaluate it. That has now been done. Would you mind taking another look and updating our comment? Thanks, ThaddeusB (talk) 15:23, 9 May 2015 (UTC)

E.T. and Next Generation

Masem,

I appreciate that you are a valued contributor to video game articles, but I am afraid that in this case you appear to be inserting yourself into an area in which you may not have sufficient expertise. Unfortunately, the Next Generation article referenced in the E.T. article is riddled with errors and inaccuracies regarding Atari and the video game market in that time period, and anyone with more than a passing knowledge of the period would see these errors right away.

• First of all, it claims that consumers stopped buying Atari cartridges after the "disaster" of Pac Man. Pac Man was actually an exceptional seller and not overproduced in the manner that some have claimed. Contemporary newspaper articles call it a commercial success. Furthermore, Electronic Industry Association estimates show that cartridge sales increased in 1983 over 1982, so the claim that consumers suddenly "refused" to buy Atari cartridges is laughable. The complete Pac Man story is far more nuanced than this oversimplified summary, but to claim it was a disaster that destroyed Atari's future game sales has no basis in fact.

• Second, the article claims Atari lost $100 million on E.T. Contemporaneous estimates placed the loss around $20 million. (See, for instance this Boca Raton News article) I am not even sure how a company could lose $100 million on a single game. If they sold not one single cartridge (and they did sell a few), they would be out manufacturing (we'll be generous and call it $5.00 per cartridge on five million units, or $25 million), licensing costs ($21 million according to most sources), research and development (unknown, but how much can six weeks of R&D possibly cost?), and marketing (one article I found states they did a $5 million marketing campaign, which may not have included TV, so let's be safe and throw in another $2 million, the standard marketing spend on a game at the time, and heck, let's do another $5 million just because E.T. was a big deal). That's just under $60 million plus R&D costs, which were certainly not another $40 million, as games generally cost a few hundred thousand to make back then. Note we have grossly overestimated manufacturing costs and marketing costs and assumed every last unit was returned, and we still don't come close to $100 million. Next Generation pulled that number from thin air.

• Third, the article claims that Atari had sold 20 million VCS systems in the United States by 1982. Contemporary news accounts and research reports from analysts put the total number of sales between 10 and 12 million at that time. Warner's own annual report for the year states that the system has sold "well over 10 million" units. If it had sold even close to 20 million units, the report would have said so.

• Fourth, the article claims Atari manufactured 6 million E.T. cartridges. In Kent's book, Kassar says it was between four and five million. I have never seen another source claim Atari manufactured six million.

• Finally, the article states the long-standing ludicrous and easily debunked (even in 1998) claim that Atari buried five million E.T. cartridges in the New Mexico desert.

In closing, please also consider the source in question. Next Generation was a video game magazine charged with reporting news and rumors related to the current video game industry. It was not a historical publication, nor was it staffed by trained historians. It is reliable as a news source, but is in no way reliable as a source of history, as the shoddy work done in this particular article more than proves. Indrian (talk) 18:52, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

Women of Algiers

What a stupid edit! What do you think the original french for Femmes d'Algers is? Johnbod (talk) 04:26, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

Per WP:COMMONNAME, if the Delacroix version is commonly called out in English while the Picasso painting in French despite meaning the same thing (and this article confirms that) then that naming scheme fits right into our naming and disambiguation policy, as long as the Picasso page calls out the Delacroix version (which it does). --MASEM (t) 04:58, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

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Chicken/egg convoluted

Most of the confusion arises because of the minimization of ethics in journalism claims. For victims at ground zero of harassment, it's understandable. Not here though. The suppression of that view is so ingrained that otherwise progressive editors have chosen to support very sexist and stereotypical accounts of allegations in order to keep the "ethics in journalism" view at a minimum. The chicken/egg and the beginnings of GG are much clearer if the ethics in journalism/GGHashtag are clearly presented as beginning with Grayson (no, ethics in journalism has nothing to do with Quinn's sex life, contrary to our article). Once the beginning of the hashtag is correctly applied to allegations against Grayson, it's very clear where everything began and how they converged. By portraying that episode as allegations against Quinn, particularly her sex life, we have made it difficult to deconvolve the non-interacting pieces. That bit needs to be restated so that the investigation (and subsequent finding) conducted by Grayson's boss had nothing to do with Quinn's sex life - and any finding would not have automatically implicated her or her choice of relationships or sex life. Phrasing it as if the allegation was Quinn's quid pro quo instead of allegations of wrongdoing by Grayson plays well with those that dismiss "ethics in journalism" even if it requires repeating an offensive gender-based stereotype to keep the focus off journalists. --DHeyward (talk) 07:29, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

I agree mostly with what it would more objective and truthful to the events as I remember them, but this is the one area that it is near impossible to argue against what the sources say specifically on the timeline (intent is different). Coverage of GG didn't begin in earnest until after Phil Fish was doxxed for stepping up to support Quinn, so much the exact details of that two week time frame is lost in the reliable sources. I do fully agree that more objectively we should be able to write a more neutral statement still using the RSes (with appropriate cavaets outlined in NPOV) on how Gjoni's claim was taken by the "ethics" side of GG (that they simple saw the relationship being a problem akin to the GameJournoPro issue - they wanted all such things above the table) vs those that were harassing Quinn for sake of harassment that focused on that other angle, but as you can tell it is very difficult to get other editors there to consider even the possibility of a more objective take at all. --MASEM (t) 14:34, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

I made the edits I thought fixed some of it [12]. I already made other edits a couple days ago.[13] for the same thing. I also left a message on gamaliel's talk page regarding IBAN he imposed but he is inclined only to revert me it seems. Rather specious to claim that the source [14] use of "unproven" is a BLP violation and needed to be changed to "false" under BLP (and the BLP requirements for reverting BLP violations while IBANed are noticeably higher than other BANEX.). I simply requested Gamaliel remove the IBAN. [15]. I used the reliable sources term but dare not restore it to the reliable sources term. --DHeyward (talk) 22:13, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

FNAF Pages

Sorry about trying to copy/paste the info from Five Nights at Freddy's (video game) onto the actual page for Five Nights at Freddy's.

Basically it was because for some reason, Batman2297 decided to rename the page about the series to simply "Five Nights at Freddy's" which means he had to rename the article on the first game as "Five Nights at Freddy's (video game)" which totally screwed it up. He should have just left the name of the series as it was and left the first article alone.

I reverted the name of the series back to how it was before, but it left the page "Five Nights at Freddy's" as a redirect, which means I am unable to revert the naming of the original page. This is why I tried to copy/paste the info, which I guess isn't really allowed.

But yeah, sorry about that. I just don't know what to do, because leaving "video game" in the title is redundant, but I can't revert back to the original title now...

Killerwhale24680 (talk) 21:30, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

It would probably be a good idea to gain an idea if the main target of "FNaF" is the first game or the series, but I would be happy to fix up any moves and redirect issues once there's consensus. --MASEM (t) 22:42, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Just in my opinion, I think it'd be best to keep the first game just named "FNaF", then name the series "FNaF (series)", and then if/when the movie comes out, just create an article "FNaF (film)". That seems to make the most sense to me, but I guess it's really up to whatever makes sense to the rest of the community. Thanks for being able to help, though. Killerwhale24680 (talk) 00:27, 18 May 2015 (UTC)