One of the earliest global bans was against user “russavia” - research him and you’ll know what I’m talking about. After that I stopped following Wikimedia internals because it was 100% clear that they were now just completely arbitrarily banning people.
Banned user Russavia edited two of the oligarch articles. He was a very active administrator on Wikimedia Commons, who specialized in promoting the Russian aviation industry, and in disrupting the English-language Wikipedia.
After finally being banned on the English Wikipedia, he created dozens of sockpuppets. Russavia, by almost all accounts, is not a citizen or resident of Russia, but his edits raise some concern and show some patterns.
In 2010, he boasted, on his userpage at Commons, that he had obtained permission from the official Kremlin.ru site for all photos there to be uploaded to Commons under Creative Commons licenses. He also made 148 edits at Russo-Georgian War, and 321 edits on the ridiculously detailed International recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Both of these articles were, at one time, strongly biased in favor of Russia.
Idk, when you’re using Wikipedia as a tool to push Russian propaganda, it seems fair that you’d be banned. That’s not what Wikipedia is for. He’s free to start russopedia.ru or whatever if he wants to do that.
I think their point was that since he got Russian government permission to use Russian gov media, and he wrote a very detailed (although very biased in favour of Russia) article, then they think he is receiving assistance from the russian government to push Russian propaganda.
and 321 edits on the ridiculously detailed International recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Both of these articles were, at one time, strongly biased in favor of Russia.
Wikipedia cares more about bias than* ridiculous details, especially when the ridiculous detail is there to put bias into the article
What is the difference between including ridiculous amounts of detail to bias the article, and superfluous biased details that still end up with a biased article?
Who’s trying to making useful contributions but got banned, and what were they banned for?
One of the earliest global bans was against user “russavia” - research him and you’ll know what I’m talking about. After that I stopped following Wikimedia internals because it was 100% clear that they were now just completely arbitrarily banning people.
Idk, when you’re using Wikipedia as a tool to push Russian propaganda, it seems fair that you’d be banned. That’s not what Wikipedia is for. He’s free to start russopedia.ru or whatever if he wants to do that.
An encyclopedia calling an article ridiculously detailed is… interesting.
I think their point was that since he got Russian government permission to use Russian gov media, and he wrote a very detailed (although very biased in favour of Russia) article, then they think he is receiving assistance from the russian government to push Russian propaganda.
Kinda burying the lede on that complaint…
Wikipedia cares more about bias than* ridiculous details, especially when the ridiculous detail is there to put bias into the article
I read it as adding a bunch of superfluous details that were biased.
What is the difference between including ridiculous amounts of detail to bias the article, and superfluous biased details that still end up with a biased article?
Seems like a distinction without a difference.
You could have just said you’re upset that a Russian propagandist was banned. Would have been quicker and more honest lol.
Great. Making generalizing statements based on ONE case from over 10 years ago, which was - at best - debatable (see other response).
To be fair, they were asked for an example and they gave one. I’m not saying I agree with them but this feels unfair to say.