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]
'''Request for arbitration''' is the last step of ]. Before requesting arbitration, please review ] you should take. If you do not follow any of these routes, it is highly likely that your request will be rejected. If all other steps have failed, and you see no reasonable chance that the matter can be resolved in another manner, you may request that it be decided by the ].
]

{{clearright}}
{{dispute-resolution}}
{{ArbComOpenTasks}}

The procedure for accepting requests is described in the ]. If you are going to make a request here, you must be brief and cite supporting diffs. New requests to the top, please. You are required to place a notice on the user talk page of each person you lodge a complaint against.

'''0/0/0/0''' corresponds to Arb Com member votes to '''accept/ reject/ ]/ other'''.

This is not a page for discussion, and Arbitrators may summarily remove or refactor discussion without comment.

*]
*] (shortcut ])
*]
*]
*]

== How to list cases ==
Under the below '''Current requests''' section:

*''Click "";''
*''Copy the full formatting '''template''' (text will be visible in edit mode), ommitting the lines which say "BEGIN" and "END TEMPLATE";''
*''Paste template text where it says "ADD CASE BELOW";''
*''Follow instructions on comments (indented), and fill out the form;''
*''Remove the template comments (indented).''

''Note: Please do not remove or alter the hidden template''



= Current requests =
----
<!-- // BEGIN TEMPLATE - copy text below (not this line) //
== Case name ==
(Title for case - use names of defendants)
===Involved parties===
(Provide links to the user page of each party and to all accounts they have edited with. Briefly summarize case. No details.)

; Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
(Provide diffs showing where parties other than the initiating parties have been informed about the request for arbitration.)

; Confirmation that other steps in ] have been tried
(''If not, then explain why that would be fruitless'')

===Statement by party 1===
(Please limit your statement to 500 words)

===Statement by party 2===
(Please limit your statement to 500 words)

===Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/0/0/0)===
// END TEMPLATE - copy text above (not this line) // -->
<!-- ADD CASE BELOW -->

== Regarding the 2004 U.S. presidential election controversy ==
===Involved parties===
Most prominantly ], although others are involved.

; Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
On his talk page.

; Confirmation that other steps in ] have been tried
(''If not, then explain why that would be fruitless'')
This dispute has been ongoing for well over a year, and is a dispute of wilful POV pushing and revert warring. Among the contributors is Kevin Baas, who narrowly escaped a previous arbcom case. The issue has appeared on the mailing list, and numerous editors have already weighed in.

===Statement by Snowspinner===
] and its associated sub-articles have been drowning in original research, POV, and edit warring since their creation. So far an astonishing 50,000 words have been written on the matter, all meticulously sourced. However, the sourcing is overwhelmingly towards nonnotable and POV sources, and the articles have been tightly controlled by their creators so as to stifle any attempts at dissent, including addition of NPOV and original research tags. The result has been to keep mostrously bad work on Misplaced Pages that stands in violation of numerous policies. Most flagrant in this has been ], who has added copyvio material to the article and persistantly refused to acknowledge the existence of an NPOV dispute, defending all sources, including things such as treating ], the founder of Ben and Jerry's, as a notable source on election fraud, the use of partisan blogs as a major source, and the production of original research through novel aggregation of facts. Simply put, the articles have grown unmanagably bad, and none of the tools offered to editors are making a significant effort in fixing them - I ask for the arbcom to put some rules on articles that will allow editors invested in NPOV to do the gut-editing these articles need without sparking yet another revert war. ] 18:50, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

====Ammendment====

I would think that , Several of , , (Particularly the second), and some variation on the "cite sources" policy, although none of the listed principles apply.

Particular tactics of stonewalling and edit warring that seem to me greivously offensive are the removal of NPOV tags despite a well-stated dispute (I did not revert war this point) as with . (Note that a list of every problematic citation has been on the talk page for quite a while now). Also problematic is the insistence on leaving bad information in place until it is fixed instead of removing badly sourced and POV material and reconstructing the article from there - in other words, an insistence on leaving the article in its POV and bad form until the task of creating a "perfect" article is finished. Examples of this mentality are at and . Further problematic is the usage of a GAO report as direct source material for the article - paragraphs were copied wholesale into the article. This is not copyvio (The GAO report is public domain), but it's still the importation of original research, and the entire thing was quoted to a Wired Magazine article instead of directly to the report.

Aggressively reverting all attempts to tag an article with a dispute tag or to remove material that is sourced to extremist blogs and ice cream moguls is a violation of policies. Since it's a dispute with quite a few editors, an article content RfC would be most appropriate, which consists of a link to the article - two VfDs on the entire block of articles and a mailing list post have clearly directed enough outside editors. As is usually the case with situations like this, the outside editors made a noble effort, got reverted, and wandered off to do other things.

That enough specific evidence of policy issues? ] 16:52, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

====Response to Fred====

I do not think it is primarily a content dispute - the case it most resembles is the first Lyndon LaRouche case - in fact, the central issue with the provided sources (Reliance on mutually self-referential sources from a minor and extremist point of view) is identical in both cases. But it is, to my mind, a dispute over the application of several policies - NPOV, NOR, as well as article ownership. It's certainly nothing that hasn't been dealt with by the arbcom before - see and for examples of cases that have similar relationships to content. ] 17:52, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
:The question of the reliability of sources remains unsettled. Unreliable sources may not be used, reliable sources may be, but the location of the dividing line is uncertain. It may depend on context. ] 19:32, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
::Have a look at - at least my first post in that thread, in which I go over all 68 of the sources. Among the things being used are Green Party press releases, geocities pages, webforum threads, blog posts, and several citations to Michael Moore, all made without crediting the claims in any sort of "Michael Moore alledges" way. ] 20:18, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by Carbonite===
The main problem with these articles (see ] for a mostly complete list) is that they grew extremely fast and were quickly considered "owned" by a tiny group of editors. Attempts to remove even the most trivial of information are usually met with reverts and demands to justify all changes. I strongly urge the ArbCom to accept arbitration on this matter. ] | ] 19:24, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

===Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/3/1/1)===
* Recuse. ] 22:44, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
* Reject. The Committee is not your mother. There is not enough substance to this. ] ] 13:40, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
* Reject, without prejudice. Come back when you have a better statement of what conduct is violating what policy. Conclusive pleadings will not be accepted. May I suggest a ]? ] (]) 13:42, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
*Reject, as per Kelly. ] ] 13:51, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
*My feeling is that you are asking us to engage in a policy debate ] 16:47, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

== ], ], and ] ==
===Involved parties===
I request a merge to the previous case on Onefortyone seeking an addendum stating that Wyss and Ted Wilkes lay off 141. In my personal opinion they have been harassing him, and I've seen them go out of their way to revert him. ]]] (]) 02:56, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

; Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
*
*
*

; Confirmation that other steps in ] have been tried

Well, this very step has been tried by Ted Wilkes it seems. He has tried to RfAr Fred Bauder over this all. I would like to get a wiki-restraining order between Onefortyone and the two others. ]]] (]) 02:56, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by party 1===
(Please limit your statement to 500 words)

===Statement by party 2===
<i>The filer of this RfAr has taken no steps towards any sort of dispute resolution or mediation and contrary to the template instructions, has declined to explain why he thinks such efforts would be presumably fruitless</i>. Meanwhile, 141 is currently on probation for abusive editing practices and tactics. I was mistaken in my initial impression that he'd been prohibited from editing celebrity articles because I misinterpreted some related edit summaries before before being contacted by Fred Bauder and reading the arbcom decision for myself. After I was contacted by Fred Bauder that single time, I never touched the articles again. Aside from Fred Bauder, ''nobody has ever meaningfully contacted me about my behaviour towards 141 in the past''. I think it's because few really care about the inclusion of unsupported gossip in celebrity articles... it is rather boring, truth be told. Anyway I'm always open to helpful suggestions in these efforts to stabilize the articles involved.

Arbcom members are respectfully requested not to conflate past issues concerning 141 with my recent attempts to explain Ted Wilkes' long and extremely unpopular RfAr against Fred Bauder on the project talk page. Given the timing of this RfAr, I'm convinced that the filer has included me in it as backhanded punishment for my commentary concerning Ted Wilkes' above-mentioned RfAr. I have informed the filer that this is a blatant, abusive breach of WP policy and that I am deeply unhappy about it. This RfAr is not necessary since any active admin or bureaucrat can contact me on my talk page and politely ask me to desist from any given behaviour and I more than likely will.

As for ], with whom I cannot remember having had any contact in the past, readers will please note that I began using metaphors (which he cites below) only after he and others had begun directing sarcasm at me on this project's talk page. I was trying to lightheartedly diffuse that by repeating back their metaphors myself in my replies. For example, Calton was the first to use the ''signal-to-noise-ratio'' metaphor, as a reference to wordiness. Later, he posted the following note to me, which I think speaks for itself.

::I write short words. You not grasp sense, but throw dirt in its place. But you ask Fred and others to grasp very long words by Ted. This make no sense. This called "double standard." You use long words wrong (like "vandalism") even when people tell you it is wrong. You call people "trolls" for when they say you are wrong. This called "bad faith."

::I write short words. You not grasp sense, but throw dirt in its place. I say I will write with big letters and short words. I say I will send to you so you can grasp sense. You still not grasp sense but throw more dirt, so I make more clear now. See?

::Where can I mail notes to you? I will use as many stamps as I need. --] | ] 04:55, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

Because Misplaced Pages's applied sourcing methodologies are not at academic levels across the encyclopedia I will no longer be participating in this project. ] 16:27, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by party 3===
] falsely accused me of spamdexing and childish vandalism. See ] and ]. Significantly, user Wyss and Ted Wilkes are frequently accusing me of being a spammer, a vandal, a liar, a troll, of fabricating texts, etc. See ], , etc. etc. Ted Wilkes has repeatedly deleted paragraphs from talk and article pages. See , , , , . He deleted a new paragraph written by me on Elvis's consumption of drugs calling this paragraph a "continued diatribe" and a "mass of personal opinions, snide or derogatory allusions", though he himself had suggested this section. See and . He even falsely claimed to have moved content from the Talk:Elvis Presley/Homosexuality page to the Talk:Elvis Presley/Sexuality page, but the content has been totally deleted by him. See . Wyss accused administrator ] of being a troll. See and . Both Ted Wilkes and Wyss are denigrating all books and articles I have used for my Misplaced Pages contributions. They are constantly reverting my edits, which are supported by several independent, and published, sources, presumably because these sources are not in line with their personal view. For instance, they have repeatedly called reputed biographer ], which was one of my sources, a gossip book writer, referring to a positive ''Guardian'' review which actually said "For bitchy, witty and perceptive high-class gossip about Hollywood, there was no better source than the critic, screenwriter, novelist and biographer Gavin Lambert." See also ]. Ted Wilkes repeatedly violated the 3RR in the past and was blocked for doing so. See ]. Significantly, another user stated on the ] page: "what I find weird is that whenever someone writes something 'bad' about Elvis ( be it drug abuse, derogatory nicknames, sexual orientation or the way he died ), somehow the 'system' prevents those things from staying there for too long." See . There are similar deleting tactics by ]. See , , ,
, , , , , .
For a discussion of Wyss's deleting tactics, see ]. The blanket reversions continue. Recently, contributions by administrator ] were also reverted by Wyss and Ted Wilkes. See , , and ]. ] 04:24, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

I am now providing diffs that show both Wyss and Wilkes of harrassing Onefortyone ''after'' arbitration closed on 3 November 2005:
*On 6 November, Ted Wilkes falsely claimed that I had violated probation. He says, "I removed your improper edit regarding the Memphis Mafia. Your actions here and fabrication at ] are unacceptable. See ].
*Since 8 November, Ted Wilkes and Wyss repeatedly reverted my contributions to the ] article referring to the Arbitration Committee ruling. See , , , . Wyss was even asking in his edit summary, "why hasn't this user been blocked as per the arbcom ruling?" Administrator ] reinstated most parts of my edits (see ), but his contributions were also repeatedly reverted by Ted Wilkes. See and ].
*Since 7 November, there were also numerous reverts by Ted Wilkes and Wyss of my contributions to the ] page. See , , . Wyss falsely claimed in his edit summary that he was reverting "edits by user who has been banned from editing celebrity articles". See . Ted Wilkes even removed the version by administrator ]. See , .
*Since 8 November, both Ted Wilkes and Wyss were reverting my contributions to the ] article. See , , , . Wilkes also reverted the version by administrator ]. See ,

Here are some diffs that show ''anyone'' attempting good faith efforts to resolve these cases of harrassment after they occurred:
*] page: , , , .
*] page: , , , . . ] 22:12, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

On 18 November 2005, ] still accused me on his talk page of having used the rumours section of an article "as a wedge from which to seed Elvis Presley with Google-friendly keywords which would lead to tabloid books by David Brent." See . Such an absurd accusation clearly shows that Wyss is not really willing to put an end to the edit war with me. ] 21:55, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by ]===
I find Wyss' statement that he'll knock off his misapplication of Onefortyone's probation if asked by an admin to be more than a little disingenuous, considering

*that he HAS been notified by an admin, Fred Bauder.
*that he is being notified of his misapprehension of the probation '''by one of the people who actually crafted it''', so therefore might be expected to have first-hand knowledge of what it means.
*that he falsely characterizes Fred Bauder's post as a threat of ArbCom, since what it actually says is ''I think complaints are justified. If he took you to arbitration over this I would vote to accept the case'', which is a (in my opinion accurate) characterization of Wyss's behavior and its potential consequences.

--] | ] 04:13, 17 November 2005 (UTC)



'''Addendum''': I'll note that Wyss's addition doesn't respond to s single one of the points I raised, in addition to throwing in an out-of-context quote. He left off the preceding posts, whereby he, despite claiming that the ArbCom members are expected to plow through all 3,000 words of Ted Wilkes' request below and sift for the nuggets of meaning...

::''And petitioners who can't take the time to read that their statements should be 500 words in length and at least arrive in the ballpark of that should be rejected out of hand. If there's a complaint, phrase it coherently - don't expect the arbcom to be psychic. ] 00:03, 17 November 2005 (UTC)''

:::''I'm not sure psychic powers are part of the required skill set for reading, but maybe Ted Wilkes can edit it down when he has a chance. ] 00:09, 17 November 2005 (UTC)''

...he then, in groundlessly questioning my qualification to comment (''...have you familiarized yourself with the background on this or are you only guessing?''), he professes to not understand my simple 92-word answer (''Could you please be more specific about the background materials you've checked into? Your own signal-to-noise ratio got rather high in that last post'') AND its bullet-pointed follow-up.

In other words, he's being disingenuous and evasive, and it appears to be his normal operating mode. He certainly lacks any standing to complain about sarcasm, given his liberal use of it. --] | ] 06:57, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by ] re wyss wilkes and onefortyone===
] closed on 3 November 2005. Please provide diffs that show both Wyss and Wilkes of "harrassing" onefortyone ''after'' arbitration closed. (A brief look at the statement by onefortyone shows that most diffs of alleged bad behaviour occur in September or October.) Then please provide diffs that show ''anyone'' attempting good faith efforts to resolve these alleged cases of harrassment after they occurred. No, a request for arbitration by Wyss or Wilkes against Fred Bauder does not satisfy either an example of harrassment against onefortyone or an attempt to resolve said harrassment.

Furthermore, FredBauder is far too involved with these editors to accept or reject this request for arbitration against Wyss and Wilkes. Fred should have recused himself from Wilkes's RFA against him, and he should ''clearly'' recuse himself from this one. That he accepted this RFA against Wilkes and Wyss without a single diff showing either editor actually harassing onefortyone or a single diff showing anyone actually trying to resolve the alleged behaviour is telling.

This whole thing has gotten out of hand, to the point that numerous editors have gotten emotionally involved. And I mean "numerous". And I don't mean "everyone you percieve to be the enemy here". Given a complete lack of evidence of misbehaviour, a complete lack evidence of any real attempt to resolve the alleged misbehaviour, and the acceptance by a member of arbcom who has a clear conflict of interest, I call a time out and a cooling off period. Everyone gets to go to their respective corners and chill out for a while. Because this is looking far more like someone is getting railroaded than any sort of legitimate attempt to resolve a real dispute. ] 06:42, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

(update) user onefortyone has provided some diffs that have occurred since the arbcom case has closed. All the dates for the diffs occur in November, so I'm just going to provide the diffs with just the date of the month in them. This is what it looks like when laid out sequentially.

evidence of disputed behaviour:

attempts to resove dispute:

So, pretty much all the diffs of disputed behaviour occurred ''before'' anyone attempted to resolve the dispute. The two attempts to resolve on the 11th were both by the same person, JackofOz, which doesn't meet the RfC requrement and they're fairly indirect attempts. Assuming you count those attempts, you're looking at a total of four diffs of alleged harrassment that occurred on or after the 11th . I don't know how much of a stickler arbcom is, but four edits doesn't seem to warrant their attention. The serious attempts to resolve the dispute seem to have occurred on teh 13th, when Kelly Martin weighs in and clarifies an arbcom ruling (Wyss or Wilkes or both cited the arbcom ruling in some of their edits that are cited as alleged harrassment. I don't know what the ruling was, but it would seem that whatever Kelly told them, plus multiple attempts to resolve the issue, cleared things up and resolved whatever problem existed). There are no diffs of alleged harrassment provided that occur after the 13th. Personally, I would declare that the attempts to resolve the dispute on the 13th, did in fact, ''resolve'' the dispute. Can we move on now? ] 22:55, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

===Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (3/0/0/0)===
* Accept ] 04:46, 17 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept (as an addenndum to the original 141 case seems sensible). ] ] 13:28, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ] (]) 14:54, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

== EffK, formerly known as Famekeeper ==
===Involved parties===
*], complaining party (party 1)

*], defendant
*], defendant

This editor has been engaging in an extended effort to use Misplaced Pages to present a theory of ] complicity in and active support of ]. This effort has involved personal attacks on other editors, accusations of bad faith (including that other editors are acting as agents of the Vatican), and using article talk pages as a soapbox.

; Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
Defendant's response shows that he is aware of the request. ] 12:41, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

; Confirmation that other steps in ] have been tried
A user conduct Request for Comments was posted in July 2005. The link has been deleted from the user conduct RfC page, but the RfC itself is available at ]. The RfC summarizes the previous steps that were taken prior to posting the RfC.

===Statement by party 1===
The RfC contains a summary of the conduct in question.

Also see the following diff of a frivolous request by the editor in question to ban another editor: http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration&diff=27989592&oldid=27748413

===Statement by party 2===
Concurrent to this RfA I posted ] my sole disputant, ] ,],]] - ],],], and to Robert Mcclenon ( talk )(false mediator ] ,],] , ] ,] ,] , ]. See :] , updated talk at ]

McClenon does not understand , ],],]], ] the sources ] of my bulk contributions ]],],]],], and WP corrections , ] ,]], ] , nor my real disputant : ],] ,]](] ,, McC thinks or pretends that I represent a vandalous attacker upon the church, when I bring only published source ],]

I have never wanted to give an email to WP , and so cookie-loss means I changed name variations.

As to Str1977 , pages ], ] and ] for today 17 November 2005 , will show that an ''anon'' & Str1977 , after a 3/4 year edit-war cf: ] ,], has accepted the gist of my sources ] ,and NPOV ]. I believe that WP has finally enabled me to correct the Str1977 ,and , after irksome discourse (filibustering to McClenon) I have repaired serious fault in WP .

Str1977 by present allowance of my edits which he consistently removed (in provocative manner ] ,] ,],], ]) over 12 months , the same day that Mcclenon starts this RfA , proves the RfA a form of ''ad hominem'' ,illustrating the WP faith problem] better than my supposed crime.

This is McClenon's second case against me (RfC) & I signed , a day late an RfC against him as lying bully . I take no pleasure here ],] , nor enjoy intellectual provocation and denial of source by means solely of the two users' ''interpretation'' ] .

I believe this RfA is last ditch attempt to remove the accusations made by the world ] at large ], ] , ] from Misplaced Pages , following from my demands that ] ,the opposition ( my good friend nevertheless ], ], Str1977 ]] ''put up or shut up'' . The ''new'' allowance of my edits to remain within the above articles , is the result.

My blocker ],] has always been Str1977, who hopefully has stopped the denialism ]] ] . I was suggested by Jimbo to leave , I did for 2 months, WP deteriorated as I proved and I came back because three users , one Str1977 started posting "FK research" , my location by country , and shared accusatory condemnation of me in WP, calling me a paranoid schizophrenic conspiracy theorist with writing disability ].

'''All these users should be admonished''' .

This ] ] , thorniest historical issue is defended here by actual '''denialism'' , ] ,] , of source ]],] something reflected in greater cyberspace . I openly claimed recently there is not one political error I have made so far . I unknowingly concurrently of this RfA sought an apology from McClenon and congratulate Str1977 on final good sense in accepting my NPOV . Links may follow. ] 01:37, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

===Caveat===

At the moment let me just note
*that EffK's statement about our agreement are wrong. Some things he has posted I have never disputed, while other things I continue to dispute. To say we have reached an agreement or that I have accepted the gist is untrue, unless he has suddenly withdrawn his theories. Hence I place doubt upon the congratulations.
*that EffK is far from having made no error (I don't know what "political" means here
*that I was not EffK/Famekeeper's sole disputant, though the main one. Other editor, e.g. ] were involved with him as well.
*that I meant no harm in posting "FK Research" - it was basically a reaction to his inquisitiveness about personal details of other editors (Robert McClenon in particular), his own seclusiveness in that matter and his insistence on being a native speaker.

I don't know whether this is the right place to post this. If it isn't, please drop me a line and show where I should place this. ] 10:05, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

===Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (2/0/1/0)===
* Accept. ] ] 13:30, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ] (]) 14:55, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
* Recuse (Wikinfo editor) ] 19:34, 19 November 2005 (UTC)



== ] ==

===Involved parties===
* ]
and
* ]
* ]
* ]

====Brief summary====
] repeatedly places content at ], despite consensus that it be merged/redirected to ] and ].

====Confirmation of awareness of request====
Notices were placed on the following pages:
* ] -
* ] -
* ] -
* ] -
* ] -
* As I'm the one filing the RFArb, I can be assumed to be aware of it without a note on my user page.

===Previous attempts at ]===
Extensive discussion has been held on the following pages. In all cases, the consensus was that any new content in ] should be merged into ] and/or ], with ] itself being a redirect to one of these pages.
* ]
* ]
* ]
Additional attempts to explain to ] what the rationale for the merge/redirect was were made on:
* ]
Additional correspondence has occurred via email. If users choose to quote it, it can be put in their statements.

===Statement by ]===
I became aware of ] when it appeared on ] as a page needing cleanup. At that point, it had been merged/redirected to ] at least twice. After surveying the associated conversation threads on ] and ], I concluded that it did indeed appear to be duplicate material, and reverted to the most recent redirect page. Since then, it has been repeatedly restored by ] and reverted by other users.

], ], and others have tried to explain to ] that a duplication of material from ] and ] really isn't a good idea, that he should expand those two articles if he feels they aren't sufficiently thorough, and have requested that he improve his fact-checking, spelling, and grammar both in ] and in his changes to ] and ]. I've stayed out of this.

I received Misplaced Pages-relayed email on 15 Nov. 2005 from ] accusing me of malicious vandalism. I attempted to explain relevant Misplaced Pages policies regarding duplication of content. While he hasn't called me names since then, comments on ] indicate that other users have been called similar things by him. --] 04:33, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

* Point of clarification: I've started an RFC, as suggested by ], but I have strong doubts that it will accomplish much. It may give formal approval to getting an admin to lock ] in redirect form, but ] has already spent much effort attempting to modify ] in ways that other editors have not considered appropriate, indicating that his disputed editing activities are not limited to the ] article. The reason that I went straight to RFArb is that I do not think that ] will accept instructions to change his ways unless they have the ArbCom's backing. Several editors, including myself, have repeatedly tried to point him at the relevant policies and explain matters already (per talk page cites above). This does not appear to have had any substantial impact. --] 21:31, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

* Additional diff showing ]'s resistance to Misplaced Pages process, and disrespect for other Misplaced Pages users:
: Choice quotes include:

: ''What have here is some immature megalomanic , no good kids with an unreasonable and rationaly absurd, attitude trying to inflate their ego by abusing me,and doing me wrong (...)''

: ''What you did was stupid, rationaly absurd, abusive arbritary, and wrong. You merely showed that you are immature , megalomaniac (...)''

===Statement by ]===
(Please limit your statement to 500 words)
The other partys in this dispute have been wrongly deleting and redirecting an article, I wrote in wickipedia called A-Bomb. I want this article restored as a stand alone article in wickipedia. I seek to enforce my right to have my own A-bomb article , which is separate from the nuclear weapons article, and the nuclear weapon design articles in wickipedia.

That is all I want. That it is alll I seek here. I want the other parties to this dispute to leave my A-bomb article in wickipedia alone. The other partys in this dispute have no right to insist that their nuclear weapons articles be the only wickipedia articles about nuclear weapons. They have no right to act like malicous vandals by deleting, and redirecting my A-bomb article. If I were to delete and redirect their nuclear weapons article,again , and again in order to insist that my A-bomb article be the only one in wickepedia , and their articles be deleted, and redirected in favor of my A-bomb article : I would be doing them a wrong. I demand that the wrong doing of the other partys in this dispute against me me ,and against my A-bomb article be ended. Tmayes1999

===Statement by ]===
The user has a somewhat fundamental misunderstanding about how Misplaced Pages works, both socially and technically (so far, is the best example of both issues). I began with the assumption that with a patient explanation and polite assistance the user would eventually come around and be able to channel his obvious enthusiasm into producing good content. However this does not seem to have been the case, and the user has not provided any indications of change in a positive direction or willingness to address the criticisms by others.

I second the factual account given by ] above. Though I'll admit it is a bit condescending to say, I feel a bit sorry for the editor in question because they are clearly in some way very confused, and they clearly have enthusiasm about the topic but are unable at this point to express it in a productive manner, for reasons unknown to me.

===Statement by ]===
In ] ] asked why ] had a separate article, this is when I first became involved with this issue. I stated there that as A-bomb was poorly written, full of factual errors and redundant that it should be but up for AfD and that it was my intention to do so if there was some support from other editors. The conclusion, after several exchanges, and an attempt to clean it up, was that the article should be redirected, and so it was. Detailed reasons were given to ] who failed to responded with rational counterarguments but instead only kept asserting that he wanted the A-bomb article restored. His final communication to us was as follows:
:I want my A-bomb article restored and left alone by the people who have been trying to delete it or redirect it. THAT IS ALL THAT ASK FOR . THESE PEOPLE WERE IN THE WRONG TO TAMPER WITH MY A-BOMB ARTICLE. i AM VERY ANGRY ABOUT THIS MATTER. FROM ARBRITATION : i WANT JUSTICE. I WANT THIS GREAT WRONG CORRECTED. TMAYES1999 ''(sic)''

*] 05:35, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

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

* Reject for now. Start a rfc on this. if the community agrees it's better to have A bomb as a redirect to nuclear weapon then do it and get an admin to protect the page. You don't need us to sort this one out. ] &#91;&#91;User talk:Theresa knott&#124; (a tenth stroke)]] 07:08, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
* Reject per Theresa. ] (]) 12:06, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
* Reject ] 18:25, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
* Reject. ]<sup><small><font color="DarkGreen">]</font></small></sup> 20:08, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
* Reject, far too early, as with Theresa. ] ] 13:21, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

==] and others acting in concert==

===Involved parties===
]
]
]
]
]

These editors, in various combinations and in various ways, have recently particpated in an editing war involving Misplaced Pages entries under my real name ], and the name of my employer ], both on the text pages and the discussion pages. I have been involved in editing disputes with all of these editors. The current editing war at ] and ] gives the appearance of using text entries in Misplaced Pages and discussion pages to bully another editor (me - ]) in retaliation for editing disputes. A policy regarding such situations needs to be articulated, and if appropriate, the participants named above held accountable.--] 21:01, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

; Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

*] - ]

*] - ]

*] - ]

*] - ]

*] - ]

*] - ]

; Confirmation that other steps in ] have been tried

At various times I have been in mediation or participated in requests for comments with most of these editors. I am currently in a stalled mediation with ] and a dormant mediation with ]. ] is the subject of an arbitration sanction that involved LaRouche entires in which I participated. --] 21:01, 15 November 2005 (UTC) Also sought mediation with ] and ] --] 14:14, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by Cberlet===

This case involves establishing the boundaries of proper editing and discussion behavior on Misplaced Pages when a Wiki editor is also the subject of a Wiki entry under their real name and identity. The editors named in this arbitration vary greatly in terms of their behavior, with Nobs01 having the most problematic edit history. Some other editors named have simply participated on the discussion page. All have been involved in editing conflicts with me as a Wiki editor, and then been involved in editing or discussing the entries on me and my employer.

At the heart of the case is a complicated set of questions. If individual Wiki editors are discouraged from editing entries on themselves, what policies might be appropriate to advise Wiki editors who have been in editing disputes with an editor for whom there is an entry? What are the proper boundaries when digging up negative and derogatory information about a fellow Wiki editor with whom one has had a dispute? Is there not a built in bias? Shouldn’t there be some ground rules?

Since Wiki relies on published materials, does a person attacked on Wiki need to “publish” a response to every criticism posted on some marginal website or published in some highly POV print publication? How can persons with entries on Wiki defend themselves against the posting of false, malicious, and potentially defamatory text?--] 22:12, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

], ], ] ] work as team regarding LaRouche and ]
-follow links after "user in question" who is ].

] proclaims that after his superior edits I "crapped my pants" .

] uploads distorted image to entry on ] after inserting POV into ]

After editorial content disputes with me, ] visits ] to add negative material .--] 14:37, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

], also suggests I am a government agent: "One of these editors briefly enjoyed, back in the 1980s, the status of being a cut-out for intelligence circles who were deployed against LaRouche; he has subsequently gone into well-deserved obscurity, and is now using Misplaced Pages as an attempt to relive his glory days." .

After editorial content disputes with ] and ] telling me "I suggest you chill the fuck out" I seek mediation
] visits ] to add negative material --] 14:14, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

After editorial content disputes with me, ] visits ] to add negative material --] 14:31, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by Rangerdude===

Insofar as it involves me, this request for arbitration is completely frivolous. This is a case of an editor, ], who believes he personally owns and/or controls the content of ], an article about himself in real life. In doing so he commits a violation of ]. Berlet also frequently self-cites his own material, such as in edit to the ] where he adds a link to a highly partisan ] opinion piece he authored as if it were a factual source.

As this case relates to the other editors he named, most if not all appear to have drawn Mr. Berlet's wrath by editing either his article in a way that is critical or differing with his strongly exhibited POV's on other articles. While each of these editor disputes should be analyzed individually, there is certainly no "acting in concert" between any of them and myself against Mr. Berlet. All communications I have made with any of the other editors is public on wikipedia article and user talk pages, and in the few instances I have done so with these editors, the topic was something other than Mr. Berlet. Thus, as far as I can tell, Mr. Berlet's real grievance with me is entirely drawn from the fact that he doesn't like the content I added to an article he claims as "his" own, no matter how sourced and valid that content may be.

I have participated in edits on the ] article in the past where I made counterbalancing NPOV additions. At the time I made these additions, the article was generally positive about Mr. Berlet and largely lifted from his own self-bio on his website at ]. Mr. Berlet is a vocal political figure who writes with a strong leftist editorial POV. To counterbalance this bias, I added sourced and documented criticism of Berlet by conservative columnist ] to the article as ] dictates. In seeking to comply with NPOV I also added several quotes and links to Berlet's responses to Horowitz so as to ensure his side of their dispute was aired as well. Mr. Berlet immediately reacted in hostility to this addition in a talk page post he titled "Help! Giant Blob of Horowitz hit '''my page'''" (emphasis added), which called for expunging the Horowitz criticism from the text and substituting a link to Horowitz's articles on the bottom of the page. This case is one of many where Mr. Berlet has referred to the ] article as "my page" and has tried to control its content, violating ]

Berlet made similar attempts to exercise ownership over his organization's article, ]. In a post that alleged bias against PRA, Berlet stated "We have discussed this problem at PRA, and we feel this situation needs to be addressed". In my response to this I suggested it was generally inappropriate for PRA to attempt to exercise control over an article about itself and suggested Mr. Berlet should "add to the article—not to subtract from it" if he felt that it was imbalanced against him. Mr. Berlet then responded in a post that contained hostile venom-laced attacks on persons who had criticized him and their supporters:
*"So far we have had this page taken over by...fans of a small uber-libertarian think tank the ].
*"The critics of PRA quoted include...David Horowitz, who acts as the carnival geek of the ultraconservative political right."
This same post by Berlet alsol alleged that Lyndon LaRouche activists had taken over the article, yet when I looked into this allegation I was unable to find any LaRouche edits in the article's history at least since last year if at all.

Back on ] a dispute over the size of Horowitz material followed and the page was temporarily protected until a version of the text was agreed upon. This agreement was reached between August 9th and 14th and a neutral admin removed protection.

From that time until the present I have kept the Chip Berlet article on my watchlist. When another content dispute involving other editors emerged earlier this week around November 12th or 13th, I read through the dispute and made a grand total of four talk page contributions. Two of these proposed compromises aimed at resolving the dispute and the other two urged editors whose tempers were flaring up to assume good faith . This arbitration request by Mr. Berlet stems from the November 12th-present dispute and now alleges some sort of vast conspiracy between myself and other editors to subvert articles that he appears to think he owns since they are about him. As can be plainly seen in the edit diffs indicating my involvement in this latest dispute, nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, one of the editors who is generally supportive of Mr. Berlet - SlimVirgin - even agreed with one of the suggestions I made as a possible compromise.

In light of the above, I urge the Arbcom to reject and dismiss Cberlet's request, at least as it pertains to me, as frivolous. Should the Arbcom decide to investigate it further, I would urge them to examine the ] issue as it pertains to Mr. Berlet's behavior on articles pertaining to him in real life. ] 21:57, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

====Recusal Request====
:I would also like to request that ] recuse himself from this case due to extensive past involvement in disputes involving Mr. Berlet and the propriety of using ]'s political material as sources. Jayjg's edits and stated opinions on this subject have exhibited strong support of Mr. Berlet that could potentially compromise the fairness of this case. He should accordingly recuse himself as required by Misplaced Pages's arbitration policy. Thank you in advance for compliance. ] 05:14, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by Snowspinner===

I would hope that the arbcom would take this case, as it touches on a major issue we face on Misplaced Pages, which is the treatment of expert contributors. Cberlet summarizes the situation accurately - because of his opposition to several groups - most notably our friends in the LaRouche movement - he is a target for harassment and defamation. On the one hand, as we've learned in countless cases (John Byrne, the Bogdanovs), we have to be careful about letting editors dictate the content of articles about themselves. On the other, it would be a far graver mistake to allow expert contributors to be driven off through campaigns of harassment by their political enemies. ]

:One issue that I think this case makes clear is that editing to bolster the representation of one POV is not itself a violation of NPOV - yes, Cberlet's edits unquestionably reflect his POV. But even in the example of the edits Sam cites to ], the edits seem to me to be good NPOV edits. In one case, after wholly rewriting the article, CBerlet also adds an NPOV tag to it, showing, to my mind, extraordinary concern for the policy. But the edits cited - removing inaccuracies, trimming quotes that just slander, but don't support any of the claims made in the article - these are good things to do. They do not magically become bad things based on the editor who does them. ] 16:49, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by Gamaliel===

While it's important to resist the wishes of public and semi-public figures who wish to eliminate criticism of themselves, this goes beyond that and into the realm of grudges and personal attacks. Insertions of tangental and irrelevant references to Berlet in a number of articles and screens of references to "body counts" add up to a POV pusher with a grudge against this user. ] 22:34, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by Sam Spade===

].

The charges Cberlet brings are of course absurd, and in my regards likely consist of nothing more than a recent thank you note from nobs on my talk page, and questions I asked ]. I have no idea who ] is, for example, and have had only fleeting contact w the other named parties. It would be interesting if Cberlet or my other accusers provided evidence for their claims.

I had, however, been considering bringing a case against Cberlet for his neverending POV pushing (have a glance at his contributions sometime), but I am uncertain he is so bad as to require banning.

I will examine my evidence, and his recent contributions, with what little time I have to spare during midterms, and will comment regarding a counter-suit at another juncture.

] 23:26, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

====Case against Cberlet====

Cberlet is the clearest example of POV pushing I know of on the wikipedia. I intend to make this as clear as possible.

Premises:

*] is ]
*] is notable enough for a wikipedia article
**Chip Berlet is an a opinionated journalist
**We know what Chip Berlet's POV is (roughly)
*Cberlet makes edits of the same POV as he expresses in his profession, sometimes even citing his POV.
*Cberlet's POV is not often notable

Examples:

*Cberlet cites himself
**

*Cberlet expresses his POV on his articles talk page
**

*Opinionated edits regarding his employer, ]
**, ,

While the wikipedia has many professors (or other sorts of experts on various matters) who are also editors, they are not allowed to cite ''themselves'', by name, in the article namespace; nor express their POV therein. If someone else cites them due to their notability, that is of course allowed. They should not however become interfered in such matters.

] 00:30, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

(Please limit your statement to 500 words)

===Statement by SlimVirgin===
I hope the committee will accept Cberlet's case. {{article|Chip Berlet}} was created in May 2004 by an IP address within a range known to have been used by the LaRouche accounts (] et al), who used the page as a platform for LaRouche criticism of Chip until the second LaRouche arbcom case in January 2005. In July, ] fell out with Cberlet on other pages, opened an RfC against him on July 25, and then started editing ] on July 28 (the first time he'd edited it), inserting criticism, which raised a potential legal problem of negative material being inserted with malice. (I'm currently having to defend myself, in the arbcom case against Rangerdude, against charges that I violated NPOV and AGF when I tried to stop him. ) Now ], who often edits with Rangerdude, is inserting that Chip was closely associated with "defender of terrorism," and has made comments that look like threats, implying that if we don't retain the material, he'll insert even worse, which again raises the issue of malice. "If you want to spend weeks discussing the Weather Underground, Philip Agee ... fine. In the end, you may wish the namespace only included 'an apologist and defender for terrorists and terrorism'," "The two deaths from terrorists incidents can be included to give context, if necessary," and "Mr. Berlet knows efforts to suppress documentation often lead to ''more'' documentation being presented." ] <sup><font color="Purple">]</font></sup> 01:52, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
:In fairness to Rangerdude, he has made a helpful suggestion for compromise between Nobs01 and the other editors, and hasn't backed Nobs up this time. ] <sup><font color="Purple">]</font></sup> 02:10, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by Herschelkrustofsky===


Since February of this year, I have made no edits to ] and a grand total of three edits to ]: , where I caution other editors about the use of weasel terms; , where I answer a question by Willmcw about Berlet's employment at '']'' magazine, and
(with a four word follow-up question to SlimVirgin ,) regarding the use of an advertising-style promotional photo in the article.
::''And I have added today. --] 01:27, 19 November 2005 (UTC)''

Consequently, I have reason to wonder what motivated Cberlet to include me in his request for arbitration. I also find it odd that Cberlet wishes to represent such a heterogenous grouping of editors as "acting in concert." Berlet cites two messages on my talk page from Nobs01, while omitting my response on Nobs' page; to put the matter in context, I have reconstituted the entire exchange .

As regards his case more generally, I agree with Rangerdude that this falls under ]. Misplaced Pages policy protects ] from personal attacks, but provides little protection to Chip Berlet, the public figure (an irony to be appreciated by those of us who witnessed Cberlet's repeated biting of newcomer ] in discussions over the article ].) Chip Berlet is without a doubt a public figure, although if he were as prominent in his field as Snowspinner, SlimVirgin and Willmcw insist, I should think he would have no need to spend hours each day promoting himself via Misplaced Pages. ], in his own abrasive way, attempted to argue that he should "own" the article ], and met with little sympathy. Of course, Cberlet should not need to edit the article ], because he has SlimVirgin and Willmcw as proxies to do it for him.

In the ], a unanimously adopted finding of fact was that "A strong point of view expressed elsewhere on a subject does not necessarily mean POV-pushing editing on Misplaced Pages; that can only be determined by the edits to Misplaced Pages." If this was intended to be a gentle warning to Chip Berlet/Cberlet, it has fallen on deaf ears. In the event that the ArbCom agrees to hear this case, I will pursue a counterclaim against Cberlet for:

*POV pushing
*Original research (much of the self-quoting that Cberlet has introduced into Misplaced Pages has never been published outside of his website)
*Exploitation of Misplaced Pages for commercial purposes
*Incessant violations of Wikiquette, including personal attacks (Sam Spade has already referenced some doozies.)

--] 07:39, 16 November 2005 (UTC)]

====Recusal Request====
:I would like to second Rangerdude's request that ] recuse himself from this case due to extensive past involvement in disputes involving Mr. Berlet and the propriety of using ]'s political views as source material. --] 13:45, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by third party Flcelloguy===
As mentioned above, a mediation was requested between ] and ] by ] on ] and began shortly thereafter. As a member of the ], I was assigned to the case, which involved several articles relating to the ]. Mediation has been ongoing ever since and was only suspended today by myself because of this Arbitration case. I only bring up the mediation because it is mentioned by the plaintiff above, and also because the mediation involves the plaintiff and one of the defendants (]). The matters that we discussed at mediation only related to the ] article; thus, the issues are at best tangentially related to the issues brought up in this Arbitration case. However, it is clear that ] and ] stand on different sides of the river and that both are in dispute with each other more than just at the articles that mediation covered.

The mediation is on Misplaced Pages and is available at ] and its corresponding subpages. I will be more than happy to detail the mediation more clearly or to clarify any questions that Arbitrators may have regarding this mediation on request.

Thanks very much. ] <small>(])</small> 20:36, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

==='''Statement by Nobs01'''===
I believe there is a long trail of ] editing in bad faith and other applicable policy violations. This is primarily a content dispute, which Cberlet has made little or no effort to use proper citations or methods, insisting upon his priveleged POV as an "expert". His opening statements here, "acting in concert", "most problematic, or "as team regarding LaRouche", are provably false, and may be another policy violation of abuse of process. The same is provable regarding his Mediation request. If necessary, the other users named here should be separated from User:Cberlet's ] about "digging up dirt".

Let me also add, I have always acted in a manner that separates Mr. Chip Berlet, aka User:Cberlet, acting in the capacity of a fellow Wikipedian, from the ] Wiki article.

However this case proceeds, before it concludes, we shall document that Mr. Chip Berlet and ], was singled out by an authority widely recognized as the "foremost analyst of left and right wing extremism" in America, as one of four of the most extremist organizations purporting to be a "Watchdog group". This may be helpful to Misplaced Pages, given the overreliance on Mr. Berlet as an inhouse "expert", which may have created ] distortions in several articles. ] 00:19, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

Grand total of 3 edits lifetime were content was added to ], ; 20 edits total lifetime since 13:23 3 August 2005 as follows: 4 rv; 11 fmt, notes, cites, or further reading; 1 wikify; 1 img. Given the above claim "Wiki editor is also the subject of a Wiki entry... Nobs01 having the most problematic" please mark as '''Exhibit 1 of abuse of process''' ] 02:15, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

'''Exhibit 2 Abuse of process''' Cberlet's most recent breach of good faith.
*9 August
:*nobs posts: "Notice: As gesture of good faith in anticipation of collaborative efforts & dispute resolution on other pages, I will be abstaining from further input in this article or other articles directly relating Mr. Chip Berlet (until such a time as suspension of abstention etc.)"
*19 October
**Cberlet raises in Mediation,
***"Whether or not the ] is accurately named"
::*note: this was agreed to earlier as part of Mediation as well.
*7 November
**Cberlet solicits assistance at WikiIN-1 to list ] at CfD since "I freely confess I have a vested interest in this matter" . ] 02:59, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

'''Exhibit 3 Abuse of process''' (Abuse of process = false statements) Cberlet lists 2 diffs above to support claim of "work as team regarding LaRouche", and "acting in concert"; this is the ''only'' contact with this User I've ever had in Misplaced Pages, and he didn't even vote at the CfD . My second posting to him was a response to his objection on my Talk page .

Please see, , pgs. 114-131 for analysis of the "pathology" of using "links and ties". ] 04:02, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

'''Exhibit 4 Abuse of process''' Allegations have been made here and elesewhere user:nobs was "digging up dirt" to "denigrate" User:Cberlet; when the time comes, nobs will be able to document, through Misplaced Pages diffs the material came into nobs hands quite accidentally (with the help of ], no less) on a completely different subject unrelated to the ] article. When the material did come into nobs hands, nobs request Cberlet in September to respond to it, twice. Acting in ], nobs spent the time to fully qualify the source of the information, and the nature of the issues raised. Nobs01 never set about with the ''intent'' to "dig up dirt". ] 04:44, 17 November 2005 (UTC)
*How ] found Laird Wilcox Report.
**"Google shows the words "magdoff", "kant" and "venona" appear on exactly four web pages ("hiss", "ales" and "venona" appear on over 700). One of these pages is Nobs01's Misplaced Pages entry, so it's really three entries. One is from a white supremacist site, which seems to be quoting from another source. One is from some far-right red-under-every-bed author, who basically accuses pretty much every known figure on the left, whether communist or not, of being a Soviet spy - Alger Hiss, Harry Magdoff, Harry Dexter White, even IF Stone for God's sake. The other is a memo referring to the original Venona message"
***"far-right red-under-every-bed author", i.e. ], ] Manuscripts Division
***"memo referring to the original Venona message"
***"a white supremacist site, which seems to be quoting from another source", i.e. Volksfront publishing Wilcox, ''The Watchdogs: A Close Look at Anti-Racist "Watchdog" Groups'', Editorial Research Service, 1999. ] 05:14, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

'''Exhibit 5 Abuse of process''' ] states,
:''users who are in conflict talk to one another on their respective talk pages''
*31 July
**20:43
***nobs posts on Cberlet's talk page "Dear Sir: I approached you in good faith; please direct any personal sentiments regarding my postings or others to my Talk page"; Cberlet continues blistering ] elsewhere.
**20:45
***"I have no interest in a side conversation."

*3 August
::*"Please carry out all contact with me through the talk pages of specific articles. I have no interest in continuing to engage with you outside the actual editing process. Messages left here will not be responded to."

Hence, it was at User:Cberlet's insistance the material at ] be dealt with publicly. ] 03:03, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

===Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (5/0/0/0)===
* Accept ] 23:43, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept ] 02:30, 16 November 2005 (UTC) Based on Nobs01's edits to ]
* Accept ]<sup><small><font color="DarkGreen">]</font></small></sup> 19:59, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ] ] 13:17, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ] (]) 14:49, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

== ], ], others ==

===Case by FT2===
;Article: ] (])
==== Involved parties====
'''Users concerned (Note: new suspected sock-puppets get added regularly)'''

The five main users discussed in this RFArb:
* ] (] | )
* ] (] | )
* ] (] | ), also apparently edited as ] (] | )
* ] (] | )
* ] (] | )
Additional suspected accounts, sock-puppets or cronies (primarily NLP talk page):
* ] (] | )
* ] (] | )
* ] (] | )

Not all of these accounts are causing problems to an equal degree as others. Roughly the above list is in order from most actual damage to date, to least. The first 5 at least have each been persistently disruptive through to vandalistic since first visiting.

==== Brief summary of case ====
The ] ("NLP") article has been damaged by aggressive POV warrioring. The named accounts (including sockpuppets, meatpuppets and cronies) are all one-use accounts, created within the same short time period. Their appearance here is connected to vandalism, disruption and POV warfare by ], in combination with a posted on the Yahoo skeptics-forum in September encouraging forum users to visit the Misplaced Pages NLP article. The users, acting in broad concert , have been engaging in a common behavior of extreme POV warfare, vandalism, sock-puppeteering, and ongoing breach of policy on that article ever since. Despite RfC and mediation, a large number of explanations by various users of ] and other policies, and a second attempt at mediation purely focussing upon NPOV aspects of the matter, the behavior remains constant. Several explicit warnings were given of referral to Arbcom (), combined with courteous requests to comply with key WP policies despite personal attacks and lack of civility to other editors. These measures failing and the problems continuing unabated, bona fide wikipedians working on this article voted 7-0 that mediation is fruitless, and to approach ArbCom for a ban on editing on the subject of NLP and its associated articles by the above and by their associated cronies.

; Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

All parties have been notified, both by general notice on the article's talk page and individually: , , , , , , , ,

; Confirmation that other steps in ] have been tried

The article and its editors have run the gamut of reasonable discussion.

The Neuro-linguistic programming article has been through discussion, dispute, RfC (linguistics) , and 5 weeks of mediation. I asked for mediation a second time specifically with ] (Oct 30). A formal talk page vote was finally held (Nov. 3) and editors agreed 7-0 that mediation should be deemed unlikely to be fruitful and the matter passed to ArbCom for a ruling.

==== Statement by ]====

The ] article, which has for the most part been well run in a civil manner in the past, has been disrupted principally by users ], ], but also with POV degradation, personal attacks and/or remarks by others such as ], ] and ]. There is now strong suspicion that most if not all of the named users may be ]s, due to similarities in their editing and histories. <!--(All eight arrived on the article at a similar time, with similar styles, at the same time of day, and with one minor exception have not been significantly involved in any article except this one). -->Having run the gamut of reasonable discussion, other contributors to the page in question voted to request arbitration.

None of the users named have made any any significant contribution to any topic other than this one topic and other NLP-related articles (with the exception of DaveRight on ] and ]). In some instances they have continued their POV approach on NLP to the detriment of other pages too. In essense, they have acted as POV warriors with a single viewpoint who have proven unable or uninterested in the wiki approach or policies, and have little interest in anything beyond their own view. (eg, see: '']'' by JPLogan). Fundamentally they do not seem to show the slightest ability or care for collaborating in a wiki manner. Indeed their idea of collaboration is insults and ignoring or dismissal of issues, often with personal attacks and remarks. Since apparently joining Misplaced Pages at similar times (HeadleyDown Aug 2005, JPLogan and AliceDeGrey Sept 2005, DaveRight Oct 2005, etc), all have done virtually no other editing except POV degradation on the NLP article and/or negative talk page comments to its existing editors.

Accordingly it is the majority sense of those presenting this request that an appropriate ban from Misplaced Pages NLP editing is appropriate, and this is what is requested.

;Examples of POV warring (DIFF examples of each given in the ArbCom vote on the article talk page):

* POV suppression
* 3RR breach reported
* Repeated deletion of sourced material or cited fact about the subject by reputable authors, often followed by addition of more POV material.
* Personal attacks (including assumption of bad faith).<!--
* Misleading edit summaries
* Attempts to exercise and take control of the article-->
* Ignoring of requests to discuss edits
* Citation of fraudulent credentials of renown ascribed to an author to back up a slanted source (a web opinion presented as scientific "research")
* Falsely representing the opinion of professional bodies or ignoring their actual opinions ''as stated on their own website'' (which had been pointed out multiple times).
* Defamatory personal attacks, eg ]'s NLP talk page comment "I'm sure someone will find a citation for it... Wanna make some money out of NLP?" in response to removal of a highly critical and unsourced personally written opinion.

These and other examples can be found as DIFFs in the Arbitration vote.

;Arbitration vote and DIFF citations at: ].

;Other action before Arbitration vote:
* Prior to the vote, a formal request was posted to the mediator's talk page for an opinion whether he felt the mediation process was able to resolve the issue. <!--
* I also posted a note to the mediator on the article talk page, asking him to discuss the state of things. . Its tone is co-operative: ''"I know mediation's best, when it works, and you'll see from Headley's talk page that I tried, and from this talk page that I ignored several insults and POV edits and at least a few personal attacks, to do so... If you have reasons to believe that NPOV will be reached on this article, then can you let me know your basis for that feeling? Because to be honest, I just don't see it, and I've mediated informally a fair few wikipedia disputes... If you can reassure me, I'll listen. The difficulty is that I don't see that kind of progress being at all likely."'' I also left my email address for private discussion.-->
* I and others also warned HeadleyDown and others on multiple occasions that co-editors' patience was running out, and that he needed to respect NPOV policy, as numerous other editors had also stated. I told him explicitly on three occasions that his present type of conduct would be unacceptable on Misplaced Pages, and would ultimately lead to an Arbitration Committee referral to prevent him editing the article. His reply was initially to agree to renewed mediation, but almost immediately to revert to personal remarks and increased POV attack.

;Article vote on ArbCom referral (Nov 3)

Users voting for ArbCom referral (with support for statement that mediation is unlikely to be fruitful):
# ]
# ]
# ]
# ]
# ] (originally posted as ])
# ]
# ] (also posting as ])

User indicating strong support but not voting due to short time of editing:
# ]: "If the history of this discussion has demonstrated anything, it's the pointlessness of trying to engage Headleydown and his ridiculous sock-puppets in a constructive dialogue. lets just get to arbitration a.s.a.p .... FT2 has already moved for arbitration not long ago. There were votes although I did not participate due to not really participating in the editing. I've just been reading the endlesly recycling discussion. Nothing will get done this way. HeadleyDown obviously has nothing better to do with his time than pursue his crusade." and

Users voting against arbitration:
# None, other than comments by the users concerned.

Mediator's comments:
<!--# No response to my requests for discussion with the mediator was noticed, either on the mediator's user page or by email. (The mediator was suffering wikistress at the time, according to other posts, *hugs*)-->
# Following the Arbcom vote, the mediator commented that he felt it was neither efficient nor necessary.
# Two days later the mediator added: "Note: to Headley et al, just because I am mediating here does not mean that I have the final say...."

;Example events since arbitration vote:
Despite the semblence of continuing mediation,
* HeadleyDown deleted the Arbcom vote post, in "revenge" for his reply being moved (unchanged) to the marked comments section below.
* HeadleyDown deleted two of ]'s comments from the Talk page.
* 3RR broken on at least two further separate occasions preventing balancing material being added, or slanted writing being corrected. (example: )
* Multiple personal remarks and attacks
* The article has had further core factual material removed
* Related articles to NLP have also begun being degraded; when it was noted that some specialised material was being moved to side-articles, HeadleyDown's response was: "Hi FT2. Presently the NLP modelling page is full of hype and exagerated claims. I wonder why you didn't notice:) That will change soon enough. Regards ]"
* Talk page posts explaining and discussing edits, with the intent of promoting mutual collaboration, continue to be bluntly ignored. (eg: )
* The definitions of the subject, cited from its founders' websites and standard texts, was deleted complete with citations, by JPLogan.
* An attempt to balance an apparent misrepresentation of an author was followed by ignoring the request to discuss on talk page, and deletion of the balancing quote and addition of more POV citations. This left the introduction with 3 selectively represented views showing a view that NLP was pseudoscience and a cult, and not one of the many research and other citations showing that the opposite view is strongly supported.
* POV warfare edits continue to the present time (eg in dated Nov 15 (12 days ''after'' the article vote and 2 days ''after'' the formal RFArb posting), ] adds the word "pseudoscience" or "pseudoscientific" 3 times in different places and removes the <nowiki>{{dubious}}</nowiki> tag from a fourth. Following this edit, the article contains 25 mentions of the word "pseudoscience" or "pseudoscientific" alone, excuding section titles.<!--
* On Nov 17, ] edited the NLP "spirituality" section, rewriting it completely. The section start was somewhat changed:
** '''1st paragraph before:''' "There is disagreement about... Some proponents such as Dilts include... others (such as Tad James) include... These views are disputed by John Grinder who... (citation)."
** '''1st paragraph after:''' "NLP often involves spirituality especially with reference to the logical levels view. Similar to other amoral pseudoscientific psychocults such as Dianetics and EST..." going on to ascribe psychic energy and remote ESP influence. The title for the edit is jaw-droppingly, "rv ''Comaze's'' extreme bias...."
* Finally, also on Nov 17, the article is set as protected by an administrator.

Note: DaveRight: "We can take it for granted you are a pseudoscientific technoshaman and amoral psychocult promoter:)" 09:33, 18 November 2005.

] characterization of myself and other wikipedians as "pseudoscientific technoshaman and amoral psychocult promoter" and "zealots" (twice)
-->

;Other information:
* One editor, ], was explicitly self-identified as a sock puppet on his talk page before becoming involved in this article . He played no part in the vote or its discussion, and only a minor role in the talk page debate, mostly between Oct 27-29.
* I have responded ''(])'' to the statements of the named users below, with citations. In summary, the counter-allegations (like most of the allegations in the article) are spurious and unhampered by inconvenient notions like article history or DIFFs. Examples include ] calling reversion of his highly slanted post back to the mediated version, "Lots of anti NPOV activity" and "Removal of a cited fact", and allegations of "crimes". As ] observes, much of the editing is attempts to hold back the flood of POV warfare, which is then named "promotion" and used to justify personal attacks and remarks.

We have acted with appropriate patience and reserve, but despite much patience, many flames, and much time, there is just no sign whatsoever of any intent to change, nor any significant indication they want to change enough to participate appropriately in Misplaced Pages NLP for the foreseeable future. We therefore ask that ArbCom accept this matter for Arbitration.

] 10:26, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

<!--====Likely source of visiting users identified====
Following GregA's statement, I have done some digging. See for a likely source of "meatpuppets" or cronies. Example post: in which a main motivator of these posts describes NLP in terms identical to those we see in this article ''(c.f. AliceDeGrey's rewording of the intro commencing: "Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) is a method for programming the mind" )''. The emphasis on subjects in this post, such as engrams, L/R brain, Eye movements, Dianetics, were also each major points of dispute on Misplaced Pages, forced into this article with excessive prominence by the named users against consensus of other editors. A message dated encourages skeptic-forum users to visit the Misplaced Pages article.

Strong evidence for a cause/effect connection, rather than effect/cause or coincidence, comes from a post on the skeptics forum dated Sep. 19 17:59 asking for advice how to argue the case NLP is a pseudoscience. The reply suggested "It would be easy to do an analysis of the characteristics listed in this chapter of pseudosciences and relate them to NLP," linking to Lilienfeld as a source. Such a list appeared on the Misplaced Pages article less than 36 hours later, added by ], citing Lilienfeld, on Sept 21

Timewise too, all the major single-purpose accounts cited were created within the same short time period that Misplaced Pages NLP was being discussed in an identical manner in this forum: HeadleyDown arrived here Aug 5, the Misplaced Pages article was "discovered" on this forum around 5 Sept 2005 , JPLogan's first edit under his own account was on Sept 17, AliceDeGrey Sept 21, DaveRight Oct 12, Bookmain Oct 13 (NB: possibly some posted as IPs before getting an account, or heard about it elsewhere).
-->

===Statement by ]===
:(Please limit your statement to 500 words)
Hello mediators/arbitrators. This is interesting. I simply want to say that arbitration is an extremely long way off, and our helpful mediator VoiceOfAll seems to concur with that. Mediation seems to be working well. Each time the NLP promoters (I call them that because a lot of them have a vested interest) remove lots of cited fact, the mediator steps in and they calm down. When the more neutral (sorry, less proNLPers) compromise (usually a lot in favour of NLP) the proNLPers calm down some more. I have to admit it does get very tedious to have to restore censored facts all the time, and have to keep answering the same questions all the time (badgering), so things do get a little heated at times. It doesn't help that nearly all non-proNLPers have been labeled sockpuppets at some time. But things are moving forward now the mediator has helped out. Actually there are often major moves in the direction away from arbitration. I personally am fairly ok with the idea of arbitration, but it seems a bit silly to do so when mediation is starting to work so well with a level head and an good and increasing understanding of the subject. Anyway, its all up to you. Regards ] 12:33, 13 November 2005 (UTC)


''(the following diffs were inserted by HeadleyDown into FT2's statement area. Moved by FuelWagon into HeadleyDown's own area. ] 22:57, 18 November 2005 (UTC))''

<font color="green">Hello Arbitrators. For the sake of helping with examining behaviour, here is some evidence of one so-called unbiased editor from the FT2 camp. Actually he is one of the milder examples compared to others such as FT2 or Comaze:</font>

<font color="green">
FuelWagon was removing occult/psychic development info that is common knowledge] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
Showing both a complete lack of knowledge, a lack of ability to research, and a desire to delete facts that are even presented within NLP books. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
Again a total disregard for the facts as they are verifiable in links and books. He deleted the fact because he don’t like the sound of New Age (it does not represent the subject as respectable), even though NLP is promoted using primarily the New Age category for promotion, NLP started at Esalen working with people from Esalen institute which was the hub of new age thinking in the 70s. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
Again, removal of cited facts with a disregard for re-phrasing etc. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
FuelWagon’s strong desire to remove the word “pseudoscience” even though it appears in all of the literature of lilienfeld, Eisner, and Salerno. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
removing a cited and verifiable link that is actually a fact. This is verified by psychotherapists such as Lilienfeld and others who are extremely critical of such bodies promoting pseudoscience. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
The attribution to these people only is FuelWagon inferring that only these people have these views. The majority of scientists who know the subject (psychologists eg) have these views. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
This was removed by FuelWagon also. NLP is promoted by NLP promoters under these categories. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC) </font>

<font color="green">
Lots of interest in wild and obscure claims (THE study of structure---) that do not clarify anything and that go against what the mediator suggested, plus a lot of hype. And deletion of fact. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
It is categorized with these other groups because of it’s pseudoscientific principles, its lack of support, and its ineffectiveness, together with its association with cults. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
Further removal of cited facts – not alteration or comromise, just blatant censorship. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
the same research-shy ignorance. ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
FuelWagon claimed that the prior was a clear violation of NLP and even a criticism. But it was a clear statement written by the mediator for the most part, plus it is far clearer and more concise than the hype version. FuelWagon also writes that the methods are empirically untested (erroneous and extremely biased in order to dismiss the scientific findings). ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
Again, whittling away the pseudoscience evidence, even though it is stated clearly in the literature ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">As I said, this is me being mild. There are far worse cases to come. Regards] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">Here are some of FT2’s crimes: </font>

<font color="green">
FT2 Removing a cited fact that was a view of psychotherapists. Removing a concluding statement from the paragraph in favour of a small section of an argument in the middle of the paragraph of an academic paper. Again, selective editing without adding the conclusion of the paragraph, and removing more cited fact. Lots of anti NPOV activity. ] 12:25, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
FT2 adding as much hype in one go as possible. ] 12:25, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
again FT2 removing properly cited facts. ] 12:25, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
FT2’s masterpiece of selective editing. The end of the paragraph actually states – But NLP has failed in controlled experiments and so it is relegated. This is FT2’s biggest trick. He likes to take the middle parts of arguments(the positive bits) and cut off the negative conclusion. No other researcher has ever quoted FT2’s section. All other people who quote Sharpley do so using -NLP failed, or is unsupported etc. From a research perspective it is intellectually fraudulent, clear selective editing, biased in the extreme, and grossly misleading. ] 12:25, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">
Here FT2 writes: “It is worth noting that NLP has been criticised for being both ineffective, and for being ''too'' effective (ie used for mind control and manipulation). This contradiction has not yet been resolved.” This is FT2’s view. It is also the view of some vandals who claimed the same thing prior to FT2’s appearance. I am willing to overlook that, but the fact is; FT2 is willing to write his own opinion on the article even though he claims to have had lots of experience on Misplaced Pages. The view is not the view of any other author. ] 12:25, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

<font color="green">There are many more similar breaches of cooperation, good research and policy that FT2 continues to commit and of course you can judge them as you wish. Regards ] 12:25, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>


''(The following text was added, again to FT2's statement area, after FT2's response/rebuttal of the above)''

<font color="green">OK Arbitrators, I wrote the above but I regret it. It is all too shrill. Forget that I said the above. The whole arbitration episode is quite ridiculous. Arbitrators should not have to look around all the content stuff. The fact is, to my knowledge, nobody has done any recent sockpuppetry, there have been no particular offenses (including people calling me a stupid wanker) and the mediator is doing fine (a lot better than I expected). The situation is thus: NLP breeds a lot of followers, and they don't like the fact that science says NLP does not work. It makes them feel really down. They try to remove the fact using every NLP method they can. Misplaced Pages is a lot more reasonable than that. Facts get removed, and the fact-minded place them back in the article. Devotees keep removing them or demanding more facts and so more facts get placed on the article. They continue to remove the facts as they look more and more depressing to devotees, and they call the mediators, or the arbitrators. They hope that by some miracle they can remove the facts by removing the scientists. Do what you will and try to make the devotees a little less censorious. Otherwise, I am fairly content to restore scientific facts as they are presented by scientists. Best regards ] 15:05, 17 November 2005 (UTC)</font>

===Statement by JPLogan ] 02:14, 16 November 2005 (UTC)===
Feel free to check my behaviour. You will find that I am no sockpuppet, although accusations abound. I really feel that the proNLP editors have just shot themselves in the foot again. Certainly I have held back on posting the more damning evidence against NLP, and I have posted plenty of remarks and solutions to solve problems. I suggest that arbitrators keep a due sense of humour. Certainly I find the whole thing ridiculous. The NLP promoters have gone against NPOV so many times. Anyway, do your best with all the checking. Cheers] 02:14, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by party ] re: NLP===
I became involved in the NLP article in October. I hadn't heard of "Neuro Linguistic Programming" until I found the article, and I have no personal bias for or against the topic. But it is clear to me that the article is in clear violation of NPOV. There appear to be a number of editors with proclaimed biases against NLP who are editing the article in violation of NPOV. Someone with a longer history of the article can present more evidence, but here are a few diffs that show some blatant biases that directly affect the article.

HeadleyDown modifies the first sentence of the introduction to say ''"(NLP) is a quasi-spiritual behavior-modification technique"'', where the term "quasi-spiritual" is clearly POV, disputed, and biased. (Violation of WP:NPOV)

JPLogan modifies the first sentence of the entire NLP article to say ''"NLP is a pseudoscientific self help development''", where the term "pseudoscientific" is clearly POV, disputed, and biased. (Violation of WP:NPOV)

DaveRight reverts with the edit summary "I think that deserves some punishment." (violation of WP:Point)

DaveRight does a blanket revert of a number of edits, reinserting a bunch of text including ''"Many such courses appear to depend more upon charismatic appeal, wish-fulfillment, quick fixes, and lack of critical faculty, than actual quantifiable results, and so are often considered pure ]."'' as well as ''"Similar to other amoral pseudoscientific psychocults such as ] and EST"'' Both sentences present as fact what is actualy disputed opinions of NLP, namely calling NLP "wish fullfillment", "pseudoscience", "amoral", and "psychocult" (Violation of WP:NPOV)

HeadleyDown removes a critic of NLP's opinion from the criticism section ("Jan Damen describes NLP as ]"), rewords it to passive tense so the source (Jan Damen) is not mentioned and the opinion is presented more as fact, and then reinserts it into the pro-NLP section, making it look as if a pro-NLP source describes NLP as "occult". (Violation of WP:NPOV)

HeadleyDown ''again'' reports in the pro-NLP section of introduction that NLP is used for "occult" purposes, where "occult" is POV, biased, and disputed.

DaveRight reports in the pro-NLP section of introduction that NLP is "fringe", where the term "fringe" is POV, biased, and disputed.

HeadleyDown inserts statement that NLP is used for "fringe therapy", "psychic activities", "covert seduction", and the "occult".

HeadleyDown inserts statement that NLP is "Similar to other amoral pseudoscientific psychocults such as ] and EST"

(update)
Headley ''"So why did you not rewrite it?"'' Here are some diffs that I've dug up showing about a dozen attempts by me to correct NPOV violations committed by another editor by rewriting them to follow policy. I believe most of these attempts by me were reverted by other editors on the page.

edit summary: ''"Jan Damen describes NLP as occult"'' edit summary ''"Reporting the various points of view as being stated by their sources, rather than stateing them as fact."'' Edit summary: ''"I'm rewriting the intro so that all POV statements are reported as someone's point of view, rather than reported as a "fact" followed by (name).)"'' edit summary: ''"Attribute pro-NLP information to advocates and supporters."'' edit summary ''"reporting the pro-NLP point of view from pro-NLP sources. including URL's so folks can verify.)"'' edit summary ''"report the NLP point of view in NLP words,"'' edit summary ''"intro describes the pro-NLP point of view from pro-NLP sources. URL's to verify."'' edit summary ''"attributing to Dilts"'' edit summary ''"another source"'' edit summary ''"source"'' edit summary ''"introduce NLP using the words of NLP supporters. provide URL's so other's can verify accuracy."''

(update) HeadleyDown provided a number of diffs that he claims are POV violatios on my part. I've included them below with my own interpretation on what each diff shows.

These diffs were posted by ] 11:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC) the format of each diff is

<nowiki></nowiki> explanation by HeadleyDown.
::my explanation in indented format

FuelWagon was removing occult/psychic development info that is common knowledge
::"quick fix or lay therapy, NLP ] seduction, and ] or ] practices." completely unsourced, unverifiable.

Again a total disregard for the facts as they are verifiable in links and books. He deleted the fact because he don’t like the sound of New Age (it does not represent the subject as respectable), even though NLP is promoted using primarily the New Age category for promotion, NLP started at Esalen working with people from Esalen institute which was the hub of new age thinking in the 70s.
::The disputed content is "The foundation for Bandler and Grinder's NLP is based in" followed by "spirituality" or "New Age". The block quote provided in the article immediately below this assertion never uses the phrase "New Age", but mentions that NLP is based on spirituality. I change the content to match what the sourced quote supports.

Again, removal of cited facts with a disregard for re-phrasing etc.
::I've provided a dozen diffs that show a dozen attempts by me to rephrase POV statements into NPOV statements. They have all been reverted. This diff shows a POV statement that I deleted. I am not required to "re-phrase" every NPOV violation made by HeadleyDown et al. I've tried and they revert it. Deleting a POV statement is not violation of policy. And a dozen attempts by me to "re-phrase" their pov statements should be sufficient to show good-faith efforts by me to try and work with these editors.

FuelWagon’s strong desire to remove the word “pseudoscience” even though it appears in all of the literature of lilienfeld, Eisner, and Salerno.
::"pseudoscience" is POV, and in this diff, the word is unsourced, reported as fact, violating NPOV.

removing a cited and verifiable link that is actually a fact. This is verified by psychotherapists such as Lilienfeld and others who are extremely critical of such bodies promoting pseudoscience.
::The content says <nowiki>NLP has also been identified by the ] as quintessential ]ry (Parker 1999). {{dubious}}</nowiki>. It was marked with a "dubious" tag and given how inflamatory a statement it is, I deleted it saying that it required some means to verify it. My edit summary ends with "please provide a URL for verification."

The attribution to these people only is FuelWagon inferring that only these people have these views. The majority of scientists who know the subject (psychologists eg) have these views.
::This is an example of me "re-phrasing" POV statements into NPOV statements. I report the views as being stated by the sources who hold them. HeadleyDown then says that these sources are not the only people who have these views. The only problem is that HeadleyDown never provided any verifiable sources to support his claim, except to say that it is "common knowledge".

This was removed by FuelWagon also. NLP is promoted by NLP promoters under these categories.
::Edit summary says "This is criticism and belongs in the criticism section of intro, with plenty of sources to support use of such biased words". And HeadleyDown found a website selling witchcraft training tapes that said it used NLP techniques. That is like saying since abortion bomber Eric Rudolph is christian, then the introduction to the ] article should say that christianity is promoted by people who bomb abortion clinics. As far as I know, the poeple who developed NLP do not associate themselves or NLP with occult practices.

Lots of interest in wild and obscure claims (THE study of structure---) that do not clarify anything and that go against what the mediator suggested, plus a lot of hype. And deletion of fact.
::Edit summary ''"reporting the pro-NLP point of view from pro-NLP sources. including URL's so folks can verify."''. I report how the NLP Seminars Group International defines NLP and provide a URL. This is not a violation of policy. HeadleyDown wants to define NLP using the words of ''critics'' of NLP only. I inserted other points of view.

It is categorized with these other groups because of it’s pseudoscientific principles, its lack of support, and its ineffectiveness, together with its association with cults.
::Edit summary: ''"Dianetics and Landmark Forum is off topic."''. ANd it's impossible to tell if the Council Against Health Fraud mentions Dianetics and Landmark, or if "Loma" mentions them, or if HeadleyDown inserted them on his own. Unsourced and unclear assertion.

Further removal of cited facts – not alteration or comromise, just blatant censorship.
::POV wording "NLP is an amoral, pseudoscientific psychocult (Smith)" needs to be rewritten to "Smith states that NLP is an amoral, pseudoscientific psychocult". I've done this a dozen times. it keeps getting reverted, so I deleted this one.

FuelWagon claimed that the prior was a clear violation of NLP and even a criticism. But it was a clear statement written by the mediator for the most part, plus it is far clearer and more concise than the hype version. FuelWagon also writes that the methods are empirically untested (erroneous and extremely biased in order to dismiss the scientific findings).
::Edit summary says it all ''"report the NLP point of view in NLP words, not simply criticize NLP."'' HeadleyDown refuses to allow pro-NLP sources to have their point of view reported in the article, and insists on reporting only the views that are critical of NLP.

Again, whittling away the pseudoscience evidence, even though it is stated clearly in the literature
::HeadleyDown needs to rewrite "NLP is pseudoscience (Smith)" to "Smith states that NLP is pseudoscience". I've done it a dozen times and got reverted.

===Allow me to chip in ] 03:19, 16 November 2005 (UTC) ===
Hello, I am not DRight:) I am Dave. OK. No idea who DRight is, but he has a cool name:) OK. For what its worth, you may want to look at the Scientology and Dianetics article page. Similar things seem to have gone on there. NLP is one of those pseudoscience subjects that recruits lots of believers who love to hear about "human potential, metaprograms, the difference that makes the difference, the science and technology of excellence" and so on. In fact, they have had all those things on the article at some point. It is interesting though, how often they advocate and even physically remove cited scientific fact. FT2 for example, keeps wanting to remove fact. He also posts his own opinion within the article even when there is absolutely no author who holds the same opinion. He posts strategically altered paragraphs (with the negative ending removed) in order to promote NLP. The fact is, NLP is a pseudoscience, according to scientists, psychologists, linguists, and anthropologists. In fact it is in the same category as Dianetics and EST and sometimes phrenology. The NLP promotional team are dead set on removing facts as they have physically done for months, and they have even tried to recruit vandals from newsgroups. Things do get a bit lively on the discussion page, though the only direct insults have been to poor old Headley. NLP promoter's call him things such as "dullard" and "wanker". No such activity has been seen from neutral editors towards proNLPers, dispite the ridiculous level of fact deletion. There is a general slur campaign against anyone who does not promote NLP. To my knowledge, no negative comment or insults or vandalism has been conducted from neutral editors to the NLPpromoter's pages. Anyway, go ahead and check my ip and tell the NLPpromoters to stop removing scientific facts. ATB Dave ] 03:19, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by party Voice of All===
While I don't believe that arbitration is the best option for now, I would say that the placement of ((test3)) and ((test4)) signs, accuations of extreme POV, and use of alternate names is likely occuring on both sides here. An IP check on all of the users would be well appretiated, as duplicates can be banned, leaving only the true users. This will removed inflated edit wars and vote tallies/consensus.

I would note however, that I had already recommended that people edit one section at a time. The blanket reverts were mainly of edits to multiple sections. One the other hand, too much anti-NLP criticism has been going into the article recently, under the idea that ''it is a fact'' or ''he did actually say this''; article's can not have every single fact about the topic, they must be streamlined, and some sort of balance between truth and representation of all POVs must be reached.] <sup><small>]|]|]</small></sup> 00:20, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by party AliceDeGrey===
My turn! Well, I wish to respond to FT2's point first. Misplaced Pages is about cooperation. If you cannot cooperate with factual information then you are going to be disruptive. The proNLPers are disruptive. The more neutral editors here cooperate extremely well, and share information through discussion sections and email. We do not delete scientific facts or advocate for its deletion as is happening on the discussion page now. In response to FuelWagon, all of the points he makes involve cited facts (views turned into facts according to NPOV policy). FuelWagon is still advocating for them to be deleted. I personally have spent time researching in my institution with help from others concerning explaining NLP through science. I see the NLP promoters wishing to delete that hard work. I can only see this demand for arbitration as fanatical desperation. I will continue to cooperate with people willing to reduce confusing hype and clearly present the facts. ] 08:24, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

=== Statement: ] 08:45, 16 November 2005 (UTC)===
Hi. I have been working in quite close co-operation with other editors such as Alice and others. We have access to a lot of good info on this subject and there has already been a lot deleted by the NLPpromoters. There is also a good deal of cooperation from other members, such as Flavius Vanillus, and HansAntel (who actually sent us some good foreign language information also). It is blatantly clear that FT2 and FuelWagon, GregA, Comaze and others, have a very strong agenda to promote NLP. If you spend all the time reading "NLP is the solution to all problems" is does not help. But they seem to be unable to even face the facts that NLP is considered pseudoscince and is completely scientifically unsupported. The pressure directed by them in order to bannish such scientific facts is enormous. Even yesterday, Comaze was doing wholesale deletion of facts from the article, even tho mediation had rested with the facts being present in the body and opening. Just take try to take their fervent censorship with a sense of humour. Its not easy. ] 08:45, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by ]===
Hello. I'm not sure if once the arbitration is "accepted" you need to hear from us? I assume you'll let us know what you need.

There has been much argument on the NLP pages and removal and reversion. The "NLP is pseudoscience" group consistently call themselves neutral and rarely choose to discuss an issue - most questions become personal responses or "you just have to accept the facts", rather than specific responses. . If we repeat the question, the response is threats to "provide more damning evidence" (which I've asked them to give us...as we should have all evidence! They don't follow through). For example, responses to a change include ''"..will lead to more damning detail being presented in order to show exactly how warped and desperate your biased edits are. People here are actually trying to be kind. I have some extremely crushing reviews..."'' (line 656 ), or ''"Well I will present his damning words on the article. I think that is what you are asking for."'' .

In fact all 4 diffs above also show a similarity in threat style of those 4 different usernames/possible sock puppets. I believe from the style of responses that there are several puppets, though there could certainly be 2 or 3 users with several more sock puppets, sharing similar negative NLP opinions and styles brought in from the yahoo skeptics newsgroup . I also see that whether they are puppets may not matter - that ] says ''"for the purpose of dispute resolution, when there is uncertainty whether a party is one user with sockpuppets or several users with similar editing habits they may be treated as one user with sockpuppets."''.

Please note that I am the one accused above of trying to "recruit" on a newsgroup. See for details including my response. If I have broken some rule my apologies.

In general I have no problem with what Headley et al says he'll do - they often seem very reasonable. His actions are quite different and he can not be judged on his words, only his follow through (Isometimes think he enjoys saying the right thing while doing something different, it certainly provokes a certain kind of response!). Thanks for taking this on, I really hope we can get to representing NLP fairly, warts and all, as soon as possible. ] 14:17, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

===Statement by HansAntel===
Hello, I am not sockpuppeting. I give science evidence and the antimediater group (FT2 and all the people he votes and deletes with) will just argue to delete my facts. Why? Because the facts are not promotion of NLP. They are science facts and views to facts that can be cited. The antimediation group want to write lots of complaint. Ignore it. They write nothing but complaint from start to now - I look at the archived information. Give research and evidence, they will delete or change it in total meaning. Check me out. I am moving around a lot but I use the same workstation most postings. Arbitrators please take antimediators (FT2 group) like unserious pestilence. They irritate but you can brush them off your neck. Sincerely Hans ] 02:38, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

=== FT2 responses to user statements===
# ]'s statement that an initial IP check on all editors concerned would be helpful - agreed. The principle editors of the article and talk page recently are as follows: the eight editors named, the 7 voters named, Voice of All, Flavius vanillus, 203.100.233.178, 203.186.238.*, 211.30.47-48.*, 80.44.*, 81.151.*. However this does not change my feeling that mediation is likely proven fruitless, because the nature of the problem is ''not'' textual compromise within the article, but non-wikipedian users and sock-puppets engaging in vandalism, fraudulent credentials cited to bolster extreme view, fraudulent representation of professional bodies despite multiple correction, deterrance of editors, constant personal attacks, remarks and defamation, heavy duty slanting, and utter lack of civility or respect for editors or information.<br>&nbsp;<br>
# I do not agree with ] that "he blanket reverts were of edits to multiple sections". For most, this seems irrelevant. Quick examples (a few out of many): HeadleyDown replaces one paragraph in intro that presents 2 sides of a view, with 2 extreme views on same side (interesting observation: ''HeadleyDown'' uses nonsense word "psychopablum" but ''JPLogan'' creates an article defining that word and referencing NLP); JPLogan deletes the entire section of core definitions within the field by its founders complete with full citations on the mind-boggling basis that they are "uncited" and that citing them is "POV"; HeadleyDown removes a key qualifier regarding the British Psychological Society leaving impression that Parkers view represents them accurately; HeadleyDown rewords an already unbalanced paragraph which had been compromised, with even more generalized wording that removes the "X said Y" qualifier; and again more selective POV insertion by DaveRight; Bookmain removes citation from British Dyslexia Association paragraph which uses NLP, replacing it by a subtlely misrepresented citation from Children In Therapy to state "NLP is quackery" (in fact it is ''attachment therapy'' and not NLP which is the target of that page, NLP is a technique claimed by attachment therapy protagonists to support it); Bookmain deletes a paragraph that states NLP rests on an observational rather than theoretical basis; ... which is re-deleted by AliceDeGrey when corrected; Bookmain edits the one paragraph on NLP in policing, 1/ replacing a factual "wide range" with "some", 2/ deletes the FBI's actual comment in support of NLP's efficacy, 3/ deletes a police statement that it is field proven, 4/ adds a spurious "claims to be", and 5/ adds a selective quotation after all this that NLP "has been tested by criminologists and has been found not to work in crime situations". ''''<br>&nbsp;<br>
# ''Re JPLogan's assertion that he is not a sock-puppet'': This case is about sock-puppets ''or cronies''. ] refers to this when it discusses the creation of:<br>''"new accounts specifically to influence a particular vote or discussion. This is especially common in deletion discussions. These newly created accounts... may be friends of a Wikipedian, or may be related in some way to the subject of an article under discussion. These accounts are not actually sockpuppets, but they are... treated similarly. Neither a sockpuppet nor a brand-new, single-purpose account holder is a member of the Misplaced Pages community... The Arbitration Committee has ruled that, for the purpose of dispute resolution, when there is uncertainty whether a party is one user with sockpuppets or several users with similar editing habits they may be treated as one user with sockpuppets."''<br>&nbsp;<br>
# ''Response to Bookmain'': Bookmain says, "It is blatantly clear that FT2 and... others have a very strong agenda to promote NLP... But they seem to be unable to even face the facts that NLP is considered pseudoscience and is completely scientifically unsupported." ''(Note the straw man)''. <br>&nbsp;<br>Untrue and not borne out by facts. For example, when I created the article "]" (proper discussion was too long for the main article), I did this neutrally on the classic Misplaced Pages basis: description, specific principles, sources, criticisms and rebuttals. It does not advocate a side. It ''describes and characterizes'', and includes both viewpoints fully representing each. Please see that article where I wrote specifically under criticisms:<ul><li>"The subject is open ended, that is, it does not specify how the information it obtains should be used, or what can be done with it. So NLP becomes very prone to quackery, incorporation of pseudoscience, and manipulative uses."</li><li>And again I wrote: "Stronger criticism is usually levelled at NLP as a whole, for the pseudoscientific hype, exaggerated claims and commercialization often associated with it by its practitioners, and this is discussed under the main NLP article."</li></ul>No other editor had worked on it and yet the mediator, reviewing it a week after drafting, made only one tiny phraseology improvement to the article upon review, leaving the entirety of the article otherwise unchanged .<br><br>As well as straw men, Bookmain has a prior history on the article of inventing other fraudulent "facts" and misrepresentative assertations out of the blue to bolster his argument. Example: he characterizes a minor hypnotist, Dylan Morgan, as "a world renowned clinical hypnotherapist" and of a critical opinion piece by the man as "research" and "the final word": ''"Dr Morgan's scientific followup and final word assessment is entirely relevant. It is also the view of a world renowned clinical hypnotherapist."'' (for the basis of my characterization of Morgan as minor, and the representation as fraudulent, see ])<br>&nbsp;<br>
# ''Re AliceDeGrey'': Misplaced Pages is about neutral, rounded and balanced encyclopaedic summaries of subjects. Co-operation is a ''means'', not an ''end''. It ceases to be a means to Misplaced Pages's goals, when it is used to enforce an unbalanced and slanted view of one approach to a subject. ] has been summarized for editors by FuelWagon, and also by myself more than once. If Alice is stating that I habitually delete "scientific fact" (or do so without discussing or indicating that a citation exists if needed) she needs to provide some examples. It's very noticeable that the presented case and rebuttals contain numerous visible citations. By contrast as a double standard, a list of 84 citations with links (]), of NLP used by credible organizations, has been provided, but AliceDeGrey has not yet moved even a finger to discuss or acknowledge it, nor to adjust the article to represent it fairly.<br>&nbsp;<br>AliceDeGrey is somewhat disingenuous when she states ''"We do not delete scientific facts or advocate for its deletion"'' (implicit acknowledgement of a group of editors). See her own edits, , removing details of how NLP is used by cults making it seem NLP ''is'' a cult, removal of critical 1st half of quote, preface the intro definition with the sentence "Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) is a method proposed for programming the mind", adds "and remote ESP influence" to a list of NLP uses, adds "and dubious (Morgan 1993)" knowing that Morgan was an opinion writer yet referencing him as if he were a scientist , rvt/reinstates this adding untruthfully that this opinion of Morgan's is "A more recent scientific assessment" , then when corrected rvt/reinstates ''again'' this time adding a further misleading characterization as a "published follow up scientific assessment (Morgan 1993)" , removes a statement by one of America's foremost professors of linguistics that two of NLPs disputed presuppostions are in fact "major findings of cognitive science" , removes the observation on the contradictory nature of criticisms leveled at NLP , reinstates the "NLP is a method of programming the mind" deleted earlier , '''removes''' the skeptics dictionary reference deliberately leaving Carroll (2003) looking like a research academic , ..... <br>&nbsp;<br>
# ''Re DaveRight'': '''''' I find it strange there are both a "D.Right" and a "DaveRight". But we'll see what we see. As far as Dave's accusations go, they are inaccurate. He has posted the identical allegation, equally untrue, on the Talk page of the article, and my reply and citations stand good here too: .<br>&nbsp;<br>I also cite other evidence of neutrality including my ''exclusion'' of a "support" vote under wikipedia policy , my talk page posts and the cited section removed as discussed and (see "response to Bookmain") the neutral inclusion of the various strong criticisms into the initial ] article when I wrote it. On numerous occasions I explain edits on the talk page for discussion, and added balancing ''negative'' criticisms on NLP on several occasions where they seemed justified. For example I try to represent both sides and ask others to edit if incorrect, I ask Headley to discuss so the edit can be agreed (ignored). On many other occasions and and and and and for examples of article edits that were explained, or citations offered, on the talk page. Edits were explained on the talk page: "Any criticisms please bring here... as I am unaware of anything controversial or disputed written in that section" and and a request to name "...one non-trivial example of a statement I added, that you feel is not supported factually and inaccurate." and "if you wish to revert please first mention here exactly which statements you feel are inaccurate. Rather than mass-reverting the entire definition. This is in compliance with wiki standards that say a dispute over wording should be hammered out on the talk page rather than repeatedly reverted" <br>&nbsp;<br>By way of contrast, the tone of DaveRight's contributions is somewhat... unwikipedian: ''Can anyone think of a good new religious name for NLP? How about The Church of New Rolling Wizdicks?DaveRight 06:24, 28 October 2005 (UTC)"'' <br>&nbsp;<br>
# ''Re HansAntel:'' I am prepared to believe Hans is not a literal sock puppet, nor is he a disruptive editor as such. Hence why I have listed him separately from the other 5 named users. But that's all. He edits with a common agenda to the other named users, he arrived here roughly with the other named users, he almost certainly found this site in connection with the current POV-warfare style editing on NLP (ie advocacy) rather than from a general wish to neutrally write for an encyclopedia. As an editor, he uses at times perjorative wording assumptions and straw men similarly to the other named users, Hans also makes vague accusations and personal remarks as they do, and falls under ] as a "single use account" and likely meatpuppet. WP policy states such users may be considered sockpuppets for this purpose. By way of example, his statement above contains no actual substantive matters, just a set of poorly defined personal remarks, an unsubstantiated and grossly inaccurate statement that I "want to write lots of complaint... nothing but complaint from start to now" and that I delete facts (see previous for rebuttals), and some statements of his personal view. I would tend to agree if he states that he has not vandalized the article in any way, or has a potential to contribute to the article: his non-neutrality, purpose on wikipedia, single use account, and common agenda with a group of aggressive POV warriors, is the concern for me.<br>&nbsp;<br>
# ''Re HeadleyDown additions:'' HeadleyDown later adds a section, most of which concerns other editors. But it references "the FT2 camp" which I object to, and at the end it states, "Here are some of FT2’s crimes", listing 5 diffs. Most of these are misrepresented:
## '''Allegation:''' There is an "FT2 camp". <br>'''Rebuttal:''' I was already a previous editor on this subject. Despite this, my contributions show none whatsoever on NLP or its talk page or related articles between 5 Aug (when HeadleyDown arrived) and 27 Oct (when it became obvious there was a sockpuppet or crony issue severely slanting the article), whilst I tried to let existing editors reach agreement. By 27 Oct it had already undergone RfC and RfM, all the other major editors were already engaged, and my focus was to try and clarify the NPOV issues, and rework visibly problematic edits, as someone unaligned. It is false to name me as having a "camp" or similar. I have tried to work with ''both'' sides.
## '''Allegation:''' Removing cited facts and selective editing. "Lots of anti NPOV activity." <br>'''Rebuttal:''' This was in fact a rvt of Headley's edits, back to the ''mediated'' version. Headley had edited the mediated version to include multiple additional criticisms (again), adding the words: "significant criticism" (twice), "promotion" (twice), "dubious" (once), "pseduoscientific" (once) on top of many existing references of these words, plus deletion of a research citation stating that research was limited and had probably not yet been undertaken properly. My edit narrative read: ''"rvt Headley to VoiceOfAll: WP is about a <u>balanced neutral encyclopaedic view</u> - not every "fact" has a place, especially not when it's merely further unbalancing an already unbalanced article"''.
## '''Allegation:''' removing properly cited facts. <br>'''Rebuttal:''' This is half of a 2-edit diff. The full diff is . It's the same identical reversion as the above, reverted again because Headley kept trying to push the above noted POV into the article without discussion. It differs slightly since it incorporated reinstatement of mediator edits that HeadleyDown had deleted from the article too. My edit narrative for these two edits read: ''", rvt to 3.09 version, including VoiceofAll's edit on "New Age" "''
## '''Allegation:''' Adding as much hype in one go as possible. <br>'''Rebuttal:''' Following the one sided nature of the article, I listed for discussion some 84 citations from credible organisations that state NLP is used or found to be of value to them, at ]. Every last item on that list was sourced, and every last one had a web link provided for verification. All but a handful were current (2004-2005). This was appropriate in view of headley and others' repeated comments that they ''did not know'' of any people taking, or using, NLP seriously. Neither Headley nor his colleagues have ever denied this list is accurate. Headley & Co. having failed to represent NLP's usage properly, I added a summary of this material myself, complete with citations for every entry, listing the facts and letting them speak for themselves. I find it hard to see how this characterizes as "hype". My edit narrative read: ''"Just a few... I think its time some balance was brought to this article, the evidence has been on the other page for some time now as to applications."''
## '''Allegation:''' FT2’s "masterpiece of selective editing... FT2's biggest trick". Alleges that the argument is selectively cited, taking the middle and ignoring the negative conclusion.. States that "The end of the paragraph actually states – But NLP has failed in controlled experiments and so it is relegated". Characterizes the edit as "intellectually fraudulent, clear selective editing, biased in the extreme, and grossly misleading" from a research perspective.<br>'''Rebuttal:''' This was part of a HeadleyDown breach of 3RR reversion, and arose after I had reverted it twice already. Edit narratives: <ul><li> ''"Rvt - misrepresentative of research sources, see talk page *again* headley. When I say "if you have an issue discuss 1st", thats because it's WP policy Headley"''</li><li> ''"See talk page, selective citation is <u>not</u> okay see WP:NPOV"''</li><li> ''"Headley..... that's still weasel ("other reasons") and pov suppression. If you don't know the scientific research or usage, then ask on the talk page as suggested, rather than just reverting."''</li></ul>The edit itself can be seen in the DIFF, and its neutrality judged. Addressing Headley's points:<ul><li>Re the allegation of selectivity, I note that if a researcher states in one and the same paper, that:<br>''"Research data do not support the rather extreme claims that the proponents of NLP have made"''<br>and ALSO states:<br>''"This does not necessarily reduce NLP to worthlessness... Rather, it puts NLP in the same category as psychoanalysis, that is, with principles not easily demonstrated in laboratory settings but nevertheless, strongly supported by clinicians in the field"'',<br>then I think to choose just the negative one, when one is already selectively inserting only the more negative citations already, is highly inappropriate. So I added the balancing quote in order that the author would not be misrepresented. It is clear that he wrote both sentences, and it is hard to see his very specific wording not being intended as it reads. </li><li>Regarding the end of the sentence, in fact Headley seems to be deliberately misquoting that paragraph here. It does NOT say "But NLP has failed in controlled experiments and so it is relegated". DaveRight actually posted the end of that sentence on the NLP pages for us, and says that it reads ''very'' differently: "'''But, if''' it has been tested and fails then it is relegated."</li><li>Headley represented the BPS (again) as viewing NLP as "Charlatanery". My response to this has been given many times, and actual BPS citations where they ''support and recommend'' NLP, or at the least do not treat it at all like "quackery", are cited and linked at ]. HeadleyDown has never acknowledged these. Rather than delete a viewpoint, I added a note in parentheses, that this view was no longer supported by the BPS.</li></ul>Apparently the standard for citation inclusion varies tremendously depending whether it is a view that represents NLP in the extremely critical light or not. That might be Headley's view. But it is not appropriate behavior on Misplaced Pages.
## '''Allegation:''' I stated that NLP is criticised both for being ineffectual and being too effective. "This contradiction has not yet been resolved". HeadleyDown states first that this is a personal view, then that it is a view he has heard from others who he calls "vandals" (but never names), finally stating that it "is not the view of any other author" but mere personal opinion. <br>'''Rebuttal:''' Apart from the contradictions in his own words, it is clear that 1/ NLP has been criticized for being ineffective, Headley & Co. have dug up multiple citations to this effect. 2/ NLP has been criticized for being effective in and used as part of mind control and cults etc. Again, both Headley & Co. and I have dug up multiple citations to this effect as well. 3/ These contradict, 4/ The contradiction is noteworthy since it shines a light on NLP and NLP research, and 5/ The contradiction has not yet been resolved. I am unaware of a reason why this would be a remarkable edit or considered unsourced. The edit contains a variety of other edits too. The edit narrative states ''"Criticism - cleanup - see talk page"''. The talk page post I wrote explaining this edit is and worth reading for its neutrality.
## ] signoff: "There are many more similar breaches of cooperation, good research and policy that FT2 continues to commit" (ominous words, but none are cited).
## HeadleyDown, rebutted, attempts to back-pedal / soft-pedal his accusations and actions, adding that "The whole arbitration episode is quite ridiculous."

===Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (3/0/0/0)===
* Accept cautiously, to judge behavior and not content ] 23:47, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ] ] 13:17, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ] (]) 14:52, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

== ] et al. ==

Pages: ], ], ], etc.

Involved parties

Complainants:

*],
*],
*],
*],
*],
*],
*],
*],
*]

Against:

*],
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] banned sockpuppet of Johnski (block log:)(Note:This user is now ]},
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski (see )
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspectedd sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski,
*] suspected sockpuppet of Johnski.

Brief summary: On going vandalism with pages associated with Dominion of Melchizedek by user Johnski and his sockpuppets. This has been going on for over four months.

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request:
Plantiffs: ] , ] , ] , ], ] , ] , ], ]

Defendants:] , ] , ] (Note: This user has been blocked as a sock puppet), ] , ] .

Confirmation that other steps in ] have been tried:

On November 3rd, I requested this case be mediated and posted in on the appropriate page. The request for mediation was declined by ] and he stated that he didn’t feel mediation was likely to be useful.

I was disappointed and asked Sam Korn what other method he thought would be useful. He stated RFC would be a better option. The problem with this is however, is we have tried to RFC this article in the past. Also, because one user is responsible for reverting the articles in question multiple times with multiple user names, the process would only be manipulated and abused by this person by voting as many times as he saw fit to.

==== Statement by ] (on behalf of all complainants) ====
There is an ongoing revert war with Johnski, who has reverted the article ], 60+ times in the last two months. Johnski has been reverting these pages without consensus for over four months.

Johnski is strongly believed to be an active member of Dominion of Melchizedek, as he possesses an intimate familiarity with details of court cases and other historical matters pertaining to it that few, if any, outsiders would be privy to. As a primary source and should not be contributing to any articles on this subject, in accordance with Misplaced Pages general editing principles.

He has violated the 3RR rule numerous times. To justify his reverts, he claims that his version has consensus, and that the prior version is biased. He has also used numerous sock puppets to revert the above page, and to introduce Melchizedek-related promotional content into many other articles as well, including: ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ] and ].

When challenged by other editors Johnski selectively quotes media reports out of context in order to put a positive spin on consistently extremely negative reportage about Melchizedek. He consistently seeks to insert these out-of-context quotations into the above articles to provide what he alleges is "balanced" reportage, and has attempted to delete quotations which show Melchizedek in a negative light.

Johnski does not follow the rules of Misplaced Pages and frankly changes them in order to push his own agenda. Additionally, his presumed association with a group known for defrauding people in many parts of the world of millions of dollars is a negative reflection on Misplaced Pages, and should be curtailed.

The specific allegations being made are as follows:

Allegation #1: Adding statements that are POV without providing proof in terms of his claims and deleting claims he disagrees with and making dishonest statements. In terms of area (size of the country), Johnski makes the assertion that DOM claims the entire earth, while not providing evidence of this claim. When he edits the page, he is careful to remove any criticisms of DOM and/or change statements to minimize frauds that have been committed by the people involved.

Allegation #2: Reverting Dominion of Melchizedek, Bokak Atoll and other articles without consensus.

Allegation #3: Inability to show good faith and follow the rules of Misplaced Pages. Posts information on talk page, then proceeds to revert the page and leaves the following message, “refer to talk page and before reverting see if you can't find something you can keep in your next revision.”
Johnski has made many statements about Misplaced Pages rules which are false and misleading. He also has made assertions that seven to ten people support his version of the article.

Allegation #4: Misquoting sources to push POV edits. Misquoting Washington Post Article, Johnski claimed it said “dubious” when the article claimed DOM was in fact a “ruse.” Misquoting the United States U.S. Comptroller of the Currency claiming that because a document refers to Melchizedek as a "non-recognized sovereignty" and make it appear that the US is giving defacto recongniztion, when that is clearly not the case.

Allegation #5: Harassment-Mainly creating an article on Misplaced Pages called ] to criticize those he disagrees with. The article itself was tagged Speedy Deletion, then recreated and deleted and protected so that he could not recreate it. ] in the edit summary that the page was stated, “Recreated after speedy deletion, created by a disgruntled user.” ] 22:49, November 13, 2005

:I would like to restate again, my allegation in terms of sockpuppets being used. So far, one user name has been blocked. I am working to try to find out any details why, but I would appreciate it if the arbitration committee would look into this, instead of mearly discarding the possiblity of this being true.

:For the record, I am not the "ringleader" of this group, which implies I'm putting pressure on other people to come forward. There are many other people that have a problem with the editing done by Johnski other then myself. Johnski would like you to believe that it is purely a matter between him and I, but this isn't true. ] 04:27, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

==== Statement by ] ====

The issues I see here is that

* A single editor is trying to impose his changes on articles against the wishes against multiple other editors.

* This editor is using sockpuppets as part of his effort to make these changes

As per point one, he keeps trying to add ] content to a number of articles about geographic locations whose only relation to ] is the fact that DOM has claimed that they own the land in question. Here are some recent edits in just one article: .

The user is also being dishonest; he is using multiple accounts. You can see above the three different accounts making the exact same ]- related changes: ], ], and ]. You can see that these accounts have, by and large, have only made a relatively small number of edits, almost all DOM related: . In particular, in all cases, the ''first'' edit for these accounts was DOM-related. This is a clear case of using sockpuppet accounts.

When a single editor goes against the wishes of multiple other editors, and uses sockpuppets towards this end, disclipinary action becomes necessary. ] 20:37, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

==== Statement by ] ====
I believe that ] is using multiple accounts to give the appearance that more than one editor supports his actions in adding heavily pro-"Melchizedek" spin to as many artticles as he can possibly find in Misplaced Pages that have the slightest tangential relationship to what is in reality a ] entity that has been widely condemned for being used as a vehicle for the conduct of criminal activities throughout the world.

It is telling that ], ], ] and the various other anonymous IPs who have edited in favour of "Melchizededk" focus wholly and solely on the exact same group of articles, from their first edit, and appear to edit in sustained bursts of activity. None of these editors have made any other substantive contribution to Misplaced Pages beyond their edits to "Melchizedek"-related articles.

It is my personal belief that ] is probably the current "president" of Melchizedek, as he has a familiarity with this subject, and with the minutiae of court cases and other legal proceedings and historic events that no outsider would (a) be aware of, and (b) be so obsessively interested in. While his involvement in Melchizedek does not preclude him from contributing to this article, he has consistently failed to conform with the principles of evidence, NPOV and good faith - particularly in repeatedly trying to "spin" negative statements into positive ones by selectively misquoting media reports critical of "Melchizedek".

In doing so he has, in my opinion, forfeited the right to further participation in the Misplaced Pages community. --] 01:53, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

:I believe that ] may be using multiple accounts as it has been pointed out that he has responded to messages to Centauri in the first person. Also, Shocktm may be another of his sock-puppets to give the appearance that more than one editor supports his actions in twisting facts about the Melchizedek story. He is known to be a part of a different micronation that hasn't achieved the same level of recognition as DOM, so he may be jealous of DOM since it was able to gain recognition while having tons of negative press against it. One most recent example is his refusal to stop mis-characterizing a Washington Post article changing the meaning from "you get the feeling" to "probably". Even when others in his group finally saw the need for correcting the reference, he refuses on the basis that it is easier reading. Who cares about misrepresenting the WP article if it is easier reading? seems his attitude.

:I can't speak for others, but the article cries out for attention, and others since the arbitration was brought have noticed the same.

:Gene's belief is not true, I am not the "president" of Melchizedek, as my only familiarity with this subject, and with court cases and other legal proceedings and historic events are all published, and it is Gene that isn't conforming to the principles of evidence, NPOV and good faith - particularly in repeatedly trying to "spin" negative statements into more negative ones by selectively misquoting media reports critical of "Melchizedek", and by removing valid quotes from U.S. government web sites. You would think that my bringing stuff to their attention previously unknown to them would get their respect. But knowing more than they know about the subject makes them better qualified to keep and guard the article only as they see fit.

:While I don't think Gene has forfeited his right to participation in the Misplaced Pages community, he needs someone with authority here to help him understand that Wikipedian articles should quote sources correctly, and that articles need to be fair and balanced. Perhaps Gene is the real ringleader here, not Davidpdx, and Davidpx has only been an unwitting tool of Gene. Sincerely, ] 07:46, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

::I would like to point out my comments were removed by one of the arbitration committee and I was told not to comment on others statements. I would hope this is treated the same. (yes and remove this comment too that's ok with me). ] 14:45, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

:::I don't mind if ]'s rant above is retained or removed. Apart from its general entertainment value it's also a pretty good illustration of precisely why he's about to become the subject of arbitartion. --] 05:04, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

::So now, I'm the "unwitting tool" and Gene is the ringleader? Make up your mind why don't you? It's funny, because you have no idea what your talking about. As Gene so elequently put it, you are clueless and that is exactly why your being taken to arbitration. ] 15:32, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

==== Statement by ] ====
Samboy effectively speaks for me; his summary of this situation is the best, I think.

] states "Neither a sockpuppet nor a brand-new, single-purpose account holder is a member of the Misplaced Pages community." Sockpuppetry per se is not at all a big deal to me, and in fact in the past I've been one to push on other disputes for less attention to be given to that in favor of other charges. In this case, though, whether we are dealing with sockpuppets or meatpuppets, it's clear we are looking at "single-purpose account"s. This has made it impossible to try to push for real consensus to be built on what these articles should or should not say, since all these new single-purpose accounts try to involve themselves in the consensus.

] (]&nbsp;&bull;&nbsp;]) 18:43, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

==== Statement by ] ====
My main problem with Jonski et al is the way he uses references. Take the Washington Post article. He tried to claim to me that the Washington Post was saying that it was DOMs declaration of war against France. However the tittle of the article was "The Ruse that Roared." ie a clear reference to the miniscule state of the film not to the act of declaring war. After a few times of checking someones refs and finding they are putting a spin which contradicts the original you lose confidence with any edit he makes.] 15:58, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

==== Statement by ] ====
Hello Kelly Martin, if you could help edit this article taking into consideration mine and others efforts to reduce the bias, and bring more balance, that could end the edit war.

I'll borrow from what I read on another subject as it says it better than I could write myself:

Davidpdx, their ringleader, has not made any contribution to any topic regarding this subject, other than ]. As soon as Samboy challenged him for that, he removed the content that Isotope23, KAJ and himself worked hard to reach consensus on. In some instances they have continued their POV approach on DOM to the detriment of other pages too. In essense, they have acted as POV warriors with a single viewpoint who have proven unable or uninterested in the wiki approach or policies, and have little interest in anything beyond their own view. (eg, only show negative aspects of ], and ignore anything else the press or governemnt web sites have put forth. Fundamentally they do not seem to show the slightest ability or care for collaborating in a wiki manner. Indeed their idea of collaboration is insults and ignoring or dismissal of issues, often with personal attacks and remarks.

Here are some problems encountered:

* factual suppression
* Repeated deletion of sourced material or cited fact about the subject by reputable authors, government web sites, often followed by addition of more POV material.
* Personal attacks
* Ignoring of requests to discuss edits
* Changing the words "you get the feeling" to "probably" when quoting the Washington Post, as one example.

When Davidpdx was first given the idea for mediation he took it as a threat, and was told that arbitration would be necessary if he didn't accept mediation. Finally he grabbed the ball and ran with it.

I've only used one of the IP addresses Davidpdx listed above, and I have no sockpuppets. I've offered to disclose my IP address, if he first agrees to disclose his after I disclose mine, but he will not comply. Made the same offer to a few others listed above. None have accepted.

I am not a Melchizedekian nor am I a member of the Pedley family. I am a Christian Scientist. I know that Jdavidb is at odds with my faith. The only thing I've been asking for is that the article become fair, balanced and factual. I've backed up every fact, and only tried to quote exactly from articles, government web sites, but that is not permitted by Davidpdx.

I created the article Wikilante as a sincere attempt to describe the vigilante behavior of Davidpdx, and told him that I'm sorry if he thought I was taunting him, and paid him a compliment for his efforts since he apparently is sincere as are vigilantes. I didn't try to create that article again after I realized that an administrator had deleted it a second time, and didn't know it was blocked.

Davidpdx claims that I didn't show anywhere that DOM claims earth, which shows he doesn't read my talk as I had just posted a link to the CBS article that stated that Melchizedek unofficially claims the entire earth, and claims Jerusalem as its homeland. Please take a look and see for yourself.

I tried hard to work for compromise with Davidpdx but it turned out he was only playing games with me, and had no such intention, which is evidenced from his lack of making any compromise on the main DOM article, but only finding reason not to compromise, having nothing to do with the facts, but only having to do with issues of my not following his idea of the rules, my being stupid, and being on LSD. I've never used LSD and although a slow learner, I doubt that I am stupid. And I have tried my best to follow the wiki rules as I slowly learn those rules.

I'm happy to get into all of the details of the efforts for a better article, but you can easily figure it out by looking at my last version compared to the one before it, and taking a look at the last talk page on DOM as of this date. Sincerely, ] 20:56, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

''(Moved from below section --]</nowiki>]] 21:02, 13 November 2005 (UTC))''

==== Statement by ] ====

I am NOT anybody's sock, meat puppet, am NOT part of any organizational push. Only have seen needfor creating a better article. I changed my name three times, first it was Samspade, then SamuelSpade and now it should stay Spadesam. ] 03:38, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

==== CheckUser lookups ====

The IPs are widely geographically disparate. In most cases, one of the usernames uses just one or two of the IPs. (I'll mark these later.) I don't think it's all one ''person''; the pattern is similar to that of agents of an organisation acting together, but I'd need to look closely at the editing style before saying it looks like that. More as I work out what on earth is going on here - ] 11:04, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

:Out of fairness, you might want to check to see if there is any sockpuppetry from Davidpdx's side of this arbitration request, because I remember reading somewhere that Centauri is a sock-puppet of Gene_polle. ] 22:45, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

====Note from ] re mediation====

Basically, I suggested mediation was a bad idea (note that I didn't "reject" the request ''per se'') because it appeared to be more of a request for sanctions against another user. The aggressive way in which it was phrased did not give me any impression that a mediation was likely to be successful. I was suggesting a user-conduct RFC, which I cannot see as having happened. From what I can see of the case, there are two groups of editors, who may or may not be sockpuppets, editing aggressively and communicating poorly. I only wish there were a way of dealing with edit-warring short of the full ArbCom salvo. ]</nowiki>]] 00:08, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

==== Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (4/1/0/0) ====
* Accept to deal with edit warring. (But tread carefully on the sockpuppet claims; on preliminary investigation they do not check out.) ] (]) 09:21, 13 November 2005 (UTC)
* Reject - whack them (all the sockpuppets/IPs except Johnski). No need for an arbcom case. If he (Johnski) won't behave, then whack him too. (For the record, I checked on the sockpuppeting allegations above and while I cannot confirm all of the above suspicions, it does look like sockpuppeting is going on) ] 05:44, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
**I'm not quite sure it's sockpuppetry per se - looks like it might be meatpuppets in the form of an organisational push. I'll get back to you all on this one - ] 11:04, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept ] 12:47, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept &mdash; looks like meat rather than socks ] 23:50, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ] ] 18:43, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

== ] and ] ==

*]
*Anon currently: ]
* ]

=== Confirmations ===
;Awareness
* I have placed a notification on ] and
* anon's ] page.
* ] just woke up, and is slightly disoriented but aware. I was informed as a neutral party a couple of days ago . --]] 08:53, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

===Other steps===
* leading to latest page protection by ]
*14 months of
* Comments at
* Comments at
* A , in which TDC invited all of his friends and allies to chime in , but based on the history of this page, this will simply not work.

=== Statement by ] ===
Since October 21, 2005 I have been involved with the page ]. This page has been protected 9 times in ten months, once since I have been invovled with the page. Currently, ] and anon have been the major players in revert wars. But other minor players have been recently involved with the editing of the page. The page has 421 deleted edits , I beleive many from ].

I attempted to set up a criticism section (which anon deletes full paragraphs from) and TDC is hooked on weaselwords, refusing to allow the word "testimony" to appear in the article. Neither wants to backdown or comprimise. Both are involved in retracted edit wars. ] 04:32, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

::* "Pro" winter soldier: ] (Myself), anon 209.86.1.4, Anon 165.247.200.100, ], ]
::* "Con" winter soldier (people who tend to side with TDC): ], ], ],
::* Neutral parties: ], ]

*'''TDC''': TDC has been booted 13 times for similar revert wars . See also Requests for comment/TDC-2, Requests for comment/TDC <font color="red"> Requests for mediation TDC and Tony Sidaway

] starts revert wars like the recent revert war on ] on several wikipages, and was recently warned again by ] on 5 November 2005 Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

'''FIRST revert war:''' Because of a FIRST revert war on ], which TDC started over long quotes, I erased many of the "superfluous use of direct quotations" (the reason why User:TDC erased many of the quotes) and moved them to wikiquote. This did not satisfy TDC.

'''SECOND war:''' TDC found a new, SECOND war. ] and Duk then attempted to get the complete article ] (along with ] at the same time erased for a "copyright violation" for no more than a maximum of 6 isolated sentences that could be considered "copyright violations" in a 9 page article. I footnoted many of the copyright violations. AGAIN this did not satisfy TDC. ] began to write the article from scratch, he even complained to ] that "The first 4 paragraphs, having been written largely by me, can not posibly be considered a copyright violation.". I stopped this attempt to rewrite the entire article by ] with the participation of ] by filing a Mediation request. ] and ] changed the few sentences. ] protected the article on request of ] and ] unlocked it a few days later.

'''THIRD revert war:''' ] began a new THIRD revert war, this time over the word "testimony", which he did not want anywhere in the article, and other weaselwords such as "claimed", "alleged". TDC refuses to allow the word "testimony" to be in the article, and continues to revert back. I reported TDC to 3RR but there wasn't enough times to get him booted.

*'''Anon:''' Anon is the other revert war participant. The opposite of ], he allows very little information '''critical''' of ] to stay on the wikipage. ''Deleted link critical to WSI and two paragraphs critical of WSI''

I suggested spliting the article into a pro and con section, with a commitment from both parties that the other person only edit that section, but Anon refused.

] reported Anon to 3RR. I initially supported Anon, then realized Anon was as guilty of revert wars and deleting information that does not support his ideology, just as TDC does. I then retracted my support for Anon too on the 3RR page.


'''Conclusion:''' Incredibly all three of these revert wars perpetuated by TDC have only been since October 21, a space of 20 days. While you are at it, maybe you can arbitrate Vietnam Veterans Against the War with the same perps and the same issues. Please help. ''(I hope I did this right, this is my first Requests for arbitration.)''

'''Request for '''

I suggest that:
::*anon have a ] placed on him for editing ] and ],
::*that as per the TDC..."should be banned with a from editing any and all controversial topics related to U.S. military conflict." -- '']''

<font color="red">UPDATE: ] reported anon for a 3RR on ], the second time in a month, both accuse each other of lying. Anon is erasing the dispute tag The bitter revert war continues...

=== Statement by ] ===

Contrary to the allegations made by Stevertigo and Travb, this is not an attempt to have the article erased or to have a certain POV dominate it, only to clear up glaring NPOV issues, remove copyvios and plagiarism and improve the quality of the article. Let me repeat that for some of the editors who are questioning my motives : THIS IS NOT AN ATTEMPT TO HAVE THE ARTICLE ERASED OR TO HAVE A CERTAIN POV DOMINATE IT.

The problem with using so much cut and paste, as has been more than well documented, is that the information is plagiarized from sources overly sympathetic to the VVAW (including the VVAW’s own website) and the WSI. The inclusion of this information in its current form fundamentally alters the NOPV of the article. Why some editors cannot see this is beyond me. Would we allow an article on GW Bush to be comprised almost entirely of press briefings from the White House? Would we allow an article about PETA to consist primarily of quotes from PETA friendly sources? That’s all I am asking for here.

I think that a history lesson on the article might be in order. The anon began contributing to this article sometime in July of 2004. He has had a pretty consistent tactic. He takes out any information he disagrees with, places it in talk and begins an never ending argument of either the validity of the information, or the relevance to the article. Almost as soon as he began contributing to the article, editors began to draw attention to his use of plagiarized material . Just in case any of you missed that, I was not the first editor to argue that the Anon’s use of plagiarized material was skewing the POV of the article. The anon then protects his edits using never ending and deceptively labeled Rv’s. Since he is using an EarthLink IP, he cannot be blocked, no matter how flagrant his violation is (he had 15rv’s in one day on another article), giving him impunity from any form of sanctions on his behavior.

I know Travb has accused me of instigating an edit war over this article, and he is partially right. There currently exists an edit war over this article, but I fail to see how I am chiefly responsible for it. Where other editors have given up in frustration, I refuse to drop the issue and walk away from the article. Some might say I am being a POV warrior here, I call it diligence. The talk page has 1 current page and three archived pages full of lengthy discussions that have not solved a damn thing. The plagiarized material still finds its way into the article and any information the anon is uncomfortable with finds its way out. One section, 540 words, is nothing more than a lengthy quote from a VVAW friendly author.

I have said before that I would abide by whatever decision is made. Not only do you have my promise, but you can sanction me if I don’t. Good luck getting the anon to do likewise. ] 17:09, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

I just wanted to add, what I think is one of the best examples of the Anon's deceptive editing and plagarism:

: ''New York Times explained that he found nothing newsworthy to report because "this stuff happens in all wars." There were a smattering of articles sympathetic to the veterans in the underground press; and Pacifica Radio, with major channels on both coasts, devoted to a pacifist, left-wing perspective on current events, gave them excellent coverage. The CBS television crew that showed up were themselves deeply impressed, but none of their footage made it to the nightly news. ''

from the WSI Misplaced Pages article

:''The local field reporter for the "New York Times," Jerry M. Flint, commented with disinterest, "this stuff happens in all wars." In a February 7, 1971 article he wrote that "much of what they said had been reported or televised before, even from Vietnam. What was different here was the number of veterans present." Several of the VVAW representatives speculated that there was an "official censorship blackout," and they would express this theory later in their newsletter. A few articles that were sympathetic to the veterans appeared in lesser-known publications, and Pacifica Radio, known for its left-wing perspective, gave the event considerable coverage. The CBS television crew that showed up were impressed, but only three minutes made it to the nightly news on the first night -- three minutes that were "mostly irrelevant to the subject," according to VVAW.''

Instead of rewriting and crediting the information, the anon has simply rearranged a few sentences and changed significant factual portions of the plagiarized work, i.e: ''but none of their footage made it to the nightly news'' as has been changed to ''only three minutes made it to the nightly news on the first night''. I mean which one is it? The source that the material was clearly ripped off from states something completely different. And I am bieng singled out for bad faith edits? ] 17:15, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

One more quick point (last one): If there weren’t users like me to balance out blatant POV's in far too many articles to count, it wouldn’t get done. ] 23:41, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

=== Statement by ]===
Please limit your statement to 500 words (more soon)

=== Statement by ] ===
I am only peripherally involved, but I would like to add one item to ]'s account above, which convinced me of bad faith being involved in the "Second Edit War" above: namely that when ] began writing a new article , his initial '''from scratch''' version was blanked 31 minutes later by ] on grounds of being a
. --] | ] 05:58, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

=== Statement by ] ===
] is flat out wrong here. shows that Ed did not re-write the article from scratch. The version I tagged after Ed's edits had copyvios that were initially identified at ], with more and more being noted on the talk page as they were uncovered. Many of these copyvios originated more than a year earlier and kept sneaking back into the article after an earlier copyvio revert. They included copied text and derivative work.

This article had large amounts of copied work in it for over a year that was eventually morphed (in August I think), so that the copied paragraphs weren't exact copies. There were still copied sentences, clauses and paragraph structure, however, and the article was never reverted to the pre-copivio version before the morphing. It was therefor a derivative work copyvio. I resolved the copyvio after a long listing on ] by reverting to the pre-copyvio version. Later, the copied and derivative work kept sneaking back into the article, resulting in my tagging the page and at one time protecting it to keep the copyvio tag on.

For example; take the phrase ''that an entire regiment of the Third Marines had penetrated several miles into that neutral nation''. It was from a paragraph that was added to the page as a copyvio from , sometime before , more than a year ago. It was removed when I resolved the copyvio by reverting to , and reappeared again, resulting the the copyvio tagging that Carlton mentions above. This phrase by itself isn't much, rather, its the numerous other examples of copied text that were identified in the article's talk page (a bunch more were identified over the following weeks). Also, look at the derivative writing around the directly copied parts.

I've been called a lot of nasty names over this copyvio by people who think I have a political agenda, to which I reply that I have resolved thousands of copyvios but have almost no politically oriented edits (if anyone cares to look). Also, the harshest comments seem to come people who haven't taken the time to look closely at the article's history.

As for Travb's complaint over the deleted history, I did that per from the administrators noticeboard. --] 02:50, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

::<font size="1">On reflection, a half hour later after adding Duk, I have removed Duk as a central person in the arbitration. Duk, see your talk page.</font>] 03:48, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

*], one after the other, over and over again. And every time they get removed, or the article tagged, charges of POV, intellectual dishonesty and hidden agendas are made against the people cleaning up the mess. --] 00:30, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

*I agree with Tony (below), TDC's behavior has been pretty bad. And I'd like to add that this behavior is responsible, in part, for the many editors and admins discounting TDC's identification of copied and derived text, assuming instead that it was another one of his stunts. However, as bad as TDC's behavior has been, the EarthLink IP's behavior has been much, much worse. Intentionally introducing plagiarism and copyright violations from slanted, POV sources in order to advance their own POV. Then, when the copyvios are uncovered, morphing them into slightly different derivative works which are also copyright violations, just harder to catch. And doing all this while editing under different IPs to remain untouchable for behavior that they know is wrong. So far, the EarthLink IPs have completely gotten away with it. --] 16:41, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

=== Statement by ] ===
User:TDC has been a consistent and active foe and violator of Wikipedias ] policy in controversial areas and topics such as this one. He should be banned from editing any and all controversial topics related to U.S. military conflict. As stated above he has been consistent in using revert wars, policy and process rules (copyviolation, protection, 3RR, etc.) to POV war against the very existence of an article. How the Arbcom has managed to avoid banning him until now should be taken as evidence of the need for ].
-]|] 01:14, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

=== Statement by ] ===
This seems to be a case of an editor deliberately choosing to treat Misplaced Pages as a battleground. I have tried to rein back the edit warring. TDC sometimes goes for the better part of a week apparently going down his watchlist and doing reverts. A month or two ago I blocked TDC for a couple of days, and more recently I admonished him, and he seemed to get the point and stop. Although others are involved, when TDC stops the warring stops. Past experience leads me to the expectation that he will simply wait until my attention is elsewhere and resume. 08:53, 12 November 2005 (UTC)


=== Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (5/0/0/0) ===
* Accept. ] (]) 16:01, 13 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ] ] 01:19, 14 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. -] ] 04:21, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept ] 23:52, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
* Accept. ]<sup><small><font color="DarkGreen">]</font></small></sup> 20:04, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

= Requests for Clarification =




==Maoririder and the current Motion to Close==

I looked on the /Proposed Decision page for Maoririder, and it seems odd to me that there is a MtC when there is currently nothing (only templates) in the "Proposed remedies" and "Proposed enforcement" sections. Can someone explain this?

=Archives=
*]
*] ''(unofficial)''

]

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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).

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 Cannot pass One support vote contingent on 1.4 passing
Motion 1.2a: name the role "scrivener" 2 6 2 Cannot pass Cannot pass
Motion 1.2b: name the role "coordination assistant" 1 5 4 Cannot pass Cannot pass
Motion 1.3: make permanent (not trial) 0 9 0 Cannot pass Cannot pass
Motion 1.4: expanding arbcom-en directly 3 5 2 Cannot pass Cannot pass Cannot pass because motion 1 is not passing
Motion 2: WMF staff support 1 9 0 Cannot pass Cannot pass
Motion 3: Coordinating arbitrators 8 0 2 Passing · Two support votes are second choice to motion 1
Motion 4: Grants for correspondence clerks 0 8 0 Cannot pass 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)
  1. 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)
  2. 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)
  3. 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)
  4. 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
  1. I don't think we should extend access to the mailing list and the private information it contains beyond what is absolutely necessary. I understand the reasoning behind former arbitrators in such a role as they previously had such access, but people emailing the Arbitration Committee should have confidence that private information is kept need to know and that only the current arbitrators evaluating and making decisions based on that private information have ongoing access to it. - Aoidh (talk) 23:36, 9 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Might as well make it formal per my opinions elsewhere on the page. Primefac (talk) 13:24, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. This is limited to former arbitrators for good reasons, most of them privacy-related. But the same concerns that led to this proposal being limited to former arbitrators are also arguments against doing this at all. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:16, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. 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)
  5. 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)
  6. 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)
  7. 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

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

Motion 1.1: expand eligible set to functionaries

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

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

For this motion there are 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
  1. Nicely whimsical, and not as likely to be confusing as correspondence clerk. CaptainEek 04:11, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. per Eek :) theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 01:28, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. I think correspondence clerk is fine if role is something we're going with, it's less ambiguous as to what it entails than scrivener. - Aoidh (talk) 04:12, 11 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. I have never heard that word before; at least "correspondence" and "clerk" are somewhat common in the English Misplaced Pages world. When possible, I think we should use words people don't have to look up in dictionaries. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:07, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. Follows on from my vote on Motion 1. Cabayi (talk) 11:38, 27 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. 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)
  5. This sounds too much like we are appointing pirates, IMO. Too obscure of a word. Z1720 (talk) 17:35, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  6. I might be in the minority but I have no issue with 'correspondence clerks'. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
Abstain
  1. 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)
  2. 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
  1. 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
  1. bleh. CaptainEek 04:12, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Follows on from my vote on Motion 1. Cabayi (talk) 11:38, 27 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. mm, not my favorite. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 01:28, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  4. Prefer correspondence clerks. Z1720 (talk) 17:36, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  5. Per 1.2a. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
Abstain
  1. 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)
  2. That would be okay. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:08, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. I'm not fussed about what color we paint the bike shed. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  4. 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
  1. I recently experimented with sunset clauses and think that frankly a lot more of what we do should have such time limits that require us to stop and critically evaluate if a thing is working. CaptainEek 04:19, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. If this change is necessary, there should be a review of it after a reasonable trial period to see what does and does not work. - Aoidh (talk) 01:34, 8 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:10, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. Follows on from my vote on Motion 1. Cabayi (talk) 11:38, 27 December 2024 (UTC)
  5. This is a big change and so I'd rather that we forced a review. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC)
  6. If this passed it should require affirmative consensus to continue past the trial period. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:58, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  7. A trial first would be better. Z1720 (talk) 17:37, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  8. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  9. 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
  1. Much less trouble to have them on the main list than to split the lists. CaptainEek 04:13, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. 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)
  3. Per my vote above. Katie 23:12, 6 January 2025 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Access to private information should be as limited as possible to only what is strictly necessary to perform such a task, and I don't see allowing full access to the contents of the current list necessary for this. I'd rather not split the list, but between that and giving full access then if we're going to have a correspondence clerk, then it needs to be split. - Aoidh (talk) 04:21, 11 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Motion 1 is already problematic for privacy reasons; this would make it worse. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:14, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. Follows on from my vote on Motion 1. Cabayi (talk) 11:38, 27 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. 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)
  5. 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)
  1. I am really torn on the competing arguments between decreased effectiveness and privacy of the lists. Sdrqaz (talk) 23:46, 30 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Per Kevin & Sdrqaz. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
Arbitrator discussion

Motion 2: WMF staff support

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

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

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

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

The remit of staff assistants shall not include:

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

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

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

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

For this motion there are 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
  1. 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
  1. I appreciate that Kevin put this together, and I think this would be very helpful, maybe even the most helpful, way to ensure that we stayed on top of the ball. But just because it would achieve one goal doesn't make it a good idea. A full version of my rationale is on the ArbList, for other Arbs. The short, WP:BEANS version is that this would destroy the line between us and the Foundation, which undoes much of our utility. CaptainEek 01:22, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. Per my comment on motion 4. - Aoidh (talk) 01:31, 7 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. Might as well make it formal per my opinions elsewhere on the page. Primefac (talk) 13:24, 10 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. I like the general idea of the WMF using its donated resources to support the community that made the donations possible. I am uncomfortable with putting WMF staff in front of ArbCom's e-mail queue, however, as this would come with unavoidable conflicts of interest and a loss of independence. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:05, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  5. The help would be useful, but the consequences would be detrimental to both ArbCom & WMF. Some space between us is necessary for ArbCom's impartiality & for the WMF's section 230 position. Cabayi (talk) 12:56, 24 December 2024 (UTC)
  6. 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)
  7. I think other options need to be tried first before considering getting resources from WMF. Z1720 (talk) 17:40, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  8. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  9. 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
  1. This is currently my first-choice option; we have unofficially in the past had arbitrators take on specific roles (e.g. tracking unblock requests, responding to emails, etc) and it seemed to work fairly well. Having those rules be more "official" seems like the best way to make sure someone is responsible for these things, without needing to expand the committee or the pool of people with access to private information. Primefac (talk) 18:53, 1 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. I may still vote for the clerks option, but I think this is probably the minimum of what we need. Will it be suffucient...aye, there's the rub. CaptainEek 01:14, 5 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. Of the motions proposed, this one is the one I'd most support. It doesn't expand the number of people who can view the ArbCom mailing list beyond those on ArbCom, and creates a structure that may improve how the mailing list is handled. - Aoidh (talk) 23:21, 9 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. Per Primefac. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:19, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  5. Second choice to motion 1. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 01:29, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
  6. 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)
  7. 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)
  8. First preference, per Primefac. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
Oppose
Abstain
  1. 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)
  2. 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
  1. Misplaced Pages should remain a volunteer activity. If we cannot find volunteers to do the task, then perhaps it ought not be done in the first place. CaptainEek 01:09, 3 December 2024 (UTC)
  2. We should not have a clerk paid by the WMF handling English Misplaced Pages matters in this capacity. - Aoidh (talk) 01:48, 6 December 2024 (UTC)
  3. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:18, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
  4. 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)
  5. Per the others. Primefac (talk) 07:23, 30 December 2024 (UTC)
  6. 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)
  7. 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)
  8. Daniel (talk) 20:08, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
Abstain

Motion 4: Arbitrator views and discussions

Community discussion

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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


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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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)

Requests for enforcement

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PerspicazHistorian

PerspicazHistorian is blocked indefinitely from mainspace. Seraphimblade 03:34, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.

Request concerning PerspicazHistorian

User who is submitting this request for enforcement
NXcrypto (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) 15:53, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
User against whom enforcement is requested
PerspicazHistorian (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Search CT alerts: in user talk history • in system log


Sanction or remedy to be enforced
WP:ARBIPA
Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
  1. 17:57, 18 December 2024 - removed "discrimination" sidebar from the page of Hindutva (fascist ideology) even though the sidebar was inserted inside a section, not even the lead.
  2. 17:59, 18 December 2024 - tag bombed the highly vetted Hindutva article without any discussion or reason
  3. 10:15, 18 December 2024 - attributing castes to people withhout any sources
  4. 12:11, 18 December 2024 - edit warring to impose the above edits after getting reverted
  5. 17:09, 18 December 2024 - just like above, but this time he also added unreliable sources
  6. 18:29, 18 December 2024 - still edit warring and using edit summaries instead of talk page for conversation
  7. 14:46, 19 December 2024 (UTC) - filed an outrageous report on WP:ANI without notifying any editors. This report was closed by Bbb23 as "This is nothing but a malplaced, frivolous personal attack by the OP."
Diffs of previous relevant sanctions, if any
  • Already 2 blocks in last 4 months for edit warring.
If contentious topics restrictions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:CTOP#Awareness of contentious topics)
Additional comments by editor filing complaint

I do not see any positive signs that this editor will ever improve. So far he has only regressed. Nxcrypto Message 15:53, 19 December 2024 (UTC)

While going through this report, PerspicazHistorian has made another highly problematic edit here by edit warring and misrepresenting the sources to label the organisation as "terrorist". This primary source only provides a list of organisations termed by the Indian government as "terrorist" contrary to MOS:TERRORIST. Nxcrypto Message 03:12, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested


Discussion concerning PerspicazHistorian

Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.

Statement by PerspicazHistorian

  • By far I am also concerned how my edits were forcefully reverted without a proper reason despite providing enough references. Please check how I am getting attacked by them on Chandraseniya_Kayastha_Prabhu Page.

I didn't know about the three-revert-rule before User: Ratnahastin told me about this: User_talk:PerspicazHistorian. Please grant me one more chance, I will make sure not to edit war.

  • In the below statement by LukeEmily, As a reply I just want to say that I was just making obvious edit on Chandraseniya_Kayastha_Prabhu by adding a list of notable people with proper references. And according to Edit_warring#What_edit_warring_is it is clearly said: "Edits from a slanted point of view, general insertion or removal of material, or other good-faith changes are not considered vandalism." It was a good faith edit but others reverted it. I accept my mistake of not raising it on talk page as a part of Misplaced Pages:BOLD,_revert,_discuss_cycle.
  • As a clarification to my edit on Students' Islamic Movement of India, it can be clearly seen that I provided enough reference to prove its a terrorist organisation as seen in this edit. I don't know why is there a discussion to this obvious edit? Admins please correct me if I am wrong.
@Valereee, Yes I read about 1RR and 0RR revert rules in Misplaced Pages:Edit warring#What edit warring is#Other revert rules. I now understand the importance of raising the topic on talk page whenever a consensus is needed. Thank You ! PerspicazHistorian (talk) 07:16, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Yes, I will commit to that. PerspicazHistorian (talk) 13:10, 20 December 2024 (UTC) Moved comment to own section. Please comment, including replies, only in this section. Seraphimblade 13:19, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
At that time I was new to how AFD discussions worked. Later on when Satish R. Devane was marked for deletion, I respected the consensus by not interfering in it. The article was later deleted. PerspicazHistorian (talk) 11:54, 21 December 2024 (UTC)
  • Hi @Doug Weller , I just checked your user page. You have 16 years (I am 19) of experience on wiki, you must be right about me. I agree that my start on Misplaced Pages has been horrible, but I am learning a lot from you all. I promise that I will do better, get more neutral here and contribute to the platform to my best. Please don't block me.
P.S.- I don't know If I will be blocked or what , according to this enforcement rules, I just want to personally wish good luck to you for your ongoing cancer treatments, You will surely win this battle of Life. Regards. PerspicazHistorian (talk) 12:23, 21 December 2024 (UTC)Moved comment to own section. Please comment, including replies, only in this section.Valereee (talk) 15:30, 24 December 2024 (UTC)
  • 1) I just asked an user @Fylindfotberserk if the page move is possible. What's wrong with it? I still have not considered putting a move request on talk page of article.
2) Many of other sources are not raj era. Moreover I myself have deleted the content way before you pointing this out. Thank You ! PerspicazHistorian (talk) 06:29, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
even @NXcrypto is seen engaged in edit wars before on contentious Indian topics. see1see2 PerspicazHistorian (talk) 06:37, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
as mentioned by @Valereee before, Please discuss at talk, not here; we don't deal with content here. You can discuss content related topics on talk pages of articles rather than personally targeting a user here in enforcement. PerspicazHistorian (talk) 06:42, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
@Valereee I once filed a complaint to find it @NXcrypto is a sock (out of a misunderstanding, as all were teamed up similarly on various pages). I think he felt it as a personal attack by me and filed this request for enforcement. Please interfere. PerspicazHistorian (talk) 06:47, 29 December 2024 (UTC) moving to correct section Valereee (talk) 13:24, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
1)Yes I usually edit on RSS related topics, but to ensure a democratic view is maintained as many socks try to disrupt such articles. Even on Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh page, I just edited on request of talk page and added a graph. I don't think its a POV push.
2) My main interest in editing is Hinduism and Indian History topics.
3)There have been certain cases in past where I was blocked but if studied carefully they were result of me edit warring with socks(although, through guidance of various experienced editors and admins I learnt a SPI should be filed first). I have learnt a lot in my journey and there have been nearly zero case of me of edit warring this month.
Please do not block me. PerspicazHistorian (talk) 14:09, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
  • @Valereee I beg apologies for the inconvenience caused, thanks for correcting me. I will now reply in my own statement section. @Bishonen I am a quick learner and professionally competent to edit in this encyclopedic space. Please consider reviewing this enforcement if its an counter-attack on me as mentioned in my previous replies. You all are experienced editors and I have good faith in your decision-making capability.PerspicazHistorian (talk) 08:27, 30 December 2024 (UTC)
  • @Vanamonde93@Bishonen I have edited content marked as "original research" and "mess" by you, I am ready to help removing any content that might be considered "poorly sourced" by the community. Please don't block me.PerspicazHistorian (talk) 08:27, 30 December 2024 (UTC)
  • @Valereee This enforcement started for edit-warring and now I feel its more concerned to my edited content(which I agree to cooperate and change wherever needed). After learning about edit wars, there has been no instance of me edit-warring, Please consider my request.--PerspicazHistorian (talk) 08:27, 30 December 2024 (UTC)
    @Valereee I am not a slow learner, I understand the concerns of all admins here. I will try my best to add only reliable sources, and discuss content in all talk pages, as I already mentioned here. PPicazHist (talk) 12:55, 30 December 2024 (UTC)
    @Valereee@UtherSRG I think admins should focus more on encouraging editors when they do good and correct when mistaken. I have made many edits, added many citations and created much articles which use fine citations. The enforcement started out of retaliation by nxcrypto, now moving towards banning me anyways. I started editing out of passion, and doing it here on wiki unlike those who come here just for pov pushes and disrupt article space(talking about socks and vandalizers on contentious Indian topics).
    The article prasada doesn't only has issue on citations, but the whole article is copypasted from the citations I added. I just wanted to point that out. Remaining about Misplaced Pages:CIR, I am currently pursuing Btech in cs from IIT delhi, idt I am a slow learner by any means. Still, happy new year to all ! PPicazHist (talk) 14:01, 31 December 2024 (UTC)
    @UtherSRG You mean to say, "The prasada is to be consumed by attendees as a holy offering. The offerings may include cooked food, fruits and confectionery sweets. Vegetarian food is usually offered and later distributed to the devotees who are present in the temple. Sometimes this vegetarian offering will exclude prohibited items such as garlic, onion, mushroom, etc. " is not copy pasted by this website? Is this also a wiki mirror website? How would you feel if I doubt your competence now? PPicazHist (talk) 14:47, 31 December 2024 (UTC)
    @ UtherSRG I just asked others to share their opinion in the enforcement. With all due respect, I don't think its wrong in any sense. PPicazHist (talk) 15:13, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
    To all the admins involved here,
    • I agree to keep learning and apologize if my previous edits/replies have annoyed the admins.
    • I have not edit warred since a month and please see it as my willingness to keep learning and getting better.
    • Please give me a chance, I understand concern of you all and respect your opinion in the matter. But please don't block me from editing from main article space. I promise that I will abide by all the rules and will learn from other editors.
    PPicazHist (talk) 15:22, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

Statement by LukeEmily

PerspicazHistorian also violated WP:BRD by engaging in an edit war with Ratnahastin who reverted his edits and restored an article to a stable version by admin. Also, I want to assume good faith but it is surprising that PerspicazHistorian claims that he did not know the three revert rule given that he has more than 800 edits.LukeEmily (talk)

Statement by Doug Weller

I'm involved so just commenting. I don't think this editor is competent. I had to give them a community sanction caste warning as they were making a mess of castes. See this earlier version of their talk page.]https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=User_talk:PerspicazHistorian&oldid=1262289249] and User:Deb's comment that "It was very unwise of you to keep moving Draft:Satish R. Devane to article space when it has not passed review. As a direct result of your actions, a deletion discussion is taking place, and when this is complete and the article is deleted, you will be prevented from recreating it. Deb (talk) 14:44, 4 December 2024 (UTC)" There have also been copyright issues. I strongly support a topic ban. Doug Weller talk 11:00, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

I won't be involved in the decision. No more treatments for me, just coast until... Doug Weller talk 12:50, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Toddy1

This is another editor who appears to have pro-Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and pro-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) views. I dislike those views, but find it rather alarming that Misplaced Pages should seek to censor those views, but not the views of the political opponents. Imagine the outrage if we sought to topic-ban anyone who expressed pro-Republican views, but allowed Democrat-activists to say whatever they liked.

A lot of pro-RSS/BJP editors turn out to be sock-puppets, so please can we do a checkuser on this account. And to be even-handed, why not checkuser NXcrypto too.

If we want to talk about WP:CIR when editors make mistakes, look at the diff given by NXcrypto for "Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested" - it is the wrong diff. He/she did notify PerspicazHistorian - but the correct diff is .

A topic ban from Indian topics would be unhelpful, unless given to both parties. Misplaced Pages is meant to be a mainstream encyclopaedia, and BJP and RSS are mainstream in India. Loading the dice against BJP and RSS editors will turn Misplaced Pages into a fringe encyclopaedia on Indian topics.

I can see a good case for restricting PerspicazHistorian to draft articles and talk pages for a month, and suggesting that he/she seeks advice from more experienced editors. Another solution would be a one-revert rule to last six months.-- Toddy1 (talk) 13:55, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Capitals00

I find the comment from Toddy1 to be entirely outrageous. What are you trying to tell by saying "Misplaced Pages is meant to be a mainstream encyclopaedia, and BJP and RSS are mainstream in India"? If you want us to entertain those who are in power, then we could never have an article like False or misleading statements by Donald Trump.

You cannot ask topic ban for both editors without having any evidence of misconduct. Same way, you cannot ask CU on either user only for your own mental relief. It is a high time that you should strike your comment, since you are falsely accusing others that they "seek to censor" this editor due to his "pro-Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and pro-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) views". You should strike your comment. If you cannot do that, then I am sure WP:BOOMERANG is coming for you. Capitals00 (talk) 15:20, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Vanamonde93

Toddy1: I, too, am baffled by your comment. We don't ban editors based on their POV; but we do ban editors who fail to follow our PAGs, and we certainly don't make excuses for editors who fail to follow our guidelines based on their POV. You seem to be suggesting we cut PH some slack because of their political position, and I find that deeply inappropriate. Among other things, I don't believe they have publicly stated anywhere that they support the BJP or the RSS, and we cannot make assumptions about them.

That said, the fact that this was still open prompted me to spot-check PH's contributions, and I find a lot to be concerned about. This edit is from 29 December, and appears to be entirely original research; I cannot access all of the sources, but snippet search does not bear out the content added, and the Raj era source for the first sentence certainly does not support the content it was used for. Baji Pasalkar, entirely authored by PH, is full of puffery ("first to sacrifice his life for the cause of Swarajya", and poor sources (like this blog, and this book, whose blurb I leave you to judge), from which most of the article appears to be drawn. Appa (title), also entirely authored by PH, has original research in its very first sentence; the sources that I can access give passing mention to people whose names include the suffix "appa", and thus could perhaps be examples of usage, but the sources most certainly do not bear out the claim.

I will note in fairness that I cannot access all the sources for the content I checked. But after spotchecking a dozen examples I have yet to find content PH wrote that was borne out by a reliable source, so I believe skepticism is justified. We are in territory where other editors may need to spend days cleaning up some of this writing. Bishonen If we're in CIR territory, just a normal indefinite block seems cleanest, surely? Or were you hoping that PH would help clean up their mess, perhaps by providing quotes from sources? That could be a pathway to contributing productively, but I'm not holding my breath. Vanamonde93 (talk) 18:00, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks Bish: I agree, as my exchanges with PH today, in response to my first post here, have not inspired confidence. . Vanamonde93 (talk) 20:22, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

Statement by UtherSRG

I've mostly dealt with PH around Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Ankur Warikoo (2nd nomination). They do not seem to have the ability to read and understand our policies and processes. As such, a t-ban is too weak. The minimum I would support is a p-block as suggested below, though a full indef is also acceptable. They could then ask for the standard offer when they can demonstrate they no longer have WP:CIR issues. - UtherSRG (talk) 20:05, 30 December 2024 (UTC)

Based on these two edits, I'm more strongly leaning towards indef. - UtherSRG (talk) 12:27, 31 December 2024 (UTC)
They now indicate they believe the article they edited was copied from one of the websites they used as a reference, when in reality the website is a mirror/scrape of the Misplaced Pages article. I believe we are firmly in WP:CIR territory here. - UtherSRG (talk) 14:25, 31 December 2024 (UTC)
This is a mirror of the Misplaced Pages article. - UtherSRG (talk) 16:29, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

Result concerning PerspicazHistorian

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.

PerspicazHistorian, can you explain your understanding of WP:edit warring and the WP:3RR rule? I'd like you to read thoroughly enough to also explain wny someone may be edit warring even if they aren't breaking 3RR. Valereee (talk) 21:58, 19 December 2024 (UTC)

@PerspicazHistorian, that explanation of edit warring is a bit wanting. An edit war is when two or more editors revert content additions/removals repeatedly. Even a second reversion by the same editor can be considered edit warring. Best practice -- and what I highly recommend, especially for any inexperienced editor -- is the first time someone reverts an edit of yours, go to the talk page, open a section, ping the editor who reverted you, and discuss. Do you think you can commit to that?
Re: your question on why your "obvious edit" was reverted: we don't deal with content issues here, only with behavior issues, but from a very quick look, the source is 50 years old, and using a list headed "TERRORIST ORGANISATIONS LISTED IN THE FIRST SCHEDULE OF THE UNLAWFUL ACTIVITIES (PREVENTION) ACT, 1967" that includes a certain organization as a source that the organization should be described as a terrorist organization is WP:ORIGINAL RESEARCH; in their revert NXcrypto provided an edit summary of "Not a reliable source for such a contentious label. See WP:LABEL." Please discuss at talk, not here; we don't deal with content here. Valereee (talk) 11:28, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
I'm seeing this as a CIR issue. I'd like input from other admins, if possible. I'm a little concerned that setting a tban from IPA is just setting a trap. Maybe a p-block from article space would be a kinder way to allow them to gain some experience? Valereee (talk) 13:28, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
@PerspicazHistorian, have you seen how many times I or others have had to move your comments to your own section? This is an example of not having enough experience to edit productively. Please do not post in anyone else's section again. Valereee (talk) 16:09, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
I do agree we're in CIR territory, and the concerns expressed are completely valid. I don't think this editor is ill-intentioned. They just don't seem very motivated to learn quickly. Well-intentioned-but-a-slow-learner is something that can only be fixed by actually practicing what you're bad at. I'd prefer an indef from article space which gives them one more chance to learn here before we send them off to mr.wiki or Simple English to try to learn. Not a hill I'm going to die on, though. Valereee (talk) 11:36, 30 December 2024 (UTC)
@PerspicazHistorian, like Uther I have major concerns about the edit you made yesterday, which included replacing a citation needed tag with these sources. The first is a company that markets astrology services. The second is the site for a religious sect. Neither is a reliable source for explaining the concept of prasada in Wikivoice. You made this edit yesterday, after you'd confirmed here and on my talk that you understood sourcing policy.
The reason for an indef from article space is to allow you to learn this policy: You would go into article talk and suggest sources to fix citation needed tags. Another editor would have to agree with you that the sources are reliable before they'd add them. Valereee (talk) 12:51, 31 December 2024 (UTC)
  • A tban from IPA for PerspicazHistorian would be a relief to many editors trying to keep this difficult area in reasonable shape. However, Valereee makes a good point about 'setting a trap': it's doubtful that PH would be able to keep to a tban even if they tried in good faith. I would therefore support a p-block from article space. Bishonen | tålk 16:48, 29 December 2024 (UTC).
    Vanamonde93, no, I don't really think PH can usefully help clean up their mess; I was following Valereee, who has been going into this in some depth, in attempting to keep some way of editing Misplaced Pages open for PH. It's a bit of a counsel of desperation, though; there is very little daylight between an indef and a p-block from article space. Yes, we are in CIR territory; just look at PH's recent supposed evidence on this page for NXcrypto being "engaged in edit wars before on contentious Indian topics": one diff of an opponent complaining on NXcrypto's page, and one diff of somebody reverting NXcrypto. What do those actually prove? That NXcrypto has opponents (big surprise). So, yes, as you suggest, I'll support an indef as well. Bishonen | tålk 20:09, 29 December 2024 (UTC).
  • Is there a length of time proposed for the p-ban or would it be indefinite? Barkeep49 (talk) 17:06, 3 January 2025 (UTC)
    I would say indefinite; not infinite, but I'd be wary about letting them back into articlespace without some kind of preclearance. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 18:39, 3 January 2025 (UTC)
  • It looks to me like there is a consensus for an indefinite partial block for PerspicazHistorian from article space. Unless any uninvolved admin objects within a day or so, I will close as such. Seraphimblade 06:31, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
    Given PH's recent slew of requests on multiple admin talk pages, yes, please do. - UtherSRG (talk) 12:58, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

References

  1. "Significance of Different Type of Prasad in Hinduism For God". GaneshaSpeaks. Retrieved 2024-12-30.
  2. "What Is Prashad". Shree Swaminarayan Mandir Bhuj. Retrieved 2024-12-30.

LaylaCares

There is consensus to remove LaylaCares's EC flag. Vanamonde93 (talk) 17:55, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.

Request concerning LaylaCares

User who is submitting this request for enforcement
Vice regent (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) 08:00, 3 January 2025 (UTC)
User against whom enforcement is requested
LaylaCares (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

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Sanction or remedy to be enforced
Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/ARBPIA
Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
  1. 13:54, December 17, 2024 EC gaming


If contentious topics restrictions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:CTOP#Awareness of contentious topics)
Additional comments by editor filing complaint

Pretty obvious case of EC gaming. Account created on Nov 17, 2024, then about 500 mostly minor edits followed by the first substantial edit ever was the creation of this article on Dec 17 (subsequently moved to draftspace).VR (Please ping on reply) 08:00, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested


Discussion concerning LaylaCares

Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.

Statement by LaylaCares

Statement by Aquillion

Question: Assuming it's determined that they gamed the extended-confirmed restriction, would the page they created be WP:G5-able? I've asked the relevant question in more detail on the CSD talk page, since it is likely to come up again as long as we have such a broad restriction on effect, but I figured it was worth mentioning the issue here as well. --Aquillion (talk) 14:16, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Statement by Dan Murphy

Please look at Draft:Hamas–UNRWA relations, written by the account under discussion. It's a hit job, originally placed in mainspace by this account. Anyone who wrote that shouldn't be allowed with 1 million miles of the topic.Dan Murphy (talk) 23:14, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Statement by starship.paint

I've edited Draft:Hamas–UNRWA relations, so Dan Murphy's link is inaccurate for the purposes of this discussion. For the version of Draft:Hamas–UNRWA relations with content only written by LaylaCares, click this link. starship.paint (talk / cont) 10:45, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Statement by (username)

Result concerning LaylaCares

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
  • I agree that this looks like EC-gaming. Absent evidence that the edits themselves were problematic, I would either TBAN from ARBPIA or pull the EC flag until the user has made 500 edits that aren't rapidfire possibly LLM-assisted gnomish edits. Vanamonde93 (talk) 17:02, 3 January 2025 (UTC)
  • I agree on the gaming piece and would suggest mainspace edits+time for restoration of EC. I will throw out 3 months + 500 (substantive) main space edits. Barkeep49 (talk) 17:16, 3 January 2025 (UTC)
  • I agree with Barkeep but I'd up it to 4 months. I don't believe that a TBAN is necessary at this point. voorts (talk/contributions) 04:45, 4 January 2025 (UTC)
  • @Aquillion: I agree that the draft should be G5'd, but will wait for consensus to develop here. voorts (talk/contributions) 01:00, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
    I don't think the wording of WP:ECR allows for deletion of a page that was created by an EC user. (ECR also seems to forget that anything other than articles and talkpages exists, but I think the most reasonable reading of provision A still allows for G5ing drafts at admins' discretion if the criteria are met.) That said, a consensus at AE can delete a page as a "reasonable measure that necessary and proportionate for the smooth running of the project". Deleting under that provision is not something to be done lightly, but I think for a case where a page's existence violates the spirit of an ArbCom restriction but not the letter, it'd be a fair time to do it. And/or this could make for a good ARCA question, probably after PIA5 wraps. -- Tamzin (they|xe|🤷) 03:48, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
  • I would just pull EC and require the editor to apply via AE appeal for its restoration. They should be very clearly aware that receiving such restoration will require both substantial time and making real, substantive edits outside the area, as well as an understanding of what is expected of editors working in a CTOP area. Seraphimblade 01:22, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
  • I see a clear consensus here to remove the EC flag. For clarity, when I proposed a TBAN above it was because removing this flag is an ARBPIA TBAN as long as the ECR remedy remains in place; it's simply a question of whether the editor get the other privileges of EC or not. I don't see a consensus on what to do with the draft, but given that other editors have now made substantive contributions to it, I don't believe it's a good use of AE time to discuss the hypothetical further. Vanamonde93 (talk) 17:55, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

AstroGuy0

AstroGuy0 has been issued a warning for source misrepresentation by Voorts. No other reviewers have expressed any wish for further action. Seraphimblade 06:29, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.

Request concerning AstroGuy0

User who is submitting this request for enforcement
Hemiauchenia (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) 03:41, 4 January 2025 (UTC)
User against whom enforcement is requested
AstroGuy0 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

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Sanction or remedy to be enforced
Misplaced Pages:Contentious topics/Race and intelligence

(Even though this isn't the usual R&I fare, I consider the intersection of "Race/ethnicity and sex offending", to come under "the intersection of race/ethnicity and human abilities and behaviour")

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
  1. 03:19, 4 January 2025 Asserts that "A majority of the perpetrators were Pakistani men" despite the cited source (freely accessible at ) does not mention the word "Pakistani" or any variant once.
  2. 01:40, 4 January 2025 Describes the sex offender ring as "Pakistani" in the opening sentence when the cited source in the body says that they were only "mainly Pakistani"
Diffs of previous relevant sanctions, if any
If contentious topics restrictions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:CTOP#Awareness of contentious topics)
Made aware of contentious topics criterion: 01:52, 4 January 2025
Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested


Additional comments by editor filing complaint:

This new user seems intent on POVPUSHING regarding "Asian/Muslim grooming gangs" and making contentious claims that are not backed up by sources. Hemiauchenia (talk) 03:44, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Discussion concerning AstroGuy0

Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.

Statement by AstroGuy0

Statement by Iskandar323

This rather dated "Asian/Muslim grooming gangs" malarkey from the UK has recently been pushed on social media by a certain US tech billionaire and is now recirculating in right-wing social media and the blogosphere, partly in connection with UK politics, so this trend could flare before it dims. Iskandar323 (talk) 03:50, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Statement by (username)

Result concerning AstroGuy0

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
The second diff was before AG0 received a CTOP alert. I've alerted AG0 to other CTOPs that they've edited in, and I am going to warn them for their conduct in diff #1 without prejudice to other admins determining that further action is warranted. voorts (talk/contributions) 04:33, 4 January 2025 (UTC)
I also looked at the source, and it indeed does not in any way support the claim made; it does not mention "Pakistani" even once. This is a fairly new editor, but I think we need to make it very clear to them that misrepresentation of sources is not something we will tolerate. Seraphimblade 04:59, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
Given that AstroGuy0 has already been issued a warning, I don't think anything further is necessary, and will close as such unless any uninvolved admin shortly objects. Seraphimblade 18:23, 6 January 2025 (UTC)

Lemabeta

This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.

Request concerning Lemabeta

User who is submitting this request for enforcement
EF5 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) 20:18, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
User against whom enforcement is requested
Lemabeta (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Search CT alerts: in user talk history • in system log


Sanction or remedy to be enforced
Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Eastern Europe#Final decision
Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
  1. 5 Jan 2025 - Made a draft on a European ethnic group, which they are currently barred from doing.
  2. 4 Jan 2025 - Started a page on a Georgian ethnologist.


If contentious topics restrictions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:CTOP#Awareness of contentious topics)
  • Previously blocked as a discretionary sanction or contentious topic restriction for conduct in the area of conflict, see the block log linked to above.
Additional comments by editor filing complaint

I likely filed this improperly, but to sum it up they continue to make pages in a scope they were banned from. EF 20:25, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

On the bullet point, I’ve never filed an AE report before, and I wasn’t sure if “block” meant T-ban, p-block, etc., so I just picked whichever one made the most sense. EF 21:45, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
(Not sure if I’m allowed to reply here) I’ve never filed an AE report before, and I wasn’t sure if “block” meant T-ban, p-block, etc., so I just picked whichever one made the most sense. EF 21:45, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
Response to Bishonen. Moved from results section. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:58, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
(RES to Bishonen) That's fair. When starting the AE, it only gave me nine options, none of which seemed to fit right. The third bullet ("Previously given a discretionary sanction or contentious topic restriction or warned for conduct in the area of conflict on DIFF by _____") didn't seem to fit, as the sanction wasn't for verbal conduct. EF 22:05, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested

Here

Discussion concerning Lemabeta

Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.

Statement by Lemabeta

Yeah, my bad. Didn't realize translation of a page of ethnographic group would count as a violation of my topic ban about "history of the Caucasus and its cultural heritage, broadly construed" I recognize my mistake. --Lemabeta (talk) 20:30, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Ethnographic groups and cultural heritage are related but distinct concepts. An ethnographic group refers to a community of people defined by shared ancestry, language, traditions, and cultural identity. In contrast, cultural heritage refers to the *practices, artifacts, knowledge, and traditions preserved or inherited from the past. But cultural heritage is indeed a component of ethnographic groups.
So i don't believe ethnographic group should be considered as either history of the Caucasus or cultural heritage. Lemabeta (talk) 20:56, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
In my opinion, cultural heritage (both tangible and intangible) emerges from ethnographic groups but does not define the group itself. Lemabeta (talk) 20:57, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
I think ethnographic groups fall under the category of Ethnography, or even socio-cultural antropology but for sure not cultural heritage. Lemabeta (talk) 21:09, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
I understand, i already apologized on my talk page for this accident. I will not repeat this mistake again. Lemabeta (talk) 21:13, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Statement by (username)

Result concerning Lemabeta

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
  • I don't see Lemabeta mentioned in the case itself, but they're currently under a topic ban imposed by a consensus of AE admins from "the history of the Caucasus and its cultural heritage, broadly construed". theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 20:26, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
    To be fair, when you click above to add a new enforcement request, the template states:
    ;Sanction or remedy to be enforced: ]
    <!--- Link to the sanction or remedy that you ask to be enforced ---> voorts (talk/contributions) 20:32, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
  • Didn't realize translation of a page of ethnographic group would count as a violation of my topic ban about "history of the Caucasus and its cultural heritage, broadly construed" @Lemabeta: what did you think "the history of the Caucasus and its cultural heritage" meant? I think it's pretty obvious that that an article on an ethnic group from the Caucasus and about an ethnologist who writes about that region is covered by your topic ban. voorts (talk/contributions) 20:37, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
    Note that I've deleted Draft:Rachvelians as a clear G5 violation. I think Mate Albutashvili is a bit more of a questionable G5. voorts (talk/contributions) 20:46, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
    Your definition of "ethnographic group" includes the phrases "shared ancestry" (i.e., history), and "shared ... traditions" and "shared ... cultural identity" (i.e., cultural heritage). Your attempt to exclude "ethnographic group" from either of the two categories in your topic ban is entirely unpersuasive, particularly since your topic ban is to be "broadly construed". voorts (talk/contributions) 21:13, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
    @Tamzin: this doesn't seem like a mistake to me, but I'm okay with a logged warning here. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:29, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
    @Bishonen: This is about violating the TBAN. Per my response to leek, I think the issue is with the AE request template, which is a bit unclear. voorts (talk/contributions) 22:00, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
    @Bishonen: I don't think a block is needed here, but the next violation, definitely. voorts (talk/contributions) 22:06, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
    @EF5: They were "reviously given ... contentious topic restriction", the topic ban at issue. voorts (talk/contributions) 22:09, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
  • @Lemabeta: Not every single thing you could write about an ethnic group would fall under cultural history, but that's not really relevant on the Rachvelians page, where the History section was entirely about their cultural history, even containing the words highlighting their ethnographic and cultural identity. There's a reason we use the words "broadly construed" on most TBANs, and a reason we encourage people to act like they're TBANned from a broader area than they are. (Consider: Would you feel safe driving under a bridge where clearance is exactly the same height as your vehicle? Or would you need a few inches' gap to feel safe doing it?)This does seem like a good-faith misunderstanding, so if you will commit to not making it again in the future, I think this can be closed with a clarification/warning. But that's an important "if". If you want to argue semantics, then the message that sends to admins is that you don't intend to comply with the TBAN, in which case the next step would be a siteblock. -- Tamzin (they|xe|🤷) 21:10, 5 January 2025 (UTC)
  • EF5, I don't understand your "Previously blocked as a discretionary sanction or contentious topic restriction for conduct in the area of conflict, see the block log linked to above" statement, can you please explain what it refers to? This T-ban? Lemabeta's block log is blank.
That said, I'm unimpressed by Lemabeta's lawyerly distinctions above, and also by their apology for "accidental violations". I'll AGF that they were accidental, but OTOH, they surely ought to have taken enough care to realize they were violations; compare Voorts' examples. I suggest a block, not sure of what length. A couple of weeks? Bishonen | tålk 21:36, 5 January 2025 (UTC).
EF5, OK, I see. Blocks and bans are very different, and the block log only logs blocks. Bishonen | tålk 22:02, 5 January 2025 (UTC).
  • It seems that the general consensus here is to treat this as a final warning, and Lemabeta has acknowledged it as such. Unless any uninvolved admin objects within the next day or so, I will close as such. Seraphimblade 01:16, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

GokuEltit

Issues on the Spanish Misplaced Pages will need to be handled there; the English Misplaced Pages has no authority or control over what happens on the Spanish project. This noticeboard is only for requesting enforcement of English Misplaced Pages arbitration decisions. Seraphimblade 22:33, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

I was blocked from Misplaced Pages for ignoring the formatting of a table, I edited an article wrong, Bajii banned me for 2 weeks, but it didn't even take 1 and Hasley changed it to permanent, I tried to make an unban request, they deleted it and blocked my talk page. I asked for help on irc, an admin tried to help me make another unblock request, but the admin jem appeared and told me that I was playing the victim and banned me and expelled me from irc. I just want to contribute to the platform GokuJuan (talk) 20:11, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

@GokuEltit: This is a complaint about Spanish Misplaced Pages - see es:Especial:Contribuciones/GokuJuan, where you have a block history from August 2023 to September 2024 (machine translation). Your block affects Spanish-language Misplaced Pages - it does not affect English-language Misplaced Pages.-- Toddy1 (talk) 20:27, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
You also had some blocks on Commons, but they have expired.-- Toddy1 (talk) 20:30, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Boy shekhar

This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.

Request concerning Boy shekhar

User who is submitting this request for enforcement
Daniel Quinlan (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) 06:34, 11 January 2025 (UTC)
User against whom enforcement is requested
Boy shekhar (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Search CT alerts: in user talk history • in system log


Sanction or remedy to be enforced
Misplaced Pages:Contentious topics/India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan
Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
  • This edit violates the topic ban because it is in the topic area. It's also based on an unreliable source and the section header includes a derogatory term.
Diffs of previous relevant sanctions, if any
If contentious topics restrictions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:CTOP#Awareness of contentious topics)
Additional comments by editor filing complaint
Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested

Discussion concerning Boy shekhar

Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.

Statement by Boy shekhar

Statement by (username)

Result concerning Boy shekhar

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.

שלומית ליר

This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.

Request concerning שלומית ליר

User who is submitting this request for enforcement
Smallangryplanet (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) 17:24, 11 January 2025 (UTC)
User against whom enforcement is requested
שלומית ליר (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

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Sanction or remedy to be enforced
WP:ARBPIA
Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation of how these edits violate it

ShlomitLir (שלומית ליר) created their account back in 2014. The breakdown of their edits is as follows:

  • 2014 to 2016: no edits.
  • 2017 to 2019: 1 edit per year. None related to PIA.
  • 2022: 7 edits. Mostly in their userspace.
  • 2023: 21 edits. Again, mostly in their userspace. Made two edits in the talk page of Palestinian genocide accusation complaining about its content and calling it “blatant pro-Hamas propaganda”.
  • 2024: Started editing after a 10 month break at the end of October.
    • Made 51 edits in October and 81 edits in November (copyedits, adding links, minor edits).
    • In December, that number rose up to almost 400, including 116 in December 6 alone and 98 in December 7. Became ECR that day.
    • Immediately switched to editing in PIA, namely in the Battle of Sderot article where they changed the infobox picture with an unclear image with a dubious caption, and removed a template without providing a reason why.
    • They also edited the Use of human shields by Hamas article, adding another image with a caption not supported by the source (replaced by yet another image with a contextless caption when the previous image was removed) and WP:UNDUE content in the lead.
    • they also voted in the second AfD for Calls for the destruction of Israel despite never having interacted with that article or its previous AfD. They have barely surpassed 500 edits, but the gaming is obvious, highlighted by the sudden switch to editing in PIA.

More importantly, there's the issue of POV pushing. I came across this article authored by them on Ynet, once again complaining about what they perceive as an anti Israeli bias on Misplaced Pages. They have also authored a report for the World Jewish Congress covering the same topic. The report can be seen in full here. I think that someone with this clear POV agenda shouldn't be near the topic.

If contentious topics restrictions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:CTOP#Awareness of contentious topics)
Additional comments by editor filing complaint
Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested
Notification diff

Discussion concerning שלומית ליר

Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.

Statement by שלומית ליר

Statement by (username)

Result concerning שלומית ליר

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
Categories: