One of my favorite deletes by JzG is this one.

I had created the article about Thomas J. J. Altizer, being that I was shocked that the man behind Time magazine's famous April 1966 story, "Is God Dead?" was not present in Wikipedia. So, I started a nice little stub, based on some facts found in my copy of Emory Magazine (Altizer taught at Emory). Other religion "experts" (hey, maybe one was Essjay!) weighed in on the article and certainly made it much better than anything I could have done on my own.

But, since JzG is "just 'zis guy" with a huge, disproportionate grudge against me personally, the ARTICLE HAD TO BE SALTED, because I had the evil vision to create a nefarious article about a theologian "while I was banned". I'm still not sure how a banned user is able to create articles in Wikipedia, if he is banned?

Way to go, Guy! You made Wikipedia so much better, especially considering that 14 other Wikipedia pages now have a glaring red link to a non-existent Altizer article. You da man, Guy Chapman!

Greg

You have just documented yet another element of Wikipedia Idiotology:



Not that the thought is idiotic — far from it — but obsequiously intoning the phrase is about as far as they go with it.

Just don't be surprised if the article shows up at a later date with somebody else as initial editor — but we'll discuss



and



some other time.

Jonny

'''Thomas J. J. Altizer''' is a radical theologian who postulated in the early 1960's the "death of God". While teaching at [[Emory University]] (from 1956 to 1968), Altizer's religious views were featured in two ''TIME'' magazine articles in 1965 and 1966. The latter issue was published at [[Easter]] time, and its cover asked in bold red letters on a plain black background, "Is God Dead?"

[[Image:Timeisgoddead.jpg|thumb|''A [[Time (magazine)|Time Magazine]]'' cover story ([[April 8]], [[1966]]) on religion in America asked "Is God Dead?" It would become one of ''Time'''s most controversial issues.]]
Altizer has repeatedly claimed that scorn, outcry, and even death threats he received were misplaced. On a pure level, Altizer's religious proclamation viewed God's death (really a self-extinction) as a process that began at the world's creation and came to an end through Jesus Christ -- whose crucifixion in reality poured out God's full spirit into this world.

In ''Godhead and the Nothing'' Altizer examined the notion of evil. He presented evil as the absence of will, but not separate from God. Orthodox Christianity—considered [[nihilistic]] by [[Nietzsche]]—named evil and separated it from good without thoroughly examining its nature. However, the immanence of the spirit (after Jesus Christ) within the world embraces everything created. The immanence of the spirit is the answer to the [[nihilistic]] state that Christianity, according to [[Nietzsche]], was leading the world into. Through the introduction of God in the material world (immanence), the emptying of meaning would cease. No longer would followers be able to dismiss the present world for a transcendent world. They would have to embrace the present completely and keep meaning in the here and now.

Altizer now lives [[Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania|Mount Pocono]], [[Pennsylvania]]. His memoir is entitled "Living the Death of God".

[[Category:Theologians]]

Someone should DRV it - G5 is a stupid reason for a perfectly valid article.

But, wouldn't that make JzG look bad? That's not allowed on Wikipedia, is it?

I'll be watching the Deletion Review page to see which brave reader of WR will dare to nominate [[Thomas J. J. Altizer]] for a resurrection.

Greg

Well, you have to remember that Mr. Chapman isn't a well man. This is from his user page:


Those conditions are nothing to sneeze at, even if you happen to be standing in front of a handy sneeze-gard like they have over the salad bar at Ponderosa. Especially that "Windows" thing... I hear it's contagious!

Then again, couldn't these be considered "unverified credentials," in a manner of speaking? I mean, how do we know that his near-constant incivility and lashing-out at n00bz is really due to these serious medical problems, as opposed to, you know... him just being a total jerk?

The article has been recreated by Grace Note with credit given to Greg. It would be nice if the history was undeleted, though. It was definitely an outrageous deletion, although I have come to expect no better from JzG.

JzG.....yup, a real winner. My favorite moment for this swell guy is this: He's explaining why not including any women on "List of important Opera Composers" can't be sexist:



So, just remember: if it ain't on Guy's Ipod, it ain't notable! End of story....

But "ziz Guy" was kind of surprized when he got some email from people calling him a sexist pig:



He's a real winner, alright...

Now there's a bit of WP:OR and WP:POV! So he can exclude say Ethel Smyth because she had the temerity to write an opera after 1900!

Yeah, not to mention things like Berg, Strauss, Zimmermann, Stravinsky, Poulenc, Prokofiev, Britten.....etc etc etc....But I guess none of that was on his IPod either, so it can safely be ignored....

I'd really like to see a "List of things on JzG's Ipod" so that we can finally KNOW without any uncertainty what is notable and what isn't. Maybe he'll make that information available publicly??

I also wonder if Kelly Martin saw this bit:



Which seems to ask the musical question "Is a post-op transsexual REALLY a woman"?

Interesting indeed...Zis Guy seems to indicate that the answer would be negative, in his book...or in his Ipod, at least....

Anyhoo, when push came to shove, the ultimate outcome of this discussion is that the WikiPeople decided that maybe, just maybe they had been a wee bit sexist in excluding the ladies from this list and added the "token female Opera composers" section... and isn't that a nice portrait of Dame Ethel there??

What sort of encyclopaedic writing is this? And since when has Wikipedia accepted expert opinion?

Of course, all that is necessary is to point out that Smyth is in Kobbe's Complete Opera Book, which is more than you can say about some of the men in the list. But how many Wikipedia "experts" have read Kobbe?

Most "List of..." articles are crap original research. The Opera list attempted to avoid this by finding 10 opera scholars and deciding that any composer who was considered significant by 4 or more of the ten would be included. No woman composer was on more than 2 lists. It may be stupid, and the underlying lists themselves may be sexist, but if that method for making a list article doesn't work for you, there's no way to have any list articles that aren't original research.

There are two ways you could do it. Either copy a 100% reliable source, such as the contents list of Kobbe, or include everyone with an article on Wikipedia who has written an opera that has been staged professionally. In the latter case, you'd need to cite a source for each composer. Asking a group of experts isn't consistent with Wikipedia policies. You might as well get an expert to rewrite the articles on members of the Wesley family.

<a HEM>Ummm, you wouldn't happen to be part (or all) of the "Folantin-and-Moreschi" Opera editing consortium, would you? That sounds like just the kind of thing that "they" would say.....

Getting back to our friend Guy, it doesn't seem to matter what's on any lists. The only thing that matters is what's on HIS Ipod. He could care less what anybody else has to say.....

The glorious beauty of how this article was restored is revealed in:

(1) The way my diatribe against Guy Chapman on Wikipedia Review is now saved for posterity in the initial restoration version of the "new" article.

(2) The "fact" that in the comment field it says "Credit for this article to Gregory Kohs", even though the version restored contained multiple later edits (some of them substantial) from other writers. Isn't it amazing how GFDL gives copyright to each editor, but Guy Chapman is able to erase all of their copyrighted versions, thanks to one personal grudge?

Wikipedia really doesn't understand the sanctity of the GFDL, does it? The closest to an actual discussion of this can be found here. What part of "you retain copyright to your materials. You can later republish and relicense them in any way you like. However, you can never retract the GFDL license for the versions you placed here: that material will remain under GFDL forever", are they just not getting? Or, am I simply misunderstanding GFDL? All I know is that the public record now attributes to me extra content with which I am not entitled to be (fully) credited. I wonder how those other contributors to the old Altizer article would feel about that?

I sound like sour grapes, but all I'm really trying to do is engage in a theoretical discussion of what GFDL and copyright really mean. Arg -- I've just started a topic that has very little to do with JzG. If anybody wants to respond to this, put it in a new thread. I'll find it.

Greg

Nothing theoretical about it. And I think I already explained to you what GFDL means in Wicker World.

Someday when things cool down a bit we'll put together a required reading list for you. In the mean time — and I do mean mean time — you might glance at the thread on what happened to the Truth Theory article. I don't have the legal expertise to tell just how illegal what they did was, but my common sense opinion tells me that something just ain't right about what they did.

Jonny

I had complained about this kind of thing before. I wrote, or largely wrote, a number of articles, some of which I have seen students using in class, because the teacher thought they were the most informative pieces on the topics. Yet Wikipedia didn't give me credit, and instead has things on my userpage lying about me, saying I am banned (which is true) and then making up stories to discredit me, thus preventing me from being able to tell the teacher "Hey I wrote that" or anything of the like.

This is a slightly different issue, but it is really quite wrong when Wikipedia does things like this.

I don't follow that. Isn't your name still in the edit history? Have they oversighted it?

Guy Chapman (JzG) is at it again.

On the WikiEN-l list, he writes:



Mr. Chapman, you really need to watch these bullcrap memes that you cook up and then apply maliciously to other people. You know damn well that I never, ever wanted or expected Wikipedia to forfeit "editorial control" to business subjects. We were talking about creating content where there was previously nothing, for God's sake. What I expected was that Wikipedia is mature enough to understand that when a business pays the Yellow Pages to list their phone number and street address, that doesn't make the Yellow Pages a corrupt, non-NPOV reference. Similarly, a company paying to have someone develop INITIAL Wikipedia article content like location, number of employees, executive leadership, history, revenues, and product descriptions (if notable), would not make Wikipedia a non-NPOV cesspool, especially with the understanding that all of your anti-business biased admins would be free to have a field day with the article afterwards. You can IMAGINE that this would be some kind of cataclysm, all you want. But don't attribute that imaginary crisis to me.

Thank God there's a place like Wikipedia Review, where you can be exposed for your attempts to paint me as something I'm not.

Also, I don't think Wikipedia is evil. I think contributors like you frequently behave in an evil manner. How convenient for your WikiEN-l position, too, that by blocking my participation, your word is -- always -- going to be the final word. You are a worthless coward, Guy Chapman. You are crafty at how you bash your opponents, I will give you that. But, it's a cowardly way to attack someone's position, by creating a myth surrounding your opponent's position, then not allow him to respond, and to (as you have admitted) even ignore his e-mails. Gutless coward.

Greg

Yeah, and that moustache is hideous!

Also, I just moved a rather vituperative post by Joel Leyden here. Please folks, only you can prevent thread-hijackings! (And, of course, me.)

Yes, I can be more PC.
Guy Chapman, Gili Bar-Hillel & Co. delete articles on Wikipedia not for the substance that those articles merit, but rather for who is posting them. My advice: ignore Guy Chapman and Gili Bar-Hillel. They and Wikipedia thrive on this S&M attention. It is not for fact that people stay glued to Wikipedia but rather who wins the AFD vote.

It is interesting (for "interesting", read "appalling") sometimes what you can learn from a userpage:

Wow. I was not previously aware that "British sense of humour" equals "sarcastic, misanthropic abuse". Still, I have a suspicion that many Scots and Welsh would react to Chapman/Guy/JzG's use of the word "British" here with a hearty "Fuck off, you English ponce!"

I think that pointing to the link between sado-masochism and fascism is very apt, but I've been way too meek to say much about it. Why else would Jimbo & Company keep running back to a DunnoMatrix like SlimVirgin?

Jonny

Nor was I.

Well, the return of Gregory Kohs to editing Wikipedia sure didn't last long. Not with Guy Chapman flying around with his impermeable cape of admin-bit destruction. In mere minutes, he:

Re-blocked me;
erased my talk page;
erased a multi-referenced stub that I created about performance artist Liz Cohen;
erased some excellent editorial improvements that I had made to the article about the Czech Air Force;
but apparently left this edit alone;
deleted an article about the firm Wikipedia Review that had been created and kept by consensus WHILE I HAD BEEN BANNED, with no input from me.

Feel better, Guy?

My contact on the Wikimedia Board has been notified. We'll see if the sh*tstorm that I predicted shall ensue. It comes down to this:

Which is more decisive --

a Jimmy Wales unblock and support from one Board member...
- - OR - -
a community ban and a hyper-vindictive Guy on a bicycle?

Place your bets!

(Seriously, this would make for some good wagering.)

All because Durova (practically) calls me a liar, says she has proof of it, then won't e-mail it to me (even from a throw-away account). If this childishness stands, this is going to be the first chapter in my book that's going to make me a fortune: Wikidrama.

Greg

Guy will win. He wears a helmet, whereas Jimmy and the Board are afraid of their own shadows. But don't despair, we're in the early stages of an across-the-board Wikipedia flameout.

Oh, that wacky "British sense of humour" strikes again!

Personally, I would love to see some books on the high Wikipedia drama that we all know so well. Someday, SlimVirgin is going to make an appearance in a real world book about Wikipedia and all the abuses that go on there. I expect that it will be done by an author of prominence in the tech area, such as Steven Levy. Levy's books usually have a lot of focus on the characters and personalities involved in major technology events.

No question that Guy will "win," assuming one regards turning Wikipedia into a Major International Clown Festival as "winning." But I'd still say it's a mistake to see this sort of thing as a sign of Jimbo's power and influence slipping away...

IMO, what it really represents is the same crap we've been seeing all along: The most reactionary and least reasonable position always wins, on everything, and it matters little who comes up with it - as soon as someone dreams up something more reactionary and unreasonable than the previous version, they all get behind it like a bunch of zombielemmings!

And this is after JzG came achingly close to actually figuring out how to solve the BLP issue, only to fall back on the familiar strawman argument about how it would mean "deleting 95 percent of the biographies" on WP. It's almost like the embarrassingly poor logic of strawmen and rigid cult discipline is more comfortable for them, somehow.... But in that case, JzG's (and SlimVirgin's, btw) position was quite a far piece from being the most reactionary/least reasonable, so no dice on that one I'm afraid.

Anyway, it was just a matter of time before ol' Guy noticed the unblock and went apeshit, I suppose. He's good at that!

I find it impossible to comprehend the kind of mind that would revert or delete beneficial work on the encyclopedia because of a user ban (and in this case Greg was editing with Jimbo's own permission when he made those edits, stretching it about as far into the realm of the absurd as one can go). The sheer pettiness and blindness of it is simply staggering to me, to the point where it's very difficult to believe one could do it and still have the best interest of the encyclopedia at heart.

Ah, that explains user "Can't Sleep Clown will eat me".

It's not that Jimbo's power and influence are waning, so much as he doesn't know when it's time to use it. It's like that frog in a pan of water heating up slowly on the stove — it doesn't know when to jump out.

For Jimmy, and also for the rest of the Board of Trustees, they're in a desperate situation of "liability creep." That means they're in a situation that will only get worse in the upcoming months. Danny Wool and Brad Patrick got out in time; the rest of them are just now noticing that the water is getting a tad warm. (Apparently there's no liability insurance for the Foundation yet, and I don't think any insurer would touch them at this point.)

The current discussion on the wikiEN-L list under "Getting hammered" is interesting. There are a few, including Jimbo and SlimVirgin and some others, who realize that something has to be done. Then there are people like David Gerard and Geni who chime in with something completely diversionary and irrelevant, and downright stupid, and everything ends up in a mush of confusion. The people who have nothing to lose just don't get it, and a lot of them are admins. At some point Jimbo will have to say, "Shut up Gerard, or I'll ban you. I'm trying to have a serious discussion here!"

I really don't see Jimbo being able to do this. He sees himself as a nice guy who elicits solutions through nice compromises. By now it's to the point where the Foundation office cannot even use a new broom as a CEO. A broom won't do it. They need a steamroller to come in and squish some admins into pancakes, if they hope to start reducing their exposure to liability.

No sane CEO would take this job unless he had guarantees that it would be worth his time, and that his power would be almost absolute, and guarantees of an early-separation package if it doesn't work out. The Foundation doesn't have enough money to hire the sort of CEO they need, nor do they recognize that this is needed. It's up to Jimbo, and all he's been doing so far is sitting in that pan on the stove.

You'd find Guy Chapman's mind incomprehensible, then. Check out these deletions of content:

M-105:

Detsl:

Czech Air Force, bad user's version:

And Guy Chapman's preferred version:


I just love that Guy!

Greg

They seem to be discussing it here on WP:AN:

Ouch! But after that, our new pal User:DennyColt objected to his deleting the Wikipedia Review article, so JzG undeleted it. (I guess it's pretty much Denny In Charge these days.)

And later, he thinks the better of it and tries to take a slightly softer approach (boldface mine, sorry):

At least his conscience should be assuaged now, eh?

I particularly liked this bit:

There's that "British sense of humour" again. That Guy Chapman! He's a bigger laugh riot than P.W. Botha!

As sorta-noted above, it appears we've reached the point where real control of the future of Wikipedia is about to be decided...

...and I don't think Jimbo Wales' vaguely-hippiesh "love, peace, and good faith" worldview can survive.

He's got to be squarely in the gunsights of the more reactionary WikiAdmins who've decided that good faith can go pound salt(ed articles) and believe that their faith is always right and everyone else is wrong.

And on the other side, he's got a Wikimedia Foundation that is showing signs of itching for some real control as well.

Some of his closest lieutenants have jumped over the port bow.

So, I wonder...

Will JzG and the small circle of admins oft-discussed here finally toss Jimbo under the wheels of his own bus?

I'm placing a small mental wager on the admins and I'm wishing Jimbo the best as he explores the next stage of his career.

Maybe Larry Sanger will hire him.

(cue insane laughter)

(and then a sigh as I realized I just blew off a perfectly good April Fool's joke 2 days early)

I actually think that Jimbo should jump ship to Citizendium. He has lost control of Wikipedia with many of his initiatives meeting resistance from the established admin powers that be. I think his differences with Larry are more about ego, and deep down they actually agree more than they disagree. Wikipedia is going to remain Citizendiums insane and out-of-control cousin and Jimbo would do well to disassociate himself with it over the long term.

You think that was bad? How bad is it when JzG literally takes WP:OWNership of everything that is Kohs/Wikipedia Review/Centiare related, as in this action, where he deleted the following, and indefinitely blocked User:GuyCritic, without even a hint of CheckUser?



Does Guy have some special right to block users who critique Guy?

I would appreciate if some of the active Wikipedians on here might at least question this move on Guy's talk page. He's (once again) gone way too far.

(Hasn't he?)

Greg

LATE EDIT: Holy crap, somebody has actually already addressed the issue! Bravo, User:Napoleon1815, bravo! Problem is, Napoleon's already been painted as a troll. What's needed is more credible support. But, who can stand up to Guy Chapman? He's invincible!

Napoleon has been indef blocked by Picaroon9288.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=134213681

And the user who was the original subject of the AN/I posting (with contribs dating back to Oct. 2005) remains unblocked, despite two links to Centiare on his user page.

Is he a sockpuppet of banned user Napoleon, or is that too obvious?

My sources indicate it is, indeed, a sockpuppet.

I also have reason to believe that the following are sockpuppet, single-purpose accounts:

GeniBot
TwerpKnuck
GiveTheGuyAChance

I guess the world will never know how JzG (Guy Chapman) would have responded to the question of how so many other professionals have been "suckered" by Centiare.

It really makes me sick how COWARDLY the hive is. Just remove all traces of any Talk page criticism, under the guise of "protecting" the encyclopedia. So unless someone with some courage steps up, the Akashic Records will forever declare (according to JzG), Centiare "looks to be dead in the water".

Strange, our site traffic stats would argue otherwise -- this past week, they were at a two-month high. Alexa confirms our ranking growth, too.

I guess I'll be adding another Wikipedia admin to my "Eat It" list.

Greg

I saw something on the road yesterday. I was driving my family to a municipal park along a very narrow, winding, rural road. Our vehicle found itself behind a couple of cyclists -- they looked serious -- fancy racing bikes, shoes clipped to pedals, spandex shorts, etc. In other words, the male cyclist could have been Guy Chapman in America.

Because the road was narrow and curvy, and my family wasn't in any kind of hurry, we just paced ourselves behind the cyclists until a safe place appeared for passing. In the interim, we came through two Stop signs. In each case, the cyclists just blew right through the intersections without even slowing down. Granted, I think they could have stopped if they saw that a vehicle was at the crossroad, and I can understand their desire not to lose momentum on the hilly terrain. But, it did get me to thinking...

1. Why would I never even dream of blowing through two Stop signs like that in my car?
2. Is it acceptable for cyclists to do this, given the situation I described?
3. Most importantly, how do you think Guy Chapman addresses Stop signs when he is out cycling? Is he a stickler for rules and stops firmly at every one; or does he give the world a big "F. You and your mythical female opera composers" and plow through any Stop sign where his life wouldn't be otherwise immediately threatened by a motorcar?

Maybe JzG will answer this for us.

Greg

Another interesting JzG anecdote: It would appear that he's spreading word about WR on French WP . Unfortunately, there is not policy against WR on French WP, so his point is rather, uh, moot...Maybe he'll link "cambriolleur de crôtes" to "homosexuel" there too, just to be helpful...

i like the French description of what we do here

I can't tell. Was the quote restored?

Typically, the other WPs don't care about policies on other WPs, particularly the English one.

If I were a French Wikipedian, I'd be hopping mad that some person outside the community would come in and enforce an English WP policy and MONGO ArbCom decision on my community.

How would the English Wikipedians like it if the French Wikipedian made them enforce Fr. WP's rules?

Very disturbing that he got away with that without a fight (at least from what French I can read, I'm more of a Spanish person myself).

That link had been in place for almost a year before being cruelly, horrifyingly, and mercilessly slaughtered by the insidious JzG. It had been put there by one of French Wikipedia's more long-term and (from what I can tell) respected contributors, Utilisateur:Almak, who now must bear the shame of having been sneeringly reverted by some irritable and depressed English person whose only known photo shows him wearing spandex pants on a recumbent bicycle.

Initially, Almak added Wikipedia-Watch as a "Criticism of Wikipedia" link:

http://fr.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...v&oldid=6284104

...But it was de-linked by Utilisateur:Korg, an admin, shortly thereafter:

http://fr.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...t&oldid=6794345

Almak then replaced the de-linked WW reference with WR on April 23rd, 2006:

http://fr.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...t&oldid=6868026

Wasn't Guy Chapman that guy who married Amy Grant?

That was Gary Chapman. Guy Chapman married the late Graham Chapman.

A lot of the same admins and people pass back and forth between English and German wikipedias, however.

Well, as long as they don't invade the Polish WP and then takeover the French WP, I guess we shouldn't be too concerned?

We will fight them on the beaches! We will fight them in the streets! We will defend our tiny Wiki, no matter what the cost may be!