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=== Armenia-Azerbaijan ===
: '''Initiated by ''' ]·] '''at''' 10:22, 22 February 2007 (UTC)


==== Involved parties ====
*{{userlinks|AdilBaguirov}}
*{{userlinks|Atabek}}
*{{userlinks|Dacy69}}
*{{userlinks|Artaxiad}} (formerly {{userlinks|Nareklm}})
*{{userlinks|TigranTheGreat}}
*{{userlinks|Fadix}}
*{{userlinks|Grandmaster}}
*{{userlinks|Aivazovsky}}
*{{userlinks|Eupator}}
*{{userlinks|Fedayee}}
*{{userlinks|Parishan}}
*{{userlinks|ROOB323}}
*{{userlinks|Mardavich}}
*{{userlinks|Azerbaijani}}
*{{userlinks|Elsanaturk}}
*{{userlinks|Ulvi I.}}
*{{userlinks|Tabib}}

; Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
*
; Confirmation that other steps in ] have been tried
*See my statement; the parties have refused numerous suggestions of mediation, and their behavior demonstrates it would not be successful.

==== Statement by Dmcdevit ====
I'm making this request as a third-party initiator that has become very involved in this dispute as an administrator only. Don't be fooled by the number of parties I've attached; I'm not going overboard, here are actually more tht could have been included. This is a very wide-ranging nationalist dispute with so many participants willfully engaging in blind edit warring, personal attacks, and sockpuppetry, that resolution has become impossible. Every party here has been blocked for edit warring, incivility, or some combination of the two.
*The amount of articles that have had to be protected over this dispute is huge: ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ] (there may be more), and so this has become ''very'' disruptive to the community.
There can be no dispute resolution as long as the parties persist in ] mentalities, endlessly reverting. Additionally, no amount of encouraging them to seek out mediation has resulted in any ''attempts'' to resolve the dispute with peaceful means. In fact, the 10 parties listed have a combined total of 13 blocks ''from me alone'' in the last month. An injunction is needed as soon as possible, and I expect to see several paroles or bans as a result of arbitration, for the parties with no capacity for working with others. I suspect with so many parties, the nature of the dispute will become obvious when they all give their statements, but I'll expand if it isn't clear. ]·] 10:22, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Note that the issue here is ''not'' some unresolvable nationalist dispute (the content dispute is not considered during arbitration anyway), but the actual ''conduct'' issues(edit warring and incivility) of some of these parties that make a resolution impossible at this time. That is what arbitration seeks to resolve. ]·] 20:57, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

==== Statement by Grandmaster ====

I would like to respectfully disagree with some of what has been said with regard to the situation. Saying that no dispute resolution was tried is not entirely accurate, I personally initiated a dispute resolution with regard to one of the articles that are mentioned above, i.e. ]. Please see: ] It is currently underway, please check ]. Also, I initiated or supported a couple of ] with regard to disputed issues.
Unfortunately, they did not generate much response. I know that some of other above mentioned people, for instance ] also tried dispute resolution procedures. Also, the disputes were mediated by wiki admins, and I would like to specifically mention ], who made a tremendous contribution to resolution of disputes between the parties. I would like to add that for people not familiar with our region such intense disputes may seem strange, but one has to bear in mind that the two countries were engaged in a war that took thousands of lives, and therefore the people from our region take the issues with more passion than those who were not affected by such tragedies. I don’t think that banning the current group of editors will help resolve the situation, it means that all active users representing these two countries would be banned, and those who take their place would start everything all over again. If you check ]-] related internet forums, you’ll see what I mean. Instead, I would recommend that the wiki community should be more active in monitoring such heated disputes related to this particular topic and help parties to find middle ground. My negative experience with RfCs shows that no one is really interested in what is going on these articles and some admins see the only way of resolving the problems by blocking and banning active editors. ] 12:21, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

''Additional statement''. Since the personal accusations started, I would like to provide some insight as to what caused edit wars in the first place. Time after time I found myself in a situation, when all of my edits, no matter how well sourced and referenced they were, were fully reverted by certain users. ] is a typical example of such indiscriminate blind reverts.

Other examples could be found here:

I tried to discuss issues on talk, and 2 archives on Paytakaran and extensive archives on other pages are a proof of that. When a third party editor filed a request for the official mediation with regard to the dispute on Paytakaran, me and other involved editors on both sides agreed, and it was Fadix who rejected it, and mediation never took place. After that I filed an AMA request, and the issue is currently being mediated. I don't think ] has much room for accusing others, while he himself was not much willing to have disputes resolved via the respective dispute resolution procedures. I was the one who always supported and in most cases initiated dispute resolution, however sometimes the other party was unwilling to cooperate. Of course it is very frustrating to see that the edits you put so much research and effort in being reverted without any valid explanation or under a false pretext. This is what causes edit wars. It is also not nice to see your edits being reverted by people, who never contributed a singe line to the articles they rv or their talks, and you can only guess what their real motives are. Therefore I think it would be fair to add ] and ] to the list of involved parties. If you check their contributions, you’ll see that in addition to edit warring on various ] related articles, these people have been actively involved in edit wars on Armenia – Azerbaijan related articles, undoing edits by Azerbaijani users. Just a couple of examples of their rvs of the articles, to which they never contributed a single line, be that the articles themselves or their talks.

]:

Same for ]:

In addition, these 2 have been edit warring on such articles as ], ], ], ], ] and many others.

Please see

Also, ] belongs to the list too. Because of his edit warring ] article has recently got protected too: He is well aware of 3RR rule, as he was warned by an admin.

I still think that arbcom will not resolve the problem, the only way out of this situation is more active involvement of wiki community in resolution of the disputes. ] 12:27, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Some more about edit warring. There was definitely some meatpuptery involved. While ] was revering edits by Azerbaijani editors to Azerbaijan-Armenia related articles, ]/Nareklm and his sock ] were reverting pages to support Iranian editors. Mikara being sock of Artaxiad/Nareklm was officially proved by checkuser: ] Moreover, banned ] was also reverting the contribs of Azerbaijani users to Azerbaijan-Armenia and Iran related articles using socks (for example, ] and ]) and countless anonymous IPs. Of course, this led to edit wars becoming more and more intense. In addition, Mardavich and Narek supported each other in voting on various pages. Mardavich voted:
Narek voted too: While I can understand Fadix voting here, because he contributed to discussions previously and after voting, Narek never neither edited nor discussed this article, so it cannot be considered a good faith vote. This activity was definitely coordinated outside of wiki, and reverts by Ararat aren strangely coincided with those of some of the aforementioned users. ] 12:02, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

It is also interesting to see the way Artaxiad tries to clean up Misplaced Pages of images related to Azerbaijan. Check his contribs: He tagged for deletion every single image uploaded by Azerbaijani users, and many of them have been deleted. It would not be a problem if he was so critical with regard to images uploaded by users of other ethnic backgrounds, including Armenians, but such selectiveness makes me think that this user tries to make a certain point. ] 16:16, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Another point I would like to mention is that Armenian users try to blame the problems on new Azerbaijani editors. Indeed, the number of Azeri editors has recently increased, and so did the number of Armenian users. It is a natural process, which will continue as many more people become aware of Misplaced Pages. So the number of contributors from both sides is now almost equal. This changed the situation, because previously due to numeral superiority it was much easier for Armenian users to remove edits they did not like, as they did on Paytakaran, for example. When 3 users make reverts in turn, they do not risk violating 3RR, so they took advantage of that. But now it is more difficult to do that, and their attempt to remove the info they don’t like results in an edit war with involvement of a larger number of editors. So it is not the behavior of newer Azerbaijani users, but rather the fact that Armenian users lost numerical superiority, which resulted in more edit wars. I do not think that punishing certain people will resolve the situation, because there will be more and more contributors from both sides joining Misplaced Pages, and this situation will repeat. I think there should be some sort of a commission or board of respected and experienced editors, who would monitor Armenia-Azerbaijan related articles and help resolve the disputes. Usually it was only Francis Tyers, who tried to mediate and resolve the disputes, but since disputes erupt on almost every article that concerns both sides, it is beyond the capacity of one person to resolve all the disputes. I think this is something that arbcom might consider, as only repressive measures will not resolve the problem. ] 16:42, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by Francis Tyers====
If it isn't too presumptuous, I'd like to add that I have sucessfully, and unsuccessfully mediated cases involving these articles and users in the past (notably ] and ]). I would agree that arbitration would be a good step. - ] ] 10:57, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by AdilBaguirov====
The case has become complicated, in part due to so many editors involved, and in part due to shortcomings of the legal and procedural rules governing such disputes. As the rules and spirit of Misplaced Pages clearly states, anything that is verifiable, from authoritative source(s), and has been presented and discussed on the appropriate Talk page, has the right to be featured in an article (in this case, for example, Tigranes the Great article . If someone has legitimate counter-arguments from authoritative sources, they too can go through the same procedure, present and discuss it on the Talk page, then either remove or most likely, modify/add their information to complement the other information. However, under no circumstances, should the properly cited, verifiable, truthful and properly presented and discussed information simply be constantly removed, sometimes without any explanation, and at other times, simple "because" someone just feels like it -- in contravening of all scholarly and historical sources.

This is unfortunately what happened on this particular page (for editing of which I got blocked), and despite my edits being fully presented and discussed, and using a URL reference to Encyclopedia Iranica, provided by a third-party user on the Talk page, my edit were reverted by two editors (who later also got blocked), and neither the edits were re-instated by the administrators, nor have the participants of the article's edits been warned about unacceptability of removing discussed, verifiable and authoritative information. In addition to being blocked for reinstating 3 times in a row such crucial edits (and thus, admittedly, potentially breaking the 3RR rule, at least in its loose interpretation), I also received the block first (at least 10 minutes before the other editor), and received it for a significantly longer time (72 hours versus 48 for the other editor). In justification of the block, admin Dmcdevit claimed that I didn't discuss the changes -- which means he clearly overlooked the Talk page or otherwise didn't dwell into the issue at all, as I have been presenting pages of sources since last year. In fact, admin Dmcdevit makes the same statement in regards to other pages , such as Stepanakert and Mamed Emin Rasulzade, despite the fact that there are pages of sources presented by users like myself, whilst the other side often doesn't present anything.

I'd like to also emphasize the following: I've been active on Misplaced Pages since early summer of last year, and never been blocked, despite editing the very same pages, with the very same editors involved. Often, the discussions would be heated, but nevertheless not result in blocks for anyone -- perhaps because several administrators, such as Khoikhoi, Golbez, etc., were actively participating in the discussions and thus dwelled into issues. However, in case of Dmcdevit, it is very different -- not only does he appear not to have done full research into the matter, but not having much of prior exposure to the Armenia-Azerbaijan issues, he jumped on the matter just recently, since about mid-January 2007.

So then why did I, who has been on Misplaced Pages long enough and has done tons of writing on many Talk pages and many edits of articles, never been blocked until last week? And suddenly, in the course of a week, I am blocked twice by Dmcdevit, in both cases for 3 days? Why? How did I suddenly become an "edit-warrior" now? Perhaps it's not me, and other editors, who have suddenly all become offenders, but a hasty decision was made?

Additionally, Dmcdevit made a coment in our private e-mail exchange (in which, I naturally appealed to him to take another, deeper, look, and unblock me) that is troublesome and threatening: "You're just going to have to sit it out. And if you're more combative afterwards, you're going to be sitting it out much more in the future." (date Feb 20, 2007 10:14 PM)

I hope Dmcdevit understands that this is not about him or me or anyone else in particular, but about the quality of the articles, which are underserved when radical decisions on blocking active editors is made in haste. Things get heated sometimes, but that doesn't mean we should all be trigger-happy. I look forward to working with Dominic in the future, but hopefully, he will use his blocking privileges only as a last resort, and instead, warn those who violate the rules and spirit of this encyclopedia and remove properly discussed and sourced verifiable facts.

Also, in my exchange of opinions with Khoikhoi, I've suggested to place a permanent semi-protection on all Azerbaijani and Armenian pages, to forever prevent IP vandals and socks from reverting and vandalizing pages -- it would help enormously, I think. --] 18:44, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by Atabek====
I am glad to see that Dmcdevit-t has taken the initiative of pursuing this problem through a dispute resolution. Though some of the blocks, whether by Dmcdevit-t or else seem to be applied rather in arbitrary or summarizing manner, it's quite understandable that administrators cannot always concentrate on a particular edit conflict on such a broad scale and cannot always be even handed.

I likewise think that both sides shall be encouraged to discuss their differences on Talk page prior to making any edits. This is effectively done by myself at ], ], ], ],] and ]. I have had encountered problems trying to invite other users to do so:

::1. On ] page, ] has completely removed the entire content of the site and refused to contribute to ]. Please, note, that this was the same content which was mediated between ] and ]/Artaxiad, with participation of third party ]. My request to provide comment and discuss the removal of several paragraphs of well referenced and balanaced material was left unanswered by ]. The removal was further supported by ], who earlier agreed to the same mediated version, ignoring an appeal by ] regarding ] content ].
::2. On ] page ] has published material which lacks any scholarly basis and persistently referenced a blogger, claiming him to be a Canadian scholar, and PhD. Yet he was unable to provide a single reference to journal, book or conference publication of the named reference "scholar". Sufficient evidence was presented on ] by myself and several other users, yet ] not only persistently disagreed, but also did not provide any strong argument thus bringing to deadlock.
::3. On ],] pages, ] has been persistently edit warring, replacing scholarly publication references with links to freelance websites or fragments of POV opinions. He was often joined in revert wars by ] and ] in a coordinated fashion on this and several other pages. All three users again refused to discuss their edits on ] and ].
::4. ], who was caught with a sock recently changed his username to Artaxiad, however, if we look here ], we can see that ] has used Artaxiad sock before switching, along with Nareklm username. He also had another sock called HayasaArmen.

This is while on all pages, I edited, I participated extensively in talk pages, often attacked and accused baselessly of puppetry. It's difficult to blame either Armenians or Azeris in this case, and it's immaterial who does the first revert. Actually in many times, Persian editors arbitrarily join/coordinate with the Armenian side and vice versa, but all of this is a content detail. It shall be understood, that both Armenian and Azeri people have suffered a long and bloody conflict taking thousands of lives, and with thousands of refugees on one of the sides still continuing to suffer in refugee camps. As long as this conflict is not resolved in reality, the effect of emotions on activity of a particular editor associated with either side is difficult to avoid. But arbitrary blockage, such as that applied by Dmcdevit, will not solve this problem either. Arbitrary blockage of one or the other side's contributors gives more leverage to other warriors to gain or do further reverts often expressing a gratitude to administrator for blocking "the enemy". This is the case in particular with ] and ] pages and only embitters the conflicting sides. It shall be kept in mind, that some of the editors mentioned above on either side are also valuable contributors to Misplaced Pages in any case, and indefinite and deliberate blockage of those will not establish peace, there will be always other new users, who may be even less qualified, joining from both ranks and having the same conflicts.

'''Suggestions''':

1. I think the first and foremost step to solve this conflict in Misplaced Pages is to have an independent administrator or an arbiter who is ''knowledgable in contents of the disputed articles''. Administrator Dmcdevit has openly stated in private correspondence that he does not claim to be ''"any more qualified to address the content concerns than the parties"'' and that the ''"area is not his area of expertise''" (February 21, 16:43). But that's the root of the problem, that if the administrator is unfamiliar with content dispute (which is a source of the conflict), it's difficult for him/her to come up with a fair judgement instead of blocking. Administrator Khoikhoi has demonstrated some of this knowledge. But in any case, whoever that one chosen administrator is, he or she shall be the judge independent of yet agreed by both parties as more or less of a balanced expert. Both parties should have sufficient trust and ability to rely on this administrator in any administrative concern.

2. Both contributors and administrators shall stick tightly to the Misplaced Pages 3RR rule, which has been recently violated very often. It's important for the administrator, who is a subject matter expert, to carefully review every request and make a fair and balanced judgement.

3. Both sides should establish a committee of even number of people, with equal representation from both sides. This committee of balanced experts will be consulted with for any kind edit by other users and shall support/coordinate with the actions of the appointed independent administrator. This shall be done on any of the national or ethnic-based editing conflicts.

Thanks and I hope we will be able to achieve a fair and just resolution as well as permanent peace. ] 19:53, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by Dacy69====

Well, I have reported my view about my blocking by ]. Since it is another topic I will write only about it. But I am happy to provide explanation and furthet info why I believe that ] blocking was unfair and double standards.

I'd like to start that it is apparant that Armenia and Azerbaijan related pages are vandalized and sometimes modified without justifications. Or there is attempt to present strict POV and to clean up pages from negative information. As for me, in most cases I have discussed my edits, supplied well-referenced information. My opponents usually deleted it. I have participated exstensively on talk pages. I have created several non-disputable (thus far) pages. Three times I made mediation offer which was not accepted by Armenian opponents - ], ], ] and plus another on page ] to Persian editor --]. Two times I filed request for assistance - , one is still open.

I'd like to touch to certain pages just to produce examples.
On page ] I requested Assistance, got it and resolved my dispute. (We argued about a section of Ethnic Composition) But then my opponents made another attempt to reintroduce their arguments and created another chapter (Urartu and Armenian Ethnogenesis) and for that purpose continued deleting my edits there.

On page ] I made edit based on the referenced information. I wanted add more sources and more information but the page got protected. Without much discussion user Fadix insulted me 2 times and threatened with edit revenge on other Wiki pages . User Fedayee also insulted me, in supporting Fadix claim . I filed 2 complaints about personal attacks but no measure has been taken except warning for 1st insults after which Fadix insulted a second time.

My edit on page ] is well-referenced. I proposed mediation offer for that page which is not accepted. I wonder why opponents, if they believe that I am wrong, don't accept mediation offer. I made explicit and informative edit summary on page ].
In the course of other disputes I was insulted too (e.g. by ]. Armenian editor ] on page ARF and Persian editor ] on page ] made open threat to launch edit revenge on other Wiki pages.

It is clear that such heated discussions should be mediated and managed by third impartial party. I found dmcdevit administrating is superficial and unjust.

I second Atabek proposals. Moreover, I believe that it will be useful if 2-3 admins will form a kind of board and monitor situation on Armenia and Azerbaijani related pages, will make judgements about references and facilitate dispute resolution, and definitely will block vandalism and punish insults.--] 21:48, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

I also suggest to add some other Armenian users to that discussion ], ] and ] as they are deleting and reverting edits or involved in disputes.

:I see that our opponents make cooments on contributors rather on the content of arbitration (pages, editing, behavior, pesonal attacks). I believe that it was checked several times - I mean accusation of sockpupetting.
:I see also that admins try to disengage from the dispute. '''Here we are not requesting to resolve Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict but make, monitor and facilitate proper editing.''' And I think solution can be find in order to put an end the desruptive activity of certain editors and insults. As I mentioned 2-3 admin might facilitate the dispute resolution process in Wiki editing.

====Statement by Fadix====

If the Arbcom decide to hear this cases and this RfAr is accepted, the evidences I will be providing will be concentrated on ], ] and ] disruption. I will be documenting that Dacy69 and Atabek are acting as meat puppets. I also request all the members involved here to be checkused, and I want to include also ].

A little historic of the situation, so that the committee understand my position.

] for a great amount of time has left Misplaced Pages. He left Misplaced Pages, with his last edit on July 25, 2006. After months out of Misplaced Pages he came back on December 10 of the same year. One day after ] has registered and first edited Misplaced Pages, which was on December 9. Adil first contribution after his long vacation was on the Urartu article which was basically reverts and supports of ] edits (done the same day, a day after he registered) on the same article. Also the same day ] had edited Armenia article , and the same day ] has edited the Armenia page in support of Dacy69 . Basically, Dacy69 registers an account, a day later makes edits, when he is reverted he has been backed by Adil who for months hasn’t edited Misplaced Pages comes in support of him.

This doesn’t stop here; there are evidences of cohesion between members. ] after over two months of absence made his first edit on the Match Days article . Reverted, 9 days later a new member has registered, ], prepared, has started extending the March Days article with controversial materials as documentations to the previous ] edit, without any discussions. , , and so on. And has been later found that ] was a sock of ] who registered on January 21, 2007, about 4 days after Tabib has reappeared.

More evidences of cohesion could be found on the Request for deletion of the Ottoman Muslim casualties of World War I. As far as I could remember, Azeri editors have never been involved on that article. First Grandmaster vote, a little more than 2 hours later ] another Azeri member vote, just 6 minutes after ] vote, less than an hour later Dacy69, ] less than a day later vote. There is nothing wrong in voting, my evidence here is regarding the cohesion between members.

Also, what is suspicious is that ] who was the most active Azeri user in the past, and who does seem to follow what is happening here on Misplaced Pages has refrained himself on the last 2 edits on voting only.

Another evidence of cohesion can be found on the deletion of Genocide deniers’ category. Again, the point is not about them having voted, but the fact that they will be voting in Armenian related articles which they weren’t even ever related in, and the time frame in which those votes were submitted. About two hours after ] has voted ] has voted under his IP address 66.46.197.50, less than 2 hours later ], and less than half hour later ].

In some instance cohesion has not only shown an organization in the action of various users, but also in attempting to reverse a legitimate request for deletion which would even qualify as a speedy delete. The cases I want to present is the one on Albanian-Udi which was submitted for deletion. ] and the rest of the members involved have opposed to the deletion of this article, even if there is already an article on ] and that the entirety of the article was coming from another Misplaced Pages article. It was deleted even though no consensus was achieved by the administrator, because it was an obvious delete material.

Not to say, that ] has broken a hard reached consensus after months of negotiations, between members and two administrators on the ] article, as a result the article was locked two consecutive times and probably had ] not been blocked it would have been locked again.

With those repeated cohesions and mass ganging, and being exhausted I have answered with rude comments, but have on the other hand not revert warred. But all the members with whom I have been rude have disrespected Misplaced Pages, disrespected various members and have engaged in disruptive actions. I won’t justify my rude comments, at times very rude comments and am ready to pay the price. On the other hand, I will maintain that being rude has given more positive result than any attempted way.

What I present in the above is just few examples of various other instances. Before concluding, I will make a last comment on what has been happening on the Armenian Revolutionary Federation article. ] actions there were against a general consensus on the uses of the term “terrorist” and “terrorism” in a wide range of articles such as the article about PKK. ] and the meat puppets have made various edits on various Armenian related articles, always in one direction, always negative materials, with dubious wording and without further discussion. Had they been done in good faith, we could have expected those same members working on Azeri related articles which are much more biased. For instance, there is no reference to Heydar Aliev article about his mafia and the organized crime in which he was involved in. In short, when ] came back after his vacation, he has brought with him other members who would go on meat puppeting and vilifying Armenian related articles, this is what brought all the edit warrings, there was some relative peace before that. ], he isn’t involved, ] isn’t more than the Armenian members involved, but definitely ], who by now I am starting to suspect being ]. ] and ] have done not much good here, they have in their account various articles which they were able to successfully lock. ] uses of a sock haven’t helped either, neither his request to change his name on the middle of a conflict. ] 03:33, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

'''Additional Comment and important note to the Clerk and the Arbitrators:''' Others here have no experience with arbitration it seems, and think that the Arbitration would decide on content. I know this is beyond the mandate of the administration committee, I already have experience with a previous cases involving ] and others I have read. The only arbitration material there is here, is if whatever or not ] is using meat puppets and is responsible of very serious disruptive behaviours which could not be handled without an arbitration cases. The administrator who brought this cases here, has it right in one major aspect, this conflict has become out of proportion. Not because of some content issues, which Grandmaster in his update report (which concerns me), and doesn’t say all what need to be said about it. I know what qualify as arbitration cases and what does not and if I am requesting the Arbcom to decide to hear this case, is not because I want to drag it in hearing some intestine war of words. ] is really being disruptive, and has really brought with him meat puppets, and one of the many results of their actions really resulted in the locking of various, various articles. I will be for now waiting the comment of the Clerk, on what need to be done, what sort of evidences should be brought here for the arbitration committee to hear this case. I have also in mind past rulings and Wikipedian Jurisprudences in that regard for comparaison purpouses if that needs to be developped. Like I said, I wait Clerk comments.

Some members here don't even bother reading about Misplaced Pages arbitration since two members have answered other members in their own section.

'''Update:''' I thank Newyorkbrad for his helpful comment. And from it, I assumed that maybe more clarification is needed to what for I think this RfAr should be accepted. My thesis does not revolve only on three users meatpuppeting, POV pushing, disruption. But as well as their stigmatisation of the members, this apply more to Adil. Classifying members as two opposit sides, adversaries. I will be adding more evidence if it fits depending on the arbitrators who have yet to make their point. Just one example of the sort of things I have to deal with, is here an example in which Adil purpously modified the name of a scholar by adding an '''i''' to make it sound as an Armenian and to later discredit him on that basis. ] ] 05:23, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by Artaxiad====
I personally hope this ends its getting old and annoying, I can see why Adil, Dacy and Atabek follow these certain patters they all follow adils theories online, possibly all of them are his accomplices or they obviously revert together, please see these users are trying to poison Misplaced Pages with false nationalist theories. Scan through the news article, that is why this edit war is happening for most of these theories they have published on the site. Another thing for example on ] Dacy keeps on want to add that he was a terrorist why is this? to make him look bad he was a great commander in the ] leading 3,000 men against them and he succeed, which he wants to make that person look as bad as possible, because regarding the situation in Karabakh Adil is highly disruptive in that stage so obviously Dacy is here to help Adil revert, Adil is in Turkish news alot with his theories regarding Karabakh possible a government worker. Not to mention identical additions on ], please see, and ] 08:01, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

* "Armenian claims of alleged genocide and its constant campaign around the world (this is despite the fact that Armenians massacred an estimated up to 2.5 million Turks" Possible Anti-Armenian,

* This may seem content-related but I just wanted to outline a detail. User Artaxiad above said "Dacy keeps on want to add that he (Monte Melkonian) was a terrorist, why is this?" -- The answer: Monte Melkonian was a member and one of the main leaders of ] - Armenian Secret Army for Liberation of Armenia, which was considered as a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department. Below are some links in reference.
:: * ]
:: * ]
:: * ]
: Thanks. ] 17:06, 23 February 2007 (UTC), P.S. The comment itemized right above this is not from me.
*Umm dude you don't get it do you, whats the talk page for?! this is my section. Not to mention all these Azeri editors listed here cause trouble on Russian Misplaced Pages also, edit wars. ] 23:50, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
----
'''Dacys battle'''<br>
I think these users have mistaken the purpose of Wiki as Dominic said this is not a battle ground.

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Misplaced Pages%3ARequests_for_arbitration&diff=110348748&oldid=110323000
Dacy69:
I see '''that our opponents make comments''' on contributors rather on the content of arbitration (pages, editing, behavior, pesonal attacks). I believe that it was checked several times - I mean accusation of sockpupetting.
It seems the guy is here to do battles and thus calls other users as opponents.
http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Monte_Melkonian&action=history ] 11:37, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

----
'''Grandmaster'''<br>
Grandmaster brings up useless accusations. Since him and Tabib are obviously socks basically all Tabibs reverts are back to Grandmaster.
*rv to Grandmaster, his last edit was well-referenced. Nevertheless, putting totallydisputed tag, as the entry content is currently being disputed
*rv POV to last version by Grandmaster
*rv to last version by Grandmaster. The edit is well referenced, pls stop edit warrying. Also, as this version states, Sultanov was appointed by Azerbaijan gov't, not the British
*rv to last version by Grandmaster. Eupator, pls, stop edit war, GM brought a well-referenced source, even Armenian MFA web-site (!) confirms these facts.
*rv to last version by GM.Eupator STOP vandalism and personal attacks on me....
*rv to GM. Stop edit warrying and deleting referenced material. ADMINS: pls consider locking the entry.
*rv to last version by GM. The issues are not addressed as long as there are fundamental disagreements. Therefore, tag should remain

* Oppose The article is not up to the FA standards, and has not been much improved since the last nomination. The references for the most part are not academic, and there are problems with neutrality. Grandmaster 11:41, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
* Oppose The content is biased and tendentious. Furthermore, the quotes have been deliberately chosen in a manner, which serve to manipulate the reader's opinion rather than provide insights. --Tabib 13:54, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Tabib logs in who hasn't been contributing lately ] 13:27, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

If this is not a Meat puppet I do not know what it is. ] 12:11, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
----
'''Atabek'''<br>
These users bring up useless accusations again they accuse me of sock puppetry which I did once and than a admin closed it so I don't know what there whining about, Second Atabek has had Two sock puppets blocked with no blocking, Tengri and Batabak.

These users are teaming up.

Regarding March Days, the article is well written non-Pov atabek comes with Tengri and his other socks and starts adding very POV material from Russian sources in which Grandmaster, Atabek, Adil all speak in.

Dacy here, is reverting with tengri and grandmaster and anyomouse ips and other unusual people, ] 12:16, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

* The comment: "adding POV material from Russian sources from in which GM, Atabek, Adil all speak in". Interestingly, this comment of Artaxiad is also repeated by ] in this revert ], saying: "Russian-language sources are not verifiable either, this is the English wikipedia, please use English-language sources". So, while the latter claims that he is not involved in the dispute, he still repeats the exact wording of the former. ] 09:28, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

* ] (ends with "t" not "k") was never proven as my sockpuppet. So this form of attack against myself does not have a basis. ] and ], coordinating together in accusations and attacks, still do not understand that ] and ], whom they groundlessly accuse of being my puppets, actually reside in a different hemisphere from me. Also, it's interesting that ]/Artaxiad agreed with ]'s edit and even made edits together with him at ], yet when Tengri was claimed as my sockpuppet simply because we were new to Misplaced Pages and used the same computer, Nareklm/Artaxiad suddenly became against the text of contribution :). This shows that Nareklm/Artaxiad tends to concentrate on personalities rather than on content of contributions. A number of times ]/Artaxiad attempted to remove Russian references, yet most of the historical references dealing with the region and conflicts are in Russian. And the fact that ] does not know the language is not really a justification in the argument against the reference or branding as POV. As far as we know, Russian side is neutral in this conflict and references thereof are quite valuable and not found in English-language books, simply because it's a remote region.] 06:10, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
:I never agreed with his edits, someone else reverted it be specific, it was obvious you guys were socks. Also Russians sources are not reliable read the requirements, you need to make it clear for us. ] 09:34, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

* I am not sure what is meant by "making clear", when the precise text, title and page number of reference is provided. Just because some user claims not to know Russian, is not a reason for invalidating the reference. Regarding ], I highly recommend arbitrators to visit ], to see where discussion was even mediated with participation of ]] to a successful version between ] and ] (Artaxiad). So ]'s action of removing the whole mediated content was counter to that mediation effort, ] acceptance of ]'s action was also a violation of mediation effort, further lack of response from both users to explain the reason for removal of 25 references, also shows a clear path of violations and ethno-centric edit warring behaviour on this page. ] 09:53, 25 February 2007 (UTC)


----
'''Adil, grandmaster and the rest of his crew'''<br>

All these users here are in this articles reverting together.
*]
*]
*]
*]
*]
*] (Adil and Dacy reverting the same things)
*] (Dacy and Atabek keep on wanting to add he was a terrorist)
*] (Atabek and Adil here)
*] (Adil and Grandmaster here)

Again all these users, Grandmaster, Adil and Dacy are also on Russian Misplaced Pages which they have been spreading Edit wars like wild fire. ] 12:24, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

----
'''Voting'''<br>
*Keep. Interesting article with valuable information, verified sources and references. --Batabat 08:27, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
*Keep - And following the logic of deletion supporters: Why then have Nagorno-Karabakh and Artsakh pages?-- Atabek 07:53, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
*Also Adil and Grand master are here.
On ] and Batabak a confirmed sock. ] 12:32, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

==== Statement by uninvolved user:Irpen ====
I have no relation to this series of editing conflicts and saw this accidentally by scanning though an AtrbCom page which I normally avoid. I think accepting this case is a road to nowhere not because there is no Arbitrable behavior but because this is all too complex and there are so many parties involved that it is impossible to sort this out through an ArbCom decision. The whole case is basically a statement that says "Oh, this is a huge mess which does not seem to be solving itself! Let's throw this into an ArbCom grinding mill and see how it goes". Trouble is that this is the wrong kind of approach and the case will keep arbcom bogged down for months, turn the workshop and evidence pages into a mess where the content debates from articles' talk pages will move and no possible working remedies may be given except "hang them all", which I doubt would help the project since most involved editors contribute in good faith.

Yes, some POV conflicts are hard to solve and the only way is to wait, invite more participants and if this does not help, repeat the cycle. Some POV conflicts are irreconcilable and it is not the business of ArbCom to reconcile them. With time and gradually increased inflow of users even ], ] and ] were all ridden of POV tags. Same here, we just have to wait and let the process rather than ArbCom work its way. If there are clearly disruptive users, this would be ArbCom's purview, but none of the statements above makes it clear that this is really the case. Some very complex content disputes become huge due to, what I would call, irreconcilable worldviews. They still remain content disputes. Mediation, third, fith, twentieth opinion and lots of talking is the way to go combined with elimination of truly disruptive editors if there are any. This case presented thus far does not demonstrate the latter and most truly disruptive users can be eliminated by the community blocks these days anyway.

To summarize, if no one knows what to do, let the time and normal development sort it out rather than ArbCom. --] 07:48, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

==== Statement by uninvolved ] ====
I am second to Irpen. There was a war there: tens of thousands displaced, thousands killed. I think every editor has a relative strongly affected by the war. The underlying ethnic conflict lasted centuries, there are historic narratives from the both sides. It is unrealistic to expect that there will be no editorial conflicts there. I do not think any arbcom decision would solve the problem. We can ban a couple of the most trouble-making editors from each side, but I am not sure there are clear candidates. On the other hand banning all prominent editors from a side would
make the articles hopelessly biased and banning both sides would completely arrest the development.

I do not see any other solutions other then to bite the bullet and let the painfully slow process of negotiations begin. The editors will edit and look for sources, admins will enforce 3RR, CIV, NOR, NPOV and all our famous policies, neutral people will try to mediate and propose compromise solution. Everything of this sort is on the article-by-articles basis. It is painfully slow but it usually works, repressions do not. ] 10:24, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by Fedayee====
I would like to second the statement that ], ] and ] have been meatpuppeting. I would like to mention that there had been relative peace before the new year but since the return/membership of some users, the tensions have escalated, notably during the recent FAC of the article ] (which has been listed as FA now). ], ] and ]'s negative editing has disrupted numerous Armenian related articles, from the 3000 year old ] to the ] article which I have been working on with relative peace for a few months now. I have also asked for a peer review and 3rd person NPOV advice which has been responded to, but before I could work on it some more, the entire article became locked because of one sentence on Nagorno-Karabakh (which can now be taken care of) and constant attempts by ] and ] to add various statements about terrorism, not to mention ] who at one point participated in the revert war and tried to ignite a huge flame between Armenians and Azeris by saying the following during a revert: (actually Karabakh is an irrelevant topic on ARF page, it's a disputed territory, and there are several pages devoted to it.) I see this statement as an attempt to completely enrage both sides and show to what extent this user will go to disrupt. ] also once tried to link ] to ] which is a ridiculous attempt to vilify the Armenians . It is hard to work and keep your cool knowing that ] and ] went through a war just a few years ago. It is frustrating when comments by ] that generalize all Armenians as ] hating people are used as a possible attempt to ignite tensions between ] and ], which is already emotional due to the ]. . - ] 00:19, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by Aivazovsky====
I haven't read all the statements listed here, but there are a few things that I wish to write about regarding the Armenian-Azeri dispute on Misplaced Pages. First, I am frustrated with the lack of attention that our problems get with Misplaced Pages administrators. Only a few admins have shown a willingness to become involved and help us. I don't believe that blocking most of the Armenian and Azeri users involved in this really helped anything. Second, although I can discuss issues with Azeri users such as ] and come to eventual compromises, I find it difficult to deal with ], ] and especially ]. All of these users do not wish to compromise unless all of their contributions are accepted, whether POV or not. They attempt to achieve this by tactics such as intimidation and pressuring other users to accept their points of view.

Like others have pointed out earlier, there was relative peace until the arrival (or rearrival) of these users. It seems that most conveniently began contributing after the Hrant Dink ordeal had settled. Seeing that, for once, Armenian and Turkish editors were beginning to have reasonably good relations, they decided to cause problems for us. They began making disruptive edits and revisions to several Armenian articles and attacked articles such as ] where a delicate Armenian-Azeri compromise was in place. Since their arrival, tensions have escalated to the greatest height since the failure of the Rambouillet talks on Karabakh. Aside from causing these disruptions though, it became apparent that part of their goal was to re-ignite Turkish-Armenian tensions. This was could be seen when they generalized us as expansionist (claiming that Armenia had claims to Turkey and Georgia) and as Turkic-hating people.

My frustration with these three users and the lack of action by administrators against them nearly led me to leave Misplaced Pages earlier this week. -- ] 00:54, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by Mardavich====

] has added me to list of parties, but I don't believe I am involved enough in the Armenia-Azerbaijan dispute to be a party to this ArbCom. I am an Azerbaijani myself, but I only made a handful of edits to a couple of Armenia-Azerbaijan-related pages against my own ethnic POV. Contrary to the claims of ] in his statement, I did contribute to the talk pages of the couple of Armenia-Azerbaijan-related pages I edited , and my edits were fully explained and compatible with Misplaced Pages policies such as ] and ] . --] 03:15, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by ROOB323====
Just for the record, first of all I want to say to ] that I was never warned by any admin in my talk page. Now getting to the main point, this edit war started a few weeks ago, but before it was peaceful and there were some understanding between different users on Armenian-Azerbaijani articles. This peace lasted until this two users came along ] and ] who kept adding their nationalist theories on many articles realting to Armenia and Azerbaijan. It is very difficult to deal with this two users ] and ] since they don't accpet anything that does not match with their views. Although there were some conflicts with ], but eventually we were able to come a compromise because unlike ] and ], it was easy to get involved in a discussions with Grandmaster. Those two users sometimes tried to force their views with telling lies that their version is "discussed version with compromise wording reverting it is not the option" , but if you look at the discussion page, there was still no compormoise. They try to achive their goals by pressuring other users to accept their points of view. Also ] in this page violated the 3RR and accusing me of vandalising the page, just because his views did not match with the vies of mine and I was only reverting to an older version which was there before until a comprimise could be made. Unless this two users stop ignoring everything that an Armenian users add or say and only adding their nationalist theories, it will continue and reach nowehre. ] 09:41, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

'''Additional comment:'''
] thats not a warning, thats an advice just so you know. I am really starting to get tierd of your false claims on me. You need to stop because if it continues this way. When you keep presenting false information than its going to get more complicated. You also accused me of coordination with banned user by saying "coordination of your rv activty with banned user" but you don't even have a prove of that.

Another point I want to make is that ] doesn't even read what he is reverting as long as he sees that an Armenian user has added information he blindly removes it without even examining and reading the content just like in this article ] I did some re-arrangements and spell checks and improved the article, but it was reverted back by ] without even reading. If you look at the differences you would notice that. Like you said Grandmaseter that it is very annoying when you put a lot of effort to it and contribute and someone comes and reverts it back to their own views, is not a good thing and you do the same kind of things. ] 04:42, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

====Statement by Azerbaijani====

Grandmaster claims that I have been involved in the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict here on Misplaced Pages, however, my contributions show that I have stayed out of this whole dispute and have only edited Iran related articles. Grandmaster only brings up two articles as proof that I was involved in the conflict, yet both of those articles are Iran related as well and I had only made one edit on each. I do not know what this is all about, I did not want to get involved, and I made sure to stay out of it. I do not belong on this arbcom as I have not been involved in the dispute between the Armenians and Azerbaijani's. I have made sure to be involved in Iran related articles only, and not get myself into this whole dispute between the Armenians and Azerbaijani's. I do not belong on this arbcom. Thanks.] 16:22, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

====Outside statement by Golbez====
As some others here have stated, I've done my own bit of mediating the conflict, though on only a small handful of ]-related articled (and once on ], which was not a grand success). I think that the existence of many of the statements above speak greatly for the need for arbitration, you can see all of the arguing going on. This is not simply an Armenian-Azerbaijan thing, there is a gross abuse of Misplaced Pages rules and privileges going on here. However, I am not really able to say *who*, apart from Adil whom I had some strong fights with. I usually just see the POV pushing and remove it; I try not to pay attention as to *whom* was doing the pushing, or necessarily what was being pushed. After working on the article for lo these many months, I can sniff POV pushing pretty much the moment an edit is made. I'm not entirely sure ''what'' is going to be arbitrated, but it does seem like arbitration is necessary. Perhaps the case should be shaved down to one or two individuals, otherwise the evidence page will be overwhelming. Then again, maybe this form of "class action" is just what is needed.

I do not envy the arbitrators on this one. Good luck. --] 16:56, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

==== Statement by uninvolved editor ] ====
Articles involoving national disputes (both current, and lingering) generate a disproportionate share of heated editing on Misplaced Pages. Editors who are attached to one side of the real-life dispute often edit those same articles. Members of an ethnic group, nationality, or even a -- WikiProject -- edit based on similar interests and outlooks in understandably similar ways - there are no meat puppets here. There is little genuine collaboration across lines; rather each side marshalls sources, challenges the other side's sources, attempts to trick the other side into violating one or another Wiki policy... ] is replaced nearly universally by "Don't publically display an assumption of bad faith." All the same, the talk pages and edit summaries show nothing but (thinly veiled) assumptions of bad faith. The articles represent far less NPOV than a compromise between warring parties. Instead of reliable sources we often have sources(?), but lots of them. The most successful groups have larger numbers of editors, have more editors who engage outside their individual Projects, have more editors with native English skills, and are cleverer about finding obscure sources, cleverer about staying "within the lines" of Wiki policies.

The articles produced, they do not lean all one way or all the other. With opposing groups pushing back against each other, they end up somewhere in the middle, though never perfectly so. And the process that gets them there is more rough and tumble than in most of Misplaced Pages. This is ]. This is ].

ArbCom, by all rights should get involved in each of these as they flare out of control. But at the core of each dispute, even when behavior crosses lines that might not be tolerated elsewhere, are deeply committed and deeply dug in editors. These are content disputes with bad behavior, but the core is content. What will ArbCom do, other than admonish the editors to be nice? The Occupation of Latvia Arbitration is almost done. Will it have accomplished something worthwhile? And should you one day come down hard on one side (in this, that, or another nationalist dispute), the other side, unchecked, will proceed to write awful POV articles.

If one or two editors are out of control, then ArbCom should step in. But in these cases, in brawls? The question should not be whether the case meets your standards to accept. It should be: "Will ArbCom taking this case benefit the community?" But in order to ask that question, in order to consider passing on this RfArb, you'd need to concede looser rules on national conflict articles, which you may be loathe to do. ArbCom may be stuck with this one. It shouldn't have to be. ] 04:21, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

==== Clerk notes ====
:One of the parties, above, requested input from a Clerk on what type of evidence should be presented. At this stage, statements should focus on whether it would be useful for ArbCom to hear and decide this case. It is helpful to include links or diffs to relevant pages or edits, as several parties have done. If the case is accepted, each editor will have the opportunity to make a more detailed evidence presentation. If any of the arbitrators has a question for the parties or a request for more information, this will be noted in their accept/reject comments just below this section. ] 22:51, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
{{Clerk-Note}} All threaded comments left in other editors' secitons have been removed. This is not a discussion. ] 03:20, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

==== Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (6/1/1/0) ====
* '''Recuse''' since I blocked some of the parties recently. ''']''' (]) 03:45, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
* Decline; I don't believe any possible outcome of arbitration would improve the project here. This is fundamentally a long-standing historical dispute between two national groups that happen to be represented here by particular editors, rather than a dispute between those editors per se; nothing we can do will resolve the underlying issue (as it's a function of real-world circumstances beyond our control), and simply divesting the articles of all their experienced editors won't actually help matters. ] 13:45, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
* '''Accept''' to examine behavior issues. This kind of disruption simply is not acceptable. ] ] 02:04, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
* Accept. Kirill is probably right; the underlying issue will not be solved with arbitration on Misplaced Pages. However, Misplaced Pages is being disrupted by this, and we can and should put an end to that. <span style="font-family: Verdana">] ]</span> 04:31, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
* Accept, this is what we do. ] 06:52, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
* Accept. Though Kirill is right that we can't solve the Azeri-Armenian tensions here, we also can't solve the India-Pakistan tensions, the Alternative Medicine-Quackbusters tensions, the Free Republic-Democratic Underground tensions... What we can do is stop people from acting out these tensions in ways that are disruptive to Misplaced Pages. --]<sup><small>]</small></sup> 16:11, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
* Accept; concur with Jpgordon here. ] <small>(])</small> 16:43, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
* Accept ] 02:12, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
----


=== Instantnood 4 === === Instantnood 4 ===

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A request for arbitration is the last step of dispute resolution for conduct disputes on Misplaced Pages. The Arbitration Committee considers requests to open new cases and review previous decisions. The entire process is governed by the arbitration policy. For information about requesting arbitration, and how cases are accepted and dealt with, please see guide to arbitration.

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GordonWatts

Initiated by GordonWatts at 02:25, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

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Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

I, GordonWatts 02:25, 25 February 2007 (UTC), hereby confirm that, upon a successful filing, I shall notified the users listed by mention on their talk page -except that, in the case of the un-named participants, I shall make a note on the related talk page, that is, here: Misplaced Pages:Community_noticeboard#Community_ban_request_on_User:GordonWatts

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried
  • A summary of other steps tried thus far can be found at .

Statement by User:GordonWatts

The situation was so emotional -and involved so many users -that is it unreasonable to assume any other method short of ArbCom will work: I certify that I have alleged several rules violations of policy of Misplaced Pages in this action by other users. You may see the Request for Ban action against me here -and it's talk page here -for documentation of my claims on this point.

Here are specific allegations of violations of policy:

From Misplaced Pages:Community_noticeboard, is this quote: "Weighing up the above, it is clear to me that the community mood is that Gordon Watts should not edit Terry Schiavo articles directly, should not link or suggest links to his own sites, and should restrict himself to making a very small number of brief comments to Talk pages, of the order of one per day. If Gordin is not able to abide by this restriction then a ban will be sought, either through community processes or through ArbCom. Guy (Help!) 13:48, 24 February 2007 (UTC)"

I did not get any sleep last night because of a combination of overnight auto trouble and the sudden death of my cousin, Kitty Barnett, which I learned this morning. so I am quite preoccupied with other things, but I see this sudden reply, and the template says that: "Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this page," so I shall comport and reply -much to the chagrin of some users, I am sure.

Reply:

  • "should not link ... to his own sites" Although I do admit that many years ago, I added a link to one of my newspapers, after having obtained consensus, and this may have been against current policy, that action many years ago is not being discussed or criticised -plus, I was a new editor back then. This admin here quite clearly shows that I did not add any links to my website: "The dispute seems to have started with this uncivil edit summary from Calton. The material Calton was removing was in the article when I joined Misplaced Pages in April 2005 (before Gordon). The actual link (to a site that Calton objected to, but not Gordon's personal website) was added by Zenger, not by Gordon, although Gordon did revert the person who reverted Zenger.." So, I am innocent of linking to my own site.
  • "should not ... suggest links to his own sites" This requirement by the "mood" is against current Misplaced Pages policy. Observe: Misplaced Pages policy: WP:COI clearly says that "If you feel it necessary to make changes to Misplaced Pages articles despite a real or perceived conflict of interest, we strongly encourage you to submit content for community review on the article's talk page or file a Request for Comment to the wider community, and to let one or more trusted community members judge whether the material belongs in Misplaced Pages," not that I suggest links to my web papers very often. Also, Misplaced Pages:Spam#Canvassing point 6 states that "If your product is truly relevant to an article, others will agree -- try the talk page. We usually recommend that editors be bold in adding directly to articles. But if the above advice makes you concerned that others will regard your contribution as spam, you can find out without taking that risk: Describe your work on the article's talk page, asking other editors if it is relevant."
  • If the editors who suggested this restriction don't like me occasionally suggesting my own websites -for occasions when no other link will do (like when The Register was the only paper to cover one Terri Schiavo Oral Argument hearing in my hometown), then these editors should either change the policy -or leave Misplaced Pages. The rules are the rules.
  • "...should restrict himself to making a very small number of brief comments to Talk pages, of the order of one per day." This is the one possibly valid complaint made against me (I was not guilty of edit-warring or linking my own site, even though one revert did have that net effect). So, a review of the RfBan page for this action will reveal that the editors claimed I was too talkative -and companied about the content of my talk page comments. This editor sums up the community opinion of many (if not most) editors: They felt that I talked too much -and they didn't like what I posted, however to restrict my talk page comments based solely on the content is censorship. Yes, I admit that, on occasion, I sometimes post somewhat lengthy posts -but so did Martin, another user, on the related talk page, as this diff shows, but he is not criticised or restricted. Also, this diff shows my documentation that I did not dominate the talk page, posting far less than half of the comments of the ban page against me, even though no one should have objected had I posted even half: As the accused, I should have been allowed at least half, but I did not use it.
  • So, it appears that my talk page comments (in the Community noticeboard talk page primarily) were rejected because of content, but this is censorship: I never threatened to violate concensus or policy, so the mere fact I held a minority opinion regarding certain links (many of them not my own newspapers) leads me to believe I was censored because of my minority view -and hints others may have been jealous that I have accomplished so much in this case, more than them. I have a right to express my opinion on the talk pages, even if it is a minority opinion.
    • Calton has a very lengthy history of having caused trouble, but he is not guilty of the actions of the other editors; They acted on a matter and made premature conclusions without actually knowing the facts.

OK, did I violate policy -or, rather, did I merely annoy editors, who falsely claimed I had violated policy.--GordonWatts 02:25, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

REMEDY SOUGHT: Discipline the editors involved, not to harm them, but rather to prevent them from doing this to other editors who annoy them.--GordonWatts 03:21, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by SVRTVDude

I know the Community Ban discussion was heated and my personal opinion was started by an editor just out to silence someone who had a different opinion then his own. User:Calton made the problem worse by going "back and forth" with Gordon and using incivil language and a rude tone in his posts. This could have been prevented if everyone backed off, took a deep breath, returned and discussed things politely. But I digress....

Nothing I seen of Gordon's edits were disruptive...long, yes, but not disruptive, and I would have liked to have seen Gordon be allowed one post per day on Schiavo-related page and talk pages, but alas that did not happen.

User:Calton took a straw poll of users about the Geocities/AOL links. I think there was a 10-0 against the links. But it was not about the information in those links, just that they were run by him. I have had a similar problem with my media news site. I used it as a reference, but since I did the research, it was not allowed. To my knowledge, no GeoCities/AOL links are allowed. None of the information of his links is false, just a personal website can not be linked by the owner of that site.

I would like to see ArbCom reverse the WP:CN ruling and allow Gordon to post one post per day with a 500 word minimum (that should make everyone happy) on any Schiavo-related page or talk page. But, I would also like to see Gordon expand out from Schiavo-related pages and work on other sections of Misplaced Pages as I think he would do well outside of just Schiavo-related pages.

Just one editors opinion.....SVRTVDude 03:25, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

  • Minor point of clarification: the ruling as I interpreted it was exactly as SVRTVDude requests, namely that GordonWatts could make a few (around one) post per day to the talk pages. The disruption is caused primarily by the sheer volume of his posts, aggravated by the hopelessly skewed perspective offered by his posts and the links he promotes. SVRTVDude is also in an extended content dispute with Calton, so his comments on Calton's behaviour may be coloured by that. Calton was far from the only editor involved in telling GordonWatts to back down. Guy (Help!) 12:21, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by ObiterDicta (talk · contribs)

As a participant in the Community Noticeboard discussion mentioned by Gordon above, I suppose I am an involved party. ArbCom is the appropriate place for Gordon to appeal the restrictions placed on him as a result of that discussion and I believe that an appeal would be more-or-less implied by Gordon's call for "discipline" for JzG, Calton and the rest of us. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 03:59, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Mangojuice (talk • contribs)

As a participant in the thread Gordon referred to, I have this to offer. With a strong enough consensus, the users may be banned per WP:BAN, and the extent of agreement to the sort of editing restrictions the discussion ended up with certainly qualifies as strong consensus: there is a little dissent but not a lot. However, per WP:BAN such bans may be appealed to ArbCom, which I think is what this request is all about. A few general comments on the discussion:

  1. Although I think Jzg did a perfectly reasonable job summing up the results of the discussion, it may have been better for someone else to do it, as Jzg endorsed a particular outcome prior to "closing". (I was tempted to sum up similarly but did not, for this reason.)
  2. The call for endorsing of solutions seemed relatively rigid, and didn't seem to provide an easy framework for those who might have opposed taking action to speak. The softest options were probation or referring to ArbCom.
  3. The complaint against Gordon boils down to that certain elements of the community are just really sick of Gordon. "Exhausing the community's patience" fits very well.. but it seems to me that this may need to be linked better to an ongoing violation of some Misplaced Pages policies, because someone abiding by the letter and spirit of the rules should not be banned under the "community patience clause" alone. Gordon may be guilty of an old conflict-of-interest violation, and arguably he ignores WP:CON by continuing discussions after they have been clearly settled.
  4. The complaint about the other users commenting on the ban request is complete hogwash and should be ignored. For the most part, those users were not involved in the conflict and were offering outside opinions. However, those users who were involved in the original conflict have had their behavior questioned by Gordon, and that questioning has largely been ignored (so as to keep the conversation on-topic). However, a consideration of the environment in which Gordon's behavior occurred may be beneficial, and was somewhat missing in the ban discussion.
  5. Although this hasn't been to an RfC yet, the ban discussion was certainly as extensive as most RfCs (and perhaps should have been one in the first place). Nonetheless, it would be needlessly disruptive to have the whole discussion over again: I think ArbCom should either take up the case, or by not doing so, be willing to implicitly endorse the community decision. Mangojuice 05:16, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by User:JzG

User:GordonWatts is Gordon Watts, an individual who was active in campaigning over the Terri Schiavo case. His editing of articles related to Terri Schiavo is tendentious and disruptive, to say nothing of obsessive in pushing his highly individual point of view. He is also relentless in pressing for links to his websites, although even he agrees these are not reliable sources.

From the community discussion, here is his edit record:

Total edits: 4210: Avg edits per article: 12.38

  • Mainspace edits: 575 (13.7% of all edits)
  • Total Terri Schiavo related edits: 484 (84.2% of category)
  • Talk Page edits: 1266 (30.1% of all edits)
  • Total Terri Schiavo-related Talk page edits: 1145 (90.4% of category)
  • Misplaced Pages space: 562 (13.3% of all edits)
  • Total Terri Schiavo-FAC page edits: 282 (50.2% of category)
  • Total Adminship request edits: 107 (19.0% of category)
  • User talk page edits: 1412 (33.5% of all edits)
  • User page edits: 134 (3.2% of all edits)
  • Everything else (other articles, Category, Template, Image, etc): 472 (11.2% of all edits)

Minor point: I was not really an involved party, when I started the motion to close I was acting as an admin trying to wrestle the more assertive calls for a permanent ban down to something a bit more appropriate tot he problem in hand, and I closed it in response to a request at the admin noticeboard to stop the ongoing argumentation (any debate with GordonWatts involved appears to spiral out of control very rapidly).

It was the opinion of the community that his editing of Terri Schiavo articles was highly disruptive and should be curtailed or stopped entirely. Numerous editors have spent a lot of time trying to resolve this, but the problem is not resolved because the resolution requires GordonWatts to accept that the consensus is against him and stop agitating for his POV and links to his websites, and he is not willing to do that. No amount of patient explanation persuades him to drop it, getting his POV and especially his links into those articles is the dominant theme of his involvement with the project and a consistent source of friction and wasted time. GordonWatts is responsible for almost all debate on these articles in recent times, and in no case that I can see has he persuaded others of the merits of his case.

Sometimes when a large number of people say you are wrong, it is because you are wrong - GordonWatts is unwilling or unable to accept this simple truth. The fact that GordonWatts has couched this request in terms requesting that everybody else is disciplined shows this as clearly as anyone could want - yet another case where he is told "no", and chooses to escalate or forum-shop instead of accepting it. See also the top of Misplaced Pages:Featured article candidates/Terri Schiavo/archive3 - from Gordon in bold red, "The page is nominated based in its own merit, not that of troublemaker-editors. Please close the troublemakers down. We will not let them win on my watch.--GordonWatts 21:20, 29 September 2005 (UTC)" The ability to believe that the problem is everybody else, not him, is clearly a hallmark of Watts' involvement, and it has been going on for far too long.

Is the problem Gordon, or everybody who interacts with Gordon? You decide. Please either take this case, and implement a temporary injunction banning Watts form disrupting those articles and talk pages, or speedily endorse the community sanction, which has considerable involvement from a decent number of editors and admins in good standing. Guy (Help!) 12:19, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by User:Fredrick day

I first because aware of User:GordonWatts when he appeared on AN/I appealing for help over his links - it was clear from the outset that those links did not match WP:RS and his actions were not in line with WP:COI. Over the period of 12 days of interaction it has become clear to me that Gordon is either unable or unwilling to work within the wikipedia framework. People here have talked about the policy based reasons that he should be restricted/should not be restricted but being a good wikipedian requires more than following policy to the letter, it requires a level of self-awareness and an ability to work with others. Gordon has two problems - first it is clear that he however he spins it, he is still trying to get his links inserted, sure he spins it as a wider concern but the endgame is clear - how do I get my non-notable self-produced links included (Gordon may make reference to running a newspaper - it's actually just a couple of freehosted webpages)? The second problem ties into the spirit of wikipedia, Gordon clearly feels that by a combination of wikilawyering and repeating himself over and over he can talk people around to his side of events - his failed RFA provided a useful snapshot of how Gordon interacted with the community in the past and from my interactions with him, nothing has changed since that time period. Now why is this a problem? It's not that it is an explicit policy breach but rather that Gordon Watt acts as a blackhole sucking all of the associated talkpages into endless debates about his links and his POV. It's that which is disruptive - even after 12 days of interaction, I consider GW a menace (not because of malice) to wikipedia process on those pages - I supported limiting his posts to one a day and I still do. --Fredrick day 10:10, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

process concern: I have a process concern - Gordon is asking Arbcom to accept this arbitration with an unnamed number of editors being covered by "other editors" and states that hereby confirm that, upon a successful filing, I shall notified the users listed by mention on their talk page -except that, in the case of the un-named participants, I shall make a note on the related talk page, that is, here: Misplaced Pages:Community_noticeboard#Community_ban_request_on_User:GordonWatts surely a) those unnamed editors should be a) named and b) informed of this process before it continues. --Fredrick day 16:46, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out. --jpgordon 17:01, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by User:ChazBeckett

I concur with everything presented by JzG, and would like to add a few comments of my own. I've had limited interaction with Gordon, but I've seen first-hand how incredibly frustrating it is to have discussions with him. Gordon doesn't easily fit into any of the typical categories of problem editors. He's not a troll, yet his actions cause considerable disruption. He's not a trouble-maker, yet problems seem to follow him wherever he edits. He's not a spammer, yet he's consistently adding links to his own sites. Basically, Gordon can only be classified as someone who just doesn't get it. The ultimate problem, as JzG points out, is that Gordon strongly believes that it's everyone else that's wrong and the solution is to explain at absurdly great length what's actually correct. His discussion style is to use a huge amount of text for Wikilawyering, making accusations against other editors and repeating arguments ad nauseum. Even some of his edit summaries have these problems . In summary, I believe that editing restriction on Gordon Watts are absolutely necessary because he is either unwilling or unable to edit in a non-disruptive manner. I don't believe that this disruption is intentional, but the effect is still very damaging to the project. I urge the ArbCom to either endorse the remedies discussed by the community or to take the case and investigate Gordon's behavior more extensively. ChazBeckett 14:44, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Clerk notes

(This area is used for notes by non-recused clerks.)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/0/0/0)

Highway 401

Initiated by RingtailedFox • Talk • Stalk at 20:49, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Involved parties

All parties are aware.
Mediation by neutral third parties have been attempted. Parties are unable to reach a middle ground

Statement by Ringtailed Fox, on behalf of himself, Gridlock Joe, Snickerdo, Dl2000, and Bacl-presby

  • Ringtailed Fox, backed by Gridlock Joe, Snickerdo, and Bacl-presby have repeatedly asked Sonysnob how the text regarding the upgrades to Highway 401 is a copyright violation of Sonysnob's website, onthighways.com. When asked by Ringtaled Fox, Snickerdo, and Bacl-presby on how it is a violation, the user either refuses to answer, or states that it is from his website, therefore a violation, even after the article was re-worded as he asked, and sourced no less than three times throughout the large article. We revert, feeling there is no violation present, and we have followed the Misplaced Pages copyright system. Ringtailed Fox and Snickerdo have also tried to contact Sonysnob, but the user tends to avoid most of hte time, choosing when and if to respond. Most of the communication is on RingtailedFox's talk page.
  • Sonysnob claims that the section regarding the upgrade of the Oxford county upgrades to Highway 401 is a direct violation of his website, onthighways.com. Sonysnob acts by reverting the article continually, or by deleting the allegedly violating information.

Statement by Dl2000

  • Dl2000 was only involved to the extent of applying 3RR messages to both Ringtailed Fox and Sonysnob to discourage revert warring on the page and to encourage dispute resolution by other means. Dl2000 was not involved in reverting the page, nor initially taking sides in this. Dl2000 15:44, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Kirill Lokshin

I am currently attempting to impress the fact that copying text from someone's website is, in fact, a copyright violation on the filing parties; unfortunately, it seems that the learning process may require blocks, as some people just don't seem to get it. Kirill Lokshin 04:40, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Clerk notes

  • One comment moved to correct section. Please include your complete statement in your own section, even if you are summarizing what you understand to be another party's position. Newyorkbrad 22:07, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/4/1/0)

ElKevbo

Initiated by John254 at 03:28, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Involved parties

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

They haven't. However, much of the controversy regarding this situation concerns the nature and proper interpretation of checkuser results, the underlying data for which cannot be publicly released to facilitate community-based dispute resolution. The Arbitration Committee, which has the privilege of viewing the exact IP addresses from which ElKevbo has been editing, is best suited to resolving this issue, as explained below.

Statement by John254

On February 20, 2007, there was an edit war on Deleting Online Predators Act of 2006 between LegitimateAndEvenCompelling, various IP addresses, and ElKevbo. Since ElKevbo joined the edit war to revert to the article version favored by the IP addresses, then filed a report on WP:AN3 regarding LegitimateAndEvenCompelling's reversions (most of which were reversions of edits from various IP addresses), I suspected that ElKevbo may have been using the IP addresses as abusive sockpuppets to violate the three-revert rule. Thus, I filed Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/ElKevbo regarding this situation, which yielded a result of "inconclusive". As checkuser results reflect only the degree to which a user's IP addresses are related to the other IP addresses, rather than the totality of evidence as to whether a user has been engaging in abusive sockpuppetry, I filed a report on WP:AN3, which set forth in detail the evidence that ElKevbo had used an IP address as an abusive sockpuppet to violate the three-revert rule, on the basis of the fact that his IP addresses were sufficiently related to the IP in question to warrant an "inconclusive" rather than an "unrelated" checkuser finding, the chronology of the edits by ElKevbo and the IP, and the fact that both ElKevbo and the IP were reverting to identical versions of the article. As a result of this report, Crum375 blocked ElKevbo for one week, then subsequently unblocked ElKevbo after he asserted his innocence. . Of particular interest is the fact that ElKevbo stated that "At least one of the IP addresses that was alleged to my sockpuppet appears to be in or around Chicago whereas I live in (rural) Tennessee" . After ElKevbo's account was unblocked, he requested the unblocking of 24.183.217.111 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), an IP address located in Tullahoma, Tennessee, allegedly to remove an autoblock. By contrast, the IP addresses at issue in Misplaced Pages:Requests for checkuser/Case/ElKevbo, 68.22.204.171 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), 68.22.193.99 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), and 66.158.92.4 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), are all located in Chicago, Illinois ( ). The distance between these two locations would seem to be consistent with "unrelated" checkuser results, not "inconclusive" as was the case in Misplaced Pages:Requests for checkuser/Case/ElKevbo. As the Arbitration Committee can view the actual checkuser data in this case, it is in the best position to consider the totality of evidence, and to determine whether ElKevbo has engaged in abusive sockpuppetry to violate the three-revert rule on Deleting Online Predators Act of 2006. John254 03:28, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by ElKevbo

If the ArbCom would like to look into this, they're more then welcome to do so. However, if the only evidence to be considered is IP address information then I'm afraid such an investigation would be inconclusive. I'm sure that we all know that IP addresses can be spoofed, proxies employed, etc. Further, I assert that the editing pattern of the anonymous editors is entirely inconsistent with own editing pattern. As an editor with several thousand edits, there is a large body of such evidence.

If the ArbCom does not take this case, would it be appropriate for you to instruct John to please drop this case and leave me alone? I was mistakenly blocked on very flimsy evidence and the block was subsequently lifted by the administrator involved after several e-mails were exchanged. I'm not sure what more can be done but this entire incident has proved very frustrating and puzzling. I expect to be treated better as an upstanding editor with a clean record of contributions. I also expect to take abuse from the vandals whose edits I continually revert; I do not expect to take such abuse from other upstanding editors. --ElKevbo 03:56, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Response to Essjay's comment at 06:07, 23 February 2007 (UTC): Ah, ok. If this had been stated to me earlier perhaps I could have cleared up part of this confusion. I did spend a few days traveling last week to two different campuses in two different states. Therefore you probably do see edits from IPs in Indiana, Michigan, and Tennessee (with the vast majority in Tennessee). Note that none of those are in Illinois which to where the anonymous editor(s)' IP addresses map. I believe the timing is also different. If you'd like further information about when and why I was out state, I'd be happy to supply that information, too, if that will allow us to drop this and move on. --ElKevbo 06:25, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
Response to Essjay's comment at 06:55, 23 February 2007 (UTC): That would have been easier if I had been told about the RFCU. But I was never told; I only found out after being blocked. I'm sure you can appreciate the problem with this sequence of events. --ElKevbo 07:19, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Essjay

On the issue of the inconclusive result in the checkuser case: The IPs listed all resolve to Chicago. The user in question is editing from two universities in two different states, and from IPs that resolve to two additional states. Under those circumstances, I did not feel comfortable calling the result unrelated. I will be happy to provide full results on the mailing list if necessary. As an aside, I was asked about this by the blocking admin via email, and made the same explanation. Essjay (Talk) 06:07, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Responding to ElKevbo: Our job is not to interrogate users about thier editing patters, and indeed, there is no way to do so while continuing to protect your privacy (I could come out and say "Why were you in Timbuktu on this date? Why are you editing from the University of Katmandu?" but then the stalkers know where you are, don't they?). Our job is to look at the technical evidence and give a report about it. Because you obviously had access to a number of different IPs in a number of different locations, I couldn't rule out that you had access to IPs in Chicago too. On the other hand, you were free to ask on the checkuser case why the result was inconclusive, and you would have been told. Essjay (Talk) 06:55, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved editor User:GordonWatts

  • I am a long-time editor, with over 4,300 edits: (ironically, using that Essjay's tool link below his comment, as other edit counters have been non-functional lately!). I see this dispute whilst a looking at mine immediately above...
  • My only purpose in commenting is to suggest that Misplaced Pages prevent unregistered users from editing any articles. (AOL and many forums require registration.) The logic behind my objective suggestion is that registration would more-or-less prevent half the problems associated with this: "...the issue of the inconclusive result in the checkuser case: The IPs listed all resolve to Chicago," i.e., trying to identify "anonymous" editors, who use only IP addresses to edit: Users could not imitate one another. As an extrapolation, I would, if I were Jimbo, require editors to post a photo, real name, and contact data, just like editors at the New York Times, and then I would solicit ads to pay these editors. Salary paycheck would help convince editors to devote more time to the project, thus it would increase quality and efficiency. This opinion is a "general" opinion and could apply to the project as a whole, thus I shouldn't need to repeat this anytime soon.--GordonWatts 04:39, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Clerk notes

(This area is used for notes by non-recused clerks.)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/5/1/0)


Instantnood 4

Initiated by SchmuckyTheCat at 20:34, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Involved parties

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

This will be Instantnoods 3rd ArbCom case. Other dispute resolution has already failed.

Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Instantnood 3, closed March 2006
Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Instantnood 2, closed December 2005

Statement by SchmuckyTheCat

Instantnood has been through ArbCom sanctions two times already. The last put him on permanent probation and said he should be banned if he can't stop revert warring. He has not stopped, whatsoever. He's been article banned repeatedly - that works. He's been put on time based blocks of up to two weeks multiple times and when he returns he just has a larger list of things he needs to revert. The last remedy from the last ArbCom case was an absolute user ban forever. I don't particularly want that outcome.

The nature of the reverts is exactly the same as always. It doesn't really matter whether consensus exists in any of his reverts - he reverts to what he prefers no matter whether talk page discussions agree with him or not. Some reverts are silly (dozens of reverts over the spelling of Macao, insisting it be spelled with an o, rather than a u) and some are absolutely unacceptable POV warring (removing Macau and Hong Kong from the Category of People's Republic of China). Some of the participants in the edit wars are the same, some are new. What's clear is the problem is centered around Instantnood.

In other words, same content and edit wars as before, same violations of polices as before. The existing remedies have not convinced him to change his behavior and the enforcement is lacking in effectiveness to curb it.

Proposed remedy

The remedies from the last case have been ineffective. The only effective remedy has been article bans; so I propose an extension of that. Instantnood should be placed on 0RR. He should never be able to revert an article to a previous version. He should be able to create new content and participate in discussions regarding content and the direction of policies. 1RR would be ineffective as he simply moves the revert war, making the same edit to different articles.

Evidence

Just a cursory examination of his contributions over the last 24 hours (19 February 2007) shows more than 100 reverts out of 200 edits. It's absolutely robotic, nearly mechanical and absolutely overwhelming. He's also making new POV re-organizations of exactly the same sort he was prohibited from doing in the last case.

Procedure

Does this really need a total case opening? It's the exact same case that's been argued twice before, there's no defense to it. I'm simply asking for a new remedy.

Response to statements below.
When Instantnood makes reverts like these he affects close to 1000 articles at a time.
Kirill Lokshin "Instantnood is already under two different probations (as well as some other restrictions); I don't see anything that a further case could reasonably add." Instantnood has been banned uncountable number of times on his existing probations. The remedy does not work. The last remedy from the last case to consider is a permanent ban from Misplaced Pages, which I don't want and neither does any commenter below. This is an attempt to save the editor when it is probably the only other course is permanent removal. What this further case would add is a workable, enforcible remedy.
All of the others below, even those who agree with him in some part, can point out that Instantnood is always on a revert spree against consensus. We need a solution that puts a stop to that but preserves his ability to edit and discuss, or as HongQiGong said, forces him to discuss.

Statement by user Penwhale

My previous involvement is at Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Instantnood_2. My stance has not changed much, although this worries me. Most of IN's edits on that page seems to be WP:POINT. And that's not talking about the PRC/ROC edits (which, to be honest, I haven't been looking at lately). My gut is telling me that this time it's not just China/Taiwan related anymore. More than that, I cannot say at this time. - Penwhale | Blast the Penwhale 04:33, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Regarding Deryck C.'s comment below, I agree that most of the mainland china/PRC/etc... is content dispute. The diff I provided above is a whole different case. The mass-revert of Macau to Macao should have been discussed. - Penwhale | Blast the Penwhale 10:05, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved user Deryck C.

I've been working closely with Instantnood in Hong Kong-related articles since mid-2005 till 2006 when Instantnood was first put on sanction. There were clear evidence that putting aside such revert wars, Instantnood's contribution to Misplaced Pages is certainly beneficial to the spreading of knowledge about Hong Kong.

From the revert wars and arbcom cases that happened so far, I noticed that no party involved in the dispute, especially Huaiwei, sought consensus. The involved parties would only like to kick the opposite opinion out of Misplaced Pages through arbcom sanctions. This violates Misplaced Pages's acceptance of variety.

An example illustrating my abovesaid situation is the article Hong Kong Central Library, in which I, Instantnood and Huaiwei all participated greatly. The main focus of the dispute was that Instantnood and I agreed the inclusion of Category:National libraries, while Huaiwei opposed. Instead of trying to seek a remedy or consensus, an edit war broke out which lasted until Instantnood's first sanction. Afterwards, it is self-explanatory that Huaiwei's version prevailed.

However, this is only part of the situation. During the period when the dispute was in process, I discovered that Huaiwei followed my edits to various articles closely and reverted or further edited many of them. Moreover, personal discussions with Huaiwei did not seem to yield much.

Moreover, even the remedy SchmuckyTheCat suggested was not useful. 0RR is not useful in most content disputes since the party under sanction can alter some wording and put forth the same idea. Categorization and other actions can be appended to another edit so that the rule was not violated.

It looks clear that some involved parties would like to make use of arbcom to terminate a content dispute through banning another user from performing reversion completely. Is this, a content dispute, something the arbcom supposed to decide upon? Seems not. --Deryck C. 06:06, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

  • Regarding Penwhale's comment on the diff, I reckon that Instantnood's probable misinterpretation of "guidelines" is worrying. However, I still doubt that another arbcom decision will be fruitful above the decisions made in prior cases. --Deryck C. 10:24, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
  • Regarding Huaiwei's reply, I am delighted to see Huaiwei's effort to seek personal discussion by posting a message on my talk page. I am sorry that I cannot provide direct reference to the situation I described above, but Flag of Hong Kong was likely a case. I cannot provide such references immediately because of my unavailability to access the computer for long time periods. Therefore it is quite impractical and non-beneficial if I check each single edit of mine and of Huaiwei's from early July to late December 2005. In the above statement, I was only describing the situation out of my memory. My apologies if (a double apology if somebody can prove) my memory is actually messed up after being stored in my brain for one and a half years. Anyway, I would like to thank Huaiwei for responding to my accusation directly and positively, making the situation clearer and more open to all parties. --Deryck C. 16:49, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
    Hereby I would like to seek some opinion: Huaiwei suggested that because Misplaced Pages:Verifiability should override Misplaced Pages:Consensus (according to the latter page, this is true as long as the consensus does not decide to reinterpret the rule of verifiability for this special case) he chose to ignore consensus when editing Hong Kong Central Library. However, since categories are just tools for reader navigation instead of article information itself, should the verifiability rule still apply strictly to categorization? Moreover, since the criterion befitting a "national library" itself is not comprehensively defined, I believe the verifiability rule, even if applies to categorization, can be twisted a bit when the consensus is to include the categorization. --Deryck C. 17:01, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Huaiwei

Before I give the full facts behind my stand, may I respond with regards to User:Deryck Chan's comment above.

If Deryck Chan's comments on my failure to act according to concensus is based on an example like Hong Kong Central Library, then I must point out that in such instances, it is almost always a case of Misplaced Pages:Consensus being pitted against Misplaced Pages:Verifiability. My primary contention is that the contributors to the said article has been unable to cite any reliable, non-self-published source, nor any official government document supporting views as advanced by the "majority", practically all of whom where Hong Kongers and thus with vested interests on the said topic. Not to say local knowledge or community concensus are unimportant, and nor am I comfortable with the idea of pitting one policy against another, but in all past disputes I have been invovled in, Misplaced Pages:Verifiability has always prevailed over Misplaced Pages:Consensus, unless I have interpreted this wrong all along. I hope someone can enlighten me if the later is true.

May I also refer to his suggestion that I was wikistalking his edits. I do hope he may provide some evidence for this allerged behavior.--Huaiwei 15:45, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by HongQiGong

I have personally been involved in revert-warring with Instantnood, and have had arguments with him. Despite that, I still believe his edits are all in good faith. And when he's not revert-warring, he does add valuable contribution to Hong Kong and Macau-related articles. Let's be honest, revert-warring takes at least two parties. But the difference with Instantnood is that his reverting always seems to be some solo personal crusade, with nearly nobody ever agreeing with him. This points to an unwillingness to work with other editors in a give-and-take situation to build consensus. I don't think the solution is a permanent ban. I would argue that he be prevented from editing article pages, but that he should retain full editing privileges on Talk pages. This will force him to gain consensus for the changes he wants to see on the articles. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 17:05, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Alai

I had, as I expressed at WP:ANI reservations about this going to the committee for a fourth iteration, as it hardly seems the speediest or most delicate way of getting resolution of these 'venerable' issues. However, as that thread has since died a death (perhaps due to this filing, or else general fatigue?), I begin to wonder if it doesn't beat no resolution at all. It's clear to me that enforcement of existing remedies haven't (yet) been successful: even today we're seeing edits with summaries like "Revert POV reorganisation by user:SchmuckyTheCat and user:Huaiwei. Status quo ante". That implies to me that either we accept constant reversion of every article, category and template on which there's no explicit case by case consensus on spelling (Macau vs. Macao) or scoping (PRC vs. Mainland China), where lack of explicit consensus is construed as a licence to revert back to some supposedly presumptively "uncontroversial" pre-edit-war version (in all likelihood simply a "who got there first" version); or more heavy-handed enforcement is employed, meaning in effect longer and longer blocks. (Or else AN/I does its occasional 'mini-arbcom' impersonation, and decides to impose a 'community-supported' sanction, or a "or else we'll block" provision.) I'm also sure there will be protests if anyone who has attempted to help resolve these issues in the past acts in such a manner, on the basis of their being "too involved". So I equally have reservations about seeing this 'declined through want of possible measures'.

Can I suggest that possible remedies would in fact be:

  • 0RR, as suggested in the filing (for anyone found to have acted against the spirit of existing injunctions, not necessarily just IN);
  • a ban from the category space (and category-populating templates), as they pertain to such issues;
  • a requirement that such edits be in line with those in closely-related articles, rather than allowing a style free-for-all;
  • or an explicit requirement to discuss such edits before they're carried out, or at the least before they're repeated.

Any of those would see to me to be preferable to the "all or nothing" options. An ideal resolution would be an explicit cross-wikipedia consensus on style, naming and scoping questions (or failing which, whatever agreement there is on such matters, made explicit), so that these battles don't have to be endlessly refought an article at a time. I hesitate to suggest enforcing any sort of 'binding mediation', since the track record in such areas doesn't seem to be good ("U.S. highways" springs to mind), but this seems as suitable a case as any, if only to draw up a 'ceasefire line', if an actual overall resolution can't be achieved.

To Deryck I would like to say: no, this isn't a content issue, this is a behaviour issue, where the behaviour is manifest in the context of a content dispute (as is very often the case). That other people may have behaved inappropriately is by no means a reason not to look at IN's behaviour (rather, it's a reason to look at theirs, too). It seems to me that a 0RR limitation (of any and all parties) would be extremely useful: it would cause the disruptive behaviour to cease. If by 'not useful', you mean 'cause "the wrong version" to prevail', I'd say that's a second-order issue, and one that other editors can take up -- hopefully in a more moderate fashion. (And I say that without reference to which version might prevail.) I'm also sure that editors already under probation would find it more 'useful' to them than a lengthy block. Further, speculating about the intent of those asking for committee to examine the issues doesn't seem helpful: even if the filer were indeed acting in bad faith, if an issue was correctly identified thereby which it was appropriate to address in this venue, I feel it would not be logical to rule it out on those grounds. (Never mind the whole 'windows into souls' area that gets into.) Alai 20:43, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

To which list of possible remedies I'd like to add: one could make Instantnood's practice of 'systematic "ante bellum" reversion' binding on all parties to the dispute. I.e. that no-one already under sanction -- or indeed more broadly, no-one at all -- should change these naming/scoping/style choices from that of the original contributor, until such time as there's a consensus to do so. Personally I don't think this is a very good solution, as it rather negates the quaint idea that we're attempting to build an encyclopaedia with common editorial standards, rather than providing a hosting service for a bunch of wiki-linked articles WP:OWNed by their original authors; but again, it would at least solve the behaviour problem(s), without getting into the area of the AC directly determining content. Alai 16:38, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Clerk notes

(This area is used for notes by non-recused clerks.)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/5/0/0)

Requests for clarification

Requests for clarification from the Committee on matters related to the Arbitration process. Place new requests at the top.

Clarification regarding a self-identified pedophile

A few days ago, Arbitration Committee member Raul654 had written in response to my querry regarding self-idenitifed pedophiles, (in part) that:

If someone is still editing as a self-identified pedophile, that would seem to me to be a violation of our ruling that people should not bring the project into disrepute.

User:Clayboy (Contributions) writes on his user page that "I self-identify as a "boylover"; a pedophile and an ephebophile." My question is: whether it is within my discretion as an administrator to block Clayboy's account indefinitely and direct him to create a new account in which he refrains from self-identifying himself as a pedophile (and by extension, linking himself to his prior account)? El_C 16:53, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Clarification on Parole violations

Refer to Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Winter Soldier

No time limit is given for the Parole violations. Am I correct to assume that this ends when the article ban ends as well? Torturous Devastating Cudgel 16:26, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Parole is generally indefinite unless otherwise stated. However, that decision is oddly worded compared to recent cases. I'd guess that since more than three months have passed, you should make a formal request to lift the revert parole. Thatcher131 22:25, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
It does not appear that any revert paroles were actually passed in this case. See Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Winter Soldier/Proposed decision#Revert parole. (The majority in this case was 6.) Recent precedent is that an enforcement provision that remains in the decision as an artifact of a remedy proposal that was not passed, but has no adopted remedy to enforce, is to be disregarded. Compare Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Konstable/Proposed decision#Implementation notes. Given the prior difficulties you encountered, you might be well-advised to abide by the proposed parole limitations voluntarily if you intend to resume editing the relevant article. However, if you wish, clarification can be requested from the arbitrators on this issue, or perhaps they will comment here. Newyorkbrad 03:27, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
The revert parole didn't pass, only the mooted enforcement for if it had passed. TDC is on parole from this case: Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Depleted_uranium#TDC_placed_on_revert_parole, and that expires May 6, 2007. Dmcdevit·t 03:33, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
I had actually wondered about that. There appears to be a discrepancy in the decision. In the “Proposed Remedies”, there appeared to be no consensus on a Revert Parole , then in the Proposed Enforcement section there is unanimous support for a “Parole violations” . The “Parole violations” also appears in the final decision. So now we have several questions.
1. Why is there a discrepancy between the proposed decision and proposed enforcement?
2. What does this discrepancy mean, if anything.
3. What is the expiration date, if any of the “RV Parole”?
Torturous Devastating Cudgel 16:25, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
From the Winter Soldier case, a revert parole was proposed but failed. See here. Therefore the enforcement proposal does not take effect, there being nothing to enforce. (It probably should have been left off the page.) There is no revert parole from the Winter Soldier case.
However, a general one-revert parole was approved in the Depleted Uranium case, see here. As stated, you are limited to one content revert per article per day, for a duration of one year from the date the case was closed (6 May 2006). Thatcher131 16:31, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
I am not trying to be obtuse here, but there is a discrepancy, and the final decision does lay out a provision for Rv Patrol, and has a unanimous passing vote. I was confused about this at the time as well. I am seeking clarification because the anonymous user has returned. Torturous Devastating Cudgel 16:34, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
Ah. Well, you can't enforce something that doesn't pass. There were 10 active arbitrators on the Winter Soldier case, so a majority is 6. The proposed 1RR parole on the anonymous editor had a vote of 5-2 here, so it didn't pass. Unfortunately, this mean that now that the one year ban is over, the anonymous editor can revert more than you can, because of your parole in the subsequent DU case. That certainly seems unfair, particularly if the anon editor is continuing to revert war. I can only suggest that you try one of the following; ask for semi-protection at WP:RFPP, try to get some admins to watch the page for you, use RFC to demonstrate that your version has consensus, or file a request to reopen the Winter Soldier case, showing that the anon editor is back and is continuing the same behavior. Good luck. Thatcher131 16:43, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
I concur with Thatcher's opinion above: the Winter Soldier revert parole did not pass (to my disappointment), so discussion of its enforcement is nugatory; once the Depleted Uranium revert parole expires, TDC's revert rate is capped only by the 3RR (which is an electric fence, not an entitlement). ➥the Epopt 16:53, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
The anon is back, but has an account now. I filed a checkuser, and it indicated that it was likely that the new user was also the anon. The edits are not taking place on the same article, but a related one. Torturous Devastating Cudgel 17:04, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
Well, there is always the usual dispute resolution process, at the end of which, if the editor is still disruptive, is arbitration. You could try filing an arbitration case now; acceptance would depend on whether the arbitrators agree that the editor's previous pass through arbitration and current behavior are enough to demonstrate the futility of running through the whole DR process from the beginning. Thatcher131 18:23, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Thatcher and The Epopt. However, one can approach the Arbcom, or even AN/I, if disruptive behaviors that were once under Arbcom sanction recur, and the process for getting those sanctions re-applied or even extended are often much less formal and quicker. Jayjg 16:12, 22 February 2007 (UTC)


Request for clarification on remedy of the Requests for arbitration/Kosovo

On 21 October 2006 the Kosovo arbcom found that I had been given 96 hours probation for edit warring on the Srebrenica massacre article and based on this (presumably) gave me one years probation and revert parole. I have a couple of questions regarding this remedy.

  • why did the Kosovo arbcom consider my misconduct on the Srebrenica massacre article? Nowehere is the Srebrenica massacre article names as a 'related article'. Nowhere is the reasoning for linking the two articles given.
  • it seems a rather harsh remedy to give me one years probation and revert parole for a 'crime' which I had already served time for (so to say).
  • is it possible to appeal the Kosovo arbcom's decision?

Sincere regards Osli73 10:17, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how this happened. I don't see any edits at all that you made to Kosovo. Fred Bauder 18:46, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
Please also refer to my note on Fred's talk page as well as the conversation on my talk page. El_C 02:15, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
Fred, what is the process I need to go through to appeal the decision of the arbcom? Regards Osli73 09:53, 14 February 2007 (UTC) Oh, I see it has already started.Osli73 09:55, 14 February 2007 (UTC)


I see that Dmcdevit is arguing not to revoke the decisions. My comments on his reasons for not doing so are:

  1. dmcdevit doesn't answer why I should be 'punished' a second time for a 'crime' which I had already been punished for. If so, could I be 'punished' for the original edit war yet another time?
  2. I don't it mentioned anywhere in the Kosovo arbcom case that edits on the Srebrenica massacre article should be considered. It might be worthy of interest that Asterion already asked Dmcdevit this question (here) to which Dmcdevit answered that "It's reasonably related enough for me". What is the 'jurisdiction' of the Kosovo arbcom? Why were not edits on other articles considered?
  3. It seems somewhat odd that a, in my opinion, wrongfully made decision should be upheld by events which took place after that decision was made. In my opinion, the original arbcom decision should be upheld or revoked based on what took place prior to the original decision. Any subsequent behaviour should be judged on its own merits. I see this process as revoking an incorrect judgment, not as an appeal for 'early release'.

Regards Osli73 10:09, 14 February 2007 (UTC)


Osli73 has repeatedly violated the terms of his parole. He created a sockpuppet KarlXII with which he created fake conversations between Osli73 and KarlXII in a willful attempt to deceive people. With the sockpuppet KarlXII, he continued the behavior that got him on parole in the first place. What purpose does it serve to lessen (?!) the penalties at a time when he should be facing more restrictions for this behavior?89.146.130.23 22:25, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
As I have explained before, this inappropriate behavior was due to personal threats (off wikipedia) and harassment (much of it by you, some recent examples ). The identity change was to avoid personal threats, not avoid the remedy (KarlXII existed before the ARBCOM decision). This does not excuse the sockpuppeteering, but it explains it. Regards Osli73 10:20, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


Motions in prior cases

(Only Arbitrators may make and vote on such motions. Other editors may comment on the talk page)

Osli73

On 21 October 2006 the Kosovo arbcom found that I had been given 96 hours probation for edit warring on the Srebrenica massacre article and based on this (presumably) gave me one year's probation and revert parole. I have a couple of questions regarding this remedy.

  • why did the Kosovo arbcom consider my misconduct on the Srebrenica massacre article? Nowehere is the Srebrenica massacre article names as a 'related article'. Nowhere is the reasoning for linking the two articles in the judgement given.
  • it seems a rather harsh remedy to give me one years probation and revert parole for a 'crime' which I had already served time for (so to say).
  • is it possible to appeal the Kosovo arbcom's decision?

Sincere regards Osli73 10:17, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how this happened. I don't see any edits at all that you made to Kosovo. Fred Bauder 18:49, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Moved that the two remedies applied to Osli73 be revoked. Fred Bauder 18:49, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 18:49, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. When we look at a case, we certainly may take into account a party's total behavior if it is relevant in coming to a conclusion. In some cases ignoring a wider problem because of concerns about scope is harmful; it's a judgment call. Since the case, Osli has been blocked for violation of his remedies, and using a sockpuppet to evade detection. And I note that Osli has repeatedly been edit warring at Srebrenica massacre for months now; in fact, 30 seconds perusing shows that he violated his revert parole yesterday: , . Lessening the restrictions at this point seems counterproductive. Dmcdevit·t 05:28, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
Abstain:

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