Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard/Archive 25

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3 things the new arbitration committee needs to address

I have no faith that this will amount to anything but a waste of my time but I am going to present it anyway in the hopes the the newly elected arbitration members will be better than the last and will improve the committee. There are a number of things that need to be fixed in this project/committee but I am going to stick to what I believe are the top 3.

  1. First, something needs to be done about the Arbitration enforcement venue and its lead executioner Sandstein. AE has been the sole domain of one admin who simply put follows his own code of justice...which amounts to block them all indefinitely. Many a good editor has fallen under Sandstein's boot based on the excuse that they violated a sanction...which leads me to the second item. My suggestion would be to pull AE directly under the Arbitration committee and either the committee members vote on the sanction or a committee be setup to do so. This one admin with unlimited power to enforce their personal narrow ideas of what sanction is needed needs to stop. Its doing harm to the project and is a leading cause of why the Arb committee is declining in respect from the community. The actions at AE are a direct reflection of the failures of the committee itself. Before people beat me up for calling him out as I did here or tell me to AGF...all you need to do is watch AE for a couple months and you'll see what I am talking about..."guilty, off with their heads!" In the past 3 months I have seen several cases come to AE and Sandsteins block em and move on attitude has been prevalent in every one. Several of which were weeks or month after the incident in question which leaves the only logical conclusion to be that the blocks were done to be punitive not preventative which is counter to our policies. Not that anyone really cares about those these days
  2. Get rid of the broadly construed language in the sanctions. If Arbcom can't take the time or effort to word the cases adequately they need to be rewritten or amended as necessary. Not take the lazy way out and write the sanction in such a way that ten people would all interpret it a different way. The addition of "broadly construed" is simply lazy arbitration/adjudication and leads to abuse by abusive admins like Sandstein.
  3. Find a way to eliminate the guilt by acceptance that currently exists when a case is selected. I don't really have an answer to how to do this but the current notion that once a case is accepted the result is guilt needs to go. Otherwise people will continue to just walk away when the case is accepted like several have done in the past. Kumioko (talk) 20:37, 14 December 2013 (UTC)
My responses.
  1. No, nothing needs to be done (except as always, more administrator eyes are needed). You seem to propose that taking action on people who've violated the terms of a sanction (be it a topic restriction or a behavioral one) is a bad idea. It's not. To be at AE,the topic area already needs to have been involved in a contentious dispute (the Committee has done well in allowing the community to handle less fractious disputes, only highly divisive areas now necessitate full lengthy arbitration cases. If an administrator is repeatedly reversed, then perhaps it would be necessary to limit from acting in that area. However, in the vast majority of sanctions handed down in these areas, it's within the bounds of discretion that administrators are given in these areas. I'd suggest that if you have a problem with the actions of administrator, that you file a RfC (and be prepared to accept things if consensus goes against you).
  2. You know why "broadly construed" entered the Arbitration Committee lexicon? It's because without it, endless hours were wasted that a topic ban on Subject A didn't cover the slight variation of Subject A subsection 1. Broadly construed was put in to prevent such endless timewasting and Wikilawyering.
  3. You see, this is a double edged sword.. if not a triple or quadruple edged sword (Of course, we're probably dealing with the fourth dimension if we're getting a four edged sword). Cases are accepted usually because of the highly divisive nature of conflicts, and the fact that normal procedures are unable to handle the situation (usually because folks aren't abiding by policy). I can think of one time when this year's Committee attempted to see if the situation would resolve during an arbitration case.. it was the universally panned Tea Party case. To be quite blunt, if there's an acceptance that guilt (somewhere) exists when a case is accepted, it's because in just about every case, there's guilty behavior involved. SirFozzie (talk) 22:05, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

My thoughts:

  1. Without commenting here about the AE work of any particular administrator, it is always true that more eyes on the noticeboard would be a good thing. I know that that's easy for us to say, and that there are any number of places around the project that could use more attention, but the more admins acquire experience on AE, the less there will be either an actual or a perceived overreliance on any one admin to make the decisions there. Having the arbitrators themselves run AE would be problematic in terms of giving the arbs yet another time commitment, and would also eliminate the ability to appeal from an AE decision to ArbCom.
  2. The idea behind the words "broadly construed" is (e.g.) "if it's borderline whether a given article is or is not within the scope of a topic-ban, err on the side of caution and assume it's included." That is not, however, the same as "if someone could conjure up any possible argument, however far-fetched that it's within the scope, then it's included. My preferred language was always "construed broadly but reasonably," but others didn't care for it. Beyond that, people need to understand that it is impossible even in principle for us to craft remedies (short of site-bans) that allow no room for disagreement or interpretation whatsoever, no matter how much we might want to. Please see my essay on this subject at User:Newyorkbrad/Newyorkbradblog#Clear remedies, arbitration decisions, and AE, as well as the article linked from there.
  3. We've had this discussion before. When I vote to accept a case, I am not engaging in any sort of "guilt by acceptance." We have had cases close with no findings of wrongdoing, or with only very general statements and no sanctions against individuals, when that is where the evidence and the best interests of the project led us. (Typically, at that point we are criticized with "so why did you waste everyone's time having a case?") I understand your point that if we vote to accept a case, it is likely that some of us have tentatively concluded that there is some basis for some remedy against someone. But I've asked before and I'll ask again, what is the alternative—that we routinely vote to open cases even when there's no reason to believe that anyone did anything wrong? Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:28, 14 December 2013 (UTC)
May as well chip in - (1) it would be great if admins with spare time should take a look help out at AE. More eyes help spread the work around and possibly for some more even discussion and decision-making. (2) per SirFozzie. People need to stop making borderline edits. really. (3) per NYB. Hopefully, if someone is named in a case and later not sanctioned, keep a handy link ready to the second item should someone bring up the first....Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 22:45, 14 December 2013 (UTC)
A huge part of the problem is Sandsteins attitude towards other editors, including admins on that venue. Everyone knows that Sandtein does whatever he wants there and any intervention by other admins is summarily dismissed. He just runs them off. That's why most other admins don't get involved..its similar with how Raul ran the TFA venue. Now I know you all think I am just spouting conspiracy theories but just watch the AE board for a while and you'll see. If admins intervene Sandstein always reverts their work or comes up with some excuse why their action wasn't valid. Now that it has been established that Sandstein rules the AE roost the only way to get others engaged there is to either pull it under Arbitration and allow multiple people to vote on it here or setup a committee of those willing to do so. Otherwise you will continue to give Sandstein a blank check to block everyone submitted to AE. For what its worth I would have even helped there but no one thinks I can possibly be trusted with the ability to delete content and block vandals, so I basically just gave up on the project and went to Wikia. Although I freely admit my attitude is completely different. I have the attitude that we should give editors the chance to fix themselves and give them a chance. If they are skirting the edge repeatedly then maybe we need to modify the case to include that, maybe we need to clarify that is..or is not ok, depending on the case. But this blocking everyone with unlimited latitude just because some POV editor on the opposite side of the argument disagrees with the edit and submits the editor to AE needs to stop.
Yes your right Sir Fozzie I do know, and it honestly made sense at the time. But now that we have had time to see it in action the Broadly construed "fix" is just as bad as the previous problem it was implemented to fix, maybe even worse. I also think as I did then that a large reason for its necessity was because the Arbcom kept writing poorly worded Arb sanctions. If that problem is fixed then some of the wiggle room can be worked out of it. But there is no sense in making the determination so broad that a restriction to editing British topics then extends to every former British Colony (IE the US Canada and Australia. If its necessary to revise and revisit the sanction to close said loopholes then so be it. The problem we are running into know with the broadly construed terminology is that the intent that Arbcom has in mind isn't what the enforcing/blocking admins have in their interpretation and Arbcom isn't following up to ensure its being properly implemented. I also don't think the Arbcom needs to write the sanctions to include every caveat and contingency. We can write them based on the case, and then enforce that. If it needs to be adjusted then we can do that.
Lets be realistic, people edit what interests them. So if you are interested in Law articles and you have a sanction "broadly construed" not to edit law articles, I am unlikely to start editing articles and Tsetse flies. I'm going to find something else that interests me, like Medal of Honor recipients. But then a lot of those are lawyers or were congressmen, or senators who wrote laws. So broadly construed means I can't edit those. What about environmental issues, nope broadly construed puts those out too...you see where I am going here. Before you say I am being farfetched these are the types of scenarios that are being "adjudicated" in AE. Kumioko (talk) 23:08, 14 December 2013 (UTC)
Let's be realistic, folks should not be that one-dimensional where they see no value in doing anything here except with anything they're most interested in. And the cases I recall were not that "broadly construed' but tried to dance just outside the forbidden area. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 03:55, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
As I said before I didn't expect this discussion to be taken seriously but you all are just making excuses and dodging it completely. Yes it would be nice if people were more well rounded but even in the admin community that's not the case. Most admins focus on certain tasks and few use the whole toolset. Most don't know how to update templates, Lua modules or Wikimedia pages, few participate in CCI or some of the other contentious areas AFD, and the like are mostly handled by the same small group. Its just not realistic o think people are not going to do something that's related to what interests the. That's why nearly everyone with a sanction ends up getting blocked (frequently indefinitely) and AE with their block first and don't ask any questions mentality is a driving factor of that. Kumioko (talk) 13:18, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
It is not what they edit but how they edit that gets them into trouble. If someone can only contribute here in one narrow area and has no interest otherwise, then unfortunately if that is a recurrent problem then it leaves the person incompatible with editing nonproblematically then. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:43, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
Not really and that comment shows me that you don't really watch AE or what happens to the editors after they get sanctioned. That assessment may be correct in regards to how they got the sanction in the first place but not always true in the follow up blocks. There have been quite a lot of cases where they attempted to edit outside what they thought the bounds of the sanction were and the arguments are reasonable. But when they were sent to AE a certain admin decided that it was somehow tangentially related. Now if the person is under a sanction for something and edits something that clearly relates (Politicial articles and then edits a article for a congressmen for instance) then I don't have much sympathy. But we need to temper the sanction with some common sense and be reasonable. The other problem that appears frequently is when weeks or months go by and they are sent to AE long after the edit was made and they still get a block eventhough there is absolutely no harm to the project. My point is the admin you all have assigned to the AE noticeboard as Arbcom's enforcer is not reasonable and heavily favors extreme's. There is no grey and usually no white in the results...just black. What this has led too is that people who are in the opposing view of the sanctionee almost always refer them to AE and they almost always get blocked. Kumioko (talk) 13:57, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
No person is "assigned" to AE; all activity is voluntary snd at admins' own discretion and interest. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 16:51, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
Your right, but here's the thing. The Arbcom members are voted in by the community and AE is an extension of the committee and what happens there directly reflects on the committee. So the responsibility for those admins and actions that occur their fall directly under the responsibility of the committee whether they like that or not. If one unappointed admin takes it upon themselves to be the judge, jury and executioner and the Arbcom does nothing about that, and they haven't for the last several years, then they have given that admin an assignment by proxy. Certainly an AE type process is needed, but it should not nor should it ever have been, one individual. One abusive individual who virtually always favor extremes I might add and generally runs off any other admins who attempt to participate. The bigger problem is that Sandstein has been placed in a position where his determinations cannot be questioned and people are afraid even to do so. Even when he makes an obvious bad decision they are powerless because he has the full support of the committee. In many ways he is more powerful than the committee members themselves. There have been numerous cases where individual arb members didn't agree with Sandstein and they couldn't do anything about his decision. Look at the recent examples of User:Lecen and User:Arthur Rubin as examples. But these are only 2 cases in a long list of questionable decisions. Personally I still think the site ban of User:Rich Farmbrough will go down as one of the most harmful decisions in the history of the project. Kumioko (talk) 17:40, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

(undent)Kumioko, the statistics do not seem to back up your statements. For example, in November, there were 11 filings at WP:AE. Of these, five were closed by Sandstein, and the others by a combination of four other admins. Of the 11, there were two blocks and two topic-bans. In October, there were again 11 filings, four of which were closed by Sandstein and the rest by three others. Of the 11, three resulted in blocks, one in a topic ban, and one in a 1RR restriction. In September, there were 11 filings. Four of these were closed by Sandstein, and the rest by three other admins. Three resulted in topic bans and one in a block (two others were blocked outside of AE while the filing was in process). So, in the past three months, neither Sandstein nor the result of "blocked" has dominated the AE board, and shows a lack of data behind your claims of AE being the "sole domain of one admin" or the result being "they almost always get blocked". The fact that you disagree with Sandstein's actions in some cases isn't justification for making accusations without proof. Dana boomer (talk) 23:52, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Actually I almost never agree with Sandstein's, not just some. I also wouldn't say the accusations are being without proof. Your right, upon review I did see that some other admins were helping out there. I will have to loo back through and do some more detailed analysis for sure. I still stand behind my underlying argument than Sandstein is not fit for the task. Its like putting a deletionist in charge of Articles for deletion or an inclusionist in charge of Articles for improvement. We need someone neutral who will make decisions based on the facts not just block and move on. Kumioko (talk) 04:33, 16 December 2013 (UTC)
But the decision based on the facts has already happened, in the original arbitration case. These cases are often long and complex, a drain on the time and effort of all involved. So to avoid a repeat of that the case often includes sanctions worded in such a way that they can be decided and acted on easily, by a single editor. This is by design, not accident. It has to be an administrator, both as the community has trusted them to make such determinations and as they have the tools to act on any such decisions. We are lucky to have administrators willing to take on these tasks, despite the flak they get.
As for Sandstein I have seen no evidence of their deciding such sanctions wrongly. But I'm sure it could happen – we all of us make mistakes at times and misjudge things. If so a blocked editor can appeal the block. Any other editor can take it to Clarification and Amendment, but they should not do so lightly or frivolously. Posting broad and vague accusations here achieves little.--JohnBlackburnewordsdeeds 01:41, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
I'm sorry that I simply don't see things in the positive light you do. I have seen the abuses at AE for years and unfortunately no one cares. I don't hold Arbcom in very high esteem either. As for admins being trusted that is true to a degree but some admins are better than others, some shouldn't be admins at all. A large subsection of the admin population couldn't even pass RFA in today's environment which speaks a lot about them and the current process. It is more apparent to me than ever that I essentially stand alone in thinking this abusive process needs to be rethought. Much the same about the RFA process it seems. I'm not going to bother following this discussion anymore. I started the discussion in the hopes that some would be willing to discuss the longterm problems associated with Arbcom but it seems I am just spitting into the wind. Kumioko (talk) 04:18, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
@JohnBlackburneThe appeal process does not seem to be working at all now. I just tried to appeal a sanction that was made 9 months ago against 4 editors, myself and 3 long-time users, three of whom stopped editing over the incident. The Arbcom refused to consider the case, and closed it abruptly before I could respond or ask followup questions. Even the admin who imposed it says I have not done any thing to merit even a warning, but his own query to the ArbCom, about whether he could reverse himself, went unanswered as well. I don't see any evidence that the community trusts this process at all. —Neotarf (talk) 14:20, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
That's not really accurate, Neotarf. You did not try to appeal a sanction, you tried to appeal a warning informing you that discretionary sanctions had been authorised for a topic area you were editing in. You are not restricted in any way as a result of that warning and it's impossible for us to unmake you aware of the fact that DS have been authorised, so there is really no point in trying to appeal the warning, which is what ArbCom told you (twice, if I'm not mistaken). Salvio Let's talk about it! 14:43, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
@Salvio, You need to look again, the template has been edited recently.
At the time the {{Uw-sanctions}} template was used on my talk page, the documentation for the template was quite clear. The template is intentionally worded to apply only to "disruptive" editors, it is supposed to "identify misconduct", and it is part of "the discretionary sanctions process". The use of the template for preemptive warnings is considered to be "hostile".
The purpose of the template is to formally document wrongdoing. It effectively allows one super-admin,--who may have COI, who may not have time to read the evidence presented at AE, and who has not read the case,--to add an editor as a party to the case after the fact, and to block or ban that user unilaterally, with no evidence, no findings of fact, and no reality check.
In fact, a recent appeal by The Devils Advocate in the Scientology case resulted in that AE action being lifted, and the entry being stricken from the case log. The main difference between this case and that, was a weeks-long acrimonious ANI thread at Abuse of admin powers and Violation of WP:INVOLVED by User:Sandstein and simultaneous discussions at least two other venues. —Neotarf (talk) 07:47, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
Salvio is not the first to state that Neotarf can't appeal a mere warning because nobody can "unmake him aware" that discretionary sanctions have been authorised for the area. Not the first to state it and not the first who should know better. Neotarf and others have pointed out several times that the warning template, at the time Sandstein whacked Neotarf and others with it in February 2013, was an accusation of misconduct, saying stuff like "If you continue to misconduct yourself on pages relating to this topic, you may be placed under sanctions" bla bla… oh, come on, you know it, I don't have to quote it again. The accusation isn't in the template any more. It shouldn't have been there before either, or Sandstein shouldn't have been using it for merely making people "aware" of the discretionary sanctions. His doing so upset a lot of people, one of whom left the project, and it's been suggested too many times that it's a trivial matter that they should have shrugged off, the problem is their "big egos", etc. Is it really such a surprise that people who have contributed a lot to Wikipedia don't like being told that they've "misconducted themselves"? In, as Neo says, "Wikipedia's voice"? Neo is still here, but it looks like he's by now rather loosely attached to this ungrateful project. Why the fuck he isn't getting a heartfelt apology from several quarters — you know who you are — instead of all this "oh, get over it" and "no the template doesn't say that now" is a mystery to me.
Anyway. Sandstein acknowledged recently that "in retrospect" the statement by Neotarf here, that he was warned for, "does appear comparatively tame and would not ordinarily merit a warning on its own"; he, Sandstein, was merely trying to "nip a possible escalation in the bud". He thinks Neo should get over it and "simply take the warning as it was intended, as an attempt to help you and others avoid unneeded trouble, rather than as a slight to your honor": i. e. take it as it was intended, rather than as it was actually phrased.[1] I suppose that's as close to an apology as could be expected from Sandstein. I have therefore removed Sandstein's warning to Neotarf from the log.[2] Per some quagmire of bureaucracy or other, it hasn't been "vacated" or whatever, not by Sandstein and not by ArbCom, but I'm against leaving it as a mark of shame in a public log. I'd really like to remove the logged warnings made simultaneously to Noetica, SMcCandlish and probably Ohconfucius (I haven't studied Oh's case closely, though) at the same time, but I haven't done that. (You do it, Floquenbeam.) I'm treating Neotarf as a special case since Sandstein has in practice, and all but technically, withdrawn it in his comment which I quote above. Bishonen | talk 20:32, 19 December 2013 (UTC).
P.S. And Sandstein immediately reverted me. Bishonen | talk 20:37, 19 December 2013 (UTC).
Only a few months ago SMcC posted this wall of text, where he made some very bold assertions of bad faith among WikiProject chess members, and arrogantly dismissed arguments contrary to his preferred capitalization standard by saying they "have been examined in detail and totally shredded". I would prefer that logged warnings regarding his approach to capitalization issues not be lifted. Sjakkalle (Check!) 14:46, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
I've reverted your action, as you appear to have misunderstood me. I've not withdrawn the warning, and am of the opinion that warnings cannot be undone. Per current practice, warnings are logged to help administrators determine whether discretionary sanctions may be imposed with respect to a particular editor. Because Neotarf was in fact warned, as provided for in WP:AC/DS#Warnings, the log entry concerning them is accurate and should not be removed – whatever one might think about the reasons for the warning. As far as I can tell, this matter was settled by the Arbitration Committee recently declining to hear an appeal against the warning.  Sandstein  20:41, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
Bishonen, I 100% agree with you that the verbiage of that warning was a problem, and I've had a similar conversation about this here: User_talk:Sandstein/Archives/2013/December#Arbitration_request. However, I think we can say that having your name listed among those officially aware of DS for a particular arbcom case is not in itself a bad thing and that no judgment is necessarily implied if you are so listed. Can we all agree on that? Again, I'm not trying to justify the phrasing "If you continue to misconduct yourself", but my claim is that receiving the notice as written today and/or being listed at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Article_titles_and_capitalisation#Log_of_notifications is not an implication of wrongdoing or misbehavior. Feel free to give me a uw-sanctions and add my name. I don't think that removing names from that log will do anything to set things right for these editors. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 21:23, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
While I agree that it is best not to think of logs as a mark of shame but rather a mere record of events (compare, if I have been pulled to be informed by an officer that my tail light as out as a courtesy and such is stated within police records, I have nothing to be ashamed of) it does not seem like we should always be uptight about our record keeping if a user genuinely feels like it is a mark of shame. So, I do not believe that warnings should fall under oversight, but, if requested by the impacted party, we should strongly consider blanking a log entry as a courtesy, with the understanding that after such an action, they remain on notice.--Tznkai (talk) 21:37, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
But Sandstein still has a point: if Neotarf is ever dragged to AE again for disruption having to do with titling/capitalization, it's easier for admins there to see if he knows about DS at ARBATC if he's listed in that section. You could list me there, too, so that if I'm ever accused at AE people will similarly know that I am aware that there are DS at WP:ARBATC. The problem – correct me if I'm wrong – is that the warning is seen as an official pronouncement of wrongdoing. I think we've heard enough to know that it isn't, from Salvio just above and even from Sandstein who said it is not intended "as a slight to your honor". Can we come to a consensus here to denounce any official implication of wrongdoing or misconduct by those original notices? I can't imagine what else might happen to repair this. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 21:56, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
If it helps to end this tedious recurring debate, we could add something like "Being listed here does not imply misconduct on the part of an editor" to the warning/notification/alerts sections of the case logs, but that would properly be a task for the Committee or its clerks who curate these pages.  Sandstein  22:02, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
(e/c)I understand what you're saying, I do, but I think it misses the point. Our mutual agreement that there is no official implication of wrongdoing would not change a user's subjective experience of wrong doing, and I place the user's subjective comfort over administrative convenience. I think it is more useful to us, collectively, to acquiesce to a request that creates only minor bureaucratic inconvenience to patroling administrators at AE than to preserve an easy to access record. Keep in mind, the actual record will remain in the page histories.--Tznkai (talk) 22:06, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

(←) Sandstein, an alternative might be you adding a notation to the log that the original warning may not have been necessary.--Tznkai (talk) 22:06, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

No. Logs are records of events that happened, not places for commentary. And administrators have better things to do than to conduct this same endless discussion about whether a mere warning may or may not have been necessary, and how any exculpatory note should be phrased, with every other one of the many editors that have been put on notice about discretionary sanctions. At some point we just have to accept that any dispute resolution system, of which this is a small part, will never be able to fully satisfy the more or less tender egos of all who take part in it. Moreover, if I were to add a note with respect to Neotarf only, this would imply by way of contrast that all other log entries (which lack such a note) do imply wrongdoing, which would also be inaccurate.  Sandstein  22:22, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
Not true. Every single one of those other names got there through recognized processes, community-voted topic bans, and actions by uninvolved admins; and for every single one of them, there were diffs and evidence presented. Not one of those names was put there by lettre de cachet, and every single other action there can be appealed. Except for the 4 of us. Regards, —Neotarf (talk) 09:38, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

@Sandstein: No, I have not misunderstood you, but you're not making the slightest effort to understand anybody else, are you? Did you read, for example, what Tznkai said about the user's subjective comfort versus the minor bureaucratic inconvenience? No doubt, but did you take it in? Try to internalize what it was about? Did you realize that there are valid, indeed thoughtful, opinions, that are not your own, about this matter? Furthermore, there you go again with the "tender egos" (pretty insulting IMHO) and the "tedious" and "endless" recurring debate. Has it struck you that the debate might not be so tedious if you were ever open to admitting that you might at any time have been wrong about anything? That the endless debate might have had an end by now, if your ego wasn't preventing it? The mystery to me isn't that you have no respect for anybody else's views, but that you get away with it, that everybody bends to your unbendingness, that they ultimately fall silent in the face of your stony repetitiousness. I don't want to be an admin while you are. Bishonen | talk 01:24, 20 December 2013 (UTC).

I wholeheartedly agree with Bishonen! A point I have attempted to make myself multiple times in the past but failed to do so as eloquently as they just did. Kumioko (talk) 01:30, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
I've expanded on my post about the review of DSs, and relocated it to the appropriate talk page, which is a much better place for such discussion. Tony (talk) 10:29, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
Bishonen, of course I can be wrong, like everybody else, and I'm open to discussing it. But every discussion has to end at some point. For actions in the discretionary sanctions process, there's a well-defined process for conducting discussion about whether such actions are wrong - the appeals process. Neotarf has, after very, very extensive discussions in multiple fora, appealed the warning to our final dispute resolution authority, the Arbitration Committee. They have declined to hear the appeal. That decision concludes the discussion about the warning to Neotarf, and I will not engage in further discussion.  Sandstein  13:08, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
There is one additional problem that I have with your conduct Sandstein that I want to point out. You have on many occassions stated that non admin comments are not important and treat non admins like second class citizens on Wikipedia. I have a major problem with that and your attitude towards non admins is counter to good order in this project. Non admin comments even at AE are important to the cases and need to be considered not ignored which you tend to do. You have even stated plainly that you feel that non admin comment at AE are unimportant and haveno bearing on AE cases. That attitude towards nmon admins is simply unacceptable and is a driving factor for my opinions that your attitude makes you ill suited to be an admin let alone be the executioner at AE. Kumioko (talk) 14:55, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
That's not true. Without non-admins making enforcement requests and submitting evidence to WP:AE, the enforcement process would not function. However, unlike most other Wikipedia processes, the AE forum is not driven by consensus among editors (whether they are admins or not). It serves to collect evidence (in the form of diffs) and pertinent policy-based arguments for individual admins to unilaterally act upon. Statements that do not serve this function, but instead make unfounded accusations against others, or continue the underlying content dispute, are useless and are disregarded, whether they are by admins or non-admins (although in practice the latter is more often the case). Admins are authorized to act (or not act) on AE requests even if every other admin or non-admin in the AE thread expresses the opposite opinion, although if they take action under such circumstances they assume the risk of being reverted on appeal. There is only one one specific, practical sense in which the opinion of non-admins matters less than the opinion of admins: the former are not able and/or authorized to act on requests. I hope this clarifies your understanding of the AE process.  Sandstein  15:23, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
Sandstein you have stated repeatedly that the opinions of non admins at AE are irrelevent. Its also rare that an uninvolved non admin goes to AE, the few non admins that do are generally involved with the content dispute and do it to get the individual they don't agree with blocked or banned. The problem is you rarely bother to investigate to see, you just look at the diff and block them. The worst part is in many cases the diff presented is so tangential to the case its far out on the edge of the sanction anyway. Like being sanctioned against editing politicians and then being blocked because they edited Chicago and politicians live and work there. Its a made up scenario but one that fits what happens on a recurring basis because of the poorly implemented "broadly construed" policy. Kumioko (talk) 17:38, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

The message Sandstein is editing warring to keep on the page clearly states If you continue to misconduct yourself on pages relating to this topic so the argument that is "just a notification" is specious. How's this for a solution?: I'll leave a neutral worded notification on Neotarf's page, dump Sandstein's diff and add mine. If, in fact, ego has nothing to do with it no one should care that the notification was done by a worthless < 10% mainspace non-admin. NE Ent 13:03, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

Hearing no objections, I'm doing this. NE Ent 13:48, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
Reverted per Neotarf's request [3]. NE Ent 21:35, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

@ArbCom @Checkuser Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive254#Too many indef blocked IPs

Due to the magnitude of the request, I'd like to bring the issue in the attention of ArbCom members and checkusers. Currently there is a serious backlog of indefinately blocked IPs which can be observed at Special:BlockList.

Of these 20,411 are indef blocked single IP and 203 are indef blocked IP ranges. Some of these blocks come from as far back as 8 February 2004. nl:User:RonaldB suggested that of the older indef blocked IPs, "vast majority is dynamic, so indef block is meaningless and superfluous".

I'd like to request a spring cleanup but would like the input of ArbCom members and checkusers. Thanks.

-- A Certain White Cat chi? 01:26, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

There are undoubtedly some that can be reverted. However, one must differentiate between hard-blocked and soft-blocked. (Hard-blocked IPs will prevent anyone except for an administrator from editing.) There is also some difference in opinion on how dynamic a lot of those IPs may be: certain IPs show as "dynamic" but in fact are assigned to servers that don't break their sessions for years. Having said that, we did a very big cleanup a few years back, but it seems we've had some creep again. I'd suggest a task group including administrators, those with experience in sock/long term abuse areas, and checkusers be set up. They should probably start looking at the oldest IP/range blocks and work their way forward. While they're at it, the user pages of dynamic IPs should probably be stripped of "sockpuppet" tags (they're actually quite pointless, and insulting to the next user with that IP). I'd also suggest perhaps a very focused look at the last 6 months of indef IP/range blocks to see how reasonable they are. My suspicion is that at least half are unnecessary and/or unhelpful. This would give us some factual basis to initiate a discussion aimed at establishing some guidance/guidelines for administrators placing such blocks. Risker (talk) 01:55, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
I feel even the most notorious Open Proxies should be given finite blocks (say 1-5 years) and perhaps be delegated to global blocks. This would give us a mechanic to timely verify the status of these IPs. Exception to that general principle can be made of course. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 03:06, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
Your point about global blocking is a good one. Often we will find that when an IP or IP range comes up for global blocking on the checkuser mailing list, it has already been blocked locally; lifting the local block and applying a global block would make more sense. I am going to draw the attention of local checkusers and stewards to this thread via the checkuser mailing list. Risker (talk) 03:24, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
Thank you. I also have meta:User:とある白い猫/English Wikipedia open proxy candidates if they want to go through it. This page lists all indef blocks. It may simplify things if multiple people go through the same list noting what they have checked. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 04:13, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
Has there been any progress on the issue? -- A Certain White Cat chi? 23:19, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
Unfortunately not, because this doesn't fall within the remit of the Arbitration Committee: we resolve disputes, and don't take very much to do with the checkusers over and above electing them. Regards, AGK [•] 19:52, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
The problem seems to me is that sysops and checkusers alike need some sort of "go ahead" to handle the ancient blocks. Perhaps such a discussion on ArbCom mailing list may yield some sort of consensus on the matter. The results would be posted on the noticeboard. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 21:34, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Should I file an arbitration case then? The collateral damage stemming from the issue needs some sort of a review somewhere. This problem wont resolve itself. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 05:02, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
How about posting an RfD RfC suggesting that we remove a bunch of these old blocks and monitor them to see if there is any more disruption, re-blocking as needed? It will most likely come back with an overwhelming consensus to do that, and then you can go to AN and ask for help. I think arbcom is a dead end; this really seems to be outside of arbcom's scope. --Guy Macon (talk) 06:48, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
Redirects for discussion? Do you mean an WP:RFC? -- A Certain White Cat chi? 10:42, 16 October 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, Typo. So, how do we resolve this? AN went nowhere, and Arbcom isn't the right place. So where is the right place? --Guy Macon (talk) 19:24, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
An issue of this magnitude (over 20k individual IPs) would normally be resolved by ArbCom. No single sysop will want to deal with it nor would they be capable of such an act. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 13:09, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

A solid suggestion would be most helpful. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 20:36, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm not an arbitrator, but I don't see how they would be any more or less equipped to deal with this than than any other group of administrators? As a first step I think the headline figure needs to be ignored - it's just too scary to work with:

  • Create a list of all the indef blocks of IPs or IP ranges, one entry per block (not per IP), the date placed and the reason. Order this list by date, oldest first.
  • Advertise this list here, at AN, the checkusers mailing list and anywhere else appropriate.
  • Starting from the top of the list (oldest first), review the first block and unblock/make it of a finite length/leave as is as appropriate.
  • Move that to a separate list of reviewed blocks, and move on.

Alternatively, and more radically, the ArbCom could just issue a statement/motion authorising:

  1. The unblocking of all indef blocks placed before $timeago, with a link to that statement in the block log for ease of tracking.
  2. The reblocking, by any administrator, of any IP ublocked for this reason, again with a link to the motion/statement. Thryduulf (talk) 17:42, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
With a view to creating a manageable subset, it might be worth separating out all old IP indefblocks that don't include the word "proxy" in the block reason and reviewing those separately. WJBscribe (talk) 19:50, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
My recollection from a years back when this came up before is that a good percentage of the indef blocked IPs are inadvertent - an administrator mistakenly proceeding as if the IP were a registered account. So if you are going to make a manageable subset to deal with first, it might be a good idea to look for default block log comments such as "Vandalism-only account" which are indicative of this kind of slip up. -- Ed (Edgar181) 20:11, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
I have created such a list on meta. It wasn't possible to post it on a single page so I broke it apart to groups of 5000: m:User:とある白い猫/English Wikipedia open proxy candidates. I have posted the issue on AN but it was able to attract little attention as the work load is quite significant not to mention the possible backlash of just a few mistaken unblocks. Admins would be more comfortable with some sort of ArbCom statement to back their action so as not to appear rouge. Mind that vast majority of the blocks are over claims of Open proxies which probably aren't even valid anymore or are (globally) ranged blocked. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 22:29, 17 November 2013 (UTC)
I'm confused. Why is this on Meta? Why is it unlinked to the IP's/IP range's contributions? This is actually harder to work on than the block list; at least there I was able to unblock directly. I mean...if you want people to actually review them, this is probably about the hardest way you could do it. Risker (talk) 22:35, 17 November 2013 (UTC)
Mind that vast majority of IP blocks are under the claim that they are open proxies. Because open proxies tend to be a global problem, ranges should probably be globally blocked rather than locally. The contributions are not linked due to MediaWiki limitations. Page will simply not load if you have more than 2000KB of content which is why everything is so bare-bone. It is meant to be a checklist of what has been done for that specific IP and whatnot. I also cannot see the relevance of the IPs past contribution as the claim here is that IPs probably changed hands and the original source of any problem isn't relevant anymore.
It is trivial to make a copy of the content there to here if there is anyone here willing to check them. I was hoping to get stewards to check the IPs globally for problems given how the IPs are indefinitely blocked here hence any conclusion here would probably be incomplete. This however never happened. At this point I do not believe anyone is willing to check these IPs due to the amount of work that would involve. So the option is to leave them blocked forever disregarding the collateral damage, or more or less blindly unblock everything before a certain date and re-block if they still cause problems. The latter option would work better if ArbCom OK'ed it IMHO.
-- A Certain White Cat chi? 09:48, 23 November 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for the effort of making the lists, but I think they're too big. It's not really a surprise that people aren't willing to go through blocked IPs in groups of 5000 without any links (not even to unblock them). The scale of the task makes it unmanageable. Also, it would be difficult to have more than one person working on any one list at a time due to edit conflicts etc. I think it work work better to break them down into much smaller batches, say 50. Then users/admins who understand how to check for open proxies could each assign themselves one set of 50, work through it, and pick another set once done. I suspect that will seem much less daunting and encourage people to get started. WJBscribe (talk) 11:23, 23 November 2013 (UTC)
This sounds like a job for a program. Doing this by hand is a waste of editor time. I'd suggest the following rules:
  • If the IP address hasn't made any edits at all in N (12?) months, unblock it.
  • When an IP address changes ASN, unblock it. The IP address space has been sold.
  • When the IP-level geolocation info [4] for an IP address changes, unblock it. (That info is not updated as mobiles move around; it's just where the provider is.)
  • If the IP address is on a Dialup Users List, it's part of a pool of addresses, and single addresses should only be blocked for N (7?) days or so to avoid collateral damage. In severe cases, where large address ranges were blocked, this rule should not apply.
That will knock the list down to a manageable size. Ask on the bot-owners notice board if anyone wants to code that. John Nagle (talk) 20:15, 23 November 2013 (UTC)
Is there a rationale for how this benefits the encyclopedia? Checking open proxies is a lot of work. If you have an unblock request from somebody who claims to be on an IP that was incorrectly blocked, then there is motivation to do the work. And that's for a single IP. Facing a list of 5000 some people would lose their optimism. EdJohnston (talk) 01:39, 24 November 2013 (UTC)
This benefits the project because it adds more edits by more people. The more people who can edit the better, generally speaking. Its like a bot that is currenty running through blocking proxies that have never even edited. Its a complete waste of time and effort indef blocking IP's. I agree with the above that there should be a limit (1 year in my opinion) to any IP block. Especially ranges. 108.45.104.69 (talk) 02:26, 24 November 2013 (UTC)
Blocks should have oversight and expiration is one example of such oversight. These IPs are blocked until time ends. There is no benefit of that to the encyclopedia.
It is possible for admins to review 50 of the blocked IPs at a time. No one wants to review a single one of them at the moment.
-- A Certain White Cat chi? 19:20, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

What is the message a blocked IP gets when trying to edit, and when trying to create an account? If the message(s) could be improved so admins are directed to active IPs, that might be helpful - and a more productive use of time than reviewing all the IPs. A simple, friendly message, like: "Ooops, there seems to be a problem. Please click "here" if you'd like to edit / create an account." And clicking "here" creates an automated IP block review request which admins can look at. SilkTork ✔Tea time 01:06, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Blockedtext is what blocked accounts/IPs see. $2 is where the block reason is rendered (so if {{blocked proxy}} is used as the block reason the blocked editor sees the rendered template). Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 06:39, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Editor data from stats:EN/TablesWikipediaEN.htm and rangeblock data from Wikipedia:Database reports/Range blocks.

Date Active editors # of IP's blocked in rangeblocks
Aug 2009 38,623 6,727,662
Sep 2009 37,255 6,168,382
Oct 2009 38,517 5,791,864
Nov 2009 37,937 5,662,110
Dec 2009 36,683 6,027,875
Jan 2010 38,656 6,258,678
Feb 2010 37,157 5,791,222
Mar 2010 39,082 6,395,728
Apr 2010 37,848 6,950,324
May 2010 38,218 6,954,356
Jun 2010 35,207 7,262,952
Jul 2010 34,851 6,698,654
Aug 2010 35,446 7,101,194
Sep 2010 33,913 6,743,305
Oct 2010 34,486 7,023,560
Nov 2010 33,887 7,675,024
Dec 2010 33,216 7,606,594
Jan 2011 36,671 7,486,394
Feb 2011 35,679 8,130,442
Mar 2011 37,553 7,784,490
Apr 2011 36,291 6,835,140
May 2011 35,949 7,491,804
Jun 2011 34,768 7,420,234
Jul 2011 34,547 7,308,898
Aug 2011 34,703 7,306,442
Sep 2011 33,814 7,279,378
Oct 2011 34,105 7,059,986
Nov 2011 33,523 7,477,354
Dec 2011 33,221 6,996,072
Jan 2012 34,198 7,248,216
Feb 2012 33,260 7,955,768
Mar 2012 33,673 7,790,740
Apr 2012 33,146 8,573,020
May 2012 33,556 9,318,066
Jun 2012 32,363 9,973,050
Jul 2012 33,304 10,735,998
Aug 2012 33,019 11,409,546
Sep 2012 31,005 11,102,978
Oct 2012 32,417 11,465,195
Nov 2012 32,079 11,579,506
Dec 2012 31,416 11,300,434
Jan 2013 33,283 13,395,414
Feb 2013 31,157 13,450,222
Mar 2013 33,181 14,347,258
Apr 2013 33,368 14,178,926
May 2013 33,072 14,774,552
Jun 2013 30,860 13,902,412
Jul 2013 30,866 14,570,453
Aug 2013 30,879 15,434,306
Sep 2013 28,699 14,884,160
Oct 2013 30,917 15,284,292
Nov 2013 15,928,304

Rangeblock RfC from August 2013 at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 105#Mass removal of old indefinite rangeblocks. Feel free to ignore this. 64.40.54.208 (talk) 09:48, 9 December 2013 (UTC)


I'm sorry, my brain is running a little too slow to follow this discussion fully, but it sounds like there are a lot of indefinite blocks that need review? Is there something that requires elevated permissions beyond administrator, or are we just trying to find a posse?--Tznkai (talk) 06:43, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

The blocks needs some better presentation, as discussed above. There needs to be a way of checking stuff and marking blocks as reviewed either way. When I go through Wikipedia:Database_reports/Indefinitely_blocked_IPs I seem to not unblock more and more. Unblocking an indef-blocked IP address should not be done lightly, imo, so you probably want a posse of admins (and users from WP:OP) who are either reckless enough to unblock anything, or feel competent enough to check them at least a bit. I'm sure checking for rangeblocks and dynamic ranges should be done by a bot or script. -- zzuuzz (talk) 07:30, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
I'm still a believer in that old time Wikipedia philosophy of "the worst thing that can happen is we have to block again" so I guess I qualify as reckless. Is there a specific reason we'd need ArbCom?--Tznkai (talk) 08:05, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
That's fine, each to their own. I guess the reason it's here is because some of arbcom should be competent (or reckless). I'm curious how you'd deal with (from the database rangeblocks page) the "scientology" blocks, and also the "by request" schoolblocks. -- zzuuzz (talk) 08:11, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
Personally? The by request blocks seem to be very old, and I am unaware of any policy or principle that supports them. If a school sysadmin doesn't want students editing Wikipedia, that is on the school sysadmin to figure out, so after asking the administrator hive mind for input, if no justification could be found, I'd unblock them and keep an eye for the almost certainly inevitable penis spam from at least one.
More to the point, if I understand this all, we have roughly two categories of indefinite blocks that need review. One is open proxies, which should either be unblocked locally, or unblocked locally and then globally blocked by a steward. The second group are indef blocks under local policy, which just need to be reviewed. If that is the case, it seems like support needs to be gathered at WP:AN for technically comfortable users for group one, and for policy comfortable users for group two. Or am I missing something?--Tznkai (talk) 18:17, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
I think you have it absolutely right, Tznkai. Would you be willing to work with and help White Cat with this? That would help move this away from ArbCom (which isn't really the right place for this) and towards where it might get dealt with. And White Cat, apologies for not responding to the message on my talk page. I did get it, and didn't have much to add to what was said at various other arbitrator talk pages. Carcharoth (talk) 00:45, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
I will see if I can do some recruiting, but after the holidays. @とある白い猫:, could you remind me in early Jan?--Tznkai (talk) 17:59, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
Certainly @Tznkai: :) Like you said, problem IPs can be blocked again. One note though, the main problem behind this section is ~20,000 SINGLE IP blocks - some dating back more than half a decade. Once those are handled we (well admins :p) can work on range blocks which would require a more in depth analysis. So we have a 4 flavors of blocks (single open proxy, single policy, range open proxy, range policy) to consider.
The reason why this is presented to ArbCom is because a lot of admins are hesitating to engage in this endeavor. ArbCom can simply vote on the matter to establish criteria on how to handle the IPs. An arbitrary cut-off date by ArbCom would for example allow mass handing of the more ancient blocks. Any issues that would be the result of the unblock would be tracked by ArbCom though I honestly can't see what kind of a problem would emerge aside from the casual vandalism IPs normally bring. Perhaps ArbCom can list or task a checkuser to list IPs they do not want to see unblocked.
-- A Certain White Cat chi? 04:15, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
Would those still interested please continue the discussion and reviews at WT:OP#Proposal_to_unblock_indeffed_IPs_en_masse (section title may change:). Thanks. -- zzuuzz (talk) 09:39, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
I fail to see the point of starting a parallel discussion. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 17:26, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
As someone pointed out above, this is outside of arbcom's remit. There is no reason to clog up this page with what needs to be done - solid review of some ancient blocks. WT:OP, with the appropriate invitees, is probably far better equipped to deal with them. -- zzuuzz (talk) 17:36, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
I disagree. Abrcom gives out and takes away checkuser flags. They have private communications among each other and checkusers on problematic IPs and have some technical background to understand the problem better. Furthermore they have the role of being the final step of dispute resolution meaning any disagreement on weather a specific IP needs to be blocked or not could be tossed at them to handle if it comes to that. This makes Arbcom ideal for handling the issue and sysops can act based on their judgement. Very few sysops (if any) would want to be responsible of 20,000 individual decisions which is why people have been reluctant to do anything about it since late April. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 03:49, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Changes to the Arbitration Committee

Original announcement
Risker, Courcelles, Kirill Lokshin, and SilkTork, thank you all for taking up such a difficult mantle in service to the community. You will be missed. Sven Manguard Wha? 08:06, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
Hear, hear! Thank you all! Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 08:25, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
Thank you from me as well. Thryduulf (talk) 20:34, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
And from me. Your work is much appreciated. Dougweller (talk) 21:56, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
(Tips hat) -- Thank you for serving the Wikipedia community on the Committee. Best of luck and hope to bump into you guys on articles soon . Sportsguy17 (talk • contribs • sign) 23:03, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
I agree, thank-you very much.--S Philbrick(Talk) 23:33, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
Me too! You all deserve thanks, and a well-earned rest. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:21, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
Congrats on escaping with your sanity (mostly) intact :) SirFozzie (talk) 04:33, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
My thanks to the outgoing members, and my most sincere condolences to the new arbitrators... rdfox 76 (talk) 05:43, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for your service. Cla68 (talk) 16:43, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
I, too, appreciate your service, and your diligent and detailed examination of evidence. TimidGuy (talk) 10:51, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
Same here. Thank you for all the years you served on the Committee. — ΛΧΣ21 Call me Hahc21 03:20, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
Nod, you, and really all former arbitrators, deserve our thanks for performing what is typically a quite thankless task. It is rarely appreciated enough. Thank you. - jc37 16:49, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for your service to the Wikipedia community.(Littleolive oil (talk) 17:05, 24 December 2013 (UTC))
I add my thanks as well. To clarify, I mean to say I am also thankful.—John Cline (talk) 17:14, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Regarding incoming arbitrators

Why is Seraphimblade the sole incoming arb being seated without oversight permission?—John Cline (talk) 17:25, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Because he didn't ask for it. T. Canens (talk) 19:31, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
More accurately, because he asked not to have it. All new arbitrators are offered the two permissions. AGK [•] 20:17, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks to both of you; Merry Christmas to all.—John Cline (talk) 04:16, 25 December 2013 (UTC)
John, just to answer you specifically, I don't need the oversight permission initially. I'll already be learning checkuser, and intend to mainly use it as need be. If in the future I need oversight to help out with that, I can always ask for it then. Seraphimblade Talk to me 04:23, 25 December 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for offering that insight. I was curious if for some reason you felt possessing the permission was some form of liability you did not wish to incur; unable to imagine what it could be, yet curious. Your expressed reason is commendable as I understand you; speaking volumes regarding your honorable purpose. As an aside, The Denver Post link on your user page exposed me to an enjoyable read; I am glad you included it on your page for I can't imagine stumbling upon it by another way of chance. I certainly gained more than I came for. Thanks for giving.—John Cline (talk) 04:55, 25 December 2013 (UTC)
Well, now I know without looking at your userpage that you're Mystrat! AGK [•] 08:36, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Ottoman Empire–Turkey naming dispute closed

Original announcement
This decision was reached without any analysis of the Evidence at 1.4 [5] on the Workshop page. The basis for, [6] and the procedures followed by the MILHIST project, [7] when agreeing to change the name of the Ottoman Empire during World War I to Turkey, were not evaluated. --Rskp (talk) 23:51, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
You made this and several similar comments on the talkpage of the proposed decision, and several arbitrators responded to you on that page, including my comment here. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:05, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
  • Yes, I agree you and they responded but without addressing the issues raised. MarcusBritish was among those who responded. Is that editor an arbitrator as well as being party to this case? --Rskp (talk) 00:13, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
    • No. The arbitrators who participated in the case are listed at the top of the proposed decision talkpage, as well as in the votes and comments on the proposed decision page. As I believe you know perfectly well. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:34, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
The evidence at 1.4 on the Workshop page was not analysed [8]. With the evidence overlooked, what was the basis for the so-called 'facts'? --Rskp (talk) 00:45, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
I believe that MilHist followed the correct procedures: a straw poll was opened, !votes were cast, a consensus was reached. I believe, if you have concerns regarding the project's procedures, you should bring them to the attention of the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Coordinators as it is outside of ArbCom's remit to determine how a project should operate. No point harking about it here, they're not going to modify or abolish the consensus for anyone. Ma®©usBritish{chat} 00:53, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for your suggestion MarcusBritish. I await a response from the Arbitrators regarding why the Evidence was not analysed here [9]. --Rskp (talk) 01:12, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
I already answered you on the proposed decision talkpage, which I linked to above. If you do not accept that answer, then I am sorry, but you have no further remedy. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:14, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
OK. --Rskp (talk) 01:22, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
@RoslynSKP: that "analysis of evidence" section is often left blank, as happened in the last two cases closed before this, Ebionites 3 and the Manning dispute. You can look through past cases here and see that when it is used, it is primarily by parties and may attract little if any Arbitrator comment. You could have used it. NYB is a highly respected Wikipedian and Arbitrator and I for one do not doubt his word that ArbCom undertakes analysis of evidence in every case, and I doubt you will find many editors who would disbelieve his statement. ArbCom makes mistakes at times, comes to conclusions which are viewed as incorrect, and attracts plenty of criticism, both fair and unfair. I have at times wondered how they can see the evidence in ways that differ significantly from my view, but I do not think they skip looking at the evidence and just accept claims blindly or make stuff up. You are perfectly entitled to believe their analysis was poor in your case, but claiming no analysis occurred because an often-unused workshop section is blank is not going to be seen as a credible basis for your view, in my opinion. Also, while ArbCom does at times reverse itself or subsequently decide a remedy needs modification, they almost never directly admit to making a mistake, and I can't recall it ever happening just because one party feels they have been mistreated. Arguing about it now will likely be seen as evidence that sanctions were needed (whether that is fair or not, it is the way the community typically responds) so I suggest you choose a different approach. Some post-case angst is common and will be excused, but try to keep it in check and avoid harming your longer-term chances for relaxation of sanctions. I haven't looked in detail at the evidence and nor will most editors, because ArbCom are united in their views and supported by experienced and respected editors, two factors which increase greatly the chance that ArbCom got it right. You are also trying NYB's patience, which is another bad sign - he is definitely not an easy guy to frustrate. Please, think carefully about what he has said, his advice is mostly very good. EdChem (talk) 04:31, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks very much EdChem for the information and advice. Incidentally I had already accepted Newyorkbrad's last post replying "OK", but it seems to have got squashed out of sequence. But in particular EdChem, I'm grateful to hear from you that other Evidence subsections have also been left blank. I was just expecting something here, and when there wasn't, couldn't understand it. But there was so much to get my head around! Thanks once again, and all the best for the festive season. --Rskp (talk) 04:47, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
Rskp: The Workshop page of Arbitration cases is mostly focused to parties and interested members of the community to propose principles, findings and remedies to the Committee to consider. The Workshop is rarely edited by the arbitrators unless the case becomes controversial like the Manning naming dispute's Workshop page. However, most workshop pages go unedited at all, and you can verify this by taking a look at the index of 2013 cases, for example. Cheers. — ΛΧΣ21 Call me Hahc21 05:36, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks from me to the Arbs for taking this case on and resolving the matter so quickly. Nick-D (talk) 22:36, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Amendment to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Argentine History

Original announcement

Finally "broadly construed" has lost favour due to the 100% likelihood of it being stretched like a bungee cord from Mount Everest. Collect (talk) 00:53, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

I think it is high time we take up "broadly but reasonably construed", as was proposed once upon a time. Adopting a procedure to re-define broadly construed as broadly but reasonably construed may be the easiest way to do this. I suspect Newyorkbrad may have comments to make on this subject.

My own feeling is that 'broadly but reasonably construed' (BBRC) has no practical advantage over 'broadly construed' (BC) because, in the enforcing administrator's mind, BBRC is equivalent to BC. However, BBRC has a theoretical advantage in that it codifies the requirement for enforcement-side decisions as to scope to be reasonable in every sense; BC, on the other hand, is theoretically open to abuse. AGK [•] 13:36, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

As an administrator working at AE, I wouldn't know what to do with "broadly but reasonably". Reasonably meaning what? How does that limit "broadly"? The more ambiguous terms you use in a sanction, the more likely it is that there will be disagreement and appeals, and even more so if the ambiguous terms appear to be contradictory. A much better approach is to circumscribe, in individual sanctions, more precisely the topic area you think is problematic, as you did in this motion. It's much easier to determine whether something is related to the political, economic, and military history of Latin America, rather than to the history of Latin America tout court.

What I mean to say is that you, the Committee, are elected to decide what specific scope the sanctions you impose in individual cases should have. You should assume that responsibility, rather than compound one ambiguity with another and expect editors to figure out what, if anything, you meant to say.  Sandstein  13:59, 30 December 2013 (UTC)


BBRC means (or should mean) that the edit is clearly substantially and directly related to the contents of prior edits on the topic, as defined by the arbitration case, made by the person being sanctioned, on any page which a reasonable person would say "yeah - that page deals with that topic in general and the edit made deals with that topic in specific." Yes -- it is "easier" to define the topic as applying to anything within six degrees of separation of Kevin Bacon, but "easier" does not equate to "logical" nor should editors be afraid that (say) a topic ban for Gnarphism includes editing any article which mentions one of Gnarph's sixth cousins. Frankly, I think "strictly construed" applying to the specific articles and associated talk pages as defined in a case would also work, but the main point it to avoid the Kevin Bacon exemplar. Cheers. Collect (talk) 15:13, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Discretionary Sanctions: a much broader community review is needed

In the last year that I have been closely following the Committee, I have found that:

  1. Arbcom cases are indeed often long and complex. And rightly so, since they take the time to examine the evidence and weigh the facts. They do a mostly adequate job of identifying and limiting disruptive behavior, while leaving good faith editors relatively unscathed and able to continue their contributions.
  2. Appeals to the Arbitration Enforcement are unfortunately a different matter--as JohnBlackburne points out, they can be decided by a single admin. This individual is not elected, but exercises unchecked power throughout the terms of successive arbs. The manner of selection is not transparent, and there are no safeguards in place to prevent nepotism.
  3. Anyone who is interested in delving into the new Discretionary Sanctions proposal would be well advised to review the now archived community discussion on the subject. The Cliff Notes version: 1) Arbitration Enforcement has a reputation for groupthink, and 2) there is no evidence that discretionary sanctions work. After protests from AE admins, who said the community should not be allowed to comment, the thread was hastily closed and archived. The proposal is now being edited to the specifications of the AE admins. —Neotarf (talk) 05:35, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
@Neotarf: On (2), the manner of selection is WP:RFA, a process in which any editor can participate. On (3), the discussion has been publicised as widely as possible. It is not "now-archived", and nobody said "the community should not be allowed to comment". Your comment is subtly but profoundly misleading on several levels. AGK [•] 07:13, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
AGK, you know as well as I do that different admins are better at different things. Some don't know anything about certain areas. That's just common sense and human nature So to assume that all 1400 admins contain the knowledge to properly adjudicate an Arbcom sanction just because they were trusted not to delete the main page is a fallacy. Besides that RFA has become a joke. The fact is some admins are good at technical stuff and some aren't and I still contend some shouldn't be admins at all. Most people who would do well in the AE arena won't touch it with a ten foot pole because of the current climate there. So I don't buy this we elected them so we trust them with unlimited power and clairvoyance mentality. Kumioko (talk) 12:57, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
  • I think the current clarification request on Argentine History provides a good illustration of Kumioko's second point. Sandstein blocked MarshallN20 for editing Chile-Peru football rivalry, as a violation of a topic ban from "all articles, discussions, and other content related to the history of Latin America, broadly construed..." Most arbitrators seem to agree that he shouldn't be banned from this, but even they have to admit that Sandstein's interpretation was perfectly defensible given the "broadly construed" clause. It seems to me that Latin American history broadly construed encompasses everything that's ever happened in Latin America. It certainly appear that this is not what the arbitrators intended. Given that they are now voting to narrow the topic ban and eliminate the "broadly construed" clause, that would seem to indicate that sometimes such a clause is not appropriate in a topic ban. Perhaps sometimes it may be necessary, but can I at least put in a plea for it not to be universally used without consideration of whether it would actually sweep too broadly in the particular context of the topic ban in issue? And perhaps Newyorkbrad's suggestion of "broadly but reasonably" (which seems to jibe with some of the comments by arbitrator about needing to apply common sense and judgment, rather than an inflexible or mechanical interpretation) could be taken up and might address some of these issues? Neljack (talk) 08:13, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

@AGK, my statement was not misleading at all, but as always, I welcome your willingness to engage on the issues. In response to your questions:

  1. How can the arbitrators delegate to an administrator the very power the arbitrators were elected to exercise? The new proposal would give sweeping powers to a caste of super-administrators, to act outside of policy, with no possibility of review by other admins. This has been questioned in other forums as well, but there is nothing in the RFC procedures mentioned, or anywhere else that I can find, that would indicate that this is within the remit of the ArbCom.
  2. The community discussion was indeed archived. The name of the archived page is Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions/2013 review/Archive 1.
  3. One of your AE administrators calls the discussion a “mistake”, saying “this discussion has been inappropriately opened to the broader community”. He adds that participants “clearly know little or nothing” and “have little of value to contribute”. He proposes opening a discussion of “those regularly involved in AE”, to reach a consensus and present it to the arbitrators. [10] Another editor then came forward, having just come across the discussion, and wished to pose some questions about enforcement implementation. She was told to “ask your questions directly to an enforcing administrator” and directed to WP:AE. [11]

So who are these editors, who took such care to make pertinent and insightful observations on discretionary sanctions, and who have now been told by the boys at AE to go away, that they “know nothing” and that their comments have “little value”? Ironically, judging by the user names, they belong to a group of editors that Wikipedia has such trouble attracting and retaining, that nearly extinct species of women editors.

I have read what they have to say. It is worthwhile. The arbitration committee should take the time to listen to them, and to have that broader community discussion. Regards, —Neotarf (talk) 10:23, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

The DSR does not give any additional power to administrators, and makes no negative changes to the existing process. Even if some administrators have been hostile to non-administrators giving feedback (news to me), I am not aware that they have actually prevented the non-administrator's participation. Your description of the DS Review and DS in general is not one I recognise, nor that I think is based in fact. It seems to be a healthy, well-conducted exercise to me. Would you prefer DS be abolished altogether, or the DS Review not happen? What exactly do you want done? I have looked at the recent AE thread concerning you to understand if there is some miscarriage of justice that needs remedied, but it did not illuminate. AGK [•] 17:36, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
AGK, I think it would be a good idea to have a community-wide discussion on Discretionary Sanctions, and it might not be a bad idea if Discretionary Sanctions were abolished altogether. Like death and taxes, conflict on certain topics will always be with us, and in many instances editors who are pushing a particular POV on those topics are neither bad people nor bad editors, but merely individuals who are very committed to a particular view of a contentious issue on which reasonable people seriously disagree both in Wikipedia and in the wider world outside. Obviously Wikipedia has to have a way of dealing with that conflict, but one has only to look at this discussion to see how like a police state it looks, how open to potential abuse it is, and how endlessly complicated and time-consuming it all is, not to mention that it involves the delegation by the arbitrators of power which properly belongs only to them. A much more efficient solution, I think, would be for the arbitrators to simply identify specific pages which are continually problematic (most have already been identified in previous arbitrations), and instruct administrators to impose temporary blocks on editing on those pages whenever the conflict becomes too heated. Nothing will be lost if no-one edits a Wikipedia page for a few days, or even a few weeks at a time. If Discretionary Sanctions are to be retained, however, the very least that could be done is (1) for the arbitrators to identify the particular pages to which DS apply, and remove the phrase 'broadly construed' entirely from current and future DS orders, and (2) attach a time limit to all current and future DS orders so that they automatically expire in a year or two years, with the proviso that they can be renewed if necessary. Otherwise they simply go on forever, even when they're no longer needed because the conflict on a particular topic has died down. NinaGreen (talk) 18:37, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
I disagree with some of that (discretionary sanctions simply can't be abolished, and "broadly construed" is the project's best defence against Wikilawyering), but you make a very good point about making discretionary sanctions lapse after a couple of years. I will think on it further – thank you very much. AGK [•] 20:18, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
An obvious solution would be to enable some form of Wikipedia:Pending changes on the ones that are really problematic but this has its own problems. It would also bee good to have something like Wikipedia:Edit filter that could be set for an individuals sanction. Currently the edit filter requires every edit to go through it which means its a pretty heavy load on the server but if the devs developed a User filter that could be set to specific users and their filters it would be a big improvement. I also agree with Nina that the current delegation of authority doesn't work and the Arbcoms hands off approach to AE needs to change. Kumioko (talk) 20:45, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

@AGK, I really don't know what to say to you. I don't have all the answers and I'm sure Arbcom doesn't have all the answers. Ask the community. Or listen to what they have already said. And if the answers aren't readily to hand, the Foundation has boatloads of metrics in their back room, if only the right questions can be formulated. This might be a good place to start (from the archived review):

"Have 'Discretionary sanctions' improved the problem which caused the arbitrators to enact 'Discretionary sanctions' in 2009, or have 'Discretionary sanctions' made the situation worse in identifiable ways? It seems impossible to find out why the arbitrators imposed 'Discretionary sanctions' in the first place, and it seems equally impossible to find out where they've been put in place, how they're working, and how they differ from the ordinary discretion which Wikipedia administrators routinely exercise every day on topics not covered by 'Discretionary sanctions'."

Here's my own question about the current DS review: "What is broke, and why are you trying to fix it?"

As far the situation of myself and the other 3 editors, what illumination would be of use, and in what venue that would not expose me to even more unproven accusations of wrongdoing? Regards, —Neotarf (talk) 09:10, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

AGK, thanks for your reply. How about this formulation of the problem? In an arbitration, discretionary sanctions are imposed against topics, not against individual editors, so the enforcement of DS should primarily focus on topics rather than on individual editors. Thus, the first step in enforcement of DS should always be a succession of temporary page blocks which are not subject to appeal and which can be put in place by any administrator. If that doesn't tamp down the conflict, then uninvolved administrators can be brought in to deal with individual editors, and the latter procedure should be subject to appeal. To make the process work, all pages subject to DS would have to be clearly marked with a hatnote so that any editor coming to the page would be aware that that page is subject to DS. (Parenthetically, it is unclear to me why DS have to be 'broadly construed' because in an arbitration it must become abundantly clear to the arbitrators which specific pages have given rise to the problem, so identifying them in the order imposing DS should pose no difficulty.) NinaGreen (talk) 16:23, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
One other point in terms of formulating the problem. DS are imposed as the result of an arbitration, and the usual result of an arbitration is that the individual editor(s) against whom the arbitration was brought are banned for lengthy periods of time. Why, then, are DS imposed as a result of the arbitration? Is there an expectation that, with those editors gone, other editors are going to pop up and cause further disruption? That seems an indefensible rationale for imposing DS, doesn't it, the mere expectation that new editors not involved in the arbitration are going to pop up and cause disruption? NinaGreen (talk) 15:34, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

FWIW, I iterate my position that "broadly construed" as a term of art has generally worked to the actual detriment of Wikipedia, and ought be removed from all sanctions. Cheers. Collect (talk) 17:47, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

  • @Neotarf: You are saying we ought to ask the community while commenting in a thread about an ArbCom-created community review of discretionary sanctions.

    I count two contributors calling for DS to be abolished on the basis that it is unnecessary or irretrievably broken and unfair. As 69 distinct contributors have made over 500 edits in the review, the arithmetic suggests 2% of the participating community agree with your position. The most helpful thing might be to suggest substantive changes that would make the process more fair and better for the encyclopedia. The line that topic areas under DS should be made back into free-for-alls doesn't, at this point, seem likely to attract support. AGK [•] 20:14, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

As the community was told early in the process "ArbCom policies, procedures, and remedies are explicitly not set up to go through normal Wikipedia consensus gathering processes." it's hardly a meaningful metric to count percentage of comments as representing the community viewpoint. If you wish to claim a explicit community mandate you should open an RFC and agree a priori to have it closed by non-committee admin(s). NE Ent 21:21, 22 December 2013 (UTC)
I would not open an RFC on a fringe view. AGK [•] 21:31, 22 December 2013 (UTC)
I think your confusing silence with consent. The fact is very very few even watch this page outside the Arbcom, even less are following this discussion. Most people don't bother to comment because the majority of the project either doesn't care or they don't believe Arbcom will listen. Your right though, it probably is a minority that are asking for DS's to be eliminated but that's also because very few understand them and 99% of those are admins or arbs who want the ability to be able to block with no questions asked or recourse. DS's are too discretionary and too broad and give too much power to too few for too little return on the investment. Kumioko (talk) 22:02, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

I agree with the other editors regarding the phrase "broadly construed", which was interpreted to extraordinary lengths in my own DS case,[12] referring to Wikipedia:ARBPS#Discretionary_sanctions #13.

  1. I was sanctioned because I was discussing in one article (not related to pseudoscience, and as mainstream as they come), the use of an academic text book as a source, whose author had written about another subject, also a Wikipedia article, that was in a "fringe" category, and that was in the sub-category of pseudoscience, and apparently because "pseudoscience and fringe theories are so closely linked, that in general, we can probably just treat scenarios as falling under 'broadly construed' ".
  2. I was never given "an initial warning". It was argued that it was sufficient being "a named party of the WP:ARBPS case". I wasn't editing the article, having followed WP:AC/DS#For_editors. Allegations were made about my conduct that included no supporting diffs whatsoever, and claims were made about what I might do. --Iantresman (talk) 23:33, 22 December 2013 (UTC)
Being banned from astrophysics under a "Fringe science" DS is insane -- did you appeal to the committee? NE Ent 01:05, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
One of the claims of the DS was that I was wikilawyering (no diffs provided). Appealing to the committee could be viewed as yet another example of Wikilawyerign.--Iantresman (talk) 10:17, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
Not necessarily "insane", NE Ent. Looking at the discussion(s) in question, it appears that Iantresman was vigorously arguing to add a textbook written by a fringe author containing a large amount of material related to a fringe astrophysics topic (plasma cosmology) as a source for our article on astrophysics. As near as I can tell, he opened this can of worms less than 18 hours after the ArbCom loosened his previous, long-standing topic ban on "fringe science and physics-related subjects, broadly defined". (The ArbCom left in place a 1RR restriction on Iantresman in those areas.) It was his very first non-trivial edit to the article or talk namespaces, and it resumed an argument (in the same talk page thread) that he had originally begun in 2006. The editors at Talk:Dusty plasma#Reference restoration put up with four days of fruitless argument before taking the issue to AE. After spending five years under restrictions in this area (four years under a community-imposed ban for disruptive POV-pushing, followed by about a year of BASC-imposed topic ban to ease him back into the community) one might have expected a bit more caution and restraint before going back to poking the same third rail. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 11:51, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for the your comments, but I believe you are taking the opinions presented at face value, but they are incorrect. The book contains nothing on Plasma Cosmology. I provided over 20 sources, and a quote from the book, supporting my discussion, so hardly "fruitless". I requested a source or a quote from the book to contradict me, but it was never forthcoming (per WP:TALK "Deal with facts"). I was cautious, choosing not to edit the article, and to discuss it first, even at WP:RSN. Afterwards, at least one of the editors admitted that he had not even read the book. This is not how editors are supposed to collaborate, and DS was inappropriate. --Iantresman (talk) 13:05, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
"The book contains nothing on Plasma Cosmology" Wow, again with this? In the last AE request I showed that you had used the book to cite plasma cosmology stuff, you had said on talk pages that it was a plasma cosmology book, and I pointed out which parts of the book contained plasma cosmology stuff. And here you are again, claiming that your topic ban was based on wrong facts. --Enric Naval (talk) 19:25, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

It seems to me discretionary sanctions are manipulated for and against some editors. We tend to forget newer editors don't understand the intricacies of Wikipedia culture, which does not mean they are either stupid or uneducated. We have to remember that communities develop their own cultures, norms, language and those inside become so accustomed to that culture, they don't remember what is was like to not understand the new culture they have walked into. Further, within the culture itself certain groups have developed certain language and norms which they then can expect others to understand and abide by. That's why diffs are critical in any kind of sanction , but admins don't necessarily think this is so, and will sanction based on a sensibility or feeling or on their own sub culture. AE with its one admin judgements is a ludicrous institution inside a community this large. No single editor should ever have the power to impose sanctions longer than a week or two, or to enforce DSs. Admins should never be the only ones capable of making those judgements. This gives too much power to individuals and most certainly opens the community to abuse from admins., by the way, another sub culture with a prestigious reputation and both explicit and implied power rather than what it was originally meant to be. Even the well meaning admin should not have the power and responsibility to make judgments that affect editors as they do. So while I'm not convinced we need to do away with DS, I am convinced DR from top to bottom needs to be revamped including AE and arbitration, so DRs are dealt with more on the community level leaving the arbs free to deal with the more complex issues. As for lantresman I agree there were some odd actions on that AE. Some were unfortunately expected, some might have opened the door for something more evolutionary for the project, some were irregular, and some were unfair. But I'd add that lantresman, a clearly intelligent, well-educated editor is relatively new here, and doesn't realize that while in real life we are encouraged to fight for what we think is right, and admired for doing so, here that's not the case. One is expected to "put a lid on it", and accept judgments no matter how unfair they seem. This all points to a need for change, and a need for understanding. Wikipedia is not the Wild West anymore. Like its parallel universe, real life, Wikipedia too must change and become more civilized.(Littleolive oil (talk) 16:58, 23 December 2013 (UTC))

Actually, I first started editing on Wikipedia almost 10 years ago. I completely agree that sanctions are manipulated against certain editors, such as in my Community Ban: it included more allegations without any diffs, and a claim that I had harassed an editor from Wikipedia, which turned out to be someone using four socks abusively, who just continued editing. It took just 5 hours to ban me, and five years before ArbCom would even consider an appeal. My case was part of the reason why the Community Noticeboard was discontinued. You can see why I am interested in checks and balances, and accountability and transparency. --Iantresman (talk) 18:23, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
Apologies lantresman. I did what I just suggested others don't do - made assumptions based on what someone said rather than looking at diffs and contributions myself. And yes, transparency , diffs, and if someone asks a question assume good faith and answer.(Littleolive oil (talk) 16:18, 24 December 2013 (UTC))
No problem, thank you for taking the trouble of checking the facts, it's more than most do. --Iantresman (talk) 11:39, 25 December 2013 (UTC)
@Littleonlive oil, you should give specific examples of discretionary sanctions being misused, and examples of editors being banned only because of misunderstandings of "the intricacies of Wikipedia culture". I have seen may claims of unfair bans, but they usually crumble when you look closely at them. --Enric Naval (talk) 19:32, 25 December 2013 (UTC)
Agreed - that Discretionary Sanctions need to be abolished. They run roughshod over any dispute resolution that Wikipedia has other than the administrators judgement. No one individual's judgement should ever be used to over-ride a legitimate consensus on any issue (except the obvious current exemptions to consensus (BLP, NFC, ATTACK PAGES ).

So yes, I concur, discretionary sanctions need to be abolished.  KoshVorlon. We are all Kosh   11:53, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

  • Sounds like we might do well to look into implementing a sort of nondelegation doctrine, since delegation seems exactly what ArbCom is doing with discretionary sanctions. I know our situation isn't exactly comparable to the concept in American constitutional law, but I would argue that's why a more empowered nondelegation doctrine might be appropriate here than is in place there. In short, I think broad construction might need to be abolished, or implement a more rigorous standard of review for such administrative actions (at present we're looking at something that might be even looser than Chevron review). —/Mendaliv/2¢/Δ's/ 21:23, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Question

Since the new Arbs take office at 00:00 UFC, and the outgoing Arbs wave their goodbyes, what happens to the requests & clarifications which are still open and have not been disposed of? (Not the cases, I understand that the Arbs who started on open cases will finish them.) Do the new Arbs get to weigh in on those issues? Do outgoing Arbs who have yet to comment on them still have jurisdiction to add their thoughts?

Just wondering. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:16, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Open ones, the soon-to-be-former arbs can weigh in on (although it's exceedingly unlikely, speaking personally here). The new arbitrators can also weigh in on any existing ones at the time of transition. The new arbs get anything after midnight UTC, both as cases and as clarification/amendment requests. Risker (talk) 21:23, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, appreciate it. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:09, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
As far as the cases, the current lists are on the talk of the proposed decision page. --Rschen7754 05:53, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

28bytes resigns

Original announcement
It's all been said elsewhere, but it's terribly regrettable when a few people can force the leading vote-getter in an ArbCom election to step aside. Even without Jimbo's fatuous statement on 28bytes' talk, it would be a very great pity. With ArbCom so controversial, anyone who can unite the community to vote for him to that extent deserves support, not being driven out. Shame.--Wehwalt (talk) 14:05, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
Hear, hear. — Scott • talk 14:06, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
Well said. Black Kite (talk) 14:09, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
Regretfully, we will never know if the same unity would have been shown had all the facts been known. I hope it would have been and am sad to see this resignation, even if it seemed inevitable in the circumstances. WJBscribe (talk) 14:14, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
Not inevitable, but from his statement, 28bytes reasoned thought-out personal decision, which should be honored. "Forced", does not, therefore, seem a proper description. But unfortunately, it appears the extensive off-site prying; "outing" (his word); and negative blogging did in whatever joy of service there could be. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:00, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, but I still think "force" is the most appropriate term. I stand by it.--Wehwalt (talk) 15:10, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, if there is a better example of the cancer that Wikipediocracy is, I haven't seen it. This was pretty much their crowning glory, and it is a shame that 28bytes had to discover first hand the perils of being associated with a forum of trolls and doxers. Resolute 04:09, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
Agreed. I will admit to glancing at Wikipediocracy and WR before it, because I keep a very small watchlist and things happen here without my being aware of them. 28bytes will have my respect forever, though I've rarely run into him personally here on wiki, for his very brave reversal of the despicable block of PumpkinSky by Moni3, who did it shortly after calling him an "idiot" and a "dingus". That of course exposed him to the rage of the Raul/Sandy/meatpuppetry clique. Apparently the community agreed with me, judging by the very high percentages of the !vote he got in his crat and ArbCom runs.--Wehwalt (talk) 09:49, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

There is a broader implication of this resignation, and it's a cause for concern. Lately, the fear of being outed has discouraged a lot of well-qualified potential candidates from running for ArbCom. This fiasco will only worsen that trend. And that's a very bad thing, if we let it stand. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:23, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

If you sincerely believe that this resignation really is so sad and regrettable then why are you jerks using this unfortunate turn of events to score cheap political points and exploiting it in pursuit of your own petty grudges? Pathetic. If you are serious about this being sad and regrettable, then show some freakin' respect and drop the concern trolling. Volunteer Marek  10:45, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Filling of vacant seat

Note from Jimbo: I won't be filling this vacancy unless requested to do so by the ArbCom, following long-established traditions. I haven't hatted the following discussion but it probably should be.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 12:17, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

As effectively this is a candidate declining to take his seat, should Jimbo not appoint an additional candidate for a one year term (and potentially extend Beeblebrox's term to 2 years)? Is there a reason to treat withdrawal during the election differently to withdrawal after the election, but before the successful candidate was due to take his seat? WJBscribe (talk) 14:14, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

I realize that views differ on Jimbo, and that I am among the less supportive editors. But we all know Jimbo is out of touch with the community. Even with advice, he could not be counted upon to appoint a proper person, and even if he did, the fact that the individual in question was not elected would lead to continuous arguing for his term. Either fill it by election or leave it vacant until December. As for Beebs, I've supported him, most of the time, since his RfA, but by the rules, he won a one-year term.--Wehwalt (talk) 15:05, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
You misunderstand me, I wasn't suggesting that Jimbo appoint anyone of his choice. I was suggesting he do exactly what he would have presumably done had 28bytes withdrawn during the election before the results were announced: (1) appoint Beeblebrox to a 2 year term; and (2) appoint Guerillero to a 1 year term. WJBscribe (talk) 15:09, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
I support WJBscribe's proposal. The next highest ranking candidate (percentage wise) after Beeblebrox (55%) was Guerillero at 54%. It would make sense to appoint Guerillero to keep the committee at full strength. Guerillero is already a Oversighter/Checkuser. Jehochman Talk 15:12, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
I could live with that, unless there was sharp dissent in the community to the point where the arbs in question might have difficulty functioning effectively. And as long as it is a community-driven, not Jimbo-driven decision (i.e., he doesn't call up his droves of IPs from the vasty deep).--Wehwalt (talk) 15:14, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
AGK's announcement indicates that the Committee will just go forward with one fewer member, and it's my understanding of the rules under which the election took place that this is the intended procedure. So we should not change it, at least not without a community vote. My understanding is that it was predicated on the idea that the Committee should be able to function with one (or more) fewer member(s) until the next regularly scheduled election. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:20, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
It seems that it is either a choice between treating it as a withdrawal prior to election, or a resignation during term and after appointment. Unless there is some clarifying language already in the "rules", it seems like it should be treated as a resignation (no new seating). Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:30, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
It's a resignation. May 28bytes' empty seat stand as a mute reminder all throughout this term of the poison present in this community. — Scott • talk 16:17, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
I thought the poison was on Wikipediocracy. I could certainly see Dan Murphy's outing of "Mason" on Wikipediocracy as off-wiki harassment of a Wikipedia editor intended to chill their activity on Wikipedia. This particular situation is unusual and I'm not going to call for remedies against Murphy, but others might want to. 50.0.121.102 (talk) 17:35, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
This whole situation is a rubbish outcome to what should have been perceived as a non-issue. The tallest of mountains made from the most insignificant of mole hills. The unerring tendency of this community to over-react to hilariously minor points, and make terrible collective decisions that benefit nothing and no-one, continues to astound me. The best we can do with this now is to take the sensible option and push the candidates one up the order - Beeblebrox to 2 years and Guerillero to 1 - there's no need to complicate this any further. This is not a bureaucracy; let's just do the sensible thing. Basalisk inspect damage⁄berate 17:47, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
As Beeblebrox and Guerillero are both beneath 60%, which a lot of people consider to be an important threshold for arbitrators to cross, we might find more consensus to give them both one year terms. John Vandenberg (chat) 18:14, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
But that's just completely arbitrary. Why draw the line at 60%? Why complicate the issue further by messing up the tranches when there's no need? Just put the next two guys in. They both got what was the stipulated minimum - a majority. No one voted for Beeblebrox to serve one year only and no one voted for Guerillero as best runner up; they simply voted "yes", "no" or "don't care". Enough people said "yes" for them to serve. Basalisk inspect damage⁄berate 19:08, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
  • There is no mechanism by which the community, Jimmy Wales, or the Arbitration Committee itself can alter the outcome of the election. If successful candidates elect not to assume their seats, then their seats are not filled until the next election. There has always been the opportunity to build into the election format an option where, if someone resigns a seat, the next successful candidate would take their place, and the community has always declined to go there. The options discussed above are not going to happen absent an extraordinary election or vote by the community, which should probably be discussed somewhere other than this page, as it would not be an action of the committee. Risker (talk) 19:16, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
I agree strongly with this. There are vacancies every year and by established precedent, the open seats sit unfilled until the next election. They are not "awarded" to runners up. Carrite (talk) 21:06, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
Yep. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 10:05, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
  • If the community, Jimmy and/or the Arbitration Committee decides they'd like the next candidate to replace 28bytes, that's me, as stated above, and it's a job I'm happy to take up - I wouldn't have run if I wasn't willing to do it. At the same time, I'm not planning on arguing that I should do it - that's for the community to decide. If I'm selected, I'll do the job to the best of my ability: if I'm not, I have a variety of on- and off-wiki tasks to keep me occupied. --Guerillero | My Talk 20:25, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

If the seat is left empty it means that 28bytes could stand for a community re vote on his position at a later date once he feels rested. I haven no sense that he'll do that but one can hope. And I'd add that I find this whole thing shaming. We as a community seem to have a tendency to jump on what doesn't matter, but as a community seem to lack heart. Action on this issue has fatigued one of our finest admins whose record shows clarity of thinking, fairness, and honesty. We cannot control what people do off Wikipedia; We have community issues that should be talked about, discussed not hidden. That an editor chose to discuss those issues in a clear-eyed way, and did not see that it was necessary to tell us doesn't worry me. How many other arbs have discussed Wikipedia issues in off-Wikipedia forums? And where is the line that separates the places where one can discuss Wikipedia off Wikipedia and where one can't, and who is setting that line? (Littleolive oil (talk) 20:48, 30 December 2013 (UTC))

More to the point is that there is no process of any kind for filling unexpectedly vacant seats on the committee, which is why they have traditionally just been left empty. If the community wants such a process, they will have to create it through the usual consensus-based processes. I think we can all agree that it would not be a good idea for the committee itself to decide who is to be on it and for how long. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:17, 30 December 2013 (UTC)
I for one don't think there is a need to fill the vacancy. I don't think there is a risk of the Arbcom coming to a draw and if they do then Jimbo, in that extremely unlikely event. Could be the deciding vote. Kumioko (talk) 21:31, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

This is not a question for the Arbitration Committee, one way or the other. There is not (as far as I know) any rule or policy that says either that vacancies are to be filled, or that they are to remain unfilled. There has simply been a failure to fill them, at least in recent years. So, at most, one might say there is a precedent for leaving vacancies vacant, but precedents don't always have to be followed. And besides, this is an unusual vacancy: 28bytes's term was supposed to start on January 1, so although he was appointed, he never actually took his seat. I think one could argue that under those circumstances, it would be reasonable for the next people down the list, who received at least 50% of the vote, to be appointed. Of course it would be nice to have actual rules governing cases like this, or an elected body (not ArbCom) that is empowered to decide these sorts of things. (Well, we do have the Election Commission, but I don't think this would be viewed as being within their jurisdiction.) But I guess the immediate question is, where is the appropriate place to discuss this? Neutron (talk) 01:04, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, there was only ever one attempt to fill a seat absent an election. It went very badly, with the newly appointed arbitrator gone from the project within days. There's nothing particularly unusual about this vacancy; in 2009, we started out with one of the 18 seats unfilled (because of the resignation of a sitting arbitrator between the completion of the election and the beginning of the year), and within a couple of weeks another arbitrator had "stepped down". It is a rare year that has not seen the resignation of one or more arbitrators early in the year (February seems to be a particularly common month). Risker (talk) 01:10, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
But this is not a question of filling a seat absent an election. There was an election. One of the winners is not taking his seat. The suggestion in the original post is simply to move the 9th-place "winner" into 8th place (for a 2-year term instead of one year) and move the next person up to the one-year term. They both got more than 50% support, so it's not a question of "electing" someone with insufficient support. As for the situation in 2009, I think I know who you are talking about, but had forgotten that the person stepped down before his term started. Maybe the wrong decision was made then; maybe the issue wasn't even raised. It's being raised now. (And I think two people in five elections is still "unusual", though it's not unheard of.) As I said on Jimbo's talk page, in most systems where people are elected to positions, this wouldn't even be considered a "resignation" because the person's term hadn't even started. That observation does not necessarily dictate the result, but neither do any of the arguments I have seen on this page. Neutron (talk) 01:30, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
Until I read NYB's post below, that is. I am not sure the sentence in question was intended to address this situation, and I have a suspicion that I may have written (or partly written) that sentence, or an earlier version of it. But it does seem to preclude using the results of the election to fill the vacancy in the way that has been suggested here, and which I think would have been a good idea. Oh well, more fodder for next year's election RfC. Neutron (talk) 01:38, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
If you go back and read the 2012 rationales for that decision (yes, one was yours), they included that the voters have to know how many seats they are filling before they can decide how many candidates to vote for, and so on. The consensus was that it wouldn't be fair to change the number of candidates to be elected partway through the election, because not all the voters would hear about and take the time to consider whether to change their votes. If that is good reasoning, then it would follow more strongly (a fortiori in legalese) that the voters shouldn't be put in that position now that they couldn't adapt their votes even if they wanted to. (Personally, I'm not so sure that voters are so nuanced about whether they are electing 9 candidates or 10, but even so.) Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:45, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
I'm not so sure either. To quote the late Justice Jackson (at least, I think he was the first to say this, in a published opinion anyway), "The matter does not appear to appear to me now as it appears to have appeared to me then." Neutron (talk) 02:06, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
I can not speak for all voters, but I assure you that I am; and do.—John Cline (talk) 02:18, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
Though it appears below that the matter is resolved, worth noting is that we would be seating the candidate with the lowest support percentage by a 'successful' candidate in any ArbCom election since we moved to the support/oppose or support/oppose/neutral format in January 2006. (Actually, we're already doing that now; seating the next candidate would mean we'd be seating the two least-supported candidates ever.) TenOfAllTrades(talk) 04:04, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
@Risker: For what it's worth, there have been previous appointments to the Arbitration Committee without elections, besides the one I think you're talking about; see this 2005 Signpost story. Graham87 14:27, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
Yes, WJBScribe has correctly pointed out that one of the two 2007 appointments worked out okay. I wouldn't really take the 2005 stuff too seriously; the committee was still in its infancy then, doing mainly things that are handled at the admin noticeboards today. I see that even back then the community didn't get around to discussing arbcom vacancies. I guess this would constitute a perennial proposal? Risker (talk) 14:34, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
Agree on (a) from Jimbo Wales (talk) (this vacancy should not be filled) but not with his (b) as, hatting or shutting things down (stifling debate), rarely proves effective, and we wouldn't be here, discussing anything, if there was nothing to discuss. As it is, the possible link between WPO, & WP, in actions the former candidate was involved in, keep increasing, if you read around. Anyone burying their head in the sand is a fool. Anyone trying to force others to do so is a bully. AnonNep (talk) 14:48, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
I do not think the 28bytes' seat should be filled in this manner. Having thought about it, I can see several downsides to a policy where if an arb-elect does not take office, the next one down the list gets the seat automatically. For example, while the attack on 28bytes does not seem to have been motivated by a desire to have a specific other person take his seat, I can see, Wiki being what it is, that concerted pressure might be put on one person not to take his seat in order to press the candidacy of the person who would take the seat.--Wehwalt (talk) 20:00, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

The pre-election RfC actually covers this

In the 2012 RfC on the election procedures, the community decided that "[v]acancies that occur before voting begins in the election will be filled in this election; vacancies that occur after voting begins will not be filled in this election."

Before the 2013 RfC, it was decided that the procedures for this year's election would be the same as last year's, except as otherwise decided in the RfC. The issue of dealing with late-occurring vacancies was not addressed in the 2013 RfC, so no change was made.

The vacancy created by 28bytes' resignation yesterday obviously occurred (long) after voting began in the election, so under the agreed election procedures, the election results should not be used to fill the vacancy.

I think this resolves any dispute over how this is supposed to work. Personally, I have no preference whether there are 14 or 15 arbitrators, but I can certainly say that having 14 instead of 15 will not be a problem. (I will miss the particular person who should have been the 15th, but that is obviously a separate issue.) Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:19, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for reading the "rules" it usually takes us too long to figure out what/where they are, so one supposes this should not have been an exception, but actually you were pretty speedy here :). Alanscottwalker (talk) 01:43, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
@Newyorkbrad. I'm not sure I agree with your analysis. It relies upon a "vacancy" having been created by 28bytes resignation. But he never took his seat. It is a different scenario to the one that would have arisen if you had resigned in the last few days (when the rules clearly say we wouldn't appoint an additional person to fill the 9th vacancy). But what has occured is different - the number of the vacant seats remains the same (8). One of the candidates who would have filled those seats has indicated that they will no longer accept the appointment. To me, it follows that the top 8 candidates willing to accept appointment from the election should fill the 8 vacant seats. But appointing the next candidate was probably only worth doing if my view had proved uncontroversial - and it clearly hasn't! WJBscribe (talk) 10:16, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
@WJBscribe I suppose your argument is that if an arbitrator isn't seated, it's comparable to their withdrawal during the course of the election. In that situation, the withdrawn candidate would simply be passed over for seat calculation purposes. That's a compelling argument.  Roger Davies talk 10:28, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
That was how I saw it. But it clearly isn't the only view and I wouldn't want someone to be appointed in circumstances where a significant proportion of the community thought the appointment improper. That would make life pretty impossible for the additional Arbitrator, and potentially undermine confidence in the Committee. Obviously both are bad things. WJBscribe (talk) 10:33, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
As I recall, in the past, arbitrators-elect-and-confirmed have actually dived into arbitration work before January 1st, if they so wanted (AGK). One assumes they are allowed to do so because while there are many things to being an arbitrator, it does not need a magic coronation or swearing in (except for Jimmy's pass of the hand). It just needs doing the work. Similarly, standing down arbitrators continue work after Jan 1st.Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:47, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
  • In simple terms one becames ARB only on 1st Jan 2014 in this case and have taken there seat . Now if a elected candidate refuses to identify or is found to below 18 years. Are you saying that that seat should remain vacant for the year ?Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 02:17, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
Does it matter? There have been long vacant seats and long inactive seats in the past. So, why does it matter if there are 15, 14, 13, when any volunteer can drop off at any time? They are all volunteers, remember. Moreover, here we wrote something that covers this just so we don't have to reinvent the wheel on the fly, using up the time of whoever shows up tomorrow, for the RfC. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 02:24, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

My view here is that once the election has been set in motion, there is very little that should be done to change anything. Ideally nothing, and only the Electoral Commission has any authority to make any changes. Effectively, once the results are announced and signed off by the scrutineers, those are the arbitrators-elect and nothing should in theory be able to change that, not even resignations or disqualifications (i.e. arbitrators-elect can announce resignations, but they don't take effect until they are arbitrators). There is effectively a 'frozen' period between the announcement of the results and the arbitrators-elect taking their seats. Any changes forced by resignations or other matters only take effect from 1 January 2014. Does that make sense? The other effect of this would be to avoid various inconsistencies in official records, and to leave things more flexible over the coming year if need be. Carcharoth (talk) 18:29, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Self-important sub-heading

I'm not sure if my position as a member of the Electoral Commission (speaking personally, however) entitles me to my own ironically-titled subsection, but hopefully it at least excuses it :D

An important first point is that the Arbitration Committee has no mandate under policy to assert the final sentence in the statement ("Fourteen arbitrators, not fifteen, will now comprise the 2014 committee."). The size of the Committee and the appointment of members are explicitly reserved to the community by the Arbitration Policy and the Committee does not have the authority to rule on them. That part of the statement should be withdrawn or struck, or I would like a statement from the drafter explaining its foundations.

A second point is that it is not clear whether or not this is a matter over which the Electoral Commission has jurisdiction. I'd like to see this clarified by the community regardless of what is decided in this specific instance. The 2012 RfC is very vague ("The mandate of the Electoral Commission would be to deal with unforeseen problems, adjudicate disputes, and as Jimbo continues to shift his role, to ceremonially announce the final results"). I have always interpreted the role as being to adjudicate where the community had tried and failed to form consensus in the normal way, or where time constraints prevented them from doing so; so it doesn't immediately render the discussion mute if it is considered within jurisdiction.

I don't have a strong opinion on whether the "Newyorkbrad school" or "WJBScribe school" of thought is correct here, they both constitute reasonable arguments. I'm more concerned that we sort out the basis on which we're supposed to be actually making a decision here, before worrying about what the decision actually is. Thoughts? Happy‑melon 13:18, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Just to be clear, "Fourteen arbitrators, not fifteen, will now comprise the 2014 committee" was a description of the current state of affairs, not an authoritative ruling. AGK [•] 13:23, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
I'm not seeing any body that has jurisdiction to rule, nor change a rule. It is a "committee of the whole" thing then, which in our general practice is a 30 day RfC; probably at VPP. (one of which potential outcomes could be no consensus). But is it worth it to do so at this time, and not leave it to next fall? Given past practice with reduced numbers on Arbcom my sense is it does not matter but if anyone wants a new policy they can propose it at VPP. However, if they want to seat anyone in particular right now (ie at the close of the RfC): one supposes they can make that direct proposal too with very wide advertisement - but (good luck, imo) and we all have seen how elections stir up things -- (for what benefit?) Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:58, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
The first I, and presumably other arbitrators, knew that an arbitration noticeboard post was about to be made (or had been made) was when I read an e-mail from AGK to the mailing list that was timestamped 13:45 UTC on 30 December 2013. I have no problem with the first two paragraphs of AGK's post, but the bit that Happy-melon objects to ("Fourteen arbitrators, not fifteen, will now comprise the 2014 committee.") was not approved by or run past the rest of the committee as far as I can tell. In my view, it should not have been published under the imprimatur 'For the Arbitration Committee', but stated here on the talk page as AGK's personal view. My view is the same as that of Happy-melon, that the committee has no authority here to say anything like that. The size and composition of the committee is something determined solely by the community. I too would like to see AGK strike or withdraw that part of the statement, even if a committee of 14 with a seat left vacant is eventually what ends up happening. What might help there is to take a closer look at the mechanics of when a resignation has been accepted or not, i.e. when a resignation takes effect. 18:03, 31 December 2013 (UTC) Addendum: the simplest way to handle this, IMO, is for 28bytes' resignation to be a post-dated one that takes effect at 00:01 UTC on 1 January 2014. The mechanics of unsubscribing him and removing the additional tools granted, have all taken place, but the seating as an arbitrator goes ahead with the removal taking place one minute later. That would sidestep all the issues debated above. Though those issues do need to be discussed for next year. Carcharoth (talk) 18:14, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

This discussion is the best illustration of Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy that I've ever seen. Happy New Year one and all. — Scott • talk 19:08, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Carch: The statement describes the state of affairs as they stand now. It is the case that the committee now comprises fourteen arbitrators. If a new one is appointed, that would be the departure from the status quo. I confess I don't see what is problematic in the statement, and it seems to me - as much as a discussion about the wiki's constitution is fun - that resolving the actual issue should be the priority... AGK [•] 22:29, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
Sure. I had somehow missed this edit. I stand by what I said above, that what happens (or fails to happen) to the vacancy is nothing to do with ArbCom. In my view (not speaking as an arbitrator), the status of 'arbitrator-elect' is not something that can be resigned. You can open an election candidacy and withdraw an election candidacy, but once the results are in and the arbitrator-elects are announced, that status is inviolable. You can announce that you are not taking up the seat, but you remain an arbitrator-elect, so the effect is to pre-announce a resignation, and that resignation takes effect once you become an arbitrator. I'm sure there is precedent for this from President-elects from US history. But maybe Jimbo is right and per this the discussion should end now. Carcharoth (talk) 01:43, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Seriously? Ya'll are going to squabble over that? I'm removed it (the 'for the committee'), problem solved. NE Ent 18:26, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Please do not edit official announcements from the Committee. If they choose to remove that of their own accord, they can do so, but that is not for you to decide. --Rschen7754 18:27, 2 January 2014 (UTC)
Correction, problem continues. NE Ent 18:30, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Arbitration motion regarding Ancient Egypt

Original announcement
Will this be treated as an amendment to the Dbachmann case? If not, then where are actions going to be logged?--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 04:53, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
That's the impression that I was under, but clarification would be helpful. --Rschen7754 05:56, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
Currently, the discretionary sanctions are not mentioned on the Dbachmann case page or anywhere else that would allow for the logging of actions.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 17:50, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
As far as I know, this was not a proper amendment to that case, since the probation remedy approved there also affected the article Afrocentrism. I'd like the arbs to clarify this a bit, so that to know if the new DS should be added there or not. — ΛΧΣ21 Call me Hahc21 19:21, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
The Devil's Advocate: After consulting, yes, I have added the remedy there so that notifications and sanctions could be properly logged somewhere. Thanks. — ΛΧΣ21 Call me Hahc21 23:25, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

The motioned noted that it superceded the article probation, but the case page gives the impression that the article probation is still active. I think precedent is that superceded and revoked remedies are stuck. If so either the entire remedy 2 or just the mention of the Race of the Ancient Egyptians article should be struck? Thryduulf (talk) 22:03, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Nightscream closed

Original announcement
  • For the sake of transparency I would like to make it clear that I did not discuss this case in any way, shape, or form with the other arbs during the entire time it was underway in any place other than on the publicly visible case pages. One of our secondary mailing lists was used for any off-wiki discussion, and I had myself unsubscribed from it for the duration of the case, so not only was I not involved in the discussion I do not even know what, if anything, was discussed and who may have said what about it. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:03, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Arbcom and/or its various functionaries arranged to have a separate mailing list to ensure appropriate behaviour during this case. An off-wiki criticism site seems to disagree that this was effective. Off-wiki nonsense has no standing here, and I congratulate the people involved for making sure that this case was conducted appropriately. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 22:42, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

If off-wiki nonsense has no standing here, why is Demiurge1000 publicizing their activities here? NE Ent 22:46, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
Speaking as someone who hasn't participated (now or ever) in any off-wiki criticism site, it is a little bit troubling that the current ArbCom mailing list setup 'recycles' its secondary mailing lists. If I understand things correctly – and please correct me if my understanding is mistaken – members of ArbCom who are recused from parties to a case are unsubscribed from one of the secondary lists (arbcom-en-B or arbcom-en-C, etc.) only for the duration of the case. They have full access to what their colleagues on the committee said about their actions and testimony, and full access to the case's private deliberations after the fact—a privilege that the vast majority of parties before ArbCom do not enjoy. This does strike me as something that we ought to fix. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:55, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
That is the reality, and, I agree, something that should be fixed. For this case, though, there was no mailing list discussion of any significant consequence. Courcelles 23:00, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
Well, this would still apply to discussions held on the main arbcom-l; we can't predict who will be elected to ArbCom in the future. --Rschen7754 23:05, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
True...and that does point to a(nother) flaw in the way the ArbCom manages its mailing lists. We probably shouldn't be opening the private deliberations of old cases to former parties who are newly-seated, though at least that practice has two somewhat ameliorating features. First, in most cases, the case and the Arb being seated are going to be well-separated in time; the new Arb isn't going to be working today with the Arbs who were secretly critiquing his testimony yesterday, and in many instances there will have been turnover on the ArbCom in the meantime. Second, in principle it could be argued that the community taking the decision to seat a past party to Arbitration amounts to an endorsement of giving them access to those past case files (though that's a stretch).
Both of those points break entirely when we deal with a case involving a sitting Arbitrator, though. The voting Arbs are left in the awkward position of knowing that they are going to have to work closely with the party to the case for months or years to come, to persuade and cajole and extract votes. The voting Arbs will be under pressure to be much more...taciturn...in their discussion of their temporarily-recused colleague, in a way that they will not for any other party to Arbitration. It's an imbalance that we could and should be avoiding. At an minimum, there should be a sensible cooling-off period – perhaps 24 months (one ArbCom term)? – before case records are unsealed to a party. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 23:23, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
(edit conflict) As Courcelles' comments demonstrates, this is what we were always told. However, a cursory Google search tells me that deleting threads is indeed possible[13]; or more accurately, replacing the contents of messages relating to recusal-laden cases with "Message body deleted" is possible. I will try to arrange with the WMF at some point this month to have this done for the Nightscream threads. AGK [•] 23:07, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
What problem are you trying to solve here, AGK? The purpose of recusal and separation of recused arbitrators from the relevant mailing list, while maintaining the archives, is so that the recused arbitrator cannot affect the specific decision being made, while future arbitrators may benefit from reviewing the discussion that was contemporaneous to the decision. The Nightscream decision has been made. Are you suggesting that Beeblebrox is so untrustworthy that he will read the archived discussions and somehow behave unethically with respect to them? Risker (talk) 18:01, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
That is in no way a reasonable interpretation AGK's comment. Beeblebrox raised the issue in the first place and Courcelles endorsed agree with ToT's suggestion that there is something to be fixed. (And what's with the toppost?) NE Ent 18:28, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
Sorry about the top post, it was meant to be further indented, and I've fixed that. But again, what is the problem that messing around with archives is supposed to fix? Really, the only one that seems to be described is that one individual who recused from the decision-making process may potentially review the archives and....what, exactly? Recused arbitrators are bound by the same expectations that they not release information from the mailing lists as every other arbitrator. Recused arbitrators are expected to "stay recused" for future discussion of the same topic/user/situation, so having access to archives should not affect future decision-making either. What problem is being solved? Risker (talk) 18:55, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
Don't know but it appears the issue you might not have considered is that one of the general reasons for keeping private long after the communication is over, is to promote full and candid discussion at the time about people and things not party to the communication (see, privileged communication). But maybe a time limit on that makes some sense. Alanscottwalker (talk) 19:09, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
Yes, exactly that. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 03:34, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
Unless I am mistaken, because I did not receive these messages at the time I would have to deliberately go into the archives and search for them in order to see them. I have yet to even set up that ability as it seems technically complicated and I have not had reason to do so yet, but I can certainly see the issue here.
Having not messed with the archives yet I am unsure of their functionality, but I wonder if there isn't an easier way to do this. If who accessed what in the archives was logged and arbs were instructed not to peek at matters from which they were recused or were parties to we would have a mechanism for making sure no one was doing so while still leaving the material there should it need to be reviewed by arbs at some future date. I don't know if that is technically feasible but if it is it would be a good idea. Logging would also (hopefully) prevent arbs from looking at stuff out of mere curiosity as opposed to material they have an actual reason to review.
Again, I don't know how feasible this is but if it isn't difficult to set up additional lists we could simply have a new list for any case in which any current arb is recused or a party and they would just never be subscribed to it. That might get complicated but it may be worth looking into.
For the moment, I can only offer my promise that I will not peek at them. (doesn't seem like it would be very interesting anyway, this does not seem to have been ac case where there was significant disagreement and as far as I am aware there was no off-wiki evidence involved) Beeblebrox (talk) 23:52, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
I'm inferring from AGK's link mailman is used for the lists. It is (or should be) trivially easy to set up a new list for cases with recused arbs. (I was thinking that lists could be set up for arbcom-l13, arbcom-l14 and arbcom-l redirected to the current year, but that'd probably make dealing with an overlap case problematic.) NE Ent 23:58, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
If it's easy to set up new lists, would it not make sense to have one list per case? It would need someone who was able to admin the lists so that access could be given to future arbs if an old case needs to be reviewed. Imho at least I wouldn't have any problem with that person being a WMF employee as the duties shouldn't be onerous. Thryduulf (talk) 08:45, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
We already have to file a request on Bugzilla to open new mailing lists, and from my experiences, the turnaround time is about 2-3 weeks to get one list made, even for something as uncontroversial as handling the oversight requests for the Portuguese Wikipedia: bugzilla:46348. I highly doubt that WMF would be willing to do this. Also, in response to AGK, that's probably a WMF issue, not a mailman issue. --Rschen7754 08:53, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
Ask for a fish, you eat for today, ask for a fishing pole, eat forever. I've asked our WMF liaison Mdennis (WMF) to liase for us here. NE Ent 12:55, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
Thanks very much, NE Ent. AGK [•] 19:28, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Okay, so, to review. The purpose of maintaining archived lists is so that future arbitrators can review any discussion about cases that were conducted in the past, because that information can be significant for rendering clarifications and amendments to cases. It's also very valuable in looking at unblock requests (to see if there were any previous ones and what issues were flushed out during previous reviews), and it's pretty much the only way to review whether or not someone actually sent in their self-report of "legitimate" alternate accounts. Most of the case-related discussion on mailing lists focuses on either the bureaucratic issues related to cases (who will write it, why it's overdue, whether any special issues should be considered); it's the less-common cases where something specific *is* discussed where it's important that future arbitrators have access to those discussions. Ensuring that relevant information remains accessible to future arbitrators is a huge make-work project; the OTRS queue that was used for 2010 applications for checkuser/oversight was closed and deleted at the end of last year, but just ensuring that all significant information was transferred took me about 30 hours of comparing data. And while it is correct that it is technically possible to delete individual emails from the archives, every deletion messes up any links to specific emails throughout the entire archive and requires direct WMF operator action.

    It's not particularly relevant that arbitrators recused on cases have the ability to see discussions after a decision is made: the purpose of recusal is to take that individual out of the decision-making process, and is done by their not participating in the discussion. The same standard of discretion and confidentiality of mailing list discussions applies to arbitrators whether or not they agree with any decision made by the committee, and applies whether or not the arbitrator is recused on a case; there is no reason to believe that recused arbitrators who subsequently read a discussion relating to a case on which they recused will behave in a way that abrogates those standards. If they did so, I'd suggest that is a reason for removing that individual arbitrator from the committee - mailing list leaks are mailing list leaks - not a reason for creating a rabbit's warren of otherwise useless mailing lists.

    My position for the last few years I was on the committee, and continuing today, is that the real issue is that the committee should move to a CRM system and stop using Mailman, which will appropriately permit changes in practice in the handling of future data; and that the older archives should be first sealed off, and then only significant information forwarded to the new system, or alternately stored on arbwiki, prior to the deletion of those archives. I'll note, however, that it is widely known that past and current arbitrators have full-scale copies of mailing list archives up to the time that they were/are no longer on the list, and that prior leaks have shown that it's important that *someone* be in a position to verify whether or not the "leaked" information is actually from the archives; we were aware that there was some pretty significant modification, abridgement, and deliberate omission in past leaks. Risker (talk) 16:09, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

  • I have to agree that just deleting the whole thread serves no purpose. I filed an RFAR last year and commented on some cases as well, should we now go back and delete any emails related to those as well? And We have an arb who recused from a current case as well, so all those emails would have to be deleted as well or Brad might go look at them later. I realize this is an unusual case in that I was not only recused but was the filing party and became an arb in the middle of the process, but deleting the emails would set a bad precedent that could get very messy very quickly. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:33, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I think we're just establishing whether deleting threads is technically possible. Deleting the threads would require a committee vote, and no such vote has been held, so this thread to my mind is just looking at whether this is an option available if we ever needed it. I tend to agree with you that deleting the threads for Nightscream is unnecessary, though some community members took a different line earlier in this thread. AGK [•] 19:40, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Perhaps I'm missing something here, but it seems to me that a member who is recused must not in any way influence a case, but there isn't a priori a harm of that person being aware, or later becoming aware, of what went on, so long as privacy is properly maintained. So I'm not particularly bothered if non-viewing of mailing list content by recused members is voluntary instead of software-enforced, just as long as the viewing does not lead to influencing. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:03, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

This is an interesting discussion, because arbitrator involvement and recusal can work in a number of different ways. In this case, Beeblebrox was recused because he was (IIRC) the filing party and acting in, essentially, a prosecutorial role (I can confirm that he has acted entirely properly throughout). Recusal can be for different reasons, though. I recused in a case that was heard at the tail-end of last year (the Ottoman Empire-Turkey naming dispute), not because I was involved in the dispute itself, but because that dispute was part of a much wider topic (World War I) in which I have edited and intend to edit in more heavily over the coming years. I wanted to, essentially, be free to speak my mind on the matter as an editor if needed. I didn't pay much attention during the case (that was a mistake, I should have done), but as matters developed after the case I saw some things that gave me cause for concern, and I've found myself as an editor with knowledge of how arbitration works giving advice to one of the parties in that case on how to proceed. It is a complex matter and I would prefer the details not be discussed here. But is this 'defence' role (even if it is entirely after the case closed) any more appropriate than a prosecutorial role? What I've essentially found myself doing is trying to maintain an awkward balance between giving appropriate advice, reconciling my concerns with those of others, and getting a fair hearing for someone from those who may look askance on me giving this sort of advice. I'm not sure it is a balance that it is possible to maintain. Carcharoth (talk) 01:34, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

I would point out that while creating lists isn't hard, nor is removing content from them, they are a quite costly thing to do in terms of staff time. It means context switching for someone every time they need to do it, and my understanding is that removing the content of particular archived posts is quite dangerous, and prone to creating problems with the archive. Our tech team is highly capable of creating lists - in fact, that part is so easy that they've delegated it (and I'm one of the people who does it) - but the expensive part truly is the context switch, and the staff member who has to take the time to create and configure each list, double-checking the setup because of the sensitivity of Arbcom cases, etc. I strongly encourage us to not go down any path that involves that sort of work. At that point, I'd rather look back toward workforce management and/or CRM products, as the Committee did last year, a conversation that has appeared to be stalled (after the WMF invested considerable resources in creating three demo instances). Let's not perpetuate the problem by using technology that isn't a fit - let's fix the root cause. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 02:27, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

Removing content from a mailing list's archives - after it has been sent - is quite a difficult task and can totally goof up an archive.--Jorm (WMF) (talk) 03:07, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
  • "after the WMF invested considerable resources in creating three demo instances" is unwelcome passive-aggressive nonsense.

    The fundamental problem with CRM software was that none of the packages trialled could easily and entirely replace Mailman as we use it. The demos were of customer-facing ticketing software (one of them was indistinguishable in substance from OTRS), not internal email discussion software. Switching at this stage, and because we can't delete threads, would be overkill.

    In any event, it does seem like deleting the body of sensitive messages after the fact is possible, but the Foundation are reluctant to make it a habit - for understandable reasons. I suppose this means the community has its answer, and a further question to consider: as you elect arbitrators knowing they might gain access after-the-fact to deliberations on cases they are a party to, is this worth it? I'm inclined to think not, but don't much mind: it's not me that would do the fiddly deleting of threads. AGK [•] 09:34, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

AGK, I find this comment (""after the WMF invested considerable resources in creating three demo instances" is unwelcome passive-aggressive nonsense. ") ... regrettable. I'm not sure why the hostile tone came out there, but I said nothing that wasn't true. The WMF did invest substantial resources in putting up three demo instances. I'm sorry none of them were to your liking, but the Arbcom had plenty of time to propose alternative solutions, which we would happily have looked into. I regret your characterization of that phrase as "passive-aggressive nonsense". It's not the collegial tone that has been employed between the Arbcom and the WMF in the past. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 03:19, 21 January 2014 (UTC)
Well, Philippe, if a polite request and a collegial tone are all that's necessary, I respectfully request that the WMF start taking a more active role in policing and sanitizing all-languages Wikipedia BLPs, including establishing and consistently enforcing strict notability guidelines, and quickly and effectively taking care of any and all child-protection issues. I humbly submit that both of these areas are as appropriate for the expenditure of substantial resources as the three demos mentioned above. Cla68 (talk) 06:26, 21 January 2014 (UTC)
    • If none of the packages were suitable, that's a good reason not to use them. It isn't a good reason to stop looking for one that is though. Has anyone drawn up a specification? Has anyone detailed why the trial packages weren't suitable? What features were missing? Has anyone done any research into what other packages are available that could/should be trialled? Thryduulf (talk) 11:49, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
The RT package was indistinguishable from OTRS, which was not a good fit. However, either of the two CRM systems are a very considerable improvement over the Mailman system; they just failed to be perfect, and required changes to the way some things are done. They were quite suitable, and a test use was proposed by moving the ban/block appeals there (which would have provided very significant tracking improvements, logging, and ease of use of standard responses), but never happened. It might be because last year there was a dearth of arbitrators with a technical bent; that isn't a problem this year. The current arbitrators have the notes on the three systems that were compared, and I believe the test instances are still available. Risker (talk) 12:29, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
I am absolutely thrilled to hear this, Beeblebrox, and will gladly provide background information and assistance wherever the committee may find valuable. If someone has specifically accepted the task of working on this, he or she should feel free to contact me. Risker (talk) 19:19, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Uninvolved comment here. Any CRM worth a damn would have auditing capabilities and ACLs; even the Windows default file system (NTFS), which is hardly a CRM, has both of these, so really, just share a Windows folder via SMB over VPN in case of desperation. Better CRMs might even have the more sophisticated RBAC making both proactive security and auditing rather easy to handle... assuming you can trust someone to manage it (i.e. not purge the logs, etc.) Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? still applies no matter the level of technical sophistication. I should add that the Wikipedia articles on these technical topics read far more scary than these things actually are to understand and use in practice. Someone not using his real name (talk) 11:08, 22 January 2014 (UTC)
  • The stuff discussed in depth above (someone not being both arb and party in the same case) is technically called [simple] dynamic separation/segregation of duties (DSD) in the RBAC (and other) security model(s). Plenty of commercial software has support for DSD because it's needed for SOX compliance. (You can do it "manually" with ACLs, but it's an obvious PITA when role holders change, whereas a RBAC model handles this seamlessly.) I don't know of any forum/wiki-type software which has support for DSD though (not normally needed there). On the other hand, I can't think of the top of my head of XRM software that supports out of the box the kind of workflows that ArbCom has, even just limiting the discussion to the public ArbCom workflows. In the $$$$+ world, stuff like this is made with semi-custom software for various XRM core products (which may themselves be FOSS). Still the custom workflows will cost you, either money or own/WMF developers' time. Someone not using his real name (talk) 14:00, 22 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I've looked at SugarCRM, which seems to be what the WMF uses, but being a FOSS product it doesn't seem cater much for more serious corporate uses. In particular it doesn't seem to have support for separation duties in its RBAC implementation; that's level 3 RBAC ("constrained RBAC") in the NIST standard. Someone not using his real name (talk) 09:21, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Promotion of clerk Rschen7754

Original announcement
This is apparently some new form of keeping one's mouth shut that I was not previously aware of. ArbCom clerking is not some position of power, they are users who volunteer to help the committee with what are quite frankly the more boring and beuracratic aspects of its proceedings. He's been a trainee clerk for some time and I am not aware of any problems with his work. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:42, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
Yeah I could have said worse and I know he/she doesn't think any better of me. Kumioko (talk) 02:31, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
Is there any chance you could start your comments with your signature so we know to ignore them? Johnuniq (talk) 03:30, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
Kumioko (talk) 03:58, 26 January 2014 (UTC) Sure! Anything for you John!
I previously had serious doubts, but Rschen7754 and I talked it over like adults and I became convinced that he would do an excellent job as a clerk or any similar position. I think that his record so far confirms my opinion 100%. Like I said, well deserved. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:22, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
Clerks don't do anything that requires much though anyway so it should be fine. They just post stuff on behalf of the committee and learn the ropes to be committee members themselves. I don't really have a problem with him being a clerk but I can see in his actions the asperations to be an Arb and I don't think he has the right demeanor. I also don't believe he has the projects best interests in mind and I can see in many of his actions self serving actions designed to futher his own gains and goals. 138.162.8.59 (talk) 14:23, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Kafziel closed

Original announcement
  • I'd just like to say that some of the way this case was conducted was throughly vexing, such as choosing the punishment and then and only then looking for the crime. I haven't really followed ArbCom cases before so I sincerely hope this isn't the way the body regularly does its business. KonveyorBelt 00:33, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
That isn't entirely accurate. If you look at the sequence of events you would see that several arbs had a crime proposed to go with the punishment. It was because other arbs were not happy with the verbage that it had to be changed. Yes, for a brief period a punishment was on the table without a proper crime to go with it, but the punishment still wasn't first. If anything the crime they settled on was basically the same as the original proposed, they just split hairs about how they should articulate it. 204.101.237.139 (talk) 17:45, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
Of course it was mandatory to get Katziel desysopped. You can't have admins disrespecting bureacrats, arbitrators, foundation stuff, stewards, Jimbo or any other of their various wiki superiors. Imagine what would happen if commoner class wikipedians would start showing bad attitude to admins, what good would that do? Whole power-structure of Wikipedia could crumble. The arbs surely did split hairs about what the crime was, for the crime was really "you did not respect our authoritat!" and how to articulate their predecided attitude desysopping, not just the presentation in the case pages. jni (delete)...just not interested 07:33, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Anyone who has watched ArbCom knows that the proposed decision is a draft by one or two Arbs, and sometimes groups or even the majority of arbitrators disagree with parts of it. In this case, a review of the evidence had led most arbitrators to a desysop conclusion but only after the draft was posted did it become clear that several different reasoning paths had been adopted. In an appellate court, this would result in a series of concurring judgements resolving the case but providing little useful precedent. ArbCom does not use this approach, preferring a single set of principles, findings and remedies, which in cases like this one leads to the unedifying display of how the sausage was made. It is more common for the findings to be agreed and the remedies to be the subject of disagreement, but the events of this case were neither unprecedented nor sentence-before-evidence as has been implied. ArbCom has had cases of sanction without evidence - one notorious example had a sanction posted before the evidence page was used, IIRC - so there have been much objectionable cases than this. By the way, as an outsider observation, Kafziel's behaviour on and off wiki made the outcome inevitable, and no I don't mean the incivility. I don't think anyone should have to kowtow to ArbCom and I have certainly criticised mistakes and unreasonable actions. The outcome for Kafziel was neither, and the one for Hasteur was within reasonable discretion. By all means, trout ArbCom when they deserve it, but stay with accuracy when it comes to facts, and the fact is this was not a punishment before evidence case. EdChem (talk) 08:00, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • No problem, AGK. I believe in criticising fairly, which means not only being critical when it is warranted but also saying when criticism is unwarranted and acknowledging positive actions. It's a matter of principle for me, acting reasonably, and it has the benefit (at least, I think it has the benefit) of having some credibility when offering criticism - after all, if one can't recognise what is reasonable, why would one be trusted when pointing to something unreasonable? (By the way, on the criticism front, this case was a good example of why better control of case pages is needed...) EdChem (talk) 02:01, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Arbitration motion regarding Increase of protection on article protected under WP:OFFICE action

Original announcement

Seriously disappointed that Philippe's behaviour was not given more attention. A few arbs made some comments, which was positive even though he may not even read them, but I hoped for more. EdChem (talk) 08:04, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Totally. Is it as difficult as admonishing Jimbo was in 2009? Bishonen | talk 10:12, 30 January 2014 (UTC).
Yes,  Roger Davies talk 10:45, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
I agree with EdChem's view. A statement about the community's expectations about the professionalism of WMF staff would have been welcome.  Sandstein  10:53, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
You may find this surprising but in this instance agree in all respects. This is typical of the WMF's feelings towards the community though and I really think something needs to be done about it. Not sure what that is though. The WMF seem to think the community members are expendable and treat them with contempt which I find highly disappointing. They make decisions that affect the community in a negative way like Visual Editor with no sense of responsibility for the fallout and expect the community to fix the problems themselves. Its really a shame the WMF doesn't seem to want to work with the community but then again its our own fault because the community generally fails to accomplish amnything resembling change. So its a double edge sword. They don't trust us because we have shown we can't be trusted to do the right thing and we don't trust them for the same reasons. At some point though if this project is going to survive (which I frankly think is already getting to an irreversible point) both sides need to work together. Otherwise we'll all be out of a job. 138.162.8.59 (talk) 15:17, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
There may have been a salient point in your message, but it's totally lost now. Unfortunately, a side-effect of generalising a true statement is that it often ends up as a false statement afterwards. --(ʞɿɐʇ) ɐuɐʞsǝp 19:54, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
Frankly it was lost when I started it as I do not believe there is anything the community can or will do nor is there even the will to pursue it if they could. This whole episode emphasis how broken this fragile system is and how no one is stepping up to do anything about anything. Its easier to ignore the problem that to accept there is a problem and pursue a remedy to it. 138.162.8.58 (talk) 20:47, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • That's true and they frequently do, but that doesn't make it right and it doesn't foster a spirit of cooperation with the community. They need us significantly more than we need them but they think its the other way around. I can guarantee that the community can keep this site running (and in many respects probably better) without the WMF. @Leaky, that has been my impression of multiple members of the WMF unfortunately. Not all of course, but many (and I have met quite a few IRL). 138.162.8.59 (talk) 15:59, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • It can't really, Guerillero. It exists at the community's pleasure; in the simplest terms, without a community the WMF has nothing. Even if this weren't the case, I'd be reluctant to endorse such a servile position. AGK [•] 22:38, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
We don't own Wikipedia, but volunteers are responsible for just about everything the encyclopedia has accomplished, and acting with a bad attitude toward your volunteers do not encourage helping. KonveyorBelt 16:53, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I realize you are one of the admins on this site HJ but your dismissive attitude about the problem really doesn't help. Ignoring the way the WMF feels about and treats the community isn't going to help it. The WMF needs the community and we need them, but the WMF doesn't feel that way because the community is so disfunctional and can't do anything other than argue. If you/we can start making some meaningful changes on this site and show the WMF that we have the projects best interests in mind and not our own petty POV it would go along way. But being dismissive is both not helpful and not flattering to you. If you care about the project than help make it better, don't degrade others for making a comment that the WMF needs to do a better job of cooperating with whom they serve. 138.162.8.57 (talk) 17:33, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I'm not known for my great love of the WMF, nor of ArbCom, and I generally think this thing has been blown out of all proportion. Kevin should have known he wasn't going to get a pat on the back for stepping on the WMF's toes, and Philippe shouldn't have got up on his high horse, but none of the drama that followed has done anything to improve the encyclopaedia. The effort that has gone into resolving this minor spat between two people who really should know better would have been more productive spent elsewhere. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 17:59, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I completely agree with all of that but the problem itself stems from a larger unchecked problem. The communities failure to make changes that positively affect the project and the WMF's hubris in thinking that they know better than the people on the front lines doing the work. Both problems are fixable and neither problem is going to fix itself by being ignored. Here are four things that might help although I am certain nothing will come out of them and they are in no particular order and certainly not all inclusive of the problems:
  1. When the WMF does an Office action they should ensure they do so with their WMF account. Not their Wikipedia account or their admin account if its different. If its an official action it needs to be done in an official capacity.
  2. 2nd the community needs to start actively addressing the various problems. It will take some time to regain our respect back but if the community starts to act in common interest again, then the WMF will liklely follow suit.
  3. the WMF needs to act like adults when they interact with the community members. They can't just go flying off the handle everytime their authority is questioned. They have made some really bad choices in the past too so they also have some room for improvement.
  4. The community and the WMF need to start working together. Not be fighting each other to show the other who's in charge. On the same token though the WMF needs to understand that this project will not survive without the community. If there is no community doing the work, there is no jobs for WMF employees and they all have to go down the hall and work for Wikia.
A lot of these could be solved at the next Wikimania by the way. Determine what some of the critical problems are and then create some working groups to adderess those. The groups should have members from WMF and Wikipedia and Wikia where applicable. We need to start working together in order to break the us and them mentality that currently exists (like the one between admins and editors). 138.162.8.57 (talk) 18:32, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Why isn't anyone commenting upon the fact that an OFFICE action overrode the English Wikipedia policy on PC2 when it appears that policy-compliant options were available? I challenge anyone to come up with any scenario, however implausible, where legal or other considerations require PC2 instead of full protection.
Also, Jimbo's original 2006 announcement[15] made it very clear the office actions were to be "a short-term action" and that "This quick action is in no way meant to override or replace the process of community consensus. There is still plenty of time, and there are still plenty of places, for the community to discuss [the office action]." (Emphasis in original). When was this changed?
Finally, a procedural question; as I read it, to appeal one should contact Philippe, but of course before doing that it would be a good idea to see if anyone else has appealed and whether the appeal was rejected or is under consideration. How would I find this out? --Guy Macon (talk) 19:46, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
To appeal the office action? IINM, Phillipe has specifically stated the only appeal would be to file a DMCA counter-notice on that article, which I don't see happening as it'll out whomever makes it due to the amount of personal information required for a DMCA counter-notice. It's a Catch-22.
As for the issue with PC2, I cannot speculate on the OFFICE's actions, only except to assume that the intent was to keep the target of the takedown notice (i.e. the URLs) from being reposted and made visible, while at the same time allowing the article to be edited - a significant concern given that the general consensus amongst the editors seems to be that the DMCA takedown notice is illegitimate. That said, the WMF using PC2 once more raises questions that were first raised in the 2012 PC RfC, where the developers more or less gave the closers no choice by stating they'd refuse to work on it unless it was turned on (a lot of people on that RfC wanted PC's most onerous issues fixed first). To me, the WMF is forcing PC2 on us, just like they forced PC on us and tried to force VE on us. —Jeremy v^_^v Bori! 20:44, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
Pardon the digression (I'd put this on your talk page, since it's only partially relevant to this discussion, but your header says you'll delete it on sight), but speaking as one of the closers of the 2012 RfC: I have no idea where you got the idea that the WMF "forced PC on us" in that RfC. We weren't "given no choice" about anything, we did not take orders from the WMF, and the issue of asking the WMF for further tool development was way, way down the list of things that were considered important by either closers or commenters at the time of that RfC. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 21:16, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
"Phillipe has specifically stated the only appeal would be to file a DMCA counter-notice on that article"? That can't be right. I can see why a DMCA counter-notice would be the only way to allow removal of PC2 protection, but I can't see how a a DMCA counter-notice in relevant to strengthening it to to full protection. What were Phillipe's exact words? --Guy Macon (talk) 23:53, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
No, the DMCA counter-notice is for overriding the office action on that article, including altering the protection level. Office actions, per the policy, can't be countermanded by rank-and-file, so adjusting the protection level in any way either has to be done by the WMF or after a successful DMCA counter-notice. —Jeremy v^_^v Bori! 05:01, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
Addendum: the specific quote from Phillipe is thus (Talk:Conventional PCI#OFFICE action), relevant parts bolded:

For those who are interested, I've posted the DMCA take-down notice at this location on the Foundation's wiki. It specifically mentions the reference section and requires that we remove the specifications. At this point, until or unless we receive a DMCA counter-notice, those standards can not be reposted. If we were to allow that to happen, we threaten the immunity under which we operate through the Safe Harbor provisions of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act.' I'd be happy to provide someone with instructions regarding where to send a counter-notice if someone has a valid couter-claim, but be aware that it would be a statement under penalty of perjury that you have a valid copyright counter-claim. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 01:24, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Hope this helps. —Jeremy v^_^v Bori! 05:10, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
Interesting, but clearly an answer to a different question. Nobody here is even hinting that those copyrighted standards should be reposted. Everybody here is discussing replacing PC2 with full protection. I do not need to have a valid copyright counter-claim to ask Philippe to increase the protection and make it harder for someone to repost the copyright-violating standards.
Nobody is questioning the removal of material that is clearly infringing. we are questioning why Philippe used PC2, which violates our policies, when a non-violating alternative (full protection) was available. Yes, we all understand that Office actions are not subject to our community standards, but it appears to me that Philippe is deliberately violating our community standards, and by doing so greatly increasing the number of editors who can (purposely or inadvertently) infringe on the copyright in question. And I would like to appeal that decision. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:33, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
That's a misreading of WP:OFFICE, but unfortunately your misreading was shared by Arbcom in this case. Admins cannot reverse or circumvent office actions. The policy does not say that alteration is forbidden.—Kww(talk) 05:13, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
Good way to fight back this DMCA nonsense is to go search for:
  • PCI Local Bus Specification, Revision 2.1
  • PCI Local Bus Specification, Revision 2.2
  • PCI Local Bus Specification, Revision 3.0
from Google and make sure the PDFs are mirrored everywhere and never get deleted from Internet. If the stupid consortium has nothing else to do than harass Wikipedia and general public with their silly lawyer letters to keep these very obsolete specifications that have been leaked to public countless times, still secret or behind a paywall, well we the editors don't have to co-operate. The Internet never forgets, so their struggle to remove these is completely futile. You can get direct links to OFFICE-censored materials from editing history of Conventional PCI and if those get rev. deleted, you can always link to the web.archive.org past copies of that article. jni (delete)...just not interested 21:00, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
You just encouraged off-wiki behavior that violates copyright law. You have every right to do that, but I have an equal right to point out that that is one person's opinion, not Wikipedia's opinion, and that my opinion is that we should try to change the laws instead of violating them. Putting my money where my mouth is, I have already sent my yearly donation to the EFF, and I encourage others to do the same. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:31, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
The DMCA is not a law where I live. I have zero interest in supporting someone else's stupid laws in some wiki. Even if the links get posted directly to some Wikimedia server, I think I'll just ignore it and not be the first one to enforce their removal, even if it violates our policies to post links to copyrighted material. jni (delete)...just not interested 07:33, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
The DMCA may not be a law where you live, but the Berne Convention is. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:33, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
Not to mention US law applies to Wikipedia as it's based in the United States, so DMCA applies regardless of where an editor lives. —Jeremy v^_^v Bori! 19:25, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
  • This ArbCom case must be the stupidest ruling ever from this silly committee. One admin raised the protection level from its invalid, against policy, state and got angry reply from some WMF bureaucrat. Yawn. Really a tempest in a teapot, no substance whatsoever. I wonder if Kww is learning anything from his "admonishment", whatever that even means. I agree with others here that the WMF needs to do a better job of cooperating with their underlings and servants^W^W^H, eh.. I mean the community of editors. jni (delete)...just not interested 21:07, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Yawn indeed, but this wasn't an arbitration case; it was an arbitration request. After it was filed, we had no option but to rule on it. I wonder what you would have did if in our position, and why. (Just noticed you've been on Wikipedia an awfully long time, but don't think we've ever crossed paths. Nice to meet you, so to speak!) AGK [•] 22:35, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Decline it, because it's not the committee's job to be the hatchet folks for WMF. NE Ent 01:20, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I'd either decline it, and if that were not possible I'd rule this to be De minimis non curat lex matter requiring a minimal verdict, which could be nothing at all. Also a "trial" were the other party is untouchable by the "court" is fundamentally unjust as a dispute resolution mechanism. ArbCom has started to resemble a criminal/military court more than a civil process with two equal sides. (I have been semi-retired for years. I don't have much intention to participate on any of the wiki politics here. I liked the ArbCom of old days better, when it was helping banning trolls from wikipedia. Now it seems to be "admonishing" normal editors about trivial things or their bad attitude.) jni (delete)...just not interested 07:33, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

I posted a question for Philippe in the discussion Leaky Caldron mentioned above, asking for his view on how Reviewers are supposed to handle the article he has OFFICE-protected. In my view, this is one of the questions that is still open from this situation. I would be hesitant to approve a pending change on the article out of concern of inadvertently treading on Philippe's or the WMF's toes and being hit with a massive over-reaction. Philippe has not edited since my question was posted, so I still hope that he might respond.

Another issue is the content of OFFICE, which suggests core policies will be respected - perhaps foolishly, I would have thought that the protection policy was core. As an Australian, I am reminded of the Howard Government which divided its election promises into "core" and "non-core" after it was elected; the government did not believe it was bound by anything it declared "non-core promises." WP:OFFICE needs to be redrafted if Philippe's actions are acceptable (and his attitude / behaviour unreviewable).

@Guy Macon: one possible scenario has already been proposed in the RfAr, though it was of the WMF's own making... if a confidential agreement were reach as a settlement in which the WMF undertook to institute PC2 protection then changing to full protection might not be recognised by a judge as fulfilling the agreement. Of course, no such agreement should be made, but given what we have seen here, I do believe that making such an agreement is something the WMF might do.

@Roger Davies (or any Arbitrator willing to comment): would you please explain why appending to the admonishment a statement that ArbCom were unimpressed with Philippe's handling of the situation and asking he be more careful, thoughtful, and assuming of good intentions in the future was not considerable possible? I understand that you can't overturn an OFFICE action, but you could state that OFFICE actions should only be undertaken with an official WMF account and that the non-WMF account falls under ArbCom jurisdiction. Kww was foolish to act without asking first, no doubt, though his assumption that using PC2 in violation of the protection policy was also understandable. If he deserved admonishment, then surely Philippe deserved more than obiter dictum observations that telling ArbCom to desysop for him was unacceptable. EdChem (talk) 23:07, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

An agreement with a judge (if it exists) simply moves the problem back one level. Instead of the question being why an office action overrode the English Wikipedia policy on PC2 when it appears that policy-compliant options were available, it becomes a question of why a confidential agreement was made overriding the English Wikipedia policy on PC2 when it appears that policy-compliant options were available. That being said, if Philippe tells us that he made such an agreement and now we are stuck, we would accept it and ask him not to do that the next time.
Not that I buy it; I have been involved in enough DMCA takedowns to be pretty darn confident that no judge was involved. I think Philippe didn't dispute the takedown, which could have wound us up in a court. I believe that instead he took down the links (as is our policy with links to copyright infringing documents) and then took action that he believed to be sufficient to make sure that they didn't come back. That's the whole point of DMCA takedowns; take it down and you are protected from being sued. If I am right, he could have chosen full protection, and he can change it to full protection now. Unless Philippe tells me differently, I am going to assume that there is no such agreement -- it is far too implausible. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:23, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
To clarify, Guy, I read the suggestion of an agreement as meaning following negotiation with the copyright holder, perhaps made by the WMF counsel who could have offered PC1 + semi but didn't and is now instructing Philippe to use only PC2 + semi. I think a judge being involved is highly unlikely. Ignorance of wikipolicy by the general counsel seems plausible to me. None of this is to defend the situation, simply to recognise it is possible; if this is the case, Philippe should really have informed the counsel that PC1 + semi was en-wiki policy compliant and PC2 is not. Philippe likes to quote the part of OFFICE about not being bound by consensus, though the opening lines about acting within core policy seems less popular. I noted above that apparently the protection policy is non-core. I wonder how ArbCom would respond to admins deciding they too are not bound by this minor non-core policy... EdChem (talk) 00:54, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
I am not asking about replacing PC2 + semi with PC1 + semi. I am asking about replacing PC2 + semi with full protection. While Kww was wrong to act instead of asking, he was correct in his conclusion that full protection is the only policy-compliant protection level that stops future infringement as well or better than PC2. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:07, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
I agree that Kww's conclusion in the light of the protection policy is unarguable. EdChem (talk) 02:04, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
  • When I run for Arbcom, I always do so on the basis that Arbcom seems to fail to get the point of any matter brought before it. Nothing that happened here changed my mind. All admins, myself and all members of Arbcom included, have an obligation to take steps that ensure that things are in a state that satisfies both WMF and the community. It is beyond unlikely that WMF actually has a need that an arbitrary group of editors that were assigned "reviewer" status during the last trial of pending changes are able to approve changes to Conventional PCI. I can't come up with a single scenario that would make that true. In fact, the article was doing quite fine under semi-protection and was doing so until George Ho complained. I hadn't noticed earlier, but George Ho also complained about the PC2 and had his objections summarily dismissed with the false statement that Philippe's usage of PC2 was in accordance with the letter and spirit of the protection policy at the time. That's a demonstrably false statement: it clearly states that there was no consensus for the use of PC2 at the time PC2 protection was installed.
While Philippe is clearly immune from any form of discipline for his behaviour, WP:OFFICE has never before been read as saying that the office can dictate a maximum protection level without explanation. The legal issue facing the article is a DMCA notice. Full protection would certainly satisfy all issues with that and fall within our protection policy. Judging from history, semi-protection did so as well, and it's quite likely that PC1 would. There are a wide range of choices that would meet the needs of the office and satisfy our policies. The clarification that Arbcom should have issued was that admins are free to upgrade protection from WP:OFFICE imposed actions in the absence of a clear statement from the office that there is a legal need not to protect the article. I suspect that such statements will never be made, because in practice that will never be the case.—Kww(talk) 01:03, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
Good point; since even I seem to have this "reviewer" right -- it doesn't get any more arbitrary than that. NE Ent 01:20, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
according to your user rights logs, it was granted after you asked for it at WP:PERM in 2010,although as I recall it was around that same time that it was being handed out like candy. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:05, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
I have this question to Philippe on the reviewer topic pending. EdChem (talk) 02:04, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I fixed those two as well, setting Persia to full protection and Vikramiditya to semiprotection. For me, the log says "heeft publicatieinstellingen gemaakt voor "Persia" [Automatisch controleren: recht "review" benodigd]", so the log should show something like "has installed publication rights for Persia ["review" right required for automatic acceptance". I don't feel like switching to English to check the exact wording. In the section I see labeled with "Automatisch bewerkingen controleren", there's a line that reads in English for everyone: "Require review for revisions by everyone except Reviewers".—Kww(talk) 04:36, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Persia still has a {{pp-pc2}} tag, which I assume accounts for the orange padlock and the "This is a redirect from a title that is semi-protected from editing" notice. I cannot remove the tag because of the full protection.

The protection log for Persia reads

04:30, 31 January 2014 Kww (talk | contribs) changed protection level of Persia‎ ‎[edit=sysop] (indefinite)‎[move=sysop] (indefinite) (PC2 has not been accepted by the community as a permitted protection state) (hist)
04:05, 26 September 2013 BD2412 (talk | contribs) protected Persia‎ ‎[edit=autoconfirmed] (indefinite)‎[move=autoconfirmed] (indefinite) (Per talk page; this redirect is frequently retargeted without discussion, causing substantial disruption.) (hist)

I see no indication that tells me it was ever under PC2. What am I missing? --Guy Macon (talk) 16:54, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Kww was kind enough to answer this on my talk page. You can see PC changes at All public logs but they are not logged in the Protection log but rather in the Pending changes log. That log is not one of the choices on the "Page --> Page Logs" tab at the top of the page, but you can reach it by choosing "Page --> Page Logs --> All page logs" and then manually changing it to "Protection log". --Guy Macon (talk) 13:05, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
Observation Much like the supreme court of the United States (or at least the fictionalized account in The Short List on The West Wing) ArbCom has movements of types of cases. Previously it ranged from various nationalistic disputes, to civility, but now has landed on the role of an Administrator with respect to others. Seeing the Nightscream case, the Kafziel case, the "increased office protection" case, and what I see potential case I see brewing (User talk:WilliamJE) I expect we'll see annother case here at ArbCom shortly to further clarify the role. Hasteur (talk) 15:44, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

The WMF can do whatever they please—they own the servers—but what they frequently do is an abysmal job of communicating with the community. At the RfC du jour on pending changes, I asked Philippe a perfectly reasonable question about using PC3 as an office action, but to no avail: assuming our beloved new notification system is working, he chose not to reply. Anyway, boo hiss at Arbcom. It's disappointing to see a body elected by the community admonishing an administrator for upholding the community's own consensus. Rivertorch (talk) 17:36, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

This was a bad decision. It's factually wrong: it states "without any form of consultation" when Kevin did consult User_talk:Philippe#Illegal_protection_state. It's a poor interpretation of events: it's like saying I lock my car in the garage and then the wife shuts the garage door she "interfered" with my locking of the car. I take some consulation that a good number of arbitrator's voted against it. That said, it's not arbcom's job to address WMF's poor behavior, it's their job to settle disputes on English Wikipedia, not the Wikipedia / Wikimedia Foundation divide. NE Ent 23:18, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

It's obvious why applying full protection is interfering with PC2. Fully protecting an article indefinitely to stop linkvios would not be accepted by the community—particularly when applied by a single admin acting on a whim. Therefore, the full protection would eventually be removed and the linkvios would resume. Also, we have no idea what agreements have been reached by the legal teams for the two sides, and it is very likely that the office action was in accord with a precisely worded agreement—to allow that to be overridden within a week would show the WMF cannot make agreements and cannot be trusted, and conceivably there could be legal repercussions. Those wanting total freedom are welcome to set up their own website and do what they like, but this website is operated by the WMF. It is also obvious that some WMF staffers are not always good at community liason, but that is a separate issue. Johnuniq (talk) 01:07, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Absurd non-sequitur strawman: a. Please show diff of linkvios being inserted after NW semi'd it [16] March 2011. b. As Kww promptly notified Philippe of his action and the reasoning for it, if there was an issue WMF could, and did, reset it. c. WMF's own Terms of use states The community - the network of users who are constantly building and using the various sites or Projects - are the principal means through which the goals of the mission are achieved. The community contributes to and helps govern our sites. The community undertakes the critical function of creating and enforcing policies for the specific Project editions (such as the different language editions for the Wikipedia Project or the Wikimedia Commons multi-lingual edition), (emphasis mine) and this community created a "no PC-2" policy. Does WMF have the "right" to violate its own terms of service and dictate PC-2. Well, legally yes. Ethically? ... Kww's approach, while perhaps sub-optimal, was not sufficiently egregious to warrant an admonishment. Admonishing him will not improve the mainspace content of the encyclopedia. NE Ent 03:44, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Johnuniq, your first point appears to be claiming is that someone changing a policy-compliant full protection office action (something that which will get you desysoped in a heartbeat and, as far as I know, has never happened) is more likely than someone changing a policy-violating PC2 office action (which has happened, and resulted in the admin being admonished). And you know which is more likely...how?
As for your second point, I will buy it as soon as I hear Philippe say that he made an agreement that [1] he cannot reveal the details of, and [2] requires PC2 and forbids full protection. I do not buy any speculation that this might be the case when the person who knows has not said that it is the case. If I accepted that argument, then nobody could question anything Phillipe does.
And by the way, I am not asking that the decision be "overridden within a week". I am not asking that it be overridden at all. I am asking Philippe to explain why he chose PC2, which violates our policies, when a non-violating alternative (full protection) was available. And I do not care whether he made that decision when negotiating some secret agreement or whether he made the decision as he selected the protection level. I don't think that this is an unreasonable request. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:56, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Johnuniq, I think characterizing my edit as "on a whim" is a bit much. I set the protection to the only available protection state that met both WP:PROTECT and WP:OFFICE. I thought this was an obvious and minor error on Philippe's part, one that he would correct by setting the article to PC1 or semi-protection. That instead of correcting his error he chose to defend it was his call. I didn't expect or provoke his overrreaction.—Kww(talk) 04:49, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Yes, "on a whim" was unduly poetic, sorry—what I meant was that if an admin chooses to apply full protection to an article, it is inevitable that another admin will choose to remove that protection. A glance at the article history shows that linkvios will follow. Johnuniq (talk) 05:00, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
As my glancing skills do not seem to be up the task, could you provide a diff of a copyvio between NW's and Phillippe's protection actions. NE Ent 12:30, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Are you saying that, in a thread titled
"Arbitration motion regarding Increase of protection on article protected under WP:OFFICE action",
and as a direct reply to NE Ent's comment that the admonishment of Kww for "interfering" with a WMF Office action was
"a poor interpretation of events: it's like saying I lock my car in the garage and then the wife shuts the garage door she 'interfered' with my locking of the car",
your reply
"("It's obvious why applying full protection is interfering with PC2")
was not about an office action applying PC2 vs. full protection but rather about an ordinary admin doing it?
That would be an excellent point if this was Wikipedia:Pending changes/Request for Comment 2014, but it appears to have nothing to do with what we are discussing here. We are not talking about a case where (in your words) "an admin chooses to applying full protection to an article" but rather when an office action does so (or fails to do so, instead choosing a weaker protection that violates policy).
Again, I am asking why PC2 was chosen,violating our policies, when a non-violating alternative (full protection) was available. I think that this is a reasonable question for me to ask. --Guy Macon (talk) 11:34, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
The answer that as been given is that it does not violate anything as it is pursuant to the Office action. You and some others may not like that answer, but given that it's their legal risk you now wish to be made the judge of (contrary to policy), and your objections seem overly bureaucratic, then they are unlikely to persuade. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:16, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
That's a misreading of WP:OFFICE, and one that is unfortunately popular these days. Office actions aren't subject to policy, but that doesn't mean that they are uncorrectable. Philippe cannot be disciplined for an out-of-policy actions, certainly, but that doesn't mean that things he has placed in out-of-policy states shouldn't be corrected. Take a close parallel in real life: someone with diplomatic immunity parks his car in a tow-away zone. The diplomat can't be arrested or fined, but his car can still be towed.—Kww(talk) 15:36, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
"Correcting" their calculation of legal risk and response to it is precisely the thing for which you are incompetent. It's like they park the car but you do not like it there, when it's neither your car, nor your parking space. You're not their "wife" (as someone so inaptly analogized above), nor their judge, nor their lawyer, nor their parking tow. They strike the balance between legal risk and open editing (as set forth in the Pillars), because they have the legal risk, and the legal communication, and the legal responsibility, and the privileged legal advice (and because it is privileged it cannot be revealed). -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:22, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Philippe isn't maintaining any delicate balance here. There's no conceivable legal advice that Philippe could have received that mandates that the article be editable by anyone. He set the article into an invalid protection state when three perfectly valid ones that meet the obligations of the office are available. Any resetting of protection was done solely as a result of the personal opinion of Philippe or other office members, and is not the result of legal advice. That's an abuse of WP:OFFICE, and one the arbcom should have called him on, not supported. He's maintaining it there when there are protection states that obviously worked: look at the article history, and you will see that semi-protection was doing just fine. As for your concept that this isn't my role: it most certainly is. The role of administrators is to ensure that Wikipedia remain in a state that is conformant to WMF's legal obligations, community consensus, and community policy, in that order.—Kww(talk) 18:46, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
It's an Office opinion. You simply don't know what legal communication and advice was received as that is the way legal communications and legal responses and legal strategies are worked out (in private). You can only make bad guesses. Making such guesses is administratively problematic, and may well risk abuse, so hopefully you will LISTEN to the message that has now been unmistakably and formally given to you. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:06, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Was logged as "Own Recognizance" NE Ent 19:20, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Yes, as the agent for the Office. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:06, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Agent for what office? When the approving entity is the office (Office of General Counsel), it's logged as OGC. NE Ent 00:18, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
The Office under which this case is entitled (see, above). Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:56, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Alanscottwalker, please let me know if you ever get around to addressing the actual question I asked ("why was PC2 chosen, violating our policies, when a non-violating alternative (full protection) was available?") I did not ask whether office actions are subject to our policies (they aren't, for very good reasons). I did not ask that the protection level on the article should be changed (It shouldn't, unless Philippe decides to change it, but we can ask). I would really, really appreciate it if certain individuals would stop propping up straw men and knocking them down, and instead would address what I actually wrote. Could we do that, please? --Guy Macon (talk) 19:52, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
I did address it directly, your assumed premise is wrong because the Office action does not violate anything, and because it involves privileged communication, Phillipe cannot disclose it; so, if disclosure is what you want, you should not expect it nor is it yours to expect. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:06, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
So the dozens of people who have said that We have a policy forbidding the use of PC2 are all mistaken? I don't think so. And any time Philippe does anything, we are to assume that there is some sort of mythical privileged communication that prevents him from telling us, in even the broadest brush strokes, why he made that decision? No. I refuse to assume that is true until Philippe tells me that he cannot answer because it would violate privileged communication. To do otherwise makes Philippe unaccountable and unquestionable in all matters, great and small. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:31, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Have you read the opinion of the committee? There is no great and small, there is this Office action, here. 'Other People on the internet have another opinion,' is worth what pixels are worth. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:56, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
  • The hell? Kww is known to shoot from the hip. But increasing protection is a problem? I realize ARBCOM wants to avoid WMF issues as much as possible, but this was just silly. And I've got to say that my respect for the WMF, with whom I've worked with in a professional capacity (funding proposal from NSF) to good effect, is dropping quite a bit. Someone other than Philippe needs to be the interface to en if this is how Philippe is going to act. Hobit (talk) 17:20, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Please note that there are still open issues at
Talk:Conventional PCI#WMF Edit request,
Talk:Conventional PCI#Edits made by IP, and
Talk:Conventional PCI#OFFICE action.
--Guy Macon (talk) 13:22, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
I've left a comment there. Short version: there is nothing there that is of interst to the committee and there is not really any point to continuing to debate sucha minor issue. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:02, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
The issue of the DMCA takedown notice itself is still unresolved, but that is something the WMF will have to deal with. I mentioned a number of options at User talk:Philippe (WMF)#Now that the kerfluffle is nearly over that would likely work to resolve things, including the cliff's notes version of Jim Boemler's story when PCI-SIG sent him a DMCA notice over the PCI Vendor and Device Lists database in December 2002. I don't know if what I've said will be taken seriously by the WMF, but if the DMCA mess continues to be unresolved, perhaps ArbCom could gently nudge the WMF to have another look at it? Leaving the Conventional PCI DMCA mess the way it currently is has been akin to slapping a band-aid on a puncture wound...it isn't going to get any better and will just continue to fester. --Tothwolf (talk) 04:13, 6 February 2014 (UTC)
Tothwolf, and anyone else reading this: What will resolve the DMCA is a legitimate counter-notice. There are no doubt a huge number of people who can legitimately issue one (you've done lots of the research), and support in creating and filing the counter-notice has been offered; all anyone has to do is ping Philippe. In fact, if Kww had bothered to speak to Philippe before going around claiming things were illegal, I'm sure Philippe would have suggested that as an even better alternative that would have allowed lifting protection entirely. Nonetheless, the reason for the admonishment is that WP:OFFICE actions are actions of the owner of the website (Philippe isn't doing them on his own volition), and they are not to be undone without discussion because whomever is undoing them has no idea of the context, whether there are court orders, or what harm can come from undoing them. Sometimes it's rather benign; but given how very, very few WP:OFFICE actions there are today, and the risks that are being taken when there is failure to follow DMCA or other legitimate laws or court rulings, it's nothing short of reckless not to have that discussion instead of taking action on the basis of a personal agenda. Risker (talk) 04:40, 6 February 2014 (UTC)
with all due respect, the above is a red herring. A DMCA counter-notice, if successful, would allow us to legally link to the infringing documents, but doing so would still be against our policies. NOBODY WANTS US TO LINK TO THOSE COPYRIGHTED DOCUMENTS. I personally want the protection against infringement to be strengthened, so why on earth would I file a counter-notice that would result in the protection being removed?
In addition, the applicable law[17] says that a counter-notice must contain "A statement under penalty of perjury that the subscriber has a good faith belief that the material was removed or disabled as a result of mistake or misidentification of the material to be removed or disabled." Nobody here believes in good faith that the specifications were misidentified, and thus nobody here can file a counter-notice without committing perjury. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:13, 6 February 2014 (UTC)
That's the thing though, the WMF currently seems to only want to consider two options, lock down the article, or entice someone else into filing a counter-notice. Neither is really the correct course of action. Locking the article down doesn't solve anything, it just pushes it off on someone else to deal with at a later time. Trying to get someone else to file a counter-notice isn't correct either since that tends to give validity to the DMCA takedown notice PCI-SIG's lawyers filed. As I mentioned in detail on Philippe's talk page, the takedown notice itself has so many problems that there is no way it could possibly hold up.

The other issue with a potential counter-notice is that we aren't really disputing the content of the links PCI-SIG's legal group took issue with. Those links, even used as references, appear to violate the English Wikipedia's external link policy since they were links to material that had been re-published elsewhere in violation of PCI-SIG's copyrights. The DMCA takedown notice (as poorly written as it was) should have never even been sent to the WMF since the material in question isn't hosted on the WMF's servers and the WMF/Wikipedia is several steps removed from the infringement.

The other two options I mentioned on Philippe's talk page, which Jim Boemler went with back in 2002-2003 were to contact Al Yanes (the president of PCI-SIG) and to take the issue to the tech-media. Those got results for Jim and I don't see why they wouldn't work here as well. In fact, I could do both, and it has been rather tempting, but I feel that doing so would be stepping on the WMF's toes, and really, it isn't my "job" to do that. Our donations pay for WMF staff to handle these matters, so for those reasons I've not gone that route. What I don't understand is why the WMF, with paid employees/staff, wasn't able to dig up the material I easily compiled in my free time over a couple of days. (What exactly are my/our donations paying for over there?) --Tothwolf (talk) 05:48, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Risker, please don't get so wrapped up in a colloquial usage of the word "illegal". Philippe's action clearly contravened our protection policies when there were effective actions that he could have taken that would have met his obligations without going outside of our policies. Choose whatever adjective you like to describe that. I had assumed good faith and believed that he wouldn't have done such a thing on purpose. And, once again, describing any action I took as "undoing" an office action is blatantly false: I did not undo any office action.—Kww(talk) 14:50, 7 February 2014 (UTC)
I don't think I've yet mentioned this in any of these discussions, but had Kww not been the one to step^H^H^H^H jump feet first into this mess, some other editor/admin would have eventually tried to modify the PC2 setting on Conventional PCI. What would have happened to an admin who was less well-known or someone fresh out of an RfA had they been the one to change PC2 to full protection? I personally suspect that they would have been treated much more harshly than Kww was. Had Kww not kicked off this entire discussion though, we wouldn't be talking about the underlying DMCA takedown notice, which definitely still needed to be addressed. --Tothwolf (talk) 23:55, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

Arbitration Clerks seeking new volunteers

Original announcement
I wouldn't mind "clerking" but I'd be afraid I could not commit to the time commitment for the arbitrary time of a case. An "Assistant clerk" with very specific delegated tasks would be more appealing (i.e "please notify X,Y,Z about case X" or please hat evidence page or the committee or please oversight evidence page while Clerk X is vacation/on other case/involved/etc). The concern is time commitment from start to finish rather than the actual role. I'd more than happy to spot fill shortcomings or even full cases if there were real world understanding that time available is dynamic. A task list "to do's" might help alleviate the clerking and I'd have no problem executing a "to do" list. --DHeyward (talk) 07:40, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Some occasional help is better than no help at all. Please feel free to apply :-). AGK [•] 12:31, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
As AGK said, a lot of the work is bit by bit, such as closing and archiving clarification/amendment requests. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 12:33, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Who wrote that, by the way? That was a bit of unexpected good humour! (In contrast to most other posts, that is.) -- Mentifisto 08:57, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

It's been used since the days of NuclearWarfare. Maybe one day we'll come up with something to replace it, but for now... --Rschen7754 09:02, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

If this is real, I wouldn't mind helping. Call me a wikipediaholic, but I wouldn't mind to work... Regards, TitusFox 17:08, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

New trainees

Original announcement

So there isn't announcements of declined cases?

This would be a good idea for logs I think. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 09:02, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Yes, it would be good to have a log (though not everyone would agree with announcements).  Roger Davies talk 10:14, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
The log of declined requests is kept at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Index/Declined requests if that's what you're looking for. I don't really see a need for announcing declined requests, it's important to announce motions (whether in lieu of a case, on a request for clarification or amendment, or a stand-alone arb motion) and cases being closed as they change or introduce arbitration policy or restrictions on editors or pages. However declined cases and requests for clarification and amendment don't. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 10:23, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
[Bewildered] I really don't know how that log escaped me as I use it all the time. My own feeling about announcing declines is that it would serve mainly to perpetuate drama, and thus sidestep any closure a decline usually brings.  Roger Davies talk 13:09, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
Declined cases often contain useful information. Arbitrators sometimes suggest other dispute resolution steps, and additional information regarding the criteria by which the committee accepts / rejects cases is useful to editors evaluating conflicts for possible referral to the committee. NE Ent 13:16, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
I also don't see a need for formal announcements, but adding links to logs and/or relevant archives at Template:ArbCom navigation seems like a good way to help curious users find recently closed items without having to spend all day squinting at page histories trying to find the relevant revisions. I've had to do this myself when I missed something and it is very annoying. Adding a few links should help with transparency in our proceedings without encouraging drama mongering. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:05, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
Hadn't noticed the declined requests page. Better - still, this page acts (somewhat) as a feedback page.....maybe the same over there.....will take a look. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 08:13, 23 February 2014 (UTC)
Roger is right that announcing declined cases can perpetuate drama. I share his bewilderment that he and you both (possibly momentarily) missed that we have had a log for declined requests for years (certainly ever since both he and you have been/were on the committee). Were you really never aware of the existence of that log? Wikipedia:Arbitration/Index/Declined requests is not on the template Beeblebrox mentions, but is a click away via Wikipedia:Arbitration/Index which is on that template (under the name 'Archive of proceedings'. I think that is sufficient. Carcharoth (talk) 17:22, 23 February 2014 (UTC)
I think that those of you who have talked about not wanting to perpetuate drama are correct about that. I just saw the clarification discussion about the recently-declined case about two users following the announcement of another user's death, and it seems to me that those members of the Committee who distanced themselves from the decision to decline did exactly the wrong thing, in terms of not perpetuating drama. If it's declined, it's declined. Individual members should not be undermining the decision to decline, once it's been made. All that does is perpetuate the drama. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:55, 24 February 2014 (UTC)
When I wrote that, I did not know that it would be reopened. But, seeing what has happened since, anyone who wanted to not perpetuate the drama, well, I think you pretty much failed at that. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:35, 24 February 2014 (UTC)
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