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Currently, there are no requests for arbitration.

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Requests for clarification

Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification/Header

Request for clarification: Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Jack Merridew ban review motion

Initiated by T. Canens (talk) at 01:03, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• Timotheus Canens (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiator)
• Jack Merridew (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) aka Gold Hat (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (diff) aka Merridew (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Statement by Timotheus Canens

It has recently come to my attention that Jack Merridew (talk · contribs) has been operating, and editing from, the account Gold Hat (talk · contribs), in apparent contradiction with the terms of the 2009 amended unban motion ("User:Jack Merridew agrees to edit from one account only "Jack Merridew" on all WMF wikis with the exception of an additional bot account approved through the regular process"). When I asked him about it, he claims that arbcom is aware of the Gold Hat (talk · contribs) account and has no issue with it. Can the committee confirm this, and if so, make suitable amendments to the restrictions? T. Canens (talk) 01:03, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Comment by Jack Merridew

{{sigh}} I said arbs, not all of ArbCom. This *has* been discussed with some arbs and last I was told, by John, was wait until mid-Feb. Guess not. Cheers, Jack Merridew 01:20, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Gold Hat's first edit was to an Arb's toy account, and that led to an email thread. Check your arb-list archives from late last July. I've also directly informed John via email. Look at Gold Hat's edits; he (ok, *I*) have had talks mostly with admins, 'crat's and admins with it. There are also assorted recent emails with a number of arbs about fulling lifting these restrictions. Also, I'm traveling, and am mostly focused off-wiki. Ask John and Cas about that. They know that story, too. Cheers, Jack Merridew 03:58, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

The recent email thread is named "Jack as the Beast". That one does not discuss Gold Hat, but is about what's next. It includes seven arbs and five non-arb admins, including a WMF-staffer ;) Cheers, Jack Merridew 04:04, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Statement by RexxS

Jack's ban was reviewed in November 2008 at Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Jack Merridew ban review motion and I'd recommend reading the discussion as background.

The result was that on 9 December 2008 Jack's ban was lifted subject to 8 conditions.

The motion to amend Jack's 2008 unban motion was agreed in December 2009, reducing the conditions to three, plus his agreement to them (which he agreed on 11 December 2009):

1. User:Jack Merridew agrees to edit from one account only "Jack Merridew" on all WMF wikis with the exception of an additional bot account approved through the regular process, and agrees to not edit using open proxies.
2. User:Jack Merridew is to seek out advisers to assist him in transitioning from a formal mentorship to unrestricted editing.
3. User:Jack Merridew agrees that the same as any other editor, he is to follow Misplaced Pages policy and guidelines, and follow dispute resolution processes to resolve editing conflicts with the understanding that misconduct could result in blocks or Community editing restrictions.

The third condition applies to all editors. The second condition has now certainly been met (at least in spirit). Jack has around 170 talk page watchers, and his talk page is often used as a "reference desk" for technical help – which Jack is always happy to give, as anyone can see from viewing it. I submit that Jack knows whom he can turn to to seek advice, and there is no reason remaining for any restriction on his editing.

Finally, that leaves the restriction to editing from only one named account. I know Jack has been considering a name change, to leave behind the baggage of the Lord of the Flies avatar, and the restriction would strictly need amendment to allow that to happen. Nevertheless, the important point is that Jack has spent the two years since his unblock contributing constructively and collaboratively. I see no suggestion that he is in any way likely to return to abusive sockpuppetry, and the two alternative accounts Gold Hat and Merridew have trivial contributions and are linked to Jack Merridew. Gold Hat has only made comments at places such as his own talk page, where the viewers are well aware that it's Jack – and who enjoy the mild humour resulting. If you like, it's a kind of echo of one of Jack's wiki-friends, Bishonen, who keeps a stable of humorous puppets to lighten people's wiki-lives.

I'd ask ArbCom to review Jack's contributions and interactions with other users, and to consider whether they would agree that unnecessary restrictions do no more than create a "second-class" user, drawing criticism for actions that would be considered harmless when done by another user. The current restriction is now over a year old, and I'd suggest that it's time to remove it. --RexxS (talk) 04:13, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Statement by other user

Clerk notes

Arbitrator views and discussion

• First I've heard of any such thing. Jack Merridew, could you clarify what you're referring to? Shell 03:37, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Request for clarification: WP:ARBMAC

Initiated by WhiteWriter at 20:05, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• WhiteWriter (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)
• Alinor (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - diff for notification
• DragonflySixtyseven (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) - diff for notification
• ZjarriRrethues (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - diff for notification

Statement by WhiteWriter

Question about clarification of 1RR regarding Kosovo article, imposed in august 2009 by Nishkid64 (talk · contribs).

This happened:

• Following the expired RfC on Kosovo article talk page, Alinor (talk · contribs) followed the agreement, and re-include the 3 infoboxes. The talk page post and RfC was raised with 2 goals:
  • To finish article separation, or
  • To restore consensus version of the STATUS QUO, before 22 July 2010.

As we didnt get agreement about finishing separation, Alinor reverted status quo.

• ZjarriRrethues (talk · contribs), without anyone's agreement, reverted Alinors inclusion of status quo, with that's not the status quo but a revert of the consensus http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Kosovo/Archive_25#ICJ_verdict. As i understand it (and all other's in question, as far as i see), RFC shown that there was no consensus for changes in question, and that therefor, linked consensus was faulty and mislead. ZjarriRrethues for some reasons, disagreed with that.
• Alinor reverted Zjarri, with revert; consensus obviously changed/wasn't reached - we have just completed a 30 day RFC Talk:Kosovo#Kosovo_article_split and there is no consensus for the changes in your version
• Zjarri writes on Alinor talk page and that post, you who read this, must reread there. Alinor, active user since 2004, without a dark spot in his resigme, was blocked 3 days for 1RR by DragonflySixtyseven (talk · contribs).
• Later, when Alinor was blocked, IJA (talk · contribs) removed one infobox, with removed the useless extra infobox, all that information is included in other info boxes. No point repeating it., without talk page entry, again changing agreed status quo.

Without question who is guilty, who is not (that is pointless not, i think), my question is, what exactly is 1RR? First edit by Alinor, implementation of talk page RfC was, by some, just a revert, while for some others new edit, followed the talk page. We must see what can be done regarding this, and with that agreement, similar problems may be excluded in the future. With this flammable page, clarification will be very useful. So, what exactly is 1rr on Kosovo page? Should any entry with similar historic content be regarded as revert? Now new editors can know about that? Is this 1ER (1 edit restriction) instead on 1RR per week? All of this should have answer. All best, and, by the way, Happy New Year! :) --WhiteWriter 20:05, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Statement by ZjarriRrethues

• Kosovo is under 1RR per week. Alinor's violation was pointed out by Alinor himself Anyway, you may technically count these as '2 reverts in total' and I don't want to argue about such technicalities and others . He was blocked per the sanctions placed by Nishkid64 on Kosovo.

• There is a consensus which hasn't been overturned since July 2010 and a few hours after he made the second revert, one of the regular Kosovo editors restored that consensus because there was no consensus about reverting to a pre-July infobox version or even a discussion about it.. Alinor didn't implement any agreement/agree status quo/consensus but reverted to a version he considered correct, which caused other users to suggest reporting him to AE. As Alinor kept saying when he was making the reverts consensus changes, however, it doesn't change by reverting but through discussion.

• As the one who started this request for clarification WhiteWriter should bring difs that show there was an agreement for Alinor's reverts as this supposed agreement WhiteWriter keeps insisting on mentioning to justify Alinor's reverts isn't on the article's talkpage.

--— ZjarriRrethues —  20:22, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Statement by Alinor

• I have explained my position here: User_talk:Alinor#1RR_violation_on_Kosovo.
• The problem is that ZjarriRrethues continues to refer to a 26 hours discussion back in July 2010 that didn't involve wide input and didn't present all possible alternatives (they made an agree/disagree statements on only 2 options out of 7). As WhiteWriter explains and the RFC recently concluded shows there is no consensus for the ZjarriRrethues supported changes. I also find them as flawed for other-than-procedural reasons (the result is misleading for readers - and this was the reason I got involved in the first place - I was misled myself) - as explained in my post on my talk page.
• I was blocked for two edits that I made - first I restored the status quo before the ZjarriRrethues-supported-changes (that got implemented after a 26 hour discussion); second - after his revert I reverted back to the status quo. The first edit was result of the lack of consensus for the ZjarriRrethues supported changes (implemented 5 months ago and under discussion since that moment - I don't know if restoring previous status quo falls inside the 1 week 1RR rules). Alinor (talk) 07:45, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
• I think that (if there is technical possibility) this block should be deleted from my block history - of course if the result of this procedure here is that DS made a mistake by blocking me in the first place. Alinor (talk) 15:20, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Clerk notes

Arbitrator views and discussion

• Without comment on the wider issue, Alinor's first edit of 31 Dec 2010 represents a reversion of the article to 05:06, 23 July 2010 (in terms of number of infoboxen), and Alinor's second edit of 31 Dec 2010 is a repetition of that revert. If a user enters some entirely new content onto a page, someone else undoes it, and the initial user reverts them - that is only one revert because the initial edit was novel (and not essentially a revert to a prior state of the article). This does not seem to be the case here. –xeno 16:25, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
• Xeno's hit the nail on the head here; there were two reverts in this instance (i.e. it doesn't matter that one was a revert to something long ago). Shell 21:32, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
• Xeno and Shell are correct in their interpretation of the word "revert"; a change to any prior state of an article constitutes a revert. (The main caveat is that the edit must have been made knowing it was a change back to a prior state: one can imagine an editor making a change without realizing that he or she is in fact reinventing an earlier version of the wheel.) I do not see that any clarification of our prior decision is required here. That being said, for what it is is worth (which may be little), in this instance if I were the enforcing administrator I would likely have given a warning rather than a block. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:02, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Request for clarification: Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate change

Initiated by Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) at 20:55, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)

• Other editors at Talk:Intergovernmental_Panel_on_Climate_Change. There are no concerns over conduct of a specific editor or editors; I have notified those participating in the article here.

Statement by Short Brigade Harvester Boris

Confusion has arisen with regard to the intent of Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate_change#Use_of_blogs_and_self-published_sources. Discussion (see here) centers on whether the provision regarding blogs and other self-published sources is meant to apply solely to BLPs (and especially to BLPs of individuals taking a contrarian perspective on the issue) or whether it was meant to apply more broadly. In the interest of disclosure my own view is the former; i.e., Arbcom's intent was to prohibit use of blogs in BLPs rather than to discourage the use of blogs more generally. Clarification of the Committee's intent would be helpful in keeping the situation from becoming more heated. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk • contribs) 21:22, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Concur (strongly) in User talk:Scott MacDonald's comment below regarding scope. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 21:44, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Query: I'm new to clarification requests. Will there be a bottom-line closing statement from the committee, or will things just sort of die out after arbitrators give their individual views? Responses so far have differed such that the situation has not been, in a word, "clarified."

To expand on this a bit: Several have commented on the use of self-published sources in BLPs. The request here does not center around use of blogs (or other self-published sources) in BLP material. That's not to be done; it's clear; we get that (or should get it). The need for clarification regards restrictions on the use of blogs and other low-rank sources on topics outside of BLP material. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:16, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Statement by Scott MacDonald

I've no interest in Climate Change, but if this is to be limited to BLP (and I take no view on that), then I'm sure arbcom and Short Brigade would agree that it should be "BLP material" rather than simply BLPs. This is an important point, but should not be contentious.--Scott Mac 21:42, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Statement by Ron Cram

I wrote the paragraph which has become the subject of contention. I did so with knowledge of the arbcom ruling Boris cited and in the belief the paragraph I wrote complies with the ruling. In my view, the intent of the ruling is clear - it is to make certain that blogs are not used in situations in which they might not be reliable sources. Blogs would typically be considered reliable when speaking about the blog proprietor and so would most typically only be used in articles about the blog or the blog proprietor. The ruling does not say this is the "only" use. Some blogs are written by notable people. Such is the case here. Roger A. Pielke is an ISI highly-cited climatologist. As the proprietor of the blog, there is no question the comments he has written reliably reflect his opinion. It is Misplaced Pages's policy that a blog post, even by as famous and well-respected researcher as Pielke, should not be considered a reliable source on the science itself. Fair enough. After all, there are qualified experts on both sides. But there is no way anyone can say Pielke's blog is not a reliable source for Pielke's opinion regarding his criticism of the IPCC. It is an unreasonable position for anyone to take.RonCram (talk) 02:39, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

I think it is important to give arbiters feedback regarding the helpfulness of their comments. So far, Jclemons comment has been the most helpful and applicable to the situation. The criticism being contested is from Roger A. Pielke, taken from his blog. It is criticism of an organization, not an individual, so comments about BLP are not applicable to this request for clarification. Finally, the citing of WP:SELFPUB was helpful because I had not seen it before and clarifying because it directly applies. Actually, WP:BLOGS (just above SELPUB) also applies since Pielke is an established expert in the field. RonCram (talk) 13:33, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

Statement by Tijfo098

I'm glad I voted for Jclemens. He's one of the few who knows "teh rulz" these days. Tijfo098 (talk) 02:43, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Statement by Jayen466

In addition to WP:SELFPUB, see WP:BLPSPS: "Never use self-published sources—including but not limited to books, zines, websites, blogs, and tweets—as sources of material about a living person, unless written or published by the subject". --JN466 17:02, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Statement by other user

Clerk notes

Arbitrator views and discussion

• Blogs, self-published materials, and the like are to be used as sources with great caution, especially when better sources are available, and especially in highly contentious topic areas, of which Climate change is the preeminent example for 2010. Blogs are particularly disfavored as sourcesw where their contents are negative comments about individuals. As Scott MacDonald observes, it is inappropriate to post an inadequately sourced negative statement about a living person (or anyone, really) in any article, whether or not the article is the BLP on the person. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:55, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
  • I can agree that a blog that is undisputedly written by one individual can be a reliable source in defining the stated views of that individual (as of the date of the post in question). A separate question is whether a view expressed only on a blog is sufficient important to warrant inclusion in an article; as to that, as much else, context is all. Newyorkbrad (talk) 06:35, 25 December 2010 (UTC)
• The short of it is "No, this applies everywhere". This is a straightforward interpretation of both policy and practice regarding careful sourcing; the point is that it's all the more important to get things right in BLPs, not that subpar sources are acceptable elsewhere. Primary sources of the sort are difficult to use right, and of very limited scope, because they are not reliable sources. — Coren  00:27, 25 December 2010 (UTC)
• Agreed with those above, except I take a harder line. Blogs, self-published materials and the like are not usable sources, ESPECIALLY in highly contentious topic areas. SirFozzie (talk) 03:59, 25 December 2010 (UTC)
• ... Except under the limited, narrow conditions of WP:SELFPUB, of course. That shouldn't normally be necessary to say, but the fact is, blogs can be useful in certain cases, such as to illustrate a BLP subject's own views, as expressed on his or her self-authored blog. Note that each of the five conditions of WP:SELFPUB must be met in order for the usage of a blog to be acceptable. To amplify Newyorkbrad's comment, I'm uncertain how a blog containing a negative statement about another person could pass point 2, "does not involve claims about third parties". (arb-elect, as of this point ...) Jclemens (talk) 04:24, 25 December 2010 (UTC)
• I tend to agree with what Guettarda said here: "The ruling says "typically articles about the blog or source itself here". That means you could use Pielke's blog in Pielke's bio, or in an article about Pielke's blog. This is neither of those." I also agree with the point made by Arthur Rubin that the IPCC is not a BLP individual. Criticisms of organisations are a valid topic for articles about those organisations, but the criticisms need to be reliably sourced. Really, though, at the end of the day, editors working on these articles should be able to resolve differences like this without needing clarification from ArbCom. Was there not a noticeboard that you could have gone to first - one that deals with self-published sources, such as the WP:RSN? That would, I suppose, only work if those asking for clarification there held their tongue and didn't all pile in to repeat what they had said on the article talk page. Agree on the article talk page on a suitable phrasing for the question, ask the question, and then step back and let others have room to give their opinion. Carcharoth (talk) 18:13, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
• In reply to Boris, it's my understanding that if the arbs conclude that a motion is necessary, then a motion is voted on. Otherwise, if arbs conclude that a motion is unnecessary, the arbs request the clerks archive the discussion. PhilKnight (talk) 16:49, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
• SBHB: I think if you glue together the bits here, the general feeling is (as per Coren) we believe policy should be interpreted as "this applies everywhere" and (as per Carcharoth) whether or not a particular source is reliable is an editorial question, perhaps for WP:RS/N and not a question of an ArbCom motion. Shell 21:31, 6 January 2011 (UTC)