Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam/2006 Archive Oct

message: Hi! I'm dealing with a couple of articles that seem to have or attract a lot of contribution from people with a financial interest in having only nice things on Wikipedia. This isn't quite spam; it's more a question of unbalanced POV from single-purpose accounts. Where's a good place to discuss articles like that? Thanks, William Pietri 22:15, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If the article does not meet the guidleines for businesses on Wikpedia (WP:CORP/WP:WEB), list the articles for AFD. If they have already been through AFD or are notable tag the articles as  and describe the problems on the talk page. --Peta 04:46, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Brad Patrick has stated that Wikipedians should be more forceful in dealing with this problem, that AfD simply isn't enough. Read the discussion on WikiEN-l for more information. Mindmatrix 15:28, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Related page for over-nice articles on real companies? 

message: Someone's spamming blocks of text into random articles, as shown here and here. This looks like a good candidate site for blacklisting. Thoughts? — Saxifrage ✎ 21:03, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: is a cello.pl IP (Poland), and  looks like a residental Cox Cable address. Both additions look like the work of bots. I'd say it's a good candidate for blacklisting. OhNoitsJamie Talk 22:23, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

text: That's about as un-subtle as it gets.  The domain itself is hosted on bulk servers and the contact is the 'set corp' in Russia; it's also only a few days old.  Destined for the black hole. Kuru talk 22:25, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm actually unfamiliar about how sites get into the blacklist, which was the second reason I brought this up here. Can anyone enlighten me? — Saxifrage ✎ 22:31, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Propose its inclusion at the sitewide blacklist talk page. OhNoitsJamie Talk 22:34, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

text: I've come across the "unknown" spambot a fair few times this last week - it switches IPs regularly and the links it's spamming... /wangi 22:34, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

text: See also Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive138#New spambot. Thanks/wangi 22:41, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, its part of a large network of zombie computers which, among other things, spam wikis.  I bet in their spare time the zombies also spam in general, and are probably on some IRC network somewhere waiting for their next instruction. Kevin_b_er 04:39, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  topege.com spam 

message: Can someone look at the contributions of ?  He is a new incarnation of .  The only contributions of both are the addition of external links to his own writings at eyeorbit.org.  The content appears to me to be more informational and commercial, but I don't know enough about the subject to determine whether they are actually useful or not.  Either way it certainly violates Wikipedia:External links#Links_normally_to_be_avoided #3.   Deli nk 15:55, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Reeks of spam. He's even attributing each link with his name. If I were to guess at motives, I'd say the purpose is to increase name-recognition as well as drive traffic. — Saxifrage ✎ 16:57, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: eyeorbit.org

message: Since it's not always easy to decide which links to remove, I was wondering if some sort of rating system might help. Wikia is going to introduce an article rating system, which could be adapted to rate specific parts of a page (such as an external link). There's a non-working demo at Scratchpad:Economics. Do you think this could be useful either in Wikipedia itself, or on a separate site as a resource for Wikipedians? I know voting is evil, but if the spam situation gets out of hand, it may be a more scalable solution than making judgements about each link yourself. Angela. 13:27, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't actually think that the spam problem is anywhere near getting out of hand—the automated spammers get caught by bot and blacklist, and the personal ones have the disadvantage, not us, in terms of numbers and time spent at Wikipedia. Apart from that, a rating system would probably encourage us to pay less attention to the content of external links rather than more. My intuition says it wouldn't be effective and might even be detrimental. — Saxifrage ✎ 16:54, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I take a somewhat grimmer view of spam (I think it's only likely to get worse), but a rating system might encourage efforts to "game the system". This is a pretty well known problem with moderation systems on web forums; given an incentive, people will find a way to manipulate the system using multiple accounts and "give me a good rating and I'll return the favor" type schemes. Even honest, trusted users are susceptible to groupthink, since it's a lot easier to mindlessly rate something than to give a coherent argument for or against it. Those are just my initial impressions; I'm not saying it's a terrible idea, and it might be useful in some circumstances. ―Wmahan. 17:54, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Rating external links

message: There's a new speedy deletion criteria out there.  Its called G11, and as of right now its worded as "Blatant advertising. Pages which only promote a company, product, group or service and which would need to be fundamentally rewritten in order to become encyclopedic."  See also Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2006-10-02/More_CSD.  We should chime in on this.  After all, we're about dealing with spam.  There's some arguements on the talk page of WP:CSD about the wording and usage of it.  Many admins have deleted pages as 'spam' in the past, so this is pretty much a formalization of it.  It does have some conflicts in terms of wording though.  Hopefully if this is your first exposure to this new speedy deletion category, I haven't tainted your opinion to my particular POV. :)  Try to keep in mind that if you're a member of our nice little project, you are likely to be biased in favor of this criteria in some form or another.  --Kevin_b_er 20:20, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  G11 discussions 

message: I'm a bit uneasy with editors adding back external links to fan sites on this page which were removed by other editors... Why? Well it's clear that those adding the links back (, ) are the folk who run the sites. While there has been previous discussion on the article talk page it seems rather minimal...  Might be worth taking a look if somebody has a spare moment. Thanks/wangi 20:20, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Stephen Colbert 

message: What is our policy of sharing our spam templates with other Wikis?
Not sure what you mean but since all content here is under WP:GFDL, nothing prevents anyone from copying the templates to other wikis with that license. Pascal.Tesson 18:51, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Template Sharing 

message: Over at Talk:Flow cytometry I attempted to enter into a discussion about the content of the article, (after tagging it as Spam and an advert) this was a mistake. I am sure you guys can offer some non-biased opinions.
Thanks!!--DO11.10 18:48, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I did comment on the talk page but I have to say I have no definite opinion in this type of case. I do feel there is some value to keeping those links. I don't think the current guidelines really adress this kind of case. There is a distinct possibility that these ELs were added in good faith. Pascal.Tesson 18:59, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Please Help!! 

message: ...but one of the most notorious accumulators of SPAMs are country pages, EG Hungary, Spain, Indonesia, etc etc. I don't know where this would be best noted on the "pages to watch" section, so I'll ask here. 68.39.174.238 05:26, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: To the best of my knowledge, we don't currently have a "watchlist" of articles that are spammed frequently. Maybe we should start one. Any thoughts, folks? --AbsolutDan (talk) 18:31, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This sounds like a good idea. --A. B. 20:08, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Don't know where to put this... 

message: :moved from wp:spam
It appears that blocked sockpuppeteer and listspam vandal user:Universe Daily has handed over the bindiirwin.com domain to the Irwins .  The name has now been removed from the meta blacklist. -- I@n 03:09, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ahh, there is some cosmic justice afterall. Thanks for the info --AbsolutDan (talk) 18:32, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  bindiirwin.com heads-up 

message: Although I am not a member of this WikiProject, I always remove external links that do not seem suitable for articles. Since forums, online petitions and some sites are bound to be included in Wikipedia, I built some small tables with the information I recompiled. Feel free to drop by User:ReyBrujo/Base/Tasks and review the current situation there. -- ReyBrujo 04:15, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't care who's a member :) and added your page to the to-do on the project page anyway. Femto 11:14, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Forums, online petitions and other sites 

message: Hi! I just noticed that some Herbalife distributors aim to improve our Herbalife article, and that they are concerned I am biased . I don't think I am, and certainly not for the reasons they mention, but in the interests of fairness, I'd like a few other people to keep an eye on the article in my stead. And I'm asking here because I'd like those people to have an awareness of the problems typically caused by single-purpose accounts and people with conflist-of-interest issues. Thanks, William Pietri 05:35, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh lovely, Herbalife is recruiting supporters through their blog to edit the article. They pay lip service to the policies and guidelines, but seem to be unaware of WP:MEATPUPPET. — Saxifrage ✎ 07:18, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Could I get a little extra help on [[Herbalife]]? 

message: An IP user (contribs) added a link to Carrot this morning to a nutrition website, but the info ws already contained in the article. Link search seems to line up with this IP's contribs. --SB_Johnny|talk|books 09:18, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  probable spammer 

message: Some additional opinions would be appreciated at Talk:Eidetic memory regarding a link to pmemory.com, which appears (to me and one other editor) to be promotional in purpose, and not a useful link at the least. Thanks --AbsolutDan (talk) 03:38, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  pmemory.com 

message: Above was outrageous with over 60 tutorial and example links present.  I've culled it right back in the hope that new links be scrutinised a bit more thoroughly.  Given the size of the EL section, no doubt there'll be plenty of howls so it'd be appreciated if others can keep an eye on this article also. -- Moondyne 15:04, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Note this recent addition; I think it's a probe from our friend above. It's probably best considered a troll edit to annoy us.--A. B. 18:34, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I can honestly say that that wasn't me. As I said above: I will not add the link again myself. I'm no spammer and never intended to be that. --Jdevalk 09:01, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Good to hear! I see no one's given you an official welcome yet (at least on your user talk page) - I will do this shortly --AbsolutDan (talk) 12:54, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ey thx mate, glad some people here believe in the good of people :) --Jdevalk 21:33, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links in [[Cascading Style Sheets]] 

message: User  seems to be starting out on the wrong foot. I've placed a couple of warnings about articles contribution. What about the user page itself? It feels like that has crossed the line, but not exactly sure where the line is. JonHarder 17:19, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I blanked the userpage as it was clearly against WP:USERPAGE and WP:NOT. I left a message explaining my action with a request to not repost the advertising. — Saxifrage ✎ 20:02, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Epizone 

message: Online music store is heading for keep in a current AfD, but what a mess. I just cleaned out a recent very blatant load of spam. Editors must be asleep at the wheel. I hope it doesn't get worse than this ... JonHarder 17:37, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I removed the massive (and somewhat opinionated) comparison list of services.  Was a magnet for advertising and original research.  This should help out the article a lot in terms of getting away from a spam tool toward a real encyclopedia article.  Kevin_b_er 04:49, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Online music store 

message: There are about a dozen or so links to  that I don't have time to deal with right now. The site is blatantly commercial with no encyclopedic value that is apparent to me. JonHarder 19:50, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I reversed some links and ran out of time. Most of the links I deleted were added by different high volume, good faith editors of Israel-related articles; this makes me think that this company may be like amazon.com -- something 1000s of editors link to without thinking about whether it's commercial or not. Maybe the links should be deleted, but there's no spam campaign that I can see. --A. B. 20:31, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Check edits of  (resolves to namespace in Israel). Maybe most of those have been cleaned out by now. JonHarder 20:50, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Help with israel-music.com 

message: User  has been adding links to  and . This user is either an exuberant wiki-editor or trying to drive traffic to these two sites. The cynic in me says the latter. Both of these sites are housed on the same server; the bartender site get revenue through advertising and I suspect the other is headed that way too. Thoughts? JonHarder 21:22, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I suggest starting with a nice note on this editor's talk page -- so far this person seems amenable to others' feedback. --A. B. 21:39, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, I've added a note. We'll see what happens. JonHarder 01:30, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

text: You can still focus on links sometimes, just maybe with a bit of a twist. It would be useful (and not trip spam-antennae) to drop a note on the Talk page of articles where you think links to those sites would be useful. Then at least they'd come to more people's attention and their being added will be clearly a matter of consensus. — Saxifrage ✎ 18:24, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cross-wiki spamming 

message: There's an effort to replace the current WP:EL guideline by a somewhat leaner Wikipedia:External links/workshop. My initial feeling is that the changes are modest and don't particularly make the guideline more EL-friendly or less EL-friendly. Still, people active on the spam project should have their say while it's being fiddled with. Pascal.Tesson 00:05, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm liking the "What cannot be linked to" section, which includes "links to websites that you own or maintain". Before, there was still some wiggle room, as "links to normally avoid" is not "never link to". Now it's black and white, people can't add links to their own websites. This can be A Very Good Thing if it sticks. --AbsolutDan (talk) 03:01, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not black and white. Is it meant to imply Wikibooks editors can no longer add the  template? Angela. 15:08, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Wikibooks arguably isn't an external link since it's a Wikimedia project. I agree that it's not always black and white. The problem is that spammers will seize upon any excuse to argue that the rules don't apply to them. The current wording vaguely implies that it's sometimes OK to link to one's own site, and leaves the specifics open to interpretation. Spammers tend to choose the interpretation most beneficial to their own interests. ―Wmahan. 15:51, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually if anyone likes the proposal, I urge you to get involved in editing it: there has been a fairly heated debate between two small groups of editors surrounding it (you might have seen this from the Village Pump). As far as I understand, the mud-slinging might all be about whether or not fan sites should be linked to. Sigh... In any case, it would be good for fresh input into the talk pages so that everyone can cool down. Pascal.Tesson 18:00, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

text: I do not agree, AbsolutDan, as you probably know. A link can be very good, even if added by the owner of a site... --Jdevalk 13:22, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Um, wikibooks editors don't own the site, though I suppose they maintain it. But those are interwikimedia links anyway. That does make me wonder about "forums you hang on" though. --SB_Johnny|talk|books 14:55, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikipedia:External links is being reworked 

message: has been adding a lot of references to articles without making other edits. Some of the references appear to be his own work, and he has also added the same book as a reference to a number of articles on different kinds of fish. It looks like spamming to me, but he's a well established editor, and I thought I would ask some other opinions before doing anything. -- Donald Albury 22:06, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Might be a silly suggestion but have you tried discussing the issue with him? My initial reaction would be that this is not spamming, just someone who loves one book too much. Pascal.Tesson 22:27, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

text: At any rate, the edits don't appear to be helpful. Items listed in a reference section should have been actually used in expanding the text of the article. In my opinion this is spam in the general sense and a note on the talk page probably would help, as suggested above. JonHarder 22:56, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Others have already complained on his talk page. I added my own comments. -- Donald Albury 03:02, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible reference spamming 

message: User  has systematically been adding links to  which should probably be removed. There are hundreds of other  links, but don't know if there is a systematic effort to add them. I don't have time to deal with these now. JonHarder 18:04, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Links to www.wiley.com/*/product* should be deleted as they appear to be promotion to buy the different books (there is an Add to Cart feature, so that qualifies as an attempt to sell an object vaguely related to the article). I checked some of the www.interscience.wiley.com/journal/* links, and you are given a set of books, where you can only read the abstract information. Clicking on the References or the PDF links require registration. Since the information given for these journal entries (I guess it is something like a category or search) is insignificant, they should also be deleted. The www.mrw.interscience.wiley.com/cochrane/* links appear to give valid information, although they could be upgraded to references if editors in the respective pages decide to use them. 333 interscience links, 464 wiley.com in total. I guess it could take a couple of hours to remove the journal and product links. I don't want to open 50 PDF to check media.wiley.com, though. -- ReyBrujo 18:31, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I just ran across the Hdynes additions as well.  The link at coral reef, for example (Wiley Journal Aquatic Conservation) was simply to a page of abstracts that linked to a 'pay per view' request.  This seemed way too commercial and promotional and was not used to expand or reference the article, so I removed it.  I also hit a few more links added to articles that were in the exact same format, but ran into the same problem with linksearch; the domain hosts abstracts and articles which are being used as references.  It will probably take a bit of time to sort the wheat from the chaff here. Kuru talk 22:32, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: A handful of editors have cleaned up essentially all of Hdynes edits (thanks!) and I nailed the few that were left. JonHarder 01:39, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

text: The above edits were recognized as spam and all cleaned up a while back. JonHarder 01:44, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Right now, there are 3 /journal/ links and 67 /productCd. Those should be removed too. We can then check the 370 or so left to see which ones are not useful. Good work! -- ReyBrujo 02:02, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Yuck, look at Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology, they even give you a two-click subscription link. I would suggest removing all the links but the media and cochrane ones. I should be able to give a hand in a matter of minutes. -- ReyBrujo 02:07, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Help with wiley 

message: I'm not keeping up today. If someone is looking for something to do,  looks like a worthy project. Many added by . JonHarder 02:25, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Removed all but three that appear to be useful. Most of the links had either too little information, information from Wikipedia, had just a remote link with the article, were pages with only images, or in spanish existing other english and spanish links. -- ReyBrujo 02:49, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  yoyita 

message: Hello. The WikiProject Council has recently updated the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory.  This new directory includes a variety of categories and subcategories which will, with luck, potentially draw new members to the projects who are interested in those specific subjects. Please review the directory and make any changes to the entries for your project that you see fit. There is also a directory of portals, at User:B2T2/Portal, listing all the existing portals. Feel free to add any of them to the portals or comments section of your entries in the directory. The three columns regarding assessment, peer review, and collaboration are included in the directory for both the use of the projects themselves and for that of others. Having such departments will allow a project to more quickly and easily identify its most important articles and its articles in greatest need of improvement. If you have not already done so, please consider whether your project would benefit from having departments which deal in these matters. It is my hope that all the changes to the directory can be finished by the first of next month. Please feel free to make any changes you see fit to the entries for your project before then. If you should have any questions regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you.   B2T2 14:19, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Project directory 

message: Hi, I need your expertise from this project. I've removed sources that links to a specific commercial website in this article Stage lighting instrument, but the editors objected it (see the talk page). Could somebody weighing there to tell us, whether linking to a commercial site is categorized as a spam link or not? Thanks. — Indon (reply) — 15:22, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Source to a commercial product 

message: Please keep an eye out for altesys dot com links. A new user, , editing in conjunction with a company-owned IP account,  has been submitting vanity articles and adding spam links in spite of warnings. I think I'm all caught up on warnings and reversions, but I don't have time to keep pursuing this guy today. Thanks, --A. B. 17:32, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: As of now he has one link left which is in a vanity article, Eustachio, I've tagged for speedy deletion. (Any admins out there feel free to delete.)--A. B. 17:34, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Altesys 

message: First a bunch of Egyptian tourism spam (Wikipedia's links to his business) and now some other sorts of spam being propagated by . Sorry, but no time today on my end to warn or revert; if someone else can, go for it. --A. B. 22:56, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Cleaned out and on my linkspam watch page. We'll see how they take the spam1 message. — Saxifrage ✎ 03:25, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  EgyptianHoliday 

message: For those who might be interested, there is some testing currently underway of an IRC bot that watches articles and reports (in the channel) those that have recent edits that include external links. It includes a link to the diff and the link that was added. It's already been helpful in finding some link spam and other inappropriate external links. 
The channel is named #wikipedia-spam on freenode (same one as the other primary wikipedia IRC channels). --AbsolutDan (talk) 02:24, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just to note, the program has gotten some upgrades. It now does not crash (except for when it crashes because of flooding!) Too many links being added to wikipedia at one time of course!. Hope you all will have a look. —— Eagle (ask me for help) 23:21, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  IRC link feed 

message: ... had a "recent links added" page just as it has special pages for new articles, new usernames and recent changes.
--A. B. 14:53, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wouldn't it be nice if Wikipedia's software ... 

message: The Center for Media and Democracy (a generally anti-commercial advocacy group) has a project called Source Watch which is a Wiki that documents the activities of people who try to sway public and political opinion.  They have articles on PR firms that list the organizations the firms represent, as well as contact numbers and other useful identifiers. Source Watch PR firms. --Siobhan Hansa 18:22, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Resource when investigating PR companies 

message: I'm hitting the road and have not time to follow up for a while:
* Book (probably non-notable; see talk page): Ninth Day of Creation
* Author's article (also probably non-notable): Leonard Crane
* Book's promoter (see contribs): 
* Author's IP acct: 
Cheers, --A. B. 04:06, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Book spamming for [[Ninth Day of Creation]]