There are (in my opinion) 2 entries in Wikapedia on 0870 and 0845 which are excellent. Very factual, no emotion and a real understanding of the issue. There is no content in the 0844 and 0871 entry so an opportunity for someone who knows more than me to make one.

Interestingly there is a note that anonymous contributors keep removing the link to saynoto0870.com and that the editor feels that this is a valid link and would like feedback as to why it should be removed.

It can't harm to reply as to why it should stay.

I think we should refer people to this site (good explanation of the local and national rate issue for example).

I also wonder why people think it necessary to delete the link. really desperate if it is coming from the industry, but I can't think who else would want it deleted.

Are these the entries to which you refer?

0870; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/0870_number

0845;  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/0845_number

Just thought it would be justified to provide the links  ;)

Keeping the saynoto0870.com link is a full time job - believe me, I'm the editor who keeps those links intact. It seems that someone who is on BT has a great dislike of saynoto0870.com and will do everything in their power to remove the links from those articles.

Keith wrote on Sep 24^th, 2007 at 11:42am:

There is no content in the 0844 and 0871 entry so an opportunity for someone who knows more than me to make one.

Regarding those numbers, there is some mention in the Talk page of 0845 and 0870 respectively regarding these number ranges. I don't really know enough about their history to start a new page (I did think about merging 0844 and 0845 together as they are "similar" but decided that would be too much like hard work). If someone from here could provide the relevant background, I'd gladly start work on an 0844 and 0871 page (unless they want to do it themselves).

There was an article in the papers within the last month showing that it was possible to see what ip addresses were amending Wikipedia entries.
It showed that one political party was amending another party's entry, and that several members of the BBC were responsible for editing many items.
Would be nice to see how easy it is to do that trace.

Well 0844 04 and 0844 09 at least started life as "surftime" dial-up internet numbers, where they were actually terminated directly at the local telephone exchange concentrators, (you can have several of these for one "exchange" and that fact gives rise to the situation my then-gf had where of two phone lines in the house, she could use one for surftime calls and not the other as they went to different concentrators. Typically, it was the wrong one that worked..)


Although surftime as a product is now dead, you can see it's legacy in the "i" tariff bands for various 0844 number ranges in the price lists.  (the surftime products then gave you 100% discount on these call rates for certain times of the day for a monthly fee.)

Now ... 0820 anybody..?  ;)

a very nice man wrote on Sep 24^th, 2007 at 3:22pm:

There was an article in the papers within the last month showing that it was possible to see what ip addresses were amending Wikipedia entries. It showed that one political party was amending another party's entry, and that several members of the BBC were responsible for editing many items. Would be nice to see how easy it is to do that trace.

You may be thinking of the item also covered here.  The tool referred to is here..

irrelevant wrote on Sep 24^th, 2007 at 4:10pm:

You may be thinking of the item also covered here.  The tool referred to is here..

Which reveals the following for the 0870 Wikipedia page:-


Quote:

name      ip      diff      comment      time Bt-Central-Plus (London, England) - 14      86.137.186.181      40391057            2006-02-20 05:50:48      86.132.98.162      48234581            2006-04-13 05:59:33      86.132.94.82      85371558            2006-11-03 00:22:05      86.140.235.110      86228968            2006-11-07 07:27:53      81.129.193.143      86493629            2006-11-08 14:27:30      86.132.97.190      86964809            2006-11-10 16:59:46      217.42.38.33      87664966            2006-11-14 01:33:04      86.132.106.29      87895697      Taken out Adwords pay per click sponsored (for profit site)      2006-11-15 02:11:23      86.132.105.87      89131291      Removed commercial links      2006-11-21 01:09:09      86.132.91.173      126255166      Taken out commercial links      2007-04-26 22:39:48      217.42.37.243      141224611      Removed commercial ad sponsored link      2007-06-28 18:54:33      86.148.216.237      143603246      Removed commercial ad sponsored link      2007-07-09 23:01:04      217.42.36.229      144004853      Removed commercial links      2007-07-11 17:41:06      86.132.100.187      144508126      [WPUNDO|Undid] revision 144484164 by [SpecialContributions/212.159.100.181|212.159.100.181] ([User talk212.159.100.181|talk])      2007-07-13 23:58:41 Telewest-Hsd_1-Edinburgh (Bristol, England) - 4      82.41.22.49      42334725      added Ofcom definition      2006-03-05 12:41:54      82.41.22.49      51021773      Removed commercial link to Planet Numbers      2006-05-01 09:22:13      82.41.22.49      82031661            2006-10-17 17:40:24      82.41.22.49      89062696      Add further external links      2006-11-20 19:16:14 Bt-Central-Plus (-, -) - 3      86.140.130.170      46165700      /* External links */      2006-03-30 14:08:45      86.140.130.170      48122683      /* External links */      2006-04-12 15:02:41      86.140.130.170      49291718      /* External links */      2006-04-20 14:47:03 Freedom To Surf (A Pipex Company) (London, England) - 3      83.67.47.90      82382871      inserted external link      2006-10-19 08:17:30      83.67.87.2      119451066      /* External links */      2007-04-01 08:52:34      83.67.87.2      119451156      /* External links */      2007-04-01 08:53:25 Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (-, -) - 2      130.246.132.26      114545903            2007-03-12 14:26:20      130.246.132.26      114546008      /* Pricing */      2007-03-12 14:26:53 America Online (Reston, Virginia) - 1      172.141.4.31      129352585      /* Pricing */      2007-05-08 21:23:03 Bt-Central-Plus (Bath, England) - 1      81.129.182.146      78706779            2006-09-30 16:43:45 Bt-Central-Plus (Swindon, England) - 1      86.133.247.93      41776349      /* External links */      2006-03-01 17:48:22 Eclipse Dynamic Adsl Pool (Huddersfield, England) - 1      82.153.102.66      46620721      /* External links */      2006-04-02 18:10:35 Hotchilli Internet Adsl - Customer Ptp Ips (Chelmsford, England) - 1      195.248.124.223      34038455            2006-01-05 23:41:37 Plusnet Technologies Ltd (London, England) - 1      212.159.100.181      144484164      [WPUNDO|Undid] revision 144004853 by [SpecialContributions/217.42.36.229|217.42.36.229] ([User talk217.42.36.229|talk]) See discussion.      2007-07-13 21:31:20 Skymarket Hosting Network (Hertford, England) - 1      212.84.183.22      38328861            2006-02-05 17:08:22 Zen20030407-Dar-Zen-Adsl (London, England) - 1      217.155.42.123      33992637      Supplier added

An awful lot of edits by BT domains removing the SayNoTo0870 links.  But would BT domestic customers also show as BT Central and/or would "BT Central-Plus" mean a Plusnet broadband customer?

And this is what comes up for the 0845 page using the IP scanner for edits:-


Quote:

Found 44 edits for page '0845 Number'. [ Close Frame ^ ] name      ip      diff      comment      time Bt-Central-Plus (London, England) - 12      86.132.96.46      21541478      /* How 0845 calls are handled by operator */      2005-08-22 02:13:49      86.137.186.181      40388226            2006-02-20 05:23:47      86.137.186.181      40391683            2006-02-20 05:57:12      86.132.90.61      46843994            2006-04-04 01:09:07      217.42.37.86      55885302            2006-05-30 06:58:04      86.132.97.73      62675099            2006-07-08 04:13:43      86.133.55.86      79269183      /* External links */      2006-10-03 16:18:02      86.132.94.82      85371098            2006-11-03 00:19:35      81.155.198.36      86079812      /* External links */      2006-11-06 17:23:28      86.140.235.110      86228907            2006-11-07 07:27:25      86.132.90.8      88300224            2006-11-16 22:46:32      86.132.90.8      88300407            2006-11-16 22:47:28 Bt-Central-Plus (-, -) - 4      86.136.26.143      26097755            2005-10-21 14:40:17      86.140.130.170      46165532      /* External links */      2006-03-30 14:06:59      86.140.130.170      48122823      /* External links */      2006-04-12 15:03:22      86.134.9.134      54046924      /* External links */      2006-05-19 15:52:22 Bt-Central-Plus (Swindon, England) - 4      86.134.13.70      35935005      /* External links */      2006-01-20 09:33:07      86.134.13.70      37371477      /* External links */      2006-01-30 16:07:40      86.142.109.102      55066064      /* External links */      2006-05-25 13:45:59      86.142.109.33      63935694      /* External links */      2006-07-15 10:21:13 Cable & Wireless Telecommunication Services Gmbh (-, -) - 3      84.71.215.29      92823034      /* External links */      2006-12-08 00:47:52      84.71.215.29      92823356      /* External links */      2006-12-08 00:49:31      84.71.215.29      92823670      /* External links */      2006-12-08 00:51:06 Force (London, England) - 3      87.113.1.188      43335703      /* External links */ Removed advertising      2006-03-11 20:59:12      87.113.1.188      43336302            2006-03-11 21:04:08      87.113.1.188      43336561      /* External links */      2006-03-11 21:06:06 Telewest-Hsd_1-Edinburgh (Bristol, England) - 3      82.41.22.49      42218465      modified language used to describe cost of calls to these numbers      2006-03-04 17:55:46      82.41.22.49      54231253      Removed commercial links      2006-05-20 19:10:20      82.41.22.49      88841026      Remove vandalism      2006-11-19 18:12:37 Eacsltd01-Uunet (-, -) - 2      62.190.6.125      64293017            2006-07-17 14:56:22      62.190.6.125      74335557            2006-09-07 14:25:32 Julia-Porter (London, England) - 2      217.37.82.169      49909462      /* External links */      2006-04-24 12:20:11      217.37.82.169      81192280            2006-10-13 11:38:29 Static Wan Ip Range Chart Street (London, England) - 2      87.74.42.35      49188534      /* External links */      2006-04-19 21:49:41      87.74.42.35      49188567      /* External links */      2006-04-19 21:49:58 Brown & Sharpe Ltd (-, -) - 1      62.173.111.114      39604094            2006-02-14 16:30:54 Bt-Central-Plus (Manchester, England) - 1      86.133.58.19      104070279            2007-01-29 12:38:36 Cable & Wireless Americas Operations Inc (New York, New York) - 1      64.69.191.231      114505885            2007-03-12 09:42:09 Cable & Wireless Telecommunication Services Gmbh (London, England) - 1      195.92.40.49      125858477            2007-04-25 15:38:48 Ftip002751122 Norfolk County Council (Norwich, England) - 1      194.75.238.5      51518168      /* External links */ removed adverts      2006-05-04 12:51:12 Gfn Adsl Solution /32 /31 /30 Customers (London, England) - 1      217.79.113.130      33315424            2005-12-31 00:08:55 Ntl Infrastructure - Leeds (Leicester, England) - 1      81.104.183.251      78305564            2006-09-28 14:26:02 Skymarket Hosting Network (Hertford, England) - 1      212.84.183.22      38328580            2006-02-05 17:06:08 Zen20030414-Dar-Zen-Adsl (London, England) - 1      217.155.199.136      49001752      /* External links */      2006-04-18 13:49:22

Edits also include NTL or Cable & Wireless apparently but does this just tell us the end user was using an NTL or Cable & Wireless broadband connection or that it was really someone from those actual companies.

The Julia Porter IP address then still points to BT in Ipswich

The person who seems to be making the most recent edits is on the BT network, but from the WHOIS, I cannot determine if they are a BT customer or a retail customer for another company using the BT network. Unfortunately, they seem to think that they don't need to contribute to the on-going discussion, and can just remove the content as they like.

jgxenite wrote on Sep 25^th, 2007 at 3:24pm:

The person who seems to be making the most recent edits is on the BT network, but from the WHOIS, I cannot determine if they are a BT customer or a retail customer for another company using the BT network. Unfortunately, they seem to think that they don't need to contribute to the on-going discussion, and can just remove the content as they like.

If one believes content is being altered for malicious reasons is it not possible to ask Wikipedia to apply editorial control in some way so that any request to amend the content of the pages is subject to editorial review first.

I believe this happens with the Wikipedia entry for Bill Gates for instance.

Well yes, you can ask them to semi-protect the article. This means that anonymous users (aka IP addresses) or recently registered users cannot make changes to the page. The articles have been semi-protected before, and that only stopped the user until the block expired. I'll have to wait until some more reverts have taken place before I can ask for further protection for the pages.

Mr Anonymous was back again this morning and so I reverted his "let's remove the link to saynoto0870" vandalism.  As expected, he didn't contribute to the discussion first.
:-/

Cheers Repton3. Unfortunately, as I keep saying to the admins (when I try to get the page protected) the "anonymous" user does not wish to contribute to the discussion. They just keep removing the link without regard for the discussion, despite every attempt by myself to get them to join in!

jgxenite wrote on Sep 27^th, 2007 at 9:44am:

Cheers Repton3. Unfortunately, as I keep saying to the admins (when I try to get the page protected) the "anonymous" user does not wish to contribute to the discussion. They just keep removing the link without regard for the discussion, despite every attempt by myself to get them to join in!

The only surprise so far has been that we have found any Ofcom or ICSTIS domains responsible for the defacement of these web pages. ;)

NGMsGhost wrote on Sep 25^th, 2007 at 11:34am:

An awful lot of edits by BT domains removing the SayNoTo0870 links.  But would BT domestic customers also show as BT Central and/or would "BT Central-Plus" mean a Plusnet broadband customer?

IP addresses beginning 81.129.0.0 to 81.129.255.255 is for public use therefore it's not someone from BT using BT's company internet access leaving BT ISP customers.

bbb_uk wrote on Sep 27^th, 2007 at 6:11pm:

IP addresses beginning 81.129.0.0 to 81.129.255.255 is for public use therefore it's not someone from BT using BT's company internet access leaving BT ISP customers.

Of course all BT staff get a special cheap deal on having a BT broadband connection but there again its the largest broadband ISP in the UK by far.................................

As to the comments about the ad links on this site to be honest that sounds rather more a like disgruntled member of this forum than another 084/7 number vending merchant.

All I can say is it wasn't me guv.

NGMsGhost wrote on Sep 27^th, 2007 at 6:46pm:

As to the comments about the ad links on this site to be honest that sounds rather more a like disgruntled member of this forum than another 084/7 number vending merchant.

Wouldn't that be referring to this site specifically meaning wikipedia 0870/0845 pages linking to this site rather than the ads on this site.

I say this because surely other wikipedia pages link to sites which carry ads on.  It's very difficult these days to find useful sites without ads

If you are talking about the criticisms of the site section, I merely added that to try and make a balanced view point of criticisms that came up, and explain that most of them are irrelevant. I guess that section really needs re-titling to something else, but I couldn't think of a better word at the time... call it writer's block :).

Right, well an admin has fully protected the 0845 and 0870 pages until the content dispute has been resolved. Unfortunately, the user(s) have now moved to remove the discussion from the talk pages!!

At 222am the links are missing from both pages, despite this appearing at the top of the page.
This page is currently protected from editing until disputes have been resolved.

a very nice man wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 2:23am:

At 222am the links are missing from both pages, despite this appearing at the top of the page. This page is currently protected from editing until disputes have been resolved.

Perhaps its an inside job. ;) ::)

Th words horse and barn door come to mind. What is the point of protecting the site after all the damage has been done so that the link can not be reinstated? Whoever did this must be laughing their socks off. It should be protected in its unedited format. Sigh.

You have to wonder what the motives are for someone doing this.

Right, let me explain what is going on before people go off on a completely wrong tangent. I was trying to get the page semi protected last night. An admin told me it couldn't be semi protected because it was a content dispute - it had to be fully protected or not protected at all. Unfortunately, the anonymous user was reverting my edits straight away so I couldn't keep the sayno stuff on long enough for an admin to protect it with it on. Therefore, I managed to get the admin to protect it with the content dispute notice, directing people to the talk page.

As a result, the anonymous user moved to the talk page to blank out the content about the sayno discussion there instead. They were warned twice about it (despite ignoring them and reverting the pages) and were blocked by the admin for 24 hours. Hopefully this will get them into the discussion (I doubt it, but worth a try).

There are ways of requesting content to be put into a fully protected article, but if you want the sayno stuff placed in it, it must have been seen to have reached a consensus - they will not edit it if there are still disputes over the content. The only other thing that can be done is a request for the page to be unprotected, but then we are back to the same scenario as before.

jgxenite wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 9:18am:

There are ways of requesting content to be put into a fully protected article, but if you want the sayno stuff placed in it, it must have been seen to have reached a consensus - they will not edit it if there are still disputes over the content. The only other thing that can be done is a request for the page to be unprotected, but then we are back to the same scenario as before.

It becomes more and more interesting to know who is doing this and if there is a way to track them down more precisely through the IP address.

The ferocity and resentment clearly involved in this attack begins to more and more strongly suggest that it perhaps might be somebody involved in trying to sell 0844 telephone numbers to doctors surgeries. ;)

jgxenite,

My comments were no refelction on yourself. Infact the complete opposite - you are doing a fantastic job - well done.

However there is something wrong here if a single anonymous poster (with quite a chip on their shoulder by the sounds of it) can cause this much damage. Surely the admin of the site should take the view that the original post should stay unless the anonymous poster can justify why it shouldn't. Being anonymous doesn't help their cause, particularly as they may have an undeclared vested interest. If they are upfront they maybe able to justify theire change, but if not it should revert to the original.

After all what is to stop me doing this to any other perfectly factual reference on the site?

You say that the saynoto0870 can not stay unless it has reached consensus. Surely the reverse is also true and that the saynoto0870 shouldn't be removed unless it has reached consensus. Who is to say which article is the base point?

NGMsGhost wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 9:50am:

The ferocity and resentment clearly involved in this attack begins to more and more strongly suggest that it perhaps might be somebody involved in trying to sell 0844 telephone numbers to doctors surgeries. ;)

We have absolutely no proof that the person editing the article to remove that information would be a certain company selling numbers to people. Plus, it is an article about 0845 numbers, not 0844 numbers, so I doubt that your conclusion is valid.

Keith wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 9:55am:

Surely the admin of the site should take the view that the original post should stay unless the anonymous poster can justify why it shouldn't.

When providing full protection, the admin will protect the page as they find it. They do not take requests as to which version to protect. I asked the admin to protect it with the version as it is.



Keith wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 9:55am:

After all what is to stop me doing this to any other perfectly factual reference on the site?

Nothing except for peer review I guess.


Keith wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 9:55am:

You say that the saynoto0870 can not stay unless it has reached consensus. Surely the reverse is also true and that the saynoto0870 shouldn't be removed unless it has reached consensus. Who is to say which article is the base point?

That is a particularly hard question to answer. Yes, it appears there is one user with a very large chip on their shoulder who wants this site kept as far away from that article as possible. I suspect that if the page had been protected with the information with it on, we might have been able to get a debate going. As the page is protected without the information, I suspect the debate will end there. If there is no feedback from the anonymous user within the next few days, I'll request that the information about sayno is added to the page. Then we'll see if we get a reply.

Large chip.  Obsessed with it.

A certain head of PR spin for a certain 084/7 number vending operation springs to mind.

Good luck jgxenite. It needs to come back. It then needs to be frozen with it on and then we can see a debate with anonymous.

I wonder what other site he/she vandalises? The logic applied seems to mean that we can change the capital of France to London on the appropriate page and keep changing it after it is corrected and there is a 50% chance that when it is protected it will be protected in the incorrect state even though that is patently stupid!

Where there is a dispute it should revert to the original for discussion not some random point with a note stating there is a dispute.

I appreciate this is out of your hands, but I needed the rant!

Again good luck. If someone is unwilling to argue why something should be changed, it shouldn't be changed. That is just vandalism.

If the offending ip address was made public, I'm sure there might be someone with the capability of tracing it and perhaps initiating a Denial Of Service attack.
Just a thought.

a very nice man wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 11:00am:

If the offending ip address was made public, I'm sure there might be someone with the capability of tracing it and perhaps initiating a Denial Of Service attack. Just a thought.

The offending IPs are made clearly available on the history of the pages. However, Denial of Service attacks SHOULD NEVER be performed on any computer. It is illegal, and if traced back to you, you could be prosecuted and end up in jail.


Keith wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 10:51am:

I wonder what other site he/she vandalises? The logic applied seems to mean that we can change the capital of France to London on the appropriate page and keep changing it after it is corrected and there is a 50% chance that when it is protected it will be protected in the incorrect state even though that is patently stupid!

I know what you mean. That is why there are techniques in place to get content placed into the page once it has been protected. However, I would like to leave it a day and see if the user can be brought into the discussion. If they do not wish to participate, I will follow the procedure for getting information included and ask an admin to place it in. Hopefully that will bring them into the debate (if they wish to continue it).


Keith wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 10:51am:

Where there is a dispute it should revert to the original for discussion not some random point with a note stating there is a dispute.

The rules for full protection state that an admin is not to pick-and-choose the version they revert - they are to revert the page as it stands. If I had asked them to revert it while the anonymous user was reverting it also, we may have got a locked copy with not even the dispute notice. Be thankful atleast that we have the dispute notice.


Keith wrote on Sep 28^th, 2007 at 10:51am:

I appreciate this is out of your hands, but I needed the rant! Again good luck. If someone is unwilling to argue why something should be changed, it shouldn't be changed. That is just vandalism.

Don't worry - rants make people feel better :). Yes, it is vandalism, but they feel it should be that way, and we feel it should be the other way. Atleast now we are making some progress with it.

I just added a detailed call charges section to the 0870 number wikipedia article,something I have wanted to see for a long time.    There are some gaps however, so if some of you could pop along and update the missing information and the tba's,  I would be most grateful.  Some of the pricing links are blocked from my work PC.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/0870

cheers :)

As a Wikipedia contributor to the NGN pages myself I would suggest that the anonymous entity causing these problems is most likely to be a plant from either Ofcom or BT (or both), who are attempting to suppress the truth. Interestingly I have not had any of my contributions removed. This is significant because until I edited these pages there was no proper coverage of revenue-generating call queuing and historical classification issues. I actually submitted the whole content for one or two pages when there was only a classification for the page commenced, and no page coverage whatsoever.

These facts are equally embarrassing to such entities, so it is surprising that they have not yet honed in on these to attack as well.  

Would there be any sense in adding an 0370 page on wikipedia? It would perhaps help some puzzled members of the public learn the difference between 0870 and 0370 as the BBC switches over. Right now, "Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name".   :-/