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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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Current requests

Ehud Lesar

Initiated by Grandmaster (talk) at 07:09, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Involved parties


Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/Ehud Lesar, Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Arbitration_enforcement/Archive11#User:Ehud_Lesar

Statement by Grandmaster

I realize that arbitrators are really tired of endless disputes at Armenia – Azerbaijan related area, and that recently a request for another Armenia – Azerbaijan case has been rejected. I was the one who opposed the new case, and I believe that it was a right decision. However this case should not be treated as another Armenia – Azerbaijan case, involving every user who contributes to that topic. This is a case about the block of a particular user and circumstances surrounding it. So it should be considered outside of general A-A framework and cover only the users involved in this particular situation.

This issue has started when User:Fedayee, User:Eupator and some others started a campaign of harassment of User:Ehud Lesar, accusing him of being a sock of User:AdilBaguirov, who was banned for 1 year by AA1. They were making accusations without any reliable evidence confirming that the 2 users were somehow related. Checkuser showed no relation between Ehud and Adil: However this did not stop the aforementioned users from making accusations and baiting Ehud. Just some examples:

Finally the sock allegations were discussed at WP:AE and rejected with the statement: No confirmation of sockpuppetry. At the same time Ehud was placed on 6 months rv parole like most of other users on the topic. Fedayee and his supporters were told to present their evidence for formal investigation to Misplaced Pages:Suspected sockpuppets. However, this never happened. I can assume that instead they sought other ways. On 9 January 2008 the admin User:Khoikhoi, who was absent from Misplaced Pages for a few months (since October 2007, to be precise), suddenly turned up and banned Ehud. I can only presume that this admin was approached off wiki and given certain information about Ehud. Otherwise it is hard to explain why a user who was absent from wikipedia for months would turn up with the single purpose of banning one user. I might be wrong, but this looks very strange. Ehud asked to be unblocked, and his request for unblock was granted by User:LaraLove. However Ehud was soon reblocked after the discussion at Lara’s page by User:Nishkid64, despite User:LaraLove refusing to support this block. Ehud contacted me soon after he was blocked and asked for help with this case, and I took the issue to WP:ANI. A lengthy discussion at WP:ANI gave no results. Ehud was willing to prove that he was a real person in real life and not a sock by various methods, including phone call, webcam chat, etc, but Nishkid64 and the group of users who supported him did not agree to any of his proposals. Nishkid64 asked for a scan of Ehud’s ID with all the info other than picture and name blacked out, but Ehud was reluctant to share any sensitive private info with admins who blocked him. He was willing to prove his identity by any means that would not violate his privacy, or share it with one of the top bureaucrats of wikipedia, who would guarantee his privacy. But even this sort of identification was not considered a sufficient prove by his accusers, who insisted that this user should remain blocked despite the lack of any prove that he was a sock. So we have a very strange situation when a user was blocked after allegations about him were rejected at WP:AE by an admin, who was away from wiki for many months, then unblocked and reblocked again. Clearly there was no consensus in the wiki community that this user was a sock, and there was no evidence to support the allegations of sockpuppetry, as cu returned negative results. While it’s never been proven that Ehud was a sock, Nishkid64 demands that Ehud needs to prove that he is not sock. I don’t understand what happened to presumption of innocence and “innocent until proven guilty” principle. The only basis for Ehud’s block was this collection of frivolous evidence complied by Fedayee, and which I addressed here. It was also addressed in much detail at WP:ANI thread, but did not result in any change of the attitude of the blocking admins. It is very strange that no attempt at any investigation has ever been made and there were no attempts at seeking consensus at WP:ANI or any other board before making such a block. So I would like to ask the arbitration committee to review all the circumstances surrounding this block, and take measures for verification of identity of Ehud, who is willing to cooperate. Also, it might be in the interest of the entire wiki community to establish some sort of a procedure for users who were blocked as result of sockpuppetry allegations to contest their block and prove their real life identity without violation of their privacy. I made inquires with many people, but it seems that no one is aware of any established procedure for such situations. Thank you very much.

In response to Thatcher. The problem is that all users representing either Azerbaijani or Armenian side are interested in the same topic and have the same POV, depending on what side of the story they represent. If users are to be banned for sharing the same views, then not many would remain. There should be some procedure for verification if the user is genuine or not. Otherwise innocent people will keep on getting banned just because they happen to share the same views or making edits that may remotely resemble those made by other users.

Additional comment

I agree with Atabek. The evidence presented by Fedayee, which resulted in Ehud’s block, is very frivolous. Atabek mentioned some points, but here’s more. Fedayee says in his evidence:

If we search on talkpages, we find that only Adil has ever called Sevan, Geycha.

But if one takes a look at Talk:Lake Sevan, he can see that the name of Geycha was used there since 2005, long before Adil joined Misplaced Pages. Moreover, if we check the history of the article about the lake, we’ll see that the one reverting to Adil’s version and sharing the same views with him about the historical names of the lake was none other than Khoikhoi, the blocking admin: Please see the edit summary in the diff. So it was not just Ehud sharing the same views with Adil on certain subjects. If people are blocked on the basis of such evidence, then we have serious problems here. I posted more counterevidence here: User:Grandmaster/Ehud

Response to Nishkid64

Nishkid64, you said that "it appears that Grandmaster and Atabek have now hinted that Ehud Lesar's real name is not "Ehud Lesar", as he had claimed many times before on-wiki and through e-mail". Please tell us where exactly did Ehud say that he contributed under his real name? That's what you have just been claiming in you previous post.

As for Geycha, I have already demonstrated that unlike what you say in your response to 5a, Adil was not "the first person on Misplaced Pages to make that point". See Talk:Lake Sevan. I understand that you only had good intentions, but I think the admins should not blindly trust any evidence presented to them, but do some investigation of their own.

Nishkid64, you said that "I asked Ehud Lesar to confirm that his real name was "Ehud Lesar". He never made any indication that Ehud Lesar was not in fact his real name". But he never told you that Ehud was his real name either, right? Then why did you say that Ehud claimed that he contributed under his real name "many times before on-wiki and through e-mail". Now it turns out that not only he did not claim so "many times", in fact, he did not claim so even once. I don't know if Ehud is his real name or not, but it might as well be a made up name. I'm not Grandmaster in real life too. People have a right to chose any names for themselves, as long as they don't violate wiki policies. But how does his wiki name prove that he is a sock, and what difference does it make?

It appears that you and Atabek were defending the name, "Ehud Lesar", but then later did a 180 and suggested that it wasn't his name.

That's not right. I was never defending the name, I was defending the user and was trying to bring to your attention that he was a real person in real life, regardless of whether he contributed under his real or made up name.

Statement by Nishkid64

I first saw Fedayee's evidence at WP:AE. He was convinced that Ehud Lesar was AdilBaguirov, an editor banned by ArbCom until August 2008. I evaluated the evidence, and sought the opinions of others. I also contacted Jayvdb (talk · contribs) on IRC and asked him for his thoughts. I don't remember what he said exactly, but I'm sure that he didn't give a clearcut opinion of the evidence. Based on the evidence, I was convinced that this user was a sockpuppet of Adil. I was a bit hesitant of the block, and I wanted to contact Khoikhoi (talk · contribs), an administrator who's quite knowledgeable of the Armenia-Azerbaijan debate, and seek his opinion about the evidence. I didn't get to contact Khoikhoi, but I saw that he echoed my thoughts and he blocked the user indefinitely. Per Dmcdevit's comments here, he had evaluated the evidence and decided to take administrative action. LaraLove (talk · contribs) unblocked the user on the basis that there was no evidence for sockpuppetry. I did not want to be accused of wheel warring, so I contacted her and asked her if she was okay with me reblocking the user. She didn't think there was any evidence for the block, and I should do what I believe is best. As a result, I reblocked Ehud. Subsequently, Grandmaster initiated an AN/I discussion. An agreement (I don't see how one could be reached in this situation; one side wants a block, the other wants an unblock) could not be reached.

A few points of clarification:

  • Francis Tyers (talk · contribs) first suggested that Ehud was a sockpuppet of AdilBaguirov. Khoikhoi, Alex Bakharev (talk · contribs), Daniel Case (talk · contribs) (who reviewed the unblock) and I have all found the evidence of sockpuppetry quite damning and indefblock-worthy.
  • The issue over identity confirmation was first brought up by Ehud Lesar in an e-mail he sent to me shortly after I re-blocked his account. Since I contested that he was indeed Adil Baguirov, a real-life Azeri energy lobbyist, I figured that an identity confirmation would prove his innocence.
  • Grandmaster and Ehud Lesar proposed some methods of confirming Ehud's identity. These methods could easily be faked, so I asked for other ideas. I was then asked what I thought would provide definitive confirmation. I suggested scanning his passport with the sensitive details blanked. It was only a suggestion, and I said Ehud was free to refuse to participate in such an action. On Google Talk, Ehud stated that he would not provide such identity, but after some convincing, I informed him (LaraLove had previously mentioned this) that he could contact Cary Bass or someone else through WP:OFFICE.
  • No admin "rejected" the allegations at WP:AE. Most of the discussion on hand took place before Fedayee created his user subpage filled with Ehud-AdilBaguirov evidence. Picaroon made a comment, stating he was a bit confused about the deal over Geycha (see the evidence for clarification). Jayvdb did not comment on the merits of the case, but it appears he did read it, as he asked for some point of clarification and said he would look into the matter on User talk:Fedayee/LesarBaguirov Evidence. Thatcher closed the AE discussion as "no confirmation of sockpuppetry", but he did place Ehud on revert parole. Judging from the timestamps of Thatcher's edits, I do not think he read the evidence, but I have no messaged Thatcher and asked him whether or not he actually got a chance to look over the material.
  • In the latter half of the discussion, it appears that Grandmaster and Atabek have now hinted that Ehud Lesar's real name is not "Ehud Lesar", as he had claimed many times before on-wiki and through e-mail.
Reply to Atabek from Nishkid64

1) Again, CheckUser does not confirm everything. There have been hundreds of cases on Misplaced Pages where sockpuppeteers easily mask their IP, thus producing unfounded CheckUser results.

2) WP:PRIVACY is a proposed policy. It just advises users that they shouldn't post such material on Misplaced Pages. I told Ehud Lesar that he could reject my suggestion.

3) I asked him if he could prove that he was indeed "Ehud Lesar". He never indicated that he wasn't this user. Even when I told him about the passport bit, he never said that he wasn't actually "Ehud Lesar".

4) I don't see how WP:PRIVACY is involved here.

5a) Adil was the first person on Misplaced Pages to make that point. Ehud Lesar made that exact same point, and given how it's not some universal view, it looks quite suspicious.

5b) Settle that matter elsewhere. This case is solely about the block of Ehud Lesar.

6) I did not really pay much attention to the Jewish username bit. The location bit came after the block, and was never used in my initial argument.

Reply to Grandmaster from Nishkid64

See what I wrote in my reply to Atabek. I asked Ehud Lesar to confirm that his real name was "Ehud Lesar". He never made any indication that Ehud Lesar was not in fact his real name. Also, judging from the AN/I discussion, it was pretty much implied that Ehud Lesar was the user's real name. Also, judging from Atabek's comments, it appeared that he was hinting that "Ehud Lesar" was not the actually identity of user:Ehud Lesar.

Please, this is not about my choice of words. Regardless of what I said, it appears many people who read the AN/I post were under the impression that Ehud Lesar was the user's real name. You and Atabek spent some time arguing Fedayee's first point about the Jewish username. You said that there are a number of Azerbaijani Jews. Atabek's later comments indicate that Ehud Lesar is not the actual name. It appears that you and Atabek were defending the name, "Ehud Lesar", but then later did a 180 and suggested that it wasn't his name. What changed?

Statement by Thatcher

The funny thing about sockpuppets and checkuser is that whenever checkuser shows that two accounts are related, people complain that IPs are shared and the checkusers don't know what they're doing and you have to look at the contributions. When the contributions show strong similarities of point of view, approach, and interest in obscure topics, people complain that checkuser shows no connection and therefore the accounts can't be the same. Any thinking person with a bit of experience at editing Misplaced Pages and on the internet can come up with two or three ways of appearing to be in two different places at the same time (with or without the help of a confederate), thus "proving" that he is two different people. So I'm dubious about the value of having Adil and Ehud contact the Foundation with their private IDs. Until Mediawiki enables the clairvoyance extension allowing admins to see who is typing at the other end of the pipe and to know with certainty that that person is not acting on instructions of another, or sharing the account when no one is looking, then we have to go on similarities of style, point of view, and topic interest. I was not convinced of the identity of Ehud when a complaint was posted to WP:AE, and Fedayee's evidence page was not linked to the complaint. But I have no problem if another admin with more experience of this user has made a determination.

Statement by Eupator

I'll keep this brief as I don't think an arbitration case is necessary regarding this matter. If the current compiled evidence was produced earlier, even a checkuser case would have been rejected based on the obviousness that Ehud Laser is not a legitimate user. I'm more worried about Grandmaster's conduct in regards to all of this and gross assumptions of bad faith in regards to virtually everyone. Same with User:Atabek and his persistence of insisting with Grandmaster that Ehud Laser is a legitimate user and accompanied with countless assumptions of bad faith and provocative instances of turning this matter into essentially a battleground. To go as far as to imply that two administrators with a long history of neutrality and absolutely no axe to grind were somehow not genuinely involved is mind boggling. I also don't understand why Grandmaster did not add Atabek as a party to this case as Atabek has been involved in it just as much as Grandmaster has. Everything I wanted to say about Ehud Laser I have here:Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/Ehud Lesar I find this to be a waste of time for everyone involved.

Statement by uninvolved User:Atabek

The accusation of User:Ehud Lesar being sock of User:AdilBaguirov has no basis, because:

1) It's not based on checkuser evidence;

2) Blocking administrator showed no interest in verifying the identity of the blocked user within the limitation of WP:PRIVACY. Nishkid64's request here for Ehud Lesar to produce a copy of his passport, especially given the lack of checkuser or any evidence produced by a non-conflicting party, is in violation of WP:PRIVACY.

3) Accusation by User:Nishkid64 that User:Ehud Lesar told him or posted somewhere about his real name being Ehud Lesar is not based on any evidence produced or presented so far.

4) Charges brought up by User:Fedayee and User:VartanM that User:Ehud Lesar is not really Jewish have no supporting evidence. Azerbaijani Jews are tightly integrated into Azerbaijani society, and many support the national point of view as shown by an independent source here . Moreover, accusing someone based on dislike of his account name being associated with a certain ethnicity is simply a violation of WP:PRIVACY and WP:HARASS.

5) User:Fedayee's evidence is frivolous:

6) Overall the argument that Ehud Lesar must be a sock of Adil, because he lives in Texas and has a Jewish username, is ridiculous and carries no basis whatsoever. There are a number of contributors, supporting the same POV as User:Artaxiad banned by ArbCom and caught with 34 checkuser-confirmed sock accounts so far, and residing in the same state of California . This does not establish a basis to accuse them all of sockpuppetry based on assumptions about POV.

Thanks. Atabek (talk) 18:08, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ehud Lesar

Clerk note: Because Ehud Lesar is currently blocked, I would be copying any statement made by him/her on the user talk page to this page, per my clerk note below.
In an email sent to me, Lesar said to link if the statement was too long. A cursory look shows that the formatting and length probably require the statement to be linked, hence that's what I've done.

Ehud Lesar's statement can be viewed here. Daniel (talk) 21:54, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Fedayee

The whole description of the situation by Grandmaster is full of half-truths. It is also time to decide whether or not AdilBaguirov should ever return to contribute and if it is not best to finally have an indefinite block on his account.

What information is missing here is that many users have already suspected Ehud Lesar months ago and this was also brought during the last arbitration case as arbitrators involved to the last case may remember. When Hetoum started making those accusations to Ehud Lesar, this was part of his reply: You're free to be either obsessed with or pretty much obviously impressed by him, but please stop dragging me into "being" someone I am not just NOT.

Francis Tyers was one of the members (and Admin when AdilBaguirov was not yet banned) who suspected Ehud and as soon as the beginning of July of last year. Then, no evidence was ever compiled which related both users yet practically everyone knew it was Adil. Everything points to him, starting from the day of his registration to his name. The pile of evidence provided against Ehud is not limited to my evidence page, others were provided elsewhere, including the evidence relating the name Lesar with Adil Baguirov. See here.

The problem lies with Grandmaster’s and Atabek’s attempts to defend AdilBaguirov’s sock and having him unbanned. Grandmaster during the last arbitration case has removed the tag of the sock of Adil from here claiming there was no evidence when there was and the evidence is compelling. See this section. Fourth paragraph about DrAlban, 19 June, DrAlban was a confirmed sock of Adil, after he is banned another sock appeared (the same exact day) Zhirtibay, which Grandmaster has claimed again that checkuser did not show the account to be Adil . The choice of names, the fact that they all appeared out of nowhere to support Atabek etc., just as Adil’s sock did.

It is very difficult to assume good faith with so much evidence of the contrary. Grandmaster is distorting my evidence and continues to do it here even after I have shown he is doing this. My quote on Geycha is selectively quoted to change its meaning and claims this is not accurate, while I have already answered to him that he distorted the meaning of my answer here by leaving out a very important piece in that quote. Grandmaster didn’t address that but has referred to how it is spelled in Azeri, (he now continues without correcting himself). I have obviously not replied to this because this is not entirely true, the ‘ç’ has no standardized pronunciation, while it could be spelled kch, tch, or simply ch, and the fact that in the modern Azeri Russianized version, there is a ‘y’ added even then, Grandmaster is not saying the truth. It is not spelled with an ‘e’ but with an ‘o.’ Khoikhoi agreeing with Adil’s version as reported by Grandmaster isn’t even true, as I have explained in the unaddressed reply here. The diff provided on Khoikhoi was a re-introduction of an edit made by Adil a day earlier. Both with an ‘o’, see how there he puts the ‘o’. Adil had it right, but then changed his version; Ehud will be maintaining that version to use it for the same reason used by Adil.

Atabek’s answer is also weird; he claims that it is not based on checkuser, when a checkuser wasn’t evidence according to him to prove Tengri was his sock. . Point 3 by Atabek is also ridiculous, Ehud Lesar was faking an identity, he added himself in the Jewish Wiki project, edited some Jewish related articles, and claimed to be of Jewish ancestor in his userpage. See Grandmaster’s remark here about him being Azerbaijani. Atabek claims that Jews are integrated in Azerbaijani society? And? It still does not address the issue that Ehud considers what happened in Algeria genocide when Turkish lobbyists are the ones who push the qualification the most as a counter-measure to the Armenian genocide. When searching for that term on Google, the second hit is from a journal to which Adil is a contributor. Also, it does not address the fact that Ehud considers what happened in Khojaly a genocide and denies the Armenian Genocide just like Adil. Grandmaster provides evidence which would tend to show that that position is not a fringe position. Check Vartan’s reply at 21:51 on that.

Point 5a) was addressed , , which was not answered by Atabek, he preferred changing the subject.

Point 5b), Atabek is harassing me with that, I have made that remark once, Atabek brought it back again and again. I have replied to him that I can not post this here. He knows what happens when such information is posted here. But for this information, I have submitted it to one admin who may feel free to provide it to whomever he thinks it is appropriate.

Point 6) does not make sense; the overall argument was never that… there are many other arguments which I didn’t even start to address adequately, like the fact that both Adil and Ehud support myths about the Armenian Diaspora which were put forward by Adil off-wiki for example during the lecture he gave on Misplaced Pages. Also, Atabek says nothing about the particularity of the name Lesar and why it is related with Adil. Atabek is also making a false analogy which was addressed on various occasions (Azeris living in Texas, Armenians living in California). Vartan already addressed this. There are half a million Armenians in California, at least half of the entire Armenian community in the US. In fact, there are more Armenians only in California than there are Azeris in the US. If an Armenian edits from the US, there is over ½ chance that that person is from California. This cannot be compared with the fact that Adil lives in Texas (with Washington) and that Ehud lives in Texas too.

Both Atabek and Grandmaster address the evidence individually, sure, when taken alone, each piece of evidence is not enough to show the link. But when taken as a whole then everything changes. - Fedayee (talk) 00:34, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

Given Ehud Lesar is currently blocked indefinitely, should he/she choose to make a statement at this stage, I (or another clerk) can copy it from his user talk page (which he can still edit) to here. Should this case be accepted, Ehud Lesar may be unblocked to take part, at the discretion of the Arbitration Committee or community consensus. Thanks, Daniel (talk) 07:32, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

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

  • Comment: awaiting completion of Nishkid64's statement, and a statement from Ehud Lazar, before voting. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:35, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Reject. Discretionary sanctions for the entire A-A area have now passed; I trust that the admins watching this area will be able to deal with this particular situation via that method, without the need for further involvement from our side. Kirill 16:50, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

SPOV and civility in fringe articles

Initiated by ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— at 05:10, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Involved parties


Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Done. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 05:27, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

And many many more.

Statement by Martinphi

First: this is not a content dispute: we don't need any help determining content. The problem is 1. disruptive editing, edit warring and POV pushing (based on both conscious and unconscious subversion of WP policy) and 2. Incivility and poisoning of the atmosphere.

That said.........

We would like the ArbCom to consider the actions of a group of editors who say they have been trying to write articles from the Scientific POV rather than from NPOV. They even wish to invoke Ignore all rules to use original research to debunk pseudoscientific, religious, and paranormal claims. They want to give more space to mainstream science within an article on a fringe subject than to the subject itself. They are also extremely rude (I tried to work this one out but... ), and have poisoned the atmosphere in fringe areas of Misplaced Pages .

(well it's all garbage, but that's another point...;-) in this discussion, it is a "pseudoscientific statement" made in the movie. When dealing with anything related to science on any subject at Misplaced Pages, whether it be a movie, a biography, an article on alternative medicine or quackery, etc., scientific sources are perfectly appropriate for dealing with the scientific matter at hand, and WEIGHT would so dictate. If someone in an article about themselves here is quoted as making an obviously unscientific statement, it would be appropriate to quote a mainstream scientific source to prevent readers from being misled by the Misplaced Pages article. That's not OR, it's common sense. If it weren't common sense, IOW used to help fringe ideas violate WEIGHT, it would be another matter. If necessary, just invoke WP:IAR. -- Fyslee / talk 19:47, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

In pursuit of this goal (and the larger goal to simply disparage), they have created large and ongoing disruptions of many articles, such as What the Bleep Do We Know!?, Parapsychology, and others. They have also been extremely contemptuous of the "kooks," cranks, and "true believers" (etc.) who disagree with their positions in any way, or believe in the "balderdash" and "bullshit" of anything fringe, thus poisoning the wiki atmosphere. Some even believe non-SPOV users should be disenfranchised (see last two posts).

The goal of this group is always to tear down any chance that a fringe subject may naturally have to seem worthy .

Imagine the reverse case: if the SPOV group were less numerous, and other editors continually referred to them (never, of course, mentioning names), as kooks, and their beliefs by words such as garbage, twaddle and insanity includes a lot...edit summary here proselytizing edit summary Sheesh, I guess I should blow him?. And these are just a sample: there is a continual drizzle of such oblique (and sometimes personal) disparagment which comes down on the heads of anyone who displeases the SPOV editors.

If you think we are merely a bunch of fringe POV pushers, perhaps you'll take pleasure in seconding this response:

Yada yada yada. Nothing new to add to the usual special pleading then? Guy (Help!) 20:44, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 05:10, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Antelan

Since there is a normal process by which civility issues are dealt with, I would imagine that going through that process before coming here (if ultimately necessary) would be preferable to starting here. Antelan 05:20, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Benjaminbruheim

I can feel the pain, but I think this is rather the symptom rather than the problem. But the introduction of the problematic words "mainstream science" and "pseudoscience" has introduced a system where certain journals are regarded as "unreliable sources" and all the articles end up being the written from the mainstream science perspective. For non-obvious reasons this makes the content unfairly treated. For example a suspect that is notable within fringe science might be written from a perspective where there has been no serious inquiry. Thus we should allow a plurality of opinions where many mutually incompatible opinions are written, but where a subject is deemed highly unlikely by a respected field it should be mentioned. Opinions from scientists should be used with caution, unless their claims are easily verifiable. Additionally I feel some skeptical articles being used as sources can be regarded as fringe, compare the RS status of SCICOP vs Journal of Scientific Exploration. Both are controversial sources yet CSICOP is regarded as a trusted source. At the same time the best info on fringe subjects are in the primary sources. There are the other patent non-sense fringe subjects, but then the science and other research do the job itself. This is a huge complex and could need a better forum of debate, but it is not only a single policy. I suggest WP:SCIENCE, since we need a more rigid method applying the wide variation of science that exists anyway. Benjaminbruheim (talk) 05:32, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Raymond arritt

Should arbcom undertake this case, I trust they will demand evidence for the extremely serious charge "they have organized large and ongoing disruptions of many articles." Should no evidence be found that the editing in question was deliberately organized and was intended merely to disrupt -- rather than to offer perspectives with which Martinphi happens to disagree -- arbcom may wish to consider sanctioning an editor who spuriously accuses others of such misconduct. Raymond Arritt (talk) 05:35, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Fyslee

I don't see any paper trail that shows a proper sequence of dispute resolution. This looks more like an abuse of the RfArb system to harass users with whom one disagrees. If I have offended Martin, then he can certainly come to my talk page and we can talk about it like adults. Using RfArb is tantamount to shooting sparrows with a canon, that's how disruptive the RfArb process is. It should be reserved when all else fails, and not for taking revenge. Considering the source of this request and his extremely controversial history here, I suggest extreme caution lest this forum becomes a soapbox for further promotion of fringe POV.

Regarding the statement "...the Scientific POV rather than from NPOV." I don't believe that the scientific POV (SPOV) is always equal to NPOV, but that SPOV is often to be given WEIGHT in articles where the sources and subject matter so dictate. Scientific sources are much more likely to qualify as V & RS than fringe sources, which are often personal sites from various renegades, quacks, visionaries, and others who invariably possess "the truth", promote conspiracy theories and personal OR, encourage hatred against science and authorities, etc. Such sources often fail to qualify for obvious reasons. Unfortunately the promoters and protectors of fringe subjects often fail to realize this and object strongly when their sources are questioned or deleted because they simply fail to qualify, all according to policy here. They take the standard scientific "provide evidence for your claims" as an insult and incivility, when that happens to be standard practice among scientists and skeptics, and is also required here if we are to keep articles from becoming filled with unreliable sources. -- Fyslee / talk 06:01, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Viridae

Scietific point of view IS a neutral point of view, formed by consensus within the scientific community using a peer review system. (disclaimer - I am a scientist) Viridae 05:46, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by FeloniousMonk

This is simply a content dispute, and one that appears to be driven by more by Martinphi's failure to understand WP:NPOV ("where multiple or conflicting perspectives exist within a topic each should be presented ... articles that compare views should not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views") and the arbcom's former ruling on the topic in Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience than by any other cause. FeloniousMonk (talk) 06:19, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Zenwhat

  • This is a content dispute, but saying that by itself does not imply ArbCom is irrelevant if dispute-resolution is not possible.
  • It is a particularly contentious content dispute that has existed across several pages. Policy does not explicitly state that articles should express the mainstream "scientific POV," however, a number of policies seem to imply it.
  • From what I understand, Jimbo himself has stated that the word, "NPOV," may be misleading, because it is meant as the reliable, objective view without bias, not a false compromise or 'neutral' middle-ground between competing biases.
  • What seems to be the issue is not the factual content of the articles, but the tone.
    • On the one hand, you have hard-nosed, atheistic skeptics (see James Randi), who would like every article on New Age-related issues to be tagged with Category:Pseudoscience and contain leads which explicitly state their rejection by the mainstream scientific community.
    • On the other hand, there are supporters of these fringe theories that wish to remove criticism entirely, even sourced criticism, and will simultaneously use unreliable sources while disputing clearly reliable ones.

I have stated that there a number of NPOV issues that need to be dealt with, but neither side is particularly in the right.

My suggestion is the following:

  1. That ArbCom clarify WP:FRINGE and put forth a specific criterion for what constitutes a "pseudoscience," that editors can appeal to, in order to resolve disputes, or at least request that the community come up with such a definition. One possible source for such information may be Pseudoscience#Identifying pseudoscience (not to be used as a primary source of course, but through verifying the claims made there, by reliable sources).
  2. That all criticism and apologetics for various pseudosciences be moved outside of article leads (such as in Astrology) and into specific sections, such as "Criticism" or "Scientific Reception," but that such articles fairly reflect the scientific consensus. There are some exceptions, of course, such as Homeopathy.

Now, on that last point, why do I make that distinction? The distinction is made because if a subject is frequently falsely presented as a science, such as Homeopathy or Ayurveda or What the Bleep Do We Know!?, then including criticism of pseudoscience in the lead makes sense. In the case of Astrology and Divination, 90% of the time its proponents put it forth as metaphysics, not science ("beyond" + "physics"). As an ex-Pagan myself, I know that a brief walk through the book store yields the fact that books on Astrology are often in sections entitled, "New Age," or "Metaphysical studies," or "Occult." Furthermore, it's existed before modern science, making it inappropriate for criticism of pseudoscience to remain in the lead.

Despite that, however, the actual information about criticism from scientists and skeptics should remain, according to the policy on preserving information.

Lastly, on the issue of civility, Misplaced Pages is not censored. Being caustic, cynical, sarcastic, and so on, is not by itself uncivil, though it may come across that way. This was noted a while back in my wikiquette alert regarding User:Sceptre. Furthermore, in the discussion over What the Bleep Do We Know!? (see the talk page) it's important to note that, at one point, someone arguing against the skeptics violated Godwin's law, making one-sided complaints about incivility somewhat spurious. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 07:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Baegis

I don't think I will make many friends by saying this, but perhaps this case should be considered and heard. For far too long, fringe pov pushers have been allowed to harrass and otherwise destroy articles while perfectly good editors have been driven away from the project. I have only been here for about 6 months and have already seen this occur enough times that it worries me. What needs to be established is a clear policy for dealing with editors who constantly disrupt and fail to read policy, except to distort it in order to have it meet their own needs. When will we, as a community, rise up and finally say that we have had enough and will stop giving disruptive editors chance after chance after chance? Maybe now is the time. Maybe this is the place. Baegis (talk) 06:57, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Nealparr

Current model of Misplaced Pages articles on topics with widespread popularity in culture, but which are either not supported by science, or are targets of rational skeptics: 

(Believers -> Misplaced Pages article <- Skeptics)
                      |
                (Cleanup Crew)

Enough said. It's not coincidence that it looks like a mushroom cloud, and yes, both groups screw up the articles. For every pro push, there's a retaliatory push to slant it con. Each push is more excessive than the previous one. Even when an article is overall neutral, they'll fight over the lead, or a particular sentence, or even a word. And this is important: It's not about science vs. pseudoscience. In nearly all cases it is completely about believer vs. skeptic. The former wants the topic treated with credibility, and the latter wants the topic treated without credibility, whether science is involved or not. The ones I feel sorry for are the cleanup crew. They're always accused of being on the left or right of the top tier, when they're just trying to fix the damn article to look like an encyclopedia. It's a crazy, hostile work involvement. In any case, I'm on wikibreak, so I can be taken off the list of involved parties. --Nealparr 08:14, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 16:11, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Agree. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 20:35, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Agree. The classic example of so-called skeptics deviating from science is Penn and Teller dismissing global warming. --Jim Butler 01:34, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Rracecarr

The diff Martin posted is my edit. Supposedly it is proof that I (we?) are "extremely rude". However I did not say or imply anything about any editors in the post. The best guess I can make is that referring to people who believe that dead people speak through radio static as "delusional crazies" is the rude part. I suppose Martin actually believes this, and so took it as a personal affront. I had no idea he believed it. I did not mean to offend. On the other hand, Martin was quite rude to me directly. Rracecarr (talk) 07:57, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Jim62sch

So far as I can see, this is simply a content dispute, and the "evidence" is hardly compelling. &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 11:23, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by ScienceApologist

It seems to me that the current method of choice for people hoping to impose accommodation of fringe and pseudoscientific beliefs on Misplaced Pages is to rigorously focus on conduct rules as a way of eliminating those who would resist this agenda. Unforunately, we have taken notice and are even now taking steps to censor ourselves so that nothing we say can be construed as personal attacks or lacking civility. Hopefully, within a few months, the people fighting undue accommodation of the fringe will be polite to a fault and then all that will be left is to impose their collective editorial will on the relevant articles. ScienceApologist (talk) 12:46, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by JzG

Pseudoscience and fringe science fans are engaged in relentless POV-pushing. They are the canonical soup-spitters. And yes, the result of their absolutely never giving up however often they are rebuffed, however often articles are wrestled from the appalling excesses of fringegruft and returned to NPOV, yes, that is incredibly vexing.

Their relentless and maddening querulousness is a pressing problem, causing endless wasted effort while we debate fatuous issues like whether we should use the conclusions of a Government report or perhaps instead use a cherry-picked paragraph from the middle of the report which is much more supportive of the tiny number of people who are actively pursuing research in a field that the rest of the scientific establishment either ignores or treats with scorn. Yup, that's a titanic waste of effort, and sometimes people are abrupt as a result.

Please do ban the whole bloody lot of them, I've had a gutfull. Guy (Help!) 12:51, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Arion

I would like to state that the hostility and ganging up that is inflicted upon editors who insist upon NPOV academic writing standards is out of control. There is no excuse for it. That includes this frequent invoking of "scientific" POV as the excuse for attacking the intelligence and integrity of other editors, and for excusing bullying tactics to enforce deletions of article content they disagree with (as opposed to discussing to reach consensus). Attempts to engage in serious discussions on improving an article are often responded to with accusations that an editor is "POV pushing" and advocating "pseudoscience". Discussions on the talk pages by these "SPOV" advocates often include rude and sarcastic juvenile level humor that is mocking and derisive. Everyone has seen this repeated innumerable times. The hostile atmosphere here at Misplaced Pages must change, and NPOV must be upheld for what everyone else in the world understands it to be. Arion 3x3 (talk) 13:18, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Kww

First, I am hardly a member of some group with a determined agenda to deal with fringe articles. The primary fringe article I have been dealing with is What the Bleep Do We Know, which has been a very contentious article for a number of months, primarily because of a group of editors that does not wish to apply WP:FRINGE to the article. WP:FRINGE requires that ideas that have been rejected, are widely considered to be absurd or pseudoscientific, only of historical interest, or primarily the realm of science fiction, should be documented as such, using reliable sources. Certainly, the extensions to quantum mechanics promulgated in the movie constitute such things, the very reason that we have reliable sources using words like tosh and balderdash to describe it. Martinphi and others believe NPOV to require us to be nicer to the movie than our reliable sources are, and to give credence to suspect organizations like the Institute of Noetic sciences. No. This is an encyclopedia, and, on article about science and on movies that discuss science, the viewpoint of mainstream science is the neutral point of view.Kww (talk) 13:53, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Filll

This mainly looks like a content dispute to me, with some minor incivility problems.

However, one of the reasons that Misplaced Pages is having a difficult time recruiting and retaining subject matter experts from Academia and the sciences is the endless pandering to WP:FRINGE elements, and somehow giving these people who push these extreme antiscience and mystical views 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 50th, 1003rd chances to disrupt the writing of a scholarly encyclopedia. Misplaced Pages is viewed as free webspace to promote the most extreme crank theories. If they are unable to do this unchallenged they feel that somehow their rights are being violated.

After some observation, I have noticed that almost every single one does not understand what NPOV is, or the fact that NPOV does not mean an uncritical point of view or a sympathetic point of view. If a topic purports to be a scientific topic, like polywater or cold fusion, the rules of NPOV of course state that material in Misplaced Pages should be in proportion and in accord with the prominence with the views in the relevant field. However, I have seen that this prominence clause is almost always ignored in every pseudoscience article, every quack medicine article, every article about creationism, every article about the paranormal, by the proponents of these unproven and unscientific views for which there is absolutely zero evidence.

Of course, these topics should be clearly described. But this does not mean that the other side, the scientific view, should not be presented clearly, and prominently. Misplaced Pages is not a platform to unquestioningly broadcast the merits of the latest psychic surgery technique.

Invariably the promoters of WP:FRINGE material misinterpret WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE, WP:WEIGHT, WP:FRINGE and other policies and create discord, leading to the examples in the original RfAr above. If Arbcomm decides to consider this, I would respectfully suggest that they consider how to make the point that the NPOV is quite close to the scientific POV in many of these FRINGE topics, and maybe suggest ways in which better guidelines can be created for how to handle this endless series of disputes. Unfortunately, the present set of policies is not working well, leading to disputes, and many editors becoming discouraged and just leaving, leading to a lot of bad material or lost material in Misplaced Pages.--Filll (talk) 14:14, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Carcharoth

Just a brief statement to attempt to correct some misunderstandings of WP:NPOV being made here. Statements like "the viewpoint of mainstream science is the neutral point of view" are highly misleading. The correct statement is "the viewpoint of mainstream science is the mainstream point of view". Neutral point of view is about applying due weight to different viewpoints, to create a balanced article. It is not about deciding which view is "neutral" (sometimes misinterpreted as the 'correct' POV), but deciding which views are mainstream (having said that, it is true that 'neutral' is increasingly used as a term of art on Misplaced Pages with a meaning distinct from the normal meaning - which is, as always, unhelpful for people who don't realise this). Articles editors should document the opinions of others on which view is 'correct', but that has little to do with 'neutral point of view'. Maybe it is time to rename NPOV if this common misunderstanding is gaining ground again? Carcharoth (talk) 15:03, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Responding to MastCell, who quoted this: "Serious and respected encyclopedias and reference works are generally expected to provide overviews of scientific topics that are in line with respected scientific thought. Misplaced Pages aspires to be such a respected work." - the key here is whether articles such as What the Bleep Do We Know!? count as scientific topics. There is a good case to be made that this is, and should be, an article about the film/documentary, the making of it, the people who made it, the content, and the reaction to it. The article should not be turned into a battleground over the topics being discussed in the film. Instead, it should carefully link to our articles on those topics, and those are the scientific topics that the ArbCom ruling was undoubtedly talking about. Carcharoth (talk) 11:23, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by JoshuaZ

I'm actually surprised I'm not listed as an involved party; as far as I can tell, the list above is essentially a shotgun of almost every editor involved with MartinPhi on a semi-regular basis. I suppose MartinPhi didn't list ScienceApologist because ScienceApologist got driven off in part by MartinPhi's antics yet again. The bottom line is that per the undue weight clause in NPOV, NPOV is not precisely SPOV but they are close for most topics related to science, especially fringe science topics. Some editors see this distinction as being worthy of note (such as myself) others such as Viridae see the distinction as so small as to not merit distinction. Where exactly that distinction lies and how much weight to give to fringe or pseudoscience topics are complicated issues that need to be decided by consensus and often is. MartinPhi to be blunt is unhappy that the consensus interpretation on Wikipidea consistently does not favor given large weight to the many non-standard ideas of which he is a proponent. There doesn't seem to be anything really ArbCom worthy here at all. JoshuaZ (talk) 15:48, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Rocksanddirt

This is mostly a content dispute with both some tenditious editing and some incivility thrown in to make it unpleasant. My take is that the focus on labels (pseudoscience) and the focus on limiting critical or mainstream views in "fringe" articles is the main content under discussion. We don't attract academics, because we don't allow original research. We attract scientists of various stripes because there is a lot out there, without the original research that academics want to write. We spend to much time on the reliablility of sources, rather than explaining the reliability of a reference in an article and letting the reader make up his or her own mind. I don't think this is a dispute that arbcomm can help with right now, other than to remind folks to play nice, and read what others have written rather than talk past each other. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 17:17, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Dlabtot

I have spent some time at What the Bleep Do We Know!? attempting to broker compromise and cool passions, so I was surprised I was not listed as an involved editor. Anyway, absent a sincere desire to reach WP:CONSENSUS on the part of editors, and in the face of outright contempt of WP:CIVIL, Misplaced Pages doesn't work. There does exist a persistent pattern of incivility and edit-warring at these articles; the problem is essentially one of conduct, not content; if ArbCom declines the case now, it's just delaying the inevitable. Eventually, you'll have to deal with it. Dlabtot (talk) 17:08, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Levine2112

It's a bit unsettling how much people differ in their interpretations of NPOV. Overall, I come closest to agreeing with the NealParr, who made the chart which resembled a mushroom cloud. You have extremists on both sides. However, where I agree with NealParr that on one side of the cloud you have the "True Believers", on the other side of the cloud, perhaps NealParr should have put the "Pseudoskeptics" instead of the "Skeptics". I think the true skeptics - the real critical thinkers - constitute part of the "clean up crew" (along with the "People who don't give a damn either way"). :-)

Some of us are too quick to label others "True Believers", but then balk when someone calls us a "True Dis-believer". A true skeptic should be open to all possibilities, no matter how unreal or magical it seems (the more unbelievable it seems, the more evidence which is required to convince the true skeptic). Science - true science - is not an exact science. In general, there aren't many theories which are immutable scientific laws. A lot of times, I see an editor dismissing something as pseudoscience when it is actually very much a true science (or at least truly scientific), just with a theory that is antithetical to the science this editor holds dear. A person not willing to consider these alternative scientific theory is by definition a "Pseudoskeptic".

"Pseudoscience" and "Fringe science" have a true definition, however, I've seen these definitions skewed and abused in the name of pushing a POV. The threshold and treatment of pseudoscience which we should all abide in here at Misplaced Pages can be found at WP:NPOV/FAQ#Pseudoscience. In general, don't characterize something as pseudoscience if it is merely a "questionable science" or an "alternative theoretical formulation".

NPOV is not SPOV. NPOV is a balance of opinions based on due weight of the sources. Misplaced Pages is not a scientific journal, but a collection of knowledge - information which can be cited to a reliable source.

Finally, just to be clear where I am coming from, please know that I only recently got involved at the What the Bleep Do We Know? article, and only in the capacity to try and reach some accord and consensus. I have tried to set up an informal survey as part of dispute resolution, and though it was generally well-received, I was perturbed (though not surprised) that an editor supposedly pushing for NPOV vandalized my attempts, calling them "pointless" among making other uncivil gestures. For my part, I rather enjoyed the film, What the Bleep. My sense of wonderment was thoroughly entertained. However, I came away believing very little (if any) of the theories presented in the film. Despite my disbelief of the theories presented, however, I am willing to put in the effort to make sure that the film's Misplaced Pages article is not overrun by criticism (no matter how much I agree with the critics). Certainly, much of the film's notability comes from the scientific criticism, but this in not the only side to it, nor is the praise/criticism of the film the only reason why it is notable.

I say all this because editors have called me a true believer in the pseudoscience or a fringe POV pusher. I am not either of those things. I am a true believer in Misplaced Pages and a pusher of following its guidelines and policies. -- Levine2112 19:00, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment by PeterStJohn

The difficulty, IMO, is that the pattern of abuse is diffuse, and that no individual diff can be unambiguously construed as violation of any explicit policy, though the aggregrate effect does violate the spirit. I've tried to enunciate this at my RfC regarding Ronz, which is related to this RfA (starting as it did with the Quackwatch article). Pete St.John (talk) 19:22, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Littleolive Oil

In my mind, fundamental to this discussion and at the root of the controversy on this article is that this, an encyclopedia, is above all else a repository for knowledge rather than a platform for defining some perceived truth. Fundamental to an understanding of controversy in the ‘What the Bleep’ article is that once again this is an encyclopedic article, about a movie, only inside of which, can the movie’s content exist. Issues of concern include:

  • Suggestions and editing that indicate that Science is the main focus of the article, rather than the movie.
  • Editors engage in language and tone that lack civility. This not only makes personal discussion harder, but also creates a toxic atmosphere for the entire talk pages, in part, because it can be relentless.
  • Editors do not assume good faith but insist that edits are made for POV purposes, when in fact most editors supporting neutrality have never even voiced an opinion about the movie. Most editors have agreed to use the controversial word (controversial in this article, that is), pseudoscience, in the body of the article. Some consider that having the word in the lead, is inappropriate in terms of writing a lead, because the general public does not necessarily understand the word, so possibly needs further explanation more suitable in the body of the article. Yet on several occasions some have agreed to leave pseudoscience in the lead anyway, just to move on with establishing a lead section. However, repeatedly, these advances are squashed.

All of these problems should be surmountable, and editors on both sides have contributed enormously to attempting to find solutions. In repeated instances at the point when it looks as if a solution is possible, the discussion is abruptly turned again to questions about Science, and the whole discussion must move into another highly repetitious cycle. I could allude to what I think the problem is, but I might as well be more forthright than that. Pseudoscience supporters may see this as a place to make a stand for the truth about how they see science and fringe science. I can’t understand though, why, even when there seems to be progress made towards consensus efforts are still made to “stonewall”. My efforts and concerns for this article have nothing to do with the article itself; although I saw the movie I can barely remember it. I am more concerned with a misunderstanding of what OR is, and with hints I see in this discussion of a desire to move the kind of argument, for inclusion of material, that is OR, into mainstream Misplaced Pages. If that begins to happen, blurring and erosion will follow, and the back of Misplaced Pages as an encyclopedia will be broken.

As I check the discussion today, some progress is being made.

I want to mention that a reference made by Zenwhat to Godwin’s Law references me and not any other editors. I used the reference Misplaced Pages itself makes to OR and Hitler, and it was construed as a violation. (olive (talk) 20:18, 18 January 2008 (UTC))

Statement by MastCell

The proposed scope of this case seems extremely broad, and the allegations made, of organized large-scale disruption, are not particularly well-supported by the diffs provided. I don't see how ArbCom can adjudicate such a nebulously defined user-conduct problem. As to the role of SPOV, ArbCom has already provided their gloss on the topic:

Serious and respected encyclopedias and reference works are generally expected to provide overviews of scientific topics that are in line with respected scientific thought. Misplaced Pages aspires to be such a respected work.

Unless the current Committee wishes to amend that nicely-written finding, I don't see the makings of a case here. MastCell 22:26, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Jim Butler

I don't see anything here that isn't already covered by WP:TPG and the material at WP:NPOVFAQ#Pseudoscience (taken from the earlier Arbcom decision that MastCell just cited).

And WP:RS:

"Claims of consensus must be sourced. The claim that all or most scientists, scholars, or ministers hold a certain view requires a reliable source. Without it, opinions should be identified as those of particular, named sources."

That nails it from all sides. If everyone heeded that, and pigs could fly, everything would be cool. --Jim Butler 03:12, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment Agree- this of course being exactly why it is not a content dispute, but a matter of user behavior and POV pushing! ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 05:52, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
If there is community disagreement about what an adequate source for "generally considered pseudoscience by the scientific community" is, then we do have to address that somehow, perhaps first by RfC or WP:RSN. That is pretty basic stuff. (n.b. teh James Randi is not such a source. No individual scientist is. Position statements from mainstream scientific bodies are, cf. Scientific opinion on climate change.
That said, I think that fringe topics that don't attract such mainsteam commentary may be balanced by statements from notable skeptics; however, those statements should be cited as being the views of the authors, and not more than that.
(Also, if I opine that foo is garbage, I am not attacking you even if you love foo.) :-) --Jim Butler 07:36, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

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

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/3/0/0)

  • Decline. All editors in this area should be mindful of our basic policies, including civility, the avoidance of personal attacks, and the maintenance of a neutral point of view (including avoiding undue weight problems), as well as the principles enunciated by the arbitrators in prior cases. In talkpage discussions on articles like the ones at issue here, contributors should think twice before hitting "send" on a post discussing another editor, as opposed to discussing article content itself. I know that some of you find each other exasperating, but this tracks disagreements in the real world, and compliance with policies and standards by all sides should reduce interpersonal disputes. However, I see no specific dispute calling for a new arbitration case at this time. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:41, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Reject. Do not see anything specific in our purview for the Committee to review or settle. FloNight (talk) 21:59, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Reject. The essential point of this case appears to be an attempt to negate WP:FRINGE by other means. Even if inclined to support that, I would think it an inappropriate content and policy ruling for an arbitrator. I am not convinced that this committee would assist writing a high quality encyclopaedia by restricting editing in this proposed case. Sam Blacketer (talk) 22:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

The Television Episodes Edit Wars

Initiated by John254 at 02:34, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Involved parties

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Please see Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Episodes and characters

There has been an extended and inconclusive discussion of the most recent edit warring at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/Edit warring on episodes articles

Statement by John254

In Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Episodes_and_characters#Parties_urged, this Committee found that

The parties are urged to work collaboratively and constructively with the broader community and the editors committed to working on the articles in question to develop and implement a generally acceptable approach to resolving the underlying content dispute.

Actually, however, the participants in this content dispute have choosen to settle the matter through massive edit warring -- for example, see the page histories of A Mattress on Wheels (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) and The Man Who Killed Batman (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). A review of Special:Contributions/TTN clearly indicates that these edit wars have affected a large number of articles, and have therefore become quite disruptive. For instance, TTN re-redirected 8 articles in a single minute on 20:40, 13 January 2008 . Of course, the Arbitration Committee is not asked to resolve the underlying content dispute on its merits, or even to interpret the present state of community consensus regarding this issue. However, edit warring this severe presents clear user conduct issues that are amenable to resolution by the Arbitration Committee. John254 02:34, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

With regard to the statement by Collectonian, I have included all the users who I found to be involved in these edit wars as parties to the case, without attempting to ascertain their degree of involvement or relative fault. Should this case be accepted, users with only incidental involvement obviously would not have any findings or remedies issued against them. Moreover, because I have not scrutinized the page history of every involved article, there may be some users with significant involvement in the edit wars who I have neglected to include, and who would need to be added to this case. John254 02:56, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
I have added Eusebeus (talk · contribs) and Pixelface (talk · contribs) to this request. Both of these users are clearly involved in the edit warring over the redirection of a large number of articles -- for Eusebeus, see , and for Pixelface see . John254 04:15, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Even after this request for arbitration was filed, TTN continued unabated in his edit warring over the redirection of television episode articles -- see . John254 21:56, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
TTN engaged in even more edit warring over the redirection of articles recently -- see . John254 03:02, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
And it continues: here's another page of redirected pages. Jack (talk) 03:34, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Collectonian

I was not involved in the Episode and Characters RfA in any way, shape, or form. I request an explanation as to why I have been included in this second RfA and evidence that I have been involved in "massive edit warring" regarding episode articles, as I only did a single revert in the two articles mentioned as per some discussion over in ANI. I did not repeat the revert and didn't even put the page in my watch list. So please provide evidence specific to me. Collectonian (talk) 02:47, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Sesshomaru

I'd like to know myself how I've been involved in this get up. One revert, to me, does not count as "edit warring". If I'm listed here because I often side with TTN on occasions regarding WP:EPISODE and WP:NN, then I suggest that you, John254, remove me from this nonsense. Bear you any sufficient evidence in my part in this so-called "ploy"? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 03:42, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

I reiterate, see explanation.Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 05:32, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Sceptre

This is a case that needs to be examined more in more detail. The previous RfAr did nothing at all to stop the edit wars. Will 03:44, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Casliber

My involvement in this particular standoff began a few hours ago when I noted the rollback of individual episodes of a famous British sitcom Open All Hours. Though (as anyone would guess looking through my contribs) I am an inclusionist, I have abided by results of AfD debates. However, I noted this one had not been discussed at TTN had merged content and removed redlinks without any formal process, so I reverted and recommended that this be taken up at AfD. Another contributor BlackKite, whose views lie more with the TTN than mine I'd guess has conceded that these episodes are likely to have sources. Upon which I was reverted by TTN, , then User:Sesshomaru, and User:Eusebeus on one of the episodes

The rationale used is that it is a redirect not a delete, yet the material on the episode pages is deleted (and no attempt was made to move any material over to the parent page). AfD is about debating whether a particular article should exist as such on wikipedia and whether there is a link to a larger article or not is irrelevant. I am concerned that what is happening is Gaming the system to bypass AfD and avoid analysis over removal of material. It is certainly inconsistent with recent policy on AfD. Even Misplaced Pages:N#Articles_not_satisfying_the_notability_guidelines suggests some sort of time frame rather than minutes. If hoaxes and other such material gets a few days then why the need to remove instantly?

All I asked for was that the material be discussed at AfD to obtain a broader consensus.

I note TTN has voiced this opinion at the last hearing, however I have not seen that happening today.

I note in this debate, there has been criticism over the speed it came after this one.

I should point out there have been other editors involved in several other debates over the past few months with different TV series, so that restricting this debate to these two series and these participants may not be helpful in the long run - in agrement with Sceptre above. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 03:47, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Crotalus that part of the issue is where we draw the line at notability and essentially how much detail/depth wikipedia should go into. The great pity is that large swathes of material is deleted after there has only been a cursory, if any, look for independent sources. Sadly, much is not directly accessible online and requires actually having written material. In this way I feel WP can raise the standard of much pop. culture material that is circulated. Many editors are young who have never seen a university library and the wealth of material therein.

Finally, I should add that the above is complicated by the fact that TTN is showing behaviour consistent with being a Single-purpose account with the agenda of removing as much TV-related material as possible, and has become fixated upon it, whether rightly or wrongly. From the issues at AN/I and frequency of conflict I see an inability to interact constructively with others who do not share his (her?) point of view. If we are to presume this zeal is from a dedication to the project, I do not see anything in the way of contributing to the encyclopedia (though there was a little to start off with in 2006) and I find it hard to believe the motive is positive (i.e. benefit to Misplaced Pages) rather than from a negative reason (i.e. some form of massive vandalism). However, I am happy to wait for Arbcom and work collaboratively with all concerned in the future. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:40, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Firsfron

Sesshomaru states above that he should not be a party to this case because he only did one revert, but what he actually did was one revert on each article, and all he was doing was reverting what the last editor did, in its entirety, in reverse order (there are no articles in that run that were not reverted to the version by TTN). There is no way that Sesshomaru was checking what he was doing. He was just going down the list and undoing each and every edit without discussion, with an edit summary of "See WP:EPISODE, an afd is not required for cases like these". Firsfron of Ronchester 04:38, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Yukichigai

I wish I could say I'm surprised this has come up in arbitration again, but I'm not. Not at all.

I've already expressed my opinion on this matter when I started the previous RFArb, but to quickly summarize over 200 page redirects in 12 hours is way too fast and too numerous to be considered acceptable. I also think Kirill summed it up best when he proposed the Fait accompli principle in the last RFArb.

What we have here is a new kind of edit war, with one side attempting to overpower the other by virtue of the sheer volume of edits and little else. I had hoped the tactic would die off in the wake of the previous RFArb, but it appears that is not the case; almost all the "chief offenders" have gone back to their old ways. TTN holds a new record, having been a significant component in (if not the focus of) numerous WP:AN/I threads for the past 12 days straight, and a number of other editors on both sides are working on similar "accomplishments" as well. There is no way in hell this is going to stop on its own. Barring some Jimbo Ex Machina I predict that RFArb is going to be treated to a regular posting of requests to resolve this dispute.

If the Arbitration Committee does accept this case (again) let me say this: a final decision with no consequences for anybody, or at least no clear-cut determination of (to be blunt) who's being a dick, isn't going to solve anything. The community needs a clear, unmistakable determination of what behavior is acceptable and what isn't for this dispute to even slow down, much less stop. -- Y|yukichigai (ramble argue ) 05:36, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by SirFozzie

The two sides are both claiming they're in the right, and are incessantly edit-warring over and over and over again. No one person violates 3 Reverts, but there's a heck of a lot of Disruptive Editing going on. This likely will not stop until made to stop, so on that terms, I urge the Arbitration Committee to accept this case.

However, I note with dismay that one side scrupulously notes the policies that un-referenced episodes of dubious quality violate, and the other side seems to point that because more of the same has existed, that by god, they should IAR, because it's UNFAIR to delete an unreferenced, questionably notable episode on "trivial pop culture show A", if there's an unreferenced, questionably notable episode on "trivial pop culture show B". I have even seen someone claim that because there's been an article on Bart the General for four and a half years, that there is no way it could violate policy on notability, verifiability and other encyclopedic rules. .

If it wasn't for the fact that it would be POINTy, I would redirect this myself (and I've not been involved in any of this until the most recent flare up on ANI). It is unduly long, has one reference to notability (that it was used in a humor study of the brain), and is filled to the brim with unencyclopedic, useless trivia. It is a wonderful article, for a Simpsons-pedia. For an EN-Cyclopedia, it is the equivalent of using a nuclear bomb to swat a rogue electron. Overkill. ArbCom does not make policy, it just reigns in those who violate policy. And there's a lot of that going on that needs to be reigned in. SirFozzie (talk) 05:53, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

::Er, no, SirFozzie, as I said above, I suggested the ones I was involved with go through AfD to gain a wider consensus.cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 06:10, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

(please move your comment to your own statement, ArbStatements are not supposed to be threaded conversations, but I will reply). Consensus is wonderful. Consensus is great. I've been accused of even being a consensus wonk at times. Consensus makes the world go round. However, Consensus can not say "X is Right!" when Policy says "X is wrong!" Consensus cannot make up for a fundamental lack of proof of Notability, of Reliable Sources, and Verifiability. As I said, some of the articles are wonderfully detailed. They should be moved to another -pedia that deals with the shows in question (or even a TV-pedia). However, according to the policies about what an article should be, they fail on just about every tick there is. They're like kudzu, eternally growing.. but it never goes anywhere. SirFozzie (talk) 06:17, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
I would like to just applaud the WP:SIMPSONS project. The article I mentioned above was brought up there, and they went, and trimmed it, and fixed the issues that there were with the article. Which just shows that the policies are a good thing, and instead of having constant wars about them and atttempts to change or ignore existing policy, I'm not trying to be dismissive, but this is a case of SOFIXIT. SirFozzie (talk) 14:42, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ned Scott

Instead of a whole new case, I urge arbcom to just look at some of the proposed stuff from the last case, and re-evaluate that. However, even that might not be necessary, since those fighting with reverting are asking for a block. (I say this to both sides of the dispute). It no longer matters who's right or wrong. I know how TTN and others feel, and I know how frustrating it is, but we have to do something that tells others that we honestly are trying to help others understand, and not just doing things with force. -- Ned Scott 08:41, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

I was not involved in this specific set of articles, but as someone who said they'd watch for these situations to help avoid them, I'd like to be added as a party. Although, again, I urge arbcom to just add something onto the past case, instead of a whole new case. -- Ned Scott 01:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Fut.Perf.

We are talking not just about enforcing consensus here, we are talking about enforcing fundamental policy. Episode articles that consist only of plot renarration (note: plot "summary" would be a euphemism in most cases) infringe on copyrights. Plot summaries must be subordinate to encyclopedic analysis. Where that is not the case, they must be ruthlessly removed just like unjustified non-free images. Same legal situation, same policy. I've personally given block warnings to people who reinstate them. If that makes me a party to this case, so be it. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:33, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Crotalus horridus

I disagree with Future Perfect's analysis. There is no evidence that any of these plot summaries in any way violate copyright. A complete (or nearly complete) transcript would probably do so, but these don't come close to that. Furthermore, most episode articles do not consist only of plot summaries; they often contain lists of trivia (which are unencyclopedic, but do improve the case for fair use) or other commentary. Even if an episode article did consist entirely of a plot summary, it would have to be taken in the context of Misplaced Pages as a whole, where it is a tiny fraction of the material, most of which is GFDL. Please remember to avoid copyright paranoia. No one has cited a single case where any website has ever been sent a takedown notice over plot summaries. Furthermore, no one at the Foundation has ever raised any issue with the lengthy, in-universe discussion on Wikimedia sites such as Memory Alpha and Wookieepedia (nor should they).

Framing this as a copyright issue is inaccurate and unhelpful. Rather, this is a disagreement about what kind of encyclopedia Misplaced Pages should be, and what the threshold of inclusion should be for trivia. I do not think that trivia and in-universe plot summaries have any place in a mainstream encyclopedia, but I do think that they need and deserve their own site. I have, on several occasions, proposed a project fork to handle such materials. I think this will prove to be the only viable long-term solution. *** Crotalus *** 11:35, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Pixelface

Short version
I'm really not surprised the issue of television episode articles is again before the committee, but I do not believe I have been involved in any edit wars over television episodes articles. On January 13, 2008 I removed redirects from 96 Scrubs episode articles and then discovered an ANI thread had been initiated against me. It should be noted that Corvus cornix did not leave a message on my talk page asking me to stop before he initiated that ANI thread. Four minutes after initiating that ANI thread and after I had removed 96 redirects, on January 13, 2008 at 22:22 (UTC), Corvus cornix left a {{ANI-notice}} on my talk page and informed me there was currently a discussion at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents involving me. Corvus cornix said "Pixelface is reverting all of TTN's edits." and that is patently false. I was removing redirects from Scrubs episode articles because there appeared to me to be no consensus for those articles be redirects on Talk:List of Scrubs episodes. After the ANI thread began, I removed 3 more redirects from Scrubs episode articles and then stopped removing them. I have been open to discuss my edits. No action was brought against me. I've never been accused before of edit-warring after performing one edit to several articles I've never edited before, and such a definition of "edit war" is news to me.

Long version
If this statement is too long, arbitrators or clerks are free to refactor it or remove it. I believe I first became aware of television episode articles being turned into redirects in October 2007. On October 17, 2007, I removed several {{merge}} tags that were placed on articles linked from List of Pee-wee's Playhouse episodes. I believe my first interaction with TTN occurred in October 2007 on Talk:List of Pee-wee's Playhouse episodes. I asked TTN about The Simpsons episode articles at that time. His reply seemed to indicate to me that The Simpsons episode articles did not each have to assert individual notability — they inherited notability from their Good or Featured articles.

After the Pee-wee's Playhouse episode articles were redirected, I added what I thought was real-world information to the episode article To Tell the Tooth, but TTN decided to redirect the article anyway. Seeing that real-world information was not going to make the article stay around, I didn't edit them further.

I was not an involved party in the Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Episodes and characters case but I did make 6 edits to the talk page of the Proposed decision from December 15-17, 2007, suggesting that List of South Park episodes be changed to List of The Simpsons episodes in the proposed decision.

From December 16-18, 2007, I left 4 comments on TTN's talk page asking about The Simpsons (season 16) and why he felt those articles did not need redirects.

I made several edits to the /Workshop during the arbitration case. I proposed a remedy during that case that TTN must notify the major contributors of an article after placing a {{merge}} tag in an article and I still think that's a good idea. On December 22, 2007, I create a template called {{mergenote}} for this purpose, similar to {{AFDNote}}, and I encourage editors to use it. I left a comment on WT:MERGE about it. I believe I have used that template in one instance, to inform the major contributors of various Dragon Ball film articles that there was a merge discussion taking place at Talk:List of Dragon Ball films. I found the major contributors of those articles using Aka's history stats tool.

On January 13, 2008, I made several comments at Misplaced Pages talk:Television episodes and later removed two sections from the guideline WP:EPISODE This was reverted by Collectonian and she left a {{uw-delete1}} template on my talk page. I then explained my edits at Misplaced Pages talk:Television episodes and made some more comments at Misplaced Pages talk:Television episodes. I then made some comments at Talk:List of Scrubs episodes, which looked to me to indicate that there is no consensus for the Scrubs episode articles to be redirects.

In my text editor I prepared a list of urls to each of the Scrubs episode articles as they appear in List of Scrubs episodes, adding "&redirect=no" to the end of the urls. On January 13, 2008 at 21:47, I began removing the redirects from the Scrubs episode articles by going to the urls I had prepared, looking at the history, and undoing the redirects. Initially I left no additional comment in my edit summary, just the standard undo message. After undoing 27 edits which took me 13 minutes, I began to include an additional reason in my edit summary, "There is no consensus to redirect these articles", because I noticed the undo message at the top of the screen says "If you are undoing an edit that is not vandalism, explain the reason in the edit summary rather than using only the default message."

After removing 96 redirects, on January 13, 2008 at 22:22 (UTC), Corvus cornix left a {{ANI-notice}} on my talk page and informed me there was currently a discussion at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents involving me. Corvus cornix left no prior message on my talk page asking me to stop removing redirects from Scrubs episode articles. After I saw the ANI notice on my talk page, I removed another redirect, made a comment at the ANI thread against me, replied on my talk page to a comment Eusebeus had left, made another comment at ANI, replied to a comment Rjd0060 had left on my talk page, and removed 1 more redirect from a Scrubs episode article.

On January 13, 2008, at 22:36, I made my last removal of redirects from Scrubs episode articles with this edit I then responded to several comments in the ANI thread, and responded to more comments on my talk page. I then noticed Eusebeus had left a comment on TTN's talk page and I left a reply there that was a bit uncivil.

I made some more replies at the ANI thread. On January 13, 2008 at 23:26, I left a message on Talk:List of Scrubs episodes that I would wait a week to remove the redirects again. On my talk page, Black Kite told me this was a threat and I responded a few times on my talk page. During the ANI thread, Sceptre archived the thread twice and I removed the archive boilerplates twice. I left a message on Sceptre's talk page asking him to please stop closing the ANI thread, because I felt that I had to clear my name and people were discussing a block of me.

I replied several more times in the ANI thread against me and made 3 more comments at Misplaced Pages talk:Television episodes

I feel that the current consensus among editors who edit actual articles and not just guideline pages is that individual episode articles do not have to assert notability by including significant coverage from reliable sources — as evidenced by the several sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes, List of South Park episodes, and List of Futurama episodes. I think it's biased to allow those television shows to have articles for every one of their episodes but not allow the same for other television series. The article Bart the General has existed since May 8, 2003 and it has never been a target of these massive episode article merge-tag/redirect-sweeps. The article has existed for over 4 1/2 years. As far as I can tell, the first reference to independent coverage was added today. I believe that article shows that WP:EPISODE (and I suppose WP:FICT as well) do not actually document consensus but are trying to make consensus into what the editors there want it to be.

I feel the entire ANI thread against me was ridiculous, but I think the arbitration committee should take this case and issue some actual blocks. I believe their remedy in the last case was totally ineffective.

I do not feel I have engaged in disruptive editing. I do not feel I have engaged in edit-warring. I made 99 edits to Scrubs episode articles. I removed a redirect once and only once on each of them. But I am willing to be blocked for months at a time if TTN and Eusebeus are blocked as well because I feel their actions are seriously harming the project and sending the wrong message that episode articles are okay — but only if they're for popular cartoons. If the arbitration committee decides to not accept this case, I think WP:EPISODE and WP:FICT should be fully protected from editing until the disputes over them are resolved. The mass-redirects of fictional content should also stop. This case should definitely be evaluated with the previous arbitration case in mind. --Pixelface (talk) 12:55, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

In response to SirFozzie's statement, *I* was the editor who mentioned that the Bart the General article has existed for 4 1/2 years, but the article does not violate any policies. The information in the article can be verified by watching the episode. And it's not original research to watch an episode and describe it — WP:PSTS allows that, it's called source-based research. WP:NOT#PLOT says articles are not simply plot summaries and if an episode article has an infobox, it's not simply a plot summary and does not violate WP:NOT#PLOT. There is no policy against episode articles. Misplaced Pages has several featured articles about television episodes. And WP:N is a guideline. When large list articles are split into sub-articles per WP:SIZE and WP:SUMMARY, I do not think each sub-article should then have to establish individual notability. These episode articles do not violate policy. Neutral point of view, however, is expected of all editors and TTN has shown he has no interest in applying the same criteria to The Simpsons episode articles that don't contain significant coverage in reliable sources. The editing policy says "During this process, the article might look like a first draft—or worse, a random collection of notes and factoids. Rather than being horrified by this ugliness, we should rejoice in its potential, and have faith that the editing process will turn it into brilliant prose." TTN allows those articles time to develop, yet does not allow the same for other television series. --Pixelface (talk) 13:31, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
In response to thedemonhog's statement, I do not know why she would say her edits would probably be reverted by me. If she turned an episode article into a redirect and there was no consensus to turn the article into a redirect on the talk page of the list of episodes article, I would probably revert the edit. Otherwise, I wouldn't. --Pixelface (talk) 21:58, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
In response to User:Eusebeus's statement, I do not know why my removal of the redirects from the Scrubs episode articles is "ill-advised." There may have been consensus at one point in time for those articles to be redirects, but there isn't now — as seen at Talk:List of Scrubs episodes. The long-standing consensus among editors who edit televison episode articles is that the articles do not have to contain substantial real-world coverage anytime soon in order to have a standalone article. Stubs are perfectly acceptable per the editing policy. Television episode articles with an infobox do not violate any policies. It's clear that the wording of WP:EPISODE was determined by a small group of editors who are trying to enforce it across Misplaced Pages as a whole as if it's a policy. Guidelines document consensus, they do not create it. It's unclear to me how having articles about television episodes makes Misplaced Pages a fansite. See the articles The Joy of Sect and A Streetcar Named Marge for two featured articles about television episodes. --Pixelface (talk) 22:08, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
In response to Black Kite's statement, I really don't know he expects the article My Mentor to develop into an article like My Musical as long as My Mentor is a redirect. Editors (and not just registered users who know how to bypass redirects) need to know that an article exists and that it needs improvement in order for the article to be improved. The article My Mentor violates no policies whatsoever. If editors want television episode articles improved, they should discuss the issue at WikiProject Television. I suggest they create WikiProjects for specific television shows instead of spending their time hiding articles by redirecting them. Sweeping the episode articles under a rug does not improve them and is actually an obstacle to improvement. --Pixelface (talk) 22:18, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by WAS 4.250

Misplaced Pages's popular culture articles constitutes the world's single most useful Popular Culture Encyclopedia and every year it gets better. The Misplaced Pages we are trying to create, as the sum of all knowledge, is the sum of all possible encyclopedias. Help that effort to make it an even better culture encyclopedia within the vast Misplaced Pages encyclopedia that contains all other encyclopedias. Don't try to destroy it. I suppose if some were editing Misplaced Pages in 2003, they would have put up the whole encyclopedia for deletion because at that time no article on Misplaced Pages was adequately sourced by today's standards. We don't delete an article just because it is not yet perfect. We should never never delete an article just because it lacks something, if what it does have is useful. An article that has an accurate plot is useful. Lacking other data makes it a kind of stub, needing additional material. It should eventually be more than that, but deleting useful articles because they are stubs by one measure or another is simply pulling up crops because they are only half grown. Where is the sense in that? WAS 4.250 (talk) 17:05, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by thedemonhog

I was not contacted by John because I have not once reverted a redirect or restore of an episode article, although I have been following these disputes. I do not really have an opinion on the matter and even if I did, my edits would probably be reverted by TTN or Pixelface. Obviously, the edit wars need to stop, which is easier said than done. One can say, "everyone, this is ridiculous so stop it", but which side should stop first? A decision must be made. Either the articles should be redirected or they should be restored; users should not just be told to work constructively amongst themselves.

Why do I not really care whether episode articles containing only plot summaries are kept or not? I know that in the long run, I will get the articles of the Lost WikiProject to good or featured atatus, which I have done before and suspect that this is why the articles have not already been redirected. There are also reasons for both sides' actions that I can understand. I recently participated in a couple Heroes WikiProject AfDs (1 2) and voted for redirection because they are notable (reviews and interviews from reliable sources for Heroes, even on specific episodes are not hard to find), but this has not been demonstrated in the article. If an article never demonstrates notability, but it can, is it notable? And there are so many stubs on Misplaced Pages, one would not think that it matters if something is a work in progress—which is explicitly stated in a guideline, although it is stated in another guideline to redirect "problem" episode articles. I do not know what the correct answers are, but hopefully I will soon. –thedemonhog talk • edits 02:50, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by SchmuckyTheCat

I'd re-iterate what WAS 4.250 says above. I'd also that I find the idea of "consensus" around deleting episode lists with tongue firmly in cheek. There are a fairly small number of editors that pay attention to the episode notability guidelines. They've written their guideline in a vacuum without input from people who actually write episode articles. They lord over it and hound away anyone who questions their interpretation. The number of people objecting to these deletions, over time, has far exceeded the people doing the deleting. Here is how it goes:

  1. A deleter comes along and redirects (which, for stubs, is a soft-delete) a series of articles from one show.
  2. An objector says "hey, what are you guys doing?" and gets hounded away: "See, this is what our policy says. Too bad you didn't speak up when we wrote it."
  3. Objector goes away, it's not worth fighting over with an entrenched clique.
  4. repeat.

Clearly, at any single moment, the deleters can claim numerical superiority - but only because the objectors have never shown up simultaneously. That's a pretty thin idea of consensus; because it isn't, it's an illusion and we describe that as tag team ownership.

There is nothing wrong with stubs about TV episodes. Any TV guide data shows when the show was on. The show website probably contains some amount of production information (show serial number, etc). The show itself is a fine source for a (non-interpretive) plot summary. Ta-da, instant stub. Those doing the deleting should stop, it's disruptive to the project and community harmony, they've done a poor job of understanding sourcing in their guideline and are stonewalling any attempts to modify it. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Statement by Eusebeus (talk)

I am indifferent as to whether this goes to arbitration again, although if it can offer fuirther elucidation it may be salutary. As the editor who initiated the recent redirects of Scrubs episodes and subsequently reverted Pixel's ill-advised attempts to restore them (which has provoked the latest tempest) I'll offer a brief commentary. When consensus changes with respect to TV episodes requiring substantial real-world impact as a basis for standalone articles, I'll gladly desist redirecting. But in this case, there has been plenty of discussion on the talk pages of the series in question and no basis for retention has been adduced for almost all the articles in question. This is a disruptive effort by a small and determined set of editors, steadfast in their conviction that Misplaced Pages policy can be trumped by the aggregation of committed interests and apparently blithe to the policies we have in place. That is shameful, given the clarity with which our policies indicate the standard that needs to be met. Misplaced Pages is an encyclopedia, not a fansite. These actions are wholly legitimated by the standards we have collectively derived. Eusebeus (talk) 05:30, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Black Kite

Bringing this back to ArbCom would appear to be the only way of reining in the disruptive editing which is occurring (and is not limited to one "side"). Episode articles are a tricky breed - there is every opportunity available for them to be made into viable articles that meet policy, but it is all too easy to create stubs which are plot summary and little else. Scrubs is a good example of this - for example compare My Musical - a perfectly good article - with My Mentor, which isn't. Other less notable TV series, however, have spawned numerous episode articles which are little more than plot summaries, and have little chance of being expanded past this state (example, another). In these situations redirecting to a summary page is without doubt the right decision. In my opinion if a number of editors who are spending large amounts of time attempting to wikilawyer their way round our policies (here, for example) would expend their time improving the articles to the standard of the one above, we wouldn't be here again. This is along the lines of the statement made by SirFozzie above, with which I concur.

Statement by Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles

Below is a chronological list of incidents reported regarding this matter, as well as some other relevant discussions, which provides a history (not analysis or opinion) of this debate and also includes the other aspect of this issue, i.e. fictional characters. Please feel free to expand this list if I left anything out, as I believe the below discussions will place the matter in context and provide a ready reference for any wishing to cite differences:

Statement by uninvolved Lawrence Cohen

Just specific to consensus matters, if there is such an epic stink being raised by people each time these episode articles are being redirected away, perhaps it may be safe to assume that consensus does not support these actions. Additionally, I'd ask the committee to look at the validity of consensus developed in "back corners" of Misplaced Pages, that many people may not be aware of. How many people actually came to the redirect consensus? 5? More than 5? Less than 10? More than 10? We don't count consensus by heads except in special major cases (Arbitration Elections, Board elections, side-wide issues like the Main Page vote, and the 3rr vote), but it would be worth looking at how many people, and who, made these consensus decisions to redirect the episode articles that are the root of all these fights. Was it a valid consensus? It may or may not have been, given how nasty this is. 22:25, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved editor Farix

I'm somewhat reluctant to comment on this matter given the divisiveness of the issue, but I will ask the Arbitration Committee to look into the edit warring engaged by editors on both sides. A secondary issue I like to see the ArbCom to look into is whether merging or redirecting articles is a form of deletion, a claim frequently made by the proponents of episode articles. Other issues that ArbCom may want to touch on are whether episode articles are immune to Misplaced Pages's policies, specifically WP:NOT#PLOT, WP:NOR, and WP:V requirement of at least one reliable third-party source, and the notability guidelines, if there a clear inheritance of notability from the series to the episodes that make up the series or do current policies and guidelines require episodes to establish notability independently of the series. And finally, does the presents of {{Infobox Television episode}}, plot notes, and quotes mean that the article no longer violates WP:NOT#PLOT. I also think that ArbCom needs to better define when discussions on merging episode articles are strongly encouraged and when discussions are not required. --Farix (Talk) 22:58, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved editor Judgesurreal777

The situation regarding disputes over Wikipedias fiction notability and television notability policies is getting out of hand. We have a fervent band of inclusionists who think that they can ignore wikipedia policies, and harass and intimidate other wikipedians. Having my userpage protected has been an eye-opening experience to the extent that people can, in many cases, successfully protect articles that are not in any way corresponding to wikipedia guidelines and policies without having anything to back it up with except "I like it". To yet AGAIN bring TTN here for of this is outrageous, and it should be recognized that those who would keep content on wikipedia must provide evidence of notability, not the other way around. It is also time to recognize teh vast incivility that is being perpetrated by inclusionists on wikipedia is not acceptable anymore than it is for "deletionists". Judgesurreal777 (talk) 23:54, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Masem

There are two issues here: a procedural/behavioral one and a content one. The former, well, I've not participated directly in TTN's edits, but there is something to be said about the proper editing procedure that needs to be employed if you notify or are notified that several articles are non-notable. As the notifier, how long to do you wait for a good faith effort towards improvement or any sort of response before merging, or how do you overcome a vocal majority of WP:ILIKEITs that don't cite policy or other consensus for keeping articles; as a notifee, what types of good faith steps can you make in improving an article. This is the issue many of the above have stated. However, clearer resolution on what should be expected by both sides of such article disputes (such as what I suggested) would be good as to provide better procedural steps to follow to help reduce such conflicts.

The bigger issue is the content one, and this is a larger point of contention which, as I understand, is likely not to be addressed by ArbCom. Specifically for episode articles, three questions are being asked:

  • Does an episode article with only a plot summary and an infobox with dates of airing satisfy policy and guidelines?
  • Is an episode article (notable or not) consider as part of the coverage of the series that it is in, in that regardless of notability, an episode article could be considered appropriate due to WP:SIZE and summary style writing approaches?

And a much larger issue (which goes beyond just articles but includes nearly all works of fiction):

  • Does Misplaced Pages is not imply, deny, or otherwise refer to the concept of "Misplaced Pages is not a fanguide" and in what way? (This might be too large an issue to be addressed here, but certainly can be seen in the number of AN/I and ArbCom cases coming up).

Unfortunately, I know that the ArbCom is not necessarily deciding issues on content. Unfortunately there, we have situations where there are a large number of both editors and readers that have come to or otherwise expect larger coverage of fictional topics (given PAPER and regardless of PLOT and NOTE (and subsequently FICT and EPISODE)), and a smaller number of editors that recognize that the level of coverage that the former group desires is, in many cases, incompatible with WP's current mission and policies. I've been leading a rewrite of WP:FICT for the last several months and know that there is a very fine line of a middle ground where we are finding a possible solution, but we have yet to find it. This may simply be a case where we editors just have to bear it out and figure out a proper consensus. --MASEM 23:08, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

  • To specifically clarify one point, how we deal with episode articles is a tip of the iceberg in terms of how we handle fictional content. The question Does WP:NOT imply, deny, or otherwise gives any advise towards the statement "WP is not a fanguide" has several implications:
  • Certainly with respect to WP:EPISODE but this also affects how WP:FICT is handled; this then leaves the question of, if fiction can be handled differently from generally notability guidelines, how do we show this?
  • In line with the typical job of a fanguide, does this or does this not allow for multiple non-free image uses in the discussion of elements of those works, particularly in lists of characters where the images are only providing visual reference
  • To what extent can we promote off-site wikis to transwiki such material to, in particular, given that some people have concerns on conflict-of-interest, Wikia and the Annex.
  • Is the coverage of in-universe details of fiction non-free use, and as such, has to have the same arguments for its use as we do for images and other media?
  • Again, I feel some of these are larger issues that do fall outside the scope of tv episodes, but some of these concerns should be addressed, if they are at all, during arbitration. --MASEM 15:25, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by AnteaterZot

I believe that at their core, all disputes are miscommunications. The people who create the articles for the episodes probably wonder, "Why are some people so against my documenting these episodes? Why are they so against my scholarship, my thoughtful analyses?" The people who dislike individual episode articles wonder, "Why do these people write these things? Why can't they understand that these articles are not appropriate?"

Why do some people dislike individual pages? Is it because they think pop culture is not worthy of scholarly consideration? Perhaps. Is it because they perceive such writings to be poor scholarship? Perhaps. Is it because they think that fans of the show are parasitizing the creativity of the writers and actors who created the show? Perhaps. In my case, I feel that anything, including TV shows, are worthy of scholarly consideration. I have read many a Misplaced Pages article that constitute poor scholarship, but that problem is not confined to TV shows (although more common there than in some fields). But poor scholarship is to be met with cleanup, right? Finally, I must admit that I do feel that there are editors who are feeding off of the creativity of the people who made the TV show. But I cannot fault them; everybody does that to some extent.

The urge to document anything is commendable. Scholarship is commendable. However, when scholars submit their writings for publication, they must undergo peer review. In my opinion, consolidating the episodes into list pages allows for better oversight (read: peer review). A Misplaced Pages user can get a better overview of the story arc on a list page than on dozens of individual pages. Certainly there are many cases where individual episodes should have their own page.

Scholars are supposed to cite correctly. When I find myself writing long stretches of text on a topic without including citations, I become uncomfortable. If I was unable to find any third party sources, I would eventually conclude that either I was incorrect about the importance of the topic, and/or that I was engaging in original research. Now, if I was sure the topic was important, and nobody else was doing a very good job of writing about it, I would stop giving it away for free on Misplaced Pages and write for academia and/or get an agent so I could get paid.

So what do we do? If this dispute is about a miscommunication, then we need to communicate better. Then we need to find points of agreement. And then we find a practical solution. I'm not sure if I have helped, but I felt I had to try. AnteaterZot (talk) 03:58, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Jack Merridew

Accept the case. This issue needs sorting and new blood on the AC may be beneficial. --Jack Merridew 13:28, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved editor Maniwar

I would like point out that this case is way above what is being discussed here. Please see this centralized discussion as well. There is currently this case, an admin noticeboard case, several RfC's, and various other discussions taking place. A solution needs to be had to fix this and all issues need to be looked at or this will never end and more arbcom, noticeboards, and RfCs will continue to be called. --Maniwar (talk) 16:27, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Carcharoth

It should be noted that the smerging of a long episode article (shortening and merging the article) can result in lots of text being edited away and made difficult to work on (not many people are aware that the previous text is still accessible in the page history of the redirect, for example). I think there are several ways for the community to resolve this without involving ArbCom. What is needed is a solution that satisfies people at both extremes. I propose the following (previously posted at ANI) as a starting point.

It is trivially easy to generate a list of the page revisions before all of TTN's redirects, and to put such a list of links to those old articles, either on an external website or on a WikiProject page or talk page. Linking to old versions from within an article itself would subvert the entire Misplaced Pages process, but it is technically possible, so something should be done to forbid putting links to old versions of other articles in current articles. For Open All Hours, try this list of episode articles I generated from looking at "what links here", and filtering for redirects and then grabbing the oldid numbers of the versions before the redirects:

I would suggest that in cases where lots of text is being smerged, that TTN (and others) leave such links in a central place, as a courtesy to editors who may wish to work on the removed material and provide sources. There are already talk page templates that call oldid numbers for featured articles - the same sort of thing could be done here. Would this be a workable compromise? The redirects would stick, but editors are pointed to older material to work from if they find sources. A similar principle applies at Category:Redirects with possibilities. Indeed, I would suggest that some template is used (if it doesn't already exist) to group the redirects into categories of: (a) Redirects from episode articles; and (b) Episodes of ABC. See Misplaced Pages:Categorizing redirects for more on how that works. Thus TTN (and others) would simply have to remember to put this template on any redirects they carry out, and they or others could create categories to hold the redirects, and lists (using oldids) to the episode articles in a "episodes with possibilities" page on the relevant WikiProject. People could then pick a particularly promising episode that they have several sources for, and work it up to a full article again. There are other ideas, but this one could, I think, help avoid the incessant drama, as it provides way for both sides to work together instead of revert warring. TTN and others would help ensure material with possibilities is not made too hard to find, and those wanting to work on episode articles would still have easy access to the text and a starting point for debates.

I know this proposal is not technically suitable for a request for arbitration, but I hope it helps to demonstrate that the community may be able to resolve this without a need for sanctions. Carcharoth (talk) 15:54, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Update: {{ER to list entry}} has been created and is starting to be used. I have notified User:TTN on his talk page. Other editors carrying out redirects should also be notified. Given that User:TTN has yet to take part in the ongoing discussions, I hope that the committee will note whether or not TTN and others modify their behaviour to use this template. This may provide a measure of how amenable the named parties are to changing their behaviour and/or participating in discussions, per the previous rulings. Carcharoth (talk) 14:25, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Further update: User:TTN has started using {{ER to list entry}}, and was already using {{R from merge}} (since when, I'm not sure). I am hopeful that this will improve things somewhat, as people can now more easily keep track of what has been redirected, and where work can be done to source notable episodes if needed. See Category:Episode redirects to lists for some examples of redirects placed in that category. Hopefully this will provide alternatives to the stale edit warring that was going on, and people can start to work on the notable episode articles again, while maintaining a record of the other episode articles. Carcharoth (talk) 11:17, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by geni

this edit summery by TTN dirrectly conflicts with the content of the article. TTN has repeatly reveted in spite of this fact. Since it would appear that TTN is no longer even skim reading the articles they redirect I belive that they need to be prevented from such activities in order to facilitate a negotated settlement.Geni 20:08, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Note by Black Kite

Earlier today, User:Tim Q. Wells unilaterally reverted every single Scrubs episode article so that they are now individual articles. I have thus added his name to this RFAR as an involved party. BLACKKITE 01:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

statement by uninvolved editor DGG (talk)

With respect to actions, BOLDly redirecting a large number of pages on a fiction episode topic is without prior discussion is an obviously controversial action, and I think it at least bad manners to do it without prior discussion. Once it has been done though, i can not see that to revert it is improper. At that point obviously, it has to be discussed until the people involved reach some sort of consensus or compromise. (Personally, I'd like to see us eliminate BRD altogether and require discussion before any major action or edit. I doubt there's consensus for this, but it might cut down on the workload for the arb com and AN/I)

With respect to the the underlying issue, I definitely have my own point of view (which is that appropriate length subarticles are almost always the way to go, recognizing that the earlier unencyclopedic over-long ones are every bit as inappropriate as a bare redirect or an uninformative sentence. ). But I can not see how to achieve any consensus on my view or any other on this topic. Certainly quoting policy is not the point, for policy can change, and the argument here is that some want to change the policy to accommodate the way they think WP should be. What do we do if we have half one way and half another, and neither will compromise? Even if it turns out 2/3 - 1/3 on a major issue, (in either direction--I do not pretend to know what everyone thinks) that's a very sizable minority--and if they wont agree to live with the other view I think too much of a minority to say there's consensus on a general matter of this importance. I dont know it is the business of arb com exactly to resolve something like this, so perhaps we should view this as an informal appeal to them to act as mediators to prevent conflict that will escalate until it needs their intervention. If they decline to do this, or put this issue back on the community, I guess someone will have to be clever enough to propose a workable compromise, or await a decision by attrition. DGG (talk) 23:48, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Note by Masem

I have created an RFC to try to open up the issue of what makes a TV episode notable to try to resolve the content aspect of this dispute without in the involvement of ArbCom, though there still may be need for their guidance if consensus cannot be reached. --MASEM 23:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Query by Radiant

I'm aware that the ArbCom doesn't decide content disputes. Although there are some conduct issues here, this would seem to be, at the core, a content dispute. Perhaps Misplaced Pages needs some new body of people to adjudicate content disputes? (or perhaps not, I can think of several pitfalls, but it can't hurt to think about it) >Radiant< 00:09, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved editor Maniwar

As I pointed out above, I initiated a central discussion in hopes of moving forward and coming up with a community solution. I would encourage this RfA to look specifically at TTN's actions because while many of the parties involved stopped redirecting and reverting to try and come up with a solution and take part in the discussion, TTN and a few others have ignored the discussion and been engaged in mass redirecting and total avoidance of trying to come to some community solution. This represents the sheer disregard and the attitude he has carried all along. Additionally, I would like to point out that much of the talk is that articles are deleted or merged or redirected because they have no sources or or 3rd party support. However, as TTN's history will point out, and as another user indicated above, many of the articles have substantial sourced support, yet they they are still wiped out. The actions of the editors must also be scrutinized in this case. I realize that some percussions may come back on me, however, if it benefits the community, I'm open to it. 00:56, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

Four votes to accept noted. Daniel (talk) 10:25, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

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

  • Accept to look at the conduct of all, and if possible, to provide some kind of basic perspective regarding the principles being disputed over. Not only follow-up of a previous case, but unlikely to be resolved by anything less, short of "blunt instrument" use of admin tools. It was hoped that general encouragement to work together at a solution would help last time, but it seems it was insufficient. The consensus related norms which might have helped, seem to have gone unheeded. We can try to do better here, I think. FT2  13:09, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
  • I have felt this issue needed additional remedies for some time but I had hoped that it could be done through a motion in the existing case (which closed as recently as 28 December). Perhaps the easiest way would be to reopen that case, but the issue needs to be addressed. Sam Blacketer (talk) 10:01, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Accept. -- FayssalF - 20:34, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Accept to look at editor conduct issues that are preventing collaborative, consensus building discussions. FloNight (talk) 21:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Austrian economics

Initiated by Zenwhat (talk) at 15:11, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Involved parties


Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

(Still in the process of notifying them.) Zenwhat (talk) 15:20, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Request noted. Skomorokh 15:29, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
All parties have been notified. Just in the process of posting diffs here to confirm it. Zenwhat (talk) 16:01, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

The request involves a block, substantial edit-warring (across several pages -- not merely those discussed in this basic summary), a rejected page-protect, and wheel-warring. This claim is demonstratably false. Coccyx isn't an admin and the appropriate block log is here and no wheel-warring appears to have been attempted. A mistake on my part, apologies. Zenwhat (talk) 16:03, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

All parties have been notified.

Zenwhat (talk) 19:25, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Zenwhat

It has been noted before that trolls are sometimes capable of winning successful edit-wars through sockpuppetry and having admins which support them block editors for intellectual reasons. This case appears to be such an example.

In this case, at my request (and anyone is free to reject my request) I would like the arbitrators to make the following assumptions about policy to be made explicit:

  • That there be roughly no assumptions be made at all in the case of evaluating my statements
  • No personal attacks against me or the accused (I'm saying this to be explicit -- not for admins, but for non-admins involved)
  • Invocations of past offenses are potential signs of bad faith, but not proof of guilt
  • The burden of proof rest with me to prove my case
  • That Assume good faith applies especially upon the accused because of the presumption of innocence
  • That, despite the current wording of Misplaced Pages policy, it be firmly recognized that User:AuburnPilot and others accused have an individual inalienable right to edit Misplaced Pages because of its core policy: A free encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Per Misplaced Pages is not a democracy, this freedom may not be arbitrarily taken away by the majority.

It is not my intent to abuse wikipedian bureaucracy to remove editors I don't like. With that said, the evidence surrounding this case may be found here: User:Zenwhat/Evidence

I have no specific requests at this time, but would like the community and ArbCom itself to decide how this matter ought to be handled. Because of the likelihood that it will come to light and an "attempt to vanish" before putting forth an ArbCom proposal would seem deceptive, I now disclose: User:Nathyn is my previous account, I did likely make some contentious, silly edits, including vandalism when I was far younger. However, overall, my edits were constructive Actually, a quick review of my contributions shows that all of my contributions under my previous account were good. It appears I only vandalized a few times while logged out, with no actual proof of it, and my claims about past behavior are unverifiable, and thus put forth strictly on a voluntary basis Zenwhat (talk) 16:12, 13 January 2008 (UTC), I have never engaged in sockpuppetry.

I have included User:Sarsaparilla in this case, because this overall problem -- and the possibility of her being the sockpuppet of one of the above users, see here. Karmaisking has been included because he is a well-known sockpuppet, so it's certainly acceptable that he be included in this investigation.

Statement by User:AuburnPilot

I'm not sure why I'm named as an involved party here, as my only involvement has been to block Zenwhat for edit warring and a clear cut violation of the three revert rule on the Austrian School article (diffs: ). Zenwhat was warned by several editors, including myself, before he reverted the 5th time and received a standard 24 hour block. My involvement is negligible, and I have no intentions of joining an arbitration case related to a single 3RR block. I would, however, encourage Zenwhat to familiarize himself with policy; especially WP:CIVIL, WP:3RR, and WP:NPOV. - auburnpilot talk 15:35, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Additionally, I'm also not sure why Zenwhat names me specifically in his claim that everyone has a right to edit Misplaced Pages, but I firmly disagree with that assessment. Nobody has a right to edit Misplaced Pages; it is a privilege that can be revoked at anytime. - auburnpilot talk 15:39, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by east718

I am uninvolved aside from a declined protection request and this alert. Mountain. Molehill. east.718 at 16:07, January 13, 2008

East718, I don't have much to say in your case other than that your page-protect was clearly unjustified, when I asked you to reconsider your position you made statements that contradicted policy word-for-word. When I pointed this out, you were rude and told me to go away.
In the case of Auburn, he\she is blatantly a POV-pusher. How exactly a WP:SPA can get admin privileges -- I am absolutely curious. The list of names above is the list of people "relevant" to this case -- that doesn't necessarily only include people that directly edited such articles. This case is specifically about Austrian economics, but it is also more generally about the vandalism on Austrian economics, which is why I also invoked User:Sarsaparilla in the original discussion, though she herself has not edited Austrian economics. Zenwhat (talk) 16:20, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Coccyx Bloccyx

Uhh, can someone please explain how and why I'm a party to this case? I can see that is is going to be rejected, but I'd like to know all the same. Thanks. Coccyx Bloccyx (talk) 20:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

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

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

Asian fetish

Initiated by user:Tkguy at 08:28, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Involved parties

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Crotalus horridus diff Cool Hand Luke diff Saranghae honey diff

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried
  • Due to the fact that this personal attack involved links to an Asian forum that I've participate in, I felt the need to protect my identity and my postings on the forum from public scrutiny. I decided against RFC not only because it attracts too much public attention but also because the last time this was done on this article diff this brought User:Cool Hand Luke, one of the involved parties, to the article. So around 1/4/2008 I tried to contact an admin I could trust. So I used the wikipedia email feature and emailed User:Neil. I didn't receive a response so I left Neil a note on his talk page that I sent an email. I still haven't receive a response.
  • I then emailed user:East718 and left a note on his talk page.user:East718 at first claim that I wanted him to get involved with the dispute on Asian fetish. I wrote back that I was asking for help with regards to personal attacks on the Asian fetish talk page. I then stated that I would submit and arbitration request since none of the admin wanted to help me. He then replied that he didn't have the time to help me and that he was sorry and offered to refer somebody else.
  • I emailed user:Royalguard11 on 1/5/2008 and left a note on his talk page. He replied back that since he was the protecting admin (the page is currently locked by him due to edit waring) he can't get involved in debates. I pointed out that I was not asking him to get involved and that I needed help with personal attacks. He then wrote back that he had trouble finding the personal attack links in my email. I replied that the links was in my first email to him. Apparently his response was put on the Asian fetish talk page and he acknowledges the personal attack but indicates that I am causing the problem for threatening to open an arbitration.
  • Posted on the Asian fetish talk page that I would submit an arbitration request if the Personal attacks were not removed and a apology was not made.
  • Posted a message on user:Crotalus horridus's talk page for him to remove his personal attack on me and that I would start an arbitration process if it was not done so.
  • Posted a message on user:Cool Hand Luke's talk page for him to remove his personal attack on me and that I would start an arbitration process if it was not done so.
    • user:Cool Hand Luke, an admin, didn't delete the comments, instead marked it. This is similiar to his actions when I was previously attacked by user:Kintetsubuffalo by being called a "pedantic little creep". I called him out on this personal attack but then user:Cool Hand Luke rather than deleting this comment, he marked the comment and labeled it "Incivility, apparently from both sides. Comment on the content, not the contributers". I didn't respond to the personal attacks on Asian fetish that is the focus of this WP:RFAR, because I knew there would be a high risk of being labeled "uncivil".
  • Posted a message on user:Saranghae honey's talk page for him or her to remove his or her personal attack on me and that I would start an arbitration process if it was not done so.
  • I deleted the personal attacks off the talk:Asian fetish page diff. Tkguy (talk) 08:40, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Tkguy

I was personally attacked and stalked by editors on Asian fetish. I hope that the arbitration board will punish these people and roll back their comments on talk:Asian fetish. The Asian fetish page is under protection due to edit warring. The involved party here intend to add significant changes as inferred below, without obtaining consensus diff. I would like the page to remain protected until after this arbitration has been completed.

Recently the seemingly perpetual edit waring took a very negative turn on this article. Rather than researching Asian fetish, user:Crotalus horridus chosed to research me with the passion of a stalker. Soon afterwards user:Cool Hand Luke and user:Saranghae honey did the same. Here user:Crotalus horridus posted on the talk:Asian fetish, directions on how to "research" me diff and discovered that I posted to an asian forum. He then proceeded to create a section on the talk:Asian fetish titled "==More about Tkguy==" and poplated it with links to some of the posts I've made 1st & 2nd 3rd. Of course it does not matter what I think or believe so long as I abide by wikipedia's rules. Here is the entire portion of the talk page with the personal attacks. user:Crotalus horridus labelled me as a racist by writing the following:

“ Tkguy is simply a racist POV-pusher and it's time he was driven off this page. ”

User:Saranghae honey supported user:Crotalus horridus actions by adding to this section with his or her own research on me here and here and is obviously working with user:Crotalus horridus in that he or she created a copy of Asian fetish here, while it is still under protection to circumvent obtaining community consensus. This was done at the advice of user:Crotalus horridus, diff. Saranghae honey's invitation to Crotalus horridus to update a copy of Asian fetish. Cool Hand Luke's approval of Saranghae honey's circumvention of gaining consensus.

User:Cool Hand Luke, an admin, encouraged more personal attacks by contributing to this section. He suggested that I should be blocked from editting diff.Then made the following comment diff: He then posted two links (first one, second one) to posts I've made on the forum. He wrote that this was wrong and then does this not once but TWICE!

This section ends with user:Crotalus horridus and User:Saranghae honey discussing about how it's ok to track what I am doing on wikipedia and arrogantly have this discussion on the Asian fetish tallk page diff.

I hope that the people will look past the emotions that the topic of Asian fetish invokes and see that I was personally attacked, bullied and stalked and will not let such actions go unpunished. And I am hoping that the board members will understand that the kind of actions these people are taking are consistent with the kind of editing and commenting they have been making on this article. Tkguy (talk) 08:41, 13 January 2008 (UTC)


  • Response to Admin board regarding involved parties' and Phoenix-wiki comments: Please note that all accusations being made against me are not being substantiated here and are possibly being used to draw attention away from the issue of me being personally attacked. I already provided proof that an admin is aware that comments made to me were inappropriate, Royalguard11's acknowledgement that an inappropriate comment was made against Tkguy. Even User:Cool Hand Luke acknowledged that researching me was not appropriate and then does it himself. And then he marks the section under "WP:CIVIL—remember, comment on the content, not the contributer". But I can't see how this is can be accepted as behaving in a "responsible manner, as expected of an administrator" after he made significant entries encouraging this kind of behavior. Tkguy (talk) 19:03, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Response to Newyorkbrad: I am confused by your suggestion can you please clarify what "appropriate involvement of administrators" means? I already noted that I went to 3 admins for help. One ignored my request for help. The second told me to look elsewhere. The third told me that the problem is with me telling others that I will initiate an arbitration. Also note that User:Cool Hand Luke is an admin and is an involved party. So 4 admins will not help me resolve this personal attack issue. And the last time we on the page did RfC User:Cool Hand Luke came to the page and user:Crotalus horridus came back after taking a long hiatus from editing this article.Tkguy (talk) 19:03, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Response to Saranghae honey: So you create a sandbox to avoid community input and you accuse me of pushing a POV? And you initiated the 4th failed AfD for Asian fetish AfD. Can you please substantiate your allegations that I am trying to push a POV? Seriously you keep accusing me of that but never ever provided actual proof. As for the stalking issue and personal attacks. Why are you trying to make it out like I am focused on your Sandbox and your discussion that it's ok to check my edits on the talk:Asian fetish? I pointed these things out to show that you are clearly working with user:Crotalus horridus and User:Cool Hand Luke. You clearly support user:Crotalus horridus personal attacks on me and his stalking of me off wikipedia. Tkguy (talk) 04:29, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Response to Crossmr: I recommend all to read the content of User:Crossmr link. Be aware much of the references in it that user:Crotalus horridus makes to edits that I've made were some of the first editing I've done on wikipedia. As I am still, even now, new to all this. Even though I believe I explain very well the situation of the edit wars on the page. But still this arbitration is once again regarding PERSONAL ATTACKS ON ME that were not being dealt with. Tkguy (talk) 04:29, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Response to Cool Hand Luke: Typically, I believe, disparaging remarks should be rolled back from the pages. You had the opportunity to do this twice but did not. Since you made your own personal attacks on me and posted links to the asian forums on the talk page, I don't think you can say that this issue is moot. Tkguy (talk) 04:29, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Response to Crotalus horridus: Can you please stay on topic? This is regarding your personal attacks on me. You make all these accusations and not one link to substantiate them. And I want all to know that you submitted the 3rd failed AfD for Asian fetish AfD. As for my brush with the 3rr rule, well that was when I first started editing and two individuals, user:Kaitenbushi and user:Christopher Mann McKay tricked me into violating the rule. The admin realized this and reverted my block and blocked one of the other two, user:Kaitenbushi for violating the 3rr rule. They then blocked user:Christopher Mann McKay because apparently he voliated the 3rr rule on yet another page and was rewarded an extra long 48 hour block for his work on tricking me. Most of the story right here. Tkguy (talk) 04:29, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Crotalus horridus

User:Tkguy is a disruptive single-purpose account who exclusively edits articles related to Asiaphilia, Asian fetish, and related issues. By his own admission, he has an "obsession with proving the prevalence of asiaphilia." He has shown himself consistently unable to follow our policies on neutral point of view and verifiability. The Asian fetish article has been protected twice recently, when the only real edit-warring was being instigated by Tkguy. Everyone else but him was discussing issues appropriately on the article talk page. Tkguy also has a very unclear understanding of Misplaced Pages policy on various other matters. He was blocked for violating the three-revert rule a while back, and unblocked early on the grounds that he didn't know about the rule. Above, he continues to show poor understanding by implying that there is something wrong about creating a sandbox in user space to continue to work on an article while it is protected. Nothing in Misplaced Pages policy or practice supports that contention.

It should be noted that Tkguy's forum posts show up very high on a Google search for his nickname. It's not as if I did any deep digging here. If he wished to retain anonymity, he could have chosen any other nickname he wanted.

No, it doesn't matter what Tkguy thinks as long as he abides by Misplaced Pages rules. But WP:NPOV and WP:V are two of our most important rules, and he has shown a repeated inability to follow them.

I urge Tkguy to withdraw this arbitration request. *** Crotalus *** 08:51, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Saranghae honey (talk · contribs)

Tkguy made no attempt at dispute resolution. If there was one, the proper consequence should have stopped Tkguy's edit warring and aggressive POV pushing at Asian fetish. He indeed is a single purpose account that has done little editing outside Asian fetish and Asiaphilia. Other editors worked cooperatively and even disagreed constructively except for Tkguy who ignored several Misplaced Pages policies including WP:CIVIL. I lost my patience towards him long, long ago for a good reason.

Tkguy has no understanding of Misplaced Pages policies which led to a post at AN/I which has lengthy yet only a partial list of Tkguy's hostile conduct to users who disagree with him. Crotalus Horridus did no deep digging when he googled "Tkguy." It's actually the second page that shows his activities outside of Misplaced Pages. I was not sure if I could comment on his activities outside of Misplaced Pages, but how can I not pretend to see what was posted on the talk page of Asian fetish? I was indeed astonished by his comments outside of Misplaced Pages.

Tkguy attacks me for making a sandbox. What's wrong with that? Again, Tkguy has no understanding of Misplaced Pages policies. Not having to follow manual of style or a consensus is the purpose of having a sandbox while I did invite feedback from several editors. Tkguy needs to understand Misplaced Pages:About the Sandbox. The part of his complaint also revolves around spying or stalking. Looking at "user contributions" of a POV-pusher is not spying or stalking not to mention that he only edits two articles. Editing the only two articles that he happens to edit is not stalking. миражinred (speak, my child...) 21:00, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Cool Hand Luke (talk · contribs)

User is a manifest SPA.

I placed the incivility under a hat, which I find to be useful in discouraging future incivility. I didn't remove the comments, but neither did Tkguy, although I advised him he should feel free to remove remarks he felt were personal attacks. Eventually he did remove them, and no editor added them back to the talk page. This dispute is therefore moot. No other dispute resolution was attempted besides.

However, if Tkguy continues to edit war on the article once it's unlocked, I will press for RfC and/or community sanction. Cool Hand Luke 23:21, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

New ANI thread: Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Proposed community topic ban for User:Tkguy on Asian fetish Cool Hand Luke 08:12, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Phoenix-wiki (talk · contribs)

As far as I can see Cool Hand Luke (talk · contribs · uploads) acted in a responsible manner, as expected of an administrator. The "Tkguy" section of the talk page does not look like a personal attack, though I can see how one would be upset by it — Tkguy is refered to as a single purpose account. Cool Hand Luke simply said:

Yep. SPA. User seems to be promoting a line of original research postulating that Asian American suicides, among other social ills, are caused by the Asian fetish. This is not a forum for original research. Moreover, user liberally accuses other editors of vandalism in support of racism. I encourage this user—and all users—to avoid personal attacks and original research. Cool Hand Luke 21:07, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

That's just a warning not to post original research or make personal attacks. He also acted sensibly on most other sections of the talk page.--Phoenix-wiki 15:12, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

  • I can't believe you changed my arbitration request from "Unfettered Personal Attacks, Bullying, and Stalking on Asian fetish" to "Asian fetish". Tkguy (talk) 00:50, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
He's quite correct to. Evidence speaks for itself here. Case names simply identify cases, they don't specify the conduct issues of the dispute, nor do they 'explain' the nature of the dispute or specify possible feelings about it. FT2  13:38, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by partially involved Crossmr (talk · contribs)

I don't have much to add, but feel this link is relevant to the issue here Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive347#User:Tkguy_at_Asian_fetish.--Crossmr (talk) 23:57, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

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

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

Rollback consensus

Initiated by Doc at 00:45, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Involved parties

Everyone here

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Statement by Doc

Non admin rollback is a perenial debate, for which there is a long-standing failure to gain an community consensus. A poll Misplaced Pages:Requests for rollback privileges/Poll was held over many months from January 2006, and having closed at 216 support to 108 oppose (exactly 2:1) was deemed to be without consensus. Another poll Misplaced Pages:Non-administrator rollback/Poll was opened by proponents of the idea on December 30th 2007. This poll (advertised on AN and ANI and Central discussions) was marked as due to close on January 6th. I discover it on January 4th - and with 48 hours to run - it had only attracted 60 votes, and was deemed to be "succeeding" with c. 49/11. Concerned over the propriety of a short snap poll over the holidays, I tried to persuade the initiators to extend it for a few weeks, when they refused, I took a lot of flack for "spamming" the official mailing list with my concerns. After that it was added to the site notices. The poll, however, was closed on 7/8th January (8 days) with 304 support and 151 oppose (exactly the same % as 2006 - nothing had moved).

Following the second poll, the feature was implemented by a developer on 9 January 2008 as noted at Template:Bug. - Since then, a new process Misplaced Pages:Requests for rollback has been initiated - and rollback widely granted. I understood that developers were only to turn on functions for wikimedia communities where there was a settled local consensus. As can be seen from the bug report, Ryan Postlethwaite presented 67% as representing an en.wp "consensus" and a dev accepted this (perhaps there were other conversations). Although consensus is more than numbers, this was the same non-consenus ration as have been stable for two years, and we don't even promote admins on 66% never mind begin a whole new policy and process - so how it can be presented and accepted as local consensus is beyond me. Every precedent has required more support that this. And the result is heated debate and a general feeling of community consensus having been manipulated by people determined to get their way.

Rollback is in itself no big deal. However, giving the power to 1400 admins to giveth and taketh away, gives alarming potential for disputes drama and the growth of process, rules and instruction creep. we have seen enough of all of these in 25 hours. Thus this impacts hugely on the project and is a potential sink hole for admin time. So we must not do this lightly on six day polls and a developer's bad judgement.

As this has been done outside of the community's process, there is no remedy other than arbcom or the WMF board. Arbcom does not make policy. The community does that. But the community cannot agree, at this point, whether there is a consensus for this new policy or not. Arbcom's role is to be a mediator where the community cannot agree. Arbcom should NOT decide whether rollback is bad or good. But I am asking them, however, to arbitrate the community dispute as to whether there exists a settled consensus.

Jimbo has already indicated that arbcom do have a roll here: "ArbCom will discuss and vote on the result, and make a formal request to the Wikimedia Foundation about whether it should be turned on or not, and to establish the policy.... ArbCom will of course most likely follow the vote of the community, but I will not require them to do so. They should serve as a "check and balance" in the event something strange happens here, or in case the discussion shows a way forward that the vote itself does not accurately represent.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 21:24, 10 January 2008 (UTC)"

I asking Arbcom to do something less than Jimbo has done. I am asking them merely to arbitrate the dispute as to whether consensus exists.

--Doc 00:45, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Addition

Jimbo has said "I recommend that people basically do nothing at all here, i.e. please don't go awarding this ability to lots of people in an effort to create "facts on the ground" about how it is used." Unfortunately, that's too late. Within minutes (or hours if my time zones are wrong - but I don't think so) of a dev responding to Ryan Postlethwaith's plea that there was community consensus (2008-01-09 22:53:17 UTC), the other initiator Majorly, moved, a ready-made process out of Ryan's userspace into action 2008-01-09 23:05 and declared it "switched on" - a site bar header invited applicants to the page shortly after.--Doc 02:36, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Question Two arbs are saying that the community should decide this. However, the community DID. We polled (badly and manipulatively) and reached no consensus = status quo remains. A developed overrode our conventions and declared this to be mandate to proceed. What is the redress if not arbcom? How is the community to address this when a large chunk are content that they've got their way - and there cannot be a consensus to reverse it? Do I personally go and lobby a developer to turn it off? I really cannot see how we move forward from here. Discussion will end with the same lack of consensus and the normal lack of consensus option (=do nothing) has been overridden.--Doc 09:20, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I withdraw from this case. The Christmas holiday coup d'etat has been unprecedentely successful in forcing through a major change without consensus. All credit to them - I'd probably have tried the same if I'd wanted something as badly and had as little chance of getting legitimate agreement. But, now we effectively have a new status-quo in this crazy process - and I predict we'll rue the day. However, that's what we've got, and the chances of the community obtaining a *genuine* consensus, which could change this status-quo, are as nil as they always have been. Jimbo's haverings about the WMF board and a new poll make no sense to me, and arbcom are not going to involve themselves in any difficult substantive issues. Maybe they will wag a finger at Ryan Postlewaith at al (a nice, manageable, user conduct issue for them) but what good would that do? Consensus lost here, and that's sad. But, as the victors have repeatedly and rightly implied, the rest of us had best shut up and get over it.--Doc 14:03, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Carcharoth

From what I saw of what happened here, this was largely a poorly-timed (over Christmas) and poorly-planned (no exit strategy) poll. My feeling is that the breakdown in communication occurred when Ryan posted in the bugzilla thread that he personally saw consensus and asked the developers to have a look and judge for themselves ("The poll has now closed with 304 supports and around 150 opposes. I'd say that's consensus, but please take a look."). It seems that the developer then switched the feature on for en-wiki (I believe the feature was already implemented globally with a default 'off' setting and was actually ready to go, unlike last time). However, a little bit of digging and reading around the talk pages would have shown that things were not yet clear. But judging a borderline or otherwise uncertain consensus should not be the role of developers. What should have happened instead was for uninvolved en-wiki bureaucrats to be asked to judge the consensus, and for the result of that judgment to be posted at the bugzilla thread. Ideally, the bureaucrats would have been asked to 'clerk' the poll beforehand, so they could remain uninvolved if needed. I will add that the en-wiki community (writing the English-language encyclopedia) and the community of developers (writing the software) and sysadmins (integrating the software changes) need to make clearer to each other how they communicate on issues like this. Carcharoth (talk) 01:19, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

  • Response to Gurch (and Nick and Acalamari and anyone else worrying that this is about shutting the process down): The title of the request specifically mentions consensus. I agree with you that for better or for worse we have non-admin rollback, and that it is bedding in quite well, and there is no need to talk about disabling or suspending it. The point here is to find out what should have happened in order to settle the consensus issue, and learn lessons for next time a change like this is proposed (eg. how to improve communications). Carcharoth (talk) 02:07, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Response to Sean William: Thanks for pointing out Ned Scott's draft RfArb. The latest version before he blanked it is here. I agree with what Ned has said concerning issues of user behaviour, and would encourage him to post the statement he was drafting. Carcharoth (talk) 02:44, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Note to self: Other examples of technical processes being implemented, with and without drama. The "Table" namespace. The New Pages patrolled feature. Anonymous page creation disabled (and the nearly-implemented proposal to switch it back on).

Statement by Ultraexactzz

I agree that the questions raised by Doc are significant, and worthy of the Committee's consideration. Where is consensus? Is it a certain percentage? Or, to borrow a metaphor, is it whoever shouts the loudest? I know that every technical change is not approved, or even discussed, by the community - but when are the developers bound to seek (and follow) consensus, and how are their decisions reviewed if they go against consensus? I would argue that, in this case, the Arbcom is the appropriate venue.

I also note for the record that the admins who put together and operate the process at Requests for Rollback have made what appears to be a good faith effort to implement a process for which there was some disagreement. The approval of any number of editors (myself included) to receive rollback tools isn't, in my view, an attempt to short-circuit consensus, but rather an attempt to fairly and reasonably implement a new process. The issues of this case should be limited to the events surrounding the activation of the developer's change, including the process for determining consensus beforehand, and whether such consensus existed (or exists).

-- UltraExactZZ ~ Evidence 01:26, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Gurch

Just when I thought discussion was dying down, Jimbo decided to intervene and now this came up. There is very definitely a community consensus to grant rollback in some form or other, all that is being debated is the workings of the process. The current process is not perfect, of course, but no process is. I think the amount that was achieved in 24 hours was remarkable, especically given that it was achieved despite the bickering of many contributors who did not like the way in which it was implemented. Sure, it could have been introduced a lot more smoothly. But we've got this far... can we please not screw up now? Requests for rollback have already died down after an initial surge. There are already long-establised rules governing the use of rollback that can simply be carried over from administrators; the only thing to settle is the process itself. We as a community can tweak and get consensus for the working of the process in good time on our own, we do not need a committee to babysit us. If the Arbitration Committee decided now to disbale use of the rollback tool, that would in all probablilty be the last time any non-administrator ever saw it. For the good of the project, this really, really isn't a good idea – Gurch 01:42, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Marlith

The implementation of rollback hit us without anyone knowing about it. I also agree with Gurch on thsi topic. Just as we finished the initial voting we went forth to a short period of discussion about the definition of consensus. Hours later, we discover that it was implemented quite quietly. The problem that caused so much controversy is the vague definition of consensus. Could it be the dictionary definition? Does it mean that one side has more logical and convinicing arguements like this? This controversy has escalated to the point where only the ArbCom can decide. Personally, I believe that RfR should be tweaked into an RfA like process instead of the RFPP like process we have now to prevent users from misusing the tool. Or if we have intelligent discussion the community can come to an agreement. Although rollback allows users to be bitey, I would like to remember that rollback can be taken away from disruptive users and it is also a very good anti vandalisim tool. Also I have seen much bad faith in the arguments against rollback, the problems lie with the users, not with the proposals or everyone who has rollback. Thank you. Marlith /C 01:54, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

A modest proposal by Durova

This just isn't worth the fuss. I respectfully request that the developer who implemented this un-implement it temporarily while the community decides whether/what type of implementation is appropriate, that ArbCom dismiss this case, and that people put their energies into something useful. Durova 02:17, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Halo

I agree with Carcharoth - it was largely a breakdown of communication between the en-Wiki process and the developers. I, for one, firmly believe there wasn't consensus for this change.

In future, there needs to be a better way to decide whether a policy has passed or not, avoiding replying on developer discretion wherever possible simply to make life easier for everyone - the suggestion by Jimbo Wales on Misplaced Pages:AN#Arbcom to let the ArbCom have the final decision on these sorts of polls and communicate this to developers seems like the best idea going forward. A way of preventing ambiguity over poll results and consensus should be the most important thing to come out of this process - if nothing else than to prevent discouraging developers from making active changes to Misplaced Pages lest they be controversial, and to prevent future controversial decisions.

However, I can't help but think Ryan Postlethwaite, the original author of WP:RFR, did his very best to muddy the waters and tried to cause as much confusion as possible to push through the policy by implying that there was consensus on Bugzilla bug 12534 while not showing his conflict of interest (or that his opinions on consensus differ from many) and advertising on MediaWiki:watchlist-details prematurely.

Rolling out WP:RFR at the first possible time irrespective of the fact that the policy wasn't ready causing confusion with policy made up on the spot was a bad idea. I believe that these sorts of actions should be strongly discouraged in future, and changes such as this should be done in a more considered manner - even if something is technically possible and enabled that doesn't mean it should be rushed into. -Halo (talk) 02:11, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Nick

I welcome and strongly support the comments made by Gurch. I would also ask that the Arbitration Committee clarify their powers in relation to technical features. Whilst not strictly relevant, I note that some Arbitrators have been appointed following the recent elections with a level of support comparable to the level of support for the Rollback proposal (both in terms of votes and in terms of percentages). Arbitrators with such a level of support enjoy a clear mandate, and I believe this should also be the case with the Rollback proposal, as such, I cannot do anything but ask the Arbitration Committee to reject the full case, permit users to be given the Rollback permission and direct the community to create suitable policy to govern the process as it has been implemented. Nick (talk) 02:15, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by MBK004

I received rollback through the process on 10 January. I echo the concerns of Gurch, and urge that a consensus be determined between the administrators granting rollback as suggested by Nick. Regardless, of what is decided, my main concern is what is to happen to the editors who have received rollback if the process is halted. I agree that the process is flawed, and have no doubts that many disagree with how the process was implemented in the first place. I commend the admins who have tried to work in good faith to implement a process to effectively judge if an editor should be given this tool. If the decision is made to stop this process of granting rollback to non-administrators, I would advocate that the editors who already have it (approximately 350+), be allowed to keep the tool, with the knowledge that their actions would be closely monitored, in order to judge if the concerns of the community in the aforementioned polls to determine community consensus have merit or not. This is because the unannounced (to those who have not kept up with the recent events following this process) removal of the tool to the 350+ users with it screams of assuming bad faith in the editors who have rollback. - -MBK004 02:20, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Alexfusco5

I was an original opposer of this proposal before it was implemented. Now that I have seen how he process is operating my concerns have been addressed. Many of the oppose votes (my included) opposed because of unneeded bureaucracy or dislike of the process. I believe that a new policy needs to be made behind the new feature to assure that the policy has consensus. As was seen by the poll many people supported the idea but opposed the way it worked (i.e. should be carried out bureaucrats, twinkle does the same thing etc.). The solution would probably be to draft a new rollback policy that has consensus from the community (unless the policy was supposed to be implemented by majority) Alexfusco 02:29, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Mercury

Everything Gurch said above.

Statement by Sean William

This situation was handled poorly on every level. Once the developers activated the feature, the process immediately began - causing utter chaos. I tried to protect the page so that some discussion could be had, but it was only protected for about 40 minutes when John Reaves unprotected it as "not needed". I feel that it absolutely was needed, and still is. The parties list could be narrowed down easily to a few key players; Ned Scott already tried to do it in a sandbox of his (User:Ned Scott/sandbox4, old revision). Sean William @ 02:30, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Acalamari

I also agree with what Gurch said. As one of the most frequent participants at requests for rollback, I can say that everything has been going fine there, and problems, if/when they have arisen at the place, have been discussed and sorted out. I don't see any reason to close the process down, and I don't see what an arbitration case will achieve apart from waste a load of time for many people. Acalamari 02:46, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Cobi

I have to echo Gurch, Nick, and MBK004 as well. Furthermore, ClueBot has seen a major performance boost since it was granted rollback. Regardless of the outcome of this request for arbitration, my main concern is those who have received rollback. Especially the anti-vandal bots, because all rollback is for the bots is a more efficient way to do the exact same thing that they do already. I have not seen any misuse of rollback since it has been granted, and to remove it would go clearly against our fundamental principle about assuming good faith. -- Cobi 02:51, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ashley Y

From this case I hope to see an improvement of the process by which technical changes are made to the site. I note, for instance, that WP:PWD "passed" by 51 to 22, smaller numbers and proportionally less discussion no doubt due to not being linked on watchlists, yet was not implemented.

People get upset not because things don't happen to go their way, but when they feel the generally agreed rules and customs of the site are not being applied fairly. Upsetting people tends to damage the encyclopedia, but a clear process can mitigate that. —Ashley Y 02:58, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment to Ashley Y

Regarding WP:PWD, it was not implemented due to lack of discussion. The rollback proposal, on the other hand has had tons of it. Majorly (talk) 03:05, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Lawrence Cohen

Oh, enough already: Misplaced Pages:Requests for rollback/Vote. Lawrence Cohen 03:04, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Update Please accept this case. An extreme minority has taken to supercede consensus now even on the vote, and have edit warred it out of Misplaced Pages, primarily administrators. Take this case, please. Please review: this and reconsider. This situation is hopeless, if some ultra minority of admins is going to drive an edit war to even take away the community's voice to decide such things like this, and kill an in-process vote that Jimbo called for. Lawrence Cohen 14:26, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ryan Postlethwaite

I’m not sure really what to say about this, we had what many could consider an RfC on the subject, a proposal and then a vote on the proposal which two thirds of the community said they wanted. What was my role in this? Well, I created the proposal which was discussed, then I created a final proposal which was put to a community vote. After around 450 people had voted on this, someone closed the poll citing discussion (I had nothing to do with the closure of the poll, I unwatchlisted it soon after it was created and I think it was closed by someone who opposed the proposal). A couple of days later, Corvus cornix cited a bug request that had been put forward by an uninvolved party (Note: This was visible to all parties on the talk page of the poll) and I simply responded on the bug, citing that I personally thought there was consensus but asked the developers to take a look at the poll). I had previously created Misplaced Pages:Requests for rollback and userfied it just in case it was implemented. I was as shocked as anyone when I saw it had been moved out of my userspace and the first request was already up. I think it would have been better for us to have had a few days (at least) warning before implementation so we could have got our policy and procedures up to scratch to stop any resulting mess happening, but this didn’t happen. I hindsight, I think everyones done a fantastic job developing this into a non bureaucratic procedure as we’ve worked in real time to sort out some real problems we had when it first started last night. As with all procedures here, they need time to develop, and I really can’t see how there’ve been any major problems with it so far. This was in no way ideal, we should have had warning, but we’ve made the best of a bad situation, and what the majority of the community wanted. Over the next few weeks I expect us to develop further and unless there’s problems (which no-one has yet been able to cite), I can’t see any real need to change things. Ryan Postlethwaite 03:14, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Mr.Z-man

I too agree with what Gurch says. At this point, most of the drama seems to just be for the sake of drama. Instead of continuing to argue about whether there was a consensus that the poll had a consensus, we should evaluate what has already been done. Is rollback being misused by non-admins on a significant scale (or at all)? Is the lack of a fully agreed upon system actually causing problems (other than people complaining about the lack of a process)? I've been mostly avoiding the discussion on the admins' noticeboard, but have instead been focusing on the discussion and process at WP:RFR and WT:RFR. For all the shouting and panicking elsewhere about how not having a pre-existing policy would be and is a disaster, it seems to be running fairly smoothly. There have been bumps, but for a totally new system, that is to be expected and work at the RFR talk page based on the experiences of people taking part in and observing the actual process is producing helpful results and minimal drama. Would having a fully agreed upon process before this was implemented have helped? Probably. Is it necessary? No. For one, except for important content policies, rules are supposed to be descriptive. How do we describe something that doesn't exist? Was is a total disaster? No, even without rules, people used (*gasp*) common sense and started to form rules based on how things were working. Even if we created rules before it started, unless we got really lucky, we probably would have ended up rewriting most of them once the process started. I'm reminded of when patrolled edits for Special:Newpages was activated (not quite as significant a change, but still quite noticeable). There was minimal on-wiki discussion beforehand, no RFC, no proposal, no straw poll, just a short discussion on the Village Pump. When it was turned on, I drafted up a quick set of rules based on my thoughts and some previous discussion (both public and off-wiki), people agreed with most, asked questions and commented on the talk page, and after a few bumps at the start (some due to it being misconfigured) it proceeded with minimal drama. Even without rules written beforehand and pages of discussion, it went quite well. I imagine that given a few days to iron out some issues, this will go well also. Mr.Z-man 03:48, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Justin

I want to emphasize a major point here. There are mixed opinions about whether or not WP:RFR is working, and those above me have commented on the various good and bad points. That being said, the real question here is not whether the tool is effective, or if the feature is a good or bad, but whether or not the implementation was made with consensus. I strongly disagree with User:Cobi that removing this tool is a violation of WP:AGF, if it's found that enabling the feature was without consensus in the first place. At this juncture, I believe full protecting WP:RFR and allowing a true consensus to form is the appropriate course of action. I see no reason to remove access to the tool, for those already granted access, unless the community decides to remove it entirely from non-admins (which I sincerely doubt will happen). As an aside, while I did vote in Lawrence Cohen's poll above, I don't think a "straight poll" is going to be any less contentious than the present situation. Justin 03:18, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Withdrawn. Apparently a suggestion by the board chair, was enough for involved admins to make a final decision. This rather contentious debate exemplifies everything that is wrong with Misplaced Pages, and ArbCom's refusal illustrates why it won't get fixed. Justin 02:43, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:TenOfAllTrades

The poll has a number of troubling aspects. Most have been enumerated above, so I will sketch them only briefly here.

  • The poll was open for a very short period of time; I count less than nine days from first to last vote.
  • The proposal on which people were voting changed substantially over the course of the voting period: .
  • Even if 67% is taken to be a consensus that non-admin rollback ought to be made available, there appear to be wildly disparate opinions on when and to whom rollback should be granted.

For comparison, I remind the Committee of the last major policy that depended on a vote to assess consensus: the three-revert rule. In that case there was as widely publicized poll, a clear question, and a full two weeks of voting: Misplaced Pages:Three revert rule enforcement. The 3RR was passed with the support of 85% of the participants in the vote.

Obviously the cat is out of the bag. The configuration that allows admins to grant and revoke rollback has gone live. There's no point to antagonizing the developers by asking them to pull the plug; it's not their fault that we've done a poor job of keeping our house in order. Indeed, I suspect that it will be beneficial to the project to have more (responsible) people with access to rollback. What might be a good idea – and what is a matter that I would very much like to see the Committee consider – is a temporary injunction.

I strongly urge the ArbCom to declare a moratorium on granting rollback bits until the enwiki community can develop something like a stable policy on when and to whom rollback is granted. In the last days, I've seen a great deal of argument and very little agreement on a number of issues.

  • Should rollback be granted via private email requests, or only through a public process page?
  • How long should the community be allowed to consider or comment on a public request? (Times from fifteen minutes to twenty-four hours have been proposed; rollback requests have been granted within four minutes of their appearance on WP:RFR.)
  • Who decides if an editor should have rollback? I've seen one admin refuse a request, only to be immediately overruled by another without any comment or discussion.
  • How is rollback withdrawn?
  • How are requests logged? Should only successful/unsuccessful requests be recorded? If private requests are permitted, should they be logged to prevent 'admin shopping'?

Right now the de facto policy is being decided not through consensus but by whichever admins decide to deliberate for the shortest amount of time and act with the least prior discussion. Presented with a fait accompli, there is a natural reluctance on the part of dissenting editors to risk the perception of wheel warring. This is not a good way to develop policy. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 04:19, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Husond

I was very surprised to witness the blitzkrieg implementation of the non-admin rollback proposal. I'm really not convinced that there was a consensus for this change in the first place (it was way too borderline, and one should bear in mind that the support camp naturally attracted many users who, instead of pondering the pros and cons, simply supported because of their own benefit of getting the rollback tool). Anyway, even if we are to determine the outcome as consensual, I think that the amount of opposition should at least justify a slow and very well discussed implementation of non-admin rollback. Which just didn't happen. It was a disappointing process and bad omen for further proposals. Húsönd 04:35, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by KnowledgeOfSelf

While ArbCom does not make policy, and this RfAb is out of the realm of what ArbCom normally handles, I do believe this is a special case that requires a firm adjudicature from some type of authority. It is very unlikely that true consensus could be reached on this issue. without a firm conclusion from such an entity as ArbCom. With that being said, the issue here is not Special:Userrights, it is not the request page either. The issue is the blatant disregard of established practice and community understanding and application of consensus.

Policy or guideline pages should never be implemented in such a scant time period. The fact that a dev enabled this feature does not mean that it was accepted by the community. When I first became aware that requests for rollback were being given I stated, "This sets a substandard precedent, and completely undermines established practice. Consensus is not counting the votes, it is not 2-1, and it is not this."

The real grievance here is the disregard shown to community consensus. A prime example is the issuing of rollback to anti-vandal bots, based on this discussion which lasted just a couple days. Consensus can change, but not in 2 days or 2 weeks for a feature that can cause a ripple effect of this magnitude. I urge ArbCom to accept this case, and be a facilitator of calmness and reason to this very serious issue. KnowledgeOfSelf | talk 04:35, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I've struck parts of my statement, as they really do not apply anymore. For the most part the stricken comments have already been decided/handled. KnowledgeOfSelf | talk 00:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:B

This is silly. Around 300 people have requested rollback in the time since it went live. Presumably they like the idea of it. 2/3 of the community approved the policy in this form. Of the 1/3 that didn't like it, many of the objections were either flat out wrong (e.g. worrying about admins taking rollback away from each other) or were objections that would also apply to tools like WP:TWINKLE (in other words, no new problems). If someone has a better implementation than the current system, then propose it, but there is nothing good that can come from arbcom reviewing this. --B (talk) 04:54, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Mbisanz

Well it seems that most if not all of the points of this discussion have been covered. The one thing I'd like to add, is that I personally disagree with the concept of developers judging consensus of userights issues. Meta says "This position was created to dissociate rights management from software development ." While developers must, by nature, flick the switch, a steward or at least a crat should have been the judge of consensus to notify the developers. Thats not to say that any users here acted in bad faith or improperly (or even that the decision to turn it on was wrong), just that in order to avoid the possible appearance of impropriety on anyone's part, a steward or a crat should have made the call publically on the vote (like an RfA or AfD) and then notified the developers, however that is normally done. MBisanz 06:27, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I'd also note that while all parties who contributed to the original discussion are listed as parties, this RfArb has only been mentioned on AN/I and the 2 Rollback related pages. If accepted I'd strongly urge a bot-notification of everyone who signed the discussion/vote page. MBisanz 16:12, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by EconomicsGuy

I understand that this was initiated based on Jimbo's comments about this so no blame to the initiator but Jimbo is way off here. We don't need ArbCom or even Jimbo for that matter to figure this out. What we need is for everyone to stop seeing ghosts and get back to writing the encyclopedia. It's rollback - it's not delete or block. This love of process is a gigantic waste of time and needs to end now. EconomicsGuy (talk) 07:37, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Okay I'm getting more worried now. Given how this is going and the fact that the only thing we can agree on is an image of a white cat on the polling page I think we may have to ask ArbCom to act as mediators. Not policy makers, but mediators because clearly we are incapable of doing this ourselves. EconomicsGuy (talk) 13:56, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Also, may I just point out to Flonight who accepted this that the current list of involved parties per this request includes some 450 people not counting those who have become involved since? I think the best solution here would be for a group of arbitrators to act as neutral mediators. EconomicsGuy (talk) 14:00, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Withdrawn. Apparently pointless now that there is a ban of at least 3 months on voting about this. I don't know where that was decided but apparently it was. So much for transparency. EconomicsGuy (talk) 22:44, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ned Scott

This might sound odd coming from me, since about 24 hours ago I was drafting a proposal for a case, but I'm not sure about taking this to arbcom anymore. Maybe yes, maybe no, but I've been thinking a lot about this in the last day.

It's not a big deal in that it's not life or death, but people need to stop being mean to people who were upset by this. Same goes the other way around, when it applies. It's not ok for people to label such editors as being disruptive, because they have a concern, because they want to talk about it. We should avoid needless drama, but that does not mean rejecting anything that might generate some drama as a byproduct.

The situation should have been dealt with better. We should have waited before promoting users. It didn't happen, and for what it's worth, the world did not explode. Still, we need a way of stopping such stampedes in the future. A lot of people thought it was ok to just jump right on in, and there was no way for someone to put it on hold without being brushed off as being "disruptive".

Still, the way everyone responded, on both sides, was somewhat.. expected/ reasonable, consideration the situations, and how people normally react to such situations (at least for Misplaced Pages). But I'm still sorry this turned out to be somewhat of a mess. I'm sorry I got mad and that other people got mad. I'm glad that rollback granting itself have gone fairly smoothly despite all this. I feel bad for some of the things I said and did, and I feel bad that situations like this can put some users at odds with other users. I feel bad that this seems unfair to everyone involved in many ways (though there are certain things that could have easily improved the situation).

I find myself agreeing with both Doc glasgow and Ryan Postlethwaite in a lot of what they say on this page. And a lot of other users too. I don't know, and it's almost 5 am and I'm tired. I don't know if I should just walk away from this whole issue, or try to help us improve things for the next time we have a similar issue. I don't even know if I would be of any help, but I'd like to be of some help if I can.

I like just about all of you on this project. I really like our project and I really like working with everyone. Valid concerns or not, for when I was a bonehead, I hope people can forgive me, and I hope I can remember to do the same for others. -- Ned Scott 12:01, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Second statement by Ned Scott

Yesterday when I posted my view I went directly to the request for arb page, fell asleep, woke back up, finished what I was writing, and went back to sleep. It's now been another 15 hours since then, and I'm still trying to fully catch up with everything that has happened in the last 40 hours.

I wish there was a way to be mad-at/address something without having it become a big commotion, but that's just kind of the nature of Misplaced Pages. In all honesty, I can't find it in me to be really upset about this anymore. It's not that I should or shouldn't be, but just.. I have a lot of stuff to do, both in real life and on wiki.

The most embarrassing part of this is my own misconception on the rollback feature. I had played a hand in this issue getting all hyped up, and I made an extreme rookie mistake. Had I understood rollback correctly, I would have actually supported it. That's not to say that I wouldn't have had any objections to the resulting situation, but.. lets just say I want to crawl into a little hole. When I realized that my main concern wasn't even related, I blanked my arbcom draft, cursing my apparent addiction to Misplaced Pages, which had prevented me from watching many awesome giant robot fights that I had planned to view on that day. Sure, I had only myself to blame, but the nature of these things, and how we normally deal with them on Misplaced Pages puts a lot of us at a disadvantage (in comparison to real-life situations/disputes).

When I first opposed the proposal I figured that it would still pass, and that if it really was a bad idea that we'd find out, and would be able to deal with it at that time. I understand that this has made a second issue, unrelated to the feature itself, but even about that I can't say that I'm that concerned. I think we'll be able to handle it, but it's hard, by the very nature of Misplaced Pages, to do so in a way that doesn't put us at ends with each other.

We should be more worried about that than the disputes themselves.

We need to figure out how to prevent misconceptions, ways to aid proper perspective, and ways to do this when we're dealing with large groups of people making the decision, using a text based method of communication, where we can shoot first and ask questions later, and where our instincts often betray us. Misplaced Pages's community is at a sort of critical mass (for a lack of better words), and this is evidence of that. -- Ned Scott 03:30, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Hiding

There are issues here that need to be examined. WP:CONSENSUS is a fundamental policy and should not be disregarded. When a consensus is disputed that dispute should be settled through dispute resolution, not ignoring the dispute. More than that, there is also a strong statement of principle by Jimmy that Any changes to the software must be gradual and reversible. We need to make sure that any changes contribute positively to the community, as ultimately determined by me, in full consultation with the community consensus. Did we have a full consultation? Were all issues aired properly? Was dispute resolution followed? Was WP:CONSENSUS, the most fundamental resolution policy, followed? Hiding T 12:39, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

  • Further. I just also want to say this. I asked Ryan how to contact the devs and at no point did he mention the bug page. I wanted to point out that whilst there may be consensus that there should be some form of rollback granting, it may be that the current proposal was not the best implementation and that the community needed time to work out the best method. The current method stinks of instruction creep, and it may be that the community could have decided that no granting of the ability to amend user rights needed to be granted to admins. We may have decided that blocking could have been the method to deal with abuses of rollback and that rollback could have been granted to all accounts or to accounts with x amount of edits. There really has been a huge swathe of discussion curtailed here and behaviour does need to be examined at some level. I'm not suggesting Ryan deliberately misled me, but I think the fact that he didn't mention it to me perhaps undercuts his statement somewhat and thus part of the reason for Sam's decline to hear this. If it was an honest oversight, fair enough, but it just feels like enough people were asking for more discussion, for proponents to slow down. It felt like proponents were dismissing that as attempts to kill the issue by filibustering, something that breaches AGF if you ask me. It felt like contrasting opinions were being disregarded by those who wished this to be implemented. Hiding T 18:20, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Withdrawn per statement to that effect from Anthere. Hiding T 22:39, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Slakr

This is my first arb post ever, so please excuse me if it's too lengthy/not addressing the right things/etc, as I normally avoid these kinds of things. :P

I think there are several issues in play here:

  • This is a permanent change — I think the pivotal issue here is the fact that we're deciding on something that is going to be a de facto permanent change, but it's been treated with wild disrespect and incorrect protocol for a serious policy change. Sure, we can say that “oh, we can just open another vote to have it removed,” but practically-speaking, even if there was wide abuse, there won't be a snowball's chance in hell of prying +rollbacker from the public's cold, dead hands.
  • +rollbacker isn't and won't be easy to remove in cases of abuse — One of the original arguments for adding it in the first place was that it would be easy to remove if it were to be abused. We've already seen that, in only the first few days of the ability being added and granted, people have allegedly abused it. But, when it comes to removing said permission, there tends to be strong favor toward readding it quickly. Whether that will be the case in the future is uncertain, but this doesn't particularly bode well for occurring within only a couple of days of the permission being live. But, because it's a logged permissions change, it it certain to draw the wrath of those involved should they perceive injustice in any form; and, it goes without saying that any negative permissions entries, including +rollbacker, will be a scarlet letter in RfA and other issues of character.
  • There have been very bizarre, confusing, atypical, and overall strange occurrences/incidents during the discussion and !voting processes — particularly:
    • Blanking votes here and here is troubling. People who would otherwise think they have casted their vote may not know it/they got wiped away until it's too late. This is extremely troubling, and I don't believe that User:Random832 meant anything by it, but in any vote where that happens, I believe that the poll should immediately closed, the issue dropped, and then reopened a couple weeks later once everyone is back on the same page.
    • Non-neutral images in the header as of this revision is also troubling. There are reasons there aren't pictures strewn about polling booths, and psychological priming has a lot to do with it. Also, notice the caption: “Do you already has rollback?” Which, in my opinion, directly prompts action resembling rally-like behavior.
    • Tacking on bots to a discussion about users and the subsequent hard-closing discussion after only 3 days of being active with atypical reasoning “I'm closing this, because it's already been acted on” ??? I could be wrong, but someone being BOLD in giving bots +rollbacker does not constitute consensus— especially after only 3 days of discussion (presumably because someone assumed it was a vote, which, in that particular case should be highly frowned upon because it involves technical issues that actually do need discussion).
    • A developer ticket being opened unilaterally before consensus was established to enable non-admin rollback. Judging by precedent of Misplaced Pages:Per-article blocking, if even 84% percent !vote support isn't accepted as clear consensus, then a figure of, around 68% definitely shouldn't be either.
    • During the discussion and straw poll, this and prior revisions had unsourced, OR, opinionated rebuttals to opposition placed well before the poll itself in a highly visible location. As a result, it is likely that people who came to the discussion with opposition were dissuaded from voicing and/or agreeing with fellow opposers, while those who arrived to support were merely reinforced in their support. Granted, this is speculation on my part, but it wouldn't be fair to do the same thing in a polling booth during an election, so I wouldn't expect it to be done here.
    • Inadvertent canvassing using Template:Watchlist — I say inadvertent, because posting a watchlist message to registered users is an issue of conflict of interest, much like posting a rally to a non-notable forum up for deletion is also a conflict of interest. My reasoning here is that there is a fundamental net gain from any editor supporting the ability to receive +rollback who isn't an admin already. As a result, people who wouldn't even be interested in policy changes in the first place or even know what rollback is are suddenly called to action, thereby artificially inflating the vote count, stimulating a false dichotomy, and reaffirming why polls are evil.


In my opinion, I do not believe that any resultant vote will be fully reflective of either consensus or numbers due to the various misconducts in the process itself. I understand that I opposed the change in the first place, but I must affirm that despite that opposition, I'm not here to try to fight against consensus or anything, as might be inferred. Anyone who knows/investigates my history will know I'll always gladly defer to consensus, but in this case, I do not believe that we will have an accurate gauge of consensus for the time being.

I'm not blaming anyone, as they seem to be done in good faith and/or as humor and/or to alleviate confusion; but, in any election/poll, controlling for bias is critical, and when the result might not reflect the true state of things, we need to decide if a recount is necessary, and what preventative measures need to be taken to assure that all procedural elements are lucid.

My opinion? I believe the entire thing should be scrapped'n'archived, waitlisted for about a month, then re-opened for discussion/vote/whatever— only in the interests of letting the dust and confusion settle so that everyone is back on the same page. From there, if a vote, discussion, or whatever is desired, then it should be done and a neutral, uninvolved group should decide what the consensus actually is; because, right now, this whole thing has turned into a zoo— and I'm not using the metaphor lightly. --slakr 14:45, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by GlassCobra

Like Slakr above me, I have been involved with ArbCom only marginally before now; please forgive me if I’m off-topic. However, I feel too strongly about this to sit on the sidelines.

I am disappointed. So far, two three of our newly elected arbs have decided to reject this case to send it back to the community, when clearly the community is incapable of deciding on its own in this matter; as EconomicsGuy has said, the only thing we can seem to agree on is having a picture of a cat on the vote page, as the vote itself has been blanked several times, and now protected before I could vote. The Arbitration Committee is not suited to the job of deciding on whether policy changes should be implemented; however, in this case, the policy change was implemented without consensus from the community. Even Jimbo seems to want to pawn this off onto someone else. I confess being a little disappointed in Doc glasgow, whose previous statement, before he struck it out, seemed to be along the same lines as my thoughts here. This is not something to merely roll over and take.

To be blunt: this is unacceptable. As much respect as I have for Ryan Postlethwaite, he seems to have some serious misguidings about what exactly consensus is. Consensus is not about straight numbers, not about who gets the most votes, and it certainly is not "who shouts the loudest." This is the premise by which he has declared victory, so to speak, and he is wrong. Ned Scott made some good points in his statement a few above mine; not only were the self-proclaimed "winners" of the rollback proposal being arrogant and rude, they were completely and utterly dismissive of anyone attempting to voice opposition, even as the feature was being implemented; see B’s post above as an example. From the very beginning, this proposal has had problems. As we all know, this is not the first time that non-admin rollback has been discussed. It was clear from the previous discussion that this was not something that could be simply voted on, and especially not in the six days that the proposal went before the proponents declared victory. As some will know, there’s been quite an uproar on the mailing list. So not only was there no consensus for this feature, there was absolutely no discussion on how it should be managed. I urge everyone to go and look at WT:RFR right now and witness the chaos currently underway; everyone voicing their opinions as to how people should be granted rollback, and we have indeed seen the beginnings of some wheel warring over permissions, as predicted. In the meantime, while the bickering continues, editors are being granted this tool left and right, with unknown ramifications. Like TenOfAllTrades and Durova, I strongly urge the ArbCom to declare a moratorium on granting this privilege until the community can develop a stable policy on when and to whom rollback is granted.

I don’t really feel that this proposal is all that much of a good one. If people like Marlith feel that this should be more like an RfA, why not just send these candidates to RfA? These are obviously good, quality editors, otherwise we wouldn’t be granting them rollback (right?). Perhaps a large influx of candidates will help the RfA process to be less of a big deal, as it has become. God knows we can always use more admins to help out around here. To sum up: like Ned Scott, I respect all of you. Like I said on my RfA back in November, these conflicts are absolutely inherent and unavoidable when such a large number of people come from so many different backgrounds to work on something together. I hope we can all work together to arrive at a solution that best serves the project. GlassCobra 15:42, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Sm8900

Sorry, I don't have any knowledgable details about the very important issue of how the discussion was handled. However, I do agree with all editors above who express any misgivngs about acceptance of and implementation of rollback. who needs it? what does it add, and how does it benefit anyone? but anything with such deep implications for Misplaced Pages needs to be looked at very, very carefully. --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 16:00, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Blue Tie

I don't believe I saw this vote and I cannot help but wonder why this is a big issue. Why do we need to have this tool? Why does it matter if we do have it? But, if the vote was not handled right and consensus not followed then it should be reversed. So in essence I am in agreement with SM8900--Blue Tie (talk) 17:37, 11 January 2008 (UTC)


Statement by Jossi

What da...? A poll? When? Where was it announced? Developer's implementation on the basis of a poll that ended 304 Support, 151 Opposed calling it consensus? Something is very wrong in Gotham city. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 16:59, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Request for Injunction

I support the current Arbitrators who are opting to decline a case on this issue, I agree their involvement is premature. I think this is something the community ought to try working out first. However, judging by the discussion on AN/I and the absurd edit warring at Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_rollback/Vote I would like to request an injunction from ArbCom to frame the proceedings.

My idea is an injunction defining where and for how long discussion ought to proceed. It's unusual, true, but it looks like most of the fighting is over the weight of past discussions and allow new discussion to proceed. So I would suggest defining a discussion period of at least one week, to be restricted to one page at or below Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_rollback. Following this, an open poll to last at least two weeks, also located in the same area. I wouldn't suggest any further definition of the discussion or polling, merely state that at the end of that time ArbCom would issue a statement either recognizing a consensus (for or against) or reopening discussions. Also at that time, ArbCom can reevaluate the need for them to referee the discussions further.

I feel an injunction like this would go a long way to calming the current drama, and refocusing energies into something constructive. --InkSplotch (talk) 17:28, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Tariqabjotu

Frivolous. -- tariqabjotu 20:41, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Grandmasterka

'Frivolous' doesn't begin to describe it. Grandmasterka 08:56, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

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

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

  • Decline, and (whether the current view is consensus or not) refer it back to community, to choose an approach to generate (or check) a consensus-based decision on the rollback facility. FT2  03:33, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Detailed reasons.
Should Arbcom hear it?

Setting aside the view of Jimbo Wales (see below), and the question whether the Committee can hear the matter (it can: 1/ policy; 2/ "unusually contentious between admins", 3/ interpersonal dispute, 4/ conduct), there are good general reasons not to.

  1. In this case there is a good chance the community will be able to resolve it, itself. Where possible Arbcom should not decide matters over the community's head, but all of us should use the opportunities to better gain understanding of consensus decision-making. This is properly a matter for the community to decide (less controversially?), and Arbcom to then ratify and formally request to the devs as a communal decision. (We may look separately at the mechanics of how it got activated, for future - presumably there should have been formal confirmation or no change?)
  2. Arbcom should set a bar for accepting cases. Arbitration policy stipulates that serious consensus building/dispute resolution (as applicable) should have usually been tried first. There's reasons for that, one of which is that ultimately it is more beneficial that the community (ie users in general) makes decisions; Arbcom is not an executive body and should only reluctantly accept a role beyond "last resort for editorial/conduct disputes" (and then only minimally). It is easy to take on new powers, roles and tasks for the best of motives, but my judgement is it would also be for the long term detriment of the community if the Committee moved in the direction of being seen as "solver of all problems". It's too easy for people to become used to passing problems to some perceived authority. The ethos of the Misplaced Pages approach is that all users in general solve them co-operatively rather than having some group "do it for us". The community is the authority here. If at all possible, the community should be aided to move beyond its own impasses and thereby become more capable. A strong collaborative community is wanted. To underline that the community is indeed capable, a fair number of other cases passed upwards later end up (once the drama is settled) as being addressed communally anyway, proving the community is more than capable and didn't really need arbcom to step in, much of the time (Attack sites NPA edit, WP:SRNC, etc). My personal view.
  3. Given further discussion and serious approaches to consensus-seeking (see WP:SRNC for what a 'serious approach' might mean), the only other contentious matter here is trouts all round for the unnecessarily contentiousness. AGF and disagree that hearing such a case would be worth the time taken away from content writing and other activity.
  4. Jimbo Wales posted that there should be a community poll and votes, followed by Arbcom discussion with a view to ratifying the outcome and draft policy. He did not say "go to Arbcom immediately". For the reasons above, I'm in agreement with that broad view.
  5. Consensus can change. The software facility isn't going anywhere. If we don't agree now, we can re-discuss in 6 months or a year. When the community wishes it, it'll happen. So "no consensus" is not troublesome.
  6. There is unlikely to be harm given rediscussion. Approvals are mostly going to be obviously sensible users, rollback abuse is easy to fix and the switch can be removed. Communally consider a moratorium or 24-48 hour approval time for the while.
Summary and decline

In this case, there is disagreement whether consensus exists. If it does, then a re-test of consensus will affirm it. If not then a retest will be needed to develop consensus. In neither case is the community served by the Committee taking the testing of that view out of the hands of the community at large. Whatever we were to say, there would be loud voices that it was incorrect/improper. This isn't Florida 2000 and Misplaced Pages works by consensus; my view is if unsure, recheck. Hence decline.

If I were to be asked to sum it up, I'd say something like this:-

The "non-admin rollback debate" is better discussed in the hands of the community, even if contentious. Consensus sometimes takes work and is gained by overcoming divisions; this is a part of our agreed approach. I feel it's best to return the matter back to the community, and encourage and recommend RFC or some way to genuinely decide what consensus would look like, and how to test it, to supersede the contentious decision-making to date. The community may wish to make a decision concerning granting of rollback in the interim. Although this matter would be within the Committee's purview if it chose, I would strongly decline to take it on, as it is in every way best dealt with as a communal policy decision.

FT2  03:33, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

  • Decline. FT2 speaks well here. ArbCom can explicitly ratify the community's consensus once that is established; we do so all the time implicitly every time we use a community policy in a case. But I'm not sure why we should, regardless of Jimbo's request; if the decision is a really bad decision, we're not going to be the only ones or the first ones to notice it, and the community's request to the Foundation would hopefully be rejected anyway; and if the decision is a good decision, ArbCom's imprimature is hardly going to make it a better decision (unless there's something odd I don't know about the Foundation's deliberation processes.) If the community likes the idea of ArbCom being some sort of conduit for the rare policy request to the Foundation, I suppose we could do that, but I'm not sure why it should be necessary. I do think the declaration of "consensus" to the developers bears examination, but that's about it. --jpgordon 08:30, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Accept to examine user conduct issues related to civility and prematurely declaring consensus in an important issue that effects the entire community. FloNight (talk) 11:43, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Decline per FT2. In other circumstances a case based on misconduct through misrepresentation of consensus to a developer might have been worth taking but Ryan Postlethwaite's statement makes it clear that there was no misconduct on his part. Sam Blacketer (talk) 16:43, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Obiter dicta
Remarks generally on 'policy' cases and consensus

The Arbitration committee is not suited to the job of deciding on whether policy changes should be implemented. It seems to me that, with such a diverse community, it is becoming harder and harder to find consensus for anything other than the most obvious change, and this is why there is a dispute over whether to go ahead, and who judges whether consensus has actually been demonstrated. I incline to the view that it is usually obvious whether a consensus has emerged, so that, if there is a dispute about it, then we almost certainly do not have a consensus.

If the community is unhappy at decision-making by consensus, then would a consensus emerge on another way? Sam Blacketer (talk) 16:43, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

  • I could accept this case for the sake of providing a foundation for similar potential cases in the future (the way of handeling it). I could reject this case on the basis that the 'process' is already in place and running somehow well, though not in a complete status; which is normal under all the circumstances presented in this case. I could recuse myself since, acting as a regular user, i had suggested here a page's full protection until the process is put in place so to avoid drama, edit warring as well as some other points i mentioned at the RFR's talk page. However, i will be reduced to comment only... I have to point out that the major concern here is not about the new feature itself but about the misunderstanding (good-faith mishandling would be probably the best term to describe the situation) of one of our core policies (i.e. WP:CONSENSUS). To settle this case, i would advise the community to revise the process of how consensus is established (in case it is possible in this case). Some say that the process is 'not' important. No, it is important, otherwise we won't need policies and guidelines, administrators and the ArbCom. There is a need to remind everyone (especially involved admins) that Misplaced Pages is not an anarchy. Which is not really important is bureaucracy. My personal opinion on the feature itself? None. As pointed out above by some of my fellow arbitrators; the ball is at your camp. In other words, my only BIG concern here is how consensus is interpreted and implemented. I don't blame any user for being 'quick'/'bold' but i'd highly suggest that important decisions about new features/processes should take enough time to decide upon. One of the advantages of that would be saving time while preserving the smooth running of this project. Probably, a simple and quick consultation with the ArbCom, Jimbo and the developpers would have been the best option; not for them to set a standard or a policy but a cool advice on how to manage the process smoothly. But well, we are already here and hope everyone thinks about ways preventing drama before it occurs in the future. Thanks everyone. -- FayssalF - 14:33, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Reject. Though I agree with Flo that there is potential behavioural concerns to examine, I think the parties involved have learnt their lessons by now. I don't see it as beneficial to the community at large to accept a case on this now. James F. (talk) 20:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Appeals and requests for clarification

Place appeals and requests for clarification on matters related to past Arbitration cases in this section. If the case is ongoing, please use the relevant talk page. Requests for enforcement of past cases should be made at Arbitration enforcement. Requests to clarify general Arbitration matters should be made on the Talk page. Place new requests at the top.


Appeal against notice to ban for incivility by user Mrg3105

The action was taken under the premise of:
General restriction

11) Any editor working on topics related to Eastern Europe, broadly defined, may be made subject to an editing restriction at the discretion of any uninvolved administrator. The restriction shall specify that, should the editor make any edits which are judged by an administrator to be uncivil, personal attacks, or assumptions of bad faith, he may be blocked for the duration specified in the enforcement ruling below. Before the restriction shall come into effect for a particular editor, that editor shall be given an official notice of it with a link to this decision.

I would like to appeal against this action and the finding of my incivility based on the following points:

1. My incivility was never explicitly stated by the administrator who imposed it despite a request to do so. Another administrator (Thatcher) simply suggesting the need for Dispute resolution, without considering that a 'request to move' is a form of dispute resolution.

2. Under some circumstances incivility is justified such as when the Misplaced Pages user is found to be using methods of argument during a discussion which are easily likened to abuse of logic, lying or propaganda, all of which contradict Misplaced Pages NPOV policy. The ruling is therefore largely the administrator's POV who may be unaware of the behaviour of the other party.

3. In order for the 'personal attack' to be personal, a person needs to be explicitly named. Since no such person was named in the cited evidence against me, the attack could only have been directed at the line of argument offered by the opposers of the 'proposal to move', which was in part lacking in supporting evidence, and therefore deceptive. In fact the proposition that I directed a personal attack contradicts my personal values that "one talks about ideas and not people"

4. If I am accused of assumptions of bad faith, then I submit that the action of the other party was in fact the precursor of the 'request for move' as a means of remedies in equity due to my inability to assume good faith given the action of renaming the article in the first place, which, without discussion, was tantamount to negation of good faith as per Misplaced Pages's policy that "Bad faith editing can include deliberate disruption just to prove a point, playing games with policies, and vandalism". In this case the points being attempted to be proven are that: a) the article is focused on places in the event name and not on the historical event itself, and b) that Romanian and European Union naming policy over-rides that of WP:UE, WP:MILMOS#NAME, and WP:ROR, for which I can find no evidence in Misplaced Pages policy.

5. That in any case, I could not be warned under the Digwuren enforcement as an "editor working on topics related to Eastern Europe" since the article is intended to be an NPOV description of of a military operation by an armed force which at one time could be claimed to have been present in Europe, Asia, Africa, the Pacific Ocean and the Arctic. It is not a topic related to Eastern Europe despite being situated in Eastern Europe in the same way that all discussion of Architecture will inevitably include Eastern Europe. This would require similar enforcements to be enacted every time any editor chose to document operations by the Soviet Army in any of these global regions should anyone fund them controversial, or any topic that might include Eastern Europe, which is a large majority of Misplaced Pages content.

I look forward to my user name being cleared of these accusations.

Thank you --mrg3105mrg3105 00:28, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Anyeverybody/Anynobody and Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/COFS

From the start it's important to understand that I am here to contribute, I can't boast WP:FA after WP:FA since the subjects I have the most knowledge about are controversial. As such they are difficult to edit into Featured shape. Nor is my edit count as high as our more prolific contributors, however as proof of my commitment I can point to over 250 free images created, enhanced or found and added to the project. (I'd guesstimate 85-90% are images I created or enhanced for the project, while the rest are simply Public Domain images found on government/military websites. I'll lowball my efforts and keep the number at 100 to make things easier for those not mathmatically inclined. 85% of 100 is 85. Many of them took more than a few hours of work and are used on several projects. (Essentially I'm also contributing to the Japanese, German, Hebrew, Vietnamese, Russian (in fact both of the two on this page are mine, the list goes on and includes five or six other languages. It also includes an image nominated for Featured status. I'm not trying to brag, but since people seem to think I'm only about trolling or gaming the system it's important to show that to be untrue. I wouldn't spend so much time helping out to turn around and troll someone while gaming the system.

The case itself was, I thought, going to be about the issue of people using Church of Scientology IPs and open proxies to edit Scientology related articles with a pretty clear view towards affecting the POV of said articles. I honestly thought that Bishonen bringing up the disagreement between Justanother and I was pretty unrelated to the case and that the arbcom would think the same thing. By the time it was clear that they didn't, I was being accused of harassment, thereby making any effort to show past, and more extensive, bad behavior on his part seem like confirmation of my harassment of him. It's very frustrating to have so many people assume bad faith on my part because a popular admin does.

For example Justanother recently cited an example of what he called bad faith on my part:Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/COFS/Workshop#Disclosure of report to WP:3RR regarding Justanother. The issue of my supposed harassment was recently brought up in the arbcom, then as now, nobody would give specifics about what was/was not harassment. Certainly reminding him that 3RR rules apply to everyone wouldn't be considered harassment, since it's true: Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/3RRArchive55#User:Justanother reported by User:Anynobody (Result: No action, warned) If you read the thread itself it should be obvious that I simply wanted to warn him that as he had made the same mistake as the editor he was trying to get blocked. (Please note also that I created both the arbcom thread and the 3RR note in good faith, if I was acting in bad faith, why would I turn around and tell the arbcom about it? I also didn't ask for or insist on a block at any time.)

So I'm asking for the arbcom to either let me explain/address whatever evidence they decided warranted an assumption of bad faith on my part, or failing that allow me to present evidence of how any harassment I could have inflicted is minimized by similar behavior which he initiated first and with other editors (who no longer edit anymore). Why am I bringing this up now? Because Justanother has begun using this case to leverage his position on articles like: Neutral reportage where he is currently arguing against including sourced material about a person who's article was recently deleted but is also mentioned in said article, Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement/Archive12#User:Anyeverybody (AKA User:Anynobody) and Barbara Schwarz by accusing me of editing the wrong part of neutral reportage before other parts are added as the reason why it's inappropriate to talk about the Salt Lake Tribune's use of Neutral reportage to defeat Barbara Schwarz's defamation suit. He's also been posting on my talk page, which begs the question, if I harassed him, why come back for more?

I think the findings re him and I in the case should be dropped, and any future issues be dealt with through dispute resolution which was essentially skipped before. Going to arbcom for editor disputes in the context of an entirely separate issue seems to be pretty rare, except in this case. (Heck, we skipped Misplaced Pages:Requests for mediation entirely.) Anynobody 07:03, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment by Justanother (JustaHulk)

Leaving the issue of the appropriateness of Anyeverybody's (Anynobody or AN) attacks on me here and sticking strictly to the facts, I do want to respond to a couple of AN's misrepresentations here.

  1. Re: "For example Justanother recently cited an example of what he called bad faith on my part:" That is a complete misread of my remark at WP:AE#Friendly reminder requested. The bad faith I was referring to was this:

    "AN constantly claims that he does not understand the ruling but when it is clearly explained to him, he ignores the explanation and grossly violates it by trotting out his collections of old, out-of-context diffs regarding me."

    That is bad faith. The other bit in that remark was clearly an answer to AN's previous question:

    "Could you please provide a diff from the arbcom where I pulled "this crap" and was told why what I did was like/unlike this? (Seriously, I'm not holding a grudge I just can't remember doing anything like what I've identified as harassment. Would you please just show where/when I did the same thing?) Anynobody 06:49, 13 January 2008 (UTC)"

  2. AN accuses me of "using this case to leverage his position on articles like: Neutral reportage". That is a lie - I never tried to use the harassment restriction on AN to my own advantage and, in fact, went out of my way to not make the restriction a problem for him. I did not accuse him of violating it in this case until he brought it up on WP:AE and, even then I did not accuse him of violating it until he did so in a gross and obvious manner. As regards editing together, there is no reason why I would stop taking an interest in the representation of Barbara Schwarz here and if AN intends to continue adding Schwarz material then he can expect my continued interest and involvement. Again, I went out of my way to NOT make our disagreement in the article have anything to do with the harassment ruling and I repeatedly clarified for him that he is perfectly free to seek WP:DR on any issues related to article content that we may have. Gotta run now but that pretty well sums it up. Thanks. --JustaHulk (talk) 15:42, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

AN constantly claims that he does not understand the ruling but when it is clearly explained to him, he ignores the explanation and grossly violates it by trotting out his collections of old, out-of-context diffs regarding me If it ever was explained I honestly don't remember or didn't see it. Please assume good faith and show me where it was explained when/how my behavior crossed into the area of harassment. The examples I've cited are not out of context when discussing the difference between harassment and acceptable behavior. If Template:Multicol This:

  • 3/8 The attempted WP:RfC/U by myself, Smee and perhaps other editors who found themselves unable to resolve their disputes with him.
  • Answering a question about it posed by a neutral editor during my RfA

and

...is harassment...

If one assumes good faith I tried to resolve a dispute involving several editors through dispute resolution, requested admin tools to help with some backlogs and in the process answered a question, then asked for independent feedback, later asking uninvolved admins if it is a personal attack to document an editor's uncivil behavior?

If one assumes bad faith, I'm not sure what they think I was doing because they'd have to assume I was out to attack him rather than resolve disputes. This doesn't describe the situation because I'd never intentionally set out to attack someone, since it doesn't actually solve anything and would actually work against me. Template:Multicol-break

...and...

Template:Multicol-break this:
*(Note, these diffs are Justanother posting his disputes regarding Smee's editing on WP:ANI/WP:AN3R and that none of them are about me. Why bring up his dealings with Smee up? To show that I'm not trying to attack him when I say other editors have had difficulty editing with him, and help explain why I felt the RfC/U was appropriate. Diffs before the RfC/U are underlined)*

Examples

...wasn't, what's the difference?

If one assumes good faith Justanother was simply being diligent about perceived violations of the rules regarding this editor. If one assumes bad faith, he was following an editor who was being recognized for adding material he found objectionable. Template:Multicol-end I honestly think the difference is that people do not assume good faith on my part, based on accusations by a popular admin who no longer seems to be editing here and didn't take the time to actually look at the conversation/context of what she cited as evidence. I never even asked that he be blocked, and have said numerous times that I don't want to see anyone banned. Even now I'm asking just that ordinary dispute resolution be used for future disagreements and am not and never have asked for him to be ruled against. Accusing me of editing under bad faith given these facts has been hard to come to grips with. Anynobody 07:22, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The only specific finding against you was that you were prohibited from harassing Justanother. Another finding specifically said it implied nothing about your editing. As no-one is allowed to harass another user (see WP:HARASS) the effect is to specifically order you not to do something that you should not have been doing anyway. The article probation for all scientology articles affects you just as much as every other editor. In those circumstances I see no cause to interfere with the remedies in this case. Sam Blacketer (talk) 10:45, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I should explain that I'm not asking for article probation to be changed. Did you see this finding? Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/COFS#Harassment of User:Justanother by User:Anynobody I have been blocked twice for trying to find out more information about it, Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/COFS#Log of blocks and bans. Anynobody 21:44, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I have reviewed this submission and see no need for any clarification or modification of the remedies at this time. I suggest that you drop this matter and proceed with your editing. Newyorkbrad (talk) 08:48, 18 January 2008 (UTC)


Free Republic

Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Free_Republic#Free_Republic_placed_on_article_probation

The Arbitration Committee has placed this article on probation. Editors making disruptive edits may be banned by an administrator from this and related articles, or other reasonably related pages.

The article is about a conservative Internet forum founded by Jim Robinson. User:Eschoir is a former member of that forum who was permanently banned in 1998 for creating nearly 100 sockpuppet accounts for purposes of disruption. He has been called "the ubertroll Eschoir," and the person using this descriptive term was clearly not biased against him by any sympathies with Free Republic. Eschoir was so disruptive that Robinson found it necessary to spend $110,000 on a federal lawsuit to obtain a permanent injunction against him. If he ever starts another account at Free Republic, he can be jailed for contempt of court. This is the mother of all WP:COI problems. Eschoir never should have been allowed to edit the Free Republic article.

Nevertheless, Fred Bauder was willing to AGF, as seen on Eschoir's User talk page. From that moment forward, Eschoir steadily transformed the Free Republic article into his own bitter little personal blog. It was an inventory of every petty little feud that occurred between Free Republic members, and every nutball statement that was ever said in a ten-year history of about 2 million posts in their forum. The article gradually moved farther and farther away from compliance with WP:NPOV.

At one point, he added an edit containing the word "penis", describing an alleged event involving two real people: Kristinn Taylor, a prominent participant at Free Republic, and another participant using the alias "Dr. Raoul." Since the article isn't about a topic dealing with sexuality or medicine, this immediately attracted my attention regarding a possible WP:BLP violation. (Since then, Eschoir has admitted that the alleged event never occurred.)

I placed a final warning for vandalism on Eschoir's Talk page and started actively editing the article to bring it into NPOV compliance. Ever since that moment, he has been making false WP:SOCK accusations, see edit summary see edit summary see edit summary see edit summary see edit summary and occupied territory that's best described as a continuous violation of WP:NPOV, WP:TE, WP:DE, WP:AGF, WP:NPA and WP:DBAD. Eschoir expanded a quotation from Robinson into a blockquote, continuing his campaign of cherry-picking quotations that make Free Republic look like a collection of nutballs and criminals. He chopped up a Talk page post into an incomprehensible mess by inserting a contentious and contemptuous response between its lines.

Eschoir then began to engage in a full-fledged edit war to revert edits that were supported by consensus, and clearly intended to restore NPOV. see edit summary

When User:BenBurch offered to do a complete rewrite, or “refactoring” of the article in an effort to end the edit war, at first it seemed like a good idea. Eschoir offered several recommendations, including using a reverse chronology format, but couldn't resist making another jab at FR regarding "volunteer shock troops" and "holy war." (See also here regarding reverse chronology format.)

Rather than wait for BenBurch to do it, Eschoir did the refactoring himself on a "sandbox" page. Now it's obvious why Eschoir wants to go with a reverse chronology. It enables him to stuff all of the following epithets, from recent critics describing Free Republic, into the first 161 words of the article:

  • vile
  • hateful
  • besmirching Christian values
  • some pretty sick people posting
  • inciting the murder of Hillary Clinton
  • racist and homophobic
  • poor moderation
  • victimized by a wave of purges

Eschoir’s continued efforts to demean anyone on the Talk:Free Republic page who doesn’t share his position: Said efforts have been recognized as demeaning by others: This is a perfect example of why COI editors need to be watched closely. Please take the necessary action.

I previously brought this up for enforcement at WP:ANI Arbitration Enforcement. I was told that your ruling was so vague that it's unenforceable, and that I should bring this issue to WP:RFAR Clarification. The ruling from the previous arbitration must be modified so that no administrator could possibly misunderstand that he has the authority, and the duty, to ban editors from editing the Free Republic article and related pages for being disruptive, failing to assume good faith, or making personal attacks. Specifically, please ban Eschoir from editing the article. It's been 10 years since he was banned from Free Republic for creating nearly 100 sockpuppet accounts. His refactoring of the Free Republic article demonstrates that even after 10 years, he can't resist the temptation to turn a Misplaced Pages article into a Poison pen letter to Jim Robinson. Samurai Commuter (talk) 20:27, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Blatantly disruptive editing on any article can be dealt with by any uninvolved administrator, following consultation on WP:ANI where appropriate. Arbitration (or arbitration clarification) is not always necessary, and may not be needed here if administrators conclude that the problem is serious enough. With specific respect to Eschoir, the editing history described above is very troubling, although I would welcome comment here by Eschoir before reaching a further conclusion. (I see that Eschoir was apparently not notified of this request for clarification, and have left him a talkpage note asking him to respond.) It is also noteworthy that a proposed finding of fact during last year's case, though not ultimately adopted, stated that "Eschoir (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) bears the name of an editor banned by Free Republic whose disruption of the site was so severe that an injunction was entered by a federal district court forbidding disruption of the site." If User:Eschoir is, or seeks to emulate, the individual covered by the court decision, then it might indeed be suitable for him to discontinue editing this particular article. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:45, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
I think you're stuck with this one, Brad. The previous article probation was advisory only, stating that the situation would be reviewed upon motion of an Arbitrator or request from an editor. After a very cursory review there is nothing in Eschoir's recent history that would be disruptive enough for a page ban in the absence of previous DR, and as you know community-enforced page bans are still somewhat novel. Thatcher 19:49, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the heads up. Samurai Commuter is clearly BryanfromPalatine, picking up from where he left before his permaban. I will give you my evidence should it be required. I think it's obvious. If there is a need to respond to his diatribe, I will do so. I will clarify again one serious sounding misconception.

"Eschoir (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) bears the name of an editor banned by Free Republic whose disruption of the site was so severe that an injunction was entered by a federal district court forbidding disruption of the site." If User:Eschoir is, or seeks to emulate, the individual covered by the court decision,

There was no "court decision," no hearings, no witnesses, no trials. Because I testified for the LATimes in the coppyright case, they sued me in state court for a million dollars. The wrong state court. I removed it to Federal Court for strategic reasons. They spent $110,000 pursuing me, then settled the case on my terms. Since they got no damages, they wanted at least an injunction, so I gave them one in the settlement papers. There was no wrongdoing alleged in the settlement and releases. Their lawyer, Bryan's mentor, was later disbarred.

Thannks again for the Heads-up. Eschoir (talk) 22:45, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

This is what Newyorkbrad said: "With specific respect to Eschoir, the editing history described above is very troubling, although I would welcome comment here by Eschoir before reaching a further conclusion." Eschoir has offered no comments about his editing history. I suggest that some explanation of his editing history is called for here, in light of the many troublesome diffs I've posted here. But Eschoir remains silent. Samurai Commuter (talk) 20:30, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

outing, harassment

Samurai Commuter placed links here to Freerepublic.com, linking to harassing and outing of Misplaced Pages editors here. I removed it and mailed oversight. It looks like there are other things like that on that message board. Is it appropriate for users to be linking there? Lawrence Cohen 07:25, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I suspect the editor "Samurai Commuter" is the banned editor "BryanFromPalatine", based on the comments and actions on this page. See also this evidence in a current RFAR: here. The user has asked me to restore a modified version of his 'evidence' to this section, but I am disinclined to do so as I have mailed Oversight to have it removed for exposing personal information about other editors here. Lawrence Cohen 19:32, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I notice that Lawrence Cohen blanked an entire section of ArbCom evidence, claiming that I posted links to personal information about Eschoir. In the preceding section, Eschoir admitted that he is the real person who was sued by an Internet forum, for creating nearly 100 sockpuppets for purposes of disruption. Eschoir then provided a ridiculous narrative of that litigation, which had ending in a federal injunction against him.
I posted two links to online court documents, proving that Eschoir's narrative was ridiculous. I also posted a lot of diffs from right here at Misplaced Pages that took time to compile, and proved Eschoir's continued disruptive activity and edit warring. If privacy was really the issue, it would have been sufficient to delete the links to the two court documents and leave a pleasant note on my User Talk page. Instead, Lawrence Cohen blanked the entire section, reported me as a single purpose attack account, and had me blocked indefinitely. He is now refusing to restore the evidence section he deleted, or even discuss the matter. Please see his User Talk page.
I'd appreciate a ruling on this at ArbCom's convenience. By admitting that he is the real person in question, by prevaricating about the federal injunction against him, and by continuing his efforts to turn a Misplaced Pages article into a Poison pen letter, Eschoir has opened the door to this discussion. Samurai Commuter (talk) 19:59, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
Please send a copy of any information that you believe was wrongfully blanked to the Arbitration Committee mailing list by e-mail. Please also respond to the assertion that you are the same individual as the banned user BrianFromPalatine. If you are, you are still entitled to have your concern with the article considered if you submit it by e-mail, but you should not be posting on-wiki. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:05, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
No comment on User:Samurai Commuter's concerns, but the accounts 52 edits all seem to be related to this subject. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 23:49, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
When there's a disagreement on content, we're asked to work it out on the article's Talk page. My reward for trying to do that is the suggestion that I'm an SPA. Samurai Commuter (talk) 11:14, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
Newyorkbrad, I have some info on this regarding BrionfromPalatine that you may want. It is nothing you can't get yourself, but since I have been involved with this page for a while I can give you an idea of the general situation if you would like. Email me if you would like that. Prodego 21:03, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Motions in prior cases

Motions

Shortcuts

This section can be used by arbitrators to propose motions not related to any existing case or request. Motions are archived at Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Index/Motions.

Only arbitrators may propose or vote on motions on this page. You may visit WP:ARC or WP:ARCA for potential alternatives.

Make a motion (Arbitrators only)

You can make comments in the sections called "community discussion" or in some cases only in your own section. Arbitrators or clerks may summarily remove or refactor any comment.

Arbitrator workflow motions

Workflow motions: Arbitrator discussion

  • I am proposing these three motions for discussion, community input, and a vote. Each seeks to improve ArbCom's functioning by providing for the performance of basic administrative responsibilities that sometimes go neglected, which, in my opinion, if successful, would significantly improve ArbCom's overall capacity. Motivation: We've known about the need for improvements to our workflow and capacity for some years now – I wrote about some of these suggestions in my 2022 ACE statement. It's a regular occurrence that someone will email in with a request or information and, because of the press of other work and because nobody is responsible for tracking and following up on the thread, we will let the thread drop without even realizing it and without deciding that no action is needed. We can each probably name a number of times this has happened, but one recent public example of adverse consequences from such a blunder was highlighted in the Covert canvassing and proxying in the Israel-Arab conflict topic area case request, which was partially caused by our failure to address a private request that had been submitted to us months earlier. Previous efforts: We've experimented with a number of technological solutions to this problem during my four years on the Committee, including: (a) tracking matters on a Trello board or on a private Phabricator space; (b) tracking threads in Google Groups with tags; (c) requesting the development of custom technical tools; (d) reducing the appeals we hear; and (e) tracking appeals more carefully on arbwiki. Some of these attempts have been moderately successful, or showed promise for a time before stalling, but none of them have fully and fundamentally addressed this dropping-balls issue, which has persisted, and which in my opinion requires a human solution rather than just a technological solution. Rationale: The work we need done as framed below (e.g. bumping email threads) isn't fundamentally difficult or sensitive, but it's essential, and it's structurally hard for an active arbitrator to be responsible for doing it. For example, I could never bring myself to bump/nag others to opine on matters that I hadn't done my best to resolve yet myself. But actually doing the research to substantively opine on an old thread (especially as the first arb) can take hours of work, and I'm more likely to forget about it before I have the time to resolve it, and then it'll get lost in the shuffle. So it's best to somewhat decouple the tracking/clerical function from the substantive arb-ing work. Other efforts: There is one more technological solution for which there was interest among arbitrators, which was to get a CRM/ticketing system – basically, VRTS but hopefully better. I think this could help and would layer well with any of the other options, but there are some open questions (e.g., which one to get, how to pay for it, whether we can get all arbs to adopt it), and I don't think that that alone would address this problem (see similar attempts discussed above), so I think we should move ahead with one of these three motions now and adopt a ticketing system with whichever of the other motions we end up going with. These three motions are the result of substantial internal workshopping, and have been variously discussed (as relevant) with the functionaries, the clerks, and the Wikimedia Foundation (on a call in November). Before that, we held an ideation session on workflow improvements with the Foundation in July and have had informal discussions for a number of years. I deeply appreciate the effort and input that has gone into these motions from the entire committee and from the clerks and functionaries, and hope we can now pass one of them. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
    • One other thing I forgot to suggest—I'd be glad to write motions 1 or 2 up as a trial if any arb prefers, perhaps for 6-12 months, after which the motion could be automatically repealed unless the committee takes further action by motion to permanently continue the motion. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:39, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

Workflow motions: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Workflow motions: Implementation notes

Clerks and Arbitrators should use this section to clarify their understanding of which motions are passing. These notes were last updated by an automatic check at 11:23, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Motion name Support Oppose Abstain Passing Support needed Notes
Motion 1: Correspondence clerks 2 3 0 Currently not passing 4 One support vote contingent on 1.4 passing
Motion 1.2a: name the role "scrivener" 1 2 1 Currently not passing 4
Motion 1.2b: name the role "coordination assistant" 0 1 3 Currently not passing 4
Motion 1.3: make permanent (not trial) 0 3 1 Currently not passing 5
Motion 1.4: expanding arbcom-en directly 1 2 1 Currently not passing 4
Motion 2: WMF staff support 0 5 0 Cannot pass Cannot pass
Motion 3: Coordinating arbitrators 4 0 0 Currently not passing 2
Motion 4: Grants for correspondence clerks 0 3 0 Currently not passing 6
Notes


Motion 1: Correspondence clerks

Nine-month trial

The Arbitration Committee's procedures are amended by adding the following section for a trial period of nine months from the date of enactment, after which time the section shall be automatically repealed unless the Committee takes action to make it permanent or otherwise extend it:

Correspondence clerks

The Arbitration Committee may appoint one or more former elected members of the Arbitration Committee to be correspondence clerks for the Arbitration Committee. Correspondence clerks must meet the Wikimedia Foundation's criteria for access to non-public personal data and sign the Foundation's non-public information confidentiality agreement.

Correspondence clerks shall be responsible for assisting the Committee in the routine administration and organization of its mailing list and non-public work in a similar manner as the existing arbitration clerks assist in the administration of the Committee's on-wiki work.

The specific responsibilities of correspondence clerks shall include:

  • Acknowledging the receipt of correspondence and assigning tracking identifiers to pending requests and other matters;
  • Tracking the status of pending matters and providing regular updates and reminders on the status of the Committee's off-wiki work to arbitrators;
  • Reminding members of the Committee to vote or otherwise take action in pending matters;
  • Organizing related correspondence into case files; and
  • Providing similar routine administrative and clerical assistance to the Arbitration Committee.

The remit of correspondence clerks shall not include:

  • Participating in the substantive consideration or decision of any matters before the Committee; or
  • Taking non-routine actions requiring the exercise of arbitrator discretion.

To that end, upon the first appointment of correspondence clerks, the current arbcom-en mailing list shall be renamed to arbcom-en-internal, which shall continue to be accessible only by arbitrators, and a new arbcom-en email list shall be established. The subscribers to the new arbcom-en list shall be the arbitrators and correspondence clerks.

The Committee shall establish a process to allow editors to, in unusual circumstances following a showing of good cause, directly email a mailing list accessible only by arbitrators and not by correspondence clerks.

All correspondence clerks shall hold concurrent appointments as arbitration clerks and shall be subject to the same requirements concerning conduct and recusal as the arbitration clerk team.

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

Majority reference
Abstentions Support votes needed for majority
0 6
1–2 5
3–4 4
Support
  1. This is my first choice and falls within ArbCom's community-granted authority to approve and remove access to mailing lists maintained by the Arbitration Committee and to designate individuals for particular tasks or roles and maintain a panel of clerks to assist with the smooth running of its functions. Currently, we have arbitration clerks to help with on-wiki work, but most of ArbCom's workload is private (on arbcom-en), and our clerks have no ability to help with that because they can't access any of ArbCom's non-public work. It has always seemed strange to me to have clerks for on-wiki work, but not for the bulk of the work which is off-wiki (and which has always needed more coordination help). When consulting the functionaries, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that four functionaries (including three former arbitrators) expressed interest in volunteering for this role. This would be lower-intensity than serving as an arbitrator, but still essential to the functioning of the committee. We already have a number of ex-arbs on the clerks-l mailing list to advise and assist, and this seems like a natural extension of that function. The Stewards have a somewhat similar "Steward clerk" role, although ArbCom correspondence clerks would be a higher-trust position (functionary-level appointments only). I see this as the strongest option because the structure is familiar (analogous to our existing clerks, but for off-wiki business), because we have trusted functionaries and former arbs interested who could well discharge these responsibilities, and because I think we would benefit from separating the administrative responsibility from the substantive responsibility. The cons I see are that volunteer correspondence clerks might be less reliable than paid staff and that we'd be adding one or two (ish) people to the arbcom-en list. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Contingent on 1.4 passing. This option was not my first choice, and I'm inclined to try having a coordinating Arb first, if we can get a volunteer/set of volunteers. Given that the new term should infuse the Committee with more life and vigor, we may find a coordinating Arb, or another solution. But I think we should put this in our toolbox for the moment. This doesn't force us to appoint someone, just gives us the ability and outlines the position. CaptainEek ⚓ 05:29, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. I don't think we should extend access to the mailing list and the private information it contains beyond what is absolutely necessary. I understand the reasoning behind former arbitrators in such a role as they previously had such access, but people emailing the Arbitration Committee should have confidence that private information is kept need to know and that only the current arbitrators evaluating and making decisions based on that private information have ongoing access to it. - Aoidh (talk) 23:36, 9 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Might as well make it formal per my opinions elsewhere on the page. Primefac (talk) 13:24, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. This is limited to former arbitrators for good reasons, most of them privacy-related. But the same concerns that led to this proposal being limited to former arbitrators are also arguments against doing this at all. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:16, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
Abstain

Motion 1: Arbitrator views and discussions

  • I'd be glad changing this to only appoint former arbs, if that would tip anyone's votes. Currently, it's written as "from among the English Misplaced Pages functionary corps (and preferably from among former members of the Arbitration Committee)" for flexibility if needed, but I imagine we would only really appoint former arbs if available, except under unusual circumstances, because they understand how the mailing list discussions go and have previously been elected to handle the same private info. I am also open to calling it something other than "correspondence clerk"; that just seemed like a descriptive title. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
    I do like the idea of using our Arbs emeritus for this position (and perhaps only Arbs emeritus); it ensures that they have experience in our byzantine process, and at least at some point held community trust. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:31, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
    @CaptainEek: I have changed the motion to make only former arbs eligible. If anyone preferred broader (all funct) eligibility, I've added an alternative motion 1.1 below, which if any arb does prefer it, they should uncollapse and vote for it. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 02:07, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
  • I also think that if we adopt this we should choose a better name. I know Barkeep49 meant this suggestion as a bit of a joke, but I actually think he was on the money when he suggested "scrivener." I like "adjutant" even more, which I believe he also suggested. They capture the sort of whimsical Misplaced Pages charm evoked by titles like Most Pluperfect Labutnum while still being descriptive, and not easily confused for a traditional clerk. CaptainEek ⚓ 03:21, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
    Whimsy is important -- Guerillero 08:55, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
  • @CaptainEek and Guerillero: Per the above discussion points, I have (a) proposed two alternative names below that were workshopped among some arbs ("scrivener" on the more whimsical side and "coordination assistant" on the less whimsical side; see motions 1.2a and 1.2b), and (b) made this motion a nine-month trial, after which time the section is automatically repealed unless the Committee takes action to extend it. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:10, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  • I plan on supporting motion 1 over anything else. I've spent a week just getting onto all the platforms, and I'm already kind of shocked that this is how we do things. Not only is there a lot to keep track of, all of the information moves unintuitively between different places in a way that makes it very difficult to keep up unless you're actively plugged in enough to be on top of the ball – which I don't think anyone can be all the time. I just don't think a coordinating arb is sufficient: we need someone who can keep us on track without having to handle all of the standard work of reviewing evidence, deliberating, and making an informed decision. (Better-organized tech would also be great, but I'd need to spend a lot more time thinking about how it could be redone.) I understand the privacy concerns, but I don't think this represents a significant breach of confidentiality: people care more whether their report gets handled properly than whether it goes before 15 trusted people or 16. So, I'll be voting in favor of motion 1, and maybe motion 3 will be a distant second. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 21:40, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

References

  1. Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Policy § Scope and responsibilities
  2. Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Policy § Procedures and roles

Motion 1.1: expand eligible set to functionaries

If any arbitrator prefers this way, unhat this motion and vote for it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

If motion 1 passes, replace the text The Arbitration Committee may appoint one or more former elected members of the Arbitration Committee to be correspondence clerks for the Arbitration Committee. with the text The Arbitration Committee may appoint, from among the English Misplaced Pages functionary corps (and preferably from among former members of the Arbitration Committee), one or more users to be correspondence clerks for the Arbitration Committee..

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

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Support
Oppose
Abstain


Motion 1.2a: name the role "scrivener"

If motion 1 passes, replace the term "correspondence clerks" wherever it appears with the term "scriveners".

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

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Support
  1. Nicely whimsical, and not as likely to be confusing as correspondence clerk. CaptainEek ⚓ 04:11, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. I think correspondence clerk is fine if role is something we're going with, it's less ambiguous as to what it entails than scrivener. - Aoidh (talk) 04:12, 11 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. I have never heard that word before; at least "correspondence" and "clerk" are somewhat common in the English Misplaced Pages world. When possible, I think we should use words people don't have to look up in dictionaries. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:07, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
Abstain
  1. I think that because it's more archaic and possibly less serious, I disprefer this to either "coordination assistant" or "correspondence clerk", but would ultimately be perfectly happy with it. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:11, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Arbitrator discussion

Motion 1.2b: name the role "coordination assistant"

If motion 1 passes, replace the term "correspondence clerks" wherever it appears with the term "coordination assistants".

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

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Oppose
  1. bleh. CaptainEek ⚓ 04:12, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Abstain
  1. I am indifferent between this and "correspondence clerk". Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:11, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. If we're going to use a role like this, either this or correspondence clerk is fine. - Aoidh (talk) 04:13, 11 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. That would be okay. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:08, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
Arbitrator discussion

Motion 1.3: make permanent (not trial)

If motion 1 passes, omit the text for a trial period of nine months from the date of enactment, after which time the section shall be automatically repealed unless the Committee takes action to make it permanent or otherwise extend it.

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

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Oppose
  1. I recently experimented with sunset clauses and think that frankly a lot more of what we do should have such time limits that require us to stop and critically evaluate if a thing is working. CaptainEek ⚓ 04:19, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. If this change is necessary, there should be a review of it after a reasonable trial period to see what does and does not work. - Aoidh (talk) 01:34, 8 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:10, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
Abstain
  1. I have no preference as to whether this is permanent or a trial. I do think that nine months is a good length for the trial if we choose to have one: not too long to lock in a year's committee; not too short to make it unworthwhile. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:13, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Arbitrator discussion

Motion 1.4: expanding arbcom-en directly

If motion 1 passes, strike the following text:

To that end, upon the first appointment of correspondence clerks, the current arbcom-en mailing list shall be renamed to arbcom-en-internal, which shall continue to be accessible only by arbitrators, and a new arbcom-en email list shall be established. The subscribers to the new arbcom-en list shall be the arbitrators and correspondence clerks.

And replace it with the following:

To that end, correspondence clerks shall be added to the arbcom-en mailing list. The Committee shall continue to maintain at least one mailing list accessible only by arbitrators.

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

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Support
  1. Much less trouble to have them on the main list than to split the lists. CaptainEek ⚓ 04:13, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Access to private information should be as limited as possible to only what is strictly necessary to perform such a task, and I don't see a allowing full access to the contents of the current list necessary for this. I'd rather not split the list, but between that and giving full access then if we're going to have a correspondence clerk, then it needs to be split. - Aoidh (talk) 04:21, 11 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Motion 1 is already problematic for privacy reasons; this would make it worse. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:14, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
Abstain
  1. I would not really object to this. C-clerks (or whatever we call them) are former arbs and have previously been on arbcom-en in any event, so it doesn't seem that like a big deal to do this. On the other hand, I would understand if folks prefer the split. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:24, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Arbitrator discussion

Motion 2: WMF staff support

The Arbitration Committee requests that the Wikimedia Foundation Committee Support Team provide staff support for the routine administration and organization of the Committee's mailing list and non-public work.

The selected staff assistants shall be responsible for assisting the Committee in the routine administration and organization of its mailing list and non-public work in a similar manner as the existing arbitration clerks assist in the administration of the Committee's on-wiki work. Staff assistants shall perform their functions under the direction of the Arbitration Committee and shall not represent the Wikimedia Foundation in the course of their support work with the Arbitration Committee or disclose the Committee's internal deliberations except as directed by the Committee.

The specific responsibilities of the staff assistants shall include, as directed by the Committee:

  • Acknowledging the receipt of correspondence and assigning tracking identifiers to pending requests and other matters;
  • Tracking the status of pending matters and providing regular updates and reminders on the status of the Committee's off-wiki work to arbitrators;
  • Reminding members of the Committee to vote or otherwise take action in pending matters;
  • Organizing related correspondence into case files; and
  • Providing similar routine administrative and clerical assistance to the Arbitration Committee.

The remit of staff assistants shall not include:

  • Participating in the substantive consideration or decision of any matters before the Committee; or
  • Taking non-routine actions requiring the exercise of arbitrator discretion.

To that end, upon the selection of staff assistants, the current arbcom-en mailing list shall be renamed to arbcom-en-internal, which shall continue to be accessible only by arbitrators, and a new arbcom-en email list shall be established. The subscribers to the new arbcom-en list shall be the arbitrators and staff assistants.

The Committee shall establish a process to allow editors to, in unusual circumstances following a showing of good cause, directly email a mailing list accessible only by arbitrators and not by staff assistants.

Staff assistants shall be subject to the same requirements concerning conduct and recusal as the arbitration clerk team.

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

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Oppose
  1. I appreciate that Kevin put this together, and I think this would be very helpful, maybe even the most helpful, way to ensure that we stayed on top of the ball. But just because it would achieve one goal doesn't make it a good idea. A full version of my rationale is on the ArbList, for other Arbs. The short, WP:BEANS version is that this would destroy the line between us and the Foundation, which undoes much of our utility. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:22, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Per my comment on motion 4. - Aoidh (talk) 01:31, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. Might as well make it formal per my opinions elsewhere on the page. Primefac (talk) 13:24, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. I like the general idea of the WMF using its donated resources to support the community that made the donations possible. I am uncomfortable with putting WMF staff in front of ArbCom's e-mail queue, however, as this would come with unavoidable conflicts of interest and a loss of independence. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:05, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  5. The help would be useful, but the consequences would be detrimental to both ArbCom & WMF. Some space between us is necessary for ArbCom's impartiality & for the WMF's section 230 position. Cabayi (talk) 12:56, 24 December 2024 (UTC)
Abstain

Motion 2: Arbitrator views and discussions

  • I am quite open to this idea. A professional staff member assisting the committee might be the most reliable and consistent way to achieve this goal. ArbCom doesn't need the higher-intensity support that the WMF Committee Support Team provides other committees like AffCom and the grant committees, but having somebody to track threads and bump stalled discussions would be quite helpful. I'm going to wait to see if there's any community input on this motion before voting on it, though. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

Motion 3: Coordinating arbitrators

The Arbitration Committee's procedures are amended by adding the following section:

Coordinating arbitrators

The Arbitration Committee shall, from time to time, designate one or more arbitrators to serve as the Committee's coordinating arbitrators.

Coordinating arbitrators shall be responsible for assisting the Committee in the routine administration and organization of its mailing list and non-public work in a similar manner as the existing arbitration clerks assist in the administration of the Committee's on-wiki work.

The specific responsibilities of coordinating arbitrators shall include:

  • Acknowledging the receipt of correspondence and assigning tracking identifiers to pending requests and other matters;
  • Tracking the status of pending matters and providing regular updates and reminders on the status of the Committee's off-wiki work to arbitrators;
  • Reminding members of the Committee to vote or otherwise take action in pending matters;
  • Organizing related correspondence into case files; and
  • Performing similar routine administrative and clerical functions.

A coordinating arbitrator may, but is not required to, state an intention to abstain on some or all matters before the Committee without being listed as an "inactive" arbitrator.

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

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Support
  1. This is currently my first-choice option; we have unofficially in the past had arbitrators take on specific roles (e.g. tracking unblock requests, responding to emails, etc) and it seemed to work fairly well. Having those rules be more "official" seems like the best way to make sure someone is responsible for these things, without needing to expand the committee or the pool of people with access to private information. Primefac (talk) 18:53, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. I may still vote for the clerks option, but I think this is probably the minimum of what we need. Will it be suffucient...aye, there's the rub. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:14, 5 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. Of the motions proposed, this one is the one I'd most support. It doesn't expand the number of people who can view the ArbCom mailing list beyond those on ArbCom, and creates a structure that may improve how the mailing list is handled. - Aoidh (talk) 23:21, 9 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. Per Primefac. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:19, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
Oppose
Abstain

Motion 3: Arbitrator views and discussions

  • I am also open to this idea, though I am worried that it will be insufficient and haven't made up my mind on my vote yet. This idea was floated by a former arbitrator from back when the committee did have a coordinating arbitrator, though that role kind of quietly faded away. The benefits of this approach include that there's no need to bring anyone else onto the list. This motion also allows (but does not require) arbs to take a step back from active arb business to focus on the coordination role, which could help with the bifurcation I mention above. Cons include that this could be the least reliable option; that it's possible no arb is interested, or has the capacity to do this well; and that it's hard to be both a coordinator on top of the existing difficult role of serving as an active arb. I personally think this is better than nothing, but probably prefer one of the other two motions to actually add some capacity. Other ideas that have been floated include establishing a subcommittee of arbitrators responsible for these functions. My same concerns would apply there, but if there's interest, I'm glad to draft and propose a motion to do that; any other arb should also feel free to propose such a motion of their own. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
  • I was partial to this idea, though it was not my first choice. I proposed that we might make it a rotating position, à la the presidency of the UN security council. Alternatively, a three person subcommittee might also be the way to go, so that the position isn't dependent on one person's activity. I like this solution in general because we already basically had it, with the coordinating arbitrator role. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:35, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
    • @CaptainEek: I think your last sentence actually kind of nails why I don't love this solution? From a new person on the scene, it doesn't seem to me like trying old strategies and things we've already been doing is really going to solve a chronic problem. If there are arbs who really are willing to be the coordinators, that's better than nothing, but I haven't seen any step up yet and I'm not convinced that relying on at least one arb having the extra time and trust in every committee to do this work is sustainable. I am leaning towards voting for the scriveners motion, though, because I do love a good whimsical name 😄 theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 21:51, 17 December 2024 (UTC)
      My concern with this is that if an arb already has the time and inclination you'd expect them to be filling the role, as has happened in the past. Simply formalizing the role doesn't help if no one has the motivation to do it. It's still the option I support the most out of those listed, though. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 22:07, 17 December 2024 (UTC)
      I think formalizing it does move the needle on someone doing it. Two possible benefits of the formalization:
  • It makes clear that this is a valuable role, one that an arb should feel is a sufficient and beneficial way to spend their time. It also communicates this to the community, which might otherwise ask an arb running for reelection why they spent their time coordinating (rather than on other arb work).
  • It gives "permission" for coordinating arbs to go inactive on other business if they wish.
These two benefits make this motion more than symbolic in my view. My hesitation on it remains that it may be quite insufficient relative to motion 1. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 22:18, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

Motion 4: Grants for correspondence clerks

In the event that "Motion 1: Correspondence clerks" passes, the Arbitration Committee shall request that the Wikimedia Foundation provide grants payable to correspondence clerks in recognition of their assistance to the Committee.

For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

Majority reference
Abstentions Support votes needed for majority
0 6
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Support
Oppose
  1. Misplaced Pages should remain a volunteer activity. If we cannot find volunteers to do the task, then perhaps it ought not be done in the first place. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:09, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. We should not have a clerk paid by the WMF handling English Misplaced Pages matters in this capacity. - Aoidh (talk) 01:48, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:18, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
Abstain

Motion 4: Arbitrator views and discussions

Community discussion

Will correspondence clerks be required to sign an NDA? Currently clerks aren't. Regardless of what decision is made this should probably be in the motion. * Pppery * it has begun... 18:29, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

Good catch. I thought it was implied by "from among the English Misplaced Pages functionary corps" – who all sign NDAs as a condition to access functionaries-en and the CUOS tools; see Misplaced Pages:Functionaries (Functionary access requires that the user sign the confidentiality agreement for nonpublic information.)  – but I've made it explicit now. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:31, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
You're right that that was there, but I missed it on my first readthrough of the rules (thinking correspondence clerks would be appointed from the clerk team instead). * Pppery * it has begun... 18:37, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

Why does "coordinating arbitrators" need a (public) procedures change? Izno (talk) 18:34, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

As Primefac mentioned above, it seems reasonable to assume that having something written down "officially" might help make sure that the coordinating arbitrator knows what they are responsible for. In any event, it probably can't hurt. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:08, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
It is a pain in the ass to get formal procedures changed. There is an internal procedures page: I see 0 reason not to use it if you want to clarify what the role of this arbitrator is. Izno (talk) 19:13, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
On top of that, this doesn't actually change the status quo much if at all. It is almost entirely a role definition for an internal matter, given "we can make an arb a CA, but we don't have to have one" in it's "from time to time" clause. This just looks like noise to anyone reading ARBPRO who isn't on ArbCom: the public doesn't need to know this arb even exists, though they might commonly be the one responding to emails so they might get a sense there is such an arb. Izno (talk) 19:21, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

While I appreciate that some functionaries are open to volunteering for this role, this borders on is a part-time secretarial job and ought to be compensated as such. The correspondence clerks option combined with WMF throwing some grant money towards compensation would be my ideal. voorts (talk/contributions) 18:35, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for this suggestion – I've added motion 4 to address this suggestion. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:08, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

In the first motion the word "users" in "The Committee shall establish a process to allow users to, in unusual circumstances" is confusing, it should probably be "editors". In the first and second motions, it should probably be explicit whether correspondence clerks/support staff are required, permitted or prohibited to:

  • Share statistical information publicly
  • Share status information (publicly or privately) with correspondents who wish to know the status of their request.
  • Share status information (publicly or privately) about the status of a specific request with someone other than the correspondent.
    For this I'm thinking of scenarios like where e.g. an editor publicly says they emailed the Committee about something a while ago, and one or more other editors asks what is happening with it.

I think my preference would be for 1 or 2, as these seem likely to be the more reliable. Neither option precludes there also being a coordinating arbitrator doing some of the tasks as well. Thryduulf (talk) 18:49, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for these suggestions. I've changed "users" to "editors". The way I'm intending these motions to be read, correspondence clerks or staff assistants should only disclose information as directed by the committee. I think the details of which information should be shared upon whose request in routine cases could be decided later by the committee, with the default being "ask ArbCom before disclosing until the committee decides to approve routine disclosures in certain cases", because it's probably hard to know in advance which categories will be important to allow. I'm open to including more detail if you think that's important to include at this stage, though, and I'd welcome hearing why if so. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:08, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
I see your point, but I think it worth clarifying certain things in advance before they become an issue to avoid unrealistic or mistaken expectations of the c-clerks by the community. Point 1 doesn't need to be specified in advance, maybe something like "communicating information publicly as directed by the Committee" would be useful to say in terms of expectation management or maybe it's still to specific? I can see both sides of that.
Point 2 I think is worth establishing quickly and while it is on people's minds. Waiting for the committee to make up its mind before knowing whether they can give a full response to a correspondent about this would be unfair to both the correspondent and clerk I think. This doesn't necessarily have to be before adoption, but if not it needs to be very soon afterwards.
Point 3 is similar, but c-clerks and community members knowing exactly what can and cannot be shared, and especially being able to point to something in writing about what cannot be said publicly, has the potential to reduce drama e.g. if there is another situation similar to Billed Mammal's recent case request. Thryduulf (talk) 19:30, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

What justification is there for the WMF to spend a single additional dollar on the workload of a project-specific committee whose workload is now demonstrably smaller than at any time in its history? (Noting here that there is a real dollar-cost to the support already being given by WMF, such as the monthly Arbcom/T&S calls that often result in the WMF accepting requests for certain activities.) And anyone who is being paid by the WMF is responsible to the WMF as the employer, not to English Misplaced Pages Arbcom.

I think Arbcom is perhaps not telling the community some very basic facts that are leading to their efforts to find someone to take responsibility for its organization, which might include "we have too many members who aren't pulling their weight" or "we have too many members who, for various reasons that don't have to do with Misplaced Pages, are inactive", or "we have some tasks that nobody really wants to do". There's no indication that any of these solutions would solve these kinds of problems, and I think that all of these issues are factors that are clearly visible to those who follow Arbcom on even an occasional basis. Arbitrators who are inactive for their own reasons aren't going to become more active because someone's organizing their mail. Arbitrators who don't care enough to vote on certain things aren't any more likely to vote if someone is reminding them to vote in a non-public forum; there's no additional peer pressure or public guilt-tripping. And if Arbcom continues to have tasks that nobody really wants to do, divest those tasks. Arbcom has successfully done that with a large number of tasks that were once its responsibility.

I think you can do a much better job of making your case. Risker (talk) 20:05, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

I think there is a need to do something as poor communication and extremely slow replies, if replies are made at all, has been an ongoing issue for the committee for some time. However I agree that asking the foundation to pay someone to do it is going too far. The point that if you are paid by the foundation, you work for them and not en.wp or arbcom is a compelling one. There's also a slippery slope argument to be made in that if we're paying these people, shouldn't we pay the committee? If we're paying the committee, shouldn't we pay the arbitration clerks....and so on. Just Step Sideways 20:26, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
I fully share Risker's concern about a paid WMF staffer who, no matter how well-intentioned, will be answerable to the WMF and not ARBCOM. Vanamonde93 (talk) 21:55, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
The 2023-2024 committee is much more middle aged and has less university students and retirees, who oftentimes have more free time, than the 2016-2017 committee. -- Guerillero 08:56, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
It seems to me that the issue of there often being some Committee members who, for whatever reason, are not "pulling their weight", is at the core of the problem to be addressed here. Because this happens "behind the scenes", the community has no way to hold anyone accountable in elections, and because of human nature and the understandable desire to maintain a collegial atmosphere within the Committee, I don't really expect any members to call out a colleague in public. I suppose there could even be a question of what happens if whoever might be filling the role proposed here nudges a member to act, but the member just disregards that. It's difficult to see how to make it enforceable. I don't have any real solutions, but this strikes me as central to the problem. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:31, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
I think this is largely correct. I was reluctant on the committee to even note this committee's inactivity problem (worst of any 15-member arbcom ever), even though it was based on a metric that is public, when I was still on the committee. And it gets further complicated by the fact that some people not visibly active in public more than pull their weight behind the scenes - the testimonials Maxim received when running for re-election being a prime example. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 00:00, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
During my first term it was Roger Davies. He was barely a presence on-wiki but he kept the whole committee on point and up-to-date about what was pending. Trypto is right that it isn't enforceable, it is more a matter of applying pressure to either do the job or move oneself to the inactive list.
I also think the committee can and should be more proactive about declaring other arbs inactive even when they are otherwise present on-wiki or on the mailing list" That would probably require a procedures change, but I think it would make sense. If there is a case request, proposed decision, or other matter that requires a vote before the committee and an arb doesn't comment on it for ten days or more, they clearly don't have the time and/or inclination to do so and should be declared inactive on that matter so that their lack of action does not further delay the matter. It would be nice if they would just do so themselves, or just vote "abstain" on everything, which only takes a few minutes, but it seems it has not been happening in practice. Just Step Sideways 00:14, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
And Roger was a pensioner which kinda proves my point -- Guerillero 08:53, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
Roger may have been a pensioner at the end of his time on the committee (7 years), but he certainly wasn't at the beginning of his term. He was co-ordinating arbitrator for a lot of that time, and did a good job without a single bit of extra software. The problem with that software is that people have to already be actively engaged to even contemplate using it. My sense is that the real issue here is the lack of engagement (whether periodic or chronic) on the part of many of the arbitrators. People who are inactive on Arbcom tasks aren't going to be active on any tasks, including reading emails asking them to do things or special software sending alerts. Simply put, if people aren't going to put Arbcom as their primary Misplaced Pages activity for the next two years, keeping in mind other life events that will likely take them away, they should not run in the first place. Yes, unexpected things happen. But I think a lot of the inactivity we've seen in the last few years involved some predictable absences that the arbs knew about when they were candidates. (Examples I've seen myself: Oh, I have a big exam to write that needs months of study; oh, I have a major life event that will require a lot of planning; oh, I'm graduating and will have to find a job.) No, I don't expect people to reveal this kind of information about themselves; yes, I do expect them to refrain from volunteering for roles that they can reasonably foresee they will have difficulty fulfilling. Risker (talk) 04:21, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
I might as well ask a hard question. Is there a way to make public enough information for the community to be able to evaluate ArbCom candidates for (re)election, in terms of behind-the-scenes inactivity? If individual Arbs were to make public comments, that would do it, but it would also potentially be very contentious and could reduce effectiveness instead of improving it. Could ArbCom initiate a new process of posting onsite information about the processing of tasks, without revealing private information (such as: "Ban appeal 1", "Ban appeal 2", instead of "Ban appeal by "), and list those members who voted (perhaps without listing which way they voted)? Maybe do that monthly, and include all tasks that had not yet gotten a quorum. Yes, I know that's difficult. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:48, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
I question an answer to the problem of "we're having trouble finding enough people to do the secretarial work we have already" being "let's create substantially more secretarial work" even accepting the premise that people would then get voted off if they didn't pull their weight. While I think that premise is correct, what this system would also encourage - even more than it already exists - is an incentive to just go along with whatever the first person (or the person who has clearly done the most homework) says. And that defeats the purpose of having a committee made up of individual thinkers. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 20:55, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
That's a fair point. I'll admit that, even from the outside, I sometimes see members who appear to wait to see which way the wind is blowing before voting on proposed decisions. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:59, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
That's something that's hard to know or verify, even for the other arbs. The arbs only know what the other arbs tell them, and I've never seen anyone admit to that. Just Step Sideways 23:44, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

I think the timing for this is wrong. The committee is about to have between 6 and 9 new members (depending on whether Guerillero, Eek, and Primefac get re-elected). In addition it seems likely that some number of former arbs are about to rejoin the committee. This committee - basically the committee with the worst amount of active membership of any 15 member committee ever - seems like precisely the wrong one to be making large changes to ongoing workflows in December. Izno's idea of an easier to try and easier to change/abandon internal procedure for the coordinating arb feels like something appropriate to try now. The rest feel like it should be the prerogative of the new committee to decide among (or perhaps do a different change altogether). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 21:44, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

Kevin can correct me if I'm wrong, but I assumed he was doing this now because he will not be on the committee a month from now.
That being said it could be deliberately held over, or conversely, possibly fall victim to the inactivity you mention and still be here for the new committee to decide. Just Step Sideways 23:12, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
Since WP:ACE2024 elections are currently taking place it makes sense to have the incoming arbitrators weigh in on changes like this. They are the ones that will be affected by any of these motions passing rather than the outgoing arbitrators. - Aoidh (talk) 00:27, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
Oh I assumed that's why he was doing it also. I am also assuming he's doing it to try and set up the future committees for success. That doesn't change my point about why this is the wrong time and why a different way of trying the coordinator role (if it has support) would be better. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 00:28, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
Regarding "timing is wrong": I think you both would agree that these are a long time coming – we have been working on these and related ideas for years (I ran on a related idea in 2022). I do think there's never quite a good time. Very plausibly, the first half of the year is out because the new arbs will need that time to learn how the processes work and think about what kinds of things should be changed vs. kept the same. And then it might be another few months as the new ArbCom experiments with less-consequential changes like the ones laid about at the top: technological solutions, trying new ways of tracking stuff, etc., before being confident in the need for something like set out above. And then things get busy for other reasons; there will be weeks or even occasionally months when the whole committee is overtaken by some urgent situation. I've experienced a broadly similar dynamic a few times now; this is all to say that there's just not much time or space in the agenda for this kind of stuff in a one-year cycle, which would be a shame because I do think this is important to take on.
I do think that it should be the aspiration of every year's committee to leave the succeeding committee some improvements in the functioning of the committee based on lessons learned that year, so it would be nice to leave the next committee with this. That said, if arbitrators do feel that we should hold this over to the new committee, I'm not really in a position to object – as JSS says, this is my last year on the committee, so it's not like this will benefit me. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 01:30, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
I think it's entirely possible for the new committee to have a sense of what it wants workload wise by February-April and so it's wrong to just rule out the first half of the year. By the end of the first six months of the year that you and I started (and which JSS was a sitting member on) we'd made a number of changes to how things were done. Off the top of my head I can name the structure of cases and doing quarterly reports of private appeals as two but there were others. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 01:47, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
Here's what I'll leave you with overall. What you may see as a downside – these proposals being voted on relatively late in the year – I see as a significant possible upside. Members of this committee are able to draw on at least eleven months' experience as arbitrators in deciding what is working well and what might warrant change – experience which is important in determining what kinds of processes and systems lead to effective and ineffective outcomes. That experience is important: Although I have served on ArbCom for four years and before that served as an ArbCom clerk for almost six years, I still learn more every year about what makes this committee click. If what really concerns you is locking in the new committee to a particular path, as I wrote above, I'm very open to structuring this as a trial run that will end of its own accord unless the committee takes action to make it permanent. This would ensure that the new committee retains full control over whether to continue, discontinue, or adapt these changes. But in my book, it does not make sense to wait. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 22:58, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
  • As a 3-term former arb and a 3-term current ombuds commissioner, I've had experience of about a dozen Wikimedia committee "new intakes". I am quite convinced that these proposals are correctly timed. Process changes are better put in place prior to new appointees joining, so that they are not joining at a moment of upheaval. Doing them late in the day is not objectionable and momentum often comes at the end of term. If the changes end up not working (doubtful), the new committee would just vote to tweak the process or go back. I simply do not understand the benefit of deferring proposals into a new year, adding more work to the next year's committee. That surely affects the enthusiasm and goodwill of new members. As for the point that the '24 committee is understaffed and prone to indecision: argumentum ad hominem. If Kevin's proposals work, they work. If anything, it might be more difficult to agree administrative reforms when the committee is back at full staff. arcticocean ■ 15:49, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
    If these pass now you will have new members join at a moment of upheaval as anything proposed here will still be in its infancy when the new members join (even if we pretend the new members are joining Jan 1 rather than much sooner given that results are in and new members tend to be added to the list once the right boxes are checked). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:55, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
    You're right. And it's important to be realistic: any proposal would be under implementation for several months, so say from December through February. Would that be so bad? Any change will disrupt, in the sense that a few people need to spend time implementing it and everyone else needs to learn the new process. But waiting until later in the year causes even more disruption: members have to first learn an 'old' process and then learn the changes you're making to it… New member enthusiasm is also a keen force that could help to push through the changes. arcticocean ■ 16:28, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
    I think new member enthusiasm is part of why I think this lame duck hobbled committee is the wrong one to do it. I have high hopes for next year's group and think they would be in a better place to come up with the right solution for them. And as I noted to Kevin above this isn't hypothetical - the year we both started as arbs we made a lot of process and procedure changes in the first six months. It was a great thing to funnel that new arb energy into because I was bought into what we were doing rather than trying to make something work that I had no say in and that the existing members had no experience with. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:34, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
    While I think a solution such as adopting ZenDesk is something that could face objections, personally I think the idea of having someone track a list of work items for a committee is a pretty standard way of working (including pushing for timely resolution, something that really needs a person, not just a program). From an outsider's perspective, it's something I'd expect. It doesn't matter to non-arbitrators who does the tracking, so the committee should feel free to change that decision internally as often as it feels is effective. I'd rather there be a coordinating arbitrator in place in the interim until another solution is implemented, than have no one tracking work items in the meantime. isaacl (talk) 19:30, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

Just to double check that I'm reading motion 1 correctly, it would still be possible to email the original list (for arbitrators only) if, for example, you were raising a concern about something the correspondence clerks should not be privy to (ie: misuse of tools by a functionary), correct? Granted, I think motion 3 is probably the simpler option here, but in the event motion 1 passes, is the understanding I wrote out accurate? EggRoll97 02:15, 2 December 2024 (UTC)

@EggRoll97 Yes, but probably only after an additional step. The penultimate paragraph of motions 1 and 2 says The Committee shall establish a process to allow editors to, in unusual circumstances following a showing of good cause, directly email a mailing list accessible only by arbitrators and not by correspondence clerks . No details are given about what this process would be, but one possibility would I guess be something like contacting an individual arbitrator outlining clearly why you think the c-clerks should not be privy to whatever it is. If they agree they'll tell you how to submit your evidence (maybe they'll add your email address to a temporary whitelist). Thryduulf (talk) 03:01, 2 December 2024 (UTC)

In my experience working on committees and for non-profits, typically management is much more open to offering money for software solutions that they are told can resolve a problem than agreeing to pay additional compensation for new personnel. Are you sure there isn't some tracking solution that could resolve some of these problems? Liz 07:20, 2 December 2024 (UTC)

In our tentative discussions with WMF, it sounded like it would be much more plausible to get a 0.1-0.2 FTE of staffer time than it would to get us 15 ZenDesk licenses, which was also somewhat surprising to me. That wasn't a firm response – if we went back and said we really need this, I'm guessing it'd be plausible. And we've never asked about compensating c-clerks – that was an idea that came from Voorts's comment above, and I proposed it for discussion, not because I necessarily support it but because I think it's worth discussion, and I certainly don't think it's integral to the c-clerk proposal. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 15:00, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
Well, offering compensation for on-wiki tasks would be breaking new ground for the project. I do wonder though about the possibility of securing former arbitrators for these correspondent clerks' positions. It sounds like all of the work of an arbitrator (or more) without any ability to influence the results. I don't know if we'd have many interested and eligible parties. How many clerks would you think would be necessary? One? Or 3 or 4? Liz 21:40, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
Yeah, these are great questions. Responses to your points:
  • On volunteers: As I wrote above, four functionaries (including three former arbs) expressed initial-stage interest when this was floated when I consulted functionaries – which is great and was a bit unexpected, and which is why I wrote it up this way. Arbitrators will know that my initial plan from previous months/years did not involve limiting this to functionaries, to have a broader pool of applicants. But since we do have several interested functs, and they are already trusted to hold NDA'd private information (especially the former arbs who have previously been elected to access to this very list), I thought this would be a good way to make this a more uncontroversial proposal.
  • How many to appoint? I imagine one or two if it was up to me. One would be ideal (I think it's like 30 minutes of work per day ish, max), but two for redundancy might make a lot of sense. I don't think it's all of the work of an arbitrator (or more) without any ability to influence the results – because the c-clerk would be responsible for tracking matters, not actually attempting to resolve them, that's a lot less work than serving as an arb. It does require more consistency than most arbs have to put in, though.
  • On compensating: Yeah, I'm not sure I'll end up supporting the idea, but I don't think it's unprecedented in the sense that you're thinking. Correspondence clerks aren't editing; none of the tasks listed in the motion require on-wiki edits. And there are plenty of WMF grants that have gone to off-wiki work for the benefit of projects; the first example I could think of was m:Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/UTRS User Experience Development (ID: 22215192) but I know there are many.
Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 21:59, 2 December 2024 (UTC)
I am quite confused, I often read arbs saying most of ArbCom work is behind-the-scenes work. But is all this behind-the-scenes work essentially just a one-person 30-minute-a-day work? If so, the solution here is that more arbs should simply pull their weight, which Motion 3 helps. I don't think WMF would pay someone to work 30 minutes a day either. Kenneth Kho (talk) 07:19, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
But is all this behind-the-scenes work essentially just a one-person 30-minute-a-day work?. No, the actual work takes a lot more time and effort because each arb has to read, understand and form opinions on many different things, and the committee needs to discuss most of those things, which will often re-reading and re-evaluating based on the points raised. Then in many cases there needs to be a vote. What the "one-person, 30 minutes a day" is referring to is just the meta of what tasks are open, what the current status of it is, who needs to opine on it, etc. Thryduulf (talk) 11:31, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
Thanks, I realized I misunderstood it. I see that this is a relatively lightweight proposal, perhaps it could work but it probably won't help much either.
@L235 I have been thinking of splitting ArbCom into Public ArbCom and Private ArbCom. I see Public ArbCom as being able to function without the tools as @Worm That Turned advocated, focused more on complex dispute resolution. I see Private ArbCom as high-trust roles with NDAs, privy to WMF and overseeing Public ArbCom. Both ArbComs are elected separately as 15-members bodies, and both will be left with about half the current authority and responsibility. Kenneth Kho (talk) 01:54, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
Thryduulf is right; I think Kevin meant that the tracking itself might be a 30 minute a day activity. But it has to happen consistently, and with a high catch rate. It also has to happen on top of our usual Arb work, which for me already averages a good ten hours a week, but can be more than twenty hours in the busy times. And I, like the other arbs, already have a full time job and a life outside Misplaced Pages. I don't like the idea of splitting ArbCom in twain, nor do I think it could be achieved. CaptainEek ⚓ 02:18, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
I agree, having someone managing the work could really help smooth things out. Kenneth Kho (talk) 11:36, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
My first thought is that cleanly splitting arbcom would be very difficult. For example what happens if there is an open public case and two-thirds of the way through the evidence phase someone discovers and wishes to submit private evidence? Thryduulf (talk) 02:31, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
I agree, the split won't be entirely clean. I'm thinking Public ArbCom would narrowly remand part of the case to Private ArbCom if it finds that the private evidence is likely to materially affect the outcome. Kenneth Kho (talk) 11:34, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
How will public know whether the private evidence will materially affect the outcome without seeing the private evidence? Secondly, how will private arbcom determine whether it materially affects the outcome without reviewing all the public evidence and thus duplicating public arbcom's work (and thus also negating the workload benefits of the split)? What happens if public and private arbcom come to different conclusions about the same public evidence? Thryduulf (talk) 11:39, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
You raised good points that I did not address. I think that a way to do this would be to follow how Oversighters have the authority to override Admins that they use sparingly. Private ArbCom could have the right to receive any private evidence regarding an ongoing case on Public ArbCom, and Private ArbCom will have discretions to override Public ArbCom remedies without explanation other than something like "per private evidence". Private ArbCom would need to familiarize themselves with the case a bit, but this is mitigated by the fact that they only concerned with the narrow parts. Private ArbCom could have the authority to take the whole Public ArbCom case private if it deems that private evidence affect many parties. Kenneth Kho (talk) 11:55, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
12 candidates for 9 open seats is sufficient. But it hardly suggests we have so many people that we could support 30 people (even presuming some additional people would run under the split). Further, what happens behind the scenes already strains the trust of the community. But at least the community can see the public actions as a reminder of "well this person hasn't lost it completely while on ArbCom". I think it would be much harder to sustain trust under this split. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 02:35, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
I honestly like the size of 12-member committee, too many proverbial cooks spoil the proverbial broth. I did think about the trust aspect, as the community has been holding ArbCom under scrutiny, but at the same time I consider that the community has been collegial with Bureaucrats, Checkusers, Oversighters. Private ArbCom would be far less visible, with Public ArbCom likely taking the heat for contentious decisions. Kenneth Kho (talk) 11:40, 4 December 2024 (UTC)
I agree with L235 regarding whether this is all the work and none of the authority: it does not come with all the responsibility that being an Arb comes with either. This role does not need to respond to material questions or concerns about arbitration matters and does not need to read and weigh the voluminous case work to come to a final decision. The c-clerk will need to keep up on emails and will probably need to have an idea of what's going on in public matters, but that was definitely not the bulk of the (stressful?) work of an arbitrator. Izno (talk) 00:26, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
@Liz well that's what I thought. I figured that ZenDesk was the winningest solution, until the Foundation made it seem like ZenDesk licenses were printed on gold bars. We did do some back of the envelope calculations, and it is decidedly expensive. Still...I have a hard time believing those ZenDesk licenses really cost more than all that staff time. I think we'll have to do some more convincing of the Foundation on that front, or implement a different solution. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:29, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

I touched upon the idea of using former arbitrators to do administrative tasks on the arbitration committee talk page, and am also pleasantly surprised to hear there is some interest. I think this approach may be the most expeditious way to put something in place at least for the interim. (On a side note, I urge people not to let the term "c-clerk" catch on. It sounds like stuttering, or someone not good enough to be an A-level clerk. More importantly, it would be quite an obscure jargon term.) isaacl (talk) 23:18, 2 December 2024 (UTC)

To that end, upon the first appointment of correspondence clerks, the current arbcom-en mailing list shall be renamed to arbcom-en-internal, which shall continue to be accessible only by arbitrators, and a new arbcom-en email list shall be established. The subscribers to the new arbcom-en list shall be the arbitrators and correspondence clerks.

Something I raised in the functionary discussion was that this doesn't make sense to me. What is the basis for this split here? Izno (talk) 00:08, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

I assumed it was so that the clerks would only see the incoming email and not be privy to the entire commitee's comments on the matter. While all functionaries and arbs sign the same NDA, operating on a need to know basis is not at all uncommon in groups that deal with sensitive information. When I worked for the census we had to clear our debriefing room of literally everything because it was being used the next day by higher-ups from Washington who were visiting. They outranked all of us by several orders of mgnitude, but they had no reason to be looking at the non-anonymized personal data we had lying all over the place.
Conversely it would spare the clerks from having their inboxes flooded by every single arb comment, which as you know can be quite voluminous. Just Step Sideways 00:23, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
And it would also prevent them from seeing information related to themselves or something they should actively recuse on. Thryduulf (talk) 01:15, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
This suggested rationale doesn't hold water: someone with an issue with a c-clerk or where they may need to recuse should just follow the normal process for an issue with an arb: to whit, kicking off arbcom-b for a private discussion. Izno (talk) 01:39, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
I was thinking of material from before they were appointed, e.g. if there was a discussion involving the actions of user:Example in November and they become a c-clerk in December, they shouldn't be able to see the discussion even if the only comments were that the allegations against them are obviously ludicrous. I appreciate I didn't make this clear though. Thryduulf (talk) 02:35, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
Making arbcom-en a "firewall" from the arb deliberations would inhibit the c-clerk from performing the duties listed in the motion. I cannot see how it would be workable for them to remind arbs to do the thing the electorate voluntold them to do if the c-clerk cannot see whether they have done those things (e.g. coming to a conclusion on an appeal), and would add to the overhead of introducing this secretarial position (email comes in, c-clerk forwards to -internal, arbs discussion on -internal, come to conclusion, send an email back to -en, which the c-clerk then actions back to the user on arbcom-en). This suggested rationale also does not hold water to me. Izno (talk) 01:43, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
Apologies – if this was the interpretation, that's bad drafting on my part. The sole intention is that the new correspondence clerks won't see the past arbcom-en archives, which were emails sent to the committee on the understanding that only arbitrators would see those emails. C clerks will see everything that's newly sent on arbcom-en, including all deliberations held on arbcom-en, with the exception of anything that is so sensitive that the committee feels the need to restrict discussion to arbitrators (this should be fairly uncommon but covers the recusal concern above in a similar way as discussions about arbs who recuse sometimes get moved to arbcom-en-b). The C clerks will need to be able to see deliberations to be able to track pending matters and ensure that balls aren't being dropped, which could not happen unless they had access to the discussions – this is a reasonable "need to know" because they are fulfilling a function that is hard to combine with serving as an active arbitrator. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 01:54, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
Well, I clearly totally misread your intent there. I.... don't think I like the idea that unelected clerks can see everything the committee is doing. Just Step Sideways 03:15, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
FWIW, I oppose splitting arbcom-en a second time -- Guerillero 10:17, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
Regarding 1.4, I think arbcom-en and -c are good ones for a c-clerk to have access to. -b probably doesn't need access ever, as it's used exclusively for work with recusals attached to it, which should be small enough for ArbCom to manage itself in the addition of a c-clerk. (This comment in private elicited the slight rework L235 made to the motion.) Izno (talk) 06:08, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
What does this mean – when was the first time? arcticocean ■ 15:52, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
@Arcticocean: In 2018, arbcom-l became arbcom-en and the archives are in two different places. -- Guerillero 18:54, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

Appointing one of the sitting arbitrators as "Coordinating Arbitrator" (motion 3) would be my recommended first choice of solution. We had a Coordinating Arbitrator—a carefully chosen title, as opposed to something like "Chair"—for a few years some time ago. It worked well, although it was not a panacea, and I frankly don't recollect why the coordinator role was dropped at some point. If there is a concern about over-reliance or over-burden on any one person, the role could rotate periodically (although I would suggest a six-month term to avoid too much time being spent on the mechanics of selecting someone and transitioning from one coordinator to the next). At any given time there should be at least one person on a 15-member Committee with the time and the skill-set to do the necessary record-keeping and nudging in addition to arbitrating, and this solution would avoid the complications associated with bringing another person onto the mailing list. I think there would be little community appetite for involving a WMF staff member (even one who is or was also an active Wikipedian) in the Committee's business; and if we are going to set the precedent of paying someone to handle tasks formerly handled by volunteers, with all due respect to the importance of ArbCom this is not where I would start. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:32, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. Regarding little community appetite – that is precisely why we are inviting community input here on this page, as one way to assess how the community feels about the various options. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 02:01, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
I also like the idea of an arb or two taking on this role more than another layer of clerks. I'm sure former arbs would be great at it but the committee needs to handle its own internal business. Just Step Sideways 03:37, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
I think it is ideal for the arbitration committee to track its own work items and prompt its members for timely action, and may have written this some time ago on-wiki. However... years have passed now, and the arbitration committee elections aren't well-suited to selecting arbitrators with the requisite skill set (even if recruitment efforts were made, the community can only go by the assurance of the candidate regarding the skills they possess and the time they have available). So I think it's worth looking at the option of keeping an arbitrator involved in an emeritus position if they have shown the aptitude and availability to help with administration. This could be an interim approach, until another solution is in place (maybe there can be more targeted recruiting of specific editors who, by their ongoing Misplaced Pages work, have demonstrated availability and tracking ability). isaacl (talk) 18:01, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

2 and 4 don't seem like very good ideas to me. For 2, I think we need to maintain a firm distinction between community and WMF entities, and not do anything that even looks like blending them together. For 4, every time you involve money in something, you multiply your potential problems by a factor of at least ten (and why should that person get paid, when other people who contribute just as much time doing other things don't, and when, for that matter, even the arbs themselves don't?). For 1, I could see that being a good idea, to take some clerical/"grunt work" load off of ArbCom and give them more time for, well, actually arbitrating, and functionaries will all already have signed the NDA. I don't have any problem with 3, but don't see why ArbCom can't just do it if they want to; all the arbs already have access to the information in question so it's not like someone is being approved to see it who can't already. Seraphimblade 01:49, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

@CaptainEek: Following up on your comments on motion 1, depending on which aspect of the proposed job one wanted to emphasize, you could also consider "amanuensis," "registrar," or "receptionist." (The best on-wiki title in my opinion, though we now are used to it so the irony is lost, will always be "bureaucrat"; I wonder who first came up with that one.) Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:49, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

Or "cat-herder". --Tryptofish (talk) 00:18, 5 December 2024 (UTC)
Following parliamentary tradition, perhaps "whip". (Less whimsically: "recording secretary".) isaacl (talk) 00:31, 5 December 2024 (UTC)
@Newyorkbrad:, if memory serves @Keegan: knows who came up with it, and as I recall the story was that they wanted to come up with the most boring, unappealing name they could so not too many people would be applying for it all the time. Just Step Sideways 05:03, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

So, just to usher in a topic-specific discussion because it has been alluded to many times without specifics being given, what was the unofficial position of ArbCom coordinator like? Who held this role? How did it function? Were other arbitrators happy with it? Was the Coordinator given time off from other arbitrator responsibilities? I assume this happened when an arbitrator just assumed the role but did it have a more formal origin? Did it end because no one wanted to pick up the responsibility? Questions, questions. Liz 06:56, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

I cannot speak for anything but my term. I performed this role for about 1.5 years of the 2 I was on the committee. To borrow an email I sent not long before I stepped off that touches on the topics in this whole set of motions (yes, this discussion isn't new):
  • Daily, ~20 minutes: went into the list software and tagged the day's incoming new email chains with a label (think "upe", "duplicate", etc).
  • Daily, ~10 minutes: took care of any filtered emails on the list (spam and not-spam).
  • Monthly, 1-2 hours: trawled the specific categories of tags since the beginning of the month to add to an arbwiki page for tracking for "needs to get done". Did the inverse also (removed stuff from tracking that seemed either Done or Stale).
  • Monthly, 15 minutes to prep: sent an email with a direct list of the open appeals and a reminder about the "needs doing" stuff (and a few months I highlighted a topic or two that were easy wins). This built off the daily work in a way that would be a long time if it were all done monthly instead of daily.
I was also an appeals focused admin, which had further overhead here that I would probably put in the responsibility of this kind of arb. Other types of arbs probably had similar things they would have wanted to do this direction but I saw very little of such. Daily for this effort, probably another 15 minutes or so:
  • I copy-pasted appeal metadata from new appeals email to arbwiki
  • Started countdown timers for appeals appearing to be at consensus
  • Sent "easy" boilerplate emails e.g. "we got this appeal, we may be in touch" or "no way Jose you already appealed a month ago"
  • Sent results for the easy appeals post-countdown timer and filled in relevant metadata (easy appeals here usually translated to "declined" since this was the quick-n-easy daily work frame, not the long-or-hard daily work frame)
(End extract from referenced email.) This second set is now probably a much-much lighter workload with the shedding of most CU appeals this year (which was 70% of the appeals by count during my term), and I can't say how much of this second group would be in the set of duties depending on which motion is decided above (or if even none of the motions are favored by the committee - you can see I've advocated for privately documenting the efforts of coordinating arbs rather than publicly documenting them regarding 3, and it wouldn't take much to get me to advocate against 2 and 4, I just know others can come to the right-ish conclusion on those two already; I'm pretty neutral on 1).
Based on the feedback I got as I was going out the door, it was appreciated. I did see some feedback that this version of the role was insufficiently personal to each arb. The tradeoff for doing something more personalized to each other arb is either time or software (i.e. money). I did sometimes occasionally call out when other members had not yet chimed in on discussions. That was ad hoc and mostly focused on onwiki matters (case votes particularly), but occasionally I had to name names when doing appeals work because the arbs getting to the appeal first were split. In general the rest of the committee didn't name names (which touches on some discussion above). I think some arbs appreciated seeing their name in an email when they were needed.
I was provided no formal relief from other matters. But as I discussed with one arb during one of the stressful cases of the term, I did provide relief informally for the duration of that case to that person for the stuff I was interested in, so I assume that either I in fact had no relief from other matters, or that I had relief but didn't know it (and just didn't ask for anyone else to do it - since I like to think I had it well enough in hand). :-) The committee is a team effort and not everyone on the team has the same skills, desire, or time to see to all other matters. (The probing above about arbs being insufficiently active is a worthwhile probe, to be certain.) To go further though, I definitely volunteered to do this work. Was it necessary work? I think so. I do not know what would have happened if I had not been doing it. (We managed to hit only one public snag related to timeliness during my term, which I count as a win; opinions may differ.)
There is no formal origin to the role that I know of. Someone else with longer committee-memory would have to answer whether all/recent committees have had this type, and who they were, and why if not.
I don't know how much of what I did lines up with what L235 had in mind proposing these motions. I do not think the work I did covers everything listed in the motions laid out. (I don't particularly need clarification on the point - it's a matter that will fall out in post-motion discussion.) Izno (talk) 08:48, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
The original announcement of the Coordinating Arbitrator position was here. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 21:29, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
Archive zero: I love it! --Tryptofish (talk) 21:37, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
Interestingly, that announcement also repeated the announcement at the top of the archive page that a departing arbitrator continued to assist the committee by co-ordinating the mailing list: acknowledging incoming emails and responding to senders with questions about them, and tracking issues to ensure they are resolved. So both a co-ordinator (plus a deputy!) and an arbitrator emeritus. isaacl (talk) 23:23, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
former arbitrator will continue to coordinate the ArbCom mailing list. was probably a statement along the lines of "knows how to deal with Mailman". And I think you're getting that role mixed up with the actual person doing the work management: the Arbitration Committee has decided to appoint one of its sitting arbitrators to act as coordinator (emphasis mine). Izno (talk) 23:46, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
Obviously I have no personal knowledge of what ended up happening. I just listed the responsibilities as described at Misplaced Pages:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard/Archive 0 § Improving ArbCom co-ordination. I'm not sure what I'm getting mixed up; all I said is that a co-ordinator and deputy were appointed, and that a former arbitrator was said to be co-ordinating the mailing list. It's certainly possible the split of duties changed from the first post in the archive. isaacl (talk) 00:01, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Oh, I see that now. Izno (talk) 00:04, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
I think I agree with Izno regarding the coordinating arbitrator role. There's no problem letting the community that the role exists, but I don't think it's necessary for the role's responsibilities to be part of the public-facing guarantees being made to the community. If the role needs to expand, shrink, split into multiple roles, or otherwise change, the committee should feel free to just do it as needed. The committee has the flexibility to organize itself as it best sees fit. isaacl (talk) 23:36, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
I think this is the right approach. It doesn't need to be advertised who is coordinating activity on the mailing list, it just needs to get done. If it takes two people, fine, if they do it for six months and say they want out of the role, ask somebody else to do it. And so on. Just Step Sideways 23:50, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
For instance, I don't think it's necessary to codify whether or not the coordinating arbitrator role is permanent. Just put a task on the schedule to review how the role is working out in nine months, and then modify the procedure accordingly as desired. isaacl (talk) 23:32, 9 December 2024 (UTC)
One exception: the first bullet point regarding responding to communications and assigning a tracking identifier does involve the committee's interactions with the community. I feel, though, that for flexibility these guarantees can be made without codifying who does them, from the community's point of view. (It's fine of course to make them part of the coordinating arbitrator's tasks.) isaacl (talk) 23:41, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
Izno, this actually sounds like a helluva lot of work, maybe not minute-wise but mental, keeping track of everything so requests don't fall through the cracks. I think anyone assuming this role should get a break from, say, drafting ARBCOM cases if nothing else. Liz 03:49, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
It might be a lot of work, but it wasn't the bulk of the work, even for the work that I was doing. There was a lot more steps to being the appeal-focused admin above. Izno (talk) 04:02, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
You made me laugh, Liz. That sounds like my normal start-of-day routine, to be accompanied by a cup of tea and, perhaps, a small breakfast. I'd expect most arbitrators to be reading the mail on a daily basis, unless they are inactive for some reason; the difference here is the tagging/flagging of messages and clearing the filters, which probably adds about 10-12 minutes. I'll simply say that any arb who isn't prepared to spend 30-45 minutes/day reading emails probably shouldn't be an arb. That's certainly a key part of the role. Risker (talk) 04:43, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
+1. In my thoughts to potential candidates I said an hour a day for emails but that included far more appeals than the committee gets now. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 04:47, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Never mind reading emails, the bulk of my private ArbCom time was spent on processing them: doing checks, reporting results, and otherwise responding to other work. You can get away with just reading internal emails, but it's going to surprise your fellow arbs if you don't pipe up with some rational thought when you see the committee thinking about something personally objectionable and the first time they hear about it is when motions have been posted and are waiting for votes. Izno (talk) 06:17, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
Right now, I check my email account about once a week. I guess that will change if I'm elected to the committee. It would have helped to hear all of these details before the election. Liz 08:41, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
My hour included time to respond to emails, though I also note you're not going particularly deep on anything with that time (at least when ArbCom had more appeals). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:26, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
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