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Please read this notice before submitting any material (evidence or workshop proposals or comments) on the case or talk pages. From the statements so far, this case is either about an administrator editing in defiance of the neutral point of view policy or a group of editors unjustly making accusations of such. The committee takes no view at present. However, all participants are reminded that breaches of the Outing and harassment policy and the Personal attacks policy are prohibited. Further, be aware that the outing policy takes precedence over the Conflict of interest guideline. No material that touches upon individual privacy may be posted publicly but must instead be sent using "Email user" to the Arbitration Committee. Such material will be accepted, or disregarded, at the committee's sole discretion. Before communicating by email with the Committee, please read our "Communications and privacy" statement.

Purpose of the workshop: The case Workshop exists so that parties to the case, other interested members of the community, and members of the Arbitration Committee can post possible components of the final decision for review and comment by others. Components proposed here may be general principles of site policy and procedure, findings of fact about the dispute, remedies to resolve the dispute, and arrangements for remedy enforcement. These are the four types of proposals that can be included in committee final decisions. There are also sections for analysis of /Evidence, and for general discussion of the case. Any user may edit this workshop page; please sign all posts and proposals. Arbitrators will place components they wish to propose be adopted into the final decision on the /Proposed decision page. Only Arbitrators and clerks may edit that page, for voting, clarification as well as implementation purposes.

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Motions and requests by the parties

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Questions to the parties

Arbitrators may ask questions of the parties in this section.

Can we have some input on analysis of the evidence please? We have two accounts in evidence, those of Wifione and Vejvančický (links: Vejvančický's evidence, Wifione's evidence) providing incompatible and contradictory interpretations of the same edits. After discussion with my fellow drafters, we therefore invite analysis of the evidence. Such analysis must be done (i) without introducing new material but instead pointing to policy and guidelines and (ii) without editorialising. At this point, best is to take a straight range of diffs, say all those within a given month or two, to avoid the appearance of cherry-picking. Please follow the model adopted here, by PhilKnight for what is expected.  Roger Davies 07:44, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

Proposed decision

Proposals by User:Begoon

Proposed principles

Purpose of Misplaced Pages

1) The purpose of Misplaced Pages is to create a high-quality, free-content encyclopedia. Use of the encyclopedia to advance personal agendas – such as advocacy or propaganda is prohibited.

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Neutral point of view

2) Misplaced Pages adopts a neutral point of view, and advocacy for any particular view is prohibited. In particular, Misplaced Pages's conflict of interest guidelines strongly discourage editors contributing "in order to promote their own interests." Neutrality is non-negotiable and requires that, whatever their personal feelings, all editors must strive to (i) ensure articles accurately reflect all significant viewpoints published by reliable sources and (ii) give prominence to such viewpoints in proportion to the weight of the source. Editors may contribute to Misplaced Pages only if they comply with Misplaced Pages's key policies.

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Administrator conduct

3) Administrators are expected to lead by example. Administrators are expected to follow Misplaced Pages policies. Egregiously poor judgment may result in the removal of administrator status.

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Proposed findings of fact

Wifione has edited wikipedia to manipulate IIPM's SEO rankings and visibility, contrary to WP:NPOV

1) This evidence about Wifione's edits to the IIPM disambiguation page and creation of stub articles clearly shows that Wifione's editing has been intended to manipulate the SEO rankings and visibility of IIPM, often to obscure information from internet searches, by ensuring searches would not go directly to the IIPM article. There is no credible, alternative explanation for this editing pattern.

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The hand waving phrase "clearly shows" should be changed to "suggests". Combine this with the lex parsimoniae principle below, and you've sufficiently proven the point. We can never know with certainty exactly what Wifione was up to. We have to make an informed conclusion based on the probabilities. Jehochman 17:46, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

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This diff, already linked in evidence, goes into greater detail about the purpose and mechanisms of this aspect of the manipulation. Begoon  23:42, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

The summary linked by Begoon () seems highly credible, and it's very difficult to think of an alternate plausible explanation for WifiOne's behavior with regard to the IIPM acronym. MastCell  17:27, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

Wifione has tendentiously manipulated wikipedia articles, to better portray IIPM, and to denigrate IIPM's competitors

2) As is clearly shown by the evidence in this section, Wifione has deliberately and tendentiously manipulated wikipedia articles, including articles covered by the BLP policy, in order to better portray IIPM, and to denigrate IIPM's competitors, contrary to WP:NPOV.

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Wifione has repeatedly attempted to avoid accountability.

3) As outlined in this evidence, Wifione has repeatedly attempted to avoid accountability. Good faith enquiries have been met with long periods of silence, diversionary attempts to discredit the questioner(s), or misleading, inadequate replies.

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See also this summary table which outlines many specific instances where Wifione's "explanations" during this case are inadequate: Summary table. Begoon  23:42, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Wifione topic banned

1) Having demonstrated an inability to edit neutrally in this area, Wifione is indefinitely topic banned from all edits concerning education in India, broadly construed.

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Wifione administrator privileges revoked

2) For having edited, over a long period, tendentiously and in a manner inconsistent with the standards expected of an administrator, and for failing to be properly accountable for these actions, Wifione's administrator privileges are revoked.

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Wifione site banned

3) For egregious violations of the WP:NPOV policies, avoidance of accountability, and prolonged, tendentious manipulation of wikipedia articles for the benefit of an organisation, Wifione is site banned for 12 months.

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A topic ban would be sufficient. There is no evidence of problems in any areas beyond IIPM and it's competition broadly construed. If her whole motive is to spin this article then the topic ban is equivalent to a site ban. If she wants to help in other areas that should be allowed. Better to keep her involved and accountable than to be reincarnated as a new account un-accountable. Jehochman 02:00, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

@Mastcell: bad editors can become good editors. There is a large industry of SEO consultants in India doing bad work, like what we see in this topic area. Folks there need jobs and they do what they can to make a living. They aren't evil; they are just uninformed and financially vulnerable. If we can show Wifione and others that there are consequences, but that we are also kind enough to forgive them if they just stop diddling our articles, we will make more progress than if we ban her. If banned she may turn up tomorrow with a new account, working on a new project. Jehochman 17:50, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

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Jehochman, there may be some merit to what you say here. Of the utmost importance is that Wifione should not be permitted to edit articles in this area again, and that they not retain administrator status, given the proposed principles and proposed findings outlined above. That should be the absolute minimum result here. I still feel a siteban would be an appropriate remedy, given the weight of evidence, and the egregious, tendentious, long-term editing pattern, but I also concede that banning one particular account is unlikely to prevent the use of other accounts, as you say, and as is also strongly indicated in evidence. Begoon  14:11, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

I disagree with Jehochman. If these allegations are true, then Wifione has behaved with a degree of dishonesty and deceptiveness which should exclude him from any further participation in this project. I certainly wouldn't feel comfortable co-editing with him on any topic. Thus I don't think a topic ban would be sufficient. MastCell  17:32, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

Proposals by User:Jehochman

Proposed principles

Lex parsimoniae

1) Among competing hypotheses, the one with the fewest assumptions should be selected. Other, more complicated solutions may ultimately prove correct, but—in the absence of certainty—the fewer assumptions that are made, the better. In arbitration, it is not necessary to prove wrongdoing with certainty. When circumstances and evidence demonstrate the likelihood of wrongdoing, the burden shifts to the presumed wrongdoer, who must explain their actions.

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The simplest explanation, the one that requires the fewest assumptions, is that Wifione has been involved in IIPM's search engine optimization and online reputation management campaign. Their activities are entirely consistent, and any other explanation for Wifione's activities requires a greater number of less probable assumptions. If there is another explanation, the burden is on Wifione to present a convincing explanation. Jehochman 17:37, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

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Analysis of evidence

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Sockpuppetry allegations

If I've done this wrong or in the wrong place, feel free to tell me off or just fix it. I got most of these links from Jayen's evidence and have arranged them in a kind of narrative. There is behavioural evidence, too, for the Wifione = Mrinal Pandy hypothesis. I'll move that here too. I think it's clear what's likely going on here.

Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 10:58, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

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Thanks for taking the trouble to do this but what I was primarily after was analysis (as against an extract) of the competing claims regarding the content issues. These probably best come from so far uninvolved people.  Roger Davies 16:42, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

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