Do you really want to encourage Sanger by accomodating him? Have you actually *read* his various exchanges with The Cunctator, 24, etc., etc., etc., etc.? It is pretty clear that when he was actively involved he was pushing an agenda of his own, and anyone that pointed this out got effectively slandered and censored to a degree I don't think we want happening around here any more. And this agenda extends into his articles -- his ethics article for instance had one link to an actual ethical theory, that being an obscure Jewish one, and it appears that he resisted at least some attempts to edit it or other of his articles -- treating some fields as his own personal editorial domain.

More dangerous to the project, he also insists that he knows people's identity based on some evidence he doesn't reveal (a kind of Bush League ethics I guess, maybe 'national security' prevents Larry revealing it ;-)) and engages in rude forms of "outing" that can endanger the project. What if these people that he names show up with lawsuits in hand, claiming Larry's unwise statements as evidence that their work was plagiarized, and suing the project out of existence? There are good reasons not to "out" any people who have made substantial anonymous contributions -- even if you hate them -- to further some personal agenda or bias.

Since he's unwilling to cooperate in any form of governance including even the original Wikipedia Governance norms laid out by Wales, or naming anyone he likes to the the ideal Wikipedia board, it's fair to question what kinds of powers he thinks he should have here, and why he thinks he'd be able to fit in at all. Perhap's he's just coming back to fuck up processes that are working and to harangue people who disagree with his own ethical or political views -- he for instance attached a lot of labels to the tops of discussion pages on meta that accussed people participating in discussions of either being trolls or pandering to them. Is that kind of practice really appropriate on the meta?

Larry appears to be a troll of the worst order, and the project is better off without him. He appears to have no capacity to cooperate with anybody, and a 'my way or the highway' attitude that is incompatible with the scale and diversity of the project these days. What domain will he claim is his next? Who's he going to go after next? What name will he hang on what IP number(s)? How will they take what he says? How long before this childish behavior backfires? Not long I suspect. -- 142

I put the material on Larry Sanger just as a kludge; I think that it actually works better linked to from History of Wikipedia. (I'll respond to the subpage comment at Talk:Larry Sanger.) I do think that Larry's edit of my introductory text was POV, so I tried to NPOV it; take a look. But in general, I don't think that moving it off of Larry Sanger is caving in to him -- the important thing is that the essays are easily accessible from Main Page by following logical links, and the link from History of Wikipedia does this, IMO. (BTW, what name do you go by on Wikipedia, or which language do you work on?) -- Toby 01:39 Feb 27, 2003 (UTC)

I don't go by a "name" here, because that simply encourages ad hominem attack. I use an IP number because that provides an ethical degree of body accountability -- anyone who actually believes there's some threat to themselves has the option of oh say tracking me down and killing me. That obligation being satisfied, I feel I can say what needs to be said, despite people like this:
I asked because I wanted to see if you were somebody whose work I was familiar with from [[en:]]. (Remember, I didn't recognise who LMS was when he started editing Larry Sanger.) It's no big deal. -- Toby 07:54 Mar 2, 2003 (UTC)

142 = 24 the same person who threatened LMS and mav -- dan

That is libel. Look up the penalties for libel, "dan". Seems you realize the value of anonymous authorship while revealing IP. But not much else. A lot of people share these beliefs that you seem to attribute all to just one person. -- 142

You're wasting your breath asking these thugs to follow any process of any integrity, Toby, they just conclude what they like and attribute what they don't like to who they don't like. If someone wishes to summarize all of someone's contributions, by all means, do so. But if someone wishes to attribute them to someone else, as a means of discrediting them, that's just ad hominem argument.

More than that, it proves that they have no response to the questions or challenges therein. You show more integrity than them by actually caring about facts of the matter, but, it appears, facts are irrelevant, and it is their feelings that cause their actions. They are afraid of losing control. They are afraid of being proven wrong. They are afraid that they are putting time into something that won't gain them status or money. They are just afraid, period.

They aren't worth your breath or typing. Make up your own mind, ignore theirs, and be happy. They're losers. They think this is some kind of religion. Hah.

Look at 142's contributions and decide for yourself how scary they are. The two on recruiting authors and recruiting editors just ask for someone to collaborate, but apparently the sysops around here just think it ought to be solely up to them. Then they complain when they end up with Saprtacus! LOL -- 142

Who exactly are "they": Larry? mav?

They reveal themselves daily with their stupid actions.
I still don't know exactly who you mean.

Without mav, I probably wouldn't be on Wikipedia now, and of course without Larry, there would be no Wikipedia to be on. Now, I realise this doesn't mean that they're right, but it does mean that you're not going to get very far with me by launching ad-hominem screeds against them on my talk page.

The criticism is of their behavior. Criticism of their personalities goes on *their* User_talk pages, where it belongs. And, the USSR got only so far on its gratitude to Lenin and Stalin, if loyalty is the issue.
As a matter of fact, the criticism that I was repsonding to wasn't of their behaviour. And loyalty is not the issue with me, rest assured.

I'll see if the questions that I put at Talk:Main Page get answered. -- Toby 03:25 Mar 3, 2003 (UTC)

Instead of those stupid questions which only serve witchhunts, why don't you ask instead if Main Page Neutral better than Main Page? Or if another Main Page style can be proposed that would better suit the ordinary contributor and expose them less to absurd toy politics? Or why not author your own Main Page alternate for those who see the issues the way you do?
Mostly because it's not worth the effort for me. I'm just trying to see if your contributions are being unnecessarily shafted, so that I can restore them to an appropriate place if so. But I can't do that without the facts, since what I'd do depends on them. We'll see. -- Toby 02:44 5 Mar 2003 (UTC)
The Main Page as it stands is fine, I have no objections to 'being shafted' there, the only problem is that the fool who hacked it, removed a subtitle that put more stuff in the subcategory 'characters' than belongs there. But who cares, Main Page Neutral is a far better arrangement. Ideally main pages would compete, and votes on a regular basis would establish what 'Main Page' would redirect to, i.e. we'd have meta parties and they'd campaign to organize meta their way, and change the front page for a fixed period of time, or until they lose confidence of meta users, and which point the redirect would be to a new/better Main Page alternate.
By no means should you treat me or any other 142 better than you'd treat a troll, whatever that is. Be fair-minded with everyone and these problems don't arise. Ask the questions, it's better in the long run than not doing so.
But I suspect you will get more accurate answers from en:User:Waveguy than from an interested party like Mav who seeks to protect his own power.

Please check Extension Syntax to be sure I don't mistaken (re)including your votes after an edit conflit. Aineko 01:42, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It's all good, thanks. -- Toby Bartels 23:53, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)

transwiki and commons moves edit

You're undoubtedly not alone.:) It'll probably take a while for people to get a handle on those things and discuss and consider the various aspects... no doubt we'll end up being able to do both with all niceties in place eventually. Jamesday 23:13, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Association of Anarchist Wikipedians edit

Actually, when I wrote the goals (or the ones I did [1]) I was being perfectly serious. Although apparently others have just assumed the association was tongue-in-cheek and made a mess of it. Wikipedia has become a lot more bureaucratic and serious since I've joined, and much less fun to edit. It'd be nice to see it loosen up again. Sarge Baldy 17:23, 31 May 2006 (UTC)Reply

I'm glad to hear that you were serious; as I said, I agree with them all, at least in the long term. Perhaps you and I can have more discussions there? (I tend to ignore meta for long periods, as you can tell by the delay in my reply. But if there's discussion going on, then I'll be back sooner.) —Toby Bartels 22:51, 10 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Wikimedia genealogy project edit

Please visit this page if you wish to contribute to a centralized discussion about a Wikimedia genealogy project. Thank you! --Another Believer (talk) 21:39, 26 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

And if you are still as keen on family history as you were in 2004, and have not yet exclusively committed your data to a website, you would feel at home on Wikia:Familypedia. (There are no individuals, yet, in http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Bartels_(surname)). Robin Patterson (talk) 03:00, 7 February 2017 (UTC)Reply