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Community ban on User:SndrAndrss

Ban enacted. Navou banter / contribs 00:13, 19 March 2007 (UTC) reply

This arbitration case has closed and the final decision is available at the link above. Smallbones is banned indefinitely from editing articles that relate to Robert Prechter, including talk pages. This notice is given by a Clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 01:26, 14 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Updated community ban language at WP:BAN

Community Ban on Verdict

Banned Navou banter / contribs 00:14, 19 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Request discussion to ban Metros from Cumberland, Maryland Project

Not sure what this is, I'm not seeing this going anywhere. Navou banter / contribs 00:15, 19 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Certified.Gangsta

Certified.Gangsta ( talk · contribs · count · logs · block log · lu · rfas · rfb · arb · rfc · lta · socks)

In the course of researching an RFC on Certified.Gangsta ( talk · contribs) I came across far more bad behavior than I expected. At this point I'm thinking there is no need to waste any more time and we can go straight to a community ban. Please review the RFC case I linked to above. -- Ideogram 07:18, 17 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Also see this thread on AN/I. -- Ideogram 07:29, 17 March 2007 (UTC) reply

I think this may be premature at this time. I can appreciate the scope of CG's revert warring, but the RfC is still very new. Give the process a little time to work. If many outside users make statements saying that CG has exhausted their patience, it will make the case for a community ban that much stronger. However, we should leave the discussion here open at the same time, as this will draw attention to the RfC and encourage people to give their viewpoint. I'm sorry if this seems like an approach with no teeth, I just prefer to work within process when possible. Harsher steps can still be taken in a week.-- Danaman5 08:04, 17 March 2007 (UTC) reply


BhaiSaab and His_excellency

The reviewing of the RfAr for Waldorf education has concluded. The Arbitration Committee has banned User:Pete K from editing Waldorf education, PLANS, Rudolf Steiner, Anthroposophy, and related pages or their talk pages.

This notice is given by an informal helper on the behalf of the Arbitration Committee. - Penwhale | Blast him / Follow his steps 18:39, 20 March 2007 (UTC) reply

QuackGuru and Wikipedia-related articles

Good evening, my fellow Wikipedians. After careful reflection, I've decided I would like to "start a fresh", in a way. Although I've never vandalised, and I'm most certainly not a "bad user", I've acted quite "power hungry" over my one-year career. In short, I've applied for several positions out of my reach.

My NHS G.P. (that's a doctor, for you non- Brits :) has spoken with me, and I've been prescribed a course of anti-depressants. Around Saturday, these took effect, and I've got a positive new outlook in life - and Wikipedia.

I would therefore like the community to suggest methods I could employ to "start a fresh"; my particular focus is on DR work, as well as XfD. However, I believe there are still those out there who are bitter over my past actions. If they can find it in their heart to forgive me, I shall be eternally grateful.

In the meanwhile, I ask the community to rather than forget what I have done, to remain impartial and mindful of my new actions, and judge me on the present, rather than dwindle on the deep, dark past.

With the greatest anticipation,
anthonycfc [ talk 00:17, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Meds do wonders don't they? :) Things get forgotten (most of time) and will be dwindle away once you start expressing this positive attitude elsewhere (in your article writing and your dispute resolution with others in particular). — Moe 01:48, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
My recommendation would be to steer well clear of xFD and do some Wikignoming. Special:Random is good - keep going till you see something interesting that wants work, it rarely takes more than a few clicks. Oh, and if it's Dosulepin, don't try doing tricky detail things after taking the meds :-) Guy ( Help!) 13:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • I have a standing offer to people who get sanctioned at arbitration that I'll give them the Barnstar of Resilience if they create a new article that makes the Did you know? section at Wikipedia's main page. Check out User:Durova/Did you know? for tips on how to get there. Best wishes, Durova Charge! 13:58, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • Thanks for your input guys! To Durova - I've not even came close to being in front of the ArbCom! anthonycfc [ talk 20:09, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I understand, but since I offer the barnstar to people who misstep that badly I can certainly offer it to you. Best wishes. Durova Charge! 21:06, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • WikiGnoming isn't a bad idea actually. I think you have a lot to contribute and I've seen you contribute very positively in areas I've been involved with, and you have a good attitude to this. I think Essjay's little graphic is always a good policy to follow when in doubt. Orderinchaos78 08:44, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Regarding El C and closure of Essjay AFD

So, how many times are high-profile debates going to be early closed out of nowhere? often creating turmoil in the process, as they are usually closed against consensus? This is getting really old. The DRV is a massive "overturn" pile-on. User talk:El C is not budging, so the opinions of dozens of Wikipedians is being swept aside at the whim of some admin. I care very little about Wikipedia and it's even bothering me. He's inviting dispute resolution; I for one am sick of seeing this happen over and over and over again, with the early closings - each one creates more chaos than the last. So the question is, is there a potential for a peaceful RFC, or will it just become a flame war like half of them do? And will I be called a "troll" for starting one? I'd like some thoughts, and am seeing if anyone is willing to certify the dispute or whatever. Milto LOL pia 16:35, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply

  • Forget it, he's said someone can unclose it. Looks like the sensible thing was done. Milto LOL pia 16:37, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
    • So, who's going to bite the bullet and actually reopen the AfD discussion? Does it count as wheel warring when the closing admin says it's OK to reverse the closure? — Josiah Rowe ( talkcontribs) 17:42, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
      • I strongly recommend a slow, measured, and considered approach, rather than yet more flip-flopping back and forth between AFD and Deletion Review. Do not take any unilateral action until the deletion review discussion has had time to for editors to discuss and to attempt to reach consensus. That includes allowing those editors who are not in the same timezone as you to fully participate in the discussion. Uncle G 18:25, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
        • While I feel the Essjay debates have got out of hand and should end, I also think it's very important to note that 'forcing the issue' by closing and protecting debate or speedily deleting an article has never had the desired effect of ending actual debate and encouraging people to move on. It simply adds another dimension to the ongoing dispute. Admins should think twice, three times and more about the actual effect of their actions, not just whether they are within policy, especially since WP:IAR is so controversial. Sam Blacketer 18:30, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • May I suggest that those in favor of keeping the article present their points, and those in favor of deleting it also present their points, and then have a (gasp) discussion for at least a few days, BEFORE you all start "voting"? I think that might be a good idea. It's my experience when we see the urge for people on both sides of a discussion to "WP:SNOW" the discussion in both directions, there's some very strongly held feelings that somebody needs to get out and the usual AFD/DRV discussion formats aren't very useful for this. In a normal parliamentary environment, I would suggest moving to recess for a fixed time to allow the members on each side of the question to go into their respective caucuses, select champions, and marshal their arguments, then return to a discussion of the question at hand (possibly in committee of the whole) with the champions presenting the respective cases. Unfortunately, Wikipedia's format doesn't allow for a "recess", nor does it readily permit the election of champions in caucus. Perhaps a three-day deferral of any attempts to delete, during which any interested party may write their own summary (or, alternatively, endorse someone else's summary) of the arguments for and against deleting (based on the opinions expressed in the prior AFD and DRV), followed by a discussion and, if consensus can be reached, then and only then a deletion (if warranted)? The regular deletion discussion format breaks down (in my opinion) on contentious issues, and I think the RFC approach method of summaries and endorsements is likely better in this situation. Kelly Martin ( talk) 23:20, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
    • Kelly is onto a good idea here. Rather than immediately skip to the "voting" of actions in bold-face, how about hold a discussion for a couple of days first? That should help deal with these kinds of cases. -- Cyde Weys 23:22, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
      • It's not a new idea. It's a long-standing maxim at AFD that It's Not About The Votes. There are several editors who reject the idea that every contribution to an AFD discussion should be prefixed with a boldfaced word, and do not do so themselves. If you think likewise, you are welcome to set an example by doing the same. An AFD discussion is a discussion, and is intended to be a discussion. Saying that a discussion between editors in order to consider alternatives and to achieve consensus, with editors presenting arguments and discussing those arguments with one another, isn't "the usual AFD discussion format" is to be misled by the current overuse of such boldfacing at AFD. In fact, such a discussion to achieve consensus is the ideal AFD discussion to which editors should aspire. Many of the best AFD discussions over the years have taken exactly this form. Uncle G 00:13, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
        • I think, however, it is safe to say that this is NOT what we are seeing in the discussions being spoken about above, and why I suggested that perhaps a more formal, constrained approach to "discussion" might yield benefit in this context. I certainly do not believe that every discussion deletion should be conducted in the more formal "summary and endorsement" format of RFC -- doing so is extra effort to no benefit in most cases. Contrariwise, I think the use of that format, or some other format which helps to provide structure to the discussion, is critical to the development of true community consensus. And that's why I so strongly urge it in the context of this particularly divisive situation. Kelly Martin ( talk) 00:20, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
If memory serves, this was proposed as a replacement system for RfA awhile back, but was rejected. I thought it was a pretty fantastic idea :/ — bbatsell ¿? 23:25, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I don't know, I've been wondering if I might see the day that someone decides to be bold and ignore all rules in order to do something like set up a workshop page for determining what's best for an article, rather than directly deleting, protecting, or replacing it. Bitnine 23:28, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
As you all probably know by now, Essjay has made ABC News [10] Link was on ABCNews.com about 8pm tonight. - SVRTVDude ( Yell - Toil) 03:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Indefinite block of User:BabyDweezil

The ArbCom and the Essjay business

One of the things that has bugged me most about the whole Essjay saga is the way in which Jimbo appointed Essjay onto the ArbCom, when he didn't ever run in the last election, after he knew about Essjay's liberties with the truth: nor, apparently, did Jimbo check Essjay's contribs for using those fake credentials to win content disputes, which we now know he did. Fair enough, Jimbo's a very busy chap, and all his actions after the initial mistake have been of the most wise and statesmanlike nature.

Now, my point is that that one bad decision - not that Jimbo makes very many of those - would not have got past us had it been put to community scrutiny, and an awful lot of bad publicity would not have occurred. Collectively, we have the time to check Essjay's contribs for dubious behaviour based on false credentials, which is what we eventually did at the RFC. The further bad publicity incurred by Jimbo's initials response to the New Yorker would not have occurred had the whole matter been put to community scrutiny earlier when Dmcdevit resigned and we needed replacements for the ArbCom.

Anyway, my point is that we, as a community, need more direct control over the final stage of our dispute resolution process, the ArbCom. It is our wiki. I have not been able to understand why Jimbo exercises so much control over the ArbCom, not only at election time but also when replacements during terms are needed. (BTW, the ArbCom terms are ludicrously long and make insufficient allowance for the high rate of admin and arbitrator burnout. But that is a side point). I cannot understand why we turn our brains off when it comes to ArbCom and delegate our responsibilities to Jimbo. As a community we control virtually every other aspect of Wikipedia: why not ArbCom? Why the abdication of responsibility? We need to take control of the process: ArbCom is important and deserves maximum scrutiny. So, any ideas how? Best, Moreschi Request a recording? 22:46, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply

I think the idea of running potential arbitrators by the community would be useful. Jimbo ran them by the arbitrators, and I feel somewhat guilty that I did not catch his use of his supposed degree and position in content disputes. I'm sure the community, with its many eyes would have found that problem. Fred Bauder 16:25, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Perhaps the fifth of the m:Foundation issues will be useful. HowIBecameCivil 22:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
You are, of course, aware that the ArbCom is a delegation of Jimbo's authority over the community, and acts on his personal authority as "god-king" rather than on any authority delegate to the ArbCom by the community. The ArbCom is not responsible to the community, and the community has no authority over it, except insofar as Jimbo chooses to allow. The ArbCom need only consider the community's interests to the extent that brazenly disregarding the community will cause the community to fail to respect it and render it practically unable to do anything useful. However, be very clear that you are delegating nothing to Jimbo when you "allow" Jimbo to select Arbitrators. Kelly Martin ( talk) 22:57, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
As Kelly points out above, Arbom is distinct from the community. Arbcom only exists because the community has failed to handle its own problems. I am always surprised by how quickly various cases are pushed onto Arbcom. Each case sent there is really the community saying "please step in we cannot handle this one". I would think the community would try harder to deal with these incidents themselves rather than abdicate responsibilty so easily. I think Moreschi is asking the wrong question. Don't ask why the abdication of responsibility in choosing arbitrators, but why the abdication of responsibility in relying on the "god-king" and his court of last resort to step in and settle so many disputes.--BirgitteSB 23:12, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
Indeed. I have often said that the purpose of the Arbitration Committee is to make decisions for the community in those situations where a decision is needed but the community is unable to make it. I've heard other Arbitrators say the same thing, so there must be some merit to the claim. Unfortunately, far too often the community abrogates its obligation to attempt to make decisions to the Arbitration Committee; conversely, (especially lately) the Arbitration Committee has occasionally seized the authority to make decisions from the community prematurely. When I was an Arbitrator, I often moved to reject cases where I felt that the community could manage to deal with the matter on its own, or where I felt that letting the community find a solution was likely to cause less damage than the Arbitration Committee taking the matter on. I fear that the sense that the Arbitration Committee should not take on matters in such a posture has been lost with the current Arbitration Committee; this is likely a reflection of the fact that the community has forgotten my oft-repeated admonishment: "The Arbitration Committee is not your mother." It is the community's obligation to police itself, not the Arbitration Committee's. The invocation of the authority of the Arbitration Committee represents a failure on the part of the community, and if the community were healthy would be an infrequent thing.
People, please try to be adults and work your problems out on your own. Don't rely on the ArbCom to do it for you. And remember, if policy gets in the way of doing this, feel free to ignore it (c.f. my above suggestion regarding controversial deletions). Kelly Martin ( talk) 23:30, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
But I would say that invocation of the Arbitration Committee's authority is an infrequent thing. We have 1.6 million articles, tens of thousands of active users, over 1000 administrators, and at present, exactly 10 open arbitration cases. Newyorkbrad 23:48, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Ten? That's high, compared to when I was an Arbitrator (except for that brief period when I was first appointed, and that's because there was a backlog caused by a shortage of Arbitrators). And more informative is not the number of open cases, but the number of cases filed (whether or not accepted). Each case filed represents a situation where the community failed to sufficiently resolve the dispute in question. And I'm quite certain that that number is increasing. Kelly Martin ( talk) 23:54, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
On the other hand, the community and the number of pages whereon conflict can arise is also larger than when you served as an arbitrator. As for rejected cases, typically when the arbitrators decline to hear a case, they advise the editor who filed it to pursue a more community-based solution to the issue. I would guesstimate that there are maybe about three rejected cases filed every week—still not a lot given our current size and scope. Newyorkbrad 00:04, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
(edit conflict)That is not useful metric. How many non-content disputes are sent to RfC without ending up at ArbCom after three months? Is the percentage up or down from a year ago? It seem to me an awful lot of disputes eventually end up on Arbcom. Especially if the dispute involves established editors on both sides (which you would think would be the ones where Arbcom is not needed to lay down the law). And there are many disputes that are just left simmering, sometimes even after Arbcom. There is not alot of dispute resolution happening within this community. It seems that the community as whole simply avoids getting involved with settling disputes as a neutral party, but jumps to get involved as an advocate (of either a position or a person). I really do see it as abdicating responsibility. I like this project and all but I am not so invested in it as to take on such these things. The problem is many people who are so invested choose to aviod the disputes as well. Things would improve greatly around here if the main players here made it a priority to resolve disputes before they get to Arbcom. As Machiavelli said "A battle delayed is a battle deferred to your disadvantage." "A battle deferred is a battle delayed to your disadvantage."--BirgitteSB 00:16, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
  1. Jimbo consulted community leaders about the appointment of Essjay and ones that had reservations have apologiged for not speaking up when they should have according to Jimbo's talk page. It's not all jimbo's fault. Whether he should appoint people in the future is being rightly questioned, but it was what worked in the past,
  2. The community does indeed control arbcom any time it has the will to do so. Their decisions care moral weight only. If need be the community can fork the project. The community will not do so without a really good reason.
  3. Our current setup has elements of monarchy/president (jimbo), democracy/anarchy (editors), and aristocracy (guess who). Theorists from ancient times to the founding of america have considered a balance of these forces to be useful in the governing of an institution. WAS 4.250 00:28, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
There are alternatives besides Requests for Comment and Arbitration. The Mediation Committee is not backlogged any more, and there is always the Mediation Cabal.  : ) Of course, mediators cannot actually enforce anything, so mediation probably would not work for the types of disputes you are talking about right now. — Armed Blowfish ( talk| mail) 01:00, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I object to the use of :) next to the MedCabal! It's highly productive, and is a welcome break from the intense attitude of DR processes higher up the chain. anthonycfc [ talk 20:55, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

(outdent) Arbitration isn't just a matter of the community abrogating its responsibilities. At the outset of Wikipedia only Jimbo could ban editors personally. In early 2004 when that load got too large for one person ArbCom was created. Community banning didn't become an established concept until last year and community topic banning is a developing issue - the recently closed discussion at the top of this board appears to be only the second time the community has applied a topic ban, and the previous one got appealed as far as RFAR (the Committee rejected the appeal). Wikipedia.en is far larger today than it was three years ago, yet there's still only one ArbCom. So it stands to reason that enough precedents have been created for the community to peel away the more routine and straightforward cases and let the arbitrators crack the tough nuts. To the extent that I can, I've helped with that in coauthoring the Wikipedia:Disruptive editing guideline and spearheading the Wikipedia:Community enforced mediation proposal. I hope the latter gets more attention when the Essjay affair dies down. I've got six volunteer community mediator trainees and am pretty much set to give the thing a trial run. Durova Charge! 01:17, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

In practice, how is Arbcom different from, say, something that worked exactly like Arbcom but was instead formed by the community? I would argue "not at all". If the present Arbcom election process was deterministic (the top n in terms of percentage, with a percentage floor of x%, become arbitrators) rather than treated like an elaborate advisement-of-Jimbo process, nothing would change except perhaps who became arbitrators. (An elaborate "arbitration cabal", selected exactly this way and operating alongside Arbcom, with the wide administrator and user support of Arbcom, would replace Arbcom entirely. It might not get this degree of admin and user support because Arbcom already exists and we have no need to recreate it, but that only illustrates how Arbcom is already accepted within the community.) So I don't think it's an issue of the community failing to solve problems and referring them to Arbcom—it's an issue of Arbcom simply being the community's way of solving certain problems. On a similar note, Arbcom has nothing to do with dispute resolution and arbitration—it's more of a formal disciplinary process much of the time, much as User RFC is a means to collect opinions about users who we feel have done wrong, and Article RFC and Mediation are about actually resolving disputes. Treating them as all the same system is about as myopic as pretending Arbcom is something totally separate from the community. (Wikipedia's greatest problem: the names and legal and organizational fictions we employ differ so much from the reality that we have to continually play an Orwellian translation game to stay on top.) Philwelch 01:36, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

It's interesting that you describe the current situation as Orwellian in a statement that appears to propose a doppelganger arbitration committee. One of the defining characteristics of a totalitarian society - as originally articulated by Hannah Arendt in The Origins of Totalitarianism is that different branches of government maintain departments that compete with each other to serve essentially the same function. The outcome of that structure is that contradictory precedents and interpretations emerge, which results in a fearful society in which no one is certain of being on the right side of the law. Obviously Wikipedia won't generate a Gulag, but serious change proposals must be thought out thoroughly: I don't see the need to replace ArbCom, although there are certainly reasons to augment it. Durova Charge! 02:03, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
By "Orwellian" I refer to the fact that we call things by names that vastly contradict reality. For instance, we vote on deletions, adminships, etc., but aren't allowed to call them votes because "voting is evil". We have an arbitration committee which doesn't really arbitrate in the usual sense of the term. "Orwellian" does not necessarily mean "totalitarian"—playing language games in order to, for instance, reconcile the dogma that "voting is evil" with the fact that voting is an essential tool to reconcile opposing views in a community is the classic sort of thing George Orwell wrote about. Competing government agencies are Arendt's idea, not Orwell's. My "arbitration cabal" wasn't a proposal of anything so much as it was a thought experiment to illustrate my primary thesis—that Arbcom is no different from something that worked exactly like Arbcom but was instead formed by the community. My point in illustrating this thesis is to illustrate, first that the theory of Arbitration Committee being an extension of Jimbo's authority instead of the community's is rather meaningless in practice, and secondly, that Arbcom isn't something external from the community that we go to in order to solve problems we can't. In essence, if we had to, we would solve those problems ourselves…by forming an arbitration committee. Philwelch 02:33, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
So I don't think it's an issue of the community failing to solve problems and referring them to Arbcom—it's an issue of Arbcom simply being the community's way of solving certain problems. On a similar note, Arbcom has nothing to do with dispute resolution and arbitration—it's more of a formal disciplinary process much of the time, much as User RFC is a means to collect opinions about users who we feel have done wrong, and Article RFC and Mediation are about actually resolving disputes I don't want to be misunderstood here that I have problem with Arbcom; I think it has been very useful. But I still see it is a symptom of the community's failure. There is no reason for a successfull community to allow the collateral damage that has to occur for a dispute to reach the level of Arbcom as simply it's way of solving certain problems. Arbcom is the community's way of giving up on certain problems. If Arbcom leans towards being disciplinary, it is only because the community failed to hold the editors to the most basic standards for months if not years before they stood before Arbcom. User RFC has scant participation, but I have seen policies completely misinterpreted there. I think it works much better as a place to reinforce specific policy interpretations than as a place to collect comments on a user as whole. But it is hard to really reinforce much with six people responding. I haven't participated on Article RFC in long time. Once I discovered the gem of an article that is the nation directly north of Greece that way. I hope it is actually resolving disputes these days, my long past experience was not that favorable. Mediation is seriously the best chance of resolving a dispute. Every dispute where the participants can agree that a resolution to the dispute is actually a priority should be resolved that way. The problems are the disputes where one or more parties would rather have continuing turmoil than to make concessions. Those are the cases where the community has to make it clear turmoil is not an option. However turmoil often seems to be a valid option here.
But I want to repeat that I support Arbcom. They are doing their best with an often floundering and a sometimes failing community. When we talk about the community being in control of dispute resolution (read the intial post in this thread again), we should not be talking about how to choose the handful of people who pick up the pieces when we fail, so much as we should be talking about how to prevent so many issues from falling to pieces in the first place.--BirgitteSB 03:15, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
I respect both of your viewpoints. Here's a rephrasing of mine: on a practical level ArbCom can't be expected to keep up with the site's growth. If we assume user conflicts increase proportionate to total articles and site membership, the committee would get swamped. Somehow the community needs to shoulder a greater share of that burden. I think we all agree that more community involvement is a good idea. I've been working on some ideas that would work on a practical level without rethinking ArbCom from the ground up. One of them is at the proposal stage (linked in my earlier edit). I'd appreciate it if you gave the idea a look. Regards, Durova Charge! 03:57, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Indeed—it's not Arbcom's fault that we need them. But it's a little misguided to say that we're failing as a community if we do need them. Any community has courts, judges, systems to settle grievances. Perhaps it's true that if you need a judge to settle your grievance you're failed in some way, but given a community of more than a handful of people, it's gonna happen. Inevitably. The only places you *don't* see these things are highly authoritarian places—companies don't have pseudocourts to settle grievances that arise between coworkers over their work because companies are hierarchical, and there's always a boss who can say "this is what's gonna happen, and you're fired". Unless we want to elevate administrators to some higher level of discretionary power and let them say "this is what's going to happen, you're fired for being a net negative contributor, you should leave because you're a fanboy and this isn't a good place for you, you're a deranged nut, you're a valuable contributor and I trust you more than Anonymous Coward…", we're gonna need Arbcom. That's the price of a free society. Philwelch 03:59, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I really do not think very differently from what you say above. I do think you are taking my comments too generally. Every case sent to Arbcom is a case where the community failed. There will always some cases where the community fails; it does not follow that the comunity is Failure. I don't think we should aim to get rid of Arbcom. But we should aim to minmize the number of cases that reach Arbcom. It does seem to me that lately many disputes are treated as if an Arbcom case is a forgone conclusion. My point is that community has been giving up on resolving disputes too easily. That they are too quick to pass the buck to Arbcom. This damaging for all that happens as an individual dispute progresses to the level of Arbcom and also because it spreads the idea that anything short of warranting an Arbcom case must be tolerated. It is also an indirect problen because it is not uncommon for people facing an Arbcom case to leave or at least plan on it. This then fuels other disputes by showing the example that if a dispute can escalate all the way to Arbcom there is a chance the other guy will just quit. This undermines the entire dispute resolution process because why would someone resolve a dispute when they can possibly WIN by forfiet. The more Arbcom is relied on the worse the general atmosphere around here will get. It is just a viscious cycle that will continue until the community stops tolerating misbehaivor. Arbcom should be a BIG DEAL.--BirgitteSB 05:49, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Section break

Maybe a few things so I can get my thoughts together.

  • Technically, is Jimbo really the absolute authority? I've always thought that if Jimbo indefblocked me in his capacity as project leader - not just as ordinary admin - I could appeal that decision with the Board, if not anywhere else.
  • I rather like Fred Bauder's idea of the community having a preview of arbitrators appointed in the manner that Essjay/Mackensen were when Dmcdevit resigned.
  • The phrase "community leaders" really, really sucks. Up to a fortnight ago Essjay would have been considered a "community leader", if we actually had any. We have no community leaders here, with the exception of Jimbo. That's rather the point of Wikipedia. In the absence of "community leaders", the community should be consulted.
  • A few people above seem to have missed the point. I'm not talking about the existence of ArbCom being us turning our brains off: it's the way in which we elect our arbitrators which, in my opinion, is us turning our brains off: with, as we have seen this week, catastrophic results.
  • In practice, whatever power ArbCom has comes from the community, insofar as it would lose credibility if we all started ignoring its rulings. Therefore, I don't think it's unreasonable for us to expect a greater element of control in the way in which we elect our arbitrators. I agree with Philwelch's point that an ArbCom that took its power from the community, rather than Jimbo, would be no different at all to the current ArbCom, which in practice already does, if not in theory. IMO it's time the practice became the theory.
  • An awful lot of pages - WP:DR, WP:AC - describe ArbCom as the last stage in dispute resolution, a last stage that can issues binding rulings. And it is a dispute resolution process that exists to serve the community.

Any thoughts? Best, Moreschi Request a recording? 18:00, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

  • This website is owned by the Wikimedia Foundation; Jimbo "owns" Wikipedia. Don't like that? The door is that way. This message was brought to you by the harsh reality department. Guy ( Help!) 18:13, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
    • Strictly speaking, the Wikipedia Foundation owns the servers and supplies the bandwidth, but each individual contribution is "owned" by the editor who creates it. You might say that Jimbo ownes the servers but "we" own the contents. These editors ("we") have, however, irrevocably licensed their contribution in a way that allows the Wikipedia Foundation (or anyone else, for that matter) to continue distributing it. It's that sentence below the edit box that says "You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL". The effect of Guy's statement is correct: if you don't like Jimbo controlling things, get a copy of the database and start a new Wiki-encyclopedia. - EMET-MET 18:34, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
      • Forking is easier said than done. The last image dump was, IIRC, in November 2005. Deleted content is not included in the dumps. -- Random832 19:11, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
We could ask Jimbo nicely that next time he wants to appoint arbitrators without an elective process, that there be a comment period so the community could vet the candidate. Thatcher131 23:22, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

(moved from WP:AN) [context was Moreschi's comment: "In the wake of the Essjay shebang, I've kicked off a discussion at CN on the lack of - as I perceive it - community influence over the Arbitration Committee. Please feel free to tell me I'm being stupid.] You're not being stupid, but you are mistaken about a key issue. Jimbo's authority is written into our policies. If you disagree with him, fine--he's actually generally open to constructive criticism if it's phrased politely and doesn't come (as at present) in the middle of a bombardment. Admins are admins because Jimbo created the position and appointed the first ones; arbcom is arbcom because Jimbo created and appointed the original tranches, and has overseen and had final authority over every subsequent election. So yes, there is a lack of community influence over arbcom--that's the idea. Chick Bowen 21:08, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

  • Actually, Moreschi, you've put your finger on soemthing that is very troubling. Jimbo's relationship to the English Wikipedia -- let alone any one of the Wikimedia projects -- is undefined. Since he resigned from the Wikimedia Board, he has no official relationship to any of the projects; & that resignation suggests that he wants to limit his interaction with these projects. All of us here on en.wikipedia tacitly accept him as the final say over any dispute here; I'm not clear on what the communities involved at the other projects think. (I suspect Jimbo isn't interested in finding out either in the case of, say, the Arabic or Georgian language Wikipedias, where not only would he need a trustworthy interpreter but perhaps even need to introduce himself to them.) Because of that lack of a official relationship, it is entirely possible that a group of unhappy Admins could conspire to ban him from Wikipedia -- & convince a large number of the rest of the community to uphold their act.
This radical act is not something I am in favor of doing. So far, his worst decision has been to appoint Essjay to the ArbCom without an open discussion, so I'm willing to continue editting under the current ill-defined arrangement. But if someone as slow & unimaginative as I can conceive of doing this, I suspect that this occasion -- which I do not want to see happen -- may come to pass. -- llywrch 19:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
<Sigh>. . . Once again, that's simply not the case. Not accepting Jimbo's authority is not an option: it wouldn't be legal or financially possible. The Foundation still answers to Jimbo and the Foundation owns the server, the domain name wikipedia.org, etc. etc. So enough of this, please. Chick Bowen 21:05, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
"Enough of this"? I'm just describing a serious point of failure here -- & it disturbs me. Right now, all that connects Jimmy Wales to this project is a lot of trust & unofficial connections -- nothing official. A group of (insert your choice from the following: Admins, Developers, Trustees, etc.) could decide one day to tell him to take a hike & ... he'd have to do it. I don't want to see that -- which is why I'm pointing this out, before someone decides to try that stunt. Since this is falling on deaf ears, I'll end this subject here, but I reserve the right to say "told ya so" if this happens a few years down the road. -- llywrch 23:32, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Foundation does not answer to jimbo alone. Foundation answer to the board. Jimbo is only one memeber. Now we have got the constitional stuff out of the way it is important to remeber that it isn't practicle to hold more than one set of arbcom elections per year so some kind of mechanism is needed for fill in apointments. Geni 03:34, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I apologize for my gruff tone, but I still don't see this as a serious problem. Our foundation principles still preserve Jimbo's role, and far as your (addressing Llywrch here) hypothetical scenario goes, only trustees have that power even on a legal level. Admins and developers don't. Chick Bowen 05:11, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
jimbo's formal ranks is on the same level as any other board memeber. Geni 10:58, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The above-named arbitration case has closed and the complete decision can be found at the link above. Andries, Wikisunn, SSS108, and Freelanceresearch are banned indefinitely from editing Sathya Sai Baba and related articles or their talk pages. Ekantik is instructed to make all future Wikipedia contributions related in any way to Sathya Sai Baba under a single username. Kkrystian is reminded that all edits must be supported by reliable sources. Editors involved at Sathya Sai Baba are encouraged to use better sources and improved citation style. The remedies in the prior decision Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Sathya Sai Baba regarding poorly sourced information remain in force and apply to all editors working on Sathya Sai Baba and related articles. The Arbitration Committee reserves the right to amend these remedies as required and to issue additional remedies as necessary to provide a positive environment for collaboration on the Sathya Sai Baba article, even if no additional case is brought forward. This notice is given by a Clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 00:41, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The above entitled arbitration case has closed, and the final decision has been published at the link shown. The Arbitration Committee has found that Philwelch misused his administrative tools. Because he gave up his status as an administrator in the face of controversy concerning his administrator actions and after an arbitration case was filed against him, he may not be automatically re-granted adminship. However, he is free to seek readminship, should he choose to do so, at any time by a request for adminship at WP:RfA. For the Arbitration Committee, Thatcher131 12:36, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Wikipedians by age - my UCFD solution

Please take a look at how I decided to close the Wikipedians born in YEAR UCFD. Before I implement it, I want to see if it's okay. Signed, your friendly neighborhood MessedRocker. 03:59, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

A very fair and measured closure that took finesse, is my opinion. Xiner ( talk, email) 04:20, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I think this is a fair compromise. It's important to remember that while WP:ENC, it's not harmful to have community-based aspects as well, and this solution cuts down on overcategorization of users while maintaining a definitive age-based structure for those who like that sort of thing. — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 04:21, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Looks good. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 04:28, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I have modified User:Ian Moody/User age auto to reflect this (and added equivalent code to other templates which did not formerly categorize, i assume due to this mess). Anyone know what we're doing about the 18-19 set? (and, did we ever reach a consensus on whether identifying users who are (say) 16 or 17 in a "15-19" group is acceptable or not? -- Random832 15:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Why not have categories for Wikipedians born "in the 90s", "in the 80s", etc? This would avoid specific ages while dealing with the issue of older teenagers (including 18-19). — Dark•Shikari [T] 20:52, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Wikipedians born in the 90s are under 18, and my closure of the debate specifies that children categories are to be gone. Same applies for a small part of the 1980s. Maybe we could have Category:Wikipedians aged 18 or 19, then Category:Wikipedians in their 20s, etc. Signed, your friendly neighborhood MessedRocker. 21:15, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Aren't Wikipedians aged 18 and 19 covered adequately by Category:Teenage Wikipedians? WjB scribe 21:20, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I suppose... Signed, your friendly neighborhood MessedRocker. 23:37, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I am still waiting for someone to explain to me how having categories dividing users up by age or year of birth helps us to write an encyclopedia. Kelly Martin ( talk) 05:54, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Perhaps some people want to encourage age discrimination? Durova Charge! 14:51, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I suppose there's a potential for trying to consider generational gap POV issues/systemic bias, though I am personally doubtful that the categories will end up being used as such. So long as no one attempts to create Category: Unsupervised Underage At-Risk Wikipedians. Because there's a point where even the more generous applications of AGF peter out. Bitnine 14:59, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I understand why it might be useful to know someone's age; in that case, they can just say it on their userpage. I still don't see what categories are necessary. I can't ever think of a situation that would come up where I would be thinking, "Hrmm, I need to talk with a 24-26-year-old Wikipedian ... better go check those categories." -- Cyde Weys 16:03, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I'll refrain from giving specific usernames on this example, but about two months ago one of our younger sysops implemented a perfectly normal block. A disruptive editor promptly joined the blocked user's talk page to lodge an ad hominem complaint based on the acting administrator's age. I happened to be active while this unfolded and promptly voiced my support of the block itself and of the good judgement of that particular administrator, whom I've seen operate well under tough field conditions. I dislike the idea of categories that facilitate this type of disruption. Durova Charge! 21:41, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

External peer review triggered by Essjay scandal

I am not sure that I am posting in the right area, but the whole Essjay scandal triggered an external peer review found at http://www.shoutwire.com/default.aspx?p=comments&id=56188. Should I post this in Wikipedia:External peer review or not, considering the source is Shoutwire and not a traditional medium? This review looks like it has some valid points. Jesse Viviano 20:10, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

I'd say to post it. It seems to be balanced and offer useful, actionable, criticism. -- AnonEMouse (squeak) 21:00, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I have posted it at Wikipedia:External peer review/Shoutwire March 2007 and have transcluded it onto Wikipedia:External peer review. Jesse Viviano 15:56, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Ditto, looks OK. This comment by one responder was hilarious, though: "Why would anybody lie about having a PhD in Theology? That'd be like claiming to have a nasty case of herpes when you don't. Weird." Cheers, Moreschi Request a recording? 21:03, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Agreed with above. We should be encouraging this kind of stuff - outside readers providing us with some article assessment is a good thing. -- `/aksha 07:58, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Finally, a productive response from the media instead of gossip. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 14:40, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Not bad grades for a work in progress. I would like to see what grades we get in 2015. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 14:43, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

I started a thread a few days ago to discuss updating the policy language in light of recent precedents. The folks who frequent that talk page don't appear to have been active on this board. The ongoing WP:RFAR of the BabyDweezil community ban raises additional points. To outline the major things:

  • The Arbitration Committee has affirmed the community's right to topic ban (per Miracleimpulse's denied appeal).
  • WP:BAN does not link to the Wikipedia:Disruptive editing guideline, which provides a detailed model for community bans. Since WP:DE has been at the guideline level for six months it's probably time for the policy to link there.
  • BabyDweezil's request for arbitration raises two interesting points that were not anticipated when WP:DE was in the draft proposal phase - specific notification to the editor under discussion when a community ban proposal opens and a mechanism for letting that user present a defense (if blocked from editing while the discussion is underway). These are reasonable points for the community to discuss, and probably to incorporate at either the guideline or the policy.

Durova Charge! 14:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

WP:N and WP:AI

Interesting discussions going on at both these places as to how our notability rules should work. Posting here because I think some more input is needed from a wider base of people. Cheers, Moreschi Request a recording? 15:39, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Thanks for posting this here, I forgot this is a good place. -- badlydrawnjeff talk 15:50, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

This arbitration case has closed and the final decision is available at the link above. The parties identified in the decision as having acted poorly in the dispute regarding Occupation of Latvia 1940-1945 are admonished to avoid such behavior in the future. That article is placed on probation, and any editor may be banned from it, or from other reasonably related pages, by an uninvolved administrator for disruptive edits, including, but not limited to, edit warring, inciviilty, and original research. The Arbitration Committee reserves the right to appoint one or more mentors at any time, and the right to review the situation in one year, if appropriate. The parties are strongly encouraged to enter into a mediation arrangement regarding any article-content issues that may still be outstanding. If the article is not substantially improved by continued editing, the Arbitration Committee may impose editing restrictions on users whose editing is counterproductive or disruptive. This notice is given by a Clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 23:32, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Ads to benefit Wikipedia

Closing this. I do not approve of it at all and it seems unlikely anyone else will. This was absolutely not the purpose of my work – Qxz 11:58, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply


One of the reasons this board got created was as a venue to dovetail with this proposal. Things have been quiet at the proposal for about a month. Does anyone object to my proposal of a three month trial run? Seeking opinions, feedback, and potential refinements. Durova Charge! 22:30, 10 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Looks OK. No objections from me if you want to run this for a bit as a trial. Moreschi Request a recording? 22:42, 10 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Deleting episode summaries

I'd like to propose the removal of episode summaries from Wikipedia. By this, I mean articles created specifically to summarize one single episode of a TV show-- Wikipedia is not a TV guide.

The only reason particular episodes of anything should be mentioned, in my opinion, is if they are particularly noteable. Jtrainor 05:49, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The problem is, we have TONS of episode articles (by TONS, i mean well into the thousands. And i'm not exxaggerating here). There are some series that have pretty good episode articles, a lot of work has gone into them, and i think you're going to be met by a lot of opposition if you suggest we just delete it all (simply because people don't want to see their hard work deleted). Even for episode articles that are really just raw summaries (stuff that blatantly violates WP:NOT), you'll have a hard time trying to get it deleted. I tried running a few dozen episode articles for a certain TV series through AfD late last year, and it got closed as no-consensus. And those episode articles where clearly just summarizes - unlike some episode articles which do have some context and commentary.
I agree with you that we have a problem with episode articles. But you're not going to get anywhere by suggesting we delete them all. -- `/aksha 08:34, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I propose the following: fairly basic articles, such as Legacies (Babylon 5) should be merged into episode lists. When section on particular episode is expanded at least to state of a good stub, it can be splitted to its own page. MaxSem 09:19, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply
That is in fact what our current guidelines say to do - start with episode lists for entire seasons/series, and when there's enough to say about each episode, split to episode articles. Sadly, that's not what people do. And very often, efforts to merge stubbed episode articles into larger season articles are met with a lot of resistance. -- `/aksha 09:21, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Emir Arven (proposed ban or indef block)

Emir Arven ( talk · contribs) is a fanatical nationalist, who regularly misquotes other users, and seems to only edit Wikipedia to promote his own agenda, rather than improve the overall quality of the project. He repeatedly uses personal attacks, and has been blocked numerous times for doing so. All the user does is preach hatred against Serbs and Croats, and tries to re-write history. No wait, that's not all he does - he also provokes other users, and, either does not understand English, or, is too unintelligent to understand what people are trying to say to him. Below is important information and evidence about his disgusting behaviour on Wikipedia. After reading over the evidence, make up your own mind whether to trust him or not, and whether he deserves to be banned or not.

Diffs of his behaviour

This section has specific diffs of Emir Arven's contributions to Wikipedia since he first joined. Please note, that this is incomplete, as it does not take into account the many sockpuppets he has most certainly used; and also, I deliberately did not include many of his edit warring pages and uncivil edit summaries, as the list would have been far bigger than it already is. If you wish to examine them yourself, feel free to visit his contributions and conduct your own investigation. This diff list will undoubtedly grow larger as time goes on, as Emir does not seem to realise that his behaviour is unacceptable.

Ustašoids in action I want to warn you, that user Ivan Kricancic, look at his user page,in his mad fanatism goes from one picture related to Bosnia to another, and suggests their deletion. Often he does that unsigned: 58.165.115.192. I know it is hard to deal with assholes, but the moron is sick and in this manner he had deleted a lot of articles about Srebrenica also. Emir Arven 08:00, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Attack pages

User talk:Emir Arven and the bottom half of User talk:Emir Arven/Archives 4 are basically attack pages against me.

Block log

Let's now have a look at Emir's block log

  • 00:32, February 12, 2007 Nishkid64 (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" (anon. only, account creation blocked) with an expiry time of 2 weeks (3RR violation, several personal attacks, longer block as this user has been blocked for PA multiple times.)
  • 00:30, February 12, 2007 Nishkid64 (Talk | contribs) unblocked Emir Arven (contribs) (Extending block.)
  • 11:20, February 11, 2007 Aksi great (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" (anon. only, account creation blocked) with an expiry time of 72 hours (3RR on Alija Izetbegović)
  • 03:26, September 11, 2006 Blnguyen (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 72 hours (personal attacks)
  • 21:48, March 6, 2006 DragonflySixtyseven (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 24 hours (need to defuse)
  • 22:11, February 28, 2006 DragonflySixtyseven (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 72 hours (reblocking)
  • 22:09, February 28, 2006 DragonflySixtyseven (Talk | contribs) unblocked Emir Arven (contribs) (had earlier been given shorter blocks)
  • 21:47, February 28, 2006 DragonflySixtyseven (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 72 hours (Mandatory cooling-off period)
  • 18:53, February 26, 2006 Sam Korn (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 24 hours (3RR on Stephen II Kotromanić)
  • 23:37, November 25, 2005 Chris 73 (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 24 hours (3RR on Petar Petrović Njegoš and other articles)

Emir has been blocked eight (8) times for heavy edit warring, personal attacks, and rampant incivility. These blocks span his entire Wikipedia career, so it is clear that he will not learn from his mistakes, and he will continue his disgusting behaviour into the future unless something is done.

Conclusion

At this stage it has become clear that Emir Arven is nothing more than a vandalistic, nationalist troll. He certainly is not here to edit constructively, but he is here to spread lies, propaganda, racism, and get on everyone's nerves. In all honesty, I believe that any administrator who has good foresight will punish this "editor" as soon as possible with an indefinite block or a ban, with no chance of him ever coming back to the English Wikipedia. King Ivan 08:45, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Note: thread moved from WP:ANI. MER-C 09:55, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community ban of 1B6

Editor is banned from editing Wikipedia per consensus of uninvolved editors. The blocking administrator is encouraged to log the blocking action on the appropiate section on the bans page. Navou banter / contribs 13:22, 22 March 2007 (UTC) Add to above: Should the user defend him/herself on the talk page with anything of substance, I do not think anyone would mind us opening another review here. Navou banter / contribs 13:28, 22 March 2007 (UTC) reply

  • Update: The user has replied on that talk page, with threats; page is now reverted/protected. -- Ben TALK/ HIST 19:22, 22 March 2007 (UTC) reply

User:Naconkantari/cleanup - Wikipedia cleanup day

  • Moved to WP:VPR. This page is for sanctions/bans/other nasty conflicts.
Erm, regarding other nasty conflicts - once or twice this board has seen the start of a thread that tried to use it as user conduct WP:RFC. This isn't part of WP:DR. Thanks for moving this discussion. Cheers, Durova Charge! 13:35, 23 March 2007 (UTC) reply


End of Anon edits

Community discussion about WP:ATT

Moved to WP:VPP where it belongs. See previous thread for details they donate money to the sick kids hosipBy today's standards the resources seem few. However, it was indeed a good library for its time. As well as a large collection of books, there was also a reading room (not a regular feature of lending libraries of the period).and that's why it's a community. because the books help the kids read better.Each year we offer a wide variety of programs and services,Milton library did to bring the members of the community together.

Community ban library

Moved to WT:CN Navou banter / contribs 07:01, 24 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The above-named arbitration case has closed and the decision may be found at the link above. Rosencomet is cautioned to avoid aggressive editing of articles when there is a question of conflict of interest. If edit warring or other conflict arises, it may be best to limit editing to talk pages. This notice is given by a clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 17:09, 24 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community ban on User:Roitr

It appears consensus to ban has been reached to ban this user. It is recommended that the blocking sysop please place the notes in the appropriate places, e.g. talk page, and ban list. Navou banter / contribs 14:55, 25 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community Ban on Turok 1

Request removed per requester and comments. Navou banter / contribs 14:48, 25 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community-imposed personal attack parole

Moved to WT:CN Navou banter / contribs 22:21, 26 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The above-entitled arbitration case has been closed and the final decision published at the above link. Ilena ( talk · contribs) is banned from editing Wikipedia for one year and is banned from editing articles and talk pages related to alternative medicine, except talk pages related to breat implants. Fyslee ( talk · contribs) is cautioned to use reliable sources and to edit from a neutral point of view. He is reminded that editors with a known partisan point of view should be careful to seek consensus on the talk page of articles to avoid the appearance of a COI if other editors question their edits. For the arbitration committee, Thatcher131 12:43, 27 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community ban on User:BenH

Bearing in mind the community bans are not determined by agreement of a handful of folk, there are at this time no objections to the banning action. If there is a substantial objection, the action is welcome to be relisted here. It appears consensus has been reached from those who commented. The blocking administrator is encouraged to re block BenH ( talk · contribs) linking this discussion and list the user at the appropiate talk and ban pages. Navou banter / contribs 14:17, 28 March 2007 (UTC) reply

This arbitration case has closed and the final decision is available at the link above. The indefinite community ban of User:BryanFromPalatine for tendentious editing, personal attacks, block evasion and disruption is endorsed. The ban also applies to User:DeanHinnen and all other proxies or sockpuppets of BryanFromPalatine. User:Fairness And Accuracy For All is banned from Wikipedia for one year. The articles Free Republic and Democratic Underground are placed on article probation. It is expected that these articles will be improved to conform with Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, and that information contained in them will be supported by verifiable information from reliable sources. Either article may be reviewed on the motion of any arbitrator, or upon acceptance by the Arbitration Committee of a motion made by any user, and users whose editing is disruptive may be banned or their editing restricted as the result of a review. This notice is given by a clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 00:40, 29 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Personal attack parole for CalJW

No consensus, closed without prejudice. Navou banter / contribs 16:30, 29 March 2007 (UTC) reply


Proposal to ban User:Ararat arev

Bearing in mind, banning is not done by a handful of folk, there have been no objections and the discussion is appears unlikely to generate more discussion. Editor banned, the banning sysop is encouraged to reban linking this discussion, and mark the appropriate talk page and note the ban page. Relist if substantial objection raised. Navou banter / contribs 16:34, 29 March 2007 (UTC) reply



Proposal to ban User:LegoAxiom1007

No consensus, and consensus appears unlikely. Closed without prejudice. Navou banter / contribs 16:31, 29 March 2007 (UTC) reply

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Community ban on User:SndrAndrss

Ban enacted. Navou banter / contribs 00:13, 19 March 2007 (UTC) reply

This arbitration case has closed and the final decision is available at the link above. Smallbones is banned indefinitely from editing articles that relate to Robert Prechter, including talk pages. This notice is given by a Clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 01:26, 14 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Updated community ban language at WP:BAN

Community Ban on Verdict

Banned Navou banter / contribs 00:14, 19 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Request discussion to ban Metros from Cumberland, Maryland Project

Not sure what this is, I'm not seeing this going anywhere. Navou banter / contribs 00:15, 19 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Certified.Gangsta

Certified.Gangsta ( talk · contribs · count · logs · block log · lu · rfas · rfb · arb · rfc · lta · socks)

In the course of researching an RFC on Certified.Gangsta ( talk · contribs) I came across far more bad behavior than I expected. At this point I'm thinking there is no need to waste any more time and we can go straight to a community ban. Please review the RFC case I linked to above. -- Ideogram 07:18, 17 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Also see this thread on AN/I. -- Ideogram 07:29, 17 March 2007 (UTC) reply

I think this may be premature at this time. I can appreciate the scope of CG's revert warring, but the RfC is still very new. Give the process a little time to work. If many outside users make statements saying that CG has exhausted their patience, it will make the case for a community ban that much stronger. However, we should leave the discussion here open at the same time, as this will draw attention to the RfC and encourage people to give their viewpoint. I'm sorry if this seems like an approach with no teeth, I just prefer to work within process when possible. Harsher steps can still be taken in a week.-- Danaman5 08:04, 17 March 2007 (UTC) reply


BhaiSaab and His_excellency

The reviewing of the RfAr for Waldorf education has concluded. The Arbitration Committee has banned User:Pete K from editing Waldorf education, PLANS, Rudolf Steiner, Anthroposophy, and related pages or their talk pages.

This notice is given by an informal helper on the behalf of the Arbitration Committee. - Penwhale | Blast him / Follow his steps 18:39, 20 March 2007 (UTC) reply

QuackGuru and Wikipedia-related articles

Good evening, my fellow Wikipedians. After careful reflection, I've decided I would like to "start a fresh", in a way. Although I've never vandalised, and I'm most certainly not a "bad user", I've acted quite "power hungry" over my one-year career. In short, I've applied for several positions out of my reach.

My NHS G.P. (that's a doctor, for you non- Brits :) has spoken with me, and I've been prescribed a course of anti-depressants. Around Saturday, these took effect, and I've got a positive new outlook in life - and Wikipedia.

I would therefore like the community to suggest methods I could employ to "start a fresh"; my particular focus is on DR work, as well as XfD. However, I believe there are still those out there who are bitter over my past actions. If they can find it in their heart to forgive me, I shall be eternally grateful.

In the meanwhile, I ask the community to rather than forget what I have done, to remain impartial and mindful of my new actions, and judge me on the present, rather than dwindle on the deep, dark past.

With the greatest anticipation,
anthonycfc [ talk 00:17, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Meds do wonders don't they? :) Things get forgotten (most of time) and will be dwindle away once you start expressing this positive attitude elsewhere (in your article writing and your dispute resolution with others in particular). — Moe 01:48, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
My recommendation would be to steer well clear of xFD and do some Wikignoming. Special:Random is good - keep going till you see something interesting that wants work, it rarely takes more than a few clicks. Oh, and if it's Dosulepin, don't try doing tricky detail things after taking the meds :-) Guy ( Help!) 13:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • I have a standing offer to people who get sanctioned at arbitration that I'll give them the Barnstar of Resilience if they create a new article that makes the Did you know? section at Wikipedia's main page. Check out User:Durova/Did you know? for tips on how to get there. Best wishes, Durova Charge! 13:58, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • Thanks for your input guys! To Durova - I've not even came close to being in front of the ArbCom! anthonycfc [ talk 20:09, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I understand, but since I offer the barnstar to people who misstep that badly I can certainly offer it to you. Best wishes. Durova Charge! 21:06, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • WikiGnoming isn't a bad idea actually. I think you have a lot to contribute and I've seen you contribute very positively in areas I've been involved with, and you have a good attitude to this. I think Essjay's little graphic is always a good policy to follow when in doubt. Orderinchaos78 08:44, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Regarding El C and closure of Essjay AFD

So, how many times are high-profile debates going to be early closed out of nowhere? often creating turmoil in the process, as they are usually closed against consensus? This is getting really old. The DRV is a massive "overturn" pile-on. User talk:El C is not budging, so the opinions of dozens of Wikipedians is being swept aside at the whim of some admin. I care very little about Wikipedia and it's even bothering me. He's inviting dispute resolution; I for one am sick of seeing this happen over and over and over again, with the early closings - each one creates more chaos than the last. So the question is, is there a potential for a peaceful RFC, or will it just become a flame war like half of them do? And will I be called a "troll" for starting one? I'd like some thoughts, and am seeing if anyone is willing to certify the dispute or whatever. Milto LOL pia 16:35, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply

  • Forget it, he's said someone can unclose it. Looks like the sensible thing was done. Milto LOL pia 16:37, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
    • So, who's going to bite the bullet and actually reopen the AfD discussion? Does it count as wheel warring when the closing admin says it's OK to reverse the closure? — Josiah Rowe ( talkcontribs) 17:42, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
      • I strongly recommend a slow, measured, and considered approach, rather than yet more flip-flopping back and forth between AFD and Deletion Review. Do not take any unilateral action until the deletion review discussion has had time to for editors to discuss and to attempt to reach consensus. That includes allowing those editors who are not in the same timezone as you to fully participate in the discussion. Uncle G 18:25, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
        • While I feel the Essjay debates have got out of hand and should end, I also think it's very important to note that 'forcing the issue' by closing and protecting debate or speedily deleting an article has never had the desired effect of ending actual debate and encouraging people to move on. It simply adds another dimension to the ongoing dispute. Admins should think twice, three times and more about the actual effect of their actions, not just whether they are within policy, especially since WP:IAR is so controversial. Sam Blacketer 18:30, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • May I suggest that those in favor of keeping the article present their points, and those in favor of deleting it also present their points, and then have a (gasp) discussion for at least a few days, BEFORE you all start "voting"? I think that might be a good idea. It's my experience when we see the urge for people on both sides of a discussion to "WP:SNOW" the discussion in both directions, there's some very strongly held feelings that somebody needs to get out and the usual AFD/DRV discussion formats aren't very useful for this. In a normal parliamentary environment, I would suggest moving to recess for a fixed time to allow the members on each side of the question to go into their respective caucuses, select champions, and marshal their arguments, then return to a discussion of the question at hand (possibly in committee of the whole) with the champions presenting the respective cases. Unfortunately, Wikipedia's format doesn't allow for a "recess", nor does it readily permit the election of champions in caucus. Perhaps a three-day deferral of any attempts to delete, during which any interested party may write their own summary (or, alternatively, endorse someone else's summary) of the arguments for and against deleting (based on the opinions expressed in the prior AFD and DRV), followed by a discussion and, if consensus can be reached, then and only then a deletion (if warranted)? The regular deletion discussion format breaks down (in my opinion) on contentious issues, and I think the RFC approach method of summaries and endorsements is likely better in this situation. Kelly Martin ( talk) 23:20, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
    • Kelly is onto a good idea here. Rather than immediately skip to the "voting" of actions in bold-face, how about hold a discussion for a couple of days first? That should help deal with these kinds of cases. -- Cyde Weys 23:22, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
      • It's not a new idea. It's a long-standing maxim at AFD that It's Not About The Votes. There are several editors who reject the idea that every contribution to an AFD discussion should be prefixed with a boldfaced word, and do not do so themselves. If you think likewise, you are welcome to set an example by doing the same. An AFD discussion is a discussion, and is intended to be a discussion. Saying that a discussion between editors in order to consider alternatives and to achieve consensus, with editors presenting arguments and discussing those arguments with one another, isn't "the usual AFD discussion format" is to be misled by the current overuse of such boldfacing at AFD. In fact, such a discussion to achieve consensus is the ideal AFD discussion to which editors should aspire. Many of the best AFD discussions over the years have taken exactly this form. Uncle G 00:13, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
        • I think, however, it is safe to say that this is NOT what we are seeing in the discussions being spoken about above, and why I suggested that perhaps a more formal, constrained approach to "discussion" might yield benefit in this context. I certainly do not believe that every discussion deletion should be conducted in the more formal "summary and endorsement" format of RFC -- doing so is extra effort to no benefit in most cases. Contrariwise, I think the use of that format, or some other format which helps to provide structure to the discussion, is critical to the development of true community consensus. And that's why I so strongly urge it in the context of this particularly divisive situation. Kelly Martin ( talk) 00:20, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
If memory serves, this was proposed as a replacement system for RfA awhile back, but was rejected. I thought it was a pretty fantastic idea :/ — bbatsell ¿? 23:25, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I don't know, I've been wondering if I might see the day that someone decides to be bold and ignore all rules in order to do something like set up a workshop page for determining what's best for an article, rather than directly deleting, protecting, or replacing it. Bitnine 23:28, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
As you all probably know by now, Essjay has made ABC News [10] Link was on ABCNews.com about 8pm tonight. - SVRTVDude ( Yell - Toil) 03:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Indefinite block of User:BabyDweezil

The ArbCom and the Essjay business

One of the things that has bugged me most about the whole Essjay saga is the way in which Jimbo appointed Essjay onto the ArbCom, when he didn't ever run in the last election, after he knew about Essjay's liberties with the truth: nor, apparently, did Jimbo check Essjay's contribs for using those fake credentials to win content disputes, which we now know he did. Fair enough, Jimbo's a very busy chap, and all his actions after the initial mistake have been of the most wise and statesmanlike nature.

Now, my point is that that one bad decision - not that Jimbo makes very many of those - would not have got past us had it been put to community scrutiny, and an awful lot of bad publicity would not have occurred. Collectively, we have the time to check Essjay's contribs for dubious behaviour based on false credentials, which is what we eventually did at the RFC. The further bad publicity incurred by Jimbo's initials response to the New Yorker would not have occurred had the whole matter been put to community scrutiny earlier when Dmcdevit resigned and we needed replacements for the ArbCom.

Anyway, my point is that we, as a community, need more direct control over the final stage of our dispute resolution process, the ArbCom. It is our wiki. I have not been able to understand why Jimbo exercises so much control over the ArbCom, not only at election time but also when replacements during terms are needed. (BTW, the ArbCom terms are ludicrously long and make insufficient allowance for the high rate of admin and arbitrator burnout. But that is a side point). I cannot understand why we turn our brains off when it comes to ArbCom and delegate our responsibilities to Jimbo. As a community we control virtually every other aspect of Wikipedia: why not ArbCom? Why the abdication of responsibility? We need to take control of the process: ArbCom is important and deserves maximum scrutiny. So, any ideas how? Best, Moreschi Request a recording? 22:46, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply

I think the idea of running potential arbitrators by the community would be useful. Jimbo ran them by the arbitrators, and I feel somewhat guilty that I did not catch his use of his supposed degree and position in content disputes. I'm sure the community, with its many eyes would have found that problem. Fred Bauder 16:25, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Perhaps the fifth of the m:Foundation issues will be useful. HowIBecameCivil 22:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
You are, of course, aware that the ArbCom is a delegation of Jimbo's authority over the community, and acts on his personal authority as "god-king" rather than on any authority delegate to the ArbCom by the community. The ArbCom is not responsible to the community, and the community has no authority over it, except insofar as Jimbo chooses to allow. The ArbCom need only consider the community's interests to the extent that brazenly disregarding the community will cause the community to fail to respect it and render it practically unable to do anything useful. However, be very clear that you are delegating nothing to Jimbo when you "allow" Jimbo to select Arbitrators. Kelly Martin ( talk) 22:57, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
As Kelly points out above, Arbom is distinct from the community. Arbcom only exists because the community has failed to handle its own problems. I am always surprised by how quickly various cases are pushed onto Arbcom. Each case sent there is really the community saying "please step in we cannot handle this one". I would think the community would try harder to deal with these incidents themselves rather than abdicate responsibilty so easily. I think Moreschi is asking the wrong question. Don't ask why the abdication of responsibility in choosing arbitrators, but why the abdication of responsibility in relying on the "god-king" and his court of last resort to step in and settle so many disputes.--BirgitteSB 23:12, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
Indeed. I have often said that the purpose of the Arbitration Committee is to make decisions for the community in those situations where a decision is needed but the community is unable to make it. I've heard other Arbitrators say the same thing, so there must be some merit to the claim. Unfortunately, far too often the community abrogates its obligation to attempt to make decisions to the Arbitration Committee; conversely, (especially lately) the Arbitration Committee has occasionally seized the authority to make decisions from the community prematurely. When I was an Arbitrator, I often moved to reject cases where I felt that the community could manage to deal with the matter on its own, or where I felt that letting the community find a solution was likely to cause less damage than the Arbitration Committee taking the matter on. I fear that the sense that the Arbitration Committee should not take on matters in such a posture has been lost with the current Arbitration Committee; this is likely a reflection of the fact that the community has forgotten my oft-repeated admonishment: "The Arbitration Committee is not your mother." It is the community's obligation to police itself, not the Arbitration Committee's. The invocation of the authority of the Arbitration Committee represents a failure on the part of the community, and if the community were healthy would be an infrequent thing.
People, please try to be adults and work your problems out on your own. Don't rely on the ArbCom to do it for you. And remember, if policy gets in the way of doing this, feel free to ignore it (c.f. my above suggestion regarding controversial deletions). Kelly Martin ( talk) 23:30, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
But I would say that invocation of the Arbitration Committee's authority is an infrequent thing. We have 1.6 million articles, tens of thousands of active users, over 1000 administrators, and at present, exactly 10 open arbitration cases. Newyorkbrad 23:48, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Ten? That's high, compared to when I was an Arbitrator (except for that brief period when I was first appointed, and that's because there was a backlog caused by a shortage of Arbitrators). And more informative is not the number of open cases, but the number of cases filed (whether or not accepted). Each case filed represents a situation where the community failed to sufficiently resolve the dispute in question. And I'm quite certain that that number is increasing. Kelly Martin ( talk) 23:54, 5 March 2007 (UTC) reply
On the other hand, the community and the number of pages whereon conflict can arise is also larger than when you served as an arbitrator. As for rejected cases, typically when the arbitrators decline to hear a case, they advise the editor who filed it to pursue a more community-based solution to the issue. I would guesstimate that there are maybe about three rejected cases filed every week—still not a lot given our current size and scope. Newyorkbrad 00:04, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
(edit conflict)That is not useful metric. How many non-content disputes are sent to RfC without ending up at ArbCom after three months? Is the percentage up or down from a year ago? It seem to me an awful lot of disputes eventually end up on Arbcom. Especially if the dispute involves established editors on both sides (which you would think would be the ones where Arbcom is not needed to lay down the law). And there are many disputes that are just left simmering, sometimes even after Arbcom. There is not alot of dispute resolution happening within this community. It seems that the community as whole simply avoids getting involved with settling disputes as a neutral party, but jumps to get involved as an advocate (of either a position or a person). I really do see it as abdicating responsibility. I like this project and all but I am not so invested in it as to take on such these things. The problem is many people who are so invested choose to aviod the disputes as well. Things would improve greatly around here if the main players here made it a priority to resolve disputes before they get to Arbcom. As Machiavelli said "A battle delayed is a battle deferred to your disadvantage." "A battle deferred is a battle delayed to your disadvantage."--BirgitteSB 00:16, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
  1. Jimbo consulted community leaders about the appointment of Essjay and ones that had reservations have apologiged for not speaking up when they should have according to Jimbo's talk page. It's not all jimbo's fault. Whether he should appoint people in the future is being rightly questioned, but it was what worked in the past,
  2. The community does indeed control arbcom any time it has the will to do so. Their decisions care moral weight only. If need be the community can fork the project. The community will not do so without a really good reason.
  3. Our current setup has elements of monarchy/president (jimbo), democracy/anarchy (editors), and aristocracy (guess who). Theorists from ancient times to the founding of america have considered a balance of these forces to be useful in the governing of an institution. WAS 4.250 00:28, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
There are alternatives besides Requests for Comment and Arbitration. The Mediation Committee is not backlogged any more, and there is always the Mediation Cabal.  : ) Of course, mediators cannot actually enforce anything, so mediation probably would not work for the types of disputes you are talking about right now. — Armed Blowfish ( talk| mail) 01:00, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I object to the use of :) next to the MedCabal! It's highly productive, and is a welcome break from the intense attitude of DR processes higher up the chain. anthonycfc [ talk 20:55, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

(outdent) Arbitration isn't just a matter of the community abrogating its responsibilities. At the outset of Wikipedia only Jimbo could ban editors personally. In early 2004 when that load got too large for one person ArbCom was created. Community banning didn't become an established concept until last year and community topic banning is a developing issue - the recently closed discussion at the top of this board appears to be only the second time the community has applied a topic ban, and the previous one got appealed as far as RFAR (the Committee rejected the appeal). Wikipedia.en is far larger today than it was three years ago, yet there's still only one ArbCom. So it stands to reason that enough precedents have been created for the community to peel away the more routine and straightforward cases and let the arbitrators crack the tough nuts. To the extent that I can, I've helped with that in coauthoring the Wikipedia:Disruptive editing guideline and spearheading the Wikipedia:Community enforced mediation proposal. I hope the latter gets more attention when the Essjay affair dies down. I've got six volunteer community mediator trainees and am pretty much set to give the thing a trial run. Durova Charge! 01:17, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

In practice, how is Arbcom different from, say, something that worked exactly like Arbcom but was instead formed by the community? I would argue "not at all". If the present Arbcom election process was deterministic (the top n in terms of percentage, with a percentage floor of x%, become arbitrators) rather than treated like an elaborate advisement-of-Jimbo process, nothing would change except perhaps who became arbitrators. (An elaborate "arbitration cabal", selected exactly this way and operating alongside Arbcom, with the wide administrator and user support of Arbcom, would replace Arbcom entirely. It might not get this degree of admin and user support because Arbcom already exists and we have no need to recreate it, but that only illustrates how Arbcom is already accepted within the community.) So I don't think it's an issue of the community failing to solve problems and referring them to Arbcom—it's an issue of Arbcom simply being the community's way of solving certain problems. On a similar note, Arbcom has nothing to do with dispute resolution and arbitration—it's more of a formal disciplinary process much of the time, much as User RFC is a means to collect opinions about users who we feel have done wrong, and Article RFC and Mediation are about actually resolving disputes. Treating them as all the same system is about as myopic as pretending Arbcom is something totally separate from the community. (Wikipedia's greatest problem: the names and legal and organizational fictions we employ differ so much from the reality that we have to continually play an Orwellian translation game to stay on top.) Philwelch 01:36, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

It's interesting that you describe the current situation as Orwellian in a statement that appears to propose a doppelganger arbitration committee. One of the defining characteristics of a totalitarian society - as originally articulated by Hannah Arendt in The Origins of Totalitarianism is that different branches of government maintain departments that compete with each other to serve essentially the same function. The outcome of that structure is that contradictory precedents and interpretations emerge, which results in a fearful society in which no one is certain of being on the right side of the law. Obviously Wikipedia won't generate a Gulag, but serious change proposals must be thought out thoroughly: I don't see the need to replace ArbCom, although there are certainly reasons to augment it. Durova Charge! 02:03, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
By "Orwellian" I refer to the fact that we call things by names that vastly contradict reality. For instance, we vote on deletions, adminships, etc., but aren't allowed to call them votes because "voting is evil". We have an arbitration committee which doesn't really arbitrate in the usual sense of the term. "Orwellian" does not necessarily mean "totalitarian"—playing language games in order to, for instance, reconcile the dogma that "voting is evil" with the fact that voting is an essential tool to reconcile opposing views in a community is the classic sort of thing George Orwell wrote about. Competing government agencies are Arendt's idea, not Orwell's. My "arbitration cabal" wasn't a proposal of anything so much as it was a thought experiment to illustrate my primary thesis—that Arbcom is no different from something that worked exactly like Arbcom but was instead formed by the community. My point in illustrating this thesis is to illustrate, first that the theory of Arbitration Committee being an extension of Jimbo's authority instead of the community's is rather meaningless in practice, and secondly, that Arbcom isn't something external from the community that we go to in order to solve problems we can't. In essence, if we had to, we would solve those problems ourselves…by forming an arbitration committee. Philwelch 02:33, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
So I don't think it's an issue of the community failing to solve problems and referring them to Arbcom—it's an issue of Arbcom simply being the community's way of solving certain problems. On a similar note, Arbcom has nothing to do with dispute resolution and arbitration—it's more of a formal disciplinary process much of the time, much as User RFC is a means to collect opinions about users who we feel have done wrong, and Article RFC and Mediation are about actually resolving disputes I don't want to be misunderstood here that I have problem with Arbcom; I think it has been very useful. But I still see it is a symptom of the community's failure. There is no reason for a successfull community to allow the collateral damage that has to occur for a dispute to reach the level of Arbcom as simply it's way of solving certain problems. Arbcom is the community's way of giving up on certain problems. If Arbcom leans towards being disciplinary, it is only because the community failed to hold the editors to the most basic standards for months if not years before they stood before Arbcom. User RFC has scant participation, but I have seen policies completely misinterpreted there. I think it works much better as a place to reinforce specific policy interpretations than as a place to collect comments on a user as whole. But it is hard to really reinforce much with six people responding. I haven't participated on Article RFC in long time. Once I discovered the gem of an article that is the nation directly north of Greece that way. I hope it is actually resolving disputes these days, my long past experience was not that favorable. Mediation is seriously the best chance of resolving a dispute. Every dispute where the participants can agree that a resolution to the dispute is actually a priority should be resolved that way. The problems are the disputes where one or more parties would rather have continuing turmoil than to make concessions. Those are the cases where the community has to make it clear turmoil is not an option. However turmoil often seems to be a valid option here.
But I want to repeat that I support Arbcom. They are doing their best with an often floundering and a sometimes failing community. When we talk about the community being in control of dispute resolution (read the intial post in this thread again), we should not be talking about how to choose the handful of people who pick up the pieces when we fail, so much as we should be talking about how to prevent so many issues from falling to pieces in the first place.--BirgitteSB 03:15, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
I respect both of your viewpoints. Here's a rephrasing of mine: on a practical level ArbCom can't be expected to keep up with the site's growth. If we assume user conflicts increase proportionate to total articles and site membership, the committee would get swamped. Somehow the community needs to shoulder a greater share of that burden. I think we all agree that more community involvement is a good idea. I've been working on some ideas that would work on a practical level without rethinking ArbCom from the ground up. One of them is at the proposal stage (linked in my earlier edit). I'd appreciate it if you gave the idea a look. Regards, Durova Charge! 03:57, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Indeed—it's not Arbcom's fault that we need them. But it's a little misguided to say that we're failing as a community if we do need them. Any community has courts, judges, systems to settle grievances. Perhaps it's true that if you need a judge to settle your grievance you're failed in some way, but given a community of more than a handful of people, it's gonna happen. Inevitably. The only places you *don't* see these things are highly authoritarian places—companies don't have pseudocourts to settle grievances that arise between coworkers over their work because companies are hierarchical, and there's always a boss who can say "this is what's gonna happen, and you're fired". Unless we want to elevate administrators to some higher level of discretionary power and let them say "this is what's going to happen, you're fired for being a net negative contributor, you should leave because you're a fanboy and this isn't a good place for you, you're a deranged nut, you're a valuable contributor and I trust you more than Anonymous Coward…", we're gonna need Arbcom. That's the price of a free society. Philwelch 03:59, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I really do not think very differently from what you say above. I do think you are taking my comments too generally. Every case sent to Arbcom is a case where the community failed. There will always some cases where the community fails; it does not follow that the comunity is Failure. I don't think we should aim to get rid of Arbcom. But we should aim to minmize the number of cases that reach Arbcom. It does seem to me that lately many disputes are treated as if an Arbcom case is a forgone conclusion. My point is that community has been giving up on resolving disputes too easily. That they are too quick to pass the buck to Arbcom. This damaging for all that happens as an individual dispute progresses to the level of Arbcom and also because it spreads the idea that anything short of warranting an Arbcom case must be tolerated. It is also an indirect problen because it is not uncommon for people facing an Arbcom case to leave or at least plan on it. This then fuels other disputes by showing the example that if a dispute can escalate all the way to Arbcom there is a chance the other guy will just quit. This undermines the entire dispute resolution process because why would someone resolve a dispute when they can possibly WIN by forfiet. The more Arbcom is relied on the worse the general atmosphere around here will get. It is just a viscious cycle that will continue until the community stops tolerating misbehaivor. Arbcom should be a BIG DEAL.--BirgitteSB 05:49, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Section break

Maybe a few things so I can get my thoughts together.

  • Technically, is Jimbo really the absolute authority? I've always thought that if Jimbo indefblocked me in his capacity as project leader - not just as ordinary admin - I could appeal that decision with the Board, if not anywhere else.
  • I rather like Fred Bauder's idea of the community having a preview of arbitrators appointed in the manner that Essjay/Mackensen were when Dmcdevit resigned.
  • The phrase "community leaders" really, really sucks. Up to a fortnight ago Essjay would have been considered a "community leader", if we actually had any. We have no community leaders here, with the exception of Jimbo. That's rather the point of Wikipedia. In the absence of "community leaders", the community should be consulted.
  • A few people above seem to have missed the point. I'm not talking about the existence of ArbCom being us turning our brains off: it's the way in which we elect our arbitrators which, in my opinion, is us turning our brains off: with, as we have seen this week, catastrophic results.
  • In practice, whatever power ArbCom has comes from the community, insofar as it would lose credibility if we all started ignoring its rulings. Therefore, I don't think it's unreasonable for us to expect a greater element of control in the way in which we elect our arbitrators. I agree with Philwelch's point that an ArbCom that took its power from the community, rather than Jimbo, would be no different at all to the current ArbCom, which in practice already does, if not in theory. IMO it's time the practice became the theory.
  • An awful lot of pages - WP:DR, WP:AC - describe ArbCom as the last stage in dispute resolution, a last stage that can issues binding rulings. And it is a dispute resolution process that exists to serve the community.

Any thoughts? Best, Moreschi Request a recording? 18:00, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

  • This website is owned by the Wikimedia Foundation; Jimbo "owns" Wikipedia. Don't like that? The door is that way. This message was brought to you by the harsh reality department. Guy ( Help!) 18:13, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
    • Strictly speaking, the Wikipedia Foundation owns the servers and supplies the bandwidth, but each individual contribution is "owned" by the editor who creates it. You might say that Jimbo ownes the servers but "we" own the contents. These editors ("we") have, however, irrevocably licensed their contribution in a way that allows the Wikipedia Foundation (or anyone else, for that matter) to continue distributing it. It's that sentence below the edit box that says "You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL". The effect of Guy's statement is correct: if you don't like Jimbo controlling things, get a copy of the database and start a new Wiki-encyclopedia. - EMET-MET 18:34, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
      • Forking is easier said than done. The last image dump was, IIRC, in November 2005. Deleted content is not included in the dumps. -- Random832 19:11, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
We could ask Jimbo nicely that next time he wants to appoint arbitrators without an elective process, that there be a comment period so the community could vet the candidate. Thatcher131 23:22, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

(moved from WP:AN) [context was Moreschi's comment: "In the wake of the Essjay shebang, I've kicked off a discussion at CN on the lack of - as I perceive it - community influence over the Arbitration Committee. Please feel free to tell me I'm being stupid.] You're not being stupid, but you are mistaken about a key issue. Jimbo's authority is written into our policies. If you disagree with him, fine--he's actually generally open to constructive criticism if it's phrased politely and doesn't come (as at present) in the middle of a bombardment. Admins are admins because Jimbo created the position and appointed the first ones; arbcom is arbcom because Jimbo created and appointed the original tranches, and has overseen and had final authority over every subsequent election. So yes, there is a lack of community influence over arbcom--that's the idea. Chick Bowen 21:08, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

  • Actually, Moreschi, you've put your finger on soemthing that is very troubling. Jimbo's relationship to the English Wikipedia -- let alone any one of the Wikimedia projects -- is undefined. Since he resigned from the Wikimedia Board, he has no official relationship to any of the projects; & that resignation suggests that he wants to limit his interaction with these projects. All of us here on en.wikipedia tacitly accept him as the final say over any dispute here; I'm not clear on what the communities involved at the other projects think. (I suspect Jimbo isn't interested in finding out either in the case of, say, the Arabic or Georgian language Wikipedias, where not only would he need a trustworthy interpreter but perhaps even need to introduce himself to them.) Because of that lack of a official relationship, it is entirely possible that a group of unhappy Admins could conspire to ban him from Wikipedia -- & convince a large number of the rest of the community to uphold their act.
This radical act is not something I am in favor of doing. So far, his worst decision has been to appoint Essjay to the ArbCom without an open discussion, so I'm willing to continue editting under the current ill-defined arrangement. But if someone as slow & unimaginative as I can conceive of doing this, I suspect that this occasion -- which I do not want to see happen -- may come to pass. -- llywrch 19:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
<Sigh>. . . Once again, that's simply not the case. Not accepting Jimbo's authority is not an option: it wouldn't be legal or financially possible. The Foundation still answers to Jimbo and the Foundation owns the server, the domain name wikipedia.org, etc. etc. So enough of this, please. Chick Bowen 21:05, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
"Enough of this"? I'm just describing a serious point of failure here -- & it disturbs me. Right now, all that connects Jimmy Wales to this project is a lot of trust & unofficial connections -- nothing official. A group of (insert your choice from the following: Admins, Developers, Trustees, etc.) could decide one day to tell him to take a hike & ... he'd have to do it. I don't want to see that -- which is why I'm pointing this out, before someone decides to try that stunt. Since this is falling on deaf ears, I'll end this subject here, but I reserve the right to say "told ya so" if this happens a few years down the road. -- llywrch 23:32, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Foundation does not answer to jimbo alone. Foundation answer to the board. Jimbo is only one memeber. Now we have got the constitional stuff out of the way it is important to remeber that it isn't practicle to hold more than one set of arbcom elections per year so some kind of mechanism is needed for fill in apointments. Geni 03:34, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I apologize for my gruff tone, but I still don't see this as a serious problem. Our foundation principles still preserve Jimbo's role, and far as your (addressing Llywrch here) hypothetical scenario goes, only trustees have that power even on a legal level. Admins and developers don't. Chick Bowen 05:11, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
jimbo's formal ranks is on the same level as any other board memeber. Geni 10:58, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The above-named arbitration case has closed and the complete decision can be found at the link above. Andries, Wikisunn, SSS108, and Freelanceresearch are banned indefinitely from editing Sathya Sai Baba and related articles or their talk pages. Ekantik is instructed to make all future Wikipedia contributions related in any way to Sathya Sai Baba under a single username. Kkrystian is reminded that all edits must be supported by reliable sources. Editors involved at Sathya Sai Baba are encouraged to use better sources and improved citation style. The remedies in the prior decision Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Sathya Sai Baba regarding poorly sourced information remain in force and apply to all editors working on Sathya Sai Baba and related articles. The Arbitration Committee reserves the right to amend these remedies as required and to issue additional remedies as necessary to provide a positive environment for collaboration on the Sathya Sai Baba article, even if no additional case is brought forward. This notice is given by a Clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 00:41, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The above entitled arbitration case has closed, and the final decision has been published at the link shown. The Arbitration Committee has found that Philwelch misused his administrative tools. Because he gave up his status as an administrator in the face of controversy concerning his administrator actions and after an arbitration case was filed against him, he may not be automatically re-granted adminship. However, he is free to seek readminship, should he choose to do so, at any time by a request for adminship at WP:RfA. For the Arbitration Committee, Thatcher131 12:36, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Wikipedians by age - my UCFD solution

Please take a look at how I decided to close the Wikipedians born in YEAR UCFD. Before I implement it, I want to see if it's okay. Signed, your friendly neighborhood MessedRocker. 03:59, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

A very fair and measured closure that took finesse, is my opinion. Xiner ( talk, email) 04:20, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I think this is a fair compromise. It's important to remember that while WP:ENC, it's not harmful to have community-based aspects as well, and this solution cuts down on overcategorization of users while maintaining a definitive age-based structure for those who like that sort of thing. — PSUMark2006 talk | contribs 04:21, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Looks good. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 04:28, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I have modified User:Ian Moody/User age auto to reflect this (and added equivalent code to other templates which did not formerly categorize, i assume due to this mess). Anyone know what we're doing about the 18-19 set? (and, did we ever reach a consensus on whether identifying users who are (say) 16 or 17 in a "15-19" group is acceptable or not? -- Random832 15:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Why not have categories for Wikipedians born "in the 90s", "in the 80s", etc? This would avoid specific ages while dealing with the issue of older teenagers (including 18-19). — Dark•Shikari [T] 20:52, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Wikipedians born in the 90s are under 18, and my closure of the debate specifies that children categories are to be gone. Same applies for a small part of the 1980s. Maybe we could have Category:Wikipedians aged 18 or 19, then Category:Wikipedians in their 20s, etc. Signed, your friendly neighborhood MessedRocker. 21:15, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Aren't Wikipedians aged 18 and 19 covered adequately by Category:Teenage Wikipedians? WjB scribe 21:20, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I suppose... Signed, your friendly neighborhood MessedRocker. 23:37, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I am still waiting for someone to explain to me how having categories dividing users up by age or year of birth helps us to write an encyclopedia. Kelly Martin ( talk) 05:54, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Perhaps some people want to encourage age discrimination? Durova Charge! 14:51, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I suppose there's a potential for trying to consider generational gap POV issues/systemic bias, though I am personally doubtful that the categories will end up being used as such. So long as no one attempts to create Category: Unsupervised Underage At-Risk Wikipedians. Because there's a point where even the more generous applications of AGF peter out. Bitnine 14:59, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I understand why it might be useful to know someone's age; in that case, they can just say it on their userpage. I still don't see what categories are necessary. I can't ever think of a situation that would come up where I would be thinking, "Hrmm, I need to talk with a 24-26-year-old Wikipedian ... better go check those categories." -- Cyde Weys 16:03, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I'll refrain from giving specific usernames on this example, but about two months ago one of our younger sysops implemented a perfectly normal block. A disruptive editor promptly joined the blocked user's talk page to lodge an ad hominem complaint based on the acting administrator's age. I happened to be active while this unfolded and promptly voiced my support of the block itself and of the good judgement of that particular administrator, whom I've seen operate well under tough field conditions. I dislike the idea of categories that facilitate this type of disruption. Durova Charge! 21:41, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

External peer review triggered by Essjay scandal

I am not sure that I am posting in the right area, but the whole Essjay scandal triggered an external peer review found at http://www.shoutwire.com/default.aspx?p=comments&id=56188. Should I post this in Wikipedia:External peer review or not, considering the source is Shoutwire and not a traditional medium? This review looks like it has some valid points. Jesse Viviano 20:10, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

I'd say to post it. It seems to be balanced and offer useful, actionable, criticism. -- AnonEMouse (squeak) 21:00, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I have posted it at Wikipedia:External peer review/Shoutwire March 2007 and have transcluded it onto Wikipedia:External peer review. Jesse Viviano 15:56, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Ditto, looks OK. This comment by one responder was hilarious, though: "Why would anybody lie about having a PhD in Theology? That'd be like claiming to have a nasty case of herpes when you don't. Weird." Cheers, Moreschi Request a recording? 21:03, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Agreed with above. We should be encouraging this kind of stuff - outside readers providing us with some article assessment is a good thing. -- `/aksha 07:58, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Finally, a productive response from the media instead of gossip. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 14:40, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply
Not bad grades for a work in progress. I would like to see what grades we get in 2015. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 14:43, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

I started a thread a few days ago to discuss updating the policy language in light of recent precedents. The folks who frequent that talk page don't appear to have been active on this board. The ongoing WP:RFAR of the BabyDweezil community ban raises additional points. To outline the major things:

  • The Arbitration Committee has affirmed the community's right to topic ban (per Miracleimpulse's denied appeal).
  • WP:BAN does not link to the Wikipedia:Disruptive editing guideline, which provides a detailed model for community bans. Since WP:DE has been at the guideline level for six months it's probably time for the policy to link there.
  • BabyDweezil's request for arbitration raises two interesting points that were not anticipated when WP:DE was in the draft proposal phase - specific notification to the editor under discussion when a community ban proposal opens and a mechanism for letting that user present a defense (if blocked from editing while the discussion is underway). These are reasonable points for the community to discuss, and probably to incorporate at either the guideline or the policy.

Durova Charge! 14:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

WP:N and WP:AI

Interesting discussions going on at both these places as to how our notability rules should work. Posting here because I think some more input is needed from a wider base of people. Cheers, Moreschi Request a recording? 15:39, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Thanks for posting this here, I forgot this is a good place. -- badlydrawnjeff talk 15:50, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

This arbitration case has closed and the final decision is available at the link above. The parties identified in the decision as having acted poorly in the dispute regarding Occupation of Latvia 1940-1945 are admonished to avoid such behavior in the future. That article is placed on probation, and any editor may be banned from it, or from other reasonably related pages, by an uninvolved administrator for disruptive edits, including, but not limited to, edit warring, inciviilty, and original research. The Arbitration Committee reserves the right to appoint one or more mentors at any time, and the right to review the situation in one year, if appropriate. The parties are strongly encouraged to enter into a mediation arrangement regarding any article-content issues that may still be outstanding. If the article is not substantially improved by continued editing, the Arbitration Committee may impose editing restrictions on users whose editing is counterproductive or disruptive. This notice is given by a Clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 23:32, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Ads to benefit Wikipedia

Closing this. I do not approve of it at all and it seems unlikely anyone else will. This was absolutely not the purpose of my work – Qxz 11:58, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply


One of the reasons this board got created was as a venue to dovetail with this proposal. Things have been quiet at the proposal for about a month. Does anyone object to my proposal of a three month trial run? Seeking opinions, feedback, and potential refinements. Durova Charge! 22:30, 10 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Looks OK. No objections from me if you want to run this for a bit as a trial. Moreschi Request a recording? 22:42, 10 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Deleting episode summaries

I'd like to propose the removal of episode summaries from Wikipedia. By this, I mean articles created specifically to summarize one single episode of a TV show-- Wikipedia is not a TV guide.

The only reason particular episodes of anything should be mentioned, in my opinion, is if they are particularly noteable. Jtrainor 05:49, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The problem is, we have TONS of episode articles (by TONS, i mean well into the thousands. And i'm not exxaggerating here). There are some series that have pretty good episode articles, a lot of work has gone into them, and i think you're going to be met by a lot of opposition if you suggest we just delete it all (simply because people don't want to see their hard work deleted). Even for episode articles that are really just raw summaries (stuff that blatantly violates WP:NOT), you'll have a hard time trying to get it deleted. I tried running a few dozen episode articles for a certain TV series through AfD late last year, and it got closed as no-consensus. And those episode articles where clearly just summarizes - unlike some episode articles which do have some context and commentary.
I agree with you that we have a problem with episode articles. But you're not going to get anywhere by suggesting we delete them all. -- `/aksha 08:34, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply
I propose the following: fairly basic articles, such as Legacies (Babylon 5) should be merged into episode lists. When section on particular episode is expanded at least to state of a good stub, it can be splitted to its own page. MaxSem 09:19, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply
That is in fact what our current guidelines say to do - start with episode lists for entire seasons/series, and when there's enough to say about each episode, split to episode articles. Sadly, that's not what people do. And very often, efforts to merge stubbed episode articles into larger season articles are met with a lot of resistance. -- `/aksha 09:21, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Emir Arven (proposed ban or indef block)

Emir Arven ( talk · contribs) is a fanatical nationalist, who regularly misquotes other users, and seems to only edit Wikipedia to promote his own agenda, rather than improve the overall quality of the project. He repeatedly uses personal attacks, and has been blocked numerous times for doing so. All the user does is preach hatred against Serbs and Croats, and tries to re-write history. No wait, that's not all he does - he also provokes other users, and, either does not understand English, or, is too unintelligent to understand what people are trying to say to him. Below is important information and evidence about his disgusting behaviour on Wikipedia. After reading over the evidence, make up your own mind whether to trust him or not, and whether he deserves to be banned or not.

Diffs of his behaviour

This section has specific diffs of Emir Arven's contributions to Wikipedia since he first joined. Please note, that this is incomplete, as it does not take into account the many sockpuppets he has most certainly used; and also, I deliberately did not include many of his edit warring pages and uncivil edit summaries, as the list would have been far bigger than it already is. If you wish to examine them yourself, feel free to visit his contributions and conduct your own investigation. This diff list will undoubtedly grow larger as time goes on, as Emir does not seem to realise that his behaviour is unacceptable.

Ustašoids in action I want to warn you, that user Ivan Kricancic, look at his user page,in his mad fanatism goes from one picture related to Bosnia to another, and suggests their deletion. Often he does that unsigned: 58.165.115.192. I know it is hard to deal with assholes, but the moron is sick and in this manner he had deleted a lot of articles about Srebrenica also. Emir Arven 08:00, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Attack pages

User talk:Emir Arven and the bottom half of User talk:Emir Arven/Archives 4 are basically attack pages against me.

Block log

Let's now have a look at Emir's block log

  • 00:32, February 12, 2007 Nishkid64 (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" (anon. only, account creation blocked) with an expiry time of 2 weeks (3RR violation, several personal attacks, longer block as this user has been blocked for PA multiple times.)
  • 00:30, February 12, 2007 Nishkid64 (Talk | contribs) unblocked Emir Arven (contribs) (Extending block.)
  • 11:20, February 11, 2007 Aksi great (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" (anon. only, account creation blocked) with an expiry time of 72 hours (3RR on Alija Izetbegović)
  • 03:26, September 11, 2006 Blnguyen (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 72 hours (personal attacks)
  • 21:48, March 6, 2006 DragonflySixtyseven (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 24 hours (need to defuse)
  • 22:11, February 28, 2006 DragonflySixtyseven (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 72 hours (reblocking)
  • 22:09, February 28, 2006 DragonflySixtyseven (Talk | contribs) unblocked Emir Arven (contribs) (had earlier been given shorter blocks)
  • 21:47, February 28, 2006 DragonflySixtyseven (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 72 hours (Mandatory cooling-off period)
  • 18:53, February 26, 2006 Sam Korn (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 24 hours (3RR on Stephen II Kotromanić)
  • 23:37, November 25, 2005 Chris 73 (Talk | contribs) blocked "Emir Arven (contribs)" with an expiry time of 24 hours (3RR on Petar Petrović Njegoš and other articles)

Emir has been blocked eight (8) times for heavy edit warring, personal attacks, and rampant incivility. These blocks span his entire Wikipedia career, so it is clear that he will not learn from his mistakes, and he will continue his disgusting behaviour into the future unless something is done.

Conclusion

At this stage it has become clear that Emir Arven is nothing more than a vandalistic, nationalist troll. He certainly is not here to edit constructively, but he is here to spread lies, propaganda, racism, and get on everyone's nerves. In all honesty, I believe that any administrator who has good foresight will punish this "editor" as soon as possible with an indefinite block or a ban, with no chance of him ever coming back to the English Wikipedia. King Ivan 08:45, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Note: thread moved from WP:ANI. MER-C 09:55, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community ban of 1B6

Editor is banned from editing Wikipedia per consensus of uninvolved editors. The blocking administrator is encouraged to log the blocking action on the appropiate section on the bans page. Navou banter / contribs 13:22, 22 March 2007 (UTC) Add to above: Should the user defend him/herself on the talk page with anything of substance, I do not think anyone would mind us opening another review here. Navou banter / contribs 13:28, 22 March 2007 (UTC) reply

  • Update: The user has replied on that talk page, with threats; page is now reverted/protected. -- Ben TALK/ HIST 19:22, 22 March 2007 (UTC) reply

User:Naconkantari/cleanup - Wikipedia cleanup day

  • Moved to WP:VPR. This page is for sanctions/bans/other nasty conflicts.
Erm, regarding other nasty conflicts - once or twice this board has seen the start of a thread that tried to use it as user conduct WP:RFC. This isn't part of WP:DR. Thanks for moving this discussion. Cheers, Durova Charge! 13:35, 23 March 2007 (UTC) reply


End of Anon edits

Community discussion about WP:ATT

Moved to WP:VPP where it belongs. See previous thread for details they donate money to the sick kids hosipBy today's standards the resources seem few. However, it was indeed a good library for its time. As well as a large collection of books, there was also a reading room (not a regular feature of lending libraries of the period).and that's why it's a community. because the books help the kids read better.Each year we offer a wide variety of programs and services,Milton library did to bring the members of the community together.

Community ban library

Moved to WT:CN Navou banter / contribs 07:01, 24 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The above-named arbitration case has closed and the decision may be found at the link above. Rosencomet is cautioned to avoid aggressive editing of articles when there is a question of conflict of interest. If edit warring or other conflict arises, it may be best to limit editing to talk pages. This notice is given by a clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 17:09, 24 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community ban on User:Roitr

It appears consensus to ban has been reached to ban this user. It is recommended that the blocking sysop please place the notes in the appropriate places, e.g. talk page, and ban list. Navou banter / contribs 14:55, 25 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community Ban on Turok 1

Request removed per requester and comments. Navou banter / contribs 14:48, 25 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community-imposed personal attack parole

Moved to WT:CN Navou banter / contribs 22:21, 26 March 2007 (UTC) reply

The above-entitled arbitration case has been closed and the final decision published at the above link. Ilena ( talk · contribs) is banned from editing Wikipedia for one year and is banned from editing articles and talk pages related to alternative medicine, except talk pages related to breat implants. Fyslee ( talk · contribs) is cautioned to use reliable sources and to edit from a neutral point of view. He is reminded that editors with a known partisan point of view should be careful to seek consensus on the talk page of articles to avoid the appearance of a COI if other editors question their edits. For the arbitration committee, Thatcher131 12:43, 27 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Community ban on User:BenH

Bearing in mind the community bans are not determined by agreement of a handful of folk, there are at this time no objections to the banning action. If there is a substantial objection, the action is welcome to be relisted here. It appears consensus has been reached from those who commented. The blocking administrator is encouraged to re block BenH ( talk · contribs) linking this discussion and list the user at the appropiate talk and ban pages. Navou banter / contribs 14:17, 28 March 2007 (UTC) reply

This arbitration case has closed and the final decision is available at the link above. The indefinite community ban of User:BryanFromPalatine for tendentious editing, personal attacks, block evasion and disruption is endorsed. The ban also applies to User:DeanHinnen and all other proxies or sockpuppets of BryanFromPalatine. User:Fairness And Accuracy For All is banned from Wikipedia for one year. The articles Free Republic and Democratic Underground are placed on article probation. It is expected that these articles will be improved to conform with Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, and that information contained in them will be supported by verifiable information from reliable sources. Either article may be reviewed on the motion of any arbitrator, or upon acceptance by the Arbitration Committee of a motion made by any user, and users whose editing is disruptive may be banned or their editing restricted as the result of a review. This notice is given by a clerk on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad 00:40, 29 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Personal attack parole for CalJW

No consensus, closed without prejudice. Navou banter / contribs 16:30, 29 March 2007 (UTC) reply


Proposal to ban User:Ararat arev

Bearing in mind, banning is not done by a handful of folk, there have been no objections and the discussion is appears unlikely to generate more discussion. Editor banned, the banning sysop is encouraged to reban linking this discussion, and mark the appropriate talk page and note the ban page. Relist if substantial objection raised. Navou banter / contribs 16:34, 29 March 2007 (UTC) reply



Proposal to ban User:LegoAxiom1007

No consensus, and consensus appears unlikely. Closed without prejudice. Navou banter / contribs 16:31, 29 March 2007 (UTC) reply


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