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

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Current requests

Jeffrey O. Gustafson 2

Initiated by Ryan Postlethwaite at 20:11, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Involved parties

• Ryan Postlethwaite (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiating party)
• Jeffrey O. Gustafson (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
• Edward Morgan Blake (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

• It’s not really applicable here since it’s a case of sock puppetry, but there have been these discussion about Jeffrey previously;
• Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Jeffrey O. Gustafson
• Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_comment/Jeffrey_O._Gustafson_2
• Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Jeffrey O. Gustafson

With respect to the sock case itself, there has been;

• Misplaced Pages:Requests for checkuser/Case/Jeffrey O. Gustafson
• Misplaced Pages:Suspected sock puppets/Jeffrey O. Gustafson

Other discussions:

• Misplaced Pages:Bureaucrats' noticeboard (permanent link)
• Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents (permanent link)

Statement by Ryan Postlethwaite

In this recent checkuser discussion it was confirmed that the administrator Jeffrey O. Gustafson had been using a sock puppet account to edit, whilst still using his administrator account. Yeah, people are allowed alternate account, but there is strong evidence that this was used abusively to help him win a content dispute. Part of the evidence is seen below (for an explanation of each edit, please see Misplaced Pages:Suspected sock puppets/Jeffrey O. Gustafson);

I would like to ask the arbitration committee to investigate this properly as they are the best people to deal with sensitive CU data, and make sure that this is the only occurrence. Administrators are trusted members of the community, and by using sock puppets in this fashion they lose that trust, so I also believe that the committee should accept this case to consider desyopping, especially given that Jeffrey has had previous instances of severe misconduct. Ryan Postlethwaite 20:11, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Thatcher

It looks to me like Jeffrey was setting up a new account in order to vanish the other one, as he hasn't edited since December 7. Under those circumstances, he probably should have left his prior dispute with Rod behind him. It would have been my choice to ignore the matter, and leave Jeffrey's new identity as one of those "open secrets" that people don't talk about. For the record, I can confirm that other than the stale and rather minor reverts listed above, there is no checkuser evidence of inappropriate behavior by the owner of these accounts.

Having read Rod's RFA, this still looks like a tempest in a teapot. There was no massive swing in votes, just a couple of editors who opposed based on the comments of the Blake account. And I'm not sure I would call Blake's comments "unethical" as there was no use of multiple accounts in the RFA. It was misleading, and stupid because it exposed the account if it was an attempt to vanish and start over, but I don't think it was as dramatic as has been suggested. Thatcher 21:13, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved AnonEMouse

Note that this came up from the currently ongoing Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship/Rodhullandemu. The EMB account opposed due to Rodhullandemu's previous conflict with JOG, Rodhullandemu complained that he seemed to be being opposed by a sock puppet, EMB expressed outrage at being accused of being a sock puppet, then a number of people opposed either per EMB or in reaction to R's accusing JOG, a respected admin, of sock puppeting. This is not a "stale and rather minor revert" issue, this is darn close to an active attempt to scuttle another person's adminship request. Please accept. --AnonEMouse 20:41, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

There are possibilities that JOG is not the same person as EMB, and if so an ArbCom statement to that effect would also be appreciated, and again, looking into the case seems warranted. --AnonEMouse 21:49, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Ronnotel

I would like to point out the brief but decidedly one-sided discussion on this issue at WP:AN/I. The issue of starting with an RfC was briefly considered by the community but rejected in favor of Ryan's action. In addition, I concur with Jehochman synopsis (below) and believe the potential for disruption of the RfA process was high. Ronnotel (talk) 20:45, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the RfA, I agree that the RfA was probably not in danger. However, being an admin is a position of trust. There is no possible interpretation of Jeffery's actions that can be construed as accidental. He quite purposefully created a ficticious alternate persona in an attempt to lend credibility to his objections to the RfA. And, in fact, it was convincing enough to begin swaying other editors. The community simply cannot turn a blind eye to this type of behavior from an admin. It was done in a devious manner and with devious intent.

The claim by User:Edward Morgan Blake that he is not User:Jeffrey O. Gustafson only escalates the importance of this case. Either (i) a string of unfortunate coincidences converged in a highly unlikely but innocent way and two users need to have their names cleared, or (ii) we have continuing misbehavior by a highly disruptive individual and the remedies should not necessarily be limited to removal of the sysop bit. I'm confident that ArbCom is equipped to discover the truth, whatever it may be.

Statement by Jehochman

The crux of the matter is unethical use of a sockpuppet at Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship/Rodhullandemu. Edward Morgan Blake's oppose vote had begun to snowball when I noticed that User:Daniel was opposing the RfA because the candidate had suggested the possibility of sock puppetry. Rather than leaving the accusation hanging, I investigated, hoping to prove it false. Unfortunately, I found substantial evidence of sock puppetry, leading me to file Misplaced Pages:Suspected sock puppets/Jeffrey O. Gustafson. Then, with the support of several administrators, I filed Misplaced Pages:Requests for checkuser/Case/Jeffrey O. Gustafson.

The diffs cited by Ryan are merely evidence connecting the two accounts. The serious issue is that Jeffrey O. Gustafson presented his opinion at RfA as if he were an uninvolved party, when in fact he was very involved in the underlying dispute. This cast his opinion in a false light and deceived other editors. After the well was poisoned, two other editors opposed the RfA citing the sock puppet's opinion. The potential for harm here was very great, and this sort of behavior cannot be ignored. Jehochman 21:58, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Upon reviewing the edits of both accounts, I said, "Either it's one person, or they are two people taking turns on the same computer." I stand by this remark. Edward Morgan Blake has not fully explained the observations, because two roommates sharing a Wi-Fi connection would be expected to occasionally edit at the same time. The record shows far less interleaving than expected. I recommend that the case proceed in order to clear up this apparent discrepancy. We need guidance on how to handle the roommate explanation because any editor operating multiple accounts can claim that they are roommates. We have no way to verify such claims except by reviewing the contributions. We also need to know whether people living or working together are so closely connected that they are constructively responsible for each other's edits when their edits support each other. Jehochman 14:11, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by JodyB

Jeffrey O. Gustafson appears to have chosen to use a second account to create an impression that an uninvolved third party was troubled by the action of the RFA nominee. This appears to be a deliberate action carefully chosen to oppose the nominee. Jeffrey O. Gustafson is no fool and is well-versed in our rules and policies. It is well within reason to assume the above facts are an accurate representation of what happened.

However, there exists the possibility that there is an innocent answer. Therefore, I encourage the committee to accept this case as a proper forum to flesh out the real facts and deal with any violations appropriately. Jeffrey O. Gustafson is an administrator with considerable influence and activity. We ought ensure that he, like all, lives up to his mandate of trust. -JodyB _talk 21:55, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Revolving Bugbear

Disclosure: I nominated Rodhullandemu for adminship.

The fact that the Edward account apparently lied in his initial statement (provided that he is in fact a sock of the Jeffrey account) is indeed worrisome. While we don't actually have a policy, as far as I'm aware, that says you're supposed to be truthful in your dealings with other Wikipedians, this kind of deception is troublesome because it denies the other party -- in this case Rodhullandemu -- a level playing field. The bigger problem, though, is the berating of Rodhull by Edward when Rodhull intuited that Edward was a sock. Provided that Edward is indeed a sock, this is clearly disruptive -- he is accusing Rodhull of something he knows to be false, because he knows the sock allegations are true.

Given the fact that Jeffrey previously had his sysop tools suspended, the deceptive oppose coupled with the deceptive accusations appear to me to be a case of using a sock to avoid scrutiny. - Revolving Bugbear 22:38, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ral315

I'd urge the Committee to take this case, primarily because there lies an uncertainty about how the existing policies on sockpuppeting apply. The sockpuppet was not used to double-vote as far as I can tell; that's usually an issue with sockpuppets. In fact, I see no evidence to state that prior to this RFA, that the sockpuppet was used for nefarious purposes. The question becomes, where does this particular situation fall -- using a sockpuppet to appear as if you're another user, concerned about issues between Rodhullandemu and your primary account. I don't believe this has ever been ruled upon, and I think it's a particularly important distinction, given that there's no real proof that Jeffrey/Edward's conduct was in bad faith. Personally, I believe the most likely scenario is that Jeffrey made the vote in a misguided attempt to oppose the RFA without showing activity on his main account, an attempt that clearly backfired. In any event, clarification of how this policy should be applied in cases like this might be worth exploring, as I'm willing to bet a similar situation will arise sooner or later. Ral315 (talk) 23:37, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by MastCell

If Jeffrey O. Gustafson was exercising his right to vanish, then he shouldn't have tried to settle an old score. If he wanted to settle an old score, he shouldn't have used an alternate account to do so. If he used an alternate account to settle an old score, then he shouldn't have played at false innocence and attacked Rod for calling him on it. If there's an alternate explanation for the checkuser and historical evidence, then Jeffrey ought to provide it privately if needed to ArbCom.

Is this a tempest in a teapot? Maybe, in the sense that this should not be a long, drawn-out ArbCom case but rather a quick one. Between the previous case and this, there's clearly enough evidence that Jeffrey O. Gustafson's sysop bit should be removed. Only ArbCom can do that, so I think the case should be accepted. At the very least, Jeffrey has some 'splaining to do if he wants to retain the sysop bit. In the absence of a response, the account ought to be desysopped and Jeffrey can begin anew if he likes, though ideally he'd avoid using his new accounts to go after his old nemeses. MastCell 00:51, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Solumeiras

This case should go before the Arbitration Committee, and not for the reasons stated above. There has been past concern about this user's admin actions, and a previous Arbitration ruling. With regard to Thatcher's point above about this being an "open secret", well, in my opinion taking the case would deal with the manner effectively. --Solumeiras (talk) 00:39, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by the_undertow

All these diffs and assuming good faith are nice, but I find it unsettling. It seems fairly simple. It's fraudulent voting. ...Jeffrey was thoroughly creeped out by (told to me via private correspondence)... He is not speaking in third person - as the word 'correspondence' nullifies that. It's not an alternate account when you use it to speak as if you were a separate entity - and continue to mention your established one. Therefore we have an admin, who used a sockpuppet, to fraudulently vote and disrupt an RfA. Couple this with the fact that this could have completely gone unnoticed if it were not for the candidate himself doing the research and this is truly as bad as it gets. If Jeffrey had an oppose he should have voiced it as himself. There can be no legitimacy to any of this behavior. the_undertow 01:17, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Casliber

Agree with previous - to put it simply, this editor has violated community trust, which is a prerequisite for sysop status. Hence, desysopping to me seems fait accompli, with the option of seeking readminship via RfA at some time in the future if they can regain the community's trust. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:39, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Edward Morgan Blake

I am not Jeffrey. I made no secret that I know Jeff in "RL" - we are room-mates, using an unsecured wifi connection - we share similar interests and used that as a basis for finding room-mates in the first place. He did not ask me to oppose the request for adminship of Rodhullandemu, I did that on my own and I imagine he is unaware that I commented. When I was accused of being a sock puppet, it didn't even occur to me that the connection to Jeffrey - I did not even consider the IP. This is all mortifying for me, in part because I seem to have gotten Jeffrey in a great deal of trouble. --Edward Morgan Blake (talk) 04:29, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

This statement was copied from User talk:Edward Morgan Blake at Edward's request by User:B. See diff. --B (talk) 04:38, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Rodhullandemu

Disclosure:This case arises from my RfA, which is still ongoing.
I have very little to say until the closure of my candidacy; however, the more I see of this, the more unanswered questions there are. A full and proper investigation is required. --Rodhullandemu (Talk) 06:53, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

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

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (2/0/0/0)

• Awaiting statement from Jeffrey O. Gustafson and/or Edward Morgan Blake. Could the filing party or a Clerk notify Edward Morgan Blake of the case and follow his talkpage for any statement please. (I am aware of the checkuser finding that JOG=EMB, but even if this is the same individual he might not necessarily check both pages.) Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:57, 24 January 2008 (UTC) Accept and address in an expedited manner. The issues are straightforward and there should be no need, one way or the other, for lengthy proceedings. Edward Morgan Blake should be unblocked for the purpose of allowing him to participate. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:49, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
• Accept. --Deskana (talk) 13:10, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Ehud Lesar

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

Involved parties

• Grandmaster (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiating party)
• Ehud Lesar (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Fedayee (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• VartanM (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Eupator (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Khoikhoi (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Nishkid64 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

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

Statement by Grandmaster

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

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

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

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

Fedayee

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

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

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

The claim that only Adil and Ehud spelled the old name of the lake as Geycha is false and can be easily disproved. Adil joined Misplaced Pages on 13 May 2006. However back on 18 February 2006 the admin User:Beland stated on the talk of Sevan:

I added the rendering "Geycha" because someone used it in the article Siunik. -- Beland 15:08, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

And the name of Geycha (spelled exactly like this) was added to the article about Siunik back in October 2004.

Ok, how come then that this spelling is exclusively Adil’s, if it was spelled that way long before he joined wiki, and that’s the way the name is spelled in Azerbaijani language? I find it strange that Nishkid64 blindly trusts whatever claims Fedayee makes without taking the time to check them.

Response to Nishkid64

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

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

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

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

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

Adil

With regard to Texas, that state is the same for Azerbaijanis as California is for Armenians. Texas has the biggest Azerbaijani community, because most of US oil companies are based in there and many Azerbaijanis work for them. So Adil surely is not the only Azerbaijani in the state with 20 million of population, plus Adil only occasionally visits that state, while Ehud is based there permanently. And Adil's appearance in Wikisource is not a coincidence either, I emailed him a couple of days ago and informed him about the Ehud's unfair block. He has a right to be aware of charges brought against him. If he chose to contribute in the meantime to another Wikimedia project, he has a right to do so. Of course, none of the above facts is a proof that Ehud is Adil's sock.

VartanM

I don’t understand how my words that Ehud should be given a chance to prove his existence in real life could be interpreted as a statement that Ehud is that user’s real life name. Ehud exists in real life, but his name is not necessarily the same as his wiki name. It might be or not be the same, but I never said that it was the same. What’s the point in such distortion of my words? Same with most of other evidence presented by VarrtanM and Fedayee. I addressed all important points in my counter evidence. VartanM says further:

The bulk of counter-evidence (which doesn’t even try to address some very important pieces) is based on the false belief that dismantling each piece without considering their interconnection and more importantly the bigger picture would be enough.

First, all the important pieces were addressed and in my opinion it was clearly demonstrated that the sockpuppetry allegations were baseless. And second, if individual pieces of Fedayee's evidence are frivolous, how the collection of them can be accurate?

Statement by Nishkid64

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

A few points of clarification:

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

Reply to Atabek from Nishkid64

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Reply to Grandmaster from Nishkid64

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

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

Statement by Thatcher

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

Statement by Eupator

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

Statement by uninvolved User:Atabek

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

1) It's not based on checkuser evidence;

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

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

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

5) User:Fedayee's evidence is frivolous:

• a) He claims "Atabek, unlike what you write, Zangezur and Geycha claim was in fact specific to Adil,", however, as evidence shows there are two independent sources , , which cannot be attributed as even being created by User:AdilBaguirov.

• b) He made an accusation at WP:ANI couple of days ago against me, claiming "given the possible relations between Atabek and Adil off-wiki", while when asked to produce evidence, his response was "You know I can not provide the evidence here so why are you bothering asking?"

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

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

Response to User:Nishkid64

4) I posted WP:PRIVACY line, which renders your arguments about whether Ehud Lesar should or should not have his name as real username, as violation. Reread the policy: Misplaced Pages requires no personal information from anyone who wishes to edit it.

5a) Your claim:

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

It may look suspicious that two contributors cite an external source of information, but it definitely does not establish basis for accusation of sockpuppetry or claims that Ehud is Adil. Nishkid64, from your sentence above, it's also clear that you have no evidence to prove that Ehud is Adil, but only trying to use any fact of POV link in edits of two people originating from one country to establish sockpuppetry. May as well state that you want to block all Azeri contributors on suspicions that their views mostly match those of Adil.

5b) It's an evidence of User:Fedayee making false accusation in Misplaced Pages and not being able to produce evidence for his claims. The case is awfully similar to User:Ehud Lesar case, with fabrication of such evidence. The purpose is single, to target contributors along national lines.

• Also as a kind reminder, pleas review this section of WP:NPA. Your statement:

• Since I contested that he was indeed Adil Baguirov, a real-life Azeri energy lobbyist, I figured that an identity confirmation would prove his innocence.

clearly violates, this line of WP:NPA, which is a fundamental Misplaced Pages policy:

• Attacking, harassing, or violating the privacy of any Wikipedian through the posting of external links is not permitted. Harassment in this context may include but is not limited to linking to offsite personal attacks, privacy violations, and/or threats of physical violence.

You haven't produced any evidence that Adil Baguirov is a "real life Azeri energy lobbyist" either. May be worth also reading for your supporters in this issue User:VartanM and User:Fedayee.

Response to User:Fedayee

Regarding your statement:

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

The false claims and assumptions that you make in your communication with any administrator is your own business. However, your claim that I have off-wiki relation with another contributor is a violation of WP:HARASS, especially without any presentable evidence. So I demanded you to produce that evidence in the same medium where you made the accusation. And please, recall fundamental policies:

• Misplaced Pages:No Personal Attacks and Misplaced Pages:Harassment apply to any kind of attack or harassment in any context, so linking to external attacks, privacy violations and other content that harasses any individual should be avoided.

Unless, you produce the evidence or apologize for your false statement, I will pursue your statements further in WP:ANI as a clear violation of WP:HARASS.

Response to User:VartanM and User:Fedayee

The application of word genocide is of subjective matter. Obviously every person from Azerbaijan, including myself, considers Khojaly massacre to be an act of genocide, just like every Armenian considers Armenian Genocide to an act of genocide. So argument that Ehud is a sock of Adil because he calls Khojaly a genocide, holds no water.

Statement by Ehud Lesar

Clerk note: Because Ehud Lesar is currently blocked, I would be copying any statement made by him/her on the user talk page to this page, per my clerk note below.

In an email sent to me, Lesar said to link if the statement was too long. A cursory look shows that the formatting and length probably require the statement to be linked, hence that's what I've done.

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

Statement by Fedayee

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Update

I was going to remain silent and not add anything new. But I could not keep silent when reading this after Vartan brought Adil’s contribution on Wikisource. This recent contribution of Adil on Wikisource after Ehud’s ban is one thing as evidence but this was needless given the obviousness that Ehud is Adil. But what strikes me as plainly provocative is this recent message by Adil which seems like personal vendetta. We, for his information, are not members of any interest group... if he wants to keep that lie about the Armenians users, he should substantiate his claim or remove that. And given his position in the Azeri community, he should be the last to write such stuff. Several members here have plenty of evidence of the contrary (involvement of interest groups). And who should we contact for the recent additions (on wikisource) by Adil Baguirov which comes from his website, when Adil Baguirov has a history of using totally fabricated sources and quotes? - Fedayee (talk) 06:19, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by VartanM

I will only address this for now before answering Grandmaster. Is Grandmaster really being honest here? Only in the administrators notice board he strongly suggested and repeated at least on three different occasions that: None of the above is a proof that Ehud is a sock and does not exist in real life. . Grandmaster is not saying that he is not Adil or that there is no proof that he is not Adil, but that Ehud exists in real life, he could not have ignored that everyone was actually speaking of the identity Ehud Lesar. He is replying to the evidences on the Lesar identity and will be repeating this again and again, he will say the same thing: This particular issue can be resolved very simply by verifying the existence of Ehud in real life. So far we have not received any clear instructions on how to do that. From what I see, no matter what Ehud does to prove his existence, it will be rejected by certain people, who are unwilling to accept that they made a mistake accusing this user. Those statements were made when evidences were presented on the name Lesar and that faked identity. It wasn’t until recently, and weird, as both Grandmaster and Atabek started to suggest (about the same time) that the Ehud identity itself was a screen name and comparing it to our usernames. And again also to a new position held by Ehud. How can a family name that is hardly notable other than one individual who was shown to have real life relation with Adil be compared with say Vartan, popular name among Armenians, or other famous Armenians used by Armenian users?

Reply to Grandmater

If you really want this case be accepted, don’t turn it into a circular discussion. You are repeating the same stuff addressed by Fedayee as if he is denying that. The point was that even Azeri users did not spell it that way. Atabek himself called it Gokcha, and then after this whole affair started calling it Goycha, but even then he didn’t spell it with an 'e', when it is with an 'o'. The evidence provided by Fedayee is in two parts. Geycha AND Used it to refer to a republic. On both accounts Ehud spelled the same way Adil did, and used it to refer to the republic. Of course this alone would not prove it is Adil. Those evidences x, y, z, etc. should obviously be treated as x AND y AND z... The Church of Kish article for instance, was created by a single purpose account and then defended by Adil’s confirmed socks, and then Ehud Lesar engaging in there. No matter what people say, this is an obscure article, the position hold by Ehud and the SPA who created the article was defended in a journal which Adil contributes to, a website build by Adil. Is this proof alone? No! And then, the Algerian Genocide thing, is it a proof alone? No! Is the claim of Khojali genocide? Alone proof? No! Is the claim that he hold the identical position held by the scholar (whose article were edited by confirmed socks of Adil) who mostly provided the Armenian genocide revisionist position in the West. Alone proof? No, only an evidence.

What about his position about the Diaspora, which was Adil’s fighting horse in off-wiki gatherings and lectures, alone proof that Ehud is Adil? No! Is the fact that he registered hours after everyone knew Adil will be banned, alone proof? What about the name Lesar? Is the fact that most if not all Lesar's in Texas are related to the David J. Lesar's family, who runs a company which associates itself with Adil, is an evidence that Ehud is Adil? Is the fact that he editwarred and reverted for other Azeri users when they run out of revert confirmation it is Adil? No! All of those alone are not confirmation when taken alone as Fedayee said. Neither the fact that Adil is known to forge identities with foreign names. Is the fact that Adil(splitting his time in Huston and Washington DC) and Ehud both live in Texas proof alone? No, it isn’t. What about the fact that Adil's sockpuppets stopped in more than one occasion when Ehud Lesar started contributing, and didn't reappear as long as Ehud Lesar was contributing. Is the fact that Ehud claimed that it is a positive thing to be impressed by Adil a confirmation it is Adil? No! Of course, each evidence taken alone can be rejected as not being sufficient proof. Is turning a banal article into an article about destructions by Armenians like this confirmation alone?. Or here. But then, even his interest on Jewish matters is so Adil of him. See here for example.

More could be added, everything points to him, the way he edited, his interests, when he registered, his personal theories, his sarcasm and even the username. The bulk of counter-evidence (which doesn’t even try to address some very important pieces) is based on the false belief that dismantling each piece without considering their interconnection and more importantly the bigger picture would be enough. It is not enough, or else, no proof of sockpuppetry can ever be provided, even if IP address was shared, only on the assumption that there is some possibility that two people could have posted with the same IP without being the same person.VartanM (talk) 19:07, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

More about Adil

Adil knows his Ehud account wont be unblocked tomorrow (never). He registered on 19 April 2007 on Wikisource and didn't start editing until 16 January 2008, few days after Ehud was blocked. Knowing Adil, I'll bet that the IP won't match with Ehud. VartanM (talk) 20:30, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by John Vandenberg

I was first made aware of the possibility of Ehud being Adil when Fayadee make the accusation on WP:AN/AE, as if it was fact, without any evidence at that time, despite a failed checkuser. This accusation had already appeared on numerous talk pages previously, so I warned the user to quit ABF and compile some evidence. In response, just before Christmas, I was notified that some evidence had been created; I did a quick evaluation of the users contributions and deduced that the user was possibly meat-puppeting initially, but had since moved onto a more productive approach. As a result, it looked suspect enough to investigate further, so I said I would look into it, and posted a query on User talk:Fedayee/LesarBaguirov Evidence to get the ball rolling.

When I came back from Christmas celebrations, I found Fedayee was again making the accusation on WP:AN/AE as if it was fact and canvassing for someone to block Ehud, so I blocked the user for 24hrs to prevent another thread from going offtopic with attacks on a new user, which is how Ehud should have been treated per WP:AGF. This resulted in my talk page gather some rather interesting attacks by TigranTheGreat (talk · contribs), and then a curious JamesDS (talk · contribs) dropped in to ask a few questions (btw, JamesDS looks like a sock, but I honestly answered rather than block).

Again I reiterated that these investigations take time. Soon after Moreschi placed Ehud on revert parole, and a few days later Thatcher closed the sock accusation on WP:AN/AE. In this time I started to research the various topics like Geycha and Zangezur Republic which are supposed to be theories of limited circulation, and I have looked for similarities in the talk page comments made by the two users. I hadnt found anything indicating a close tie when Nishkid inquired about it, and I clearly said so. Because he was certain that it was a sock, and I still wasnt convinced, I asked for more time, saying something to the effect of "I will play devils advocate, and try to find evidence that they are different people." So I then started to collate evidence that they have different editing habits; enough to raise doubts.

Before I could discuss with Nishkid, Ehud was blocked, and I decided to stayed clear of it due to lack of time to read the volumes of text that appeared on AN, and now here. I did see the two diffs that Khoikhoi used as additional justification, and didnt see reason to block based on that, but I havent caught up entirely or read everyones statements here, so perhaps there has been better proof of similarity than the initial evidence. I find the block odd, the defense of the block odd, and I am surprised that we havent yet confirmed or denied the separate identity of the two users. I am quite sure that we will find that the user is a separate person, with few touch points except for a few topics of shared interest, and Ehud being drawn into questions about Adil, which are being used as evidence of similarity. Quite simply, Ehud has been harassed, and the harassment has gone unchecked under the umbrella of "identifying socks".

As an aside since I see VartanM has mentioned it, I hassled Adil to contribute to Wikisource around April 2007 due to some PD documents he emailed me during a content dispute, and I was unaware that he had actually registered as I was only a newbie there myself at that stage. Besides that one email reply to Adil, I had never communicated with him. Grandmaster and VartanM have both started contributing since October, with increasingly frequency. It comes as only a mild surprise that Adil turned up there recently in the wee hours of the morning (my time) with some texts that are on shaky PD grounds, to which I replied by littering his talk page with the Wikisource equivalent of "non-free image" messages.

Comment by Moreschi

Tough one, this. I'm not especially familiar with Adil's edit pattern, so it's hard for me to really say. All I can assert is this: Ehud Lesar was not editing disruptively enough to merit an indefinite block on grounds of disruptive editing alone, though I did put him on revert parole. I think it's worth taking the case, if only to determine whether the evidence really is good enough. From an outside perspective I wasn't convinced, but that may have been from ignorance of Adil's behaviour pattern. Moreschi 14:59, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Marshal Bagramyan

In an attempt to prevent another drama from unfolding, I have came up with a long reply.

With all due respect John, your answer seems a bit out of the ordinary, following this, where you propose an evasion of 1RR for an occurrence where a user forgot to login. Also this: as if it was fact and canvassing for someone to block Ehud. What does that connote since several users have identified it was Adil ages ago and openly wanted him blocked; there is no undisclosed information there, Adil is banned. So I don't see why it must be a someone. Moreover John, with the ease that you pull the sockpuppet term, (even just now: JamesDS looks like a sock), your reservations seems selective to me, and is it not weird that you only thought about meatpuppeting on the current case? And I don’t understand what you mean when you note down: I am quite sure that we will find that the user is a separate person, with few touch points except for a few topics of shared interest, and Ehud being drawn into questions about Adil, which are being used as evidence of similarity. How can you be convinced? And your disagreement does not make sense to me; although Ehud was editing the church of Kish, this is what he had to say:I don't know and want to know who Adil is and is not. The guy lives in Texas and does not know one of the most well-known Azerbaijani figures in the United States, who has built the first English language Azerbaijan resource site with several other sites and who partly lives in Texas, who hosts a web site about the Church of Kish, one of his main subjects of interest will inevitably appear on Google when searching his positions on top of everything else (note that he wrote that he can provide Azerbaijani scholars from Azerbaijan during the same period). And this: rather positive that you're so impressed by Adil Bagirov , how does the word positive fit in his justifications here?

Ehud wasn't banned months before because Francis Tyers was not an admin anymore and wasn't implicated much in those topics anymore. Golbez was pushed off by Azeri users long ago, and would have been atypical of him to block. Khoikhoi, who knew Adil’s editing pattern is inactive. All the admins who were concerned with Adil's disturbance aren’t involved any longer, besides Alex, who also thinks it is Adil. And John, if you notice nothing in Ehud’s demeanor which is symptomatic and deceptive, subsequently I don't think you can effectively impose policies for AA2 as an administrator. I was the first one to observe it was Adil, and Alex from his blocks of Adil, it's unambiguous he knows how Adil operates. Before even inspecting the rest of the evidence, one glance at the record of Ehud's contributions suggests that it's Adil. The entire regiment of Adil's socks have a particular signature. Verify this. He alternates leisurely inward bound in the 'juice', here it was from the most contentious and controversial articles at the time he had edited them and Jewish associated articles by their subject. He starts with Jewish related, then switches to the republic, the History of Azerbaijan, then returns to the Jews of Azerbaijan, followed by Israel-Azerbaijan relations, he then tried a tiny more heated topic with the Ethnic minorities in Azerbaijan, after that he backed off, and returned to Jewish related articles and added himself to the Israel WikiProject. Then more heat loaded the United Nations Security Council materials on the Armenia and Azerbaijan conflict. He returns on Israel related topics to ultimately leap to the warmth of the Church of Kish (which at the moment was the article which attracted the most controversy, I presume if this case is accepted the diffs to confirm that he is always dead on to find the controversial articles with the right timing will be well documented). He is then accused to be Adil, he returns to edit Jewish related articles and then jumps again on the other hot spot article of the time, the 'Azeri Waffen SS Volunteer Formations.' He finds his way on to another obscure article, which was also at the time on the middle of a controversy to do with this and also continue on another to do this with this as justification, the same list of Azerbaijani Khanates which Adil was pushing over (see history of the History of Azerbaijan talkpage). John are you still not convinced of the deception? Right during the controversy on the enforcement board, Ehud makes this edit knowing full well he will be accused even more. This obviously was the result, and following further accusations of harassment. Coincidently coinciding what few hours prior Atabek brought here to further exasperate the already tense atmosphere.

John, if you feel arbitrators should deal with the harassment, then you ought to add yourself to the case as a party, you are the admin who blocked Fedayee for that. Moreover, what does Tigran's comment have anything to do with this? It wasn't the first time you've been accused to take sides, which you perceptibly did when you blocked Fedayee and then admitted that you didn't read the evidence that you yourself requested (perhaps it was unintentional, but that was the result), and merely (from you answer here) resumed reading it after Khoikhoi's block and not even fully.

The approach both Grandmaster and Atabek take to deal with issues like these, is a little bit troubling. If they both are unaware of it being Adil, they deal with this with an incredibly curious way. Atabek, among many things, claims every person in Azerbaijan considers the Khojaly event genocide (and again, what is the purpose of yet another comparison with the Armenian genocide? Is it necessary for him to carry this on forever?) Isn't it inaccurate (when he writes all, he makes it compatible with what he wants to suggest on the position of Azerbaijani Jews)? And by the way, the way Atabek deals with the material provided is noticeably wrong; it’s manifest that the provided evidence on that particular subject (Khojaly) by Fedayee considers that Ehud was impersonating a Jew. Fedayee's point was, that it was very unlikely that any Jew will call the event genocide when not a single notable and reputable work names it as such (because there is no reason to do so), will not call what went on in Algeria a genocide and at the same time deny the Armenian genocide (not only are those nationalistic positions, but Algeria as a reference involves Turkish nationalism in this particular case not only Azerbaijani, not unfamiliar to Adil). Now they altered their version and Ehud becomes an Azerbaijani with some Jewish ancestry (in an attempt to merge Grandmaster and Ehud's contradictory position on that matter), then obviously that piece of evidence by Fedayee becomes worthless except for the Algerian Genocide bit. The issue here is more about how Ehud deceivably used a Jewish screen name and a fake Jewish identity. Unlike what Ehud started suggesting recently (that he may not be a full Jew, he seems to intentionally leave the door open for interpretations), it seems that in the past he wanted others to believe that he was solely a Jew: I do not have any kind of 'fake' identity. I am a Jew and am proud of it. Whatever I contribute to Jewish WikiProject or Azeri WikiProject or any other WikiProject is completely none of your business. , his reply to Vartan initiated Shalom: Shalom Vartan, shalom. Ma nishma? he made such comments on other occasions: Mr. Azizbekov, I do follow Misplaced Pages rules. Again, you can jump back and forth trying hard to present me as a 'fake Jew', this does not and will not change my ethnicity. And came with this following remark talking in the name of Jews: Jews consider every civilian death a loss, when death in masses deliberately planned by another party: genocide. So it seems there were attempts to deceive, as while most of his edits relate to controversial subjects about Azerbaijan on obscure articles which are politically heated. Ehud claimed his identity being solely Jewish and added himself solely to the Israel Wikiproject as an icing on top of a cake. Note that Grandmaster called him an Azerbaijani user. This seems to be a misrepresentation from Ehud’s part to give his arguments more weight (only a supposition, as I will be following Vartan's logic, and call each pieces as evidence instead of the proof). I am not trying to deal with whatever or not Ehud is Adil, I don't think that is even an issue of dispute, it’s a false controversy still maintained by two users.

As for Grandmaster's approach, putting this without looking like I am not assuming good faith is complicated. His answer to Vartan sums up the troubling approach he takes to deal with this subject. He starts by accusing Vartan of distorting - how, since the discussion spinning around Ehud's identity was whether or not he was Ehud Lesar, so the way Grandmaster is interpreting his own answer would have been inappropriate - he closes the reply with the following: And second, if individual pieces of Fedayee's evidence are frivolous, how the collection of them can be accurate? This is not even a reinterpretation but a fabrication (Assuming good faith, I presume unintentional). Vartan's point on the differences between evidence and proof has not been only deformed but entirely altered. In actual fact, not explicitly, neither implicitly did Vartan say anything such as that. What he held was that the pieces of evidence were not proof per say and should not be dealt individually as the individual and ultimate proofs. And Grandmaster's accusation seems highly hypocritical as he accused many newcomers of sockpuppetry, not even providing a tenth of the evidence provided for this case. Here Grandmaster labels someone an obvious sock of Fadix. And accuses under the claim that the IP comes from Canada. While here he claims that Texas is huge, he accuses Fadix, who lives in Montreal because of an IP trace to Vancouver. It was found later that the IP didn't even trace there but to California, and I still don't see how the comparison between "Armenians in California" and the "Azeri in Texas" is accurate.

On another topic, Atabek removed himself from the case, when a large part of his statement is to accuse Fedayee of harassment against himself. If this accusation is relevant to the case, then obviously Atabek is an involved party, if it is irrelevant, since Atabek thinks he is not involved, then he should remove his accusations. Atabek has been involved in this much more than the initiator of the case. I don't think it is unrelated (the link accusation) having personally seen the evidence, and it makes sense, but this is to the arbitration to decide. It's also pertinent because if Fedayee's claim is right (on the connection between both users), deciding Ehud being a sockpuppet and with the history of Adil's sockpuppetry in reverting to Atabek's version, far more than to any other Azeri users version, the arbitration I consider should then deal with such a possible link. I will not get involved there since I try to step away from what Atabek edits and will not be answering to his "evidences" nor produce against him. I won't hide that I am intentionally ignoring him because of an event, which led (dyed-in-the-wool) for me to believe that his intentions are not genuine. After that the first sock of Fadix was identified, while Flavius Belisarius, now banned, massively edited on different articles making reference to the Armenian genocide, Atabek more than a week afterwards (after Fadix's sock was banned,), goes into a rampage by imitating Flavius Belisarius by doing this which seemed to be an attempt to oblige Fadix to come back with yet another sock for something which he came back for prior. More recently Atabek provoked Armenian users by using analogies between Nazi Germany and Armenia, which resulted in stirring a conflict between both sides, which was continued in an abusive way, from both sides, in the Arbitrations enforcement.

If the arbitration thinks it can open another can of worms and restrict it, it will not work. I think the case should be rejected. It goes down to whatever, that several admins and all Armenian veteran implicated users harassed him, or Grandmaster and Atabek have tried to rehabilitate a banned user. On both accounts, it cannot be restricted to Ehud Lesar, not to say Adil’s other socks not properly labeled thanks mostly to Grandmaster who kept removing the tags. Those should be dealt with too (Grandmaster should think twice, this case could result with an indefinite ban for Adil). All those socks were at the right place and at the right time, and mostly reverting for Atabek. So it all boils to, if the arbitration wants to take this case to what it really is.

Statement by uninvolved user:Pocopocopocopoco

If this case is accepted I request that all fairly recent instances where the WP:DUCK test has been used to ban users be given scrutiny and I also request that the ARBCOM committee look into what I consider abuse of the WP:RFCU process by user:Atabek and user:Grandmaster. Artaxiad (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) was banned about a year ago by the ARBCOM committee and it appears that he had a history of using proxies. Subsequent checkuser run against Artaxiad thus have (and had) a good chance of becoming inconclusive after which the user was often banned by an admin by the duck test. The following users were banned in such a manner:

Bassenius (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Verjakette (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Azizbekov (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Vonones (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)

Those are the ones that I am aware of, there may be more. Bassenius and Verjakette were found to be likely socks of one another but it was inconclusive as to whether they were socks of Artaxiad (due to his proxy use). Also, see the following evidence comparing the writing style of Bassenius, Verjakette, and Vonones. Three alleged sockpuppets of Artaxiad. user:VartanM may be able to provide additional evidence to being different from Artaxiad. One may argue that they were likely socks of each other so what's the big deal about indef. blocking them? The answer is that there is a chance that they were not and even if they were, they didn't seem to be socking abusively. I would also ask that the committee look at Grandmaster and Atabek's checkuser requests in Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/Artaxiad, especially the latest one. They are now checkusering user:Steelmate, user:Andranikpasha, against Artaxiad, completely ignoring writing style. I have also somehow made it onto the latest checkuser list. I may expand upon this if I have more time. I also suggest that if this case is accepted, the name be changed to something like Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan-Ducktest. Pocopocopocopoco (talk) 03:04, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

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

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (4/2/0/1)

• Comment: awaiting completion of Nishkid64's statement, and a statement from Ehud Lazar, before voting. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:35, 18 January 2008 (UTC) Accept. This is a rare situation of a sufficiently controverted and complicated sockpuppetry allegation that we should review it (compare, Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/SevenOfDiamonds). The focus of the case should be kept narrow, it should proceed quickly, and it certainly should not be allowed to turn into a forum for venting generalized grievances concerning ongoing Armenia-Azerbaijan disputes. To Kirill's point, the new discretionary sanctions ruling does not moot this request, because the question presented is not whether Ehud Lazar should be subject to editing restrictions, but whether he may edit at all. To Sam's point, while this type of issue can generally be addressed by community discussion on ANI or another board, I don't believe any discussion is ongoing and I don't foresee that any consensus is likely. I will add that there is no evidence that any administrator acted other than in complete good faith and I do not presently foresee anyone's admin conduct as a focus of the case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:18, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
• Reject. Discretionary sanctions for the entire A-A area have now passed; I trust that the admins watching this area will be able to deal with this particular situation via that method, without the need for further involvement from our side. Kirill 16:50, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Comment for now. This is a difficult issue. It is primarily an appeal against a sockpuppetry block through challenging the evidence on which the block was founded. It seems clear that Ehud Lesar was not editing sufficiently disruptively in order to provoke a block, but that if he is closely identified with Adil Baguirov then a block is justified. The issue therefore comes down to whether the evidence of identification is high enough quality to be relied upon, with the possibility that further evidence may be conclusive. At this point I cannot be sure whether this evidence is best sifted by the Arbitration Committee or by the community. Sam Blacketer (talk) 14:41, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

  Accept per Newyorkbrad; there is reason to look again and I agree there is no other practical venue where it can be decided. Sam Blacketer (talk) 09:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

• Reject. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 01:59, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
• Accept. Admins could not be able to reach a unanimous decision. Mediation is irrelevant to this case. -- FayssalF - 07:20, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
• Accept. FloNight (talk) 20:41, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
• May accept, or not see the need, depending upon Khoikhoi's perspective. FT2  21:38, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Explanation and details.

Background: The user was stated to be a sockpuppet of a banned user, by the word of an admin who has much prior experience in identifying socks of that user, and who came back briefly to (presumably) identify the user as a reincarnation and block them before vanishing again on wikibreak. The user has remained blocked essentially on that admin's view that it is a reincarnation. There's also other evidence (circumstantial, frivolous or valid depending on point of view). The topic area has very recently been given a strong range of remedies which admins can employ as they see fit, including enforcement and sock measures. The concern is whether the identification as a sock, and consequent block, was reasonable (the ban of the original user is not in question or being revisited), and the issue is therefore, does Arbcom need to accept the case to look at that concern and decide on it, or should it be left to the community? Analysis of request: The blocking admin has made a statement which is entirely reasonable in its approach - this is certainly the sort of decision an admin is empowered and able to make. Sadly some blocks based on one admin's analysis have resulted in serious concern of a good faith mistake; without more eyeballs users cannot be sure if this is one. Asking for review of a sock identification and block is therefore also an entirely reasonable step. In summary: An admin has blocked a user based upon behavior and long term experience. On the other hand, some other users are concerned that the decision may be mistaken, and would like to review or check it, or if not, then unblock ("innocent until proven guilty"). Finally a third view is he may be unblocked safely since strong remedies exist if there is misconduct. Good faith may be assumed in all of these positions. It is entirely proper to block a likely reincarnation based on behavior and experience, as Khoikhoi says. It is also entirely proper to expect that to be able to have impartial review of the evidence, as other users say. Given the sockmaster in question is experienced, Khoikhoi may be fine posting all evidence in public, or may feel this will lead to problems (eg the banned user learning how he can evade his ban). That is legitimate too. Therefore my opinion is this: Opinion: If Khoikhoi wishes to post the evidence on the wiki, then there is no need for the Committee to intervene, because the community could then review it quite adequately. On the other hand if he feels this would be unhelpful and risk harm to the project (by helping a banned user return in future), then the only review possible becomes by Arbcom accepting the case, to examine khoikhoi's evidence in private and form a view whether it genuinely supports the view of sockpuppetry and whether the block is reasonable.

Appeals and requests for clarification

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

Is homeopathy pseudoscience?

Per Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience#Generally considered pseudoscience et seq., is homeopathy generally considered pseudoscience, or just questionable science? MilesAgain (talk) 12:54, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience#Generally considered pseudoscience makes a reference to scientific versus nonscientific evaluations and treatments of the human mind where there is a great deal of uncertainty and where the term pseudoscience should not be used lightly. Homeopathy by contrast makes claims about chemistry that are illogical and have been dis-proven by science and that no scientist takes seriously. Homeopathy is clearly pseudoscience. Does ink get more ink-like if you dilute it? Does sugar-water gain calories if you add water? Is blood serum better to give as a transfusion if you add more water? When you take Vitamin C, is it more potent to dissolve in water and take less? Does gasoline for your car give more energy if you dilute it in water? Diluting a substance decreases the qualities of that substance. WAS 4.250 (talk) 13:42, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Even the article itself states (with good references) that "Claims for the efficacy of homeopathy are unsupported by the collective weight of scientific and clinical studies. Ethical concerns regarding homeopathic treatment, a lack of convincing scientific evidence supporting its efficacy, and its contradiction of basic scientific principles have caused homeopathy to be regarded as "placebo therapy at best and quackery at worst".Nergaal (talk) 14:11, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

You using a wiki article to prove a point? The article is a point of contention and a work in progress. Homeopathy is currently the subject of much research by reputable scientist. The research methodology is evolving (improving) as is common with topics worth scientific review. Anthon01 (talk) 14:15, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Your claim of "reputable scientist " conduducting research is somewhat false. What reputable studies have been done show no basis other than the placebo effect, and those that show some other benefit have major flaws (lack of control and small sample sizes to name but two) LinaMishima (talk) 14:31, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

(ec) The present article is not NPOV in the opinion of a number of editors. Homeopathy does not make claims about chemistry, contrary to WAS statement above. It is not obvious pseudoscience, it may be an alternative theoretical formulation. —Whig (talk) 14:17, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually, they often do make such claims. There are entire (unreliable) journals devoted to "water memory" and "quantum" effects. If one uses the terminology of science, one must be prepared to defend oneself against it. LinaMishima (talk) 14:31, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

The claims have to do with the physical structure of water and are consistent with quantum electrodynamics. This is not chemistry, however, and as you note this is a content issue not properly resolved here. —Whig (talk) 14:39, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

They are most certainly not, if you actually understand the science involved. The scales at work with homeopathy are such that said claims have no basis remaining in fact. But that is a discussion for elsewhere. I shall have a search for specific discussions, but for now try reading , , , , . I certainly do not agree with the overly aggressive tone of some of these, but their content is generally sound. If you wish to discuss this further, it would probably be an idea to head over to my talk page LinaMishima (talk) 14:51, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Additionally, serious scientist are researching homeopathy. Anthon01 (talk) 14:28, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Read the commentary attached to the BMJ article. This points out a number of flaws, and shows that conclusions cannot be drawn at this time. There is a common misunderstanding that scientists do not investigate pseudoscience. The difference between science and pseudoscience is that scientists are happy to investigate fully any claim, and are willing to change their opinion on a subject based upon the evidence. The evidence currently for Homeopathy is extremely lacking, and furthermore there is no means for any method of action to actually exist, given the dilution beyond the Avogadro limit. Again, to conclude, investigation does not automatically lend merit. LinaMishima (talk) 14:50, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

content dispute: as much as I have a professional opinion on this matter, this is clearly a content dispute, and as such I'm not sure if it is really an appropriate matter for ArbCom. LinaMishima (talk) 14:31, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I would like to apologise to ArbCom, the Clerks and other uninvolved parties for being part of a discussion which is really off-topic here and belongs elsewhere. Sorry. LinaMishima (talk) 15:08, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Palestine-Israel articles

Is there any chance the wording of the "discretionary sanctions" remedy could be tweaked to allow uninvolved admins to place a specific article (or closely related set of articles, if necessary), on article probation? I believe this would help, given the current thread at WP:AE and attendant squabbling at Jewish lobby. I suppose you could argue that article probation here might be redundant (seeing as all Arab-Israeli articles are kind of on article probation anyway) but it helps as a solution on especially problematic articles - the tag at the top lets people know there is a long-term issue. Furthermore, it means the article as a whole can be monitored and you don't have to pick through contributions elsewhere if deciding when to topic-ban. Best, Moreschi 17:39, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is necessary Moreschi. If there's problematic editing on the page, article ban the participants on the page who are taking part in the problematic behaviour. If there's problems on numerous pages with certain editors, topic ban them. If they carry on editing these pages then should be blocked. Ryan Postlethwaite 17:53, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

The sanctions are so broadly written that I think they allow for pretty much everything. I will probably place all editors on Jewish Lobby on 1RR per week for that article pending an attempt to more deeply analyze the problem. The sanctions are written against "any editor" not "any article," but articles don't write themselves, and I'm pretty sure that "any editor" includes "all editors of article X". Thatcher 18:09, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, this is what I was trying to say. The ability to place a specific article on 1RR (and put in extra sanctions against uncooperative editing etc) is what's needed in some cases, because some articles are so darn controversial it's just natural to edit-war (the poor darlings can't help themselves). But Thatcher's work-around is rather neat, and will serve equally well. Moreschi

Tariqabjotu has brought to my attention, in connection with a different matter altogether, an apparent edit war involving the same editors at New antisemitism. It's evidently escalated well beyond the issues at Jewish lobby, to the point of the article having being protected. I'm not involved in any way with either article and not really up to date on what has been going on, but maybe one of you guys could take a look. Now my request for clarification: would such an article be covered by this arbitration in the first place? I'm not certain how broadly the link with the Palestine-Israeli conflict is going to be interpreted, though looking at the article's content it does seem to be indirectly related to that conflict (which is mentioned at various points). Does an article have to be about Palestine-Israel, or is it sufficient that it should have some sort of non-trivial link to the conflict? -- ChrisO (talk) 23:32, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

"The area of conflict in this case shall be considered to be the entire set of Arab-Israeli conflict-related articles, broadly interpreted." In my view a broad interpretation does include New antisemitism. Sam Blacketer (talk) 00:09, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

That is plenty wide to cover about anything, clearly the intent of the ruling. — Rlevse • Talk • 00:20, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) The remedies were deliberately wide, to indicate in a way, simply, that we feel that

1. Administrators on this area may need to use their judgement and adminship to bring the edit war (and warriors, and some editors who need to modify their conduct) back within acceptable limits, and
2. The edit war has exhausted patience, and we are therefore now inclined to give uninvolved administrators wide ranging scope to achieve that end (as described in the decision).

Note that a stricter application of "drawing a line on unproductive behavior" is not the same as "anything an admin does will be okay". However a user who cannot or will not take note of the need to edit productively and appropriately in their conduct ("WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT"), has now basically got only two choices in this arena: voluntarily do not edit there, or be prevented from editing in an unhelpful manner, by admin action. What counts as "unproductive" or "inappropriate" is pretty much "any action that contradicts high quality collaborative creation of a neutral encyclopedia article for readers".

Bottom line: the encyclopedic community is not expected to endorse some areas being a perrenial edit war, for any reason, and the belief that somehow they should, is misplaced. Disputes are fine provided they are carried out appropriately, which includes non-disruption, listening to uninvolved administrators, and editors actively and genuinely working to achieve resolution via NPOV.

An approximate summary of my own personal thoughts. If in doubt the remedy wording overrides any comment I might make. FT2  01:59, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks very much for these very informative comments. I hope one of the clerks will archive this thread somewhere (maybe on the arbitration page?). -- ChrisO (talk) 21:37, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Yup, main case talk page, after it's stale for a couple more days (in case any other Arbs wish to comment) Thatcher 00:56, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Request extension of RFAR/Martinphi-ScienceApologist to deal with multiple article disruptions

There is an ongoing problem with articles covering fringe scientific topics. As seen in the above case request, fringe articles are clearly targeted by a determined group of editors interested in inflating the legitimacy of the topics and de-weighting the scientific or evidence-based view. It is part of the wikipedia way of doing things that neither admins, nor arbcom, can make content rulings. Admins could be given more advanced tools for dealing with disruption, though.

Two prior cases, Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience and Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/ScienceApologist, dealt with narrow topics and resulted in bans for a few single-purpose editors and "cautions" to ScienceApologist. As a result of Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Martinphi-ScienceApologist, Martinphi is placed on probation and ScienceApologist on civility parole, but these remedies do not begin to address the broad range of disruptive behavior and continual disruption at multiple articles. There have been multiple complaints filed against ScienceApologist, mostly groundless or incredibly minor, by editors seemingly more interested in getting rid of him than editing collaboratively, and ScienceApologist has unfortunately taken the bait more than once and responded in an inappropriate manner. There has also been edit warring on multiple articles, and at least two three disputed articles are currently protected.

I believe that a broad article probation covering the entire topic is needed to give admins the tools to deal with this long-running battle. I propose giving admins discretion to ban individual editors from pages they edit disruptively, for the short or long term, enforceable by blocking, and/or to place editors on revert limitation. Because the three previous cases have resulted in only probation for one editor and civility parole for a second, out of a large group of interested editors, has not given administrators an effective means of dealing with this long-term problem area. Thatcher 23:40, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Please propose specific language for a motion that potentially affected editors and the committee can review. Thank you. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:43, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

I think it would be premature to use the ultra-broad general sanctions imposed at Israel-Palestine, but 1RR and page bans are needed to impose some sort of order here. Thatcher 00:17, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

May I comment here? Anthon01 (talk) 00:54, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, general discussion is permitted. Thatcher 01:14, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments here are encouraged. To be most helpful, they should deal with how problems on these articles can be minimized going forward so that accurate, NPOV articles will be written and a harmonious editing environment maintained. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:20, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I think we can all recognize that Homeopathy is a controversial science, but pseudoscience is a pejorative that seems to be part of the problem here. Because what we need to move forward is an environment where editors treat one another with respect and let the sources speak for us in the article space. —Whig (talk) 01:46, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

comment: If the definition of Pseudoscience applies to Homeopathy, then WP:SPADE. This type of useage is not inappropriately pejorative. (See also List of pseudosciences and pseudoscientific concepts) -- Writtenonsand (talk) 17:24, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

The definition does not fit in my opinion, but without bringing content issues here, that list is clearly NPOV disputed, and the ArbCom has spoken on this issue before. By their definitions, I believe Homeopathy qualifies as an alternative theoretical formulation, but certainly not obvious pseudoscience. —Whig (talk) 19:24, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Whatever it is, it's a problem. Thatcher 01:56, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps you should be more conservative when stating what "we can all recognize" or agree upon. I certainly don't agree that Homeopathy is not pseudoscience (it is rightly included in Category:Pseudoscience), nor do I agree that the term "pseudoscience" is a pejorative - and apparently neither does the Arbitration Committee. Dlabtot (talk) 02:09, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

To clarify what I said, I think we can all agree that it is controversial. —Whig (talk) 19:30, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I think it would be premature to use the ultra-broad general sanctions imposed at Israel-Palestine - Thatcher, what are those sanctions? Perhaps some of them would be appropriate here. Fwiw, I generally support your motion. Dlabtot (talk) 05:26, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Dlabtot, here is the link to the Palestine-Israel sanctions. Thatcher 12:14, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• Comment Thatcher, if you read past the rhethoric and look at the actual page disruptions, especially the ones that lead to a page being locked, you'll find that only one or two editors cause it while everyone else is participating on the talk page, acting civily and with respect for each other, trying to reach consensus despite individual differences in viewpoint. There really are only a handful of editors (less than five) who don't care about that process and just want their way, wiki-process be damned. The rhetoric you read from them centers around their view that the wiki-process of trying to develop consensus needs to be changed because they feel it is broken, when surprisingly this system seems to work for everyone else but them. The system isn't broke, just some editors don't care about it. Check the logs on the two articles you used as examples and see who caused the pages to be locked, and why. In both cases it's because they (admittedly) didn't care about the consensus-building process. They're the same ones that are saying massive reform needs to take place. While they're busy disrupting pages and saying Misplaced Pages is broken, everyone else is on the talk page trying to address actual problems. Please don't confuse their view as a correct assessment of the problem when they're the ones that are acting like WP:MASTADONS. Everyone else seems to be able to get along just fine. --Nealparr 01:23, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
  • I don't know to whom you are referring and perhaps it is best if you don't name names. Maybe. The point is that aside from a few single purpose accounts that have been banned for significant problems (Like User:Richard Malter and User:Asmodeus), three arbitration cases have not either resolved the problems of these articles or given admins tools to resolve them. Unless you can convince the Arbitrators to open a case against the 4 or 5 specific editors you are thinking of, the ability to levy page bans and 1RR limitation should allow admins to get these disputes under control. And if you are correct, then only those 4 or 5 editors will be affected. Thatcher 01:56, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
    • I would never dream of filing an arbitration case against the 4 or 5 mastadon editors who are actually disruptive, even if I wanted to, when vexatious complaints are considered part of the problem and any admin can ban me for it. As I'm sure you know, misreadings and misinterpretations are common at Misplaced Pages. I was just pointing out that there are far more editors willing to work together on these articles than those who don't, and that the handful of mastadons are the real problem. --Nealparr 05:09, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
      • The range of articles covered by Thatcher's proposal is remarkably broad. Of course, I've often agitated for something similar, so I can't argue with it. I'd only say that admin discretion is paramount: these articles are frequented by single-purpose agenda-driven accounts which edit-war, edit tendentiously, etc. These sanctions should not hit editors who have to deal with such accounts, but they run the risk of being used in such a manner. That said, provided there's some standard recourse for review of sanctions (via WP:AN/I and/or ArbCom), I would find myself hard-pressed to disagree with Thatcher on this. MastCell 05:17, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
        • • Odd you mention that, because it's exactly what led to this whole flareup. I can't mention names for fear of being sanctioned, but one editor that is a self-admitted agenda-driven editor had sanctions placed against him after two arbitrations where he was found to be consistently uncivil. He calls some people some names, someone complains, and the editor gets blocked. A few days after he is unblocked he edit wars against RfC consensus, someone complains, he gets blocked again, and two articles get locked down because of his massive edits that resulted in edit warring. A few days after that he is uncivil again and gets blocked again. In the wake of all this, a bunch of supporting editors say he's being "provoked" (though no one talked to him before the edits) and say that none of this is actually his fault but rather vexatious litigation. These editors are all riled up and calling for better tools to stop editors from "picking on him" (some of these people are admins). Look, I usually get along with the editor, and don't have a problem with him except when he's gone all angry mastadon, but sometimes we do disagree. How am I not supposed to be afraid of admins running around with banning powers on anyone they feel is disruptive?, some of whom clearly want to "avenge" him. It's just one editor who started this whole thing, while acting like your typical, angry, agenda-driven editor. Everyone else was mostly getting along. (Note: I didn't mention names and tried to be as civil as I could and still explain the situation the way it happened; please don't ban me). --Nealparr 06:09, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Why make the pretense of not naming names when you've done all but that? Although he cannot respond here due to his block, I've notified the ostensibly innominate user. Please, if a discussion like this ever comes up about me (even if not by name) at a place like this, extend me the same courtesy. Antelan 07:04, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

If I had thought to I would have, but it's not like he can be sanctioned for anything I'm saying. He hasn't done anything new. My point is that these are broad ranging sanctions that could be misused, especially considering the exact circumstances involved that we're apparently not supposed to talk about because it's considered picking on someone. I don't understand any of this, quite frankly, because it focuses on possible future disruptions from a broad range of editors, when there's logs that show the locus of the dispute already in a small handful of editors. The locus is in editors who see Misplaced Pages as a battleground, not normal editors who get along and participate in normal content disputes. He knows how I feel about it, that I don't want him sanctioned further, and that I'd just like to see him stop being contentious. I'll send him a note. --Nealparr 07:25, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• Honestly, if arbitration members feel it is a necessary addition to the Martinphi-ScienceApologist case to impose sanctions on a broad number of editors to prevent disruption, it's not that bad of a proposal. The current wording needs to drop the "vexatious litigation" part in a bad way though, because that's the part that is going to cause even more headaches as it's too open to interpretation. The proposal is effectively saying the ArbCom is tired of hearing about disruptions on these articles and is going to empower admins to deal with it by providing blocking tools. However, no one actually involved in the dispute is allowed to ask for help in resolving the situation because it may be interpreted as "solely to harass or subdue an adversary", in which case you'll be blocked too. Instead the only way to resolve the dispute is to hope that an uninvolved administrator happens upon the dispute by chance, reads through all the discussions, understands what's going on, and sides with you. Otherwise, you could get blocked just for telling the administrator that a disruptive editor made two reverts instead of one, or that someone called you a name. It happens. Busy admins don't always know what's going on and can interpret your good faith complaint in a bad way. I personally don't think that editors who try to work well with others, and don't see Misplaced Pages as a battleground, should be sanctioned and limited in what they can do here, but that's just my take on the subject. I am fully convinced, though, that imposing restrictions on what someone can complain about is just going to lead to more headaches. --Nealparr 11:46, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• So then, do you think that there should be no sanction for vexatious litigation? That someone should be able to bring repeated frivolous actions until they wear down their opposite number? Raymond Arritt (talk) 16:13, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

On one hand people are saying there's serious problems in these articles that to led to massive disruptions, and that editors should reign themselves in and follow normal dispute resolution processes. Then they say complaining is frivilous. The two views aren't compatible. --Nealparr 18:12, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Sure they are compatible. Nobody is saying that complaining is frivolous. Frivolous complaints are frivolous. If someone is both litigious and can't tell the difference between frivolous and serious problems, they will quickly discover the difference. This isn't all that different from Misplaced Pages under normal conditions. Antelan 18:19, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Replied below. --Nealparr 19:40, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

(Unindented) If I may, here are two diffs the underscore the problem we are having with moving forward on many of these pages. I am not certain that admin tools alone will solve this problem. Regardless of the merits, I suspect admins, in good faith, could be found who would support both sides of these discussions. There are also admins, who in good faith, believe that discouraging "minority or fringe views" are more important than civility. Because of that, I am concern about the misuse of additional tools against editors who support the inclusion of RS/V minority views on fringe topics. Anthon01 (talk) 07:49, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• Yes, that's a valid point - it illustrates the fact that the Quackwatch article is being disrupted, as it has been for years, by voceferous opponents of mainstream medicine and Stephen Barrett, and that this is winding up those who are here to write an encyclopaedia rather than serve an agenda. So much so that several people believe you, Anthon01, to be Anthony Zaffuto, and thus almost certainly an unacceptable party on that page per the restrictions and ban on Ilena Rosenthal. Guy (Help!) 12:13, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

You have made my point exactly. Here is an admin who has it in for me. IMO, he has it in for me because is certain situations I have opposed SA. It is probable that in most situations I would agree with SA. However in these cases it isn't so. Like SAs current attempt to purge wikipedia of most mention of homeopathy. Guy has admitted himself he has a prejudice against non-mainstream writers. What do I do about that? I see pattern with your accusations. They are baseless and diffless. Why don't you prove it! When are going to stop your baseless and diffless accusations? Anthon01 (talk) 15:56, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Instead of discussing the content or merits, Guy is baselessly accusing and attacking me personally. Is there a remedy for admin abuse? Anthon01 (talk) 16:03, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

You've made a claim. Who are the several people? Isn't there a policy against revealing personal information "A user may be blocked when necessary to protect the rights, property or safety of the Wikimedia Foundation, its users or the public. A block for protection may be necessary in response to: ... * disclosing personal information (whether or not the information is accurate). Where do I address this issue? Anthon01 (talk) 16:27, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I assume Guy was referring to this discussion of you on the Administrator's noticeboard, but Guy can correct me if I'm wrong. Antelan 18:56, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Two questions here: (1) How can you reliably distinguish single-purpose and argumentative-but-new editors from new editors? To be frank, I don't trust the judgment of some administrators involved in this area when they label some editors as SPAs and trolls. (2) Under these sort of restrictions, what would have happened to User:MatthewHoffman? Would he have been indefinitely blocked? Should indefinite blocks be handed out as liberally as they are? (I see the provision here says that the blocks should be escalating - a point I wholeheartedly agree with). OK, that was more than two questions, but I don't want to see editors who participate constructively on talk pages banned merely because they argue for the wrong weight in an article. They can be wrong without being disruptive. Carcharoth (talk) 16:32, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

If the committee finds the inclusion of "vexatious litigation" to be a problem they can remove it. As anyone can see from the recent discussion of Martinphi at WP:AE, while I agree that Martinphi's current probation could allow him to be banned from pages like RFC and RFAR for making disruptive complaints, I would be very reluctant to actually do so. In response to Carcharoth, probations are usually enforced incrementally. If this expanded authority were passed, I would unprotect Homeopathy and WTBDWK and place all editors on 1 revert per week limit, while encouraging talk page discussion. The next step would be bans from the article while continuing to allow use of the talk page. Actual bans from talk space are very rare, even under Arbitration, and should obviously be used with caution. In the case of MatthewHoffman, if he was found to be disruptive, the sanction would call for an article ban, not a total ban, and he could appeal as indicated. Thatcher 17:35, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

That sounds good. Are there restrictions on what other admins can do and how this interacts with other processes? For instance, what is admins disgreed on what to do and one of them carried out an indefinite block for reasons related to that article, or if a community discussion based on behaviour at that article ended up with a complete ban of a particular editor? Carcharoth (talk) 17:46, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Under the terms of the remedy, a user would have to have been banned from some articles and/or violated a 1RR limit and been blocked at least 5 times before we started talking about an indefinite ban under the remedy. Arbitration remedies do not supersede ordinary admin action but are meant to give admins more tools; they do not immunize the editor from ordinary and normal discretionary actions. Suppose an editor was placed on 1RR for all pseudoscience articles, and later edit wars on an unrelated article; he could blocked for edit warring with or without violating 3RR at any admin's discretion like any other editor can be. Likewise the community can discuss and implement a community ban for someone even without that editor having reached his sixth blocking offense under the remedy, such discussion to be subject to the usual rules for such things. Thatcher 18:03, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I would support wholeheartedly these new restrictions. I think we have been too accommodating so far and that has not resolved much. These articles can and should be able to achieve NPOV and stability if the opposing parties would allow/encourage wider participation. I attempted offer help at the Quackwatch article and some other articles, but iy is extremely tedious and after a while whatever gains are made, are lost again in the never ending disputes. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 18:35, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I would remove the ""vexatious litigation" item, though. Users need to have a way to alert admins and others without the fear that if they do, they will get dinged. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 18:42, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I understand your (and Nealparr's) concern. But the history of the present case shows that vexatious litigation has been an ongoing problem with these users. I'd rather leave this in and have it be applied with the same judgment and common sense we must use in any other administrative provision. Raymond Arritt (talk) 18:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Ongoing problem? Let's look at that. Vexatious litigation is a "frivilous" complaint meant solely to remove an opponent, and here that's being defined as a disruption worthy of blocking. That's odd, because the whole purpose of the arbitration committee, and the arbitration enforcement page, is for people to come and complain about their opponent civily and seek remedy, presumably to have that opponent sanctioned for their actions. Again, calling that frivilous is incompatible with also treating dispute resolution seriously. This proposal criminalizes normal dispute resolution processes, with the possibility of blocking, and instead leaves the interpretation of what's frivilous up to any random admin. I have a problem with that. Namely because I was the one who pointed out that ScienceApologist has a history of being incivil in this very arbitration. I posted diffs stating that he was warned for incivility before, and then posted diffs showing that he continued doing so. In the arbitration I was accused by other editors, I think even an admin, of doing all of that just to support Martinphi. By this definition and remedy, apparently I was being frivilous and should be blocked because at least one admin thought I was frivilous. What common sense is there in that? The dispute resolution process is supposed to be about showing evidence of problems in opponents. It's probably for that reason that vexation litigation isn't in WP:DE, WP:DR, WP:HARASS or any other guideline that I'm aware of. When you have what you feel is a legitimate complaint you're supposed to take it to an authority who can help you. --Nealparr 19:39, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

If the vexatious litigation clause were left in, it would be subject to the same admin discretion as the other remedies, plus could be appealable. Plus. if someone who had cried wolf too many times then had a legit complaint, he could ask and admin to review it and, if legit, the admin could temporarily lift the restriction. I'd rather not have to write that level of detail into a remedy that should be interpretable with common sense, but maybe it should be specified. Eh. Thatcher 19:28, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

It would probably help if you established a basis for including it first before adding detail on how to interpret it. So far I've only seen people file complaints for what they believe are legitimate complaints. It's not been established that any complaint has been raised in bad faith. --Nealparr 19:39, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I understand it's hard to keep up with everything, but for what it's worth, several notices have been filed here, at ArbEnforcement, on the Admin Noticeboard, and elsewhere. I think there's a reasonable basis for this vexatious litigation element, and I'd be willing to go through the effort of compiling links to different filings if you haven't seen them. That said, I am OK with whatever, if anything, the Arbitrators decide. Antelan 20:33, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

A list doesn't demonstrate bad faith is my point. All the filings against ScienceApologist could be in the list, his filings against Martinphi could be as well, it could include filings that I'm not aware of, and the list would still not demonstrate that the intent was anything other than to resolve what they felt was legitimate disruptive editing. Filing complaints is not bad faith, nor is it disruptive (as this proposal suggests) especially when everywhere you turn it's what's encouraged instead of being disruptive. --Nealparr 21:10, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Isn't "vexatious litigation" a self-correcting problem? Because anyone who brings (for example) a request for arbitration, becomes subject to that arbitration... I'd also like to note that this whole matter of "vexatious litigation" really seems to be a veiled reference to Martinphi's request above - which is in its essence, no different from the one we are commenting on here, except that it was brought by an involved party, and was therefore couched in more one-sided terms. Dlabtot (talk) 19:39, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Besides the built-in self-correcting mechanism, don't admin already have tools to deal with vexing complaints? Anthon01 (talk) 05:53, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

It would be helpful if editors can show us something which they considered to be vexatious litigation against ScienceApologist or Martinphi and explained to us exactly why they feel this way. Right now, I don't know how admins could draw the line if we as a community don't identify exactly where that line lies. -- Levine2112 02:55, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I think everyone should take a moment of reflection here - there are people who are compensated to cast doubt on modern science - they are professional PR individuals. There are no individuals compensated to set the record straight - those people are required to be volunteers who love knowledge. This is a real and substantial problem, and it resonates throughout this project. The difference between the two is obvious and readily transparent. PouponOnToast (talk) 22:11, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

As a pure volunteer myself, it could easily be viewed in the opposite way, with a strong financial interest of pharmaceutical interests versus alternative medicine practices that rely on no patented methods. I think there are a wide mix of editors from every perspective, and assuming good faith is the best policy. —Whig (talk) 22:37, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Request for the Matthew Hoffman case to be closed with no decisions, FoF, etc..

It's been a month of being criticised at the RfCs, a month and a half before that was spent criticising me at the case, and the actual block was back in September. Can we accept that I am sufficiently cautioned and throw out the case, which was accepted as a "test case", but actually worked out to a "torment the admin who's undergoing exams, money problems, and so on" for several months. Can we accept that I am sufficiently chastened by now, and let me get on with my life? Adam Cuerden 21:30, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

The case was not just about you. Some of the findings of fact were not about you. Why should those points be thrown out? And the best way to avoid criticism is to look more closely and consider which parts of the criticism are well-founded. If this whole thing ends up as "I was criticised and bullied" (the words you used back in November), then how can anyone see if you have learnt anything from this? Carcharoth (talk) 16:28, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

It was accepted as a "test case", and, while I accept I did wrong, and think I know how and how to prevent the problem in future. However, that doesn't change that there were problems: Charles Matthews' evidence was unusually incivil; voting to desysop me was started before I presented evidence. FoF#9 was created from evidence that did not appear in the Evidence section, and thus I had doubly no chance to respond; and when I got upset over the phrasing, which was at the least misleading (See Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_comment/Adam_Cuerden#Request_for_comment_on_Finding_of_Fact_.239_.28Adam_Cuerden.29, I never - and still have never - gotten any sort of response from the Arbcom. Requests to wait until after my exams were ignored. I had asked for a wikibreak to come after the RfC several weeks ago, and even volunteered, if necessary, to give up my adminship during it. I have still had no response about it, nor has FT2, the arbcom member who said he'd sort it out.

In short, the case was so badly handled, that it's hard to see how it can be salvaged at this point without restarting the case and dragging everyone through Arbcom again, and, frankly, after the amount of feedback I had, I think we can accept that I know what I did wrong, and won't do it again.

As I see it, there are two options for continuing this case: #1: ignore that the RfC ever happened, and proceed with the voting as it stood. This would give a strong appearance that the RfC was done for appearance's sake only, particularly given none of the arbcom commented on the RfC.

The second option is pretty much to restart this case from scratch, using the RfC, new evidence that came up during it, etc, to make new FoF and such to vote on - which pretty much amounts to restarting the case.

Given that User:MatthewHoffman has been unblocked since November, and has not edited as of this date, I fail to see any actual benefit to him, me, or anyone else of continuing this case, and, given the amount of stress caused by these cases, large amounts of actual, real life harm. Adam Cuerden 00:38, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

You make some good points. But do you remember what UninvitedCompany said when the injunction was proposed? "I understand the desire to delay things but don't see why we need a provision for the case to self-destruct." If cases get thrown out because they become too long and messy, there will be every encouragement for people in future to actively try and drag things out and protest loudly at various points. As for MatthewHoffman - try and put yourself in his shoes. Would you edit using that account again after all that has happened? Carcharoth (talk) 01:18, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

No, but it does mean the proposals for annotating the block log, etc, are probably unnecessary - so long as he's not an indefblocked user, there's not going to be people blocking him for being a sock of an indefblocked user. Now, that said, while simply dragging the case on may not be a reason to drop it, it is hard to deny this case was very badly handled, and I would appreciate some recognition from the Arbcom that their poor handling of it caused me, who was very willing to learn from it. There are other problems which I think you know about, but which are private. However, there are so many problems that at this point, this whole case seems to have turned into something of a mistrial. I am willing to undergo the process of admin recall, if there's enough people who want that, but the communications issues - despite many emails, talk page discussions, and communications with Arbcom members, I have gotten absolutely NO significant response from them beyon d the proposed decision page, and a promise by one of the new admins that voting will not begin until after evidence is provided in future cases.

In short, after 3 months of begging the arbcom to respond to me, through several media (IRC, talk pages, e-mail, e-mails to JIMBO) without any luck, I think that the arbcom should accept that they have messed up heir handling of this case so badly that they should dismiss it. Adam Cuerden 01:38, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

In short, I think there's been something of a mistrial Adam Cuerden 01:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, it's meant to be arbitration, not a trial (or mistrial). Mis-arbitrated? But anyway, I'm going to back off from this one, other than to agree that is is indeed time for the case to be brought to a close soon. It is for the arbitrators to respond to you though, and I hope they do respond to your questions. Carcharoth (talk) 01:47, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough, I've e-mailed them again, and will search out that Admin recall thingie. Adam Cuerden 02:27, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Regardless of the result, isn't it time to resume some form of action on this case, whether dismissing or getting back to voting? The 30 days have passed, and I can't see why we're leaving this hanging like this. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 02:25, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

==== Request for block log annotation (Whig) 8uut Regardless of whatever disposition the ArbCom would like to make of the Matthew Hoffman case, I would request an annotation to my block log. Since Adam declines to do this himself, I would ask the ArbCom to review his blocks of my account. —Whig (talk) 00:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Your request will be considered by the committee, but I think we should make it clear that annotating a user's block log to indicate that the Arbitration Committee finds that a block was unjustified is an unusual remedy and is going to be reserved for extreme situations. This remedy was employed, for example, in a recent case where the blocking administrator offered no explanation for a block at the time it was imposed, the admin claimed not even to remember the block when it was questioned later, and circumstances justified the conclusion that the block may have been inspired by an unrelated dispute on another website and thus was grossly out of order. I am not suggesting that a judgment has been reached on whether this remedy is available to Whig or for that matter to MatthewHoffman (in fact, I am presently inactive on this case, which originated last year, before I and the other new arbitrators joined the committee). But I would not want to leave the impression that the committee is in a position to review every questioned block, even after it has expired, in the absence of extreme or unusual circumstances. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:59, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Relevant to the blocks in question is Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Whig 2. MastCell 05:21, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Please note my responses and especially those of Wanderer57. —Whig (talk) 06:14, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Appeal against notice to ban for incivility by user Mrg3105

The action was taken under the premise of:
General restriction

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

• Reviewers should refer to this AE thread: Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Arbitration_enforcement#User:Mrg3105. — Rlevse • Talk • 20:33, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
  • User has been blocked for 24 hours for incivility . Thatcher 23:37, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
    • In my opinion rightly so. Sam Blacketer (talk) 23:39, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Ok, now what happens to the undiscussed arbitrary renaming of the historically non-extant Battle of Romania into the non-WP:UE, non-WP:MILMOS#NAME, and non-WP:ROR compliant Iaşi-Chişinău Offensive, and the subsequent denial of the RM based on arguments that did not apply to the reasons given for the RM?--mrg3105mrg3105 01:05, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Anyeverybody/Anynobody and Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/COFS

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

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

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

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

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

Comment by Justanother (JustaHulk)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

and

• Asking neutral editors where I went wrong
• 6/19 Is it a personal attack to document an editor's uncivil behavior?

...is harassment...

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Would you mind explaining what in your review leads you to say that? Or, with all due respect, is this another comment you can't or won't explain? (If you're just backing up you know who then please say so.) Anynobody 23:11, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I think it's time to strengthen the remedies against Anynobody. What we have in place does not seem sufficient to deter the constant low-level baiting and bad faith that he repeatedly demonstrates, such as the post above. Jehochman 23:18, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

• Little Jehochman correct. Jehochman already much patience and little avail. Anynobody back in very stubborn mode from which arbcom attempted discouragement, see little 'shonen RFAR/COFS evidence. 'Zilla propose special remedy for unusual Anynobody case: Anynobody prohibited from making other users tear their hair out in frustration. Enforcement: on evidence substantial portions pre-existent hair missing, any admin block Anynobody briefly, up to a month for repeat offenses. After five blocks, maximum block increase to one year. bishzilla _ROARR!! 10:14, 20 January 2008 (UTC).

Folks it's amazing that I have to point this out to such experienced editors but here goes; If it's really bad faith on my part all that is necessary for one of them to simply provide a diff/diffs showing where my questions were clearly answered. I mean no offense to Newyorkbrad but my point was if he had engaged in a discussion rather than ignoring my reply then I'd be unable in good conscience ask it here again. For example if one looks at the old history of the talk page where I was supposedly told the RfC was improper they'll note that the admin's concerns were about attempts by Smee and myself to resolve my dispute with Justanother but said nothing about the dispute between Smee and Justanother I cited above which Smee was hoping to get resolved. (As I have always said, if the issue was just the disagreement between Justanother and I, a third opinion would've been my choice. However given

and the guidelines for a 3rd opinion state This page is primarily for informally resolving disputes involving only two editors.If any more complex dispute cannot be resolved through talk page discussion, you can follow the other steps in the dispute resolution process. At the time I had hoped that the fact it was approved would save me from having to explain to an experienced admin that she was ignoring another dispute entirely. Anynobody 23:57, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• You really need to drop this. --jpgordon 00:24, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

All I am asking for is an explanation of why the arbcom found I had harassed anyone in my efforts to pursue dispute resolution. I'm asking because I assume good faith in the processes here. Anynobody 00:40, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

jpgordon why did you vote for this:Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/COFS#Harassment of User:Justanother by User:Anynobody? You could help resolve this by explaining. Anynobody 00:45, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Anynobody, if you want to prove that you aren't the sort to harass people, the best way of doing so is by not harassing people. Sam Blacketer (talk) 00:57, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Sam Blacketer I honestly don't think I have. Are you talking about asking jpgordon why he voted for Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/COFS/Proposed decision#Harassment of User:Justanother by User:Anynobody? He really seemed to support it, so it should be easy enough to explain why. Is it really harassing to ask why? There honestly must be some kind of misunderstanding, finding out his pov (why he voted that way) is the first logical step in straightening it out. Please understand I am not trying to prove deliberate wrongdoing on anyone's part, only trying to find out how the line was crossed in the eyes of the arbcom. All that would entail is them saying my behavior here was harassment because: the reason. It appears as though they share Bishonen's declared assumption of bad faith regarding me, which I think is a mistake. If she doesn't want to discuss it then that's ok, I'm not trying to force her to however in the name of fairness I'd hope the arbcom would. Anynobody 06:34, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

A prior case involving harassment was very clear:Misplaced Pages:Arbitration policy/Past decisions#Harassment I totally understand the findings in this case, it's obviously harassment to add links to webpages which attack or harass other users or to sites which regularly engage in such activity are responsible for their actions. I tried to open a WP:RFC/U with other editors, it's hard to see the similarity. Anynobody 06:44, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Has the argument "He harassed someone else so I can harass him back" ever worked? Your essential argument is that because user:Smith harassed user:Jones, you should not be punished for harassing user:Smith. You ignore the facts that user:Smith's harassment was months ago, while your harassment continues to this day; and that user:Smith has promised to mend his ways (and appears to have done so) while you seem persistently ignorant of the problem. I am loathe to actually ban someone from the pages of the dispute resolution process but you are heading in that directing mighty quick. Thatcher 14:48, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Motions in prior cases

Motions

Shortcuts WP:ARM WP:ARBM This section can be used by arbitrators to propose motions not related to any existing case or request. Motions are archived at Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Index/Motions. Only arbitrators may propose or vote on motions on this page. You may visit WP:ARC or WP:ARCA for potential alternatives. Make a motion (Arbitrators only) You can make comments in the sections called "community discussion" or in some cases only in your own section. Arbitrators or clerks may summarily remove or refactor any comment.

Arbitrator workflow motions

Motion 3 enacted. SilverLocust 💬 23:31, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Workflow motions: Arbitrator discussion I am proposing these three motions for discussion, community input, and a vote. Each seeks to improve ArbCom's functioning by providing for the performance of basic administrative responsibilities that sometimes go neglected, which, in my opinion, if successful, would significantly improve ArbCom's overall capacity. Motivation: We've known about the need for improvements to our workflow and capacity for some years now – I wrote about some of these suggestions in my 2022 ACE statement. It's a regular occurrence that someone will email in with a request or information and, because of the press of other work and because nobody is responsible for tracking and following up on the thread, we will let the thread drop without even realizing it and without deciding that no action is needed. We can each probably name a number of times this has happened, but one recent public example of adverse consequences from such a blunder was highlighted in the Covert canvassing and proxying in the Israel-Arab conflict topic area case request, which was partially caused by our failure to address a private request that had been submitted to us months earlier. Previous efforts: We've experimented with a number of technological solutions to this problem during my four years on the Committee, including: (a) tracking matters on a Trello board or on a private Phabricator space; (b) tracking threads in Google Groups with tags; (c) requesting the development of custom technical tools; (d) reducing the appeals we hear; and (e) tracking appeals more carefully on arbwiki. Some of these attempts have been moderately successful, or showed promise for a time before stalling, but none of them have fully and fundamentally addressed this dropping-balls issue, which has persisted, and which in my opinion requires a human solution rather than just a technological solution. Rationale: The work we need done as framed below (e.g. bumping email threads) isn't fundamentally difficult or sensitive, but it's essential, and it's structurally hard for an active arbitrator to be responsible for doing it. For example, I could never bring myself to bump/nag others to opine on matters that I hadn't done my best to resolve yet myself. But actually doing the research to substantively opine on an old thread (especially as the first arb) can take hours of work, and I'm more likely to forget about it before I have the time to resolve it, and then it'll get lost in the shuffle. So it's best to somewhat decouple the tracking/clerical function from the substantive arb-ing work. Other efforts: There is one more technological solution for which there was interest among arbitrators, which was to get a CRM/ticketing system – basically, VRTS but hopefully better. I think this could help and would layer well with any of the other options, but there are some open questions (e.g., which one to get, how to pay for it, whether we can get all arbs to adopt it), and I don't think that that alone would address this problem (see similar attempts discussed above), so I think we should move ahead with one of these three motions now and adopt a ticketing system with whichever of the other motions we end up going with. These three motions are the result of substantial internal workshopping, and have been variously discussed (as relevant) with the functionaries, the clerks, and the Wikimedia Foundation (on a call in November). Before that, we held an ideation session on workflow improvements with the Foundation in July and have had informal discussions for a number of years. I deeply appreciate the effort and input that has gone into these motions from the entire committee and from the clerks and functionaries, and hope we can now pass one of them. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC) One other thing I forgot to suggest—I'd be glad to write motions 1 or 2 up as a trial if any arb prefers, perhaps for 6-12 months, after which the motion could be automatically repealed unless the committee takes further action by motion to permanently continue the motion. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:39, 1 December 2024 (UTC) Workflow motions: Clerk notes This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals). I've excluded from the vote counts the votes of arbitrators whose terms expired on 1 January. See WP:ARBPOL#Participation and WP:AC/CP#Tasks at the beginning of each year. SilverLocust 💬 00:46, 3 January 2025 (UTC) Workflow motions: Implementation notes Clerks and Arbitrators should use this section to clarify their understanding of which motions are passing. These notes were last updated by SilverLocust 💬 at 05:39, 10 January 2025 (UTC) Motion name Support Oppose Abstain Passing Support needed Notes Motion 1: Correspondence clerks 4 7 0 Cannot pass One support vote contingent on 1.4 passing Motion 1.2a: name the role "scrivener" 2 6 2 Cannot pass Motion 1.2b: name the role "coordination assistant" 1 5 4 Cannot pass Motion 1.3: make permanent (not trial) 0 9 0 Cannot pass Motion 1.4: expanding arbcom-en directly 3 5 2 Cannot pass Cannot pass because motion 1 is not passing Motion 2: WMF staff support 1 9 0 Cannot pass Motion 3: Coordinating arbitrators 8 0 2 · Two support votes are second choice to motion 1 Motion 4: Grants for correspondence clerks 0 8 0 Cannot pass Motion 1: Correspondence clerks Nine-month trial The Arbitration Committee's procedures are amended by adding the following section for a trial period of nine months from the date of enactment, after which time the section shall be automatically repealed unless the Committee takes action to make it permanent or otherwise extend it: Correspondence clerks The Arbitration Committee may appoint one or more former elected members of the Arbitration Committee to be correspondence clerks for the Arbitration Committee. Correspondence clerks must meet the Wikimedia Foundation's criteria for access to non-public personal data and sign the Foundation's non-public information confidentiality agreement. Correspondence clerks shall be responsible for assisting the Committee in the routine administration and organization of its mailing list and non-public work in a similar manner as the existing arbitration clerks assist in the administration of the Committee's on-wiki work. The specific responsibilities of correspondence clerks shall include: Acknowledging the receipt of correspondence and assigning tracking identifiers to pending requests and other matters; Tracking the status of pending matters and providing regular updates and reminders on the status of the Committee's off-wiki work to arbitrators; Reminding members of the Committee to vote or otherwise take action in pending matters; Organizing related correspondence into case files; and Providing similar routine administrative and clerical assistance to the Arbitration Committee. The remit of correspondence clerks shall not include: Participating in the substantive consideration or decision of any matters before the Committee; or Taking non-routine actions requiring the exercise of arbitrator discretion. To that end, upon the first appointment of correspondence clerks, the current arbcom-en mailing list shall be renamed to arbcom-en-internal, which shall continue to be accessible only by arbitrators, and a new arbcom-en email list shall be established. The subscribers to the new arbcom-en list shall be the arbitrators and correspondence clerks. The Committee shall establish a process to allow editors to, in unusual circumstances following a showing of good cause, directly email a mailing list accessible only by arbitrators and not by correspondence clerks. All correspondence clerks shall hold concurrent appointments as arbitration clerks and shall be subject to the same requirements concerning conduct and recusal as the arbitration clerk team. For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 8 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Support (former arbitrator) This is my first choice and falls within ArbCom's community-granted authority to approve and remove access to mailing lists maintained by the Arbitration Committee and to designate individuals for particular tasks or roles and maintain a panel of clerks to assist with the smooth running of its functions. Currently, we have arbitration clerks to help with on-wiki work, but most of ArbCom's workload is private (on arbcom-en), and our clerks have no ability to help with that because they can't access any of ArbCom's non-public work. It has always seemed strange to me to have clerks for on-wiki work, but not for the bulk of the work which is off-wiki (and which has always needed more coordination help). When consulting the functionaries, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that four functionaries (including three former arbitrators) expressed interest in volunteering for this role. This would be lower-intensity than serving as an arbitrator, but still essential to the functioning of the committee. We already have a number of ex-arbs on the clerks-l mailing list to advise and assist, and this seems like a natural extension of that function. The Stewards have a somewhat similar "Steward clerk" role, although ArbCom correspondence clerks would be a higher-trust position (functionary-level appointments only). I see this as the strongest option because the structure is familiar (analogous to our existing clerks, but for off-wiki business), because we have trusted functionaries and former arbs interested who could well discharge these responsibilities, and because I think we would benefit from separating the administrative responsibility from the substantive responsibility. The cons I see are that volunteer correspondence clerks might be less reliable than paid staff and that we'd be adding one or two (ish) people to the arbcom-en list. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC) I continue to urge my colleagues to support this motion to establish the trial of correspondence clerks. I hear the concern that this will add one or two more people to the mailing list, bringing it from 15 to 16-17, but I would suggest that the additional risk is quite small relative to the other considerations, which should predominate. Every new arbitrator elected in the future has access to every email sent to the committee now. One might estimate that over the next ten years, perhaps on average eight arbs will be elected per year of which four will be new to the committee. So, in addition to 15 current arbitrators, 40 future arbitrators will also be able to see the mailing list. (And let's be honest – it's not that hard to be elected to the committee.) By contrast, this proposal draws solely on former arbitrators (who have already had mailing list access), and doesn't increase the set much at all. And I trust that the committee will appoint only those former arbs who in its view retain its trust to access highly confidential information. In 2019, the community increased the size of the committee from 13 to 15, which reversed the 2018 change from 15 to 13. In neither discussion did the additional security risk of 15 mailing list subscribers (over 13), or the marginal security benefit of 13 subscribers instead of 15, even come up. The community was far more concerned with the effect of the committee's size on its ability to fulfill its functions. Similarly, here, I believe the committee should focus on whether this change could help the committee execute on its responsibilities. If yes, I urge the committee to give it a try; this nine-month trial isn't all that risky in the grand scheme of things. As for Cabayi's point that some material should be seen only by arbitrators, that's why this proposal explicitly provides that The Committee shall establish a process to allow editors to, in unusual circumstances following a showing of good cause, directly email a mailing list accessible only by arbitrators and not by correspondence clerks. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 08:53, 30 December 2024 (UTC) Contingent on 1.4 passing. This option was not my first choice, and I'm inclined to try having a coordinating Arb first, if we can get a volunteer/set of volunteers. Given that the new term should infuse the Committee with more life and vigor, we may find a coordinating Arb, or another solution. But I think we should put this in our toolbox for the moment. This doesn't force us to appoint someone, just gives us the ability and outlines the position. CaptainEek ⚓ 05:29, 7 December 2024 (UTC) (former arbitrator) Slight support for this, mostly on the condition that it only be former Arbs that have consistent activity. One point I do wonder on is how the email clerks can ensure that Arbs actually get around to resolving the raised issues. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 23:20, 28 December 2024 (UTC) Per below – the community wants us to solve problems, and this is what best helps us solve problems. I don't think we severely damage people's privacy by increasing the number of ANPDP-signed and trusted functionaries who view the emails from 15 to 16, and to the extent it's bad for the opacity of ArbCom as an institution, that's just not my highest priority. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 01:28, 1 January 2025 (UTC) I think this idea would allow someone to nudge us to ensure votes would take place. In the past, this was done by individual arbs, and if that worked we wouldn't need this motion. However, it hasn't and thus outside assistance would probably be more likely to solve the workflow problems we experience. Z1720 (talk) 17:34, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Per Eek. Former arbs know what this is like, they know how to push the buttons, they understand the privacy implications, and of the myriad imperfect solutions that have been suggested, it's imho the best one. Katie 23:12, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Oppose I don't think we should extend access to the mailing list and the private information it contains beyond what is absolutely necessary. I understand the reasoning behind former arbitrators in such a role as they previously had such access, but people emailing the Arbitration Committee should have confidence that private information is kept need to know and that only the current arbitrators evaluating and making decisions based on that private information have ongoing access to it. - Aoidh (talk) 23:36, 9 December 2024 (UTC) Might as well make it formal per my opinions elsewhere on the page. Primefac (talk) 13:24, 10 December 2024 (UTC) This is limited to former arbitrators for good reasons, most of them privacy-related. But the same concerns that led to this proposal being limited to former arbitrators are also arguments against doing this at all. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:16, 14 December 2024 (UTC) I don't find it hard to think of correspondence that the committee has received recently that absolutely should not have a wider circulation. I find myself in agreement with Aoidh - need to know. Cabayi (talk) 11:32, 27 December 2024 (UTC) As I've made clear in private, I prefer having staff help (see that vote). I think that having non-professionals in this role mean that this proposal barely fails in balancing an acceptable level of "intrusion" on the list (ie the reduced privacy) against the probability of success and benefits. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC) Roughly per Aoidh, with additional concerns about creating additional overhead such as another mailing list and creating a bottleneck that could become a problem if the clerk were to become inactive for any reason. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Coordinating arbitrators appears to be passing, and that's my preference on trying to keep workflow moving behind-the-scenes. I am not necessarily opposed to this in principle, but my preference would be to try coordinating arbitrators (including one coordinating this portfolio) first, and if for any reason we get a portion of the way through the year and that still isn't working, very happy to look at this again. I was considering supporting for the same reasons as Eek (put it in our toolkit for a rainy day), but instead I'm voting oppose on the basis that, should we wish to try it in the future, it's a very easy vote to quickly run through at that point (and, even if this passed, we'd probably need to have an internal vote to implement it at that time anyways). Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Abstain Motion 1: Arbitrator views and discussions I'd be glad changing this to only appoint former arbs, if that would tip anyone's votes. Currently, it's written as "from among the English Misplaced Pages functionary corps (and preferably from among former members of the Arbitration Committee)" for flexibility if needed, but I imagine we would only really appoint former arbs if available, except under unusual circumstances, because they understand how the mailing list discussions go and have previously been elected to handle the same private info. I am also open to calling it something other than "correspondence clerk"; that just seemed like a descriptive title. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC) I do like the idea of using our Arbs emeritus for this position (and perhaps only Arbs emeritus); it ensures that they have experience in our byzantine process, and at least at some point held community trust. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:31, 3 December 2024 (UTC) @CaptainEek: I have changed the motion to make only former arbs eligible. If anyone preferred broader (all funct) eligibility, I've added an alternative motion 1.1 below, which if any arb does prefer it, they should uncollapse and vote for it. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 02:07, 3 December 2024 (UTC) I also think that if we adopt this we should choose a better name. I know Barkeep49 meant this suggestion as a bit of a joke, but I actually think he was on the money when he suggested "scrivener." I like "adjutant" even more, which I believe he also suggested. They capture the sort of whimsical Misplaced Pages charm evoked by titles like Most Pluperfect Labutnum while still being descriptive, and not easily confused for a traditional clerk. CaptainEek ⚓ 03:21, 4 December 2024 (UTC) Whimsy is important -- Guerillero 08:55, 4 December 2024 (UTC) @CaptainEek and Guerillero: Per the above discussion points, I have (a) proposed two alternative names below that were workshopped among some arbs ("scrivener" on the more whimsical side and "coordination assistant" on the less whimsical side; see motions 1.2a and 1.2b), and (b) made this motion a nine-month trial, after which time the section is automatically repealed unless the Committee takes action to extend it. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:10, 7 December 2024 (UTC) I plan on supporting motion 1 over anything else. I've spent a week just getting onto all the platforms, and I'm already kind of shocked that this is how we do things. Not only is there a lot to keep track of, all of the information moves unintuitively between different places in a way that makes it very difficult to keep up unless you're actively plugged in enough to be on top of the ball – which I don't think anyone can be all the time. I just don't think a coordinating arb is sufficient: we need someone who can keep us on track without having to handle all of the standard work of reviewing evidence, deliberating, and making an informed decision. (Better-organized tech would also be great, but I'd need to spend a lot more time thinking about how it could be redone.) I understand the privacy concerns, but I don't think this represents a significant breach of confidentiality: people care more whether their report gets handled properly than whether it goes before 15 trusted people or 16. So, I'll be voting in favor of motion 1, and maybe motion 3 will be a distant second. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 21:40, 17 December 2024 (UTC) I just want to briefly address @Moneytrees's question. In my view, nothing a c-clerk (or anyone else) can do can make arbs fulfill their functions. What the c-clerks can do is help reduce the needless duplicated time and effort arbs spend on trying to figure out what matters are outstanding, what balls they might be dropping, where their time can be effectively spent. But if an arb truly is checked out, yeah, regular emailed reminders aren't going to help. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 08:59, 30 December 2024 (UTC) References Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Policy § Scope and responsibilities Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Policy § Procedures and roles Motion 1.1: expand eligible set to functionaries If any arbitrator prefers this way, unhat this motion and vote for it. The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. If motion 1 passes, replace the text The Arbitration Committee may appoint one or more former elected members of the Arbitration Committee to be correspondence clerks for the Arbitration Committee. with the text The Arbitration Committee may appoint, from among the English Misplaced Pages functionary corps (and preferably from among former members of the Arbitration Committee), one or more users to be correspondence clerks for the Arbitration Committee.. For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 8 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Support Oppose Abstain Motion 1.2a: name the role "scrivener" If motion 1 passes, replace the term "correspondence clerks" wherever it appears with the term "scriveners". For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 1 arbitrator abstaining, 7 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Support Nicely whimsical, and not as likely to be confusing as correspondence clerk. CaptainEek ⚓ 04:11, 7 December 2024 (UTC) per Eek :) theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 01:28, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Oppose I think correspondence clerk is fine if role is something we're going with, it's less ambiguous as to what it entails than scrivener. - Aoidh (talk) 04:12, 11 December 2024 (UTC) I have never heard that word before; at least "correspondence" and "clerk" are somewhat common in the English Misplaced Pages world. When possible, I think we should use words people don't have to look up in dictionaries. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:07, 14 December 2024 (UTC) Follows on from my vote on Motion 1. Cabayi (talk) 11:38, 27 December 2024 (UTC) As I've said in private, I think that this name would be unnecessarily opaque and complicated. Most people would need to search in a dictionary to understand what this means. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC) This sounds too much like we are appointing pirates, IMO. Too obscure of a word. Z1720 (talk) 17:35, 1 January 2025 (UTC) I might be in the minority but I have no issue with 'correspondence clerks'. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Abstain (former arbitrator) I think that because it's more archaic and possibly less serious, I disprefer this to either "coordination assistant" or "correspondence clerk", but would ultimately be perfectly happy with it. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:11, 7 December 2024 (UTC) (former arbitrator) Agree with Kevin. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 23:20, 28 December 2024 (UTC) I don't think the name matters overmuch, although I think even if this passed they'd probably still be called a clerk in practice because who wants to type out scrivener every time? ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC) I do. not. care. what it's called. Katie 23:12, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Arbitrator discussion Motion 1.2b: name the role "coordination assistant" If motion 1 passes, replace the term "correspondence clerks" wherever it appears with the term "coordination assistants". For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 3 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Support Slightly better, I guess, in that the role (whatever it is called) is more about coordination (keeping track of business) than actual correspondence (replying to people who contact us). Not exactly an issue of paramount importance. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC) Oppose bleh. CaptainEek ⚓ 04:12, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Follows on from my vote on Motion 1. Cabayi (talk) 11:38, 27 December 2024 (UTC) mm, not my favorite. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 01:28, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Prefer correspondence clerks. Z1720 (talk) 17:36, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Per 1.2a. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Abstain (former arbitrator) I am indifferent between this and "correspondence clerk". Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:11, 7 December 2024 (UTC) If we're going to use a role like this, either this or correspondence clerk is fine. - Aoidh (talk) 04:13, 11 December 2024 (UTC) That would be okay. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:08, 14 December 2024 (UTC) (former arbitrator) 🤷‍♂️ Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 23:20, 28 December 2024 (UTC) I'm not fussed about what color we paint the bike shed. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Per above. Katie 23:12, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Arbitrator discussion Motion 1.3: make permanent (not trial) If motion 1 passes, omit the text for a trial period of nine months from the date of enactment, after which time the section shall be automatically repealed unless the Committee takes action to make it permanent or otherwise extend it. For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 8 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Support Oppose I recently experimented with sunset clauses and think that frankly a lot more of what we do should have such time limits that require us to stop and critically evaluate if a thing is working. CaptainEek ⚓ 04:19, 7 December 2024 (UTC) If this change is necessary, there should be a review of it after a reasonable trial period to see what does and does not work. - Aoidh (talk) 01:34, 8 December 2024 (UTC) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:10, 14 December 2024 (UTC) Follows on from my vote on Motion 1. Cabayi (talk) 11:38, 27 December 2024 (UTC) (former arbitrator) Agree with Eek. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 23:20, 28 December 2024 (UTC) This is a big change and so I'd rather that we forced a review. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC) If this passed it should require affirmative consensus to continue past the trial period. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC) A trial first would be better. Z1720 (talk) 17:37, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Katie 23:12, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Abstain (former arbitrator) I have no preference as to whether this is permanent or a trial. I do think that nine months is a good length for the trial if we choose to have one: not too long to lock in a year's committee; not too short to make it unworthwhile. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:13, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Arbitrator discussion Motion 1.4: expanding arbcom-en directly If motion 1 passes, strike the following text: To that end, upon the first appointment of correspondence clerks, the current arbcom-en mailing list shall be renamed to arbcom-en-internal, which shall continue to be accessible only by arbitrators, and a new arbcom-en email list shall be established. The subscribers to the new arbcom-en list shall be the arbitrators and correspondence clerks. And replace it with the following: To that end, correspondence clerks shall be added to the arbcom-en mailing list. The Committee shall continue to maintain at least one mailing list accessible only by arbitrators. For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 2 arbitrators abstaining, 7 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Support Much less trouble to have them on the main list than to split the lists. CaptainEek ⚓ 04:13, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Especially if it's former arbs who've already had access to most of the list at one point or another, I think the trade-off of scriveners being able to properly do their jobs is worth it. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 01:28, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Per my vote above. Katie 23:12, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Oppose Access to private information should be as limited as possible to only what is strictly necessary to perform such a task, and I don't see allowing full access to the contents of the current list necessary for this. I'd rather not split the list, but between that and giving full access then if we're going to have a correspondence clerk, then it needs to be split. - Aoidh (talk) 04:21, 11 December 2024 (UTC) Motion 1 is already problematic for privacy reasons; this would make it worse. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:14, 14 December 2024 (UTC) Follows on from my vote on Motion 1. Cabayi (talk) 11:38, 27 December 2024 (UTC) (former arbitrator) I think the lists should be split. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 23:20, 28 December 2024 (UTC) If the clerk/skrivienenrener (see, I can't even spell it!) motion passes I would prefer to split the lists. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC) I'd like to split the lists, in case there is a topic that arbs want to discuss as arb-only. The new role doesn't need to be observers in many discussions we have amongst arbs. Z1720 (talk) 17:39, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Abstain (former arbitrator) I would not really object to this. C-clerks (or whatever we call them) are former arbs and have previously been on arbcom-en in any event, so it doesn't seem that like a big deal to do this. On the other hand, I would understand if folks prefer the split. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:24, 7 December 2024 (UTC) I am really torn on the competing arguments between decreased effectiveness and privacy of the lists. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC) Per Kevin & Sdrqaz. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Arbitrator discussion Proposed per Guerillero's comment below. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:24, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Motion 2: WMF staff support The Arbitration Committee requests that the Wikimedia Foundation Committee Support Team provide staff support for the routine administration and organization of the Committee's mailing list and non-public work. The selected staff assistants shall be responsible for assisting the Committee in the routine administration and organization of its mailing list and non-public work in a similar manner as the existing arbitration clerks assist in the administration of the Committee's on-wiki work. Staff assistants shall perform their functions under the direction of the Arbitration Committee and shall not represent the Wikimedia Foundation in the course of their support work with the Arbitration Committee or disclose the Committee's internal deliberations except as directed by the Committee. The specific responsibilities of the staff assistants shall include, as directed by the Committee: Acknowledging the receipt of correspondence and assigning tracking identifiers to pending requests and other matters; Tracking the status of pending matters and providing regular updates and reminders on the status of the Committee's off-wiki work to arbitrators; Reminding members of the Committee to vote or otherwise take action in pending matters; Organizing related correspondence into case files; and Providing similar routine administrative and clerical assistance to the Arbitration Committee. The remit of staff assistants shall not include: Participating in the substantive consideration or decision of any matters before the Committee; or Taking non-routine actions requiring the exercise of arbitrator discretion. To that end, upon the selection of staff assistants, the current arbcom-en mailing list shall be renamed to arbcom-en-internal, which shall continue to be accessible only by arbitrators, and a new arbcom-en email list shall be established. The subscribers to the new arbcom-en list shall be the arbitrators and staff assistants. The Committee shall establish a process to allow editors to, in unusual circumstances following a showing of good cause, directly email a mailing list accessible only by arbitrators and not by staff assistants. Staff assistants shall be subject to the same requirements concerning conduct and recusal as the arbitration clerk team. For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 8 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Support I will come out here and support this, given my many comments in private, though it seems unlikely to pass now. Pragmatically speaking, I think that having staff on-list would have a greater likelihood of effectiveness due to being professionals who do this in their day job and having a greater obligation to help us because they're, well, staff (have a clearer subordinate–superior relationship in the WMF structure compared to a clerk, who is ultimately a volunteer that cannot be forced to work). Moreover, while I think that the separation between Community and Foundation is important, I feel that active Community members would have greater chances of having conflicts of interest due to pre-existing relationships; we have had very few petitions to us on Foundation actions in the last few years. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC) Oppose I appreciate that Kevin put this together, and I think this would be very helpful, maybe even the most helpful, way to ensure that we stayed on top of the ball. But just because it would achieve one goal doesn't make it a good idea. A full version of my rationale is on the ArbList, for other Arbs. The short, WP:BEANS version is that this would destroy the line between us and the Foundation, which undoes much of our utility. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:22, 3 December 2024 (UTC) Per my comment on motion 4. - Aoidh (talk) 01:31, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Might as well make it formal per my opinions elsewhere on the page. Primefac (talk) 13:24, 10 December 2024 (UTC) I like the general idea of the WMF using its donated resources to support the community that made the donations possible. I am uncomfortable with putting WMF staff in front of ArbCom's e-mail queue, however, as this would come with unavoidable conflicts of interest and a loss of independence. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:05, 14 December 2024 (UTC) The help would be useful, but the consequences would be detrimental to both ArbCom & WMF. Some space between us is necessary for ArbCom's impartiality & for the WMF's section 230 position. Cabayi (talk) 12:56, 24 December 2024 (UTC) (former arbitrator) Not a bad idea, but I believe the various conflicts of interest between us and the foundation, both major and minor, make this unworkable. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 23:20, 28 December 2024 (UTC) This would likely be the most effective way to go for keeping things moving, but I'm too concerned about the separation of Arbcom and WMF. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC) I think other options need to be tried first before considering getting resources from WMF. Z1720 (talk) 17:40, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Under no circumstances do I want the WMF inserted into the arb list. Katie 23:02, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Abstain Motion 2: Arbitrator views and discussions I am quite open to this idea. A professional staff member assisting the committee might be the most reliable and consistent way to achieve this goal. ArbCom doesn't need the higher-intensity support that the WMF Committee Support Team provides other committees like AffCom and the grant committees, but having somebody to track threads and bump stalled discussions would be quite helpful. I'm going to wait to see if there's any community input on this motion before voting on it, though. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC) Motion 3: Coordinating arbitrators The Arbitration Committee's procedures are amended by adding the following section: Coordinating arbitrators The Arbitration Committee shall, from time to time, designate one or more arbitrators to serve as the Committee's coordinating arbitrators. Coordinating arbitrators shall be responsible for assisting the Committee in the routine administration and organization of its mailing list and non-public work in a similar manner as the existing arbitration clerks assist in the administration of the Committee's on-wiki work. The specific responsibilities of coordinating arbitrators shall include: Acknowledging the receipt of correspondence and assigning tracking identifiers to pending requests and other matters; Tracking the status of pending matters and providing regular updates and reminders on the status of the Committee's off-wiki work to arbitrators; Reminding members of the Committee to vote or otherwise take action in pending matters; Organizing related correspondence into case files; and Performing similar routine administrative and clerical functions. A coordinating arbitrator may, but is not required to, state an intention to abstain on some or all matters before the Committee without being listed as an "inactive" arbitrator. For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 1 arbitrator abstaining, 7 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Enacted. SilverLocust 💬 23:30, 10 January 2025 (UTC) Support This is currently my first-choice option; we have unofficially in the past had arbitrators take on specific roles (e.g. tracking unblock requests, responding to emails, etc) and it seemed to work fairly well. Having those rules be more "official" seems like the best way to make sure someone is responsible for these things, without needing to expand the committee or the pool of people with access to private information. Primefac (talk) 18:53, 1 December 2024 (UTC) I may still vote for the clerks option, but I think this is probably the minimum of what we need. Will it be suffucient...aye, there's the rub. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:14, 5 December 2024 (UTC) Of the motions proposed, this one is the one I'd most support. It doesn't expand the number of people who can view the ArbCom mailing list beyond those on ArbCom, and creates a structure that may improve how the mailing list is handled. - Aoidh (talk) 23:21, 9 December 2024 (UTC) Per Primefac. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:19, 14 December 2024 (UTC) (former arbitrator) Sure; this has been an informal position shared by many Arbs over the years (Barkeep, Maxim, Izno, L235, myself etc.) Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 23:20, 28 December 2024 (UTC) Second choice to motion 1. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 01:29, 1 January 2025 (UTC) I've mentioned that I don't think that having a titled role will make it more likely that the work gets done, but I accept that Kevin's arguments have some merit so here I am. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Second choice to motion 1: I would prefer that the correspondence clerks be implemented instead: if this option worked, I think it would already be implemented (and has been implemented informally in the past in various forms). However, if motion 1 doesn't pass, this is probably the next best thing. Z1720 (talk) 17:42, 1 January 2025 (UTC) First preference, per Primefac. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Oppose Abstain I don't think that this needs to be in our public procedures and feel like this could have been carried out without needing a formal vote on the subject (see comments by Izno and leek/SFR). I do have some reservations over whether having a specific person to do x will mean that the rest of us won't do x, but we'll see. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC) My first thought was "as long as I'm not the one who has to do it," and if that's how I'm thinking, I should sit this one out. Katie 23:01, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Motion 3: Arbitrator views and discussions I am also open to this idea, though I am worried that it will be insufficient and haven't made up my mind on my vote yet. This idea was floated by a former arbitrator from back when the committee did have a coordinating arbitrator, though that role kind of quietly faded away. The benefits of this approach include that there's no need to bring anyone else onto the list. This motion also allows (but does not require) arbs to take a step back from active arb business to focus on the coordination role, which could help with the bifurcation I mention above. Cons include that this could be the least reliable option; that it's possible no arb is interested, or has the capacity to do this well; and that it's hard to be both a coordinator on top of the existing difficult role of serving as an active arb. I personally think this is better than nothing, but probably prefer one of the other two motions to actually add some capacity. Other ideas that have been floated include establishing a subcommittee of arbitrators responsible for these functions. My same concerns would apply there, but if there's interest, I'm glad to draft and propose a motion to do that; any other arb should also feel free to propose such a motion of their own. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:28, 1 December 2024 (UTC) I was partial to this idea, though it was not my first choice. I proposed that we might make it a rotating position, à la the presidency of the UN security council. Alternatively, a three person subcommittee might also be the way to go, so that the position isn't dependent on one person's activity. I like this solution in general because we already basically had it, with the coordinating arbitrator role. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:35, 3 December 2024 (UTC) @CaptainEek: I think your last sentence actually kind of nails why I don't love this solution? From a new person on the scene, it doesn't seem to me like trying old strategies and things we've already been doing is really going to solve a chronic problem. If there are arbs who really are willing to be the coordinators, that's better than nothing, but I haven't seen any step up yet and I'm not convinced that relying on at least one arb having the extra time and trust in every committee to do this work is sustainable. I am leaning towards voting for the scriveners motion, though, because I do love a good whimsical name theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 21:51, 17 December 2024 (UTC) My concern with this is that if an arb already has the time and inclination you'd expect them to be filling the role, as has happened in the past. Simply formalizing the role doesn't help if no one has the motivation to do it. It's still the option I support the most out of those listed, though. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 22:07, 17 December 2024 (UTC) I think formalizing it does move the needle on someone doing it. Two possible benefits of the formalization: It makes clear that this is a valuable role, one that an arb should feel is a sufficient and beneficial way to spend their time. It also communicates this to the community, which might otherwise ask an arb running for reelection why they spent their time coordinating (rather than on other arb work). It gives "permission" for coordinating arbs to go inactive on other business if they wish. These two benefits make this motion more than symbolic in my view. My hesitation on it remains that it may be quite insufficient relative to motion 1. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 22:18, 17 December 2024 (UTC) I could get behind this idea, not as a permanent single coordinating arb but as a "hat" that gets passed on, with each of us taking a turn. That would allow the flexibility for periods of inactivity and balancing workload when the coordinating arb wants/needs to act as a drafter on a complex case. It would also ensure that a wide-view of our workload was held by a wide-range of arbs. 3.5 weeks each and the year is covered. Cabayi (talk) 08:35, 27 December 2024 (UTC) Motion 4: Grants for correspondence clerks In the event that "Motion 1: Correspondence clerks" passes, the Arbitration Committee shall request that the Wikimedia Foundation provide grants payable to correspondence clerks in recognition of their assistance to the Committee. For this motion there are 14 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 8 support or oppose votes are a majority. Majority reference Abstentions Support votes needed for majority 0 8 1–2 7 3–4 6 Support Oppose Misplaced Pages should remain a volunteer activity. If we cannot find volunteers to do the task, then perhaps it ought not be done in the first place. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:09, 3 December 2024 (UTC) We should not have a clerk paid by the WMF handling English Misplaced Pages matters in this capacity. - Aoidh (talk) 01:48, 6 December 2024 (UTC) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:18, 14 December 2024 (UTC) I feel bound by my RFA promise - "I have never edited for pay, or any other consideration, and never will." Cabayi (talk) 08:41, 27 December 2024 (UTC) (former arbitrator) Would be cool, but no. “To whom much is given, much will be required”… Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 23:20, 28 December 2024 (UTC) Per the others. Primefac (talk) 07:23, 30 December 2024 (UTC) Not against having a paid clerk in general, given my support of a WMF staff liaison, but would rather devote that money to a WMF professional, whom I believe would provide a greater likelihood of effectiveness. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC) I might support something like this if it were to to hire a clerk independent of the WMF and volunteer functionaries, but I don't support paying a volunteer to tell other volunteers they need to respond to emails. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC) Abstain Motion 4: Arbitrator views and discussions Proposing for discussion; thanks to voorts for the idea. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:00, 1 December 2024 (UTC) I am leaning no on this motion. The potential downsides of this plan do seem to outweigh the benefit of being able to compensate a correspondence clerk for what will ultimately likely be something like 5 hours a week at most. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 02:13, 3 December 2024 (UTC) Community discussion Will correspondence clerks be required to sign an NDA? Currently clerks aren't. Regardless of what decision is made this should probably be in the motion. * Pppery * it has begun... 18:29, 1 December 2024 (UTC) Good catch. I thought it was implied by "from among the English Misplaced Pages functionary corps" – who all sign NDAs as a condition to access functionaries-en and the CUOS tools; see Misplaced Pages:Functionaries (Functionary access requires that the user sign the confidentiality agreement for nonpublic information.)  – but I've made it explicit now. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:31, 1 December 2024 (UTC) You're right that that was there, but I missed it on my first readthrough of the rules (thinking correspondence clerks would be appointed from the clerk team instead). * Pppery * it has begun... 18:37, 1 December 2024 (UTC) Why does "coordinating arbitrators" need a (public) procedures change? Izno (talk) 18:34, 1 December 2024 (UTC) As Primefac mentioned above, it seems reasonable to assume that having something written down "officially" might help make sure that the coordinating arbitrator knows what they are responsible for. In any event, it probably can't hurt. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:08, 1 December 2024 (UTC) It is a pain in the ass to get formal procedures changed. There is an internal procedures page: I see 0 reason not to use it if you want to clarify what the role of this arbitrator is. Izno (talk) 19:13, 1 December 2024 (UTC) On top of that, this doesn't actually change the status quo much if at all. It is almost entirely a role definition for an internal matter, given "we can make an arb a CA, but we don't have to have one" in it's "from time to time" clause. This just looks like noise to anyone reading ARBPRO who isn't on ArbCom: the public doesn't need to know this arb even exists, though they might commonly be the one responding to emails so they might get a sense there is such an arb. Izno (talk) 19:21, 1 December 2024 (UTC) While I appreciate that some functionaries are open to volunteering for this role, this borders on is a part-time secretarial job and ought to be compensated as such. The correspondence clerks option combined with WMF throwing some grant money towards compensation would be my ideal. voorts (talk/contributions) 18:35, 1 December 2024 (UTC) Thanks for this suggestion – I've added motion 4 to address this suggestion. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:08, 1 December 2024 (UTC) In the first motion the word "users" in "The Committee shall establish a process to allow users to, in unusual circumstances" is confusing, it should probably be "editors". In the first and second motions, it should probably be explicit whether correspondence clerks/support staff are required, permitted or prohibited to: Share statistical information publicly Share status information (publicly or privately) with correspondents who wish to know the status of their request. Share status information (publicly or privately) about the status of a specific request with someone other than the correspondent. For this I'm thinking of scenarios like where e.g. an editor publicly says they emailed the Committee about something a while ago, and one or more other editors asks what is happening with it. I think my preference would be for 1 or 2, as these seem likely to be the more reliable. Neither option precludes there also being a coordinating arbitrator doing some of the tasks as well. Thryduulf (talk) 18:49, 1 December 2024 (UTC) Thanks for these suggestions. I've changed "users" to "editors". The way I'm intending these motions to be read, correspondence clerks or staff assistants should only disclose information as directed by the committee. I think the details of which information should be shared upon whose request in routine cases could be decided later by the committee, with the default being "ask ArbCom before disclosing until the committee decides to approve routine disclosures in certain cases", because it's probably hard to know in advance which categories will be important to allow. I'm open to including more detail if you think that's important to include at this stage, though, and I'd welcome hearing why if so. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:08, 1 December 2024 (UTC) I see your point, but I think it worth clarifying certain things in advance before they become an issue to avoid unrealistic or mistaken expectations of the c-clerks by the community. Point 1 doesn't need to be specified in advance, maybe something like "communicating information publicly as directed by the Committee" would be useful to say in terms of expectation management or maybe it's still to specific? I can see both sides of that. Point 2 I think is worth establishing quickly and while it is on people's minds. Waiting for the committee to make up its mind before knowing whether they can give a full response to a correspondent about this would be unfair to both the correspondent and clerk I think. This doesn't necessarily have to be before adoption, but if not it needs to be very soon afterwards. Point 3 is similar, but c-clerks and community members knowing exactly what can and cannot be shared, and especially being able to point to something in writing about what cannot be said publicly, has the potential to reduce drama e.g. if there is another situation similar to Billed Mammal's recent case request. Thryduulf (talk) 19:30, 1 December 2024 (UTC) What justification is there for the WMF to spend a single additional dollar on the workload of a project-specific committee whose workload is now demonstrably smaller than at any time in its history? (Noting here that there is a real dollar-cost to the support already being given by WMF, such as the monthly Arbcom/T&S calls that often result in the WMF accepting requests for certain activities.) And anyone who is being paid by the WMF is responsible to the WMF as the employer, not to English Misplaced Pages Arbcom. I think Arbcom is perhaps not telling the community some very basic facts that are leading to their efforts to find someone to take responsibility for its organization, which might include "we have too many members who aren't pulling their weight" or "we have too many members who, for various reasons that don't have to do with Misplaced Pages, are inactive", or "we have some tasks that nobody really wants to do". There's no indication that any of these solutions would solve these kinds of problems, and I think that all of these issues are factors that are clearly visible to those who follow Arbcom on even an occasional basis. Arbitrators who are inactive for their own reasons aren't going to become more active because someone's organizing their mail. Arbitrators who don't care enough to vote on certain things aren't any more likely to vote if someone is reminding them to vote in a non-public forum; there's no additional peer pressure or public guilt-tripping. And if Arbcom continues to have tasks that nobody really wants to do, divest those tasks. Arbcom has successfully done that with a large number of tasks that were once its responsibility. I think you can do a much better job of making your case. Risker (talk) 20:05, 1 December 2024 (UTC) I think there is a need to do something as poor communication and extremely slow replies, if replies are made at all, has been an ongoing issue for the committee for some time. However I agree that asking the foundation to pay someone to do it is going too far. The point that if you are paid by the foundation, you work for them and not en.wp or arbcom is a compelling one. There's also a slippery slope argument to be made in that if we're paying these people, shouldn't we pay the committee? If we're paying the committee, shouldn't we pay the arbitration clerks....and so on. Just Step Sideways 20:26, 1 December 2024 (UTC) I fully share Risker's concern about a paid WMF staffer who, no matter how well-intentioned, will be answerable to the WMF and not ARBCOM. Vanamonde93 (talk) 21:55, 1 December 2024 (UTC) The 2023-2024 committee is much more middle aged and has less university students and retirees, who oftentimes have more free time, than the 2016-2017 committee. -- Guerillero 08:56, 2 December 2024 (UTC) It seems to me that the issue of there often being some Committee members who, for whatever reason, are not "pulling their weight", is at the core of the problem to be addressed here. Because this happens "behind the scenes", the community has no way to hold anyone accountable in elections, and because of human nature and the understandable desire to maintain a collegial atmosphere within the Committee, I don't really expect any members to call out a colleague in public. I suppose there could even be a question of what happens if whoever might be filling the role proposed here nudges a member to act, but the member just disregards that. It's difficult to see how to make it enforceable. I don't have any real solutions, but this strikes me as central to the problem. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:31, 2 December 2024 (UTC) I think this is largely correct. I was reluctant on the committee to even note this committee's inactivity problem (worst of any 15-member arbcom ever), even though it was based on a metric that is public, when I was still on the committee. And it gets further complicated by the fact that some people not visibly active in public more than pull their weight behind the scenes - the testimonials Maxim received when running for re-election being a prime example. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 00:00, 3 December 2024 (UTC) During my first term it was Roger Davies. He was barely a presence on-wiki but he kept the whole committee on point and up-to-date about what was pending. Trypto is right that it isn't enforceable, it is more a matter of applying pressure to either do the job or move oneself to the inactive list. I also think the committee can and should be more proactive about declaring other arbs inactive even when they are otherwise present on-wiki or on the mailing list" That would probably require a procedures change, but I think it would make sense. If there is a case request, proposed decision, or other matter that requires a vote before the committee and an arb doesn't comment on it for ten days or more, they clearly don't have the time and/or inclination to do so and should be declared inactive on that matter so that their lack of action does not further delay the matter. It would be nice if they would just do so themselves, or just vote "abstain" on everything, which only takes a few minutes, but it seems it has not been happening in practice. Just Step Sideways 00:14, 3 December 2024 (UTC) And Roger was a pensioner which kinda proves my point -- Guerillero 08:53, 4 December 2024 (UTC) Roger may have been a pensioner at the end of his time on the committee (7 years), but he certainly wasn't at the beginning of his term. He was co-ordinating arbitrator for a lot of that time, and did a good job without a single bit of extra software. The problem with that software is that people have to already be actively engaged to even contemplate using it. My sense is that the real issue here is the lack of engagement (whether periodic or chronic) on the part of many of the arbitrators. People who are inactive on Arbcom tasks aren't going to be active on any tasks, including reading emails asking them to do things or special software sending alerts. Simply put, if people aren't going to put Arbcom as their primary Misplaced Pages activity for the next two years, keeping in mind other life events that will likely take them away, they should not run in the first place. Yes, unexpected things happen. But I think a lot of the inactivity we've seen in the last few years involved some predictable absences that the arbs knew about when they were candidates. (Examples I've seen myself: Oh, I have a big exam to write that needs months of study; oh, I have a major life event that will require a lot of planning; oh, I'm graduating and will have to find a job.) No, I don't expect people to reveal this kind of information about themselves; yes, I do expect them to refrain from volunteering for roles that they can reasonably foresee they will have difficulty fulfilling. Risker (talk) 04:21, 6 December 2024 (UTC) I might as well ask a hard question. Is there a way to make public enough information for the community to be able to evaluate ArbCom candidates for (re)election, in terms of behind-the-scenes inactivity? If individual Arbs were to make public comments, that would do it, but it would also potentially be very contentious and could reduce effectiveness instead of improving it. Could ArbCom initiate a new process of posting onsite information about the processing of tasks, without revealing private information (such as: "Ban appeal 1", "Ban appeal 2", instead of "Ban appeal by "), and list those members who voted (perhaps without listing which way they voted)? Maybe do that monthly, and include all tasks that had not yet gotten a quorum. Yes, I know that's difficult. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:48, 6 December 2024 (UTC) I question an answer to the problem of "we're having trouble finding enough people to do the secretarial work we have already" being "let's create substantially more secretarial work" even accepting the premise that people would then get voted off if they didn't pull their weight. While I think that premise is correct, what this system would also encourage - even more than it already exists - is an incentive to just go along with whatever the first person (or the person who has clearly done the most homework) says. And that defeats the purpose of having a committee made up of individual thinkers. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 20:55, 6 December 2024 (UTC) That's a fair point. I'll admit that, even from the outside, I sometimes see members who appear to wait to see which way the wind is blowing before voting on proposed decisions. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:59, 6 December 2024 (UTC) That's something that's hard to know or verify, even for the other arbs. The arbs only know what the other arbs tell them, and I've never seen anyone admit to that. Just Step Sideways 23:44, 6 December 2024 (UTC) I think the timing for this is wrong. The committee is about to have between 6 and 9 new members (depending on whether Guerillero, Eek, and Primefac get re-elected). In addition it seems likely that some number of former arbs are about to rejoin the committee. This committee - basically the committee with the worst amount of active membership of any 15 member committee ever - seems like precisely the wrong one to be making large changes to ongoing workflows in December. Izno's idea of an easier to try and easier to change/abandon internal procedure for the coordinating arb feels like something appropriate to try now. The rest feel like it should be the prerogative of the new committee to decide among (or perhaps do a different change altogether). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 21:44, 1 December 2024 (UTC) Kevin can correct me if I'm wrong, but I assumed he was doing this now because he will not be on the committee a month from now. That being said it could be deliberately held over, or conversely, possibly fall victim to the inactivity you mention and still be here for the new committee to decide. Just Step Sideways 23:12, 1 December 2024 (UTC) Since WP:ACE2024 elections are currently taking place it makes sense to have the incoming arbitrators weigh in on changes like this. They are the ones that will be affected by any of these motions passing rather than the outgoing arbitrators. - Aoidh (talk) 00:27, 2 December 2024 (UTC) Oh I assumed that's why he was doing it also. I am also assuming he's doing it to try and set up the future committees for success. That doesn't change my point about why this is the wrong time and why a different way of trying the coordinator role (if it has support) would be better. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 00:28, 2 December 2024 (UTC) Regarding "timing is wrong": I think you both would agree that these are a long time coming – we have been working on these and related ideas for years (I ran on a related idea in 2022). I do think there's never quite a good time. Very plausibly, the first half of the year is out because the new arbs will need that time to learn how the processes work and think about what kinds of things should be changed vs. kept the same. And then it might be another few months as the new ArbCom experiments with less-consequential changes like the ones laid about at the top: technological solutions, trying new ways of tracking stuff, etc., before being confident in the need for something like set out above. And then things get busy for other reasons; there will be weeks or even occasionally months when the whole committee is overtaken by some urgent situation. I've experienced a broadly similar dynamic a few times now; this is all to say that there's just not much time or space in the agenda for this kind of stuff in a one-year cycle, which would be a shame because I do think this is important to take on. I do think that it should be the aspiration of every year's committee to leave the succeeding committee some improvements in the functioning of the committee based on lessons learned that year, so it would be nice to leave the next committee with this. That said, if arbitrators do feel that we should hold this over to the new committee, I'm not really in a position to object – as JSS says, this is my last year on the committee, so it's not like this will benefit me. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 01:30, 2 December 2024 (UTC) I think it's entirely possible for the new committee to have a sense of what it wants workload wise by February-April and so it's wrong to just rule out the first half of the year. By the end of the first six months of the year that you and I started (and which JSS was a sitting member on) we'd made a number of changes to how things were done. Off the top of my head I can name the structure of cases and doing quarterly reports of private appeals as two but there were others. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 01:47, 2 December 2024 (UTC) Here's what I'll leave you with overall. What you may see as a downside – these proposals being voted on relatively late in the year – I see as a significant possible upside. Members of this committee are able to draw on at least eleven months' experience as arbitrators in deciding what is working well and what might warrant change – experience which is important in determining what kinds of processes and systems lead to effective and ineffective outcomes. That experience is important: Although I have served on ArbCom for four years and before that served as an ArbCom clerk for almost six years, I still learn more every year about what makes this committee click. If what really concerns you is locking in the new committee to a particular path, as I wrote above, I'm very open to structuring this as a trial run that will end of its own accord unless the committee takes action to make it permanent. This would ensure that the new committee retains full control over whether to continue, discontinue, or adapt these changes. But in my book, it does not make sense to wait. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 22:58, 2 December 2024 (UTC) As a 3-term former arb and a 3-term current ombuds commissioner, I've had experience of about a dozen Wikimedia committee "new intakes". I am quite convinced that these proposals are correctly timed. Process changes are better put in place prior to new appointees joining, so that they are not joining at a moment of upheaval. Doing them late in the day is not objectionable and momentum often comes at the end of term. If the changes end up not working (doubtful), the new committee would just vote to tweak the process or go back. I simply do not understand the benefit of deferring proposals into a new year, adding more work to the next year's committee. That surely affects the enthusiasm and goodwill of new members. As for the point that the '24 committee is understaffed and prone to indecision: argumentum ad hominem. If Kevin's proposals work, they work. If anything, it might be more difficult to agree administrative reforms when the committee is back at full staff. arcticocean ■ 15:49, 10 December 2024 (UTC) If these pass now you will have new members join at a moment of upheaval as anything proposed here will still be in its infancy when the new members join (even if we pretend the new members are joining Jan 1 rather than much sooner given that results are in and new members tend to be added to the list once the right boxes are checked). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:55, 10 December 2024 (UTC) You're right. And it's important to be realistic: any proposal would be under implementation for several months, so say from December through February. Would that be so bad? Any change will disrupt, in the sense that a few people need to spend time implementing it and everyone else needs to learn the new process. But waiting until later in the year causes even more disruption: members have to first learn an 'old' process and then learn the changes you're making to it… New member enthusiasm is also a keen force that could help to push through the changes. arcticocean ■ 16:28, 10 December 2024 (UTC) I think new member enthusiasm is part of why I think this lame duck hobbled committee is the wrong one to do it. I have high hopes for next year's group and think they would be in a better place to come up with the right solution for them. And as I noted to Kevin above this isn't hypothetical - the year we both started as arbs we made a lot of process and procedure changes in the first six months. It was a great thing to funnel that new arb energy into because I was bought into what we were doing rather than trying to make something work that I had no say in and that the existing members had no experience with. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:34, 10 December 2024 (UTC) While I think a solution such as adopting ZenDesk is something that could face objections, personally I think the idea of having someone track a list of work items for a committee is a pretty standard way of working (including pushing for timely resolution, something that really needs a person, not just a program). From an outsider's perspective, it's something I'd expect. It doesn't matter to non-arbitrators who does the tracking, so the committee should feel free to change that decision internally as often as it feels is effective. I'd rather there be a coordinating arbitrator in place in the interim until another solution is implemented, than have no one tracking work items in the meantime. isaacl (talk) 19:30, 10 December 2024 (UTC) Just to double check that I'm reading motion 1 correctly, it would still be possible to email the original list (for arbitrators only) if, for example, you were raising a concern about something the correspondence clerks should not be privy to (ie: misuse of tools by a functionary), correct? Granted, I think motion 3 is probably the simpler option here, but in the event motion 1 passes, is the understanding I wrote out accurate? EggRoll97 02:15, 2 December 2024 (UTC) @EggRoll97 Yes, but probably only after an additional step. The penultimate paragraph of motions 1 and 2 says The Committee shall establish a process to allow editors to, in unusual circumstances following a showing of good cause, directly email a mailing list accessible only by arbitrators and not by correspondence clerks . No details are given about what this process would be, but one possibility would I guess be something like contacting an individual arbitrator outlining clearly why you think the c-clerks should not be privy to whatever it is. If they agree they'll tell you how to submit your evidence (maybe they'll add your email address to a temporary whitelist). Thryduulf (talk) 03:01, 2 December 2024 (UTC) In my experience working on committees and for non-profits, typically management is much more open to offering money for software solutions that they are told can resolve a problem than agreeing to pay additional compensation for new personnel. Are you sure there isn't some tracking solution that could resolve some of these problems? Liz 07:20, 2 December 2024 (UTC) In our tentative discussions with WMF, it sounded like it would be much more plausible to get a 0.1-0.2 FTE of staffer time than it would to get us 15 ZenDesk licenses, which was also somewhat surprising to me. That wasn't a firm response – if we went back and said we really need this, I'm guessing it'd be plausible. And we've never asked about compensating c-clerks – that was an idea that came from Voorts's comment above, and I proposed it for discussion, not because I necessarily support it but because I think it's worth discussion, and I certainly don't think it's integral to the c-clerk proposal. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 15:00, 2 December 2024 (UTC) Well, offering compensation for on-wiki tasks would be breaking new ground for the project. I do wonder though about the possibility of securing former arbitrators for these correspondent clerks' positions. It sounds like all of the work of an arbitrator (or more) without any ability to influence the results. I don't know if we'd have many interested and eligible parties. How many clerks would you think would be necessary? One? Or 3 or 4? Liz 21:40, 2 December 2024 (UTC) Yeah, these are great questions. Responses to your points: On volunteers: As I wrote above, four functionaries (including three former arbs) expressed initial-stage interest when this was floated when I consulted functionaries – which is great and was a bit unexpected, and which is why I wrote it up this way. Arbitrators will know that my initial plan from previous months/years did not involve limiting this to functionaries, to have a broader pool of applicants. But since we do have several interested functs, and they are already trusted to hold NDA'd private information (especially the former arbs who have previously been elected to access to this very list), I thought this would be a good way to make this a more uncontroversial proposal. How many to appoint? I imagine one or two if it was up to me. One would be ideal (I think it's like 30 minutes of work per day ish, max), but two for redundancy might make a lot of sense. I don't think it's all of the work of an arbitrator (or more) without any ability to influence the results – because the c-clerk would be responsible for tracking matters, not actually attempting to resolve them, that's a lot less work than serving as an arb. It does require more consistency than most arbs have to put in, though. On compensating: Yeah, I'm not sure I'll end up supporting the idea, but I don't think it's unprecedented in the sense that you're thinking. Correspondence clerks aren't editing; none of the tasks listed in the motion require on-wiki edits. And there are plenty of WMF grants that have gone to off-wiki work for the benefit of projects; the first example I could think of was m:Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/UTRS User Experience Development (ID: 22215192) but I know there are many. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 21:59, 2 December 2024 (UTC) I am quite confused, I often read arbs saying most of ArbCom work is behind-the-scenes work. But is all this behind-the-scenes work essentially just a one-person 30-minute-a-day work? If so, the solution here is that more arbs should simply pull their weight, which Motion 3 helps. I don't think WMF would pay someone to work 30 minutes a day either. Kenneth Kho (talk) 07:19, 3 December 2024 (UTC) But is all this behind-the-scenes work essentially just a one-person 30-minute-a-day work?. No, the actual work takes a lot more time and effort because each arb has to read, understand and form opinions on many different things, and the committee needs to discuss most of those things, which will often re-reading and re-evaluating based on the points raised. Then in many cases there needs to be a vote. What the "one-person, 30 minutes a day" is referring to is just the meta of what tasks are open, what the current status of it is, who needs to opine on it, etc. Thryduulf (talk) 11:31, 3 December 2024 (UTC) Thanks, I realized I misunderstood it. I see that this is a relatively lightweight proposal, perhaps it could work but it probably won't help much either. @L235 I have been thinking of splitting ArbCom into Public ArbCom and Private ArbCom. I see Public ArbCom as being able to function without the tools as @Worm That Turned advocated, focused more on complex dispute resolution. I see Private ArbCom as high-trust roles with NDAs, privy to WMF and overseeing Public ArbCom. Both ArbComs are elected separately as 15-members bodies, and both will be left with about half the current authority and responsibility. Kenneth Kho (talk) 01:54, 4 December 2024 (UTC) Thryduulf is right; I think Kevin meant that the tracking itself might be a 30 minute a day activity. But it has to happen consistently, and with a high catch rate. It also has to happen on top of our usual Arb work, which for me already averages a good ten hours a week, but can be more than twenty hours in the busy times. And I, like the other arbs, already have a full time job and a life outside Misplaced Pages. I don't like the idea of splitting ArbCom in twain, nor do I think it could be achieved. CaptainEek ⚓ 02:18, 4 December 2024 (UTC) I agree, having someone managing the work could really help smooth things out. Kenneth Kho (talk) 11:36, 4 December 2024 (UTC) My first thought is that cleanly splitting arbcom would be very difficult. For example what happens if there is an open public case and two-thirds of the way through the evidence phase someone discovers and wishes to submit private evidence? Thryduulf (talk) 02:31, 4 December 2024 (UTC) I agree, the split won't be entirely clean. I'm thinking Public ArbCom would narrowly remand part of the case to Private ArbCom if it finds that the private evidence is likely to materially affect the outcome. Kenneth Kho (talk) 11:34, 4 December 2024 (UTC) How will public know whether the private evidence will materially affect the outcome without seeing the private evidence? Secondly, how will private arbcom determine whether it materially affects the outcome without reviewing all the public evidence and thus duplicating public arbcom's work (and thus also negating the workload benefits of the split)? What happens if public and private arbcom come to different conclusions about the same public evidence? Thryduulf (talk) 11:39, 4 December 2024 (UTC) You raised good points that I did not address. I think that a way to do this would be to follow how Oversighters have the authority to override Admins that they use sparingly. Private ArbCom could have the right to receive any private evidence regarding an ongoing case on Public ArbCom, and Private ArbCom will have discretions to override Public ArbCom remedies without explanation other than something like "per private evidence". Private ArbCom would need to familiarize themselves with the case a bit, but this is mitigated by the fact that they only concerned with the narrow parts. Private ArbCom could have the authority to take the whole Public ArbCom case private if it deems that private evidence affect many parties. Kenneth Kho (talk) 11:55, 4 December 2024 (UTC) 12 candidates for 9 open seats is sufficient. But it hardly suggests we have so many people that we could support 30 people (even presuming some additional people would run under the split). Further, what happens behind the scenes already strains the trust of the community. But at least the community can see the public actions as a reminder of "well this person hasn't lost it completely while on ArbCom". I think it would be much harder to sustain trust under this split. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 02:35, 4 December 2024 (UTC) I honestly like the size of 12-member committee, too many proverbial cooks spoil the proverbial broth. I did think about the trust aspect, as the community has been holding ArbCom under scrutiny, but at the same time I consider that the community has been collegial with Bureaucrats, Checkusers, Oversighters. Private ArbCom would be far less visible, with Public ArbCom likely taking the heat for contentious decisions. Kenneth Kho (talk) 11:40, 4 December 2024 (UTC) I agree with L235 regarding whether this is all the work and none of the authority: it does not come with all the responsibility that being an Arb comes with either. This role does not need to respond to material questions or concerns about arbitration matters and does not need to read and weigh the voluminous case work to come to a final decision. The c-clerk will need to keep up on emails and will probably need to have an idea of what's going on in public matters, but that was definitely not the bulk of the (stressful?) work of an arbitrator. Izno (talk) 00:26, 3 December 2024 (UTC) @Liz well that's what I thought. I figured that ZenDesk was the winningest solution, until the Foundation made it seem like ZenDesk licenses were printed on gold bars. We did do some back of the envelope calculations, and it is decidedly expensive. Still...I have a hard time believing those ZenDesk licenses really cost more than all that staff time. I think we'll have to do some more convincing of the Foundation on that front, or implement a different solution. CaptainEek ⚓ 01:29, 3 December 2024 (UTC) I touched upon the idea of using former arbitrators to do administrative tasks on the arbitration committee talk page, and am also pleasantly surprised to hear there is some interest. I think this approach may be the most expeditious way to put something in place at least for the interim. (On a side note, I urge people not to let the term "c-clerk" catch on. It sounds like stuttering, or someone not good enough to be an A-level clerk. More importantly, it would be quite an obscure jargon term.) isaacl (talk) 23:18, 2 December 2024 (UTC) To that end, upon the first appointment of correspondence clerks, the current arbcom-en mailing list shall be renamed to arbcom-en-internal, which shall continue to be accessible only by arbitrators, and a new arbcom-en email list shall be established. The subscribers to the new arbcom-en list shall be the arbitrators and correspondence clerks. Something I raised in the functionary discussion was that this doesn't make sense to me. What is the basis for this split here? Izno (talk) 00:08, 3 December 2024 (UTC) I assumed it was so that the clerks would only see the incoming email and not be privy to the entire commitee's comments on the matter. While all functionaries and arbs sign the same NDA, operating on a need to know basis is not at all uncommon in groups that deal with sensitive information. When I worked for the census we had to clear our debriefing room of literally everything because it was being used the next day by higher-ups from Washington who were visiting. They outranked all of us by several orders of mgnitude, but they had no reason to be looking at the non-anonymized personal data we had lying all over the place. Conversely it would spare the clerks from having their inboxes flooded by every single arb comment, which as you know can be quite voluminous. Just Step Sideways 00:23, 3 December 2024 (UTC) And it would also prevent them from seeing information related to themselves or something they should actively recuse on. Thryduulf (talk) 01:15, 3 December 2024 (UTC) This suggested rationale doesn't hold water: someone with an issue with a c-clerk or where they may need to recuse should just follow the normal process for an issue with an arb: to whit, kicking off arbcom-b for a private discussion. Izno (talk) 01:39, 3 December 2024 (UTC) I was thinking of material from before they were appointed, e.g. if there was a discussion involving the actions of user:Example in November and they become a c-clerk in December, they shouldn't be able to see the discussion even if the only comments were that the allegations against them are obviously ludicrous. I appreciate I didn't make this clear though. Thryduulf (talk) 02:35, 3 December 2024 (UTC) Making arbcom-en a "firewall" from the arb deliberations would inhibit the c-clerk from performing the duties listed in the motion. I cannot see how it would be workable for them to remind arbs to do the thing the electorate voluntold them to do if the c-clerk cannot see whether they have done those things (e.g. coming to a conclusion on an appeal), and would add to the overhead of introducing this secretarial position (email comes in, c-clerk forwards to -internal, arbs discussion on -internal, come to conclusion, send an email back to -en, which the c-clerk then actions back to the user on arbcom-en). This suggested rationale also does not hold water to me. Izno (talk) 01:43, 3 December 2024 (UTC) Apologies – if this was the interpretation, that's bad drafting on my part. The sole intention is that the new correspondence clerks won't see the past arbcom-en archives, which were emails sent to the committee on the understanding that only arbitrators would see those emails. C clerks will see everything that's newly sent on arbcom-en, including all deliberations held on arbcom-en, with the exception of anything that is so sensitive that the committee feels the need to restrict discussion to arbitrators (this should be fairly uncommon but covers the recusal concern above in a similar way as discussions about arbs who recuse sometimes get moved to arbcom-en-b). The C clerks will need to be able to see deliberations to be able to track pending matters and ensure that balls aren't being dropped, which could not happen unless they had access to the discussions – this is a reasonable "need to know" because they are fulfilling a function that is hard to combine with serving as an active arbitrator. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 01:54, 3 December 2024 (UTC) Well, I clearly totally misread your intent there. I.... don't think I like the idea that unelected clerks can see everything the committee is doing. Just Step Sideways 03:15, 3 December 2024 (UTC) FWIW, I oppose splitting arbcom-en a second time -- Guerillero 10:17, 3 December 2024 (UTC) Regarding 1.4, I think arbcom-en and -c are good ones for a c-clerk to have access to. -b probably doesn't need access ever, as it's used exclusively for work with recusals attached to it, which should be small enough for ArbCom to manage itself in the addition of a c-clerk. (This comment in private elicited the slight rework L235 made to the motion.) Izno (talk) 06:08, 7 December 2024 (UTC) What does this mean – when was the first time? arcticocean ■ 15:52, 10 December 2024 (UTC) @Arcticocean: In 2018, arbcom-l became arbcom-en and the archives are in two different places. -- Guerillero 18:54, 10 December 2024 (UTC) Appointing one of the sitting arbitrators as "Coordinating Arbitrator" (motion 3) would be my recommended first choice of solution. We had a Coordinating Arbitrator—a carefully chosen title, as opposed to something like "Chair"—for a few years some time ago. It worked well, although it was not a panacea, and I frankly don't recollect why the coordinator role was dropped at some point. If there is a concern about over-reliance or over-burden on any one person, the role could rotate periodically (although I would suggest a six-month term to avoid too much time being spent on the mechanics of selecting someone and transitioning from one coordinator to the next). At any given time there should be at least one person on a 15-member Committee with the time and the skill-set to do the necessary record-keeping and nudging in addition to arbitrating, and this solution would avoid the complications associated with bringing another person onto the mailing list. I think there would be little community appetite for involving a WMF staff member (even one who is or was also an active Wikipedian) in the Committee's business; and if we are going to set the precedent of paying someone to handle tasks formerly handled by volunteers, with all due respect to the importance of ArbCom this is not where I would start. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:32, 3 December 2024 (UTC) Thanks for your comments. Regarding little community appetite – that is precisely why we are inviting community input here on this page, as one way to assess how the community feels about the various options. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 02:01, 3 December 2024 (UTC) I also like the idea of an arb or two taking on this role more than another layer of clerks. I'm sure former arbs would be great at it but the committee needs to handle its own internal business. Just Step Sideways 03:37, 3 December 2024 (UTC) I think it is ideal for the arbitration committee to track its own work items and prompt its members for timely action, and may have written this some time ago on-wiki. However... years have passed now, and the arbitration committee elections aren't well-suited to selecting arbitrators with the requisite skill set (even if recruitment efforts were made, the community can only go by the assurance of the candidate regarding the skills they possess and the time they have available). So I think it's worth looking at the option of keeping an arbitrator involved in an emeritus position if they have shown the aptitude and availability to help with administration. This could be an interim approach, until another solution is in place (maybe there can be more targeted recruiting of specific editors who, by their ongoing Misplaced Pages work, have demonstrated availability and tracking ability). isaacl (talk) 18:01, 3 December 2024 (UTC) 2 and 4 don't seem like very good ideas to me. For 2, I think we need to maintain a firm distinction between community and WMF entities, and not do anything that even looks like blending them together. For 4, every time you involve money in something, you multiply your potential problems by a factor of at least ten (and why should that person get paid, when other people who contribute just as much time doing other things don't, and when, for that matter, even the arbs themselves don't?). For 1, I could see that being a good idea, to take some clerical/"grunt work" load off of ArbCom and give them more time for, well, actually arbitrating, and functionaries will all already have signed the NDA. I don't have any problem with 3, but don't see why ArbCom can't just do it if they want to; all the arbs already have access to the information in question so it's not like someone is being approved to see it who can't already. Seraphimblade 01:49, 3 December 2024 (UTC) @CaptainEek: Following up on your comments on motion 1, depending on which aspect of the proposed job one wanted to emphasize, you could also consider "amanuensis," "registrar," or "receptionist." (The best on-wiki title in my opinion, though we now are used to it so the irony is lost, will always be "bureaucrat"; I wonder who first came up with that one.) Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:49, 4 December 2024 (UTC) Or "cat-herder". --Tryptofish (talk) 00:18, 5 December 2024 (UTC) Following parliamentary tradition, perhaps "whip". (Less whimsically: "recording secretary".) isaacl (talk) 00:31, 5 December 2024 (UTC) @Newyorkbrad:, if memory serves @Keegan: knows who came up with it, and as I recall the story was that they wanted to come up with the most boring, unappealing name they could so not too many people would be applying for it all the time. Just Step Sideways 05:03, 10 December 2024 (UTC) So, just to usher in a topic-specific discussion because it has been alluded to many times without specifics being given, what was the unofficial position of ArbCom coordinator like? Who held this role? How did it function? Were other arbitrators happy with it? Was the Coordinator given time off from other arbitrator responsibilities? I assume this happened when an arbitrator just assumed the role but did it have a more formal origin? Did it end because no one wanted to pick up the responsibility? Questions, questions. Liz 06:56, 6 December 2024 (UTC) I cannot speak for anything but my term. I performed this role for about 1.5 years of the 2 I was on the committee. To borrow an email I sent not long before I stepped off that touches on the topics in this whole set of motions (yes, this discussion isn't new): Daily, ~20 minutes: went into the list software and tagged the day's incoming new email chains with a label (think "upe", "duplicate", etc). Daily, ~10 minutes: took care of any filtered emails on the list (spam and not-spam). Monthly, 1-2 hours: trawled the specific categories of tags since the beginning of the month to add to an arbwiki page for tracking for "needs to get done". Did the inverse also (removed stuff from tracking that seemed either Done or Stale). Monthly, 15 minutes to prep: sent an email with a direct list of the open appeals and a reminder about the "needs doing" stuff (and a few months I highlighted a topic or two that were easy wins). This built off the daily work in a way that would be a long time if it were all done monthly instead of daily. I was also an appeals focused admin, which had further overhead here that I would probably put in the responsibility of this kind of arb. Other types of arbs probably had similar things they would have wanted to do this direction but I saw very little of such. Daily for this effort, probably another 15 minutes or so: I copy-pasted appeal metadata from new appeals email to arbwiki Started countdown timers for appeals appearing to be at consensus Sent "easy" boilerplate emails e.g. "we got this appeal, we may be in touch" or "no way Jose you already appealed a month ago" Sent results for the easy appeals post-countdown timer and filled in relevant metadata (easy appeals here usually translated to "declined" since this was the quick-n-easy daily work frame, not the long-or-hard daily work frame) (End extract from referenced email.) This second set is now probably a much-much lighter workload with the shedding of most CU appeals this year (which was 70% of the appeals by count during my term), and I can't say how much of this second group would be in the set of duties depending on which motion is decided above (or if even none of the motions are favored by the committee - you can see I've advocated for privately documenting the efforts of coordinating arbs rather than publicly documenting them regarding 3, and it wouldn't take much to get me to advocate against 2 and 4, I just know others can come to the right-ish conclusion on those two already; I'm pretty neutral on 1). Based on the feedback I got as I was going out the door, it was appreciated. I did see some feedback that this version of the role was insufficiently personal to each arb. The tradeoff for doing something more personalized to each other arb is either time or software (i.e. money). I did sometimes occasionally call out when other members had not yet chimed in on discussions. That was ad hoc and mostly focused on onwiki matters (case votes particularly), but occasionally I had to name names when doing appeals work because the arbs getting to the appeal first were split. In general the rest of the committee didn't name names (which touches on some discussion above). I think some arbs appreciated seeing their name in an email when they were needed. I was provided no formal relief from other matters. But as I discussed with one arb during one of the stressful cases of the term, I did provide relief informally for the duration of that case to that person for the stuff I was interested in, so I assume that either I in fact had no relief from other matters, or that I had relief but didn't know it (and just didn't ask for anyone else to do it - since I like to think I had it well enough in hand). :-) The committee is a team effort and not everyone on the team has the same skills, desire, or time to see to all other matters. (The probing above about arbs being insufficiently active is a worthwhile probe, to be certain.) To go further though, I definitely volunteered to do this work. Was it necessary work? I think so. I do not know what would have happened if I had not been doing it. (We managed to hit only one public snag related to timeliness during my term, which I count as a win; opinions may differ.) There is no formal origin to the role that I know of. Someone else with longer committee-memory would have to answer whether all/recent committees have had this type, and who they were, and why if not. I don't know how much of what I did lines up with what L235 had in mind proposing these motions. I do not think the work I did covers everything listed in the motions laid out. (I don't particularly need clarification on the point - it's a matter that will fall out in post-motion discussion.) Izno (talk) 08:48, 6 December 2024 (UTC) The original announcement of the Coordinating Arbitrator position was here. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 21:29, 6 December 2024 (UTC) Archive zero: I love it! --Tryptofish (talk) 21:37, 6 December 2024 (UTC) Interestingly, that announcement also repeated the announcement at the top of the archive page that a departing arbitrator continued to assist the committee by co-ordinating the mailing list: acknowledging incoming emails and responding to senders with questions about them, and tracking issues to ensure they are resolved. So both a co-ordinator (plus a deputy!) and an arbitrator emeritus. isaacl (talk) 23:23, 6 December 2024 (UTC) former arbitrator will continue to coordinate the ArbCom mailing list. was probably a statement along the lines of "knows how to deal with Mailman". And I think you're getting that role mixed up with the actual person doing the work management: the Arbitration Committee has decided to appoint one of its sitting arbitrators to act as coordinator (emphasis mine). Izno (talk) 23:46, 6 December 2024 (UTC) Obviously I have no personal knowledge of what ended up happening. I just listed the responsibilities as described at Misplaced Pages:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard/Archive 0 § Improving ArbCom co-ordination. I'm not sure what I'm getting mixed up; all I said is that a co-ordinator and deputy were appointed, and that a former arbitrator was said to be co-ordinating the mailing list. It's certainly possible the split of duties changed from the first post in the archive. isaacl (talk) 00:01, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Oh, I see that now. Izno (talk) 00:04, 7 December 2024 (UTC) I think I agree with Izno regarding the coordinating arbitrator role. There's no problem letting the community that the role exists, but I don't think it's necessary for the role's responsibilities to be part of the public-facing guarantees being made to the community. If the role needs to expand, shrink, split into multiple roles, or otherwise change, the committee should feel free to just do it as needed. The committee has the flexibility to organize itself as it best sees fit. isaacl (talk) 23:36, 6 December 2024 (UTC) I think this is the right approach. It doesn't need to be advertised who is coordinating activity on the mailing list, it just needs to get done. If it takes two people, fine, if they do it for six months and say they want out of the role, ask somebody else to do it. And so on. Just Step Sideways 23:50, 6 December 2024 (UTC) For instance, I don't think it's necessary to codify whether or not the coordinating arbitrator role is permanent. Just put a task on the schedule to review how the role is working out in nine months, and then modify the procedure accordingly as desired. isaacl (talk) 23:32, 9 December 2024 (UTC) One exception: the first bullet point regarding responding to communications and assigning a tracking identifier does involve the committee's interactions with the community. I feel, though, that for flexibility these guarantees can be made without codifying who does them, from the community's point of view. (It's fine of course to make them part of the coordinating arbitrator's tasks.) isaacl (talk) 23:41, 6 December 2024 (UTC) Izno, this actually sounds like a helluva lot of work, maybe not minute-wise but mental, keeping track of everything so requests don't fall through the cracks. I think anyone assuming this role should get a break from, say, drafting ARBCOM cases if nothing else. Liz 03:49, 7 December 2024 (UTC) It might be a lot of work, but it wasn't the bulk of the work, even for the work that I was doing. There was a lot more steps to being the appeal-focused admin above. Izno (talk) 04:02, 7 December 2024 (UTC) You made me laugh, Liz. That sounds like my normal start-of-day routine, to be accompanied by a cup of tea and, perhaps, a small breakfast. I'd expect most arbitrators to be reading the mail on a daily basis, unless they are inactive for some reason; the difference here is the tagging/flagging of messages and clearing the filters, which probably adds about 10-12 minutes. I'll simply say that any arb who isn't prepared to spend 30-45 minutes/day reading emails probably shouldn't be an arb. That's certainly a key part of the role. Risker (talk) 04:43, 7 December 2024 (UTC) +1. In my thoughts to potential candidates I said an hour a day for emails but that included far more appeals than the committee gets now. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 04:47, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Never mind reading emails, the bulk of my private ArbCom time was spent on processing them: doing checks, reporting results, and otherwise responding to other work. You can get away with just reading internal emails, but it's going to surprise your fellow arbs if you don't pipe up with some rational thought when you see the committee thinking about something personally objectionable and the first time they hear about it is when motions have been posted and are waiting for votes. Izno (talk) 06:17, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Right now, I check my email account about once a week. I guess that will change if I'm elected to the committee. It would have helped to hear all of these details before the election. Liz 08:41, 7 December 2024 (UTC) My hour included time to respond to emails, though I also note you're not going particularly deep on anything with that time (at least when ArbCom had more appeals). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:26, 7 December 2024 (UTC) Now that I'm off the committee and have had a moment to compile some fairly accurate stats, here was the committee's email load over the last four years: 2024: 6435 emails in 1040 distinct threads 2023: 7826 emails in 1093 distinct threads 2022: 7679 emails in 1103 distinct threads 2021: 9687 emails in 1271 distinct threads These are undercounts of the true email load, because this only counts the main arbcom-en list and not the clerks-l, arbcom-en-b, and arbcom-en-c lists, all of which are used for ArbCom-related purposes. But hopefully this gives a general flavor for why, when I was on the committee, I viewed better managing the email workflow as a priority for the committee. My guess would be that these email rates are substantially higher than most, and quite possibly all, other volunteer-driven committees within the Wikimedia movement. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:51, 3 January 2025 (UTC) By the way, I just did some counting and clerks-l had 2724 emails in the four-year period between 2021 and 2024 — which is substantially down from the average rate from when I was a clerk. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:54, 3 January 2025 (UTC) Currently, motion 3 passes and other motions fail. If there is no more !votes in 3 days, I think this case can be closed. Kenneth Kho (talk) 17:31, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

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