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Revision as of 22:07, 28 December 2007 editEl Sandifer (talk | contribs)Extended confirmed users19,528 edits →David Gerard's relationship to Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins: Not your evidence section, kiddies.← Previous edit Revision as of 22:24, 28 December 2007 edit undoBishonen (talk | contribs)Autopatrolled, Administrators80,326 edits /* Evidence presented by BishonenNext edit →
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--] 17:13, 28 December 2007 (UTC) --] 17:13, 28 December 2007 (UTC)


==Evidence presented by {Put your username here}== ==Evidence presented by Bishonen==
===#wikipedia-en-admins and Tony Sidaway===
==={Write your assertion here}===

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.
Exerpt from log at en-admins, December 22 (an exact copy, typos and all). Posted per one version of , as correspondence that is intended to harass or intimidate the recipient.
==={Write your assertion here}===

Place argument and diffs which support your assertion; for example, your first assertion might be "So-and-so engages in edit warring", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits to specific articles which show So-and-so engaging in edit warring.
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> It seemed to me at one time that whenever somebody raised an ongoing issue on Misplaced Pages on this channel, BIshonen would object that the problem user was not here so we should not talk about the,
==={Write your assertion here}===
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> them,
Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.
<br>'' <bishonen> it did, did it.
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> Which is kinda problematic when you consider that this is an admin channel and often admins are talking about problem users.
<br>'' =-= Nihiltres_away is now known as Nihiltres
<br>'' <Doc_glasgow> Tony_Sidaway: bishonen you are about to quarrel. Neither of you will convince the other of anything, so why not drop it
<br>'' |<-- Until1is2 has left irc.freenode.net (Remote closed the connection)
<br>'' <bishonen> and it seemed to me i couoldn't open my mouth without you calling me a bitch or some other choice epithet. woould you like to stop now, tony?
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> If it was a channel for problem users, that would be a different matter.
<br>'' |<-- Maximr has left irc.freenode.net ()
<br>'' <Rdsmith4> There is a thin line between a reasonable discussion of a user's behavior and a complaint session.
<br>'' <Rdsmith4> The former also tend to become the latter as they grow longer.
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> bishonen: you did once claim that I called you a bitch. it's true. I apologised for any slight you might have believed I made. There and then.
<br>'' |<-- Rdsmith4 has left irc.freenode.net ("Leaving")
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> Why bring it up again?
<br>'' |<-- GDonato has left irc.freenode.net ("Bye!")
<br>'' <bishonen> believed? youo still didn't actually call me a bastard bitch from hell, but you'd like to apologize for my imagining you did? No, i actually don't accept it in that form. who would?
<br>'' <bishonen> i wouold be happy to just stop.
<br>'' * FT2 passes the coffee round :)
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> bishonen: I'm not aware of calling you a bastard bitch from hell.
<br>'' * Freya shoots a tranqulizing dart at everyone.
<br>'' <bishonen> alternatively, i'll show you the log.
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> I am however aware of apologising in any case.
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> bishonen: email me if you li,e
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> I have already apologised. Why are you trying to ram this idiocy down my throat again?
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> It's disgusting.
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> Worse than disgusting. Boring.
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> I will now admit that if I ever didcall you a bastard bitch from hell, you are now richly justifying that epithet.
<br>'' <bishonen> aplogizing while denying IS worse than disgusting, I agree.
<br>'' <bishonen> i see.
<br>'' <Tony_Sidaway> go and act like an arsehole somewhere else, please.

The conversation is obviously lacking in wit and charm on both sides. But I hereby declare that I had no intention there to refer to the specific event where Tony once called me a "bastard bitch from hell". It happened in September 2006! I'm ''well'' over it, and Tony needs to get over it too. I meant to say that he had called me names in channel now and then ("a bitch or some other choice epithet"). I understand that this was easy to misunderstand, and I acknowledge that I was quite ready to start discussing it when Tony brought it up (as I thought, though clearly he thought I did). I tried to clear up this misunderstanding , on December 24 and exhorted Tony to not dredge up ancient history. I got no response.

For more context, I will share the full log—up to where I left the channel, which was soon after the dialogue above—by e-mail with any user in good standing, subject to my own judgment.

'''Historical background''' <br>
In the year 2007, I've only spent some three or four months frequenting en-admins. I foreswore the channel after some unfortunate experiences with the then active operatives about a year ago. Tony and I have some IRC baggage from these events, which I don't think needs to be gone into here. Anyway, in October or November 2007--I'm not sure exactly when--I decided that I'd been cowardly to let myself be driven away (as I experienced it), and returned. Several people seemed quite pleased to see me, and the channel seemed idyllic enough, except that I personally found Tony Sidaway an extremely dominant and rather disruptive presence. I formed the habit of not using the channel when he was in it. Since the quarrel between us on December 22 (in my timezone), exerpted above, I haven't used it at all.

Tony has not contacted me in any shape or form in the meantime, and briskly deleted my one post to his page without reply. But I see from such means of information as I have, his contribs, that he has asked James Forester to be removed from the en-admins access list "to cool things a bit" . (making former admins are surely in general, or frequently, "former" because they no longer enjoy the community trust that adminned them in the first place. And if all it takes to remove access is a request, well... then the technical difficulties that ] says prevent the removal of former admins clearly can't be insuperable.

===Giano and Geogre===
Full disclosure: Giano and I are long-standing wiki friends. Geogre and I are RL friends sinced before we joined the project. We've all three worked quite a bit on article collaboration together. I spoke with Giano on the evening of December 22 (European time), not intending to mention the disagreeable experience I'd just had on en-admins; but Giano noticed I was upset, and insisted, until I told him. I showed him the log of Tony's disconcerting remarks, thus—unfortunately—engaging his loyalty and indignation. Both he and Geogre were angry on my account. I was angry myself, too. I would point out that there is nowhere to turn in this situation, except—if you can figure it out—it's not any too obvious—to a chanop. I knew one I had reason to trust, Mark Ryan. Giano and Geogre did not know, or have reason to trust, any. On the contrary, they both have a low opinion of IRC as such (compare ]). I consider this lack of outlet for justified IRC complaints (or "whining", as the most frequent term is) to be extremely damaging. Note that ] has '''now''', on December 23, edited the ] article to encourage those who witness unbecoming conduct on the channel to contact the arbitration committee (which has previously always responded to IRC complaints with a "That's nothing to do with us, go away") or Jimbo directly. This, it seems to me, amounts to a tacit admission that something was missing before. When my appeal to Mark Ryan only led to a half hour block from the channel for Tony, I did not indeed know which way to express my strong feeling that Tony (not an admin) shouldn't be in the admin channel at all, and certainly wasn't an asset there. When I saw Jimbo's fresh edit, I wrote to him, and he replied promptly. Although I don't feel that my contact with Jimbo resulted in any joint flow of reason and feast of soul, or even in much mutual comprehension, it still made a great difference to me, psychologically, to have someone in an appropriate position to appeal to. I wonder if I can explain this? Probably not, but in my case it certainly was so. In Giano's and Geogre's case, they instead exploded spectacularly (somewhat from personal loyalty, and largely from taking a principled stand of criticism) all over the place, fitfully illuminating it with the eloquence of indignation, and focusing on reverting the ] about the en-admins idyll in the article ] . To see the feeding frenzy of humiliation and condescension and tender nursing of old grudges that has resulted (see the various proposed punishments in the workshop. snd the complaints on this evidence page about "querolous" edit summaries and similar horrible infringements ), with the G-men's arguments and principles reduced to "personal attacks" (bah!), in a place where so much ''real'' attacking goes on, and so much power politics ... well, no point in finishing that sentence. You see it or you don't. YMMV. I wish I hadn't told them about it. ] | ] 22:24, 28 December 2007 (UTC).


==Evidence presented by {Put your username here}== ==Evidence presented by {Put your username here}==

Revision as of 22:24, 28 December 2007

Create your own section to provide evidence in, and do not edit anyone else's section. Keep your evidence to a maximum of 1000 words and 100 diffs. Evidence longer than this will be refactored or removed entirely.

Anyone, whether directly involved or not, may add evidence to this page. Create your own section and do not edit in anybody else's section. Please limit your main evidence to a maximum 1000 words and 100 diffs and keep responses to other evidence as short as possible. A short, concise presentation will be more effective; posting evidence longer than 1000 words will not help you make your point. Over-long evidence that is not exceptionally easy to understand (like tables) will be trimmed to size or, in extreme cases, simply removed by the Clerks without warning - this could result in your important points being lost, so don't let it happen. Stay focused on the issues raised in the initial statements and on diffs which illustrate relevant behavior.

It is extremely important that you use the prescribed format. Submitted evidence should include a link to the actual page diff in question, or to a short page section; links to the page itself are insufficient. Never link to a page history, an editor's contributions, or a log for all actions of an editor (as those will have changed by the time people click on your links), although a link to a log for a specific article or a specific block log can be useful. Please make sure any page section links are permanent. See simple diff and link guide.

This page is not for general discussion - for that, see the talk page. If you think another editor's evidence is a misrepresentation of the facts, cite the evidence and explain how it is incorrect within your own section. Please do not try to re-factor the page or remove evidence presented by others. If something is put in the wrong place, leave it for the Arbitrators or Clerks to move.

Arbitrators may analyze evidence and other assertions at /Workshop. /Workshop provides for comment by parties and others as well as Arbitrators. After arriving at proposed principles, findings of fact or remedies, Arbitrators vote at /Proposed decision. Only Arbitrators may edit /Proposed decision.

Evidence presented by Christopher Parham

Misuse of administrative powers by David Gerard

Evidence presented by Phil Sandifer

Giano disruptively violated the 3RR

Giano made seven separate reverts to Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins on December 25th.

Four were to add the sentence "Arbcom has no control over this channel at all, but as the channel is used to make decisions concerning wikipedia," .

Three more were to remove two paragraphs added by Jimbo regarding how to deal with problems in the channel: .

Given his previous edits to the page (such as violating 3RR to reinsert this content: ) it is clear that the intention of these edits was to disrupt the page, and that he was aware of the 3RR.

Note also that Giano was warned and briefly blocked for the 3RR violations on the 23rd.

Sean William unblocked Giano

Sean William lifted the 3RR block on Giano, saying that "Block did not account for the other participants of the dispute, see ANI" . Note that no other participants in the edit war violated the 3RR, making the insistence on blocking others questionable at best.

Geogre made incivil personal attacks

Geogre has made a wealth of incivil personal attacks in this matter, including incivil comments about David Gerard and about me (Note that I am in fact wholly uninvolved - as of the time of writing I have not been in IRC in nearly two weeks, and had not participated in any previous discussions on this matter.)

Further attacks and incivility

Against David:

Against me:

Against people who disagree with him in general: (Accusing people flatly of "conspiracy") ("HTH HAND")

These attacks have continued on the arbitration workshop page: (Referring to those he disagrees with as "monsters")

David Gerard's relationship to Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins

This is from David's statement in the case, but it is an important piece of evidence that forces a reconsideration of evidence posted below regarding wheel warring:

The Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins page was set up after the Giano/IRC-related arbcom case of late last year. The page is an odd one as "policy" pages go; I wrote it after the complaints of it being an undocumented private channel (complaints notably coming from ... Giano, Geogre and Irpen, the edit warriors this time around who say they now want the page removed!). Unlike the typical Misplaced Pages: policy page which describes a policy determined on the wiki whose power flows directly from the community, this describes a policy determined by the group contact (James Forrester), his designated agents for the purpose (me), Jimbo and the Arbitration Committee themselves (there being considerable discussion of the channel and how to keep it working on the AC list in late 2006 and early 2007). As such, there is such a thing as right and wrong edits to make to it - statements of reality that are not as determined by that small group.
That's why I locked it and edited it locked - it's not a general wiki policy page in the usual sense, but is present in Misplaced Pages: space as useful information. If the arbcom considers that unacceptable, then I ask them to keep in mind the circumstances of the page's creation, the origins of its contents and their own involvement therein.

Salient points:

  • The page is not a normal policy page, and several policies, most notably WP:OWN do not apply straightforwardly.
  • David possesses a special right to edit the page based on current policy towards IRC, and could reasonably have expected that his actions would not be construed as wheel warring.
  • Geogre does not enjoy any comparable privileges, and could not have reasonably thought that he did.

Evidence presented by User:Maxim

I will have more diffs for my assertions, re. editwarring/wheelwaring --Maxim(talk) 01:35, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Giano has been unnecessarily disruptive previously and now

  • Previous history of revert-warring, see block log
  • WP:OFFICE blocked by Cary Bass (talk · contribs); more detailed reasons in:
  • DMCA issues.
  • Blocked twice for editwarring at WP:WEA
  • Baiting users, see:
  • Abusive edit summaries:
    • **

And more similar egregious behaviour. This kind of behaviour has provoked unnecessary drama and disruption.

Geogre has abused his administrative privileges and editwarred

Editwarring: Wheel-warring: Abuse of rollback:

Geogre has abused his rollback tool, he reversed a protection to continue the edit-war, apparently in the notion that Giano couldn't edit, as he was one of the very few non-admins involved in this

Administrators have been editwarring

Numerous administrators have editwarred; by looking at the history of Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins, there are 10 users who have edit-warred, of which 8 are admins, one former, and another who is a very experienced users, has been blocked for doing that before and should know better, and so do all the others:

  1. Geogre (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
  2. Giano II (talk · contribs)
  3. AzaToth (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
  4. Betacommand (talk · contribs)
  5. Bishonen (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
  6. Ryulong (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
  7. John Reaves (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
  8. Coredesat (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
    1. Sean William (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) With many apologies, this was in error
  9. David Gerard (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

Abuse of rollback

These users have used a rollback feature, or something similar (i.e Undo, twinkle)

  1. Geogre (talk · contribs)
    1. ()
  2. AzaToth (talk · contribs)
    1. ()
  3. Doc glasgow (talk · contribs)
    1. ()

Locus of dispute

The dispute is center around WP:WEA, the on-wiki info page about #admins IRC channel, and the information on the page.

Evidence presented by Tony Sidaway

I was wrong

My actions on the channel #wikipedia-en-admins in response to comments by Bishonen were grossly inappropriate. I was wrong. I will try to make amends. -Tony Sidaway 02:51, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Ryulong

My own involvement in the edit war has been minimal

I really don't see myself as part of this ongoing dispute between what I perceive as a dispute between a clique of users who abhor the existence of #wikipedia-en-admins and the users of the aforementioned channel. I do comment in the channel, but my editting of the page about the channel on the website has been ulimately minimal. This is a summary of my part in the edit war, as it most certainly is.

  1. 18:40, December 25, 2007 (UTC) - I reinstate content that was added by Jimbo in an attempt to end the dispute, which had been removed multiple times by both Giano and Geogre.
  2. 18:40, December 25, 2007 (UTC) - I undo an edit by Geogre that I perceive as inappropriate content and editorialization which was first placed at 18:14, December 25, 2007.
  3. 18:50, December 25, 2007 (UTC) - I begin the tread titled This vendetta has to end on the talk page, with continued discussion that is visible on the talk page.
  4. 19:58, December 25, 2007 (UTC) - I revert what I perceive as an inappropriate edit by Giano. I revert again at 20:08, December 25, 2007 (UTC)
  5. 20:06, December 25, 2007 (UTC) - I warn Giano that he's breached WP:3RR and that if he persists he will be blocked. I never state that I would be the one to block, as I am falsely accused several times. I continue to discuss this on Giano's talk page, where at some point User:Irpen and User:MrWhich interject at some point. Giano does not archive this content, as is evident by User talk:Giano II/archive 7. The content of the thread including baiting by both Irpen and MrWhich can be seen here.
  6. 22:54, December 25, 2007 (UTC) - Minor edit
  7. 7:22, December 26, 2007 (UTC) - I undo an edit by User:Jouster which had been done earlier by Geogre that had been added with the falsely leading edit summary "verb mood."

I honestly don't see myself as a party in this. I attempted to stop the dispute, and only made the above edits to the page. Even Geogre does not see me as an included party and had edited my initial statement without my consent, and even attacked it, as I was planning on bringing this to the arbitration committee in June when Giano had decided to edit Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins in an equally disruptive way.

Giano, Geogre, et al. have edit warred

The following is simply the edit warring over a sentence added by Jimbo.

By Geogre
By Giano

Giano has been querelous in edit summaries

  1. RV back to the truth
  2. RV not a beleif that happens to be the truth! - now stop edit warring
  3. rv Aza Toth seems to be behind the times
  4. check your mail to see what rubbish this paragraph (now removed) is
  5. If you can't face the truth at least don't have a pack of lies
  6. rv TO THE TRUTH!
  7. rv back to THE TUTH
  8. You want I publish the logs as evidence?

Geogre has enabled Giano's disruption

  1. Oh, we're going to tell the truth now? Wow! Do we have permission from David to tell the truth? He owns this page.
  2. Reverted edits by David Gerard (talk) to last version by Wknight94
  3. Unprotected Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins: NEVER protect to shoo away a single user, David. The protection was 100% illicit
  4. *sigher* (Is this the /man page for Freenode? Why don't we say what's true?)
  5. Reverted edits by AzaToth (talk) to last version by Geogre
  6. "has no direct evidence" is not proper rationale; see talk and gain consensus before substantially destructive edits; this is how Misplaced Pages works
  7. Now *that* is honest, and it's got active voice verbs!
  8. verb mood
  9. The COI vendetta must end

In June 2007, Geogre unblocked Giano after Thebainer blocked him for "incivility, despite exhortations to avoid being uncivil."

Geogre has also wheel warred at Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins after it had been protected by David Gerard and after it had been deleted by Doc glasgow.

Blocks do not work

Giano has been blocked a total of 15 times and has been unblocked 13 times under the user name Giano II. In total, Giano has been blocked for approximately 14h 57min. This does not include the blocks under Giano (talk · contribs) of which the block log had been expunged and the account abandoned. This is ordeal is described in Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Giano in greater detail. None of these blocks have served any purpose of getting Giano to change his actions on Misplaced Pages, and only seems to strengthen him and his stubborn ideals.

Irpen assumes bad faith

In my warning (often read as a threat) towards Giano, Irpen suggests that I do not write articles.

MrWhich assumes bad faith

MrWhich "seconds" this question and later assumes that I was seeking to block Giano.

Evidence presented by Coredesat

Incivility by Giano II

All I really have to offer is further examples of gross incivility and personal attacks on the part of Giano and MrWhich, namely here, here (when I had indicated I was working to help resolve his autoblock), here (a threat to use private logs to humiliate me), , here (quite a while after I agreed to the unblock), here, and this personal attack. All this shows is how full of himself he is acting, in violation of WP:CIV and WP:POINT (as mentioned by Rockpocket here). Giano does everything he can to gain the upper hand in a dispute, resorting to threats and incivility, and when he feels he has won, proceeds to hammer his "opponents" into the ground. That, and he uses the fact that admins are hesitant to reprimand or warn him for various actions to his advantage; he immediately resumed edit warring on WP:WEA the next day. This sort of goes hand in hand with Maxim's evidence presented above. --Coredesat 04:43, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

My presence on the IRC channel

I would also like to add that while I was in the IRC channel that day, I was not in the channel when the events in question occurred, and I had not been participating in any relevant discussion until I saw on-wiki that Giano was being incivil toward everyone on his user talk page. I left shortly after. All the other stuff here is news to me. --Coredesat 04:45, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

My comment on ANI

I would also like to note that I was frustrated to the point of nearly leaving the project by the whole ordeal, and made a comment that might indicate I hold a grudge; while I was very upset, I'd like to make it clear that I don't hold a personal grudge against Giano. I made the comment because I personally disagreed with what I was doing at that time - I felt Giano deserved the 72-hour block for reasons already detailed by Maxim above. --Coredesat 06:08, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Penwhale

Underlying principle problem

While ArbCom can consider private exchanges (e.g. e-mails), they've never made it clear regarding IRC logs. Since ArbCom has no jurisdiction (technically) over private e-mails, it isn't so much different from IRC channels. In one of the earlier cases (case name fled my mind), editors were sanctioned because of private e-mail correspondence. IRC logs, if quoted in its entirety (and submitted privately to arbcom-l, for example), should be treated as private correspondence and accepted whether Arbitrators can make any decision based on the treatment of IRC channels. (Which, I firmly believe, being unofficial channels of WP, they cannot pass anything related to the channels without making the channels official) - Penwhale | 08:41, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Carcharoth

Locus of the dispute

The locus of the dispute is Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins and Misplaced Pages talk:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins. The evidence here lays out the timeline and the numbers of edits and editors involved from 23 December to 26 December 2007, while briefly covering the earlier history as well. The reasons for the creation of the page are not covered here.

Editors of Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins who reverted or used admin tools during the current dispute

This section covers the editors involved (some only tangentially) in the current dispute, and are from the editors listed here. The list will be annotated to indicate the level of involvement, with the aim of ascertaining whether the involvement rose to the level of knowingly participating in the edit war (those who are clearly uninvolved are in the next sections). References to the 14-stage edit war refer to this. NB. Annotations not yet finished.

Minor involvement, possible edit warring
Clearly involved and edit warring to varying degrees
  • User:Giano II - sixteen edits (initial edit followed by numerous reverts, three of which were part of the 14-stage edit war)
  • User:Geogre - eight edits (including several reverts, one page unprotection, and one undeletion of the page - three of the reverts were part of the 14-stage edit war)
  • User:David Fuchs - one edit (a revert, an undo action with the additional edit summary "this is not constructive"). Already involved due to simultaneous block of Giano.
  • User:AzaToth - four edits, all reverts (two of the reverts were part of the 14-stage edit war)
  • User:David Gerard - twenty-four edits and one page protection (some reversion, mostly rewriting and editing the page, but some while it was protected, one of the reverts was part of the 14-stage edit war)
  • User:Irpen - seven edits (one of these was a revert as part of the 14-stage edit war)
  • User:Coredesat - one edit - a revert, part of the 14-stage edit war
  • User:Betacommand - three edits (two identical reverts as part of a mini-edit war with Giano, and another, more substantial, revert as part of the 14-stage edit war)
  • User:Ryulong - six edits (some reverts, one was part of the 14-stage edit war)
Not yet examined

Editors of Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins who attempted to calm or resolve the current dispute

  • User:GDonato - one edit (a revert of content added by Bishonen, with a plea in the edit summary to stop this because it is unhelpful)
  • User:Jimbo Wales - one edit (a rewrite of part of the document, and an edit summary stating the edit is intended to move things forward)

Uninvolved editors who protected Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins

Clearly uninvolved page protections.

Editors of Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins who were uninvolved in the current dispute

While some of these editors may have been involved elsewhere (such as the talk page), they did not get involved in the editing of the disputed parts of the page in the time period in question. Some were and remain totally uninvolved.

Discussion took place in edit summaries and on the talk page

The evidence here summarises the comments in the edit summaries in light of the talk page discussion, in an attempt to show that these were experienced users who were using (to a greater or lesser extent) both methods of communicating their intent and engaging in discussion with others. Some of the edit summaries were direct continuation of talk page discussions. Diffs and quotes to follow. Actually, see the "14-stage edit war" bit - that give a flavour of the edit summaries being used, and has a link to the talk page history, though links to the whole talk page threads are still needed. Carcharoth (talk) 04:24, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Other locations where discussion took place

This section covers on-wiki discussions about this dispute.

That should be most of them. Carcharoth (talk) 15:59, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

The main edit wars

During this dispute, there were several different edits wars over several bits of text. Not all the edit wars need to be clearly shown to demonstrate the extent of the edit war. The main edit wars will be detailed here, looking at the clear reverts.

Edit war: Dealing with problematic behaviour on the channel

This edit war was over the following text:

"Dealing with problematic behaviour on the channel If peer pressure ("please stop that") doesn't work: Admins witnessing behavior unbecoming a Misplaced Pages admin in the channel, of any kind, are encouraged to contact a channel operator, the Arbitration Committee or Jimbo Wales directly. Jimbo has committed to a sense of kindness and civility on Misplaced Pages, and this can include some forms of off-wiki interaction. Arbitrators have been particularly asked to help uphold standards of conduct by gentle or less gentle encouragement as may be required."

This text was removed and added over a sequence of at least 14 different edits. The text originated from Jimbo Wales, with some modification by David Gerard. Jimbo's original text had been reinserted by Wknight94. David Gerard then moved it into its own section, while also removing a duplicate sentence not spotted by Wknight94, and adding the phrase "If peer pressure ("please stop that") doesn't work:" and the section title "Dealing with problematic behaviour on the channel". Quite a few edits later, David added the final sentence: "Arbitrators have been particularly asked to help uphold standards of conduct by gentle or less gentle encouragement as may be required.", resulting in the text quoted above. The 14-stage edit war (lasting 8 hours and taking place in distinct groups of edits) then proceeded as follows, all times referring to 25 December 2007:

  1. 11:35 - Giano removed the text
  2. 11:37 - John Reaves reverted it back in
  3. 11:47 - Giano reverted it back out
  4. 13:05 - Coredesat reverted it back in
  5. 13:09 - Geogre reverted it back out
  6. 15:18 - AzaToth reverted it back in
  7. 15:19 - Geogre reverted it back out
  8. 15:27 - AzaToth reverted it back in
  9. 15:28 - Giano reverted it back out
    Skip a couple of minor edits.
  10. 18:17 - David Gerard reverts it back in
    Skip a couple of minor edits.
  11. 18:58 - Geogre reverts it back out again (this revert also undid the intervening edits as well)
    Geogre then attempted to edit another part of the document.
  12. 19:15 - Betacommand reverts it back in (this revert also undid Geogre's other edit as well)
  13. 19:25 - Irpen reverts it back out (also restoring Geogre's other edit - ie. a straight revert of Betacommand)
    Skip a minor edit.
  14. 19:40 - Ryulong reverts it back in

At that point, the edit warring moved on to different parts of the page. One point here is that two of the participants in the edit war were also engaging in talk page discussion at the time of the edit war detailed above, and were also continuing the discussion in their edit summaries. Between the times in question (11:35 to 19:40 on 25 December 2007), the following edits were made on the talk page, indicating relevant discussion by Geogre and David Gerard (among those involved in the edit war) and Duk (who had earlier protected the page). Others participated in talk page discussion before and after this, and some failed to engage in talk page discussion at all, limiting their comments to edit summaries. Over the course of the 14-stage, slow motion edit war shown above, the edit summaries were telling their own story. All are quoted from the above links, except's John Reaves's one which is here. NB. These edit summaries were spread out over a period of 8 hours:

  1. Giano - "If you can't face the truth at least don't have a pack of lies"
  2. John Reaves - "they're just suggestions - let's try the talk page shall we?"
  3. Giano - "check your mail to see what rubbish this paragraph (now removed) is"
  4. Coredesat - "*sigh*"
  5. Geogre - "*sigher* (Is this the /man page for Freenode? Why don't we say what's true?)"
  6. AzaToth - "Undid revision 180101628 by Geogre (talk)"
  7. Geogre - "Reverted edits by AzaToth (talk) to last version by Geogre"
  8. AzaToth - "Undid revision 180111702 by Geogre (talk) George undid an edit by Jimbo, restoring it as a fact."
  9. Giano - "rv Aza Toth seems to be behind the times"
  10. David Gerard - "replacing - neither Geogre (per talk page) or Giano have direct knowledge of being on the channel"
  11. Geogre - ""has no direct evidence" is not proper rationale; see talk and gain consensus before substantially destructive edits; this is how Misplaced Pages works"
  12. Betacommand - "rm POV"
  13. Irpen - "more precisely and removed counterfactual nonsense"
  14. Ryulong - "Jimbo specifically added this content"

Some things should be noted here. Firstly, as detailed at the start of this section, the material in question was partly from Jimbo (48 words), with two additions made by David Gerard (36 words), thus the edit summaries by AzaToth and Ryulong referring to Jimbo, while understandable, are not technically correct. Secondly, AzaToth used the "undo" function twice (once without any additional edit summary), while Geogre responded to the first "undo" with what appears to be a rollback revert. Thirdly, John Reaves suggested using the talk page, but then did not post there or engage any further in this edit war (a good decision, really). Fourthly, David Gerard and Geogre both refer to the talk page, presumably to their ongoing and parallel discussion there. Fifthly, and finally, Coredesat's and Betacommand's edit summaries are noticeably short and, without any talk page follow-up, difficult to engage with.

Overall, the conclusion I would draw from this is that all sides here (except maybe John Reaves, who only reverted once, at the beginning, and then backed off) are guilty of egregious edit warring. All (including John Reaves) are experienced enough to be able to check page histories and see that an edit war was in progress, and that even a single revert would just be fuelling the flames. All should have ceased edit warring (or not joined the edit war) and gone to the talk page to discuss things, and only David Gerard and Geogre did so. All sides here were guilty of using edit summaries to discuss things during an edit war, instead of making those comments on the talk page (though some of the edit summaries indicated that the editors may have read the talk page). I don't use strong language normally, but the words "utterly pathetic" spring to mind, or as Alison put it: "Absolutely inane edit-warring by those who should know better". Carcharoth (talk) 01:46, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by David Fuchs

I won't go into too much detail, as the relevant points of most of the debate has come up above, however some major points:

Giano is essentially impossible to block

Right after being blocked for one hour, Giano quickly starts up the "poor me" routine and surprise, admins who later unblock Giano appear to agree wholeheartedly with Giano's actions. As shown time and time again by Giano's block log blocks will not stick for long, even for incivility, personal attacks, and blatant 3RR violations. ArbCom 'remedies' have obviously done nothing. And in the meantime, Giano's entourage will attack and pile on any other user who gets 'in the way'.

Addendum: seconding Ral's view of things. What I mean by entourage is that there are certain editors who will say "ok, Giano said he wouldn't do it", even when it's clear the pattern of attacks, et al will continue, and unblock. But Ral is correct that the 'stupid Giano' crowd occasionally also overstep; Coredesat, although probably well-meaning to give Giano a more substantial block, only fueled the flames and made the 'pro-Giano' side, for lack of a more descriptive phrase, more likely to overturn the block. Both sides are contributing to an atmosphere of disruption in response to a user's disruption. -15:03, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Doc

I had no intention of getting involved here. But since my limited involvement has been cited as abuse, I offer an explanation. I intend to leave it at that, unless I'm questioned further. I believe I tried to act as a peace maker and not a party in this dispute.

My reverts on Misplaced Pages:IRC channels....

N.B. Although I sometimes used twinkle (which I basically don't understand how to use) I only once "blind reverted" - at all other points I left clear, civil and rational edit summaries.

  • 13:37, 23 December 2007 I reverted Geogre's attempt to use to page to prosecute a specific complaint. Clearly inappropriate whatever the merits.
  • 14:04, 23 December 2007 I amended a comment by bishonen to make it more general and less of a dig at one specific complaint.
  • 14:45-15:41, 23 December 2007 three uninterrupted edits again attempting to generalise from the specific. Effectively I reverted Bishonen and Giano for the first time - although the revert was selective - they had some valid points.
  • 20:49, 23 December 2007 a second revert of Giano's determination to make the Tony Sidaway allegations part of the page documentation.
  • At this point I walked away - it was getting ugly and I'd had enough.
  • 18:03, 24 December 2007. 24 hours later I deleted the page in the hope of a "Christmas truce" between the edit warriors . When I was reversed, I walked away entirely.

Evidence presented by Lawrence Cohen

David Gerard and Geogre wheel warred on Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins

The page was protected from

  • 22:57, 23 December 2007 to
  • 16:44, 24 December 2007

It was deleted from

  • 18:03, 24 December 2007 to
  • 18:24, 24 December 2007

It was re-protected at 21:08, 25 December 2007. All the edits outside those windows would have been done by admins.

This includes the following users, full timeline of protected edits (excludes trivial or cloak-related edits):

  • 22:57, 23 December 2007 Initial protection by DragonflySixtyseven.
  • 10:40, 24 December 2007 Duk changes protection from indefinite to one week.
  • 15:14, 24 December 2007 David Gerard reverts content while protected.
  • 15:17, 24 December 2007 David Gerard changes content while protected.
  • 15:29, 24 December 2007 David Gerard changes content while protected.
  • 15:33, 24 December 2007 David Gerard undoes Duk's protection, resetting it to indefinite.
  • 15:48, 24 December 2007 Wknight94 changes content while protected.
  • 16:41, 24 December 2007 David Gerard changes content while protected.
  • 16:43, 24 December 2007 Geogre reverts David Gerard.
  • 16:44, 24 December 2007 Geogre removes the protection.
  • A full-blown unprotected revert war with a dozen people happens (too many to list here).
  • 18:03, 24 December 2007 Doc glasgow (Talk | contribs) deleted "Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins" ‎ (disruptive - will undelete on 26th December. Merry Christmas)
  • 18:24, 24 December 2007 Geogre (Talk | contribs) restored "Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins" ‎ (421 revisions restored: Come on, Doc, that's not right. Lumpy carpets aren't clean.)
  • 21:08, 25 December 2007 East718 reprotects, set to expire 21:38, December 25, 2007.
  • Other unprotected edits followed, and then Alison finally locked down the page for good: 09:01, 26 December 2007 Alison (Talk | contribs) protected Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins ‎ (Absolutely inane edit-warring by those who should know better / WP:RPP request (expires 09:01, 2 January 2008 (UTC)))

Evidence presented by FT2

Faked logs

Tony mentions in his statement that faked logs exist. This is what I know.

A couple or so days ago, a while after Tony and Bish had their brief spat, I saw Tony being removed from the admins channel access list. I asked what was up, and was given a one line quote attributed to him. Since the rest of that text was still visible in my IRC scrollback buffer, it was very easy and natural to search back for the text to confirm it had been said and read this second conflict I hadn't known about. But there wasn't one, and the line I'd been given was doctored. The first half was genuine and harmless (and not about Bish), the second part (the epithet) was a nasty and crude add-on. I mentioned the disparity, that it didn't match what I had. The person who I was talking to (who will identify themselves if they wish to) said they'd check it, and came back a day later saying their source thought it might be fake as well, on re-checking. Further evidence was found after. I didn't get details (or ask for them). They told Tony around then which is when he heard. I'm posting this, (being the first time I'm aware it was mentioned on-wiki) to confirm it for others here too. I gather it was also noticed by others such as Giano too . FT2  01:12, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by GRBerry

ArbComm has authority over IRC and is now an appropriate forum for adressing incivility there

Jimbo said so after the edit war: "You may consider this a statement of policy. I consider it well within the overall remit of the Arbitration Committee and my own traditional role in the English Misplaced Pages community to have authority over IRC as necessary. If this is a policy change (I do not think so) then it is a policy change. In any event, this page should reflect the fact that from this day forward, concerns about standards of civility in IRC should be taken up with the channel operators, the Arbitration Committee, and me, in that order." GRBerry 01:26, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Ral315

Giano is essentially impossible to block, with caveats

I'd second David Fuchs' arguments above for the most part. I wouldn't by any means call them "Giano's entourage", but there are some administrators, right or wrong, who have shown that they're willing to unblock or defend Giano for nearly any transgression or perceived transgression he might make. The problem is that there's also a group of administrators, right or wrong, who have shown that they're willing to block or attack Giano for nearly anything as well. It is worth noting that there's only one administrator who has blocked Giano twice, or unblocked Giano twice (Naconkantari, who's since left). This tells me that it's more than just a few people involved in this.

The fact is that Giano's been blocked many times, and not a single block has lasted for more than 3 hours (although a few short blocks were never undone) . That tells me that there's a group of good-faith, perhaps overzealous administrators who believe that Giano is a well-meaning contributor who should be blocked due to civility or other issues, and there's a group of good-faith, perhaps overprotective administrators who don't really give a damn about civility, because Giano's occasional temper has little effect on others, and his writing is superb. Which group is right? I honestly don't know -- I can see the arguments of both. But something has to be done to remedy this, because if Giano continues to edit, these tensions will only grow larger and more problematic. Ral315 (talk) 12:58, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Duk

Page protection used to silence one side of the dispute

The edit war on this page is a two way street. Some people want to add criticism and commentary, especially when unfortunate events on #adminIRC fail to be addressed, while others want to remove criticism. Page protection has been abused more than once to silence that criticism.

I've alterd the page protection twice: the first time was after an administrator noted that the page was destined for permanent protection; I immediately unprotected, since a group of admins were editing the page without restraint and thereby using protection as a weapon to win a dispute. Productive editing then followed and a controversy section was added. No protection was needed for the next five months. My second action was to reduce an indefinite protection to a week, as noted here.

David Gerard then rewrote the page to his liking while it was protected and upped the protection to indefinite. In the course of his edits he removed all criticism of the channel, including the history of its creation and links to previous dispute resolution processes. He then threatened to move the page to meta and have it protected. His actions and abuse of power exemplify the very worst meaning of the word censorship.

--Duk 17:13, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Bishonen

#wikipedia-en-admins and Tony Sidaway

Exerpt from log at en-admins, December 22 (an exact copy, typos and all). Posted per one version of WP:PRIVATE, as correspondence that is intended to harass or intimidate the recipient.


<Tony_Sidaway> It seemed to me at one time that whenever somebody raised an ongoing issue on Misplaced Pages on this channel, BIshonen would object that the problem user was not here so we should not talk about the,
<Tony_Sidaway> them,
<bishonen> it did, did it.
<Tony_Sidaway> Which is kinda problematic when you consider that this is an admin channel and often admins are talking about problem users.
=-= Nihiltres_away is now known as Nihiltres
<Doc_glasgow> Tony_Sidaway: bishonen you are about to quarrel. Neither of you will convince the other of anything, so why not drop it
|<-- Until1is2 has left irc.freenode.net (Remote closed the connection)
<bishonen> and it seemed to me i couoldn't open my mouth without you calling me a bitch or some other choice epithet. woould you like to stop now, tony?
<Tony_Sidaway> If it was a channel for problem users, that would be a different matter.
|<-- Maximr has left irc.freenode.net ()
<Rdsmith4> There is a thin line between a reasonable discussion of a user's behavior and a complaint session.
<Rdsmith4> The former also tend to become the latter as they grow longer.
<Tony_Sidaway> bishonen: you did once claim that I called you a bitch. it's true. I apologised for any slight you might have believed I made. There and then.
|<-- Rdsmith4 has left irc.freenode.net ("Leaving")
<Tony_Sidaway> Why bring it up again?
|<-- GDonato has left irc.freenode.net ("Bye!")
<bishonen> believed? youo still didn't actually call me a bastard bitch from hell, but you'd like to apologize for my imagining you did? No, i actually don't accept it in that form. who would?
<bishonen> i wouold be happy to just stop.
* FT2 passes the coffee round :)
<Tony_Sidaway> bishonen: I'm not aware of calling you a bastard bitch from hell.
* Freya shoots a tranqulizing dart at everyone.
<bishonen> alternatively, i'll show you the log.
<Tony_Sidaway> I am however aware of apologising in any case.
<Tony_Sidaway> bishonen: email me if you li,e
<Tony_Sidaway> I have already apologised. Why are you trying to ram this idiocy down my throat again?
<Tony_Sidaway> It's disgusting.
<Tony_Sidaway> Worse than disgusting. Boring.
<Tony_Sidaway> I will now admit that if I ever didcall you a bastard bitch from hell, you are now richly justifying that epithet.
<bishonen> aplogizing while denying IS worse than disgusting, I agree.
<bishonen> i see.
<Tony_Sidaway> go and act like an arsehole somewhere else, please.

The conversation is obviously lacking in wit and charm on both sides. But I hereby declare that I had no intention there to refer to the specific event where Tony once called me a "bastard bitch from hell". It happened in September 2006! I'm well over it, and Tony needs to get over it too. I meant to say that he had called me names in channel now and then ("a bitch or some other choice epithet"). I understand that this was easy to misunderstand, and I acknowledge that I was quite ready to start discussing it when Tony brought it up (as I thought, though clearly he thought I did). I tried to clear up this misunderstanding here, on December 24 and exhorted Tony to not dredge up ancient history. I got no response.

For more context, I will share the full log—up to where I left the channel, which was soon after the dialogue above—by e-mail with any user in good standing, subject to my own judgment.

Historical background
In the year 2007, I've only spent some three or four months frequenting en-admins. I foreswore the channel after some unfortunate experiences with the then active operatives about a year ago. Tony and I have some IRC baggage from these events, which I don't think needs to be gone into here. Anyway, in October or November 2007--I'm not sure exactly when--I decided that I'd been cowardly to let myself be driven away (as I experienced it), and returned. Several people seemed quite pleased to see me, and the channel seemed idyllic enough, except that I personally found Tony Sidaway an extremely dominant and rather disruptive presence. I formed the habit of not using the channel when he was in it. Since the quarrel between us on December 22 (in my timezone), exerpted above, I haven't used it at all.

Tony has not contacted me in any shape or form in the meantime, and briskly deleted my one post to his page without reply. But I see from such means of information as I have, his contribs, that he has asked James Forester to be removed from the en-admins access list "to cool things a bit" . (making former admins are surely in general, or frequently, "former" because they no longer enjoy the community trust that adminned them in the first place. And if all it takes to remove access is a request, well... then the technical difficulties that AzaToth says prevent the removal of former admins clearly can't be insuperable.

Giano and Geogre

Full disclosure: Giano and I are long-standing wiki friends. Geogre and I are RL friends sinced before we joined the project. We've all three worked quite a bit on article collaboration together. I spoke with Giano on the evening of December 22 (European time), not intending to mention the disagreeable experience I'd just had on en-admins; but Giano noticed I was upset, and insisted, until I told him. I showed him the log of Tony's disconcerting remarks, thus—unfortunately—engaging his loyalty and indignation. Both he and Geogre were angry on my account. I was angry myself, too. I would point out that there is nowhere to turn in this situation, except—if you can figure it out—it's not any too obvious—to a chanop. I knew one I had reason to trust, Mark Ryan. Giano and Geogre did not know, or have reason to trust, any. On the contrary, they both have a low opinion of IRC as such (compare User:Geogre/IRC considered). I consider this lack of outlet for justified IRC complaints (or "whining", as the most frequent term is) to be extremely damaging. Note that Jimbo Wales has now, on December 23, edited the Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins article to encourage those who witness unbecoming conduct on the channel to contact the arbitration committee (which has previously always responded to IRC complaints with a "That's nothing to do with us, go away") or Jimbo directly. This, it seems to me, amounts to a tacit admission that something was missing before. When my appeal to Mark Ryan only led to a half hour block from the channel for Tony, I did not indeed know which way to express my strong feeling that Tony (not an admin) shouldn't be in the admin channel at all, and certainly wasn't an asset there. When I saw Jimbo's fresh edit, I wrote to him, and he replied promptly. Although I don't feel that my contact with Jimbo resulted in any joint flow of reason and feast of soul, or even in much mutual comprehension, it still made a great difference to me, psychologically, to have someone in an appropriate position to appeal to. I wonder if I can explain this? Probably not, but in my case it certainly was so. In Giano's and Geogre's case, they instead exploded spectacularly (somewhat from personal loyalty, and largely from taking a principled stand of criticism) all over the place, fitfully illuminating it with the eloquence of indignation, and focusing on reverting the snowjob about the en-admins idyll in the article Misplaced Pages:IRC channels/wikipedia-en-admins . To see the feeding frenzy of humiliation and condescension and tender nursing of old grudges that has resulted (see the various proposed punishments in the workshop. snd the complaints on this evidence page about "querolous" edit summaries and similar horrible infringements ), with the G-men's arguments and principles reduced to "personal attacks" (bah!), in a place where so much real attacking goes on, and so much power politics ... well, no point in finishing that sentence. You see it or you don't. YMMV. I wish I hadn't told them about it. Bishonen | talk 22:24, 28 December 2007 (UTC).

Evidence presented by {Put your username here}

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support your assertion; for example, your first assertion might be "So-and-so engages in edit warring", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits to specific articles which show So-and-so engaging in edit warring.

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.