Infected RationalWiki - Whiny hugbox for spergs and a clusterfuck of neverending drama on a rapidly declining website.

[Cynical]

Even if CheckUser were used, surely any user with half a brain would be using a VPN or be behind manual proxies?

If you want see how CheckUser works, sign up for a test wiki where they let people play with mod tools or install your own instance of MediaWiki and try it out.

Having done so myself, the above is usually true. CheckUser is nigh useless on anyone using a proxy almost all the time, though somewhat more effective for Tor nodes, since those can be tracked as Tor nodes (TorBlock is even better). CheckUser can be paired with honeypot IP checkers, spam hunter sites, and other online databases to weed out common spammer IPs and commonly known internet dickheads, but it's by no means an end-all, be all cure for sockpuppeters. IP blocklists, restricting certain editing privileges, and instituting things like the VandalBrake RationalWiki has can piss off sockpuppets much more easily.

 

[AnOminous]

If you want see how CheckUser works, sign up for a test wiki where they let people play with mod tools or install your own instance of MediaWiki and try it out.

Having done so myself, the above is usually true. CheckUser is nigh useless on anyone using a proxy almost all the time, though somewhat more effective for Tor nodes, since those can be tracked as Tor nodes (TorBlock is even better). CheckUser can be paired with honeypot IP checkers, spam hunter sites, and other online databases to weed out common spammer IPs and commonly known internet dickheads, but it's by no means an end-all, be all cure for sockpuppeters. IP blocklists, restricting certain editing privileges, and instituting things like the VandalBrake RationalWiki has can piss off sockpuppets much more easily.

The thing about Wikis is that while general vandals and trolls are always a thing, the real problem users are single issue spastics who obsessively edit one or more articles making specific changes. Think Ryulong. Even if they use a proxy, their activities stand out like a sore thumb because if they manage to worm their way back in, they just instantly start doing exactly the same shit that got them kicked off in the first place.

A troll who doesn't care at all about the articles they fuck with isn't going to have such a distinct pattern, but they're also less likely to have the energy of a tireless autist like Ryulong.

 

[fuehrer_dessler]

They could also use the primitive approach (egrep the logs) or use an external log analyzing tool.

 

[Moexlibu]

Yeah, he's their Emanuel Goldstein with bonus points for being actually Jewish. Avenger has the same role and gets bonus points not for being Jewish (he said he ain't), but for being leftist.

That's the beauty of the internet. Not only can you hang someone on trumped up charges, you can then go on and accuse everybody else of not only doing similar stuff, but being the evil offender. I am sure even Stalin would rub his hands in glee if he knew he could simply declare all his enemies are literally Trotsky himself. Though at some point he would run out of ice picks...

 

[WhoopieDoo]

So you're happier with your IT guys knowing you're using TOR to browse during work hours?

It's strongly suspected that the NSA monitors and/or records TOR traffic, and given that TOR traffic is suspect merely on account of being TOR traffic, you may actually be better off *not* using TOR and get lost "in the crowd" with normal traffic.

For example if you are offering a service, say, an online marketplace, which is offering trade in illegal goods, say, drugs, and you announce that you're using TOR on a public website, say, a programming Q&A site, that might help lead to some people, say, the FBI, come knocking at the door.

 

[fuehrer_dessler]

It's strongly suspected that the NSA monitors and/or records TOR traffic, and given that TOR traffic is suspect merely on account of being TOR traffic, you may actually be better off *not* using TOR and get lost "in the crowd" with normal traffic.

For example if you are offering a service, say, an online marketplace, which is offering trade in illegal goods, say, drugs, and you announce that you're using TOR on a public website, say, Stack Overflow, that might help lead to some people, say, the FBI, come knocking at the door.

TOR can't do anything against PEBCAK.

 

[Moexlibu]

TOR can't do anything against PEBCAK.

Which is ironic, because that seems to be the main problem with David Gerard...

 

[fuehrer_dessler]

Which is ironic, because that seems to be the main problem with David Gerard...

Of course, we remember RW being offline due to what looks like an user error.

 

[WhoopieDoo]

Of course, we remember RW being offline due to what looks like an user error.

... Which happens to every site.

 

[Moexlibu]

... Which happens to every site.

Pray, tell me, when was the last time it happened to Wikipedia or some other actually well run site?

 

[Cynical]

Pray, tell me, when was the last time it happened to Wikipedia or some other actually well run site?

Wikipedia has had some rare fuckups before, such as unexpected issues cropping up whenever they update themselves. Wikipedia beta tests it's newest MediaWiki branches on it's own sites before anything else, rare issues have gotten past their tests on their test wikis before.

Doesn't happen often, but it has happened.

 

[Hellfire]

http://wikipediasucks.boards.net/post/946/thread

I should also point out the "sysop list" of RW:

rationalwiki.org/wiki/Special:ListUsers/tech

Looked it over, and find that at least seven of the 13 accounts shown here have either retired openly or are semi-inactive. It appears that most of them quit in 2014-2015 as a direct result of the Gamergate editwarring. The only remaining sysops still posting on RW on a semi-regular basis are Gerard, "FuzzyCatPotato‏‎", "Ikanreed" and "Bertran".

You're doing it wrong, David!!

Plus, if you don't find enough lulz on RW's noticeboards, have a look at their Reddit section.
www.reddit.com/domain/rationalwiki.org

http://wikipediasucks.boards.net/post/701/thread

Things have changed. Prior to 2009 checkuser was abused on almost a daily basis. Supposedly no one abused it more than one of the first CUs, "Mr. Whiteface The Clown" himself David Gerard. Even he probably doesn't know how many times he abused checkuser and oversight powers. We'll never have hard information. All nicely covered up. Any discussion happened only in private emails or on the admin IRC channel.

http://rationalwiki.org/w/index.php...upport&curid=79044&diff=1639271&oldid=1639269

Seeing newly-uploaded images
It has been the case for months now, if not over a year, that newly-updated images often do not display. Any way to fix? Peace. AgingHippie (talk) 06:24, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

The reason is that rather than having apache2 mount the images from apache1 via NFS like any sane MediaWiki would, Trent tried that and it didn't work so there's an rsync that copies them across and isn't instant - David Gerard (talk) 08:22, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

... This is probably also the reason that some images magically disappear in a black hole sometimes... You could maybe do mount -t nfs ... and edit /etc/crontab to set up a NFS? This is not rocket science. This is a 30 minute fix at most. Apparently editors losing time and images is not worth fixing. Carpetsmoker (talk) 22:44, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

http://rationalwiki.org/w/index.php...upport&curid=79044&diff=1639269&oldid=1638739

Problems in the David Irving article
The note about his fucked-up acronym won't show up.--Kugelschreiber (talk) (mail) (block) 09:58, 7 March 2016 (UTC) 09:58, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

I tried using {{efn}} and {{notelist}} instead of the ref group things, but that didn't work either.--JorisEnter (talk) 10:18, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
This is the problem where something weird about the third-party DPL extension messes up footnoting. Cure: make the navbox first - David Gerard (talk) 11:38, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
Thx!--Kugelschreiber (talk) (mail) (block) 12:17, 7 March 2016 (UTC) 12:17, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
It's not "weird". I told you exactly what the problem is and what the fix is. I spent hours on that. Did you even bother to reply? No. It will take you ten minutes to implement a fix. Don't weasel out of it by saying that "it's the extension's fault". No. It's your fault. Carpetsmoker (talk) 22:41, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

 

[WhoopieDoo]

Pray, tell me, when was the last time it happened to Wikipedia or some other actually well run site?

Every major sites has fuckups. I'm not going to go find a list. For example last year the Tamagochi April fools game crashed all the Stack Exchange sites. And then there was of course Knight Capital which lost somewhere around $450 million in 45 minutes due to *several* human errors. Oops!

 

[fuehrer_dessler]

Pray, tell me, when was the last time it happened to Wikipedia or some other actually well run site?

To be fair, Wikipedia DID have some hickups (I witnessed them with my own eyes), but Wikipedia has a capable staff, multiple well-maintained IRC channels for support in multiple languages and other stuff on freenode and even a super-detailed status monitor. Wikipedia did have hickups, but they handle them much more professionally. The problem is, that RW is not only smaller, but also has an incompetent technical staff.

 

[DrJonesHat]

Wikipedia has an actual budget to hire a technical staff. Rationalwiki is run by people who think they're smarter then they are. Granted, some are pretty smart, but they suffer from the common smart person delusion that being good at one thing means you're good at everything.

 

[HG 400]

Granted, some are pretty smart

[citation needed]

 

[WhoopieDoo]

Wikipedia has an actual budget to hire a technical staff. Rationalwiki is run by people who think they're smarter then they are. Granted, some are pretty smart, but they suffer from the common smart person delusion that being good at one thing means you're good at everything.

It has little to do with either budget or size. I've seen many, *many* volunteer projects with a very professional and competent staff. I've also seen many, *many* large companies with woefully inadequate and incompetent technical management. There's a reason "enterprise-y" is something of a slur.

The problem is having two sysadmins, one MIA, and one not really doing anything. I offered to help out last year several times (long *before* all the crap started) and was basically ignored, even after I spent quite a bit of time trying to track down problems as best as I could on my end. I basically has a RationalWiki copy running on my server. It took me quite a while to set up.

The only response real concrete action I got was this over email:

well, that should be a little more reliable. Here it is if you ever
need it for anything:

===
description "memcached"

env MEMCACHED=/usr/bin/memcached

start on runlevel [2345]
# Not sure why it was recommended to use ^ rather than !. I'm sticking with !.
stop on runlevel [!2345]

# This test is completely optional, I'm just paranoid.
pre-start script
test -x $MEMCACHED || { stop; exit 0; }
end script

respawn
exec $MEMCACHED -m 1024 -p 11211 -u nobody -l 127.0.0.1
===

One for lucene doesn't seem to be working, I'll poke upstart some more ...

That's a basic script to restart memcached after it fell over for the umpteeth time. Not that this is a real fix. Looking into why it falls over is. But ah well, it's better than nothing. But as even the non-techs can see, it's not exactly rocket science. In fact, it's pretty damn basic.

The lucene that's mentioned is for the search. That sometimes breaks silently. Unlike memcached which causes the entire site to fail this is very sneaky because there are no errors and it broke for at least a week once. It broke a few weeks after this mail again (but maybe now it's been fixed? Who knows).

There are also issues with mails not being sent out sometimes. Mailing someone on RW is no guarantee that it's delivered. When FCP reported a blatant error a while ago David's response was "do you know when this happened" ?! dafuck?! Anyone would just grab the nearest copy of a grep and unleash it on some logfiles to figure out *how the hell that happened*. It was a binary not executing; potentially a large security problem (probably not, but could be). AFAIK nothing was done.

I can go on for a while...

So how can RW fix this?

Well, maybe by not bullying people away who are willing and able to help. It would be a start, perhaps. It's fine that David doesn't do too much. He's just a volunteer ... But also *preventing other people from doing stuff*. That's the problem. The community coughs up $4000 yearly (an amount that could be slashed in half, probably, but that's another rant) and gets very very little in return beyond the very bare minimum...

Ahem .. </rant> ... I'll go back to my basement now.

 

[The Kebab and Calculator]

Wikipedia has an actual budget to hire a technical staff. Rationalwiki is run by people who think they're smarter then they are. Granted, some are pretty smart, but they suffer from the common smart person delusion that being good at one thing means you're good at everything.

In essence, RW is run by one person - Gerard. He definitely has the personality type to believe he is very good at everything.

No other active member has database access.

 

[Hellfire]

FuzzyCatPotato got in an argument on reddit. "Calling RW a den of SJWs and feminists is ridiculous."

http://archive.is/zhF27

 

[chimpburgers]

FuzzyCatPotato got in an argument on reddit. "Calling RW a den of SJWs and feminists is ridiculous."

http://archive.is/zhF27

Something about this part doesn't sit well with me. Like just the way he's trying to defend RW here.

That's based on viewership. RW gets about 60 million pageviews per month. Even with its low Alexa rating, it's one of the most visible anti-conspiracy websites: