- Category:2011 disestablishments in New Jersey (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- Category:2012 disestablishments in New Jersey (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- Category:Proposed indoor arenas in the United States (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- Category:Sports venues in California by city (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- Category:1923 establishments in Florida (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- Category:Polo clubs in the United States (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- Category:Public high schools in Montgomery County, Maryland (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- Category:Public middle schools in Montgomery County, Maryland (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- Category:Private high schools in Montgomery County, Maryland (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
One of a very large number of categories in a mass deletion by User:Coffee as part of an effort to punish a banned user that has had the effect of destroying extensive numbers of productive edits. Per the terms of the user's ban, such edits "can be reverted", without specifying that they "must be". The thousands of edits Coffee has needlessly reverted can be undone, as the content is still sitting back one edit in history, but the content of the categories is no longer available. Despite pleas to User:Coffee to refrain from further destructive actions, the deletes have continued. I use this one category as a model and will add further entries, as appropriate Alansohn (talk) 18:35, 6 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment by banning administrator: For anyone interested, here is the community sanctioned authority for these actions. — Coffee // have a cup // beans // 18:41, 6 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- To save time, the link specifies that "his edits can be reverted without question". It says that they "can be" not that they "must be". User:Coffee's mass reverts and mass deletions of categories have resulted in significant damage to this encyclopedia. I am not as offended by his taking vindictive action against the editor in question, but this we had to destroy the village to save it is making Wikipedia worse with each of Coffee's further edits. Alansohn (talk) 18:49, 6 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment by banning administrator: DRV is a forum for requesting a review on out-of-process deletions. Considering WP:G5 specifically allows for the type of deletions being discussed here, that is clearly not the case. Therefore, I would put forward that this is not the forum for this discussion. If the user feels that some of the categories created by the banned user are actually helpful to the encyclopedia (and this may be so), then he is free to re-create them. But I see no point in wasting further time discussing particular recreations. — Coffee // have a cup // beans // 19:33, 6 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- This is deletion review. Your deletions are being reviewed. You were able to delete these categories without discussion, but your actions are still reviewable and this is the place to do it. As specified at WP:DRV, this process is to review not only those case where "a speedy deletion was done outside of the criteria" but also those cases where the speedy deletion "is otherwise disputed". While it's a little easier to reverse your destructive reverts to article edits, it's impossible to figure out what was in the categories you have destroyed. Rather than waste time and resources trying to reverse engineer what you have destroyed one at a time, DRV allows discussion provides a means for the community to undo the massive damage you have already caused and prevent further deliberate harm by undoing your deletions. Alansohn (talk) 19:50, 6 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse- I see nothing wrong with these deletions. Policy explicitly allows the deletion of pages created in defiance of a ban. It's true that deleting them was not compulsory, but I don't understand how you can go from "may be deleted does not mean must be deleted" and from there arrive at "must not be deleted". As for the pages themselves, I note that each one categorizes only three pages. You could argue to delete these categories based on WP:OCAT. Claiming that deleting these minimal categories is "significant damage to the encyclopedia" is a bit of an exaggeration. But permit recreation if Alansohn really wants to re-make them. Reyk YO! 21:59, 6 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- And I specifically object to adding new categories to the DRV nom once discussion is underway. Reyk YO! 02:13, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- I would have waited to list all of the hundreds of categories that have been spitefully destroyed by User:Coffee. As listed above, "I use this one category as a model and will add further entries, as appropriate." There are hundreds more. Do you want to deal with them all one-by-one or just systematically undo Coffee's destructive rampage through the category system. Alansohn (talk) 02:44, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- The problem with drip-feeding things into a batch nomination is that it's not clear who has !voted on which entry, obviously. At the time of my vote, there were only two entries; now there are nine and it makes it look as though I've endorsed deleting all nine, when in fact I only expressed an opinion on the first two. (As it happens, I endorse the other seven deletions as well, but that's not the point.) Also, your continual sensationalist exaggeration ("destructive rampage", "spitefully destroyed", etc) is over the top. The categories in question really are minimal and largely useless, and the user that created them was banned specifically for creating these trivial categories. If this person turns up again with a sockpuppet and starts making exactly the same kinds of edits, and you claim administrators are forbidden to enforce the ban by reverting the edits, what's the point in banning anyone? You can't go around accusing people of "spite" and "disruption" for enforcing a community ban. Now stop with the belligerent screaming. Reyk YO! 06:37, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Thousands of productive edits and hundreds of categories are deleted for no purpose other than to spite a banned editor. I'm glad that you're fine with that, but I'm not the only editor bothered by the pattern of disruption by User:Coffee. I don't claim that admins are forbidden from doing breathtakingly stupid actions, I just hope that the rational members of the Wikipedia community stand in the way. I'd rather find more effective tools to prevent sockpuppets from editing and some means to prevent malicious admins from taking revenge on banned editors by taking revenge on the entire community. What's the point in needlessly deleting hundreds of categories used in thousands of other articles? Alansohn (talk) 06:46, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Why would the community delete hundreds of these categories if they were productive? They weren't. They had the effect of splitting useful, well-populated categories into a multitude of overly specific and poorly populated ones, making navigation harder instead of easier. Having checked a few of Coffee's reverts, I agree with that assessment. So I think the deletions and reversions were correct not just from a ban-enforcement perspective, but from a quality point of view as well. Reyk YO! 07:06, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment It seems to me this edit was by a (very) likely sock puppet of a user banned from this sort of editing. So, the edit to the article was properly reverted. Did the edit also actually create the category Category:2011 disestablishments in New Jersey? I don't know enough about how HotCat and the contributions logs work. If not, could someone tell me whether the category was created abusively (i.e. which user created the category and when)? Thincat (talk) 00:15, 7 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Overturn. Poor application of the banning policy. Let me quote directly:
Since categorization can impact many pages, and deletion of a category without merging can leave pages orphaned, you should carefully consider what to do with categories created by a banned user. Blatantly useless categories can be speedy-deleted, as well as any categories which clearly violate existing category standards. Care should nonetheless be taken to see if articles need to be merged to a parent category before the speedy deletion. Categories created by a banned user which may be useful or fit into a larger category scheme should be tagged for discussion and possible merging using the categories for discussion process instead of deleting them outright.
- Blind reversion of a banned user has always been controversial because of these sorts of outcomes and therefore requires some judgement. That doesn't appear to have been exercised here. A community ban discussion on a noticeboard cannot override core policies, especially not after four years when memories of the user have faded. Mackensen (talk) 14:56, 7 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- I would usually agree with this perspective, except that this editor was banned specifically from category creation. — Coffee // have a cup // beans // 00:16, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- What you seem to fail to understand is that a significant percentage of the hundreds of categories you destroyed in your rampage are in use by thousands of articles. You didn't just spite Oriole85, you screwed all Wikipedia editors and readers who use these categories and read these articles. By helping the rest of us to undo your damage, rather than coming up with more excuses for your actions, you can help mitigate the damage that has resulted from your needless actions. Alansohn (talk) 00:45, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Overturn and restore. The speedy deletion criteria apply only when deletion will uncontroversially benefit the encyclopaedia. Blindly deleting in-use categories that are not blatantly unacceptable is explicitly controversial per the banning policy (cf Mackensen's comment). Additionally, a user has in good faith specifically objected to speedy deleting these categories, again meaning that speedy deletion is inappropriate. If you think plausibly encyclopaedic, in-use categories created by a banned user should be deleted then you need to get consensus first. Thryduulf (talk) 01:02, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse - It looks like Oriole85, now blocked sock puppet of Levineps banned specifically from category creation, created the categories and populated them. In addition to WP:G5 deleting the categories, Oriole85's effort to populate the categories should have been reversed, which can be done manually or via a request at Wikipedia:Bot requests. No one has identified any specific problematic G5 deletion. Batch review with sensationalism is not strength of argument. -- Jreferee (talk) 01:24, 8 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
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