[OSM-dev] Vandalism how to proceed?

[Apollinaris Schoell]

On 23 Mar 2010, at 1:27 , Frederik Ramm wrote:

> Apo,
> 
> Apollinaris Schoell wrote:
>> any ideas on how to deal with vandalism of a technically skilled user?
> 
> What you have given us here is not really an example of vandalism. You seem to have someone who thinks that certain roads should rather be tertiary, and who writes arrogant e-mails. (But anyone can be made to write arrogant e-mails given the right input so this doesn't say much.)
> 

don't have the time to explain all the reasons and analysis done so far if there is no chance that this will help in any way to stop this. Can't spend 24/7 on osm. I can as well give up on this area evan that I l live there Don't need a map or navigation here since I know how to come around and spend my time on more useful things in unmapped areas.

> And while other "vandals" rarely bother to put proper changeset comments (or they write "piss off" and things like that), this guy explains what he is doing and why. He might still be wrong but at least he talks about it:

and this makes it so difficult to revert. I do not want to blindly revert things if some edits have been useful. 
> 
> http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/mk408/edits
> 
> Unless this guy is really good at cloaking his "vandalism", he looks like somebody who does a lot of work and who truly believes that he makes OSM better. It should be possible to engage him in a discussion. I do not know anything about the exchanges between him and the multiple users who contacted him, but does the possibility exist that these exchanges have perhaps been initiated in a way that put him in the defensive?

I don't think so. there have been friendly emails from people more patient than me. but all responses are like this "I am correct"
> 
> You're telling us how you have spent time investigating and writing scripts and reverting his edits and all - but to be honest, from the information you have given us, it looks like more time should have been spent on the human side rather than on the technical side!

haven't finished the scripts for lack of time and difficulties to really define how data should be reverted without creating more damage in case other users have worked on different aspects of the same ways. just coming up with a criteria what needs to be reverted it requires analysis of the changes and then I can as well use josm to look at a way at a time instead writing scripts
and again if there is no help in sight why should I spend hours to write it all up instead trying to fix things or don't care at all.

> 
> I'd say calm down, go slow, try to talk to him - if he doesn't like mailing lists then ask him if he'd prefer a meeting in person or what. It's not like 3500 roads changed from residential to tertiary need to be fixed instantly - if we decide to change them back a few months from now we can still do it.

talk to someone who doesn't accept any inputs? I know of 2 others who contacted him but same response. 
it's already > 2 months it doesn't change. Again I can't spend as much time as this guy definitely can. reverting in a few months is practically impossible if a way has been edited may times after. ways are split, ways are merged. osm is a nightmare when it comes to deep history analysis. You or others might have better tools than revert.pl and if they are not published I can fully understand. But if they exist than it will be useful to know what evidence is required to document bad edits that anyone would be willing to share it or run it themselves. 
Honestly if I finish any of my scripts there will be very view trusted users I am willing to share it as any revert tool is a weapon in the hands of the wrong person.


> 
> Bye
> Frederik
> 
> -- 
> Frederik Ramm  ##  eMail frederik at remote.org  ##  N49°00'09" E008°23'33"