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Case Opened on 11:57, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Case Closed on 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Case Amended by motion on 19:43, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
Case Amended by Motion on 14:32, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
Case Amended by motion on 11:22, 30 November 2014 (UTC)
Please do not edit this page directly unless you are either 1) an Arbitrator, 2) an Arbitration Clerk, or 3) adding yourself to this case. Statements on this page are original comments provided when the Committee was initially requested to Arbitrate this page (at Requests for arbitration), and serve as opening statements; as such, they should not be altered. Any evidence you wish to provide to the Arbitrators should go on the /Evidence subpage.
Arbitrators, the parties, and other editors may suggest proposed principles, findings, and remedies at /Workshop. That page may also be used for general comments on the evidence. Arbitrators will then vote on a final decision in the case at /Proposed decision.
Once the case is closed, editors may add to the #Log of blocks, bans, and restrictions as needed, but this page should not be edited otherwise. Please raise any questions at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration#Requests for clarification, and report violations of remedies at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement.
- Abd ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), filing party
- William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
- Enric Naval ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
Requests for comment
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/William M. Connolley
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Abd and JzG
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Cold fusion
- Summary
- WMC was involved in immediate content dispute and long-term behavioral dispute with me.
- He edited Cold fusion while protected in expectation of controversy over it, and contrary to an expressed consensus.
- Then he declared me banned from the article and its Talk.
- Later, he blocked me for making a self-reverted harmless edit, contrary to his expressed prior opinion about harmless edits under ban.
- In spite of charges of involvement, he insists that he remains the enforcer of an expired community ban, asserting it as indef.
- History of prior dispute, mostly over use of tools while involved
Stored at: [1]
- The present dispute;
Stored at: [2].
- Further considerations and issues to be arbitrated
Stored at [3].
-- Abd ( talk) 05:04, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd re Mathsci
I decided not to make this RfAr cover specific Fringe science issues; had I done so, Mathsci would have been a party, along with as many as a dozen others. ArbComm may, however, decide to look at his statement here, and the series of directly false or ABF charges he has made; I suggest, however, avoiding a focus on Fringe science here, it will complicate an otherwise simple case. To correct false statements, my full response is at [4].
Mathsci subsequently removed, without comment or edit summary, his statement. -- Abd ( talk) 04:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
And then he restored and extended it. -- Abd ( talk) 13:24, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd to Bilby
I agree with Bilby that clarification would be useful. Complete response, correcting errors, is at [5]. -- Abd ( talk) 15:54, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
I did not edit war in the June 1 incident that resulted in the 2nd protection and the ban. A ban reason was not given, except for hints: alleged walls of text in talk, and interest in policy. -- Abd ( talk) 17:02, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
Bilby, I can understand your concern about the addition of parties, but it's not a laundry list, it's a very focused list which covers only editors who have not only been active in attempts to ban me for months, but who also involved themselves here by extensive comment about justification for the ban. You will note that you !voted for the ban at AN/I, as did one or two other editors commenting here, besides the ones included, but you are not included. You have no long-term active involvement in this, the others do. In addition, these editors have been active with bans of others; editors who devote substantial amounts of energy to banning others should not be above examination. -- Abd ( talk) 15:46, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd re Enric Naval and Protonk
- Enric's comment shows why ArbComm should take this case, for he has promised disruptive action if it's rejected. I urge ArbComm to keep it simple and not extend to a full addressing of Fringe issues at this time. My complete response is at [6]. -- Abd ( talk) 18:59, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
- Protonk's comment shows this even more urgently. Promising page bans if ArbComm disagrees with him? Grounds for immediate desysop? Perhaps Protonk will refactor that comment. -- Abd ( talk) 17:10, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd to Jehochman et al
- Thanks. Such a response! Voluntary disclosure: I'm 65. 7 children, ages 5-40, 5 grandchildren, ages 5-17. Long experience with voluntary communities and consensus process; on-line since The WELL, about 1986.
- Carcharoth: There are hosts of issues, and good process would suggest isolating them where possible. An RfAr can become a coatrack for every possible complaint about a user. We should encourage the use of RfC/User, possibly a summary form, perhaps abbreviated to ten days, for all community bans. (When there is urgency, any uninvolved administrator may ban, pending.) My strong recommendation is that RfC process be nudged toward RfAr process, otherwise we have verdict first, trial afterwards. In RfAr/Abd and JzG, I urged that the focus be kept narrow. In the end, only two issues of weight were decided: the original recusal issue, and the blacklist issue; beyond that there was only good advice for me, which I have attempted to heed, which is why I shut down argument at AN/I, when it was obvious that it would be unproductive. With JzG, I waited for months in hopes that JzG would receive better advice; in this case, I made one attempt, very early, to solicit a mediator, someone WMC might listen to. You can see the result at [7].
- ArbComm: I will ask, as this proceeds, for arbitrators to identify specific issues which they consent to consider. I will be charged with many offenses, real and imagined, and if I respond to these charges, well, wall of text, you ain't seen nothing yet! I prefer to remain silent about moot charges, I'd rather not testify on a motion unless it has been seconded. I was urged, by email, to include Mathsci as a party; however, this RfAr was filed solely over WMC recusal failure, and only secondarily over my expired community ban, and Mathsci's behavior is only indirectly relevant. It is not efficient to combine cases, it complicates and lengthens them. And I thank the Committee for its kind consideration, I am heartened by its clear-eyed response. -- Abd ( talk) 13:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd to William M. Connolley
- I'm still trying to understand the concept of banning me from an article when, having studied the topic for five months, having bought the references (half of them skeptical), and having discussed it perhaps too extensively, I stopped talking so much and started seriously editing it, based firmly on reliable sources, with the reason given for maintaining the ban being my "unhealthy interest in policy." I assume you'll explain to ArbComm, I'll be reading with interest. -- Abd ( talk) 17:52, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
I came to cold fusion - I forget how - and discovered the talk page a disaster area. I banned Hipocrite and Abd from CF [8], which was mostly an effort to achieve symmetry, though I believed the harm was mostly from Abd. Since then, peace and calm have largely reigned. Abd broke that ban on two occaisions: on the first, I removed his comment and warned him not to do it again. On the second, I blocked him.
Abd has an unhealthy interest in policy above content. In short, he is a wiki-lawyer. He isn't very good at it, but that doesn't stop him offering his unhelpful advice, e.g. to User:PJHaseldine. He produces walls of text that no-one reads and which disrupt the flow of any page he is involved in.
Essentially all of his statement is wrong or misleading; the claims of prior involvement are an attempt to muddy the waters.
My opinion is that Abd is a net negative to the encyclopaedia: he has forgotten the purpose is to write articles and instead uses it as a forum to pursue his interest in discussing policy.
William M. Connolley ( talk) 20:15, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, can't resist adding this [9], its lovely William M. Connolley ( talk) 20:35, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
More: @GR: My unban of H [10] was not conditional on his not editing CF. I've said that already somewhere, but I forget where. And GR's "disclosure" somehow omits Wikipedia:Requests for comment/GoRight#Outside View by Abd William M. Connolley ( talk) 21:05, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Yet more: I complained to Casliber that his statement subject to a previous case was inaccurate [11], but he hasn't corrected it, so I will: the "a" is wrong, since there are several cases forgotten (ah you young folks): Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Climate change dispute 2 for example William M. Connolley ( talk) 07:36, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Disclaimer: I have edited both Cold fusion and its talk page, and I have very strong disagreements with Abd, although we ocassionally agree on stuff. I also raised the review of Abd's ban at ANI, and I would raise it again.
I think that the community can handle Abd's ban, and I think that Abd refuses to take this to AN/ANI because he knows that there is a very high chance that the continuation of the ban is resoundingly endorsed. This is trying to shorcut the community because he doesn't agree with what it thinks. If this case gets rejected, my first step will be raising the issue at AN where the community can give input on the continuation of the ban. (or start a RFC/U, maybe, I am never sure about these things) Abd also said that reviewing the ban at ANI was a disruptive actions, people commenting there didn't agree at all.
WMC's actions were reasonable, and they protected the editors of the article and the, what was the name, the ambient of peaceful and calm colaboration ambient in the page, which was being disrupted to hell and back by enormous walls of text, refusal to accept consensus, insistance in refusing the input of any actual expert in Physics that gave his input, inserting half a dozen unrelated topics in one long meandering reply, etc. WMC's actions broke that bad atmosphere, and allowed work to continue in the article, so WMC was clearly doing the job that wikipedia admins are supposed to do, using the tools given to him by the community, and this community endorsed his actions in the only occassion when it was asked about it.
As an editor, I have to say that I welcome the tranquility and peace that there is now at Talk:Cold fusion after Abd was banned from the page. I also welcome that Abd's editing is now limited to the cold fusion mediation by Cryptic_C62, where his walls of text can be kept in check, and where Cryptic_C62 can keep the discussion on-topic.
Abd has not stopped wikilawyering about his own ban, Jed's ban and Pcarbonn's ban, saying that "experts" have been banned from the article for POV reasons, while refusing to agree that they were being disruptive, COI'ed, soapboxing and POV pushing. I think that this is just the latest instance of this disruptive behaviour, and that Arbcom should deny him the attention to his disruptive ideas, and let the community handle this.
P.D.: Put Cold Fusion under discrectionary sanctions like Homeopathy. No wonder that admins don't want to intervene if they get treated like this every time they take good action against POV pushers. Pleae take Homeopathy case as precedent, where DanaUllman was banned for one year, Dana was also causing disruption in talk pages and saying that he shouldn't be banned because he didn't edit the articles themselves. Don't repeat the mistakes of past committees, but consider repeating their correct decisions. -- Enric Naval ( talk) 13:58, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
In my experience, Abd has no understanding of science as a process and little knowledge about science as a subject. Unfortunately, he has chosen to become a champion of fringe science topics. His (in)famous "wall of text" technique of incredibly long, rambling, and mostly content-free talk page postings make attempts at communication with him unproductive and frustrating. His definition of involvement apparently would allow each admin exactly one interaction with a given user, and only in fields the admin never worked in before. This is not a useful or even realistic interpretation of Wikipedia's rules.
William, on the other hand, is a productive and active admin. He is willing to work on WP:3RR violations, to enforce ArbCom decisions and promote a rational environment. He is somewhat brusk and of course not very popular with several editors he blocked, but his actions contribute significantly to making Wikipedia a better place for constructive editors.
- Reply to Jehochman: I object to the implied ageism and the request for irrelevant personal information.-- Stephan Schulz ( talk) 15:43, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to Abd adding additional parties (including me): I'll let the clerks decide if unilateral addition of parties after voting is acceptable in general. This instance in particular I find it entirely preposterous. I'd like my name to be spelled correctly, too.. Also, " what Mathsci said"!-- Stephan Schulz ( talk) 15:08, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Preliminary motion 1 (proposed): Abd is restricted to add no more than 3 new parties per day to the case. At least one of these parties has to be vaguely connected to the case. -- Stephan Schulz ( talk) 21:24, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Preliminary motion 2 (proposed if motion one fails): If the case gains more parties than voted in the last ArbCom elections, the case will be delayed until after new ArbCom members have been elected. -- Stephan Schulz ( talk) 21:24, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
WMC has acted properly throughout, and his actions have vastly improved the atmosphere at CF talk, which has led to improvements on the CF page. The ban and WMCs "involvement" has been so far fully approved of by the community at ANI. If Abd has a problem the correct place to take it for review would be ANI, but he is probably aware his poor wikilawyering, walls-of-text (which arbcom has censured him for), and other verbal tricks would be ignored there, and the ban probably endorsed if not extended. Claims of WMCs involvement are clearly ludicrous. This should be rejected, and Abd warned about his behaviour. I fully endorse the views of William, Enric, MathSci, Stephan Schulz, and Biliby (apart from the criticism of WMCs responses, they were factual and appropriate). Unfortunately I fail to see the relevance of Jehochman's view, as Abd has been given every chance. Verbal chat 11:09, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to Jehochman What relevance does your request have? WP:AGF, I'm in my late twenties (as of two days ago, unfortunately), other information on my talk page. I wouldn't be surprised if a clerk removed your question and any replies, however. Re Abd's reply, I've been online since Prestel and then on the internet since CompuServe arrived in the UK. Verbal chat 17:58, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to Coren This has been to ANI once, and Abd's interpretation of events was found wanting. I see no need for arbcom's involvement in a situation which could quite possibly be solved by the community, if it were taken to them. On your other point, if I was to come along and accuse an admin of involvement, would that automatically lead to an accept? "Both factors demand examination" - why? Could you support or explain your reasoning, please. If you could make it clear whose behaviour you feel deserves investigating, that might answer some of my concerns. Thanks, Verbal chat 17:58, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to Casliber I repeat my requests made of Cohren, see above. If you want to investigate WMC, say why. If you want to investigate Abd, say why. If both, say why - an actual reason. Eg. "Xs disruptive wikilawyering here" or "Ys probable admin abuse here". A bit more specific than "accusations of admin abuse" - unless you believe that has happened, and say why! I'd also like to hear why you think the community can't deal with this, when so far it has when given the chance. Thanks, Verbal chat 22:55, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to being added as party and arbcom involvement I don't think the scope should be extended at all, and only Abd's behaviour and whether WMC has acted appropriately should be looked at. Adding other people just makes it more of a time sink and waters down the issue. I also fail to see why the community has been short circuited by ArbCom (although I understand why Abd would like to avoid community scrutiny). If ArbCom wants to deal with Abd this way, fine - but the community should have been tried first. I'm sure the community would have dealt with Abd appropriately. I hope arbcom will do the same. Verbal chat 16:29, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (6/0/1/2)
- Awaiting further statements.
Newyorkbrad (
talk) 15:07, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
- Abstain - not sure whether this dispute (or group of disputes) is best suited for arbitration, but deferring to consensus that we'll take the case. I implore all participants to be as concise as possible in their evidence presentations and workshop proposals; pages such as those we saw in the Abd and JzG cases become almost useless to the arbitrators. Newyorkbrad ( talk) 13:08, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept; there are repeated returns of this dispute to the various noticeboards, showing difficulty for the matter to be settled by the community, and there are allegations of administrative abuse or improper involvement. Both factors demand examination, but the scope is to be strictly the behavior and not content disputes over cold fusion (or any other fringe science topic). — Coren (talk) 13:30, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept - Coren sums it up well. To clarify, (1) we have one user (Abd) for whom in a recent case there was concern over his pursuit of dispute resolution, (2) another (WMC) for whom there is a concern over misuse of tools, and has been subject to a previous case and a page (Cold Fusion) over which there have been disputes which have reached arbitration already. Thus if people have acted properly, it'd be also good to vindicate them rather than leave a cloud of suspicion over their head(s). Agree with others about clarifying scope. Casliber ( talk · contribs) 20:40, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept. Wizardman 05:26, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept per Casliber. The scope of the case will need to be carefully handled, as there is almost a case for three separate issues to be addressed here (Abd conduct, WMC conduct, and Cold Fusion conduct issues), but that could get very messy. The Scibaby issue has just been mentioned by Mathsci (and I am aware both WMC and Abd have been involved in editing Global warming topics, so that may not be beyond the scope of any case) - I will say here that there is anecdotal evidence that the extent of the Scibaby range blocks has been discouraging people from editing Wikipedia (not everyone makes the effort to request an account be created for them). Any alternative way to address Scibaby issues would be good, though possibly beyond the scope of this request. Carcharoth ( talk) 08:08, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Agree per Cas and Coren. FloNight ♥♥♥ 11:34, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept. John Vandenberg ( chat) 12:41, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Recuse. Also, depending on how the case develops, I may submit evidence on-wiki. Cool Hand Luke 14:51, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Comment: There are now the required number of votes to accept this case. I believe, however, that we should keep this as narrowly focused as possible. Like Newyorkbrad, I urge all participants to present clear and concise evidence and commentary. Risker ( talk) 17:50, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Final decision Information
All numbering based on /Proposed decision, where vote counts and comments are also available.
Decorum
1) Wikipedia users are expected to behave reasonably, calmly, and courteously in their interactions with other users; to approach even difficult situations in a dignified fashion and with a constructive and collaborative outlook; and to avoid acting in a manner that brings the project into disrepute. Unseemly conduct, such as personal attacks, incivility, assumptions of bad faith, harassment, or disruptive point-making, is prohibited.
- Passed 9 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Conduct on arbitration pages
2) The pages associated with arbitration cases are primarily intended to assist the Arbitration Committee in arriving at a fair, well-informed, and expeditious resolution of each case. Participation by editors who present good-faith statements, evidence, and workshop proposals is appreciated. While allowance is made for the fact that parties and other interested editors may have strong feelings about the subject-matters of their dispute, appropriate decorum should be maintained on these pages. Incivility, personal attacks, and strident rhetoric should be avoided in arbitration as in all other areas of Wikipedia.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia page or topic bans
4.1) A Wikipedia ban is a formal revocation of editing privileges on all or part of Wikipedia. A ban may be temporary and of fixed duration, or indefinite and potentially permanent. When enacting an editing restriction that includes a ban on an editor, administrators should take reasonable steps to ensure that the editor is notified of the particulars of the ban and its duration. Editors that are ‘‘page or’’ topic banned from a section of Wikipedia are expected to cease contributing to that area. User account blocks may be used to enforce violation of ‘‘page or’’ topic bans. Any user can bring an administrator action up for review in the relevant noticeboard. The community can, among other things, lift the block/ban, endorse it or extend it in time and/or scope.
- Passed 8 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Use of administrator tools in a dispute
5) An administrator must not use his or her administrator tools to further the administrator’s position in a dispute.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Avoiding apparent impropriety
6) All editors, and especially administrators, should strive to avoid conduct that might appear at first sight to violate policy. Examples include an administrator repeatedly making administrator actions that might reasonably be construed as reinforcing the administrator’s position in a content dispute, even where the administrator actually has no such intention; or an editor repeatedly editing in apparent coordination with other editors in circumstances which might give rise to reasonable but inaccurate suspicions of sockpuppetry or meatpuppetry.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Good faith and disruption
7) Inappropriate behavior driven by good intentions is still inappropriate. Users acting in good faith may still be sanctioned when their actions are disruptive.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Locus of dispute
1.1) The locus of this dispute is a page ban applied to Abd ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) by William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA), and several associated disputes, in relation to editorial disputes on the cold fusion article.
The cold fusion article was also the locus of dispute in the ’’cold fusion’’ arbitration in December 2008.
- Passed 9 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Events leading to this case
Recent disputes
2) In May 2009, Hipocrite ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and Abd were involved in an edit war on cold fusion [12] leading William M. Connolley to protect the page [13].
On 31 May and 1 June 2009, edit warring on cold fusion involving a number of users [14] led Causa sui ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) to protect the page for two weeks [15].
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
William M. Connolley’s controversial action as an administrator
3.1) On 5 June, William M. Connolley edited through protection on cold fusion [16], reverting to a version from three weeks earlier [17] with the edit summary "Lets [sic] wind everyone up", an action and comment that needlessly escalated the dispute.
- Passed 9 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Page bans
4.1) On 6 June, William M. Connolley placed a page ban on Hipocrite and Abd from cold fusion and its talk page, for an indefinite duration "of approximately one month, during which time we’ll see if a stable version developes [sic]" [18]. He then removed the full protection on the article and replaced it with semi-protection [19].
A subsequent administrators’ incidents noticeboard discussion on 11 and 12 June ( Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive544#need review of the topic ban of two editors from Cold Fusion) endorsed and reaffirmed the page ban placed by William M. Connolley for one month.
William M. Connolley then lifted the ban of Hipocrite on 24 June [20].
- Passed 7 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
First block of Abd
5) On 15 June, Abd edited cold fusion to adjust a citation [21] and immediately self-reverted [22] with the edit summary "per ban". Two hours later, William M. Connolley blocked Abd for 24 hours for violating the topic ban [23].
As Abd was under a community topic ban at this point, he was liable, under the blocking policy, to be blocked for any edit made in violation of that ban. However, given the dispute between Abd and William M. Connolley about the latter’s ability to unilaterally apply a topic ban, William M. Connolley should not have taken any enforcement action under the community ban.
- Passed 6 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Conduct during this case and during the request for arbitration
Edit-warring on the request for arbitration
6) On 14 July, Abd, Mathsci ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and William M. Connolley edit-warred on Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case over the list of parties to the request for arbitration that resulted in this case: Abd, Mathsci (with uncivil edit summary), Abd, Mathsci, Abd, William M. Connolley.
- Passed 5 to 3 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Editing comments of other editors and edit-warring on case pages
7) On 21 July, William M. Connolley removed a comment by Abd from the workshop with the edit summary "rm poorly indendted rambling junk. put it in your own bit" [24]. After it was restored, and after being advised to contact a clerk, he edit-warred to remove it twice more [25], [26].
- Passed 7 to 3 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Second block of Abd
8) Following the expiration of the topic ban against him, Abd voluntarily submitted to an extension of that ban. On 8 August, he withdrew this submission, and on 9 August made an edit to Talk:cold fusion. William M. Connolley then reverted Abd, and blocked him for 24 hours, with the action summary "Violation of ban at t:Cold Fusion". On Abd’s talk page, William M. Connolley said:
"I’ve blocked you for 24h for violation of the ban, and reverted your edit. If you want to edit there, you need to get someone other than yourself to overturn the ban. You could, for example, ask for an injunction at the Arbcomm case - that would be a fairly obvious remedy. Or you could have asked me. But instead you chose to test the limits; well, now you know".
All of these actions took place during this case.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd’s style of discussion
10) Abd’s style of discussion has made it difficult for other editors to work with him.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd tendentious editing
11) Abd ( talk · contribs) has tendentiously edited the cold fusion article. 1; 2; 3; 4; 5
- Passed 8 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Allegations of a cabal
12) There is no evidence of collusion or other improper collaboration among the various users Abd has alleged to be part of a cabal, nor did Abd attempt to provide any such evidence.
- Passed 7 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd in violation of prior remedy
13) In Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Abd and JzG, Abd was advised ‘‘to heed good-faith feedback when handling disputes, to incorporate that feedback, and to clearly and succinctly document previous and current attempts at resolution of the dispute before escalating to the next stage of dispute resolution.’’ He has failed to follow that advice.
- Passed 7 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
William M. Connolley’s use of administrator tools while involved
14) William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) has, on a number of occasions, misused his administrator tools by acting while involved:
- In January 2008, he edit warred with Lapsed Pacifist ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) on the article Shell to Sea ( [27], [28], [29], [30], [31], [32], [33]) before blocking him and then reverting to his preferred version.
- In May 2008, he semi-protected the United States and state terrorism article and then reverted to his preferred version.
- In May 2008, he blocked Giovanni33 ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) while they were both involved in the ’’Giovanni33’’ arbitration. Giovanni33 removed a comment on the workshop, William M. Connolley reverted him, and Giovanni33 reverted again. William M. Connolley blocked Giovanni33, and reverted once more.
- In August 2008, in the ’’Geogre-William M. Connolley’’ case, William M. Connolley was found to have "inappropriately extended a block that he had made, because of incivility directed at himself [and] later inappropriately reapplied his block after it was reversed..."
- Passed 7 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.
Discretionary sanctions
1) The
cold fusion article, and parts of any other articles that are substantially about cold fusion, are subject to discretionary sanctions.
- Discretionary sanctions
Any uninvolved administrator may, on his or her own discretion, impose sanctions on any editor working on an affected article if, despite being warned, that editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process. The sanctions imposed may include blocks of up to one year in length; bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; bans on any editing related to the topic or its closely related topics; restrictions on reverts or other specified behaviors; or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project.
Prior to any sanctions being imposed, the editor in question shall be given a warning with a link to this decision; and, where appropriate, should be counseled on specific steps that he or she can take to improve his or her editing in accordance with relevant policies and guidelines.
In determining whether to impose sanctions on a given user and which sanctions to impose, administrators should use their judgment and balance the need to assume good faith and avoid biting genuinely inexperienced editors, and the desire to allow responsible contributors maximum freedom to edit, with the need to reduce edit-warring and misuse of Wikipedia as a battleground, so as to create an acceptable collaborative editing environment even on our most contentious articles. Editors wishing to edit in these areas are advised to edit carefully, to adopt Wikipedia’s communal approaches (including appropriate conduct, dispute resolution, neutral point of view, no original research and verifiability) in their editing, and to amend behaviors that are deemed to be of concern by administrators. An editor unable or unwilling to do so may wish to restrict their editing to other topics, in order to avoid sanctions.
- Appeal of discretionary sanctions
Discretionary sanctions imposed under the provisions of this decision may be appealed to the imposing administrator, the appropriate noticeboard (currently Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement), or the Committee. Administrators are cautioned not to reverse such sanctions without familiarizing themselves with the full facts of the matter and engaging in extensive discussion and consensus-building at the administrators’ noticeboard or another suitable on-wiki venue. The Committee will consider appropriate remedies including suspension or revocation of adminship in the event of violations.
- Logging
All sanctions imposed under the provisions of this decision are to be logged at
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William M. Connolley#Log of blocks and bans.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Superseded by an alternate sanction passed 14 to 0, 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)- Rescinded by motion, 11 to 0, 11:22, 30 November 2014 (UTC)
Abd editing restriction (existing disputes)
3.2) Abd is prohibited from participating in discussion of any dispute in which he is not one of the originating parties, unless approved by his mentor(s). This includes, but is not limited to, article talk and user talk pages, the administrator noticeboards, and any formal or informal dispute resolution. He would be allowed to vote or comment at polls.
- Passed 8 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
3.3) Abd is indefinitely prohibited from discussing any dispute in which he is not an originating party. This includes, but is not limited to, article talk and user talk pages, the administrator noticeboards, and any formal or informal dispute resolution pages. He may, however, vote or comment at polls.
- Passed 9 to 0 with 2 abstentions by motion on 16:08, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
Abd banned from cold fusion article
3.3) Abd is banned from the cold fusion article, any content related to cold fusion, and any talk page discussion related to cold fusion for one year.
- Passed 8 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd banned for 3 months
3.6) Abd is banned from Wikipedia for 3 months. Should remedies requiring him to identify a mentor (or develop a mentorship plan) pass, the mentorship will become effective at the end of the ban.
- Passed 8 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd admonished
4) Abd ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is admonished not to edit war, especially not on arbitration pages. Abd is further admonished for engaging in personal attacks during this case, and for failing even to attempt to substantiate allegations of misconduct levelled at other editors.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Mathsci reminded
5.1) Mathsci ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is reminded not to edit war — especially not on arbitration pages — and to avoid personal attacks at all times.
- Passed 5 to 4 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
William M. Connolley desysopped
6) William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) administrative privileges are revoked. William M. Connolley may apply to have them reinstated at any time, either through the usual means (i.e., via request for adminship) or by appeal to the Committee.
- Passed 7 to 3 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
William M. Connolley admonished
7) William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is admonished not to edit war, especially not on arbitration pages.
- Passed 9 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Community discussion of topic-ban and page-ban procedure urged
8) The Arbitration Committee urges that the community engage in a policy discussion and clarify, on an appropriate policy page, whether and under what circumstances an administrator may direct that a given editor is banned from editing a particular page or on a particular topic (outside the context of arbitration enforcement), without first attaining a consensus for the ban on a noticeboard, and if so, how such bans are to be reviewed. Such discussion should seek to attain consensus on a policy in this area within one month from the close of this case.
- Passed 7 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Mutual interaction ban
9) Abd and William M. Connolley prohibited from interacting
Abd ( talk · contribs) and William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs) shall not interact with each other, nor comment in any way (directly or indirectly) about each other, on any page in Wikipedia. Should either editor do so, he may be blocked by any administrator for a short time, up to one week.
- Passed 6 to 1 on 23:48, 2 February 2010 (UTC) by motion
Standard discretionary sanctions
10) Cold fusion and related pages are are placed under
discretionary sanctions. Any uninvolved administrator may levy restrictions as an
arbitration enforcement action on users editing in this topic area, after an initial warning.
- Passed 14 to 0 by
motion, 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
Superseded by motion, 22:35, 15 November 2012 (UTC). See Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience#Discretionary sanctions.- Rescinded by motion, 11 to 0, 11:22, 30 November 2014 (UTC)
Enforcement of restrictions
0) Should any user subject to a restriction in this case violate that restriction, that user may be blocked, initially for up to one month, and then with blocks increasing in duration to a maximum of one year.
- In accordance with the procedure for the standard enforcement provision adopted 3 May 2014, this provision did not require a vote.
Appeals and modifications
0) Appeals and modifications
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This procedure applies to appeals related to, and modifications of, actions taken by administrators to enforce the Committee's remedies. It does not apply to appeals related to the remedies directly enacted by the Committee.
Appeals may be made only by the editor under sanction and only for a currently active sanction. Requests for modification of page restrictions may be made by any editor. The process has three possible stages (see "Important notes" below). The editor may:
No administrator may modify or remove a sanction placed by another administrator without:
Administrators modifying sanctions out of process may at the discretion of the committee be desysopped. Nothing in this section prevents an administrator from replacing an existing sanction issued by another administrator with a new sanction if fresh misconduct has taken place after the existing sanction was applied. Administrators are free to modify sanctions placed by former administrators – that is, editors who do not have the administrator permission enabled (due to a temporary or permanent relinquishment or desysop) – without regard to the requirements of this section. If an administrator modifies a sanction placed by a former administrator, the administrator who made the modification becomes the "enforcing administrator". If a former administrator regains the tools, the provisions of this section again apply to their unmodified enforcement actions. Important notes:
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- In accordance with the procedure for the standard appeals and modifications provision adopted 3 May 2014, this provision did not require a vote.
On 3 May 2014 Arbcom established a new method of notifying for discretionary sanctions which is explained at WP:AC/DS#Awareness and alerts. All notices given prior to the May 2014 cutover date will expire on 3 May 2015. New notices are to be given using {{ Ds/alert}} and they expire one year after they are given. No new notices should be logged here.
- Gregory Goble ( talk · contribs) notified. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 09:16, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
Log any block, restriction, ban or extension under any remedy in this decision here. Minimum information includes name of administrator, date and time, what was done and the basis for doing it.
- Abd blocked for a week for repeated breach of editing restriction (commenting on disputes he is not an originating party to), in connection with overall hostile behaviour and excessive wikilawyering [34]. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:36, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Abd blocked again for a week for the same type of behaviour, especially with this and related edits, after extensive discussion at AE. For details see [35]. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:32, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
- Abd blocked for a week for breach of both topic ban and editing restriction (commenting on disputes he is not an originating party to) at [36], per AE thread. T. Canens ( talk) 19:56, 18 June 2010 (UTC)
- Abd is topic banned for 1 additional year from today's date from Cold Fusion articles, talk pages, and related pages, interpreted broadly, under the General sanction remedy in this case, pursuant to discussions on WP:AN [37], permalink (TBD), and metawiki's spam blacklist board [38], permalink (TBD). Notification [39], term of effect until October 5, 2011. Georgewilliamherbert ( talk) 21:33, 5 October 2010 (UTC)
- Abd blocked for 48 hours for violating the prohibition from interacting with William M. Connolley (see AE request). Sandstein 14:08, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
- Abd blocked 2 weeks for violating the topic ban on Cold Fusion–related discussions [40]. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:55, 30 April 2011 (UTC)
- Abd ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) indefinitely blocked by user:Future Perfect at Sunrise for evading topic ban with sockpuppet EnergyNeutral ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), checkuser confirmed. Guy ( Help!) 19:48, 3 June 2011 (UTC)
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Case Opened on 11:57, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Case Closed on 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Case Amended by motion on 19:43, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
Case Amended by Motion on 14:32, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
Case Amended by motion on 11:22, 30 November 2014 (UTC)
Please do not edit this page directly unless you are either 1) an Arbitrator, 2) an Arbitration Clerk, or 3) adding yourself to this case. Statements on this page are original comments provided when the Committee was initially requested to Arbitrate this page (at Requests for arbitration), and serve as opening statements; as such, they should not be altered. Any evidence you wish to provide to the Arbitrators should go on the /Evidence subpage.
Arbitrators, the parties, and other editors may suggest proposed principles, findings, and remedies at /Workshop. That page may also be used for general comments on the evidence. Arbitrators will then vote on a final decision in the case at /Proposed decision.
Once the case is closed, editors may add to the #Log of blocks, bans, and restrictions as needed, but this page should not be edited otherwise. Please raise any questions at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration#Requests for clarification, and report violations of remedies at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement.
- Abd ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), filing party
- William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
- Enric Naval ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
Requests for comment
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/William M. Connolley
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Abd and JzG
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Cold fusion
- Summary
- WMC was involved in immediate content dispute and long-term behavioral dispute with me.
- He edited Cold fusion while protected in expectation of controversy over it, and contrary to an expressed consensus.
- Then he declared me banned from the article and its Talk.
- Later, he blocked me for making a self-reverted harmless edit, contrary to his expressed prior opinion about harmless edits under ban.
- In spite of charges of involvement, he insists that he remains the enforcer of an expired community ban, asserting it as indef.
- History of prior dispute, mostly over use of tools while involved
Stored at: [1]
- The present dispute;
Stored at: [2].
- Further considerations and issues to be arbitrated
Stored at [3].
-- Abd ( talk) 05:04, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd re Mathsci
I decided not to make this RfAr cover specific Fringe science issues; had I done so, Mathsci would have been a party, along with as many as a dozen others. ArbComm may, however, decide to look at his statement here, and the series of directly false or ABF charges he has made; I suggest, however, avoiding a focus on Fringe science here, it will complicate an otherwise simple case. To correct false statements, my full response is at [4].
Mathsci subsequently removed, without comment or edit summary, his statement. -- Abd ( talk) 04:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
And then he restored and extended it. -- Abd ( talk) 13:24, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd to Bilby
I agree with Bilby that clarification would be useful. Complete response, correcting errors, is at [5]. -- Abd ( talk) 15:54, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
I did not edit war in the June 1 incident that resulted in the 2nd protection and the ban. A ban reason was not given, except for hints: alleged walls of text in talk, and interest in policy. -- Abd ( talk) 17:02, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
Bilby, I can understand your concern about the addition of parties, but it's not a laundry list, it's a very focused list which covers only editors who have not only been active in attempts to ban me for months, but who also involved themselves here by extensive comment about justification for the ban. You will note that you !voted for the ban at AN/I, as did one or two other editors commenting here, besides the ones included, but you are not included. You have no long-term active involvement in this, the others do. In addition, these editors have been active with bans of others; editors who devote substantial amounts of energy to banning others should not be above examination. -- Abd ( talk) 15:46, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd re Enric Naval and Protonk
- Enric's comment shows why ArbComm should take this case, for he has promised disruptive action if it's rejected. I urge ArbComm to keep it simple and not extend to a full addressing of Fringe issues at this time. My complete response is at [6]. -- Abd ( talk) 18:59, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
- Protonk's comment shows this even more urgently. Promising page bans if ArbComm disagrees with him? Grounds for immediate desysop? Perhaps Protonk will refactor that comment. -- Abd ( talk) 17:10, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd to Jehochman et al
- Thanks. Such a response! Voluntary disclosure: I'm 65. 7 children, ages 5-40, 5 grandchildren, ages 5-17. Long experience with voluntary communities and consensus process; on-line since The WELL, about 1986.
- Carcharoth: There are hosts of issues, and good process would suggest isolating them where possible. An RfAr can become a coatrack for every possible complaint about a user. We should encourage the use of RfC/User, possibly a summary form, perhaps abbreviated to ten days, for all community bans. (When there is urgency, any uninvolved administrator may ban, pending.) My strong recommendation is that RfC process be nudged toward RfAr process, otherwise we have verdict first, trial afterwards. In RfAr/Abd and JzG, I urged that the focus be kept narrow. In the end, only two issues of weight were decided: the original recusal issue, and the blacklist issue; beyond that there was only good advice for me, which I have attempted to heed, which is why I shut down argument at AN/I, when it was obvious that it would be unproductive. With JzG, I waited for months in hopes that JzG would receive better advice; in this case, I made one attempt, very early, to solicit a mediator, someone WMC might listen to. You can see the result at [7].
- ArbComm: I will ask, as this proceeds, for arbitrators to identify specific issues which they consent to consider. I will be charged with many offenses, real and imagined, and if I respond to these charges, well, wall of text, you ain't seen nothing yet! I prefer to remain silent about moot charges, I'd rather not testify on a motion unless it has been seconded. I was urged, by email, to include Mathsci as a party; however, this RfAr was filed solely over WMC recusal failure, and only secondarily over my expired community ban, and Mathsci's behavior is only indirectly relevant. It is not efficient to combine cases, it complicates and lengthens them. And I thank the Committee for its kind consideration, I am heartened by its clear-eyed response. -- Abd ( talk) 13:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response of Abd to William M. Connolley
- I'm still trying to understand the concept of banning me from an article when, having studied the topic for five months, having bought the references (half of them skeptical), and having discussed it perhaps too extensively, I stopped talking so much and started seriously editing it, based firmly on reliable sources, with the reason given for maintaining the ban being my "unhealthy interest in policy." I assume you'll explain to ArbComm, I'll be reading with interest. -- Abd ( talk) 17:52, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
I came to cold fusion - I forget how - and discovered the talk page a disaster area. I banned Hipocrite and Abd from CF [8], which was mostly an effort to achieve symmetry, though I believed the harm was mostly from Abd. Since then, peace and calm have largely reigned. Abd broke that ban on two occaisions: on the first, I removed his comment and warned him not to do it again. On the second, I blocked him.
Abd has an unhealthy interest in policy above content. In short, he is a wiki-lawyer. He isn't very good at it, but that doesn't stop him offering his unhelpful advice, e.g. to User:PJHaseldine. He produces walls of text that no-one reads and which disrupt the flow of any page he is involved in.
Essentially all of his statement is wrong or misleading; the claims of prior involvement are an attempt to muddy the waters.
My opinion is that Abd is a net negative to the encyclopaedia: he has forgotten the purpose is to write articles and instead uses it as a forum to pursue his interest in discussing policy.
William M. Connolley ( talk) 20:15, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, can't resist adding this [9], its lovely William M. Connolley ( talk) 20:35, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
More: @GR: My unban of H [10] was not conditional on his not editing CF. I've said that already somewhere, but I forget where. And GR's "disclosure" somehow omits Wikipedia:Requests for comment/GoRight#Outside View by Abd William M. Connolley ( talk) 21:05, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Yet more: I complained to Casliber that his statement subject to a previous case was inaccurate [11], but he hasn't corrected it, so I will: the "a" is wrong, since there are several cases forgotten (ah you young folks): Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Climate change dispute 2 for example William M. Connolley ( talk) 07:36, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Disclaimer: I have edited both Cold fusion and its talk page, and I have very strong disagreements with Abd, although we ocassionally agree on stuff. I also raised the review of Abd's ban at ANI, and I would raise it again.
I think that the community can handle Abd's ban, and I think that Abd refuses to take this to AN/ANI because he knows that there is a very high chance that the continuation of the ban is resoundingly endorsed. This is trying to shorcut the community because he doesn't agree with what it thinks. If this case gets rejected, my first step will be raising the issue at AN where the community can give input on the continuation of the ban. (or start a RFC/U, maybe, I am never sure about these things) Abd also said that reviewing the ban at ANI was a disruptive actions, people commenting there didn't agree at all.
WMC's actions were reasonable, and they protected the editors of the article and the, what was the name, the ambient of peaceful and calm colaboration ambient in the page, which was being disrupted to hell and back by enormous walls of text, refusal to accept consensus, insistance in refusing the input of any actual expert in Physics that gave his input, inserting half a dozen unrelated topics in one long meandering reply, etc. WMC's actions broke that bad atmosphere, and allowed work to continue in the article, so WMC was clearly doing the job that wikipedia admins are supposed to do, using the tools given to him by the community, and this community endorsed his actions in the only occassion when it was asked about it.
As an editor, I have to say that I welcome the tranquility and peace that there is now at Talk:Cold fusion after Abd was banned from the page. I also welcome that Abd's editing is now limited to the cold fusion mediation by Cryptic_C62, where his walls of text can be kept in check, and where Cryptic_C62 can keep the discussion on-topic.
Abd has not stopped wikilawyering about his own ban, Jed's ban and Pcarbonn's ban, saying that "experts" have been banned from the article for POV reasons, while refusing to agree that they were being disruptive, COI'ed, soapboxing and POV pushing. I think that this is just the latest instance of this disruptive behaviour, and that Arbcom should deny him the attention to his disruptive ideas, and let the community handle this.
P.D.: Put Cold Fusion under discrectionary sanctions like Homeopathy. No wonder that admins don't want to intervene if they get treated like this every time they take good action against POV pushers. Pleae take Homeopathy case as precedent, where DanaUllman was banned for one year, Dana was also causing disruption in talk pages and saying that he shouldn't be banned because he didn't edit the articles themselves. Don't repeat the mistakes of past committees, but consider repeating their correct decisions. -- Enric Naval ( talk) 13:58, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
In my experience, Abd has no understanding of science as a process and little knowledge about science as a subject. Unfortunately, he has chosen to become a champion of fringe science topics. His (in)famous "wall of text" technique of incredibly long, rambling, and mostly content-free talk page postings make attempts at communication with him unproductive and frustrating. His definition of involvement apparently would allow each admin exactly one interaction with a given user, and only in fields the admin never worked in before. This is not a useful or even realistic interpretation of Wikipedia's rules.
William, on the other hand, is a productive and active admin. He is willing to work on WP:3RR violations, to enforce ArbCom decisions and promote a rational environment. He is somewhat brusk and of course not very popular with several editors he blocked, but his actions contribute significantly to making Wikipedia a better place for constructive editors.
- Reply to Jehochman: I object to the implied ageism and the request for irrelevant personal information.-- Stephan Schulz ( talk) 15:43, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to Abd adding additional parties (including me): I'll let the clerks decide if unilateral addition of parties after voting is acceptable in general. This instance in particular I find it entirely preposterous. I'd like my name to be spelled correctly, too.. Also, " what Mathsci said"!-- Stephan Schulz ( talk) 15:08, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Preliminary motion 1 (proposed): Abd is restricted to add no more than 3 new parties per day to the case. At least one of these parties has to be vaguely connected to the case. -- Stephan Schulz ( talk) 21:24, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Preliminary motion 2 (proposed if motion one fails): If the case gains more parties than voted in the last ArbCom elections, the case will be delayed until after new ArbCom members have been elected. -- Stephan Schulz ( talk) 21:24, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
WMC has acted properly throughout, and his actions have vastly improved the atmosphere at CF talk, which has led to improvements on the CF page. The ban and WMCs "involvement" has been so far fully approved of by the community at ANI. If Abd has a problem the correct place to take it for review would be ANI, but he is probably aware his poor wikilawyering, walls-of-text (which arbcom has censured him for), and other verbal tricks would be ignored there, and the ban probably endorsed if not extended. Claims of WMCs involvement are clearly ludicrous. This should be rejected, and Abd warned about his behaviour. I fully endorse the views of William, Enric, MathSci, Stephan Schulz, and Biliby (apart from the criticism of WMCs responses, they were factual and appropriate). Unfortunately I fail to see the relevance of Jehochman's view, as Abd has been given every chance. Verbal chat 11:09, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to Jehochman What relevance does your request have? WP:AGF, I'm in my late twenties (as of two days ago, unfortunately), other information on my talk page. I wouldn't be surprised if a clerk removed your question and any replies, however. Re Abd's reply, I've been online since Prestel and then on the internet since CompuServe arrived in the UK. Verbal chat 17:58, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to Coren This has been to ANI once, and Abd's interpretation of events was found wanting. I see no need for arbcom's involvement in a situation which could quite possibly be solved by the community, if it were taken to them. On your other point, if I was to come along and accuse an admin of involvement, would that automatically lead to an accept? "Both factors demand examination" - why? Could you support or explain your reasoning, please. If you could make it clear whose behaviour you feel deserves investigating, that might answer some of my concerns. Thanks, Verbal chat 17:58, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to Casliber I repeat my requests made of Cohren, see above. If you want to investigate WMC, say why. If you want to investigate Abd, say why. If both, say why - an actual reason. Eg. "Xs disruptive wikilawyering here" or "Ys probable admin abuse here". A bit more specific than "accusations of admin abuse" - unless you believe that has happened, and say why! I'd also like to hear why you think the community can't deal with this, when so far it has when given the chance. Thanks, Verbal chat 22:55, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Response to being added as party and arbcom involvement I don't think the scope should be extended at all, and only Abd's behaviour and whether WMC has acted appropriately should be looked at. Adding other people just makes it more of a time sink and waters down the issue. I also fail to see why the community has been short circuited by ArbCom (although I understand why Abd would like to avoid community scrutiny). If ArbCom wants to deal with Abd this way, fine - but the community should have been tried first. I'm sure the community would have dealt with Abd appropriately. I hope arbcom will do the same. Verbal chat 16:29, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (6/0/1/2)
- Awaiting further statements.
Newyorkbrad (
talk) 15:07, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
- Abstain - not sure whether this dispute (or group of disputes) is best suited for arbitration, but deferring to consensus that we'll take the case. I implore all participants to be as concise as possible in their evidence presentations and workshop proposals; pages such as those we saw in the Abd and JzG cases become almost useless to the arbitrators. Newyorkbrad ( talk) 13:08, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept; there are repeated returns of this dispute to the various noticeboards, showing difficulty for the matter to be settled by the community, and there are allegations of administrative abuse or improper involvement. Both factors demand examination, but the scope is to be strictly the behavior and not content disputes over cold fusion (or any other fringe science topic). — Coren (talk) 13:30, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept - Coren sums it up well. To clarify, (1) we have one user (Abd) for whom in a recent case there was concern over his pursuit of dispute resolution, (2) another (WMC) for whom there is a concern over misuse of tools, and has been subject to a previous case and a page (Cold Fusion) over which there have been disputes which have reached arbitration already. Thus if people have acted properly, it'd be also good to vindicate them rather than leave a cloud of suspicion over their head(s). Agree with others about clarifying scope. Casliber ( talk · contribs) 20:40, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept. Wizardman 05:26, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept per Casliber. The scope of the case will need to be carefully handled, as there is almost a case for three separate issues to be addressed here (Abd conduct, WMC conduct, and Cold Fusion conduct issues), but that could get very messy. The Scibaby issue has just been mentioned by Mathsci (and I am aware both WMC and Abd have been involved in editing Global warming topics, so that may not be beyond the scope of any case) - I will say here that there is anecdotal evidence that the extent of the Scibaby range blocks has been discouraging people from editing Wikipedia (not everyone makes the effort to request an account be created for them). Any alternative way to address Scibaby issues would be good, though possibly beyond the scope of this request. Carcharoth ( talk) 08:08, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Agree per Cas and Coren. FloNight ♥♥♥ 11:34, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Accept. John Vandenberg ( chat) 12:41, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Recuse. Also, depending on how the case develops, I may submit evidence on-wiki. Cool Hand Luke 14:51, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
- Comment: There are now the required number of votes to accept this case. I believe, however, that we should keep this as narrowly focused as possible. Like Newyorkbrad, I urge all participants to present clear and concise evidence and commentary. Risker ( talk) 17:50, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Final decision Information
All numbering based on /Proposed decision, where vote counts and comments are also available.
Decorum
1) Wikipedia users are expected to behave reasonably, calmly, and courteously in their interactions with other users; to approach even difficult situations in a dignified fashion and with a constructive and collaborative outlook; and to avoid acting in a manner that brings the project into disrepute. Unseemly conduct, such as personal attacks, incivility, assumptions of bad faith, harassment, or disruptive point-making, is prohibited.
- Passed 9 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Conduct on arbitration pages
2) The pages associated with arbitration cases are primarily intended to assist the Arbitration Committee in arriving at a fair, well-informed, and expeditious resolution of each case. Participation by editors who present good-faith statements, evidence, and workshop proposals is appreciated. While allowance is made for the fact that parties and other interested editors may have strong feelings about the subject-matters of their dispute, appropriate decorum should be maintained on these pages. Incivility, personal attacks, and strident rhetoric should be avoided in arbitration as in all other areas of Wikipedia.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia page or topic bans
4.1) A Wikipedia ban is a formal revocation of editing privileges on all or part of Wikipedia. A ban may be temporary and of fixed duration, or indefinite and potentially permanent. When enacting an editing restriction that includes a ban on an editor, administrators should take reasonable steps to ensure that the editor is notified of the particulars of the ban and its duration. Editors that are ‘‘page or’’ topic banned from a section of Wikipedia are expected to cease contributing to that area. User account blocks may be used to enforce violation of ‘‘page or’’ topic bans. Any user can bring an administrator action up for review in the relevant noticeboard. The community can, among other things, lift the block/ban, endorse it or extend it in time and/or scope.
- Passed 8 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Use of administrator tools in a dispute
5) An administrator must not use his or her administrator tools to further the administrator’s position in a dispute.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Avoiding apparent impropriety
6) All editors, and especially administrators, should strive to avoid conduct that might appear at first sight to violate policy. Examples include an administrator repeatedly making administrator actions that might reasonably be construed as reinforcing the administrator’s position in a content dispute, even where the administrator actually has no such intention; or an editor repeatedly editing in apparent coordination with other editors in circumstances which might give rise to reasonable but inaccurate suspicions of sockpuppetry or meatpuppetry.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Good faith and disruption
7) Inappropriate behavior driven by good intentions is still inappropriate. Users acting in good faith may still be sanctioned when their actions are disruptive.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Locus of dispute
1.1) The locus of this dispute is a page ban applied to Abd ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) by William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA), and several associated disputes, in relation to editorial disputes on the cold fusion article.
The cold fusion article was also the locus of dispute in the ’’cold fusion’’ arbitration in December 2008.
- Passed 9 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Events leading to this case
Recent disputes
2) In May 2009, Hipocrite ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and Abd were involved in an edit war on cold fusion [12] leading William M. Connolley to protect the page [13].
On 31 May and 1 June 2009, edit warring on cold fusion involving a number of users [14] led Causa sui ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) to protect the page for two weeks [15].
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
William M. Connolley’s controversial action as an administrator
3.1) On 5 June, William M. Connolley edited through protection on cold fusion [16], reverting to a version from three weeks earlier [17] with the edit summary "Lets [sic] wind everyone up", an action and comment that needlessly escalated the dispute.
- Passed 9 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Page bans
4.1) On 6 June, William M. Connolley placed a page ban on Hipocrite and Abd from cold fusion and its talk page, for an indefinite duration "of approximately one month, during which time we’ll see if a stable version developes [sic]" [18]. He then removed the full protection on the article and replaced it with semi-protection [19].
A subsequent administrators’ incidents noticeboard discussion on 11 and 12 June ( Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive544#need review of the topic ban of two editors from Cold Fusion) endorsed and reaffirmed the page ban placed by William M. Connolley for one month.
William M. Connolley then lifted the ban of Hipocrite on 24 June [20].
- Passed 7 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
First block of Abd
5) On 15 June, Abd edited cold fusion to adjust a citation [21] and immediately self-reverted [22] with the edit summary "per ban". Two hours later, William M. Connolley blocked Abd for 24 hours for violating the topic ban [23].
As Abd was under a community topic ban at this point, he was liable, under the blocking policy, to be blocked for any edit made in violation of that ban. However, given the dispute between Abd and William M. Connolley about the latter’s ability to unilaterally apply a topic ban, William M. Connolley should not have taken any enforcement action under the community ban.
- Passed 6 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Conduct during this case and during the request for arbitration
Edit-warring on the request for arbitration
6) On 14 July, Abd, Mathsci ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and William M. Connolley edit-warred on Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case over the list of parties to the request for arbitration that resulted in this case: Abd, Mathsci (with uncivil edit summary), Abd, Mathsci, Abd, William M. Connolley.
- Passed 5 to 3 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Editing comments of other editors and edit-warring on case pages
7) On 21 July, William M. Connolley removed a comment by Abd from the workshop with the edit summary "rm poorly indendted rambling junk. put it in your own bit" [24]. After it was restored, and after being advised to contact a clerk, he edit-warred to remove it twice more [25], [26].
- Passed 7 to 3 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Second block of Abd
8) Following the expiration of the topic ban against him, Abd voluntarily submitted to an extension of that ban. On 8 August, he withdrew this submission, and on 9 August made an edit to Talk:cold fusion. William M. Connolley then reverted Abd, and blocked him for 24 hours, with the action summary "Violation of ban at t:Cold Fusion". On Abd’s talk page, William M. Connolley said:
"I’ve blocked you for 24h for violation of the ban, and reverted your edit. If you want to edit there, you need to get someone other than yourself to overturn the ban. You could, for example, ask for an injunction at the Arbcomm case - that would be a fairly obvious remedy. Or you could have asked me. But instead you chose to test the limits; well, now you know".
All of these actions took place during this case.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd’s style of discussion
10) Abd’s style of discussion has made it difficult for other editors to work with him.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd tendentious editing
11) Abd ( talk · contribs) has tendentiously edited the cold fusion article. 1; 2; 3; 4; 5
- Passed 8 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Allegations of a cabal
12) There is no evidence of collusion or other improper collaboration among the various users Abd has alleged to be part of a cabal, nor did Abd attempt to provide any such evidence.
- Passed 7 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd in violation of prior remedy
13) In Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Abd and JzG, Abd was advised ‘‘to heed good-faith feedback when handling disputes, to incorporate that feedback, and to clearly and succinctly document previous and current attempts at resolution of the dispute before escalating to the next stage of dispute resolution.’’ He has failed to follow that advice.
- Passed 7 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
William M. Connolley’s use of administrator tools while involved
14) William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) has, on a number of occasions, misused his administrator tools by acting while involved:
- In January 2008, he edit warred with Lapsed Pacifist ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) on the article Shell to Sea ( [27], [28], [29], [30], [31], [32], [33]) before blocking him and then reverting to his preferred version.
- In May 2008, he semi-protected the United States and state terrorism article and then reverted to his preferred version.
- In May 2008, he blocked Giovanni33 ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) while they were both involved in the ’’Giovanni33’’ arbitration. Giovanni33 removed a comment on the workshop, William M. Connolley reverted him, and Giovanni33 reverted again. William M. Connolley blocked Giovanni33, and reverted once more.
- In August 2008, in the ’’Geogre-William M. Connolley’’ case, William M. Connolley was found to have "inappropriately extended a block that he had made, because of incivility directed at himself [and] later inappropriately reapplied his block after it was reversed..."
- Passed 7 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.
Discretionary sanctions
1) The
cold fusion article, and parts of any other articles that are substantially about cold fusion, are subject to discretionary sanctions.
- Discretionary sanctions
Any uninvolved administrator may, on his or her own discretion, impose sanctions on any editor working on an affected article if, despite being warned, that editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process. The sanctions imposed may include blocks of up to one year in length; bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; bans on any editing related to the topic or its closely related topics; restrictions on reverts or other specified behaviors; or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project.
Prior to any sanctions being imposed, the editor in question shall be given a warning with a link to this decision; and, where appropriate, should be counseled on specific steps that he or she can take to improve his or her editing in accordance with relevant policies and guidelines.
In determining whether to impose sanctions on a given user and which sanctions to impose, administrators should use their judgment and balance the need to assume good faith and avoid biting genuinely inexperienced editors, and the desire to allow responsible contributors maximum freedom to edit, with the need to reduce edit-warring and misuse of Wikipedia as a battleground, so as to create an acceptable collaborative editing environment even on our most contentious articles. Editors wishing to edit in these areas are advised to edit carefully, to adopt Wikipedia’s communal approaches (including appropriate conduct, dispute resolution, neutral point of view, no original research and verifiability) in their editing, and to amend behaviors that are deemed to be of concern by administrators. An editor unable or unwilling to do so may wish to restrict their editing to other topics, in order to avoid sanctions.
- Appeal of discretionary sanctions
Discretionary sanctions imposed under the provisions of this decision may be appealed to the imposing administrator, the appropriate noticeboard (currently Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement), or the Committee. Administrators are cautioned not to reverse such sanctions without familiarizing themselves with the full facts of the matter and engaging in extensive discussion and consensus-building at the administrators’ noticeboard or another suitable on-wiki venue. The Committee will consider appropriate remedies including suspension or revocation of adminship in the event of violations.
- Logging
All sanctions imposed under the provisions of this decision are to be logged at
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William M. Connolley#Log of blocks and bans.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Superseded by an alternate sanction passed 14 to 0, 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)- Rescinded by motion, 11 to 0, 11:22, 30 November 2014 (UTC)
Abd editing restriction (existing disputes)
3.2) Abd is prohibited from participating in discussion of any dispute in which he is not one of the originating parties, unless approved by his mentor(s). This includes, but is not limited to, article talk and user talk pages, the administrator noticeboards, and any formal or informal dispute resolution. He would be allowed to vote or comment at polls.
- Passed 8 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
3.3) Abd is indefinitely prohibited from discussing any dispute in which he is not an originating party. This includes, but is not limited to, article talk and user talk pages, the administrator noticeboards, and any formal or informal dispute resolution pages. He may, however, vote or comment at polls.
- Passed 9 to 0 with 2 abstentions by motion on 16:08, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
Abd banned from cold fusion article
3.3) Abd is banned from the cold fusion article, any content related to cold fusion, and any talk page discussion related to cold fusion for one year.
- Passed 8 to 2 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd banned for 3 months
3.6) Abd is banned from Wikipedia for 3 months. Should remedies requiring him to identify a mentor (or develop a mentorship plan) pass, the mentorship will become effective at the end of the ban.
- Passed 8 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Abd admonished
4) Abd ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is admonished not to edit war, especially not on arbitration pages. Abd is further admonished for engaging in personal attacks during this case, and for failing even to attempt to substantiate allegations of misconduct levelled at other editors.
- Passed 10 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Mathsci reminded
5.1) Mathsci ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is reminded not to edit war — especially not on arbitration pages — and to avoid personal attacks at all times.
- Passed 5 to 4 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
William M. Connolley desysopped
6) William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) administrative privileges are revoked. William M. Connolley may apply to have them reinstated at any time, either through the usual means (i.e., via request for adminship) or by appeal to the Committee.
- Passed 7 to 3 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
William M. Connolley admonished
7) William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is admonished not to edit war, especially not on arbitration pages.
- Passed 9 to 0 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Community discussion of topic-ban and page-ban procedure urged
8) The Arbitration Committee urges that the community engage in a policy discussion and clarify, on an appropriate policy page, whether and under what circumstances an administrator may direct that a given editor is banned from editing a particular page or on a particular topic (outside the context of arbitration enforcement), without first attaining a consensus for the ban on a noticeboard, and if so, how such bans are to be reviewed. Such discussion should seek to attain consensus on a policy in this area within one month from the close of this case.
- Passed 7 to 1 at 22:30, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Mutual interaction ban
9) Abd and William M. Connolley prohibited from interacting
Abd ( talk · contribs) and William M. Connolley ( talk · contribs) shall not interact with each other, nor comment in any way (directly or indirectly) about each other, on any page in Wikipedia. Should either editor do so, he may be blocked by any administrator for a short time, up to one week.
- Passed 6 to 1 on 23:48, 2 February 2010 (UTC) by motion
Standard discretionary sanctions
10) Cold fusion and related pages are are placed under
discretionary sanctions. Any uninvolved administrator may levy restrictions as an
arbitration enforcement action on users editing in this topic area, after an initial warning.
- Passed 14 to 0 by
motion, 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
Superseded by motion, 22:35, 15 November 2012 (UTC). See Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience#Discretionary sanctions.- Rescinded by motion, 11 to 0, 11:22, 30 November 2014 (UTC)
Enforcement of restrictions
0) Should any user subject to a restriction in this case violate that restriction, that user may be blocked, initially for up to one month, and then with blocks increasing in duration to a maximum of one year.
- In accordance with the procedure for the standard enforcement provision adopted 3 May 2014, this provision did not require a vote.
Appeals and modifications
0) Appeals and modifications
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This procedure applies to appeals related to, and modifications of, actions taken by administrators to enforce the Committee's remedies. It does not apply to appeals related to the remedies directly enacted by the Committee.
Appeals may be made only by the editor under sanction and only for a currently active sanction. Requests for modification of page restrictions may be made by any editor. The process has three possible stages (see "Important notes" below). The editor may:
No administrator may modify or remove a sanction placed by another administrator without:
Administrators modifying sanctions out of process may at the discretion of the committee be desysopped. Nothing in this section prevents an administrator from replacing an existing sanction issued by another administrator with a new sanction if fresh misconduct has taken place after the existing sanction was applied. Administrators are free to modify sanctions placed by former administrators – that is, editors who do not have the administrator permission enabled (due to a temporary or permanent relinquishment or desysop) – without regard to the requirements of this section. If an administrator modifies a sanction placed by a former administrator, the administrator who made the modification becomes the "enforcing administrator". If a former administrator regains the tools, the provisions of this section again apply to their unmodified enforcement actions. Important notes:
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- In accordance with the procedure for the standard appeals and modifications provision adopted 3 May 2014, this provision did not require a vote.
On 3 May 2014 Arbcom established a new method of notifying for discretionary sanctions which is explained at WP:AC/DS#Awareness and alerts. All notices given prior to the May 2014 cutover date will expire on 3 May 2015. New notices are to be given using {{ Ds/alert}} and they expire one year after they are given. No new notices should be logged here.
- Gregory Goble ( talk · contribs) notified. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 09:16, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
Log any block, restriction, ban or extension under any remedy in this decision here. Minimum information includes name of administrator, date and time, what was done and the basis for doing it.
- Abd blocked for a week for repeated breach of editing restriction (commenting on disputes he is not an originating party to), in connection with overall hostile behaviour and excessive wikilawyering [34]. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:36, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Abd blocked again for a week for the same type of behaviour, especially with this and related edits, after extensive discussion at AE. For details see [35]. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:32, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
- Abd blocked for a week for breach of both topic ban and editing restriction (commenting on disputes he is not an originating party to) at [36], per AE thread. T. Canens ( talk) 19:56, 18 June 2010 (UTC)
- Abd is topic banned for 1 additional year from today's date from Cold Fusion articles, talk pages, and related pages, interpreted broadly, under the General sanction remedy in this case, pursuant to discussions on WP:AN [37], permalink (TBD), and metawiki's spam blacklist board [38], permalink (TBD). Notification [39], term of effect until October 5, 2011. Georgewilliamherbert ( talk) 21:33, 5 October 2010 (UTC)
- Abd blocked for 48 hours for violating the prohibition from interacting with William M. Connolley (see AE request). Sandstein 14:08, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
- Abd blocked 2 weeks for violating the topic ban on Cold Fusion–related discussions [40]. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:55, 30 April 2011 (UTC)
- Abd ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) indefinitely blocked by user:Future Perfect at Sunrise for evading topic ban with sockpuppet EnergyNeutral ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), checkuser confirmed. Guy ( Help!) 19:48, 3 June 2011 (UTC)