Utilisateur:Ghirlandajo/Draft

I cherish my block log as the sterling example of the inadequacy of WP admins and the dangers of off-Wikipedia communications. That's the primary reason why I refuse to abandon this account and register a new one (as some of my unfairly blocked friends did). Since some people like to invoke my block log in their ad hominem screeds, while others share the rotten doctrine of block logs in perpetuity, I feel obliged to narrate the entire saga here:

• My first block was in November 2005. After User:AndriyK was blocked for his record-breaking revert-warring spree, I found myself blocked as well for "inciting a 3RR violation by another user". Less than an hour later, the blocking admin unblocked me with an apology. No offenses taken. As a result of Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/AndriyK the guy was banned from Wikipedia for three months.

• The second block was engineered by User:Bonaparte, who was later banned from Wikipedia for running a sock-farm. One of his socks compiled a pile of nationalist crap under the title of Anti-Romanianism. I added to the provocative page several appropriate tags, which were removed by another open proxy with the summary "rv vandalism from vandal user:Ghirlandajo".[1] I made various edits to the page which included, among other things, reinsertion of one tag or another. Bonaparte's anonymous sock submitted a report on WP:AN3 about Ghirlandajo, "troller, vandal, anti-Romanian, nazi".[2] A newly promoted admin rushed to block me for 24 hours in the face of my arguments that I was reverting vandalism and no "revert" was identical. A block for the open proxy was deemed redundant. Bonny was happy.[3] [4] My protestations about the real identity of the disruptive IP on WP:ANI did not have any effect other than prompting the same admin to double my block for "anonymous block evasion". This action was reverted by a neutral observer. Feeling that Wikipedia was manipulated by trolls and idiots, I left the project for several weeks but returned after Bonaparte's indef ban.

• The third block was rather unexpected. I was busy writing Spanish Baroque (one of several pages started by me on the subject) when there appeared User:Circeus, known for making small annoying edits to my pages and, despite my previous protestations to desist, started reshuffling the images around the page. Finding the new outlook of the page rather ugly, I asked him to explain his edits on talk but was reverted. This was not the first time that Circeus was seen bulldozing my newly created pages with no apparent reason, so I asked him to "eff off"[5]. Circeus found no better reply than to block me for three hours (although he was not supposed to block his opponent). He was told on WP:ANI that it was more "a revenge block than anything else", but I'm not angry with him. Some of us are here to contribute articles like Spanish Baroque, others are here to prevent them from doing so. About 200 people regularly write articles, and about 1,500 admins buzz around them. Perhaps in Citizendium the editors are thanked for their contributions. Definitely not here.

• I really cherish the fourth block. It arose from this thread on WP:RD/H. My mistake was in daring to repeat (verbatim) a pun the thread was based upon. Although I provided a link to the original thread, User:Piotrus, who had been gunning for me in the space of more than a year with groundless complaints on all the noticeboards of Wikipedia, seized upon it and, anxious to mend his relations with a compatriot after Wikipedia:Mediation_Cabal/Cases/2006-06-07_Polish_Cabal_and_myself_as_its_leader, asked her to submit a complaint, which she did while I was asleep. Without bothering to notify me about this incident of block shopping, a passerby admin blocked me for 48 hours, Piotrus was overjoyed, but the ANI discussion went contrary to his expectations and ended in me being unblocked.[6] The underhand methods of Piotr's anti-Ghirla campaign were examined by ArbCom in Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Piotrus.

• I will not draw on the three-hour block by User:Tony Sidaway in connection with Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Giano. Suffice it to say that, after blocking me and Giano, over our disappointment at how Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Carnildo 3 was handled, he was asked to resign his adminship and Giano's entire block-log was expunged by ArbCom. Tony's rudeness at the period was really painful to accept, and his attempt to put a slur in his opponent's block log looks pretty pathetic in the light of defrocking that followed.

• More than a year later, there was a ninety-minute block engineered by the pro-Estonian clique on IRC pending Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Digwuren. A group of real-life friends (so-called "Tartu accounts") had been plotting against myself on IRC. After being urged to desist, they succeeded in persuading someone on IRC that two page moves and two reverts should be interpreted as a violation of 3RR. This is particularly remarkable, since I'm a big advocate of 1RR, while my opponents' edits consist of nothing but reverts. Unfortunately, by that junction the community ethos had deteriorated to the point when discussions and decision-making largely moved from the appropriate noticeboards (such as WP:AN3) to IRC channels, in breach with the ideals of transparency Wikipedia used to stand for. IRC is evil and should burn in hell. When your name is discussed somewhere off Wikipedia and some decisions are taken, you can't really say anything in your defence. Seeing little hope of improvement in this regard, I transferred much of my activity to Russian Wikipedia.

I find every block indicative of the problems Wikipedia had to tackle at a given period of time. Each serves to confirm my low opinion about the qualifications of the admin corps. It is also a reason why I have refused all attempts to nominate me for adminship. I don't want to join a huge group of people whose profile is as low as that.