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This is a page for working on Arbitration decisions. The Arbitrators, parties to the case, and other editors may draft proposals and post them to this page for review and comments. Proposals may include proposed general principles, findings of fact, remedies, and enforcement provisions—the same format as is used in Arbitration Committee decisions. The bottom of the page may be used for overall analysis of the /Evidence and for general discussion of the case.

Any user may edit this workshop page. Please sign all suggestions and comments. Arbitrators will place proposed items they believe should be part of the final decision on the /Proposed decision page, which only Arbitrators and clerks may edit, for voting, clarification as well as implementation purposes.

Motions and requests by the parties

Motion to add SQRT5P1D2 as a party

1) We have had an editor who states that he has done a number of edits to wikipedia as an IP and who recently created an account, SQRT5P1D2 (talk · contribs), request to be added as a party to this arbitration. John Carter (talk) 21:11, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Arbitrators:

? Where does he say he edited a lot as an IP? — Rlevse • Talk • 01:12, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, see it now below in a new stmt by him..."Although I contributed to many Wikipedia entries before, this was the perfect time to register an account in order to keep track of the case. " — Rlevse • Talk • 01:30, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

We need to resolve the injunction (below) first, as user:SQRT5P1D2 was created after the case. If the injunction is not passed, I dont think there is any point in listing the user as a party. If the injunction is passed, SQRT5P1D2 is not able to participate, in which case they also cant be a party. Then this motion becomes a formal way of indicating that SQRT5P1D2 is allowed to participate in spite of the injunction. I'm not convinced that we are in need of parties to this case; they are plentiful already. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 02:01, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Personally, I have received the impression that the editor in question has been a contributor to wikipedia as an IP. I indicated to him that I would be willing to see him added as a party, and he indicated he wanted to be. Please see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Greek nationalist canvassing off-wiki for the conversation. John Carter (talk) 21:11, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I don't have any particular problem with this user, the question is where do we stop since everybody can claim "I've been editing as IP, let me in" this would not work well with the other proposal where it has been requested that participation be "limited to Wikipedia editors whose accounts were created prior to the opening of the case". Do you have any solution to keep this in line with the other proposal? man with one red shoe 21:23, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - Actually, yes, I hope so anyway. I get the impression that, for better or worse, this one individual might be involved with bringing many of the others in. I could see how we would benefit from having someone represent the number of editors who want to be involved, and having someone like him, who apparently does have some weight with that community involved, might give anyone else who wants to make a statement a person they can contact and, I hope, trust, who could make any statements they might care to make for them. John Carter (talk) 21:35, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That's actually a good point, if new users need to present crucial evidence or arguments they can pass them down to people who are already part of the case, there's no need for any special representation. man with one red shoe 21:42, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Weakly support to add party, on the grounds of #3 of the WP:5P. However one exception should not mean others too. This user is the only outsider that so far has shown interest in participating in the case here, when others just spam the talk pages. We should respect that. Shadowmorph (talk) 21:50, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Attest to that: there should be no cabals: principle #2 of User:Jimmy Wales. Shadowmorph (talk) 21:56, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I would also stipulate that this party be the only newcomer allowed to join. However, having him here would give some of those who read his blog a chance to have someone they can trust to add information for them. I tend to think most if not all of them are less familiar with the rest of us, and might not be quite so willing or able to trust us than him. And, at least as opposed to me, he seems fluent in at least one of the local languages there. John Carter (talk) 22:12, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

While this newcomer has personally shown restraint in his comments, I oppose adding him. The principal reason is that he, inadvertently or not, initiated a wave of new one-topic users who bring nothing useful to Wikipedia, but only clog the talk page of the single article they were directed by SQRT to comment on. He did not direct them to be open-minded and consensus-building productive editors, but to express their nationalistic views (although warning them not to be too nationalistic with an indirect reference to sarissas) and oppose the naming of the article. I find recruiting one-topic editor warriors to be distasteful. The two sides in this arbitration are about equally balanced as it is. There is no need for the "masses" to have more voice than they already have. I have read the comments by the new editors at Talk:Macedonia and they are uniformly repetitive, uninformed on the Wikipedia issue, not helpful, and not willing to engage in consensus-building. Even SQRT's arguments have been made before. I see that his input has already been placed on the Evidence page. Shouldn't the evidence page be restricted to the named participants? (Taivo (talk) 22:41, 23 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Actually "Anyone, whether directly involved or not, may add evidence to this page". --Avg (talk) 22:50, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That remark is from the top of the Evidence page. Also, on that same page, "/Workshop provides for comment by parties and others as well as Arbitrators." On the top of this page, the second sentence says, "The Arbitrators, parties to the case, and other editors may draft proposals and post them to this page for review and comments." And, although Taivo is free to have whatever opinions he wants, I cannot see how having a balanced number of editors on both sides is at all relevant. ArbCom generally wants all the information it can get more than it wants to have a balance of voices talking to them. As someone who's been here before, trust me, they read the comments for facts and conclusions more than they do for the number of "votes" per side. John Carter (talk) 22:56, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Taivo's comment illustrates perfectly the state of mind of the other side (other than "the Greeks" ChrisO listed) as being just anti-Greek. Beside the Greek side is more accurately the pro-UN until a resolution side. It's one thing attacking editors based on their edits. It's worse to judge newcomers in only racial (he is Greek) grounds. Taivo and ChrisO didn't read the "Anyone, whether directly involved or not" sentence. Besides the "masses" coming here only illustrates the validity of asseting the havoc and chaotic disruption ChrisO's move has initiated. Furthermore why should the "two sides" be balanced when ChrisO based his move on unbalanced statistics (ignoring the pro-UN side of English speakers)? Shadowmorph (talk) 23:28, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You have failed to read my comment and the reason why I personally oppose his addition. "I find recruiting one-topic editor warriors to be distasteful." Whether intended or not, he is the source of a group of one-topic editors swarming the Talk:Macedonia page responding to his call to come specifically and make their voices be heard at Wikipedia. His page was written in Greek, so you do the math about who he was summoning. He was not recruiting Wikipedia editors for the project as a whole, he was recruiting respondents for one specific article, one specific poll, one specific POV. That's what I object to. If he had not done that, I would have no objections to adding him. It is the "call to arms" mentality evidenced by summoning non-editors to make their uninformed mark on Wikipedia that offends me. (I would be just as opposed to adding a Macedonian who had done the same thing.) (Taivo (talk) 00:01, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

I did read your comment. You think the new user had wrongdoing outside the wiki, it's your opinion. Would you propose to him inaction and acceptance better? Anyhow,enough said, I was referring to your state of mind. My proof is your above explanation still having to resort to using the word "Greek". Shadowmorph (talk) 00:46, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

(ecx2) Support I wish to applaud John's tireless efforts to be open-minded and fair. What a breath of fresh air. But I think just saying thanks to John, doesn't do enough justice to the civility and fairness that he brought to this, often acrimonious, debate. By assuming good faith of SQRT, IMO, he is acting in the best traditions of Wikipedia and he is being sensibly inclusive. I respect that. Also thanks for the valuable insights on how Arbcom works. Dr.K. logos 23:14, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - Despite reading that "any user may edit this workshop page", I wouldn't do that while I'm being proposed to be added to the list: it's a matter of principle. However, I would like to clarify a few things because certain users like Taivo, seemingly supportive of ChrisO's questionable actions, repeatedly spread false information. A few days ago, after I came back from holidays, I saw a message in my mailbox about the current issue regarding Macedonia's Wikipedia entry. Although I contributed to many Wikipedia entries before, this was the perfect time to register an account in order to keep track of the case. I also posted in grk.forthnet.users (note: this is a newsgroup) a message, in case anyone else was interested in voicing his opinions. This newsgroup is also indexed by Google; someone took it from there and posted in several blogs/fora. Others also took it and repeated the same procedure, sometimes leaving the message intact, sometimes not. Some Wikipedians found this message in a certain blog and their poor command of the greek language led them to believe that a) this is my blog and b) I'm calling for waves of nationalists to flood Wikipedia. How odd is that! I do not claim to represent anyone, but since the english version of Wikipedia isn't very popular within the greek-speaking community, I believe that my voice would be a useful addition to the ongoing dialogue. This is the translation of the original newsgroup message (check the timestamp) and this is where I stand on the issue. Last but not least, I'm not aware of any rules that restrict the participation of users based on their nationality; I also don't see any other Wikipedians expressing interest in joining the list. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 00:58, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I really don't get why it would make sense to add someone who, in terms of information we can verify, has had nothing to do with the dispute until the past few hours. If we get some sort of evidence that the user has in fact made IP contributions, maybe then. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 01:08, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I accept SQRT's description of his involvement here and his posting in the spirit of WP:AGF. It is, however, a very clear example of the Law of Unintended Consequences. I still find distasteful the idea of asking people outside Wikipedia to come here just to voice their opinions. If he were recruiting editors with an eye for long-term contributions across a spectrum of articles, that is one thing. But calling for people to join Wikipedia just to comment on one specific issue is not within the spirit of the project. SQRT seems to have a good command of the historical literature relevant to Greece (at least) and his future contributions will be welcome. But "recruiting" to Wikipedia any Tom, Dick or Harry who has an opinion on Macedonia is not going to add quality editors for the long-term and will not really add any enlightenment to the issue. This is all I'm going to say on this matter. (Taivo (talk) 01:17, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

I'm not sure why everybody is treating this issue as if being a participant in this case was a desirable privilege. This is not about whether this person is going to be granted the right to use these pages for his grandstanding (which is what he is apparently hoping to achieve). "Participants" in this case are those of us who have some concrete past involvement with the dispute, and who are putting our own past behaviour up for scrutiny by the committee. Basically, making yourself a "participant" here means stepping forward as a candidate to have your head chopped off. Why would anybody want to do that if they can avoid it? Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:41, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your kind remarks. I've been part of the dispute, since I've edited entries related to Macedonia in the past, before registering an account. This is not something that can be proved, but it can't be disproved either. Assume good faith. Now, I did not propose myself to be added to the list. I want to be added to the list, but it was my belief that someone else should propose me, if he feels that way. Another administrator did and I accepted. That should tell something about your speculation ("hoping to achieve", "grandstanding"). Who am I, the Queen (cue Seinfeld: "not that there is anything wrong with that")? I even hesitated to post here (see previous comments), as a matter of principle! Unfortunately, since some users distort the reality, I have to. This whole discussion is about one (1) user, proposed by others to be added to the list, with no other Wikipedians lining for a position. I see no reason to be afraid of a newbie: I won't bite. As for my head: count me in; I'll bring the soda. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 15:48, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose, even more nationalists, do we need it? No. chan dler ··· 01:37, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - (again, sorry for posting in this section) Thank you. I respect people showing confidence in their own savoir-faire. However, you might find these useful: a) "Translation of the original newsgroup posting about Macedonia", b) Yet More Analysis 1.0 RC and c) WP:CIV. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 22:36, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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Proposed temporary injunctions

Participation by newly registered editors

1) Participation in this arbitration, including the posting of evidence and comments on workshop pages and the associated talk pages, shall be limited to Wikipedia editors whose accounts were created prior to the opening of the case.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I think this is necessary, otherwise these pages will be overwhelmed with well-meaning but useless information and discussion. If new editors have something useful to add, they should contact existing editors or clerks. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 00:38, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This seems like a wise idea. I can think of many other places that are much healthier for a new editor to start with than arbitration. As noted by John V and others, if newer editors have something pertinent and helpful to add, it can be handled through others. --Vassyana (talk) 03:51, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by parties:

I've been made aware that Greek nationalist blogs are apparently urging readers to come to Wikipedia and campaign on the Macedonia article move (see [1] and [2] for more. New single-purpose accounts like SQRT5P1D2 (talk · contribs) are already appearing and posting reams of "evidence" to the arbitration case [3]. To avoid coordinated off-wiki disruption of this case, I propose that participation in it should be limited to established Wikipedians. -- ChrisO (talk) 18:34, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Blogs? This is nothing. This has been reported even by news channels in the Republic of Macedonia. So, while I agree with the proposal, I would advise you ChrisO to once again refrain from your one-sided rhetoric.--Avg (talk) 18:53, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Wholeheartedly support. Lord knows we don't want the whole bloody country posting here. We've got news shows telling people in the ROM/FYROM/whatever about this?! John Carter (talk) 19:02, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The headline is along the lines of "Macedonians succeed in changing the reference FYROM to Macedonia, but only virtually". (I don't speak Macedonian, but Google's Bulgarian translator can give you a basic gist of the story.) -- ChrisO (talk) 19:09, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I wasn't aware of the news channel report, so thanks for letting us know about that. You'll note that the proposal would apply equally to both sides. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:02, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I completely concur with this. One of the "new people" added their name to the participant list just an hour ago. He has been removed. Semi-protection of this arbitration that limits it to accounts already in existence a week ago is completely warranted. Since this applies to both sides equally and since there were about equal numbers of named participants on both sides, this is a fair and reasonable request. (Taivo (talk) 19:23, 23 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

I agree, it's common sense, however having a whole country posting here in outrage would probably clarify once and for all that this a POV/COI issue and it has to be dealt as such. man with one red shoe 19:30, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You know what this actually is? The best proof of the level of disruption that ChrisO's move caused. If we get armies of nationalist IPs attacking or defending this controversial move, then I would at least entertain the thought that it was the move itself that brought them here in the first place? --Avg (talk) 19:35, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've got news for you - we already have armies of nationalist IPs waging war across Wikipedia on the Macedonia issue, the vast majority of them promoting a Greek POV and many tracing to IPs in Greece or Cyprus (see [4]). That's always been the case. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:44, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

There is the occasional IP vandal, but there is a direct causal relationship between the blog posts, the news reports and your very move. And I'll mention again, as I will every time you use this filter, that it specifically excludes admins (and hence the dozens of reverts you and Future have done).--Avg (talk) 19:53, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Follow-up question - Would there be any value to trying to protect from new editors the various relevant mainspace article and talk pages as well? If and when certain people see themselves removed from these posts, I can easily see them vandalizing elsewhere. John Carter (talk) 19:56, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Macedonia itself is already semi-protected (and has been for a long time), but there may be some value in semi-protecting Talk:Macedonia. People are specifically being directed there by the blog postings of SQRT5P1D2, which are being reposted on other Greek blogs. I'd suggest keeping an eye on it to see how bad it gets. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:59, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose ChrisO remarks. It is wrong to attack and WP:BITE new users only on the grounds of one being Greek (or Albanian or whatever). This is unacceptable, and maybe borderline racist. In Wikipedia Everyone should be able to edit though not in this arbitration I guess. ChrisO has been warned before about this practice of attacking new editors and of specific nationalities. See Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Kosovo#ChrisO_warned and specifically about new editors Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Kosovo#ChrisO_2. What is true is that User:SQRT5P1D2 has only used mild language and has shown nothing to attest nationalism or bad manners. Evidently User:SQRT5P1D2 is the blogger of enimerwsi-gr.blogspot.com, (just another news blog), as he himself accepts here[5], view it in English (automatic translation) here[6]. This is a very sad behavior from an admin. It is in fact ChrisO unilateral move that created this Wikipedian cross-country issue, by aligning with nationalists from within the Republic of Macedonia. I have evidenced the sudden rise of google "Macedonia Wikipedia" searches from within RoM (the news made it in RoM TV) to Future Perfect in the talk page; I was not believed though.Shadowmorph (talk) 21:14, 23 April 2009 (UTC). What difference does it make that User:SQRT5P1D2 is whoever he may be? Shadowmorph (talk) 21:20, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

There are good reasons for not letting new people join an arbitration case directly, for one they should familiarize first with Wikipedia's policies and how things work here. Even User:SQRT5P1D2 post in /Evidence shows this clearly, he doesn't help your cause by bringing all kind of facts about Macedonia naming issue that are not pertinent to policies here. Potentially spamming Wikipedia and this case with requests from new users that don't have any idea about Wikipedia policies is not something that I can support. Also, I doubt new users can bring any new evidence to the case, since 1. have not been part of the discussion (that's obvious) 2. things have been already discussed ad nauseum. man with one red shoe 21:32, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This is not a vote anyways so there's no need for "stuffing the ballot", if new people really feel the need to provide crucial evidence or arguments, I'm sure they can contact some of the involved parties to pass those evidence/arguments to them. man with one red shoe 21:40, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Clarification:I opposed ChrisO's remarks, not the proposed temporarily injunction. But I weakly oppose that too. Shadowmorph (talk) 21:44, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Also new users shouldn't have to learn any firm rules. We'll just get him to learn WP:5P by heart :) Shadowmorph (talk) 21:54, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Actually WP:IAR is more useful (if you don't know the rules is easier to ignore them) ... :D man with one red shoe 21:57, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm very sorry but I have to post again here. Shadowmorph and others, I've already posted about this above. I'm not the owner of any blog (unless I'm a sleepwalker) and I could not find any "evidence" pointing to that. In this universe. I just posted in a newsgroup (check timestamp) and others took my post from there. The translation is here and I believe that there is nothing wrong with asking for anyone interested to participate in a dialogue. Let's not prejudge people and remember to assume good faith. Finally, regarding my abilities, I would like to ask everybody implanted with Wikipedia's policies during their embryo stage, to raise their hands. I thought that this was not a private members club. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 02:46, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Apology: Please accept my sincere apologies.I'm sorry, I was mislead by the blogger who didn't specify a source. Very sorry, damn that web 2.0. I agreed with you about the "private members club" but I hope you understand the issues involved here. Don't focus on trying to prove "you are not an elephant" ;-) Try to focus on what actual evidence and suggestions you could present to the issues at hand that could be helpful to the ARBCOM (like facts, the use of policies, manners of conduct etc). A good thing to start on policies would be WP:Purpose and WP:5P the only firm rule. I hope I helped Shadowmorph (talk) 10:58, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

We've got another new user showing up--Dimorsitanos--and adding himself to the involved parties list. While SQRT's innocent posting may not have been intended to open the flood gate, I fear that this is just the tip of the iceberg. The clerks deleted the last person who added themselves to the list, but there are still comments on the evidence page from at least two previously uninvolved parties and a whole section on this page from a previously uninvolved user. I wait eagerly for the involved users to post over the weekend (as I will be doing myself). (Taivo (talk) 16:29, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Please excuse my frustration, but we now have about one-third of the "evidence" on the evidence page presented by users who were not registered users at the time that this arbitration was filed. I'm sorry, but that is unacceptable to me. Does Wikipedia arbitration actually allow a newly-registered user to issue a notice to join the discussion outside Wikipedia and then allow all those new users to contribute their "evidence" to an arbitration? (Taivo (talk) 03:25, 25 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

I don't see a need to request an excuse for the frustration. But, for what it's worth, just because the "evidence" is there doesn't necessarily mean that, if it doesn't say anything particularly useful, anyone will pay any attention to it. Were I an arbitrator, and I know I'm not, never have been, and probably never will be, I think all I'd do is look for any real evidence in their comments, and, if I don't see any, basically, well, ignore them. 14:23, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

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Questions to the parties

How do other-language Wikipedias handle this conflict?

(Or, if they don't have this conflict, how do they avoid having it?) --83.253.240.46 (talk) 00:18, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The Swedish (my native) wiki uses Makedonien, the German (second biggest wiki after English) uses Mazedonien, the French (third biggest) uses Macédoine (pays) (I can only presume that pays means country). Three examples, you can just look yourself otherwise under "Languages" on the left side, it's somewhat mixed over the different languages. The reasons (on the Swedish Wikipedia) stated for the naming include "sovereign country is priority", the same goes for other countries that might be controversial outside of Sweden, Irland (Ireland), Kina (China), Taiwan (Republic of China/Taiwan) chan dler ··· 00:49, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I regret to say that I haven't actually looked into the matter myself, but here goes.

The first thing that we might want to remember is that this is by far the largest wikipedia. That means we get lots of editors from all over the world and that tends to make disagreements, even extreme ones, more likely.

Second, remember that most other wikis, with maybe exceptions in Spanish and French, tend to be limited to only a single country or a small number of countries. As a result, it is much easier and probably more likely that there will be less disagreement there, because there's more of a consensus to the best-known name.

Those are just guesses, but they are based on what I have seen in terms of other articles. Anyone with more concrete knowledge of this particular case is encouraged to add whatever direct information they might have. John Carter (talk) 00:23, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Magyar (Hungarian) labels the article Macedónia, but has Macedónia Volt Jugoszláv Köztársaság as the "foreign name" bolded in the first sentence and bolded in the first sentence of the section labelled "Neve" (Name). Macedón Köztársaság (Macedonian Republic) is listed as the domestic name in the second sentence of the "Neve" section. Except in these three sentences, Macedónia is used everywhere else in the article. There is no disambiguation page listed or linked to. On the map shown at Görögország (Greece), it is labelled simply as Macedónia. I checked the history on these articles and they have been stable for a very long time. [addition] The only notable piece of relevant vandalism on the Macedónia article was the insertion of the acronym "(FYROM)" in the first sentence. Of course, "FYROM" means absolutely nothing in Magyar. (Taivo (talk) 00:30, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

There's no need to do a case by case analysis. Just go to the country article and hover over the interwiki links. The large majority of them have ROM, fewer have M and a handful of them have FYROM or Macedonia (country).--Avg (talk) 00:46, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

For people interested in the general inter-wiki wide situation here it is.

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"Republic of..." 81: /Template:Country data World Spanish; República de Macedonia; / Italian; Repubblica di Macedonia; / Portugese; República da Macedónia; /Template:Country data World Russian; Республика Македония; Afrikaans; Republiek van Masedonië; / Alemannic German; Republik Mazedonien; Amharic; የመቄዶንያ ሬፑብሊክ; Anglo Saxon; Cynewīse Macedonia; Aragonese; Republica de Mazedonia; Template:Country data Aromanians Aromanian; Republica ali Machedonia; Franco-Provencal/Arpitan; Rèpublica de Macèdonie; Asturian; República de Macedonia; Azeri; Makedoniya Respublikası; Min Nan; Makedonija Kiōng-hô-kok; Belarussian; Рэспубліка Македонія; Bosnian; Republika Makedonija; Breton; Republik Makedonia; Bulgarian; Република Македония; // Catalan; República de Macedònia; Chuvash; Македони Республики; Cebuano; Republika sa Macedonia; Welsh; Gweriniaeth Macedonia; Template:Country data World Esperanto; Respubliko Makedonio; Basque; Mazedoniako Errepublika; Võro; Makõdoonia Vabariik; Waray-Waray; Republika han Masedonya; Zazaki; Cumurêtê Makedonya; Faroese; Lýðveldið Makedónia; Irish; Poblacht na Macadóine; Manx; Pobblaght ny Massadoan; Hawaiian; Repupalika o Masedonia; Upper Sorbian; Republika Makedonska; / Croatian; Republika Makedonija; Template:Country data World Ido; Republiko Macedonia; Bahasa Indonesian; Republik Makedonia; Ossetian; Республикæ Македони; Icelandic; Lýðveldið Makedónía; Javanese; Republik Makedonia; Kapampangan; Republic of Macedonia; Kazakh; Македония Республикасы; Cornish; Repoblek Makedoni; /// Swahili; Jamhuri ya Masedonia; Komi; Македония Республика; Haitian Creole; Republik d Masedoni; Kurdish; Komara Makedonyayê; /Template:Country data World Latin; Respublica Macedonica; Bahasa Malaysian; Republik Macedonia; Mongolian; Бүгд Найрамдах Македон Улс; Norfolk/Pitcairn creole; Repablik o' Masedoenya; Norwegian (Nynorsk and Bokmål); Republikken Makedonia; Occitan; Republica de Macedònia; Uzbeki; Makedoniya Respublikasi; Dutch Low Saxon; Republiek Makedonien; Crimean Tatar; Makedoniya Cumhuriyeti; / Romanian; Republica Macedonia; Romany; Republika Makedoniya; Sakha; Македония Республиката; / Sami; Makedonia dásseváldi; Scottish; Republic o Macedonie; / Albanian; Republika e Maqedonisë; Sicilian; Ripùbblica di Macidonia; //Template:Country data World Simple English; Republic of Macedonia; Slovenian; Republika Makedonija; // Serbian; Република Македонија; // Serbocroatian; Republika Makedonija; Tagalog; Republika ng Masedonya; Tajik; Ҷумҳурии Мақдуния; // Turkish; Makedonya Cumhuriyeti; Udmurt; Республика Македония; Ukranian; Республіка Македонія; / Uyghur; Makédoniye Jumhuriyiti; Venetian; Republica de Macedonia; Vietnamese; Cộng hòa Macedonia; Chinese; 馬其頓共和國; Classical Chinese; 馬其頓共和國; / Wolof; Réewum Maseduwaan; Korean; 마케도니아 공화국 [7]; Nahuatl; Tlācatlahtocāyōtl Macedontlān; Malayalam; റിപ്പബ്ലിക് ഓഫ് മാസിഡോണിയ; / Tamil; மாக்கடோனியக் குடியரசு; / Assyrian Neo-Aramaic; ܩܘܛܢܝܘܬܐ ܕܡܩܕܘܢܝܐ

| class="col-break " |

"Macedonia" 37: // German; Mazedonien; Polish; Macedonia; Japanese; マケドニア共和国 [8]; Template:Country data World Arabic; مقدونيا (translit: maqaduniya); / Guarani; Masedoña; Česky; Makedonie; Danish; Makedonien; Lower Sorbian; Makedońska; Estonian; Makedoonia; / Ewe; Macedonia; Farsi; مقدونیه (translit: maqeduniya); / Hakka; Mâ-khì-tun; Hebrew; מקדוניה; Georgian; მაკედონია; Latvian; Maķedonija; Lithuanian; Makedonija; Hungarian; Macedónia; Macedonian; Македонија; Egyptian Arabic; مقدونيا; Chechen; Македони; / Pashto/Afghani; مقدونيه; Piedmontese; Macedònia; /// Quecha; Makidunya; Saterland Frisian; Mazedonien; Slovak; Macedónsko; Silesian; Macedůńijo; Finnish; Makedonia; Swedish; Makedonien; Template:Country data World Church Slavonic; Макєдоні́ꙗ; Telugu; మేసిడోనియా; / Urdu; مقدونیہ; Template:Country data World Volapük; Makedoniyän; Samogitian; Makeduonėjė; Thai; ประเทศมาซิโดเนีย [9] compared to [10]; Nepali; म्यासेडोनिया; Armenian; Մակեդոնիա hy:Մակեդոնիա; Hindi; मैसिडोनिया [11]

"Macedonia (country)" 4: /Template:Country data World French; Macédoine (pays); Netherlandic/Dutch; Macedonië (land); West Frisian; Masedoanje (lân); Limbourgish; Macedonië (land)

"Former Yugoslav..." 2: / Greek; Πρώην Γιουγκοσλαβική Δημοκρατία της Μακεδονίας; / Pontic Greek; ΠΓΔΜ

others 1: Galician; Macedonia (ARIM) - Македонија (ПЈРМ) (the second half is strangely in the Macedonian language?)

Template:EndMultiCol

Note: The top ten inter-wikis are bolded. I have tried to get the flag/country data as close as possible. Please dont cut sick at if you have a minor issue. PMK1 (talk) 05:57, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for doing that work. So, to summarise, six of the top ten wikis use "Macedonia" by itself or with "(country)" as a disambiguator, and four use "Republic of Macedonia". Only three wikis use "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" (not surprisingly, two of those are Greek wikis). I should add that many of the smaller wikis take their lead from the English wiki in terms of naming and article content, so the names of their articles may reflect this wiki more than it reflects any conscious choice on the part of the editors. -- ChrisO (talk) 07:40, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

There are two very interesting observations here. First, the mk wikipedia had the name "Република Македонија" for the article since it was first created back in 2005. It changed its name to "Македонија" two days ago [12], just after the arbitration started. And suddenly, we hear that "Macedonia" alone is the preferred self-identification. But more on that on the evidence page.

Secondly, ChrisO just above accepts that "many of the smaller wikis take their lead from the English wiki in terms of naming". Even if I wanted to say that he was simply irresponsible in changing the name by not knowing the scale of the impact, he proves once again, that he knew the effect that en wiki has and he still did it, so it was a deliberate move.--Avg (talk) 16:25, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"So it was a deliberate move"... No can't be, I was under the impression ChrisO had moved it in his sleep... I don't really see what you're trying to achieve with your comment above. The move is not wrong, Macedonia in English == the country. chan dler ··· 16:39, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Wrong info should be fixed. 共和國 = 共和国 = 공화국 mean "Republic".--Caspian blue 16:50, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Avg, as for your comments doubting the influence of English Wikipedia over smaller ones; we will just have to see whether or not changes are made on the other wikipedias. Nobody here can predict the future; we will all have to wait. On your comments about "Republika Makedonija"; well when many Macedonians refer to simply "Makedonija" they often refer to Macedonia (region); in that type of context. It is clear that on English Wiki that is unacceptable practise, (so it should be). Anyways as Fut.Perf. predicted somewhere you have steered the conversation elsewhere. (No Offence). PMK1 (talk) 00:14, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Perfect, why then did people change the article title in mk wiki, if not to push a POV in the arbitration case? It is very well known that a large percentage of the Slav Macedonian editors are active in both wikis. And it is quite funny that you, a Slav Macedonian, admit that many Slav Macedonians refer to Macedonia in a United Macedonia context. On your last comment, you know, efforts to create a chilling effect on opposing parties probably doesn't reflect good on you, as it didn't to the original accuser, in case you missed it.--Avg (talk) 02:51, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It is not just English Wikipedia with a strong influence over the others. Take Dutch wikipedia which has "Macedonia (county)", with the two other wikipedias based primarily in Holland taking a similar stance (West Frisian/Limbourgish). The same could be said for Croatian/Bosnian/Serbian/Serbocroatian/Slovenian. Italian could also possibly affect Venetian and Sicilian Wikis. A change in Spanish wikipedia could very easily influence Aragonese/Catalan/Basque/Asturian/Quecha/Galician/Nahuatl. In turn the English Wikipedia could be said to have influence over Anglo Saxon/Simple English/Welsh/Hawaiian/Manx/Irish/Faroese/Cornish/Norfolk creole/Scottish/Afrikaans/Cebuano/Kapampangan. Russian also has possible influences in Belarussian/Estonian/Chuvash/Võro/Ossetian/Kazakh/Komi/Uzbeki/Crimean Tatar/Tajik/Udmurt wikipedias. One change in the Major Wiki could precipitate several changes. PMK1 (talk) 00:26, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Mongolian also appears to use "Republic of Macedonia", not "former Yugoslav..." anything; at least mn:Бүгд Найрамдах Чех Улс is the Czech Republic, not any once Yugoslav state. That leaves two, both Greek-speaking. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:32, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Here is the direct inter-wiki link [13] I would not stress if it is not 100% correct. I have restored it. PMK1 (talk) 04:52, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Avg, before the move on mk wiki, I'm pretty sure Македонија was simply a redirect to Република Македонија. So the move would simply have been technical. In Macedonian, Македонија refers to the Republic of Macedonia in most cases, rather than the larger region. Balkan Fever 10:59, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

mk:Македонија (регион) was moved to mk:Македонија on 6 Dec 2008[14] and back to mk:Македонија (регион) on 19 Apr 2009[15]. Details of the article names related to Macedonia over time can be found at mk:Македонија (појаснување). Andreas ^(T) 13:16, 25 April 2009 (UTC) It is also to note that the articles el:Μακεδονία (about the wider Region) and el:Μακεδονία (διαμέρισμα) (about the Greek region) were never moved. Andreas ^(T) 13:36, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Has any of the Greek or Macedonian editors considered to recuse themselves when it comes to this touchy subject?

If not, how do you argue that a strong national POV (over 90%-95% of Greeks with a specific opinion as claimed by the Greek side itself, and probably the same for Macedonians) does not tantamount to a conflict of interest? man with one red shoe 03:47, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You may have missed the comments by User:Tasoskessaris who was strongly opposed to the ethnic profiling of users. He pulled out of the straw poll but did not pull out of the arbitration. As for Macedonian editors, I have only noticed 3 or 4 involved with this current issue. I am sure that there are many other editors some who genuinely are not interested in pushing their national POV's and Edit warring and some who have not learned of this ARB case. PMK1 (talk) 05:02, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The title should reference "Macedonian Greek and Macedonian editors ..." if it was supposed to be NPOV. The WP conflict of interest is defined for personal affiliations (like in autobiographies) or close relations (a page about someone's company). It is not about a whole group of people and their race/nationality/place of origin. The American official position about Macedonia shifted in 2003, so I could assert that if you were say American, you have a conflict of interest. If that was the case then all Americans that have edited Wikipedia should fall into WP:COI when they edit the pages like America, United States or even Iraq ...you get my point. My main objection was the concentration of data about ethnicities (for either group supporting or oppossin) in one page. Lists like that are a discrace. Of course the data can be retrieved if someone wan't to dig enough about it. If it was a list of Jewish editors, wouldn't that be a discrace? Besides the reasons of making this list are obvious Ad hominem. There is also the danger of this list appearing in outside wiki places. The IPs of editors have been accidentally shown in the past (Hussond recently in the talk page revealed it by not logging in) and the persons in the list might even become targets of direct real life attacks. WP:COI would be the case only for politicians or officials or spies that are actually real-life involved. Shadowmorph (talk) 10:25, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So the short answer is I will recuse when all Americans recuse in articles like Iraq or even Macedonia. Shadowmorph (talk)

Man with one red shoe. I must disagree with this. While the middle and end of Shadowmorph's comment drops into irrelevance, his concise first statement about WP:COI is accurate. The three or four Greek editors who have been involved with this case since long before it was sent to arbitration are generally honest, thoughtful, and well-meaning individuals who have a legitimate voice to add to the discussion. (Taivo (talk) 13:41, 25 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

I don't know, again it's not bad faith or dishonesty, is bias. And is a larger issue in my view, I mentioned in other places this example: take the Chinese, they are numerous, they have a specific POV regarding Tibet, they would be able to filibuster, edit war (but not infringe any 3RR individually -- there's no need when there are many people doing it) and vote in straw polls regarding national POV issues, they wouldn't need to be "nationalists" they would simply see themselves as "patriots", they will be able to block any change that they don't agree with. The question is, can we find some way to avoid a national bias leaking into Wikipedia? (not that it didn't happen, but it can get worse then simply deciding what name to pick for Macedonia). Again, the problem is not ideas that people bring forth, the problem is where the sheer number of the editors makes a difference: edit wars, filibustering, straw polls. I personally would not accept the result of a biased poll, would Greeks accept results of a poll taken mostly by Turks when it comes to Greek history, islands, Cyprus, genocide of Greeks in Anatolia? (BTW, how about the genocide of Armenians, should we ask the Turks if it was a genocide or not?) I don't accuse Turks of anything, I don't "assume bad faith", but there are different POVs that are different distributed in different nations and we have to take that into account when we examine the results of straw polls (and whether is good to use them at all in such matters). In this case I was just testing to see if people of nations that are involved directly in this naming conflict if they are willing to recuse themselves, it seems that's not the case. Just asking... move forward.... man with one red shoe 18:47, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I regret to say that I have never known many people who do clearly prove themselves non-neutral who ever readily acknowledge it. Also, particularly considering that in most cases people with an interest in a country are most likely to read material about it, in most cases they can somewhat reasonably see themselves as more "expert" than most, and will on that basis be doubly insulted by someone saying they aren't objective. I actually do wish such people would recuse themselves, but, unfortunately, I'm not holding my breath for it. John Carter (talk) 19:04, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I am a bit lost with all these discussions and points going on simultaneously and I don't really know when, where and if I have to bother answering all this stuff that's flying all over the place. But this point made by the man with the one red shoe is interesting and so I will reply. So here it goes: As Greeks or Macedonians we must recuse ourselves because we have our national POV. Perfect. But how do I know what is the background of the man with the one red shoe. He is obviously not revealing his name, nationality, allegiance, country, POV he may have etc. Why should such a user be in a more privileged position than another user who chose to reveal his name, country and many more details about himself. Should secrecy be assumed to be automatically NPOV? That's absolute hogwash and confused thinking. I respect PMK1, Balkan Fever, Macedonians, Albanians, Turkish people, Mongolians, Armenians etc. etc. I do not want anyone recused. The only one maybe that may neeed to recuse himself must be the man with the red shoe because he keeps coming up with these ideas for filtering out people based on their ethnicity while at the same time he does not reveal his. The level of this debate is falling like a brick. Dr.K. logos 23:44, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please no more of this ethnic profiling. The fact that people are Greeks or Macedonians of any background Greek or Slav does not automatically render them brain damaged when it comes to the Macedonia naming issue. People have ideas. Judge them by their ideas not by their ethnicity, race, sexual orientation or any other identifier or slogan. If that were the case then the Israelis and the Palestinians should never have to negotiate amongst themselves because they would have to recuse themselves from such a touchy subject such as the Palestinian problem. Gays need not be consulted about same sex marriage. Forget about asking blacks about contributing to racial discrimination related articles etc. etc. This is simply ridiculous. Editor apartheid is not the solution. Dr.K. logos 00:02, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have to agree. I acknowledge that there are possibly several individuals from both "sides" in this argument whose contributions are, at best, dubiously thought through and considered. I would certainly welcome seeing most if not all of them recuse themselves. The fact that even some of the remaining editors will have rather intractable positions isn't that surprising. I think I've seen that in virtually every disagreement I've seen in wikipedia. In general, in those cases, there often can be some sort of compromise at least at some level. I have no objections to seeing some of the less reasonable participants in these discussions told to not take part, because in general their comments are less than productive. But I personally would seek their removal more for their incompetence and intransigence than because of their ethnicity.

Having said that, there is the fact that there seems to be a real difference of opinion on the naming issue between the two factions here. I honestly cannot think of any way to resolve that problem, but I don't think that it makes sense to tell thoughtful editors to go away simply because of their ethnicity. John Carter (talk) 00:12, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

A few more thoughts following John's comment. I see no factions. At least, I think that counting heads is counter-productive. Allow me to illustrate this. Let's ban all US editors because their president recognised this country by its constitutional name and there are hordes of them in the english branch of Wikipedia. And no more oranges from Florida. Let's also ban UK editors, because of their country's "special relationship" with the US. Balkan editors should be banned too and, hopefully, relocated to Mars, eating their hearts out. Germans should have no say in this, because of the Holocaust (everything has to do with the Holocaust). Soon, we'll be left with an editor from some obscure observatory in Antarctica, trying to make sense of it all. All? What all? The Jews did it! SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 00:38, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) @John: I agree completely. It is relatively easy to detect intransigence or filibustering using logic. We don't need to employ ethnicity-based analysis for that. Editors engaging in such behaviour may be asked politely to stop. But disagreement is not a sin. I don't have to agree with everything the opposing side proposes, the same way that the so-called uninvolved or neutral editors don't agree on all points amongst themselves either. That's, after all, the reason we came to the arbcom. I am Greek, but that doesn't automatically make me a neutral party for the Palestinian-Israel related articles, because I may have a strong POV favouring one side or the other. My ethnicity has nothing to do with my neutrality on any issue. Intellectual honesty and analytical/cognitive skills are the most important parameters in any debate, not personal identifiers. But, to tell you the truth John, I am tired of making these points which I consider to be so plainly obvious. I wish we could argue about something really interesting instead of being stuck in a seemingly endless cycle of anti-intellectual ethnicity oriented debates which can only promote ignorance, editor apartheid and ethnicity-based cleansing of contributions. Dr.K. logos 00:58, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

One certain ethnicity cannot be blamed in what ever the case. People need to realise that for the past 20 years Greece has been promoting the idea that "Macedonia is Greek". I am sure that many users here (who are probably young), have been brought up believing that. I sympathize with them, they have been educated and brought up that "Macedonia is Greek" but on Wikipedia, Macedonia is not Greek. I think that the practise of ethnic profiling has served is purpose in this particular case and from now on is no longer necessary here. It served to provide evidence of the walled garden. PMK1 (talk) 01:29, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree PMK1 with your point that "the practise of ethnic profiling has served is purpose in this particular case". It was not only the Greeks that were profiled. Others, including even the Albanians, were also profiled as "involved ethicitities" Are you to tell me you are somehow "inferior" to the "superior" so-called "neutral" nationalities? Or are you inferior because you did not hide your ethnicity while others routinely do so and thus are considered automatically superior to you? Is a nicknamed user who hides all info about themselves an automatically flawless editor? So let's all hide our personal information so that we can reach a state of perfection. Perfection through information suppression. How zen. Or is an editor who provides no logical reason for supporting one side or the other better than someone who although Greek gave a logical argument to support their position? Or am I supposed to reject your opinion or your compatriots' opinions simply because your nation is involved in this dispute and for no other intellectual reason? Am I supposed to consider you a brainless automaton just because your nation is at odds with mine? The premise of ethnicity based analysis is offensive to the human spirit and it is a regressive step in the evolution of the intellect. Dr.K. logos 02:19, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I think for example a Chinese would be less passionate about the name used in Wikipedia for Republic of Macedonia and would me more likely to pay attention to the policies and try to work some compromise than somebody who think that if we use "Macedonia" name for the republic the Universe will implode, Greeks would be evacuated from Greek Macedonia and that part of the country would be glued to the Republic of Macedonia. A Chinese or somebody from South Africa would also be less likely to support using a name like "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" in Greece page alone, when all the rest of the pages use a different name. man with one red shoe 03:17, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I do agree in some aspects with what Dr K and John Carter have recently said. There is no need to judge a user's neutrality simply by their membership to a certain community. But if you look at their arguments, the similarity (even repetition) of those arguments by members of the same community, the sheer numbers and activity of the members of that community when discussions about real-world disputes take place, it's different. There is a pattern. Others have gone into more depth about that and I'll leave it for them.

About the logical arguments, what we have seen is "uninvolved" (by nationality) users rebut the arguments of the one side with other (more?) logical arguments, not with "you are Greek so you are wrong". And it doesn't help that many of the arguments aren't very logical, and come from nationalist POV-pushers and trolls (I won't name individuals) rather than intelligent users (e.g. Dr K). Discussion gets flooded with off-topic rants (regarded as relevant by those who post them) and even ethnic slurs. The truth is if all editors from "involved" nationalities were to recuse themselves, we wouldn't have any morons, at the expense of some non-nationalists not participating.

Where are the (automatically involved) ethnic Macedonian editors anyway? It's basically me and PMK1, and two other Macedonians having been active at Talk:Greece or Talk:Macedonia but not at this arbitration (I'm not even a party to the case). Where are the Macedonians who have been canvassed in? Where are the Macedonians "defending national honour"? Macedonian users have had almost no influence on the recent discussions, while Greek users have made a larger impact, and this needs to be addressed in some way.

I'm not sure where else I'm going with this, so I'll wrap it up: Remove the users who rant and filibuster, address the arguments of those who actually contribute, see where it goes. That seems to have already happened though - the rants and the profiling stuff have been "noise" but legitimate arguments were nonetheless countered with other legitimate arguments. Balkan Fever 03:28, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I do agree with some parts in your post, but what about straw polls? Do they have any meaning in case of such strong POV? man with one red shoe 03:35, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

They provide an insight into the problem: see Talk:Greece/Naming poll#Results summary by FP. They don't solve disputes, that's what discussion is for. Balkan Fever 03:53, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you Balkan Fever for your nice comments and I agree that polls cannot replace intelligent discussion in solving disputes. But I disagree that the results summary given by FP provides any insight into the problem, except if you count misleading claims as insight. FP's analysis is based on simplistic generalisations that ethnicity determines the POV or NPOV of an editor. But it conveniently neglects to account for the pre-existing history of the dispute which included such notable attempts at compromise as WP:MOSMAC. I did not participate in the formulation of MOSMAC and I don't know if you did but the presence of MOSMAC indicates that things cannot be simplistically attributed only to the Greek POV. There was dialogue between the various parties and there was some progress made in the form of that essay. Now FP and others abandon this effort and in a hurry they proclaim a new orthodoxy whereby MOSMAC and related efforts are replaced by slogans and ethnicity-driven allegations. It looks too manufactured to be believable. This new orthodoxy also would have us believe that the various ethnic editors who until now have been able to reach a level of accommodation with each other cannot any longer be trusted to contribute in solving the problem, since they are involved ethnicities, but everyone else on the planet can have a hand at solving the problem. As well, editors who hide their identity and other personal information are also assumed to be neutral parties as long as they are against the Greek position. Slogans such as walled gardens and nationalism replace intelligent conversation and propaganda reigns supreme. Bottom line: If the problem was so simple as the ethnic-based analysis proponents and practitioners would have us believe there would have been no MOSMAC. The mere presence of MOSMAC and the fact that many editors engaged in its development indicates that this dispute is not as simplistic as the current anti-intellectual orthodoxy would have us believe. Dr.K. logos 04:48, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Dr K., I disagree with the call for recusal (see above). I would hate to continue this discussion without your involvement, for example. I disagree with you, but I respect you. But I continually find your attempts to paint this as anything other than a nationalistic dispute to be weak, at best. This isn't ethnic profiling, which wrongly attributes negative actions to an ethnicity based on their ethnic status. Ethnic profiling is stopping a black driver on the highway when he is obeying the law just to see if he has drugs in the glove compartment. That's ethnic profiling. When there are two parties to a dispute and one party is nearly all Greek and follows the national policy of Greece right down the line, and the other party has not a single Greek, pointing out that fact is not "ethnic profiling". If this were not a national issue, then one could reasonably expect a mix of Greeks and non-Greeks on both sides of the issue. One would expect a certain number of Greek editors to see the validity of the other side as well. That is the statistical probability based on any issue that does not have nationalistic consequences. Not all Greeks think alike, are educated alike, etc. so on a straw poll for the, say, composition of Genghis Khan's inner circle, we would expect half of the involved Greeks on one side and half of the involved Greeks on the other side. We could even expect half the Mongols to align on one side and half on the other if it was an objective discussion without nationalistic implications. But the discussion of what to call Macedonia is strictly polarized. There is not one single Greek on the "Macedonia" side of the issue. Not a single one. That, without any other evidence, is enough to demonstrate that this is a nationalistic issue for the Greek editors participating in this discussion. Maybe there are Greek Wikipedia editors that disagree with the "Greek" position here. But they are not participating and have not uttered a peep in the discussions at either Talk:Greece or Talk:Macedonia. I have great respect for Greeks. I have shared cubicles with them at several jobs and have dated a couple of Greek women. So trying to paint me as "anti-Greek" is a mistake. But this is a nationalistic issue. The statistics of participation and choice of stance are irrefutable. (Taivo (talk) 05:11, 26 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

In this latest chain of events, the ethnic editors from both sides are the least responsible. They understand the issue and they had worked a good compromise between them in MOSMAC and they were faithful to their word. It is a small amount of (supposedly) third party editors that caused this huge amount of disruption and policy violations. And I do not have a problem at naming ChrisO and Fut.Perf. as the two main perpetrators. I mentioned back then in the poll section and I will mention it now, Fut.Perf. ethnic profiling would automatically place an editor like ChrisO with no useful input in the debate and a history of disruption in many controversial topics in a higher ground than Dr.K. or Yannismarou, two absolutely sterling editors with no history at all of involvement in this kind of topics. And the reason being that ChrisO has simply stated that he is not Greek or ethnic Macedonian. Leaving aside the absolutely racist connotation that some ethnicities are incapable of producing intelligent discourse, let me turn the tables. How do we know where he is really living? How do we really know what is his ethnicity? What ethnicity are his parents? His wife (if he's married)? Has he a COI with the subject? Is he employed by en employer who has COI with this subject? Has any Greek or ethnic Macedonian had a conflict with him in the past? Are there a lot of Greeks or ethnic Macedonians in his neighborhood? Is he an agent? This is a very sad string of arguments and it must be stopped right now. At the beginning. We, as the community that collectively writes an encyclopedia, have to be absolutely adamant in that all editors should only be judged by their editorial merit. Any arguments based on the ethnicity of the editor should not only strongly be discouraged but be a punishable offence. In fact isn't that the case already?--Avg (talk) 05:36, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How is it racist to call out that there are Greeks who think they have the monopoly on the name Macedonia (which happens to be the common name in English of a neighbouring country) and they want that to be shown on Wikipedia. As the politically incorrect would say, a false stereotype never sticks. I've yet to see any evidence of that Macedonia is not the common name for the country, I've mostly complains about the move-process "ChrisO knew what he was doing", "The move was pre-planned", "ChrisO is a dangerous editor" from the registered editors and rants from IPs who try to argue that Macedonia referring to the country can not be verified or be neutral. chan dler ··· 06:10, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Chandler, please go back and see in which page the country article resides in right now. It is in the disambiguation page, not in a format of say Macedonia (country), that could possibly have a remote sort of justification from being the common name. Macedonia is the common name in English for the Ancient Macedonia, for the region of Macedonia, for the Greek Macedonia and, even for Macedonia in Ohio. So your argument is simply irrelevant. And also, you know, we don't need to reinvent the wheel. Policies are here for a reason. If you do not understand why they are here please go and have a second read. It doesn't need to be explained again and again that without these policies Wikipedia cannot function at all. These are the fundamental principles for writing a collaborative encyclopaedia. Otherwise, ChrisO, you, me and whoever else can just post their articles on their site or blog and that would be all.--Avg (talk) 07:02, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You don't know what common name is if you think it referrs to anything other than the country. Here's a example for you: A newspapers writes a story, "Forest fires in Macedonia"[16][17], No it's not Macedonia, Ohio (which will be described as Macedonia in Ohio), its not the region (which will be described as the wider region of Macedonia or something similar) nor Greek Macedonia (which will be described as "Macedonia the greek region" or "Macedonia in Greece" etc.). It is the country. (ancient macedonia will be referred to as Ancient Macedonia, just as Ancient Greece, or Ancient Egypt is). If you do a simple news search of Macedonia on English language news websites you'll find yourself with a bit of news about the country. Here's another example, if you say "I live in Macedonia" everyone will assume you're talking about the country, because thats the common usage of the word Macedonia in the English language. You think that's wrong, we already know that, but it doesn't change it. chan dler ··· 07:30, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No chandler, encyclopaedia articles are not judged by what a newspaper or news site writes. Or all of them for that matter. Obviously news sources report news(duh). So not much chance you'll hear news about for example Macedonia. This will consequently skew news references and google hits. And this, among others, is why the methodology ChrisO uses is highly problematic. I think you also might want to have a look at WP:RECENTISM. --Avg (talk) 12:37, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

(ecx2) Taivo hi. Thank you for your nice comments. I enjoy talking to you and respect you as well, even though we do disagree on some points. I really don't see where you got the impression that I try to paint you as anti-Greek. I have never referred to you in this way at all, neither would I ever want to. I am very pleased that you dated Greek women. That's an application of ethnic profiling that I can agree with wholeheartedly. Back to the subject at hand however. The definition of Ethnic profiling states:

Racial profiling is the inclusion of racial or ethnic characteristics in determining whether a person is considered likely to commit a particular type of crime or an illegal act or to behave in a "predictable" manner.

It is this insistence that the behaviour of editors can be predicted based solely on their nationality that constitutes the profiling. There is disagreement among editors even on the definition of the term Macedonia and how confusing the term is, or what it means and what criteria should be used to define it. Couple this to the fact that the naming policies of Wikipedia are not completely clear and you have pedictably a big problem. That there is no Greek editor who disagreed with the use of the term "FYROM" may be due to the fact that MOSMAC was a well established and respected convention that worked in practice and was respected by most editors versed in all matters Macedonia until Future decided to abrogate it. Respecting MOSMAC became a rallying cry for the Greek editors who also became uneasy by FP's precipitous actions and persuaded them to vote along the same lines. There are Greek editors who abstained from voting. So not all Greek editors supported the "FYROM" term. Terefore there are plausible reasons for this seeming conformity among Greek editors other than slogans and ethnic profiling innuendo. It's always nice talking to you, nevertheless I'll try to end this here since I think I addressed the main points and my typing skills always try to remind me to make discusssions as brief as practicable. Take care for now. Dr.K. logos 06:32, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Dr. K, no, you never called me "anti-Greek", but other, less well-mannered editors here have. I would gladly like to know of any Greek Wikipedia editors who have not lined up on the same side as all the involved Greek editors. Until I actually have an example of a Greek editor who disagrees with the Greek national position vis a vis this issue, however, their behavior has been 100% predictable. So far every single new self-identified or clearly Greek editor has lined up on the same side with all the other Greek editors. Please, show me a counterexample. And MOSMAC was not a "success". It clearly states that in Greek-related articles there was no consensus, but nearly everywhere else Republic of Macedonia or Macedonia was to be used. This whole arbitration did not start with ChrisO's action, but in the failure to find any kind of consensus at Greece for the use of Republic of Macedonia rather than the non-self-identification (and non-Wikipedia-approved) "FYROM". That's the failure of MOSMAC--it did not definitively establish a single Wikipedia-wide policy. This issue was already headed for arbitration with or without ChrisO's action. That nearly always goes unmentioned in the comments being made by the Greek editors on the Evidence page. ChrisO's action is only the opening act--the main show was already scheduled--"(Republic of) Macedonia" at Greece. (Taivo (talk) 08:49, 26 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Just to explain myself, I was talking of examples like this one:
1. directly interested party - check
2. real-life POV - check
3. only reason he cares about the issue - check
(and everything is self-admitted, there are probably many editors that are not that honest and push their agenda in a hidden way)

I don't know if this is COI as defined in Wikipedia, I actually started to believe that it isn't, but it's at least bias and demonstrated interest in promoting a POV. I have more examples where editors show the reasons for using another name than "Macedonia" that are based on real-life POVs, I don't even have to go far, in the Evidence page of this case there are a number of arguments made why "Macedonia" name should not be used for the name of the republic, arguments that are not based on Wikipedia's policy, but on real-life political considerations. What we should actually discuss are things like: do we use the common English term? Do we need disambiguation? How to disambiguate if we need it? None of these things should be political, this should be relatively easy to decide, the very fact that this is a "controversy" it shows that POV from real-life is dripping into Wikipedia and there should be a way to limit this. My interest and effort in this case is not to promote a specific solution or to disenfranchise Greek editors, but to find some principles that can help us in such cases of strong POV and in finding ways to achieve NPOV, I personally think that's a weakness of Wikipedia that it depends on a "consensus" of interested parties, and thus actually gives a strong incentive to biased parities to join the discussions with bad effects for NPOV stand of Wikipedia. Maybe I'm just too pessimistic about the way things work here, I will try to limit my participation to this case since I feel I've wasted your time for nothing.

My question is misguided, please ignore it from now on. man with one red shoe 10:53, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

@Dr.K., my statement was in relation to how the ethnic profiling did reveal the existence of a walled garden. By stating "it served" (past tense); I was trying to convey the notion that it should no longer be related to this case anymore (except for the complaints about it perhaps).

Anyways, nobody was saying that "You are a Greek who voted with the Greek national POV; therefore your vote does not count". Users (most notably FP and ChrisO) were merely making the point that people from a similar background all had the same Point of Veiw on this issue. PMK1 (talk) 11:17, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Americans all have 100% same position on Osama Bin Laden (as do Greeks and me). So we should desregard that POV then? I don't get it. Of course all Greeks would be aligned, the dispute is with Greece. Just like Serbians are aligned about Kosovo and Georgians about South Ossetia. All the points I read here lead nowhere. There will always be a POV and an opposite POV. If we diregard the one, shouldn't we disregard the others? Aren't Fut.Perf, ChrisO and others aligned? Why should their ethnicity matter? I sure don't care about who they are in real life. All opinions are created equal Shadowmorph (talk) 22:11, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know how we turned this discussion to Osama, but in any case is not opinions about Osama that should be presented. Wikipedia should present facts, and I assume it needs to present the same facts in US, Greek or any other articles with no "walled gardens" where the facts would be presented according to a national POV. In case an US article would present something that would go against anything else in Wikipedia, let's say many Americans would claim that his name is "Osama bin Evil" that being the American form of his name, then we'd look at that as POV suspicious and I wouldn't shy from asking admins to impose in US page the standard that's used in the rest of the articles. It's not POV and opposite-POV it's POV and NPOV. man with one red shoe 02:21, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Where is some proof, in the English speaking community, that the word "Macedonia" does not usually refer to the country?

I am interested in hearing something from the other side of the story. PMK1 (talk) 11:20, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have detailed arguments in my evidence[18]. Temporal context of citations in books[19], inside Wikipedia[20], related Google searches coming from major English speaking countries[21][22][23], important places by Google[24]. Add also the practices of neutral officials[25]. Of course the pre-1992 history of use of the word, that is still used by elder English speakers.That is difficult to prove online since there was no Internet then. Prior to 1992, Republic of Macedonia was always called Yugoslavia, their inhabitants Yugoslavian (e.g. basketball players).Shadowmorph (talk) 13:46, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Inter wiki use is irrelevant as it would have depended upon the reference to the former name of the article. Also we have heard that Australia annd S. Africa still dont recognise ROM as ROM. Where is some say, reference to the English speaking community upon which this encyclopedia is based? Thanks. PMK1 (talk) 14:20, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Actually much of Shadowmorph's evidence is worthless for determining what the most common meaning of "Macedonia" is. I have talked in my evidence posting about how meaningless Google numbers are. Since most of his argument is based on Google and not upon any real-world data, it can be ignored. His "neutral observers" are anything but. They are international organizations that have, based on pressure from the government of Greece, simply acquiesced to Greece's naming demands in order to keep Greece as a member. In order to join the organizations, Macedonia was forced to accept the naming injunctions demanded by Greece. These are not "neutral observers". Shadowmorph is unable to present actual English-language evidence that the most common usage of "Macedonia" in English is not for the country. When you look at English-language atlases, there is only one American publisher that does not use simply "Macedonia" as the name of the country. Published atlas usage is the most reliable indicator of what common usage is. Shadowmorph claims that history references more commonly use "Macedonia" for the ancient region. Of course they do, just as all news media use "Macedonia" for the modern country. But the question isn't what do history professors use, but what do common English speakers use. They look at atlases and watch the news. The vast majority of English speakers have never cracked open a history book except for the few minutes required to study for an exam in the 6th grade. This Google Books search for "Macedonia" reveals that the majority of books labelled "Macedonia" deal with the modern country and neither with the region, nor the ancient kingdom. Even the books dealing with the naming controversy simply have "Macedonia" in the title. The attempts to show that there is some great ambiguity are disingenuous and are just playing with Google numbers. Google numbers are inherently unreliable. (Taivo (talk) 15:02, 26 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

So the bad Greeks could handle some officials by what way, threatening them? But not all like CIA?. Have you noticed I narrowed some Google searches only in English speaking countries? Ok, I get your point now, Google is broken (!) Shadowmorph (talk) 22:18, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oh and if one looks the first page of results in the above link by Taivo, one finds "Macedonia: 4000 Years of Greek History and Civilization" and the 1950 book "Macedonia: its place in Balkan power politics" that was not referring a future sovereign country but the whole of the region (read it) and "Macedonia: From Philip II to the Roman Conquest". Even though the political ones will have much higher page rank because of present-day popularity. Shadowmorph (talk) 23:21, 26 April 2009 (UTC). I forgot my most important point, responding to your assertion about the English speakers education in any of the countries. So, you are saying Wikipedia should not teach history but focus on what? Alexander the Great (song) or Alexander (movie) rather than Alexander the Great. This is the reason we call it a -pedia you know! Shadowmorph (talk) 23:30, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed final decision

Proposals by ChrisO

Comment by others:

Naming conventions

4) Wikipedia:Naming conventions (WP:NC), a longstanding policy, provides that:

Generally, article naming should prefer what the greatest number of English speakers would most easily recognize, with a reasonable minimum of ambiguity, while at the same time making linking to those articles easy and second nature.
This is justified by the following principle: The names of Wikipedia articles should be optimized for readers over editors, and for a general audience over specialists.
Wikipedia determines the recognizability of a name by seeing what verifiable reliable sources in English call the subject.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Principle taken from the Ireland article names case. In this case, naming has generally been determined by what Greek editors deem to be politically acceptable to them rather than what is easiest for readers, and the naming has followed formal diplomatic terminology used by specialists rather than the common naming used by the rest of the population. -- ChrisO (talk) 20:18, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Use of common names

5) Wikipedia:Neutral point of view requires articles to be named "using the common English language name". WP:NC requires editors to "title an article using the most common name of the person or thing that is the subject of the article". Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names) makes a clear distinction between the common name of a person or thing and its formal name, defining a common name as "a commonly used name, the word "common" being used in the sense of "in general use; of frequent occurrence; usual, ordinary, prevalent, frequent." (Oxford English Dictionary, common:10a)."

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Documentation of English-language usage (presented here) indicates that the term "Macedonia" by itself is overwhelmingly used to refer to the country rather than to the region or the Greek province, and that the formal term "Republic of Macedonia" and the reference "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" are infrequently used in contemporary English works. -- ChrisO (talk) 07:34, 22 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

The analogies you had posted are a little too simplistic and not adequate for this particular case. While Azerbaijan is an interesting comparison, there are still relevant differences. Azerbaijan articles direct to the republic and Azarbaijan with the a directs to the Iranian province, in fact the latter redirects to Azerbaijan (Iran) and that's how the conflict over the term Azerbaijan was settled. In this case both Macedonias are rendered the same exact way. - Fedayee (talk) 23:36, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Use of formal names is deprecated in article titles

6) Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names) deprecates the use of full formal names for people or things in article titles: "Using a full formal name requires people to know that name, and to type more."

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Note that "Republic of Macedonia" is a full formal name, and "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" is not a name at all but a reference. -- ChrisO (talk) 07:34, 22 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Use of verifiable reliable sources

7) WP:NPOV requires that common names be used "as found in verifiable reliable sources" (with reference to Wikipedia:Verifiability). Names that are not common and do not appear in verifiable reliable sources are therefore excluded from consideration.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Note that some editors have attempted to use names such as "Republic of Skopje", "Vardarska", etc, that have no common usage and do not appear in English-language sources, except pejoratively. See evidence at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Macedonia 2/Evidence#Persistent vandalism and disruption. The use of unsourced names violates both WP:NPOV and WP:V. -- ChrisO (talk) 07:34, 22 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Use of disambiguation

8) The purpose of disambiguation, as defined by Wikipedia:Disambiguation (WP:DAB), is to resolve "conflicts in Wikipedia article titles that occur when a single term can be associated with more than one topic, making that term likely to be the natural title for more than one article." Disambiguation is not a means of promoting, endorsing or rejecting one party's point of view.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. -- ChrisO (talk) 07:34, 22 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

It's an oversimplification in this particular case. A better use of the disambiguation page is much more viable. I see there is a map on the disambiguation page which is a good thing and this idea can be pushed a little bit further. Having two or three major columns, in one having the actual former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia with its picture and the intro of its main article with smaller characters. Also having Greek and Ancient Kingdom intros with their individual columns. Each column having their maps and a text taken from their main's intro. Then the rest, less notable Macedonias at the bottom as a list. This way both will have information about their Macedonia's in the main article (which will be a better suited disambiguation page) more than the name. Obviously the solution of the disambiguation to primary topics is outside of the Arbcom mandate. - Fedayee (talk) 23:36, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disambiguating to primary topics

9) WP:DAB mandates that "When there is a well-known primary topic for an ambiguous term, name or phrase ... then that term or phrase should either be used for the title of the article on that topic or redirect to that article."

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. -- ChrisO (talk) 07:34, 22 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Determining primary topics

10) WP:DAB identifies a primary topic as one that is "much more used than any other topic covered in Wikipedia to which the same word(s) may also refer (significantly more commonly searched for and read than other meanings)" and provides several objective criteria for identifying a primary topic, including the number of incoming links from Special:WhatLinksHere, usage statistics from http://stats.grok.se, and searches from external sources. WP:DB also states that "If there is extended discussion about which article truly is the primary topic, that may be a sign that there is in fact no primary topic, and that the disambiguation page should be located at the plain title with no "(disambiguation)""

Comment by Arbitrators:

That's a misunderstanding of Wikipedia's Conflict of Interest guideline and such a misunderstanding is at least troublesome. From this broad conception almost everyone can be accused of having a conflict of interest. This guideline should only be restricted to Wikipedians who have a documented case of real life advocacy and interests which contradict core policy beyond mere ethnicity. - Fedayee (talk) 23:36, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Consensus (or lack of) does not override policy

16) Wikipedia:Consensus#Exceptions, a policy, states:

Consensus decisions in specific cases do not automatically override consensus on a wider scale – for instance, a local debate does not override the larger consensus behind a policy or guideline.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. The relevance to this case is that a lack of consensus on the application of policy, or a consensus among one group of editors to act contrary to policy, does not override the applicability of policy in the first place. In this instance, a number of editors have apparently reached a consensus that the use of common terminology as mandated by WP:NPOV and WP:NC, both policies, is unacceptable to them. That does not override the applicability of the NPOV and NC policies.

Comment by others:

Consensus is not immutable

17) Wikipedia:Consensus, a policy, states:

Consensus is not immutable. Past decisions are open to challenge and are not binding, and one must realize that such changes are often reasonable. Thus, "according to consensus" and "violates consensus" are not valid rationales for making or reverting an edit, or for accepting or rejecting other forms of proposal or action.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. The previous naming was essentially based on a political compromise between editors - not the principles set out in WP:NC. The fact that previous discussions had resulted in an informal compromise formula is not a binding factor; the naming has to be weighed against what is required by policy, not simply what is politically acceptable to editors. (Note the principle cited in #Naming conventions - "names of Wikipedia articles should be optimized for readers over editors". Our individual political views are not meant to dictate what the reader sees.) -- ChrisO (talk) 19:20, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Boldness

18) Wikipedia:Be bold, a longstanding guideline, provides that:

"The Wikipedia community encourages users to be bold when updating pages ... problems are more certain to be fixed, and will probably be fixed faster, if you are bold enough to do it yourself."

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. This principle underlay my actions in moving the page. -- ChrisO (talk) 10:42, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Meat puppetry

19) Wikipedia:Sock puppetry, a policy, states:

"Do not recruit meatpuppets. It is considered highly inappropriate to advertise Wikipedia articles to your friends, family members, or communities of people who agree with you, so that they come to Wikipedia and support your side of a debate."

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. This is in relation to #SQRT5P1D2 has solicited meatpuppets, below. -- ChrisO (talk) 09:20, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Outing

20) Wikipedia:Harassment, a policy, states:

"Posting another person's personal information (legal name, date of birth, identification numbers, home or workplace address, job title and work organisation, telephone number, email address, or other contact information, regardless of whether or not the information is actually correct) is harassment, unless that editor voluntarily posts this information, or links to this information, on Wikipedia themselves."

3) Discussions on Wikipedia concerning the use of the name Macedonia have been characterised by ethnic polarisation, with Greek and international editors forming opposing consensuses.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Evidence is at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Macedonia 2/Evidence#Ethnic polarisation. -- ChrisO (talk) 07:42, 22 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Singling out editors according to their ethnic affiliation will have dangerous precedents. - Fedayee (talk) 23:36, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It's a straightforward factual observation. It's not the first time we've had this kind of polarisation on Wikipedia articles; we can't ignore it when it happens. -- ChrisO (talk) 09:27, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Persistence of the dispute

4) Disputes on Wikipedia about the use of the name "Macedonia" have been ongoing since at least October 2003. The most recent straw poll on the issue took place in March-April 2009. The dispute remains unresolved.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. The earliest discussions I can find on the issue are at [26] and the recent straw poll is at [27]. This illustrates well the interminable nature of the dispute. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:25, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Treatment of other overlapping names

5) A number of other countries share names with geographical regions and provinces of neighbouring countries. These include Azerbaijan, Luxembourg and Moldova. Because there is no overlap with the names of other countries, the articles are not disambiguated. The use of disambiguation in country names is generally limited to instances of countries whose names overlap with that of another country (e.g. Democratic Republic of the Congo / Republic of the Congo, People's Republic of China / Republic of China, Dominican Republic / Dominica).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. The full list of countries is given at List of sovereign states. Note that there is no overlap between the name of the country Macedonia and any other country, and that where country names overlap with that of a region (but not another country), the country is invariably prioritised as the primary topic. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:25, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Just to clarify, this isn't a proposed principle; it's a finding of fact. It's an indisputable fact that we generally don't disambiguate country names simply because they may overlap with a geographical region. It may well be that we can draw a general principle from that, but for now I'm simply stating what the current situation is. -- ChrisO (talk) 21:17, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

And just to clarify the above statement clearly and prominently uses weasel words. To quote "It's an indisputable fact that we generally (italics added by me) don't disambiguate country names simply because they may overlap with a geographical region." Note not only the very early usage of a blatant weasel word but also the apparent attempt to minimize anything that isn't a nation with the term "geographical region." While there is a fact buried in that comment somewhere, the fog of language makes it hard to see. John Carter (talk) 21:21, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I say "generally" because I can think of one specific example where a country name has been disambiguated to distinguish from a regional name - i.e. Republic of Ireland / Ireland. I won't pretend I fully understand the reasons why that terminology has been chosen, but I note that it's (a) a heavily politicised dispute and (b) the subject of a previous arbitration case which did not resolve the naming issue. But generally, as I said, where a country shares a name with a geographical region or another country's province, the country's name has been given priority. I note you've not disputed that fact. -- ChrisO (talk) 21:51, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose There are other factors to consider as well, beyond those mentioned above. We would not want to set a policy/guideline/ruling which might well be problematic in a subsequent development elsewhere. Also, there are the matters of countries which are recognized only by a select few other countries to consider. I think the idea for naming expressed above is, perhaps, too simplistic to be practically useful in the long term. John Carter (talk) 18:43, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agree. People tend to look for countries, not for regions. We could list a great many regions that share the common name of a country--Mongolia, e.g., so that our list of disambiguation pages as primary targets could grow to disagreeable lengths. Most people aren't looking for the regions, however, since most people think in terms of the world being divided up into sovereign nations, not geographic regions. The "unrecognized" or "barely recognized" countries are not a problem. They do, indeed, also have common English names and articles in Wikipedia--South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Transnistria, to name but a few--and the target of Abkhazia is not a disambiguation page, but the country. Wikipedia needs simple rules for this because it is a very simple principle. No shading required. (Taivo (talk) 19:15, 25 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Oppose. Of course there other things involved. Some are conflict areas, some are stable ones. I have made a table[28] of the cases that ChrisO forgot. Most of them are about a region and not about a country. If you want please expand it. I will paste it here for convienince. If it is clustering this comment, anyone feel free to delete it. There is no debate on Luxembourg no name is disputed and no regional conflicts. In all other conflict areas except Azerbaijan the main page is never about a country. Shadowmorph (talk) 22:33, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How Wikipedia treats other conflicts

Common name article	what it is about:	countries	provinces of countries
America	disambiguation page	United States of America
Micronesia	greater region	Federated States of Micronesia
China	cultural region	Republic of China and People's Republic of China
Taiwan	island (region)	Republic of China	Taiwan Province
Ireland	the island (region)	Republic of Ireland	Northern Ireland
Korea	a formerly unified...	Republic of Korea and Democratic People's Republic of Korea
Central Africa	core region	Central African Republic (similar name)
Nagorno-Karabakh	landlocked region	Nagorno-Karabakh Republic
Abkhazia	disputed region	Republic of Abkhazia
Azerbaijan	a country	Republic of Azerbaijan	Azerbaijan (Iran)

On America, the common name of the country would be the "United States", seeing how a consensus for that name hardly would've been possible without majority of US Americans agreeing. On China/Taiwan I personally think they should be located at China and Taiwan (this is how it's done at my native wikipedia). On Ireland, I don't know if the Republic as just "Ireland" is the common usage in English, do the Irish them self (perhaps excluding the loyalists in NIR) use Ireland for the country or the island? My experience from the UK side is they seem to use "Republic" (this experience is mostly from 5 live in a sporting sense, but also tv shows), it is very possible that in the USA "Ireland" == "Republic of Ireland", it is also very possible that to most non-native English speakers "Ireland" == "Republic of Ireland" (by just hovering over the inter-wiki links there seems to be a fair number just using translation of "Ireland", but without checking they can be redirects or faulty links etc). On Korea, well I would argue that the common name of neither of those countries is Korea, but rather South and North Korea (even though you sometimes here South Korea being called Korea, though I can't recall if this is in English I've heard that). On Central African Republic, personally I've never come across this country in English usage, but perhaps just as "Czech Republic" its just the common name. On Nagorno-Karabakh, unrecognised country so I wouldn't put them in the same category. On Abkhazia, that article is about the country. chan dler ··· 08:06, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The constitutional and self-identifying name is Ireland (not "Republic of") or Eire in Irish and in their constitution here. But wait, Eire is an article about the word to refer to the region, even though it always refers to the country when used commonly. Central Africa and Micronesia are not less important because nobody talks about them. This is a wiki"-pedia". Nagorno-Karabakh is unrecognized; but "Republic of Macedonia" is also partially recognized with that name and partially with the UN term. You're right about Abkhazia redirecting, but the articles talks about the "disputed region governed by" not about the unrecognized republic; I think it shouldn't redirect there. In the Taiwan case the common usage rationale is broken. You are half-right about Korea; the common usage reasons don't apply there but the self-identificating name that has been such a cornerstone here is broken in that case. Off course you can't find a completely equal situation elsewhere, only analogues. Additive in our case is the issue of the 300BC's Macedonia, (which is hardly insignificant) Shadowmorph (talk) 08:40, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

on Ireland, yes I know the self-identifying name is Ireland, but I was more referring to how they actually use, for example do Irish media use "Ireland" for the country or island. I'm not saying Central African Republic or Micronesia are less important, only that I've not even heard about them in English so I don't have any knowledge on their common names in English. In the Korea case I would say I'm not half, but fully right, their common names are North and South Korea. I don't think self-identification can't always trump common name, for example "Greece" vs "Hellenic Republic" or "Switzerland" vs "Helvetic Confederation". How Abkhazia is handled seems somewhat similar to how Kosovo is handled, neither in really the best solution Imo... (I'm guessing most Greek editors would dislike that format for Macedonia, where that would mean more or less Republic of/Region/Historical Macedonia would all be in one article) chan dler ··· 09:03, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In theory we could have consensus on Macedonia (region) being the main article at Macedonia Shadowmorph (talk) 10:24, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Agree. There may be an exception when the subnational entity is a major subdivision of an English-speaking country. But I mention this pre-emptively; the exception has been disputed, and applies only in one case, which is not this one. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:17, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Previous attempts to reach consensus have failed

6) Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Macedonia-related articles) (WP:MOSMAC) was proposed to find a common approach to this naming issue, but failed to achieve consensus.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. For the record, I was the original proposer of WP:MOSMAC, back in May 2007, and I spent a lot of time (apparently to little effect) trying to find a consensus on the issue. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:25, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Outing has not occurred

7) An editor's country, language or nationality does not constitute personally identifying information as defined by WP:OUTING. If an editor has previously voluntarily self-identified his or her country, language or nationality, noting that information does not constitute outing.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. See #Outing above for the related principle, as stated in WP:OUTING. We have had various accusations of outing from a number of Greek editors (who, oddly enough, seem to be the only ones making such claims). I think we need to make it clear that compiling previously disclosed non-personally-identifying information as at User:Husond/Straw Poll does not constitute outing. -- ChrisO (talk) 10:59, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Strongly Oppose. I don't know who defines what is outing and I wasn't in that list for what is worth. But in support of those included without being asked, I strongly oppose. I have made it clear that my opinion is strongly against making lists of editors for whatever reason. If list-making is ok, then people might make lists of others like Jews or communism supporters etc. It is irrelevant if the info is readily found, and it is not always that case. Anything can be found with proper digging into. The lists could be dangerously copy-pasted off wiki. This is Wikipedia, not McCarthyism!. List-making is bad manners to say at least Shadowmorph (talk) 22:43, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Strongly Disagree. This is not even what happened here. Nationality was inferred by clues of varying level of reliability. Not all editors that were characterised as "Greeks" say so in their pages. They very well might not be Greeks at all. I'm not even getting into my very strong disagreement in principle with this practice, since it was covered by Shadowmorph.--Avg (talk) 02:20, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Let's keep it one issue at a time, if you consider that the list was wrong or that it was not appropriate you can discuss that in your sections, but in this section we discuss if it was "OUTING" or not. man with one red shoe 04:37, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The list was compiled using exclusively public information that anyone has access to. Anyone, anywhere can read any user's contribution history and would generally come to the same conclusions that were listed here. The opposition to this finding has nothing to do with anyone's policy violations, but rather stem from an "I don't like it" mentality from those who found the information damaging to their POV. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 07:22, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support, no WP:OUTING per evidence and logic. man with one red shoe 04:37, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Strongly Agree. If an editor sends me a private email saying he's Greek, it would be outing for me to mention that. If an editor posts anything publicly on Wikipedia that identifies him as Greek, it is not outing for me to mention that. Anything posted on Wikipedia is already public information. That's not outing to reorganize and list public information. (Taivo (talk) 04:44, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Agree, no outing has occurred, again here (as in the whole dispute) it seems one side is against the "outing" because it shows how the opinions clearly line up based on nationality and they understand that it doesn't help them. chan dler ··· 05:00, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Reorganize and list public information. Isn't that what McCarthy did? And did that user with the Japanese name stated "publicly on Wikipedia that identifies him as Greek". Was everyone in that list asked about it and concurred to release that detail? Wasn't some digging required to out them? It was not public information for all of them. Do you think English people knew that Rizos01 "hints Greek" or that his dated 2007 edits and the speculation about them was common knowledge? I'm curious if ChrisO used some special admin tool, I don't know about, to dig out all that information. Shadowmorph (talk) 05:32, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How about Self-Outing? Just a question about the "other side" of the list that didn't seem to mind. Was it common knowledge that User:Heimstern was not in fact German? I think he had to out himself in that case. Shadowmorph (talk) 05:35, 27 April 2009 (UTC).[reply]

Of course he was first speculated as German from what? The lhama on his page? Wouldn't it be outing if he was infact German, since he hadn't stated that himself? How about all the others in the list. Do they all concur on outing that information? Shadowmorph (talk) 05:38, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Shadwomorph, all this information is public information. There is a difference between "publicly available" and your use of "common knowledge". There is no secret to the word for "Greek" in Japanese. It can easily be found in any Japanese-English dictionary. It may not be "common knowledge", but it is "publicly available". Husond may have had to look it up, but it was neither secret nor private. (ChrisO did not make the list, Husond did.) Outing requires the exposure of private information, such as something communicated by email between editors or over a beer. Anything that is public is, well, public. You can't "out" public information. And, no, that's not what McCarthy did. You are simply using his name as a defamatory comment because you are wrong about the outing issue and are seeking to reframe it by tying it to a name in history that carries a negative connotation. To reiterate, "outing" requires the exposure of private information, not the listing of public information. (Taivo (talk) 06:13, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Since my username and nationality seem to have come up here: Husond made a common error of thinking I might be German because of my username. By choosing that username, I invited that mistake to be made. If someone determines from my username that I am a German star who runs in a home, that is not OUTING, regardless of whether it is correct or not. Perhaps part of the reason why my nationality is hard to guess might be the fact that, unlike certain other editors here, I am not a single-purpose account: my edits exist over a fair variety of articles throughout Wikipedia. I'm not here to push a POV. Some others here clearly are. More on this when I post my evidence. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 07:29, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Reaper7

8) Reaper7 (talk · contribs) has violated Wikipedia:No personal attacks by accusing other editors of bigotry and utilising terminology conveying ethnic hatred. [29], [30]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. -- ChrisO (talk) 23:46, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

He also accused people of ignorance [31], [32], or just implied it [33] and he accused editors of lying: [34]. Moreover he insists in using the "Fyromian" term which is considered offensive by many and clearly is not English. man with one red shoe 02:07, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support all points expressed above. John Carter (talk) 14:38, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. (Taivo (talk) 06:17, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Comment by others:

SQRT5P1D2 has solicited meatpuppets

9) SQRT5P1D2 (talk · contribs) has solicited meatpuppets, specifically Greek-speaking Usenet users, to support his position on Wikipedia [35]. His post has been reposted on numerous Greek blogs [36].

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. A very clear breach of WP:MEAT that has already resulted in numerous IP editors and SPAs turning up to protest. Note that WP:MEAT specifically prohibits "the recruitment of new editors to Wikipedia for the purpose of influencing a survey, performing reverts, or otherwise attempting to give the appearance of consensus is strongly discouraged" and compare to SQRT5P1D2's request to uninvolved Greek people to "vote here" [37]. -- ChrisO (talk) 09:21, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - While technically true, I believe that it is reasonable to give someone who we would have to assume has done several good edits as an IP but had not created his account until the 20th the benefit of the doubt whether he knew such an act would be contrary to wikipedia policy. To bring any sort of sanction against him on the basis of violating policies there was no good reason to know he existed, particularly regarding such an emotional issue, would I believe send a very strong, and very bad, message to anyone else who might choose to create a user account, effectively telling them that they have to toe the line of every policy from the second they create an account. Also, I have to question whether the phrasing of the above proposal seems to be blaming one party for the actions of others, which is at best a very weak argument. John Carter (talk) 18:30, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

SQRT5P1D2 claims that he is an experienced editor who has "contributed to many Wikipedia entries before" using his IP address and he certainly seems to know his way around Wikipedia. It's not credible to view him as a brand new user who has no knowledge of Wikipedia's principles. Your comment about "sending a message" is thus something of a strawman - we do expect people who have been editing for some time to abide by policy, and by his own admission SQRT5P1D2 falls into this category. Finally, you're misreading the finding of fact - it doesn't blame SQRT5P1D2 for anybody's actions. It specifically focuses on SQRT5P1D2's own actions, which as you've acknowledged yourself are a "technically true" violation of the prohibition against canvassing. -- ChrisO (talk) 09:52, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I never even implied that I thought of him as a "brand new user who has no knowledge of Wikipedia's principles", as you stated. I truly regret your attempting to rephrase the statements of others. Please however know that there are several editors I know of who are likely more experienced, certainly based on their edit counts, than this user, whose understanding of policy is at best weak. Taivo has some about 6000 edits in over a year's time, and he indicates in these pages that he didn't know there was a difference between policies and guidelines in wikipedia here. To assume that this editor, who presumably has fewer edits, would necessarily know the rules when Taivo doesn't even know the fairly basic difference between policies and guidelines is I think a dubious assumption. On that basis, I think, barring a clear statement to the contrary from the party, at the very least the phrasing should be altered to include a "possibly" or "probably involuntary", to prevent the appearance of prejudicial phrasing and attempts to lead the arbitrtors. Also, as he stated he invited all comers, not just those who agreed with him, although I expect he knew most would, I find the use of the word "meatpuppets" at best dubious, because he had no way of knowing they would agree with him. John Carter (talk) 21:38, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

AFAIK, assuming good faith is a core principle of Wikipedia and the term "meatpuppet" is derogatory and should be used only with care. All I did was informing people about the case, as I was informed by others. I did not ask them to support any position; quoting myself "whoever wants to participate". People that contributed to Macedonia-related articles in the past were celebrating Greek Easter (there are established Wikipedians like John Carter, supporting that you took advantage of the holiday season). They were informed by my original newsgroup post, while you accused me of recruiting people through my blog (!), presenting no evidence that a) I have a blog and b) I'm engaging in these actions. You shouted ""Greek nationalist canvassing off-wiki". How's that for assuming good faith and being civil? In any case, since the jury is out, you remain involved in the case. That means that your actions are also part of the scrutiny. When supporting conspiracies, you should be more careful; after all, it would be more practical to conspire using private communication means. If other Wikipedians do that, I feel sorry for them. If I have anything to say, whether I'm right or wrong, I'm not afraid to say it publicly. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 13:28, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

ChrisO's rewording (adding the word "uninvolved"), attempts to distort my original message. I myself offered the translation, while he spread false rumours. By now, I'm used to him making this type of accusations. This public newsgroup is read by people contributing to Wikipedia and Macedonia-related articles. While ChrisO took advantage of the holiday season (most people are absent for ten days or more during Greek Easter) and acted the way he did, I posted a public message informing fellow Wikipedians what happened, in a civil manner. They can make up their own minds and were not instructed to act in any way. I have my own arguments, they may have theirs. That's the difference between public actions and conspiracy theories. Conspiracy requires action behind the scenes. That's what people repeatedly violating WP:AGF, WP:CIV and WP:NPOV don't seem to understand. Instead of bringing arguments and evidence to the table, they try to support their position by discrediting and ridiculing others (an example). Since this open case concerns the english branch of Wikipedia, somehow they try to convince others that greek-speaking editors are the root of all evil. I rest my case about this. I'm sure that those that will have the final say, don't condone such practices. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 16:17, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

See WP:CANVASS. We disapprove of solicitation even when it is not behind the scenes; it casts doubt on the fundamental assumption of our srawpolls: that the self-selected !votes represent Wikipedia as a whole (except for the large portion who don't care about any given issue). Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:21, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I saw WP:CANVASS and my post was in the green area. It was one (1) post, the wording is neutral, other editors may have their own opinions on the subject (WP:AGF). As for transparency, I couldn't be more transparent than that. If I wanted to hide something, I would post this privately on a massive scale and certainly I wouldn't include my own nickname in the message. Or I could open another account, use proxies and so on. But I don't have anything to hide, or anything to fear, despite the intimidation attempts. Use of privileges is one thing; abuse is another. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 21:52, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Some thoughts after reading John's comment (note: John, I've already wired the money from my ultra-secret greek-lobby account). I understand the implications after registering a user account. There are rules. Wikipedia has rules. Also, Wikipedia has to follow real-world rules, written or not, because it's not an entity isolated from the rest of the universe. I'm certainly not a know-it-all and I've already made some mistakes (for example, my contribution to the evidence section; although the arguments stand, ARBCOM needs other type of information and this will change soon). I also understand that WP:BITE should be in every administrator's handbook. Unfortunately, several members from my welcoming committee forgot theirs. At least, I always try to remember that there are people behind their monitors. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 23:40, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Why do I get the feeling that some people are prejudiced against Greek editors? ChrisO, editing sporadically (despite the accumulation of edits) doesn't make you an expert on everything related to Wikipedia, as you focus on other things, like the phrasing of an entry, the quality of the sources etc. I don't know my way around Wikipedia. I learn my way around Wikipedia, since registering an account and deciding to be more involved, mostly in english language articles in arts and humanities. I knew how to hold the wheel, now I learn how to shift gears. In addition, as stated by others (also some administrators), even experienced administrators like you, were in violation of policies (for example WP:AGF, WP:CIV, WP:BITE). Why should I bother? I could register again under a new nickname and still participate in this mess as an editor. Instead, I'm trying to prove that I'm not an elephant. Now, about WP:CANVASS. Friendly notice = Limited posting (scale) AND Neutral (message) AND Nonpartisan (audience) AND Open (Transparency). Scale? One message. Neutral? Check. Nonpartisan audience? Check (unless if Wikipedia decided that WP:AGF doesn't apply to Greeks). Transparency? Public newsgroup, mentioning who I am here. Result? I'm in the green area. I'm not responsible for other people's actions. Quoting Radjenef: For it to be canvassing, it would have to be classifiable as Excessive cross-posting, Campaigning, Votestacking or Stealth canvassing. It is not "excessive cross-posting" because he didn't indiscriminately send announcements to uninvolved editors in the form of spamming; he posted on a usenet newsgroup where some interested people might read. It is not "campaigning" because he did not use a non-neutral tone (see: "be rational and leave nationalism outside of the field" in [38]). It is not "votestacking" because this is not a poll where editors would vote or try to reach a consensus; this is ArbCom. It is not "stealth canvassing" because he openly admitted posting it, because he translated it and because usenet is open by definition. Q.E.D. SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 17:38, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Template

1) {text of proposed remedy}

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Template

1) Wikipedia operates by consensus. If a consensus has been reached, particularly if that is a long-standing consensus, then that has happened for a reason. Consensus can change of course, but that is a gradual process that involves discussion, consensus building and dispute resolution. The editorial guideline WP:BOLD can not be used to override consensus, a binding policy, particularly if the editing is done without prior discussion. Ignoring consensus in such a way is extremely disruptive.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 22:58, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Problematic. "Fatigue" does not equal "consensus". Consensus is a general agreement, not just a lack of argument for a period. Items that violate Wikipedia policy, even a new policy, are subject to change if a true consensus has not been reached and the item is simply the result of a "ceasefire". (Taivo (talk) 03:21, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

ChrisO himself referred to the status quo ante as a consensus [39]; an arbitration decision also referred to it as a long-standing consensus [40]. Besides, whatever happened to discussing changes like these before making them. --Radjenef (talk) 09:32, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You are making proposals here for future policy. That is what I am commenting about--not past actions or statements. (Taivo (talk) 11:19, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Ah, ok, understood. I didn't equate fatigue with consensus though. --Radjenef (talk) 12:29, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Ethnic profiling is counter-productive

2) It is more important to pay attention to what people are saying (i.e. the validity of their argument) as opposed to where they are from. Decisions in wikipedia were never based on the number of flags appearing on either side (WP:VOTE); they were based on the merits of each side's arguments. Attempting to ethnically profile one side in order to show that external political factors are determining its editors' positions is fallacious. The fallacy in this case being that, although ethnicity might provide a genuine interest in the subject, it is not the reason behind their position. The reason behind their position, provided you assume good faith, is in the content of their arguments ([41], [42]). Ethnic profiling is a very dangerous path to take that threatens users' privacy, civil rights and sets a precedent that could lead to a horrible slippery slope.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. I strongly object to the ethnic or racial profiling of people's views in wikipedia. I find the practice offensive to say the least: it's degrading; it's like saying it doesn't really matter what so-and-so says because of where they were born. Furthermore, even if some users have provided information in previous edits that could link them to an ethnic group, speculating as to a user's ethnicity based on the character codes or phrases they've used is way out of line. To be honest, I think that meticulously hunting these things down in the archives, speculating and aggregating everything in an easy to access table is an unhealthy attribute for a wikipedia editor. Clearly their time could have been better spent. --Radjenef (talk) 22:58, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Policies supersede editorial guidelines

3) Wikipedia policies are binding on all cases. Editorial guidelines are not binding; they are meant to advise editors on how to proceed in cases where a policy might be unclear. In cases where a policy and a guideline suggest different methods of proceeding, the policy will always take precedence. The fact that an editorial guideline is referenced from within a policy does not automatically elevate it to the status of a binding policy.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 22:58, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Wikilawyering. This is just trying to add layers of importance to words that are nearly synonyms in actual English usage. I seriously doubt that the multiple editors who wrote Wikipedia policies/guidelines were aware that their choice of vocabulary would be used in a legal sense. (Taivo (talk) 03:24, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

This is not wikilawyering; assume some good faith please! The multiple editors who wrote Wikipedia policies, like WP:NC, chose to put this on top:

This page documents an official English Wikipedia policy, a widely accepted standard that should normally be followed by all editors. Any edit to it should reflect consensus. Consider discussing potential changes on the talk page first.

Shortcuts

Similarly, the multiple editors who wrote WP:NCON chose to put this on top:

This guideline documents an English Wikipedia naming convention. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though it is best treated with common sense and the occasional exception. Any substantive edit to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page.

They explicitly and purposely used a more relaxed language for guidelines. The words are clearly not synonyms. --Radjenef (talk) 09:22, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please see Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#Policy and guideline pages, which makes it clear that policies by definition take priority over guidelines. John Carter (talk) 20:05, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Policy mandates the use of the most common non-ambiguous name

4) If we look at WP:NC, WP:NCCN to be more precise, we will see: "title an article using the most common name of the person or thing that is the subject of the article. Make the title unique as described in the disambiguation guideline." This means that editors are required to use the most common name of a person or thing that does not conflict with the names of other people or things.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 22:58, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Problematic. There is virtually no name on the planet that is not ambiguous. Athens, Greece or Athens, Georgia; Macedonia or Macedonia, Georgia; Paris, France or Paris, Texas; Moscow, Russia or Moscow, Idaho. In the vast majority of cases, the most common meaning should be the contemporary meaning of the most important element. Thus, Paris, France is a larger city and a national capital; Macedonia is an independent country; etc. This should be the primary place where a name focuses. Other secondary uses should be found on a disambiguation page. But the most important element should be the primary place where a search for that name goes. (Taivo (talk) 03:30, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

So, you are assuming that the Republic is "the most important element" just because it is a country whereas Macedonia (Greece) is a region. This sounds very arbitrary and is not referenced anywhere in wikipedia's policies. I beg to differ. --Radjenef (talk) 09:39, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, an independent country is more "important" than a subordinate region because it will be the focus of much more cross-referencing and searches. For example, in the front of a typical atlas you see a list of countries, not a list of subordinate regions. You will see a list of world capitals, but not a list of regional centers or towns. Larger and more independent is always more useful than smaller and subordinate. (Taivo (talk) 11:26, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Then we disagree on our definition of "important". In this case, the "subordinate region" [sic] has a larger population, richer history, covers a larger area and has received more scholarly citations than the Republic. I don't see why countries should automatically be considered "more important" than regions with regards to naming. This isn't stipulated by any policy. In light of this, let's wait and see what ArbCom has to say about this disagreement. --Radjenef (talk) 12:47, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't mean that, it means "use the most common name and make it unique" like in "Macedonia (country)" or "Macedonia (region)" not "use the second common name that doesn't conflict" -- this is your invention, I personally cannot deduce it from that sentence. man with one red shoe 03:42, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So, I take it that you disagree with ChrisO's move to trash the disambiguation. Thank you! The problem with your argument is that the burden of proof would be on you to prove that "Macedonia (country)" is more common than "Republic of Macedonia" or "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia". "Macedonia (country)" is so ambiguous that there is no way of actually showing this. At least I don't think there is. If you can prove me wrong then please, by all means, do! --Radjenef (talk) 09:53, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"the burden of proof would be on you to prove that "Macedonia (country)" is more common than "Republic of Macedonia"" -- I'm sorry but this makes no sense. man with one red shoe 13:26, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In "Macedonia (country)", "Macedonia" would be the ambiguous base name, and "country" a disambibuating qualifier, see WP:D#Links to disambiguated topics and Help:Pipe trick. Andreas ^(T) 13:37, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Editorial guidelines advise the use of the most common non-conflicting English-language name

5) WP:NCON clearly states that when the name of a non-human entity conflicts with the name of another non-human entity, editors are advised to consider English-language equivalents and use the most common one: "If the name of an inanimate or non-human entity is disputed by two jurisdictions and one or more English-language equivalents exists, use the most common English-language name."

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 22:58, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. The most common self-identification is more important than an externally-imposed name that may be offensive. "Zaire" is the most common name after "Congo" for Democratic Republic of Congo, but it is inappropriate since it is no longer the name of the country and is linked to the previous dictator. (Taivo (talk) 03:48, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Why is it offensive? Honestly, if you can find me a credible external source claiming that "Republic of Macedonia" or "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" is offensive, I will name you man of the day! I also disagree with your unproven premise that "self-identification is more important". --Radjenef (talk) 10:01, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't say that "Republic of Macedonia" was offensive, just "former...". You are making proposals on this page, therefore I find your proposal unsatisfactory since it violates the principle of self-identification that is clearly spelled out at WP:NCON. It is for the ARBCOM to decide. (Taivo (talk) 11:23, 24 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

I agree that this is for ArbCom to decide. It might help your case if you could find a credible external source claiming that "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" is offensive. You haven't done that yet. As far as "self-identification" goes, I believe I have made my argument clear in [43], so I won't bother repeating it here. Also, I believe that the sentence I quoted from WP:NCON in my proposal takes precedence over the "self-identification" clause. --Radjenef (talk) 13:04, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose this time you got the quote right, but you still kept a misleading title, where did you get the " most common non-conflicting " part? What does "non-conflicting" actually mean, and which object gets to keep the "conflicting" name, and on which criteria? Would that be the country or it would be the Greek province? man with one red shoe 03:56, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Proposed findings of fact

Return to the status quo ante is not out of line

1) ArbCom is probably not here to rule on content. However, if after these proceedings are over, an administrator decides to return things to the status quo ante by reverting ChrisO's move, then that action will not be out of line. This will reset consensus building processes and allow them to proceed tabula rasa.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 02:13, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

ChrisO's misuse of his administrative privileges has been severely disruptive

2) Based on principle 4.2.1.1, backed by evidence in [44].

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 02:34, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. Far more disruptive of Wikipedia, and preceding any action by ChrisO, was the widespread vandalism by Greek editors across a wide spectrum of articles. This has been documented several times in this arbitration. (Taivo (talk) 06:23, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Let me get your argument straight; are you agreeing that ChrisO's actions were disruptive, yet arguing that one wrong justifies another? Also, are you accusing all Greek editors of vandalism, or are you saying that "just because some of the vandals were Greek, all Greeks probably are"? This persistent attempt of throwing everyone in one ethnic sack and accusing them collectively as if they were one is wrong. --Radjenef (talk) 10:19, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm no fan of Chris's action, but "severely disruptive" goes too far, especially since it's the stonewalling nationalists who are really causing the disruption here. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 06:53, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Are you arguing that ChrisO should be indemnified because other people are disruptive as well? Disruptive users exist on both sides of this dispute, as was demonstrated by evidence [45], but that alters nothing with respect to ChrisO's conduct. In fact, how's that [46] for stonewalling by ChrisO himself! --Radjenef (talk) 10:45, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

ChrisO and other editors have acted in a manner that is unbecoming of a wikipedia editor

3) Based on principle 4.2.1.2, along with [47].
Clarification: By other editors I mean User:Husond, User:Future Perfect at Sunrise, as well as all editors (from either side) who have been proved to be vandalizing or otherwise blatantly disregarding wikipedia policy.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 02:40, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. The stonewalling of the group of editors attached to the Greek POV at both Talk:Greece and Talk:Macedonia has been far more "unbecoming" since it blocked any form of consensus-building based solely on wikilawyering, WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT, WP:IDONTLIKEIT, and all manner of other filibustering techniques to avoid actually coming to consensus or compromise. (Taivo (talk) 06:27, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

You are launching terrible accusations without citing any findings of fact. You are also taking these accusations and applying them to an entire POV, citing common ethnic background amongst many of them. I would like to see you providing evidence to substantiate your assertion that all editors disagreeing with your POV "blocked any form of consensus-building based solely on wikilawyering, WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT, WP:IDONTLIKEIT, and all manner of other filibustering techniques". Finaly, I want to add that accusing others of unbecoming behaviour doesn't in any way vindicate ChrisO. Such a reasoning would be fallacious; I was expecting better from a scholarly person such as you, Taivo. --Radjenef (talk) 09:56, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"And other editors"? Names, or that part of the finding is meaningless. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 06:51, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I am sorry, I was tired last night, you are right it is ambiguous the way I've phrased it. I promise I'll revise it. --Radjenef (talk) 09:58, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well, there's some names, sure, but there's still some unnamed ones in there, apparently. This won't make a good finding. Now mind you, I disagree with your characterization of their behaviour, anyway, and I really doubt the arbs will make a finding like this, as "acted in a manner that is unbecoming of a wikipedia editor" is much to vague and scolding-like (most of their findings list specific behaviours, such as incivility, edit warring or battleground treatment). Heimstern Läufer (talk) 10:20, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Sysop status

1) ChrisO should either be desysopped, or his administrative powers should be restricted to articles outside of this dispute. This would mean him having no administrative powers over Greek and Macedonia-related articles. Related findings of fact include: [48], [49], [50], [51], [52]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. I feel that, because of ChrisO's partisanship, Macedonia-related articles would be better off without his administrative interference. --Radjenef (talk) 03:00, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. What Radjenef means is that it would be easier for the Greek POV to prevail in Macedonia-related articles without a strong editor standing in their way. (Taivo (talk) 06:28, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Comment by others:

Topic ban

2) Irrespectively of what is decided with regards to administrative rights, ChrisO should be topic banned from all Greek and Macedonia-related articles for a period no less than six months. Related findings of fact: [53], [54], [55], [56]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 03:08, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. ChrisO has engaged in no disruptive behavior. He took a bold move that was needed based on Wikipedia policy, but would have been impossible because of the refusal of the Greek editors to reach any consensus or to compromise on the issue of Macedonia. (Taivo (talk) 06:30, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

What Chris did most certainly doesn't merit a topic ban. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 07:10, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Strong statement against ethnic profiling by ArbCom

3) ArbCom should issue a strong statement condemning ethnic profiling. Editors should be cautioned, under the threat of sanctions, that such practices are unacceptable. People should be judged on the merits of what they have to say, not on their ethnic background.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Radjenef (talk) 03:14, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. While this is a nice thought, in this case, the ethnic makeup of one side of the discussion was so heavily skewed in one direction that it becomes part of the discussion. It was not a random group of editors who interpreted policy differently. It was a solid wall of Greek editors who stood shoulder to shoulder with their homeland in its foreign policy. That becomes a major factor in understanding why consensus could not be reached at Greece. One part of the meaning of ethnic profiling means predicting behavior based on ethnicity. In most cases it is not accurate. But in this case it was 100% accurate--not a single Greek opposed the national position. (Taivo (talk) 06:35, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Editors should not use potential offensive non-English terms.

1. Editors should not use potential offensive non-English terms. "Fyromian" is not an English term and can be considered offensive by some, per WP:ENGLISH and WP:TALK good practices, editors should use English when they communicate in Wikipedia, thus this term should be avoided even in talk pages. Same thing goes for "Skopjans" when it doesn't refer only to people living in the city of Skopje. This term is OK probably in Greek Wikipedia, but is not the English term for "Citizens of Republic of Macedonia" and it can be deemed offensive if used as such, in any case is not an English term and is not the self-identifying term either which in the absence of an English term would be acceptable.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. man with one red shoe 02:35, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I actually agree with you. There's always ways of making a point without having to resort to ridiculous made up names. I take it that "person from fYRoM" would be an ok thing to use in a talk page, though, to be on the safe side, I usually refer to people from the Republic which is even more neutral (I always try to be extra careful not to offend people). --Radjenef (talk) 23:07, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agree Fyromians and Skopjans are not acceptable terms and they should never be used to indiscriminately identify people from RoM. Dr.K. logos 23:23, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, with the asterisk that "Skopje" in order to refer to ROM should not be construed as offensive, as per diplomatic norms. Same with "Athens" for Greece. Of course on the other side, "Grecomans", "Christian Turks", "Atheneans" and even "Ethiopians"[58](!) should be avoided as well. The list is endless. --Avg (talk) 05:27, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In "news speech" like "the government in Skopje..." is fine, but if somebody uses "Skopjans" and they refer to people from the Republic of Macedonia and not necessarily Skopje is not OK, just like is not OK to refer to Greeks as "Athenians". Otherwise I see a consensus emerging about this, should we include "Pseudomacedonians" and "Bulgaromacedonians" and other such non-English terms? man with one red shoe 06:37, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Generally agree with Avg. However Athenian usually refers to Athens and people from there. Grecomans has been used in a wide historical context and is still often used by many people. While "Ethiopian" should only be used in reference to here, it is very offensive. "Christian Turks" again should be only used when refering to Ethnic Turks who are Christians. PMK1 (talk) 01:34, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agree. Both sides should avoid nasty terms, however insults can be made in other ways to. General etiquette should be prescribed. Shadowmorph (talk) 22:48, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support as something obvious.--Yannismarou (talk) 09:56, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Makes sense. Balkan Fever 08:22, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"FYROMian" and "Skopjan" are offensive terms. Nor are they English terms. Just to let people know Skopje is a city not a country. PMK1 (talk) 14:27, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"Long held consensus" cannot be used as an excuse against a change that follows Wikipedia's policies.

2. "Long held consensus" cannot be used as an excuse against a change that follows Wikipedia's policies. Since now it is a debate and the case is in ArbCom it is clear that there is no longer any consensus, the past consensus (if it ever existed) is dead and irrelevant now and cannot be invoked as an argument against a change that's based on polices and new realities.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed man with one red shoe 03:19, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that the argument on consensus was referring mainly to ChrisO's conduct which happened before this case was brought to ArbCom. If you are saying that his actions were so disruptive that they completely shattered consensus, then I am inclined to agree with you; that move was a disappointing thing to see from a wikipedia administrator. In short, consensus can be used to judge conduct prior to ArbCom, but the old conensus probably won't be used to prevent change in the future. --Radjenef (talk) 13:22, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The point I'm making here is that there was such a strong consensus before the move it would exist after the move too, we don't see it here. Since there's no consensus, invoking past consensus is only Wikilawyering and holding on the straws, but you seem to agree with me. I didn't make this point to save ChrisO from responding for his actions, I'm just pointing out that since there's no consensus after a move the illusory consensus before the move was probably just status quo, nothing more. man with one red shoe 13:32, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, I see, so you're saying that there was never a real consensus to begin with. Well, you are entitled to your own beliefs. You do, however, realize that both the arbitration decision [59] and ChrisO's view [60] was that there was a consensus, right? --Radjenef (talk) 22:57, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

They are entitled to their opinion, in my opinion it was just a status quo. If it were a real consensus there would have been a consensus against his move, can you claim that? But I've noticed that in other discussion too, the "losing" party always claims consensus somehow, maybe because they lack other tangible arguments (like clear policies or references). man with one red shoe 23:15, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

While I can and do agree with the idea of the proposal, I would myself change the phrasing rather a lot. In the event of real-world changes which make the prior consensus irrelevant, like Cassius Clay becoming Muhammad Ali, Lew Alcindor becomming Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Malcolm Little becoming Malcolm X, I can easily see how the prior consensus might be irrelevant now. However, this proposal could potentially lead to real problems of having individuals declare, seemingly on their own, that the prior consensus is invalid because they personally disagree with it. In most cases where there isn't a clearcut obvious need for a change, it would make sense to me to at least establish that the old consensus is no longer a consensus through at least minimal discussion to verify the current lack of consensus first. John Carter (talk) 20:47, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Paradoxical. How can a change be according to policies, when enforced without prior consensus when WP:Consensus is also a policy? Changing against consensus is also against policies. Your proposal is a paradox, isn't it? Shadowmorph (talk) 22:51, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"consensus" is many times an empty word used by POV editors to support the status quo that is convenient for them, I don't see this situation to be in any way different. Using "consensus" as a club to beat down everybody who wants to make a change is ridiculous. man with one red shoe 02:11, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Policies, such as NPOV and article sourcing, can not be overridden by straw polls. "Lack of consensus" as shown by a straw poll should not be used as an excuse to ignore policies and NPOV considerations.

3. Policies, such as NPOV and article sourcing, can not be overridden by straw polls. "Lack of consensus" as shown by a straw poll should not be used as an excuse to ignore policies and NPOV considerations. First sentence is almost word-by-word from WP:POLLS, the second one follows logically.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed man with one red shoe 03:19, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I saw this as a given, myself. Clearly agree to what is basically just a restating of policy. John Carter (talk) 19:59, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Comment by others:

Please phrase this extremely carefully. Whig and Tory originally were, and still can be, in the wrong contexts, offensive terms; they are also the standard English for their subjects. We do not want "Fyromian"; we also don't want a principle that can be quoted in an Arbitration as mandating political correctness. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:37, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

All of these terms are pejorative in English (even though they're not English) regardless of context. Elena Risteska would normally be described as a "person from Skopje" rather than a "Skopjan". Balkan Fever 03:16, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed enforcement

1) Warn nicely and politely people who use such non-English terms: "Fyromians" or "Skopjans", impose progressive bans for people who don't comply.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed man with one red shoe 02:35, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. An alternate possibility might be to impose some sort of explicit civility probations, but I myself don't know if that sort of thing is done often. I don't think I've ever seen it myself, but I'm only familiar with a few cases directly myself. John Carter (talk) 20:02, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Proposals by Fut.Perf.

Proposed. Factual background. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:44, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. The point you make about it being a status quo rather than a consensus is very important. There was no consensus, as the failure of WP:MOSMAC shows, merely a deadlock between Greek editors and everyone else. The outcome of this deadlock reflected Wikipedia's internal politics rather than the standards prescribed by our naming policies. -- ChrisO (talk) 10:04, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. Fatigue does not equal consensus and MOSMAC clearly stated that no consensus had been reached. The subsequent massive vandalism perpetrated throughout Wikipedia by supporters of the "FYROM" terminology vindicates the nationalistic nature of this issue. (Taivo (talk) 01:59, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Comment by others:

Challenge to the status quo

4) In March 2009, the status quo at the Greece article was challenged by a number of editors, who proposed switching to the "Republic of..." convention. This resulted in a multilateral edit war and finally protection of the page. A straw poll held in parallel ended in a polarised result: half of the respondents, almost all of them Greeks, advocated "former Yugoslav...", the other half, almost all of them from uninvolved outside nations, advocated "Republic of".

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Still just a brief narrative of the recent dispute. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:44, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. There was nothing "multilateral" in the disruption. It was mainly User:Fut.Perf. unilaterally claiming there is consensus in the poll and mass-renaming dozens of references to the country from FYROM to ROM. When he was reverted, he edit warred.--Avg (talk) 23:28, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. The poll was split right down the middle--opponents of "Republic of" were virtually all self-identified Greek (either by birth or self-proclaimed ethnicity). Avg refuses to look at the numbers supporting the level of Greek vandalism and only focuses on the editing that Future Perfect did, including to many articles that had nothing to do with Greece, such as Staffordshire University, 2007 Fort Dix attack plot, and a couple of articles about Macedonian and Serbian nationals with no ties to Greece. (Taivo (talk) 02:03, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Comment by others:

ChrisO's move

5) On 18 April, User:ChrisO, an admin with a long involvement in the debate, moved the country article to plain "Macedonia", without prior discussion, arguing that this was the solution best in line with existing policy, and that in these very exceptional circumstances prior discussion would have been useless because the expectable stonewalling from the Greek editors would make consensus-forming impossible. The article was previously move-protected for a very long time, and has remained so since. Reactions to this move, including reactions from previously uninvolved outside editors, were mostly critical of the process, but partly supportive of the result.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Will have to be dealt with one way or another, obviously. Chris, please feel free to tweak my summary of your arguments so it reflects your position properly. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:44, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. I think that sums it up pretty well. See also Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Macedonia 2/Evidence#Timing. -- ChrisO (talk) 09:59, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. (Taivo (talk) 02:07, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Oppose. As strongly as possible. Wording is incomplete and inaccurate: 1) It fails to mention the fact that there was a long-time (years long) consensus for the "RoM" title (and it was a WP consensus with the full sense of the term), 2) It fails to mention that ChrisO supported the aforementioned consensus weeks before the "drama move" took place [61], [62], [63]. 3) It fails to mention that nobody (and I do mean nobody!) contested the long-time consensus before the "drama move". 4) It offers a POV interpretation of these reactions, which confirmed what was pretty obvious: That there was indeed no consensus for Chris' move. 5) "because the expectable stonewalling from the Greek editors would make consensus-forming impossible": offensive, and totally inacceptable as targeting a particular ethnic group. After all how do you know that Greeks would make consensus impossible, if a) you don't state you opinion that there is no consensus, b) you don't even initiate the procedure to test if consensus-forming is indeed stonewalled or not?! Finally, what consensus-forming are we talking about when consensus exists! You have first make your case against the existing consensus!--Yannismarou (talk) 10:13, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Political influence of Greek editors

6) Since the beginnings of Wikipedia, editors with Greek ethnic background, most of whom have strongly felt opinions on the issue, have adamantly demanded or defended editorial conventions that strengthen the use of "former Yugoslav" forms, through tenacious debating, massive turnout in related polling procedures, and sometimes edit-warring.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:44, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. Undeniably true. -- ChrisO (talk) 09:57, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. "editors from Greece" would be a non-racial wording. Still wrong. Maybe "potential influence of POV editors" to include others like you two? Just a suggestion. Shadowmorph (talk) 23:05, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Race? Please stop baiting, there's no race issue here. man with one red shoe 01:59, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well, there is if Greek (or assumed to be Greek) editors are targeted in every proposal by Fut.--Yannismarou (talk) 10:21, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. man with one red shoe 01:59, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. The Greek faction is willing to do nearly anything to support the "home team." We have an example under discussion here in this arbitration of summoning the troops from outside Wikipedia, to make their voices heard. (Taivo (talk) 02:09, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Oppose. You can criticize Greek users for that, but what they (we) did was to apply MOSMAC seen as a process towards consensus. I see no evidence for strengthening the "former Yugoslav" forms. Even the "Greece article case" is a case of "defense" of the existing title (right or wrong is going to be judged) and not "strengthening". On the other hand, there is an effort to "push" the "Macedonia (and that's all)" format even with the non-consensual abuse of adm tools, as it happened with the "drama move".--Yannismarou (talk) 10:20, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Shadowmorph, please play with the standard deck of 52 - no race card. And as for your other suggestion, we don't need to include ChrisO or Fut. Perf. in a "potential influence of POV editors" since they are not part of the problem. Balkan Fever 10:23, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Collective stonewalling

7) Over several years, a majority of Greek editors have factually represented a coherent opinion bloc (or "faction") with regard to this issue. While many of the editors concerned have undoubtedly acted individually in good faith, and individual conduct of most of them did not reach a level of disruptiveness that would normally call for individual sanctions, their actions taken together have taken on a collectively disruptive form. The stance of the Greek faction, as represented by a small number of core regular editors and a larger volatile group of occasional supporters, has had the effect of permanently blocking regular consensus-seeking mechanisms. Many Greek editors have shown a willingness to put wikipedia editing in the service of their national political interests. Disruptive behaviour shown by some editors in this context include: wikilawyering, overt appeals to political considerations, "refusal to get the point" ("WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT"), filibustering, assumptions of bad faith, personal attacks and ad hominems, external lobbying, and edit warring. Several outside editors have over time turned away from the dispute exasperated by the immobility of the Greek opinion block.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Now, here's the crux. I think this is new: Arbcom has never dealt with the notion of "collective behavior". It is my strongly felt opinion that it will have to learn to do so. The collective influence of political factions is one of the big driving issues in these kinds of disputes, and they can only be handled adequately if we develop instruments of addressing them. -- More individualised FoF's are going to follow. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:44, 24 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Problematic, since there is no official policy on that. I want to congratulate you for the nice wording that is not in anyway racial; it adresses your concern of the problem of voices being lost by collective behaviour of others. But that is exactly the opinion of the other side too: Administrative or editorial practices should always take the minority opinion into account (the pro-"UN term" or pro-Greece in this case). However your finding fails to ascribe the same behavior to editors of the other part who form a block too (you are a part of it). Ethnicities are irrelevant, the other block is also numerous very coherent voting always in accord, as the same aforementioned ChrisO/Hussond list shows graphically. The disruptive behavior of some of them is illustrated by ChrisO unilateral move. Shadowmorph (talk) 14:43, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Strongly agree. This is, as Future Perfect said, the crux of this entire arbitration. ChrisO's actions are simply a sideshow, this is the main act. Talk:Greece contains thousands and thousands of kilobytes of "discussion" over the issue of naming Macedonia within that article and on the accompanying map. Every filibustering technique known to Wikipedians has been used, sometimes in tag teams, by the Greek faction. There are honest and hard-working Greek editors, but for every one of them there are ten others who are just single-topic voices used in straw polls and to provide cannon fodder for the incessantly repetitive assertions of political, legal, and moral "rights" to the word "Macedonia". (Taivo (talk) 02:16, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Oppose. First it is interesting that this comes from a user who has repeatedly attacked users he does not like in the most inappropriate and contemptuous way. I'd support the proposal, if a) he did not target Greek users in particular (as he usually does), b) if he added himself to those applying "personal attacks and ad hominems, external lobbying, and edit warring". The wording is too vague, wordy and again inaccurate. Those accused of ""personal attacks and ad hominems, external lobbying, and edit warring" are often those targeted by the proposer with such means: [64], [65] or his attacks against Avg and Kekrops.--Yannismarou (talk) 10:34, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

I am absolutely convinced that this coherent bloc exists, and extends to multiple issues, not just the use of the word "Macedonia." But showing that would require much more evidence. On the other hand, I am also convinced that there are editors who have at times been part of this, but who follow policies, seek consensus, discuss, etc. A good editor will support proposals that they agree with, believe meet policy, etc, and there is nothing wrong with this. I think that this finding needs to lean hard on 1) the existence of a non-productive core, and 2) perversion of consensus. Is there a guideline against "Rallying the Troops" or embarrassing in, through 'patriotism,' reluctant support? Jd2718 (talk) 14:33, 25 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This National point of veiw also extends to pages such as Minorities in Greece, Slavic-speakers of Greek Macedonia, Slavic dialects of Greece, Albanian-speakers of Western Thrace, Languages of Greece. Confusing and often contradictory titles and information is displayed in regards to the "ethnic homogenity" of Greece. This has often led to much edit warring etc. PMK1 (talk) 11:31, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed remedies

Proposals for personalised sanctions to be added.

Consensus in Greece-related articles

1) The community is advised to recognise that in the debate and straw poll at Talk:Greece/Naming poll, a valid consensus supporting the change from the "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" to "Republic of Macedonia" in this article and other Greece-related articles was reached. Administrators are instructed to take appropriate action to prevent further disruption from editors who might be trying to block the implementation of this consensus.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:55, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. No third party administrator closed the poll and affirmed there is a consensus. Instead, it was you who disrupted the project going into a renaming spree ignoring that the poll had not been closed yet.--Avg (talk) 01:49, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. There was a pretty much consensus among editors who are not bent of defending the Greek POV on that page. If anybody wants to test that I suggest opening a straw poll for uninvolved people who have never edited in Greece and Macedonia space. Otherwise this type of content will be decided by professional POV warriors, which in my opinion this is the problem we are facing here. man with one red shoe 02:05, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support, sort of. Whenever discussions concerning Macedonia occur, there is a strong consensus when the unified Greek voice is ignored. Once you factor in the single-topic editors whose only function in Wikipedia is to serve as on-call dissenters to the use of "Macedonia" or "Republic of Macedonia", then you have a split right down the middle. I don't want to say that the honest, contributing Greek editors (Dr. K and Yannismarou come to mind immediately) should be silenced. But the power of the Greek rabble needs to be eliminated because it is counter-productive to Wikipedia. We want well-informed and productive Greek input in the topics of Wikipedia where they truly have the expertise, but in issues relating to Macedonia, the majority of Greek voices are not productive Wikipedia contributors and are only there to vote in accordance with Greek foreign policy. (Taivo (talk) 02:25, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Comment by others:

Consensus process regarding the country article (Republic of) Macedonia

2) On conclusion of this case, the country article (currently at Macedonia) is to be moved provisionally back to Republic of Macedonia, the status quo before ChrisO's unilateral move. A fresh consensus-forming process, possibly with an ensuing poll, is then to be held in order to form a valid consensus deciding between "Macedonia", "Republic of Macedonia", or any other new naming proposal. The committee will name a task group of three experienced, uninvolved administrators who will be charged with overseeing this process, closing it and determining a consensus from it, with due account taken of the principle outlined in (4) above.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:55, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Any polling must take into account the nature of the editors voting. Single-topic editors and new accounts should be excluded from the process and voting. There should be no opening for a "call to arms" to summon the hordes. (Taivo (talk) 02:29, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Oppose (mainly on the procedural issues). 1) Disagree with "provisionally" (why the ARBCOM to make such a statement partly legitimizing an improper move?), 2) Disagree with "the fresh consensus-forming process" formula. The move should be simply undone, and then whoever wants to argue that there is no consensus, he can go to the talk page, make his case, and initiate a consensus-reaching procedure. But when nothing like that is done, ARBCOM should not go by itself one step forward. This would again legitimize the intentions of the "drama move".--Yannismarou (talk) 10:42, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Proposals by Avg

Proposed principles

Wikipedia has a code of conduct

1) Respect your fellow Wikipedians even when you may not agree with them. Be civil. Avoid conflicts of interest, personal attacks and sweeping generalizations. Find consensus, avoid edit wars, follow the three-revert rule, and remember that there are many articles on the English Wikipedia to work on and discuss. Act in good faith, never disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point, and assume good faith on the part of others. Be open and welcoming.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. The fourth pillar, verbatim, except the number of articles.--Avg (talk) 21:30, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Actions inside Wikipedia resonate outside Wikipedia

2) Editors should understand that Wikipedia is one of the top-10 sites on the internet and Wikipedia articles may be seen by thousands or even millions of people. They have a responsibility to avoid controversial actions stirring passions that exist in the outside world.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Avg (talk) 22:57, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The proposal seems to me to be saying "Act reasonably. People are watching." I can't see any objections to that. That doesn't preclude action in some cases, it might even demand it in some cases. John Carter (talk) 00:01, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Strongly oppose. Wikipedia is not governed by outside influences. That is one of the hallmarks of NPOV. WP:NCON, for example, specifically excludes any outside considerations of political, legal, or moral rights to a name. This proposed action is simply another way to say, "Don't get us mad by using 'Macedonia'". Wikipedia is independent of personal emotion. That is the relevance of NPOV here. (Taivo (talk) 02:33, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Comment by others:

Strongly oppose. We are ranked as we are in part because we adhere to the neutral point of view, not the Sympathetic Point of View advocated here. This is a consideration for Wikinfo, not for us. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:07, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This principle is focused on the prudence that someone should exercise before engaging in controversial actions. I do not understand how WP:NPOV is relevant here.--Avg (talk) 23:58, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - User:Taivo can refer to the Arbitrators opinion for further information. According to my understanding, this is a place where editors agree or disagree that this action was an abuse of admin tools.--Avg (talk) 16:57, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - Yes, this page is for agreeing or disagreeing. I believe that I made it clear that I disagree. You will also note that the arbitrators generally agreed that the issue was not restricted to ChrisO's actions per the agreement at Talk:Greece. The attempt to restrict this arbitration to just ChrisO is a red herring. (Taivo (talk) 17:25, 26 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Response to Taivo - Sir, I have seen absolutely no evidence which even remotely supports your contention that there is an attempt to restrict the arbitration to ChrisO. What I have seen is that a number of editors whose primary complaints are regarding that editor's actions clarifying what those complaints are, which is another matter. I also note that agreement and disagreement are generally supposed to be based on sound thinking. Your statement above, which seems to imply that these early statements, based on the early evidence presented to date, are somehow expected to be the sole focus of this arbitration strikes me as being both clearly untrue (reference the Reaper7 comments extant), and possibly a willful misrepresentation of fact to achieve some purpose of its own. I would very much urge you to cease making what are at this point unfounded accusations, or, if you persist in such claims, to present evidence to support them elsewhere. But this is supposed to be about agreement or disagreement based on the evidence presented, not agreement or disagreement based on a failure to assume good faith of apparently most other participants and an apparently closely held belief that they are all somehow "ganging up" on one party. You yourself are free to submit evidence regarding any other parties as well, you know. It might benefit you if you were to do so, rather than continue to make unfounded, prejudicial allegations such as the above. John Carter (talk) 19:28, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I will gladly welcome when the supporters of the Greek POV start addressing the issue that was the original focus of the planned arbitration--the reference to Macedonia at Greece. So far all I have seen is an overwhelming focus on ChrisO's actions at Macedonia and what that article should be called. Maybe I've missed a comment or evidence that was presented to this point. But so far none of the Greek editors are talking about Greece, which was where the arbitration was originally to be focused. (Taivo (talk) 06:46, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Comment - You are making your own conclusions. I have never said I will limit myself to these four Findings of Fact, although these are crucial for my proposed remedy regarding ChrisO. There are a lot more to follow. --Avg (talk) 17:33, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. --Radjenef (talk) 17:50, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Why is everybody here saying "oppose" or "support" as if we were !voting on these proposals? Fut.Perf. ☼ 23:00, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Probably because it tends to be fairly common to do so? Granted, I don't see as many repetitions on other pages, but they tend to be less hotly contested than this one. But you will see that the same thing is done, on a lesser scale admittedly, at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Scientology/Workshop. John Carter (talk) 23:04, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Abuse of administrative privilege by ChrisO (2)

2) ChrisO abused his administrative privilege when he closed a poll initiated in the Republic of Macedonia talk page while being an involved editor.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Avg (talk) 16:09, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. John Carter (talk) 16:14, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. This is not the main issue of this arbitration. It is a red herring. (Taivo (talk) 16:39, 26 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Support. --Radjenef (talk) 17:51, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose, naturally. Closing a poll is not an administrative action and does not involve any use of the sysop bit. -- ChrisO (talk) 18:34, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but this move proposal was supposed to be closed by an uninvolved administrator, as it was closed in the second time. You are not an uninvolved administrator. --Avg (talk) 22:35, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support.--Yannismarou (talk) 09:21, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Abuse of administrative privilege by ChrisO (3)

3) ChrisO abused his administrative privilege when he moved the article Republic of Macedonia to Macedonia while being an involved editor.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Avg (talk) 16:09, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. John Carter (talk) 16:14, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. Haven't you said this same thing three times now? Three red herrings is still a red herring. (Taivo (talk) 16:39, 26 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Support. ChrisO was obviously an involved editor, nobody tries to challenge that fact, not even the only person opposing this so far. Further to that, I do not see why saying that this thing is a red herring three times would make it a red herring. --Radjenef (talk) 17:58, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support Per Avg's, John Carter and my evidence.--Yannismarou (talk) 09:22, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Abuse of administrative privilege by ChrisO (4)

4) ChrisO abused his administrative privilege by imposing WP:ARBMAC blocks while being an involved editor.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed.--Avg (talk) 16:09, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. John Carter (talk) 16:14, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. Only Jesus could make one fish into enough to feed a crowd. This is the same red herring you've mentioned three times already. (Taivo (talk) 16:41, 26 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

And your response is as irrelevant as it was each previous time as well. Please see my response to your initial claim of "red herring" to see why. John Carter (talk) 16:47, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Your comments are so confusing. I see that you are conveniently talking about fish instead of attempting to rebut the proposed finding of fact. (Tu quoque) --Radjenef (talk) 18:17, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support.--Radjenef (talk) 18:17, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. Being "involved" is not a bar to dealing with straightforward episodes of vandalism, which is what I've focused on. -- ChrisO (talk) 18:40, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

ChrisO's action to move the article was premeditated and disclosed to selected parties

5) Fut.Perf. admits knowledge of ChrisO's intentions here [66]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed.--Avg (talk) 19:05, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Fairly obvious, given the evidence. It should also be noted it was hinted at only to selected parties who seemingly have a history of agreeing with ChrisO on issues relevant to this topic. John Carter (talk) 19:09, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support: "Premeditation" is not just an assumption here! The move of "Macedonia" to "Macedonia (disambiguation)", which occcured just before the move of "Republic of Macedonia" to "Macedonia" is proved to be a well-prepared and well-designed "clearing of the field" for what happened then. Fut's comment cited by Avg above reveals that indeed ChrisO disclosed his planned move to some involved parties he selected.--Yannismarou (talk) 09:34, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

ChrisO broke a long standing consensus on the Republic of Macedonia article name

6) There was a 7-year consensus that the name of the country article should be Republic of Macedonia by Greek editors, ethnic Macedonian editors, neutral party editors and ChrisO himself.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Agreed. John Carter (talk) 20:54, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This is yet again another oxymoron. You have just contradicted your strong views on ethnic profiling [67], [68] by once again mentioning them in your above statement. Do you think that ethnicity is relevant or not? You cannot play on both sides of the court. If you are in favour of ehtnic profiling, then continue what you are doing but if you are not in favour of ethnic profiling, then

using ethnicity based statements to back up your argument.

In response to your point about the long standing consensus; it has become clear through the pages and pages of talk and discussion that the consensus since 2007 has changed. The majority of editors are now in favour of simply "Macedonia" as that reflects the common use. ChrisO broke the old consensus to put in place the New Consensus. PMK1 (talk) 01:17, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Um, maybe you'd like to tell us where you see this consensus which has been in place since 2007? If you are going to indicate that such a consensus exists, then it is more or less incumbent on you to provide some idea where an outsider can find out. John Carter (talk) 01:20, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

PMK1 I'm very strongly against ethnic profiling. Please tell me where I have dismissed anyone's views based on their ethnicity. My comment simply states that everybody, from every side of the dispute, was in agreement. Nothing else.--Avg (talk) 01:27, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Avg, I know that you are against ethnic profiling and the constant use of ethnicity as an argument in these discussions. Nobody has actually said "you are Greek so your vote does not count", and nobody should say those kinds of things. My point was, for someone who appears to be completely against references to ethnicity and ethno-national POV in these discussions you have not stopped your self from refering to ethnicities. Had you really been against the ethnic profiling you would not have talked about "greek" or "macedonian" editors in your statement. PMK1 (talk) 06:18, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support.--Yannismarou (talk) 09:36, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

ChrisO's current opinion is inconsistent with his past opinion

7) ChrisO has at numerous times supported that his preferred terminology is Republic of Macedonia (even a month ago). Also he was a supporter of FYROM being used in articles about Greece and international organisations.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Partial support for the first sentence, and the second part of the second sentence. About the "Also he was a supporter of FYROM being used in articles about Greece" I'll keep my doubts about whether or not the wording and the assertion is accurate. Yes, years ago he supported that, but the situations have changed in the meantime. However, for the other two assertios we have concrete statements or actions by ChrisO weeks or days before the "drama move" [69] [70] [71].--Yannismarou (talk) 09:48, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

There is consensus over how the Republic of Macedonia should be named in all articles except those about Greece

8) WP:MOSMAC has not been altered at all since its creation in May 2007.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Avg (talk) 19:41, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. There seems to have been a good general consensus, up until the surprising move of the article by ChrisO, that Republic of Macedonia should be the name used, as we wherever possible try to use the name of the article itself when making links to it. John Carter (talk) 20:31, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Disagree. MOSMAC has been marked as rejected or an essay since September 2008. Jd2718 (talk) 20:28, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

As one of the three editors (ChrisO, NikoSilver, and myself) who began to draft it, I can testify that WP:MOSMAC was severely altered during its brief attempt at being {{proposed}} and {{guideline}}; even in May 2007, there was no consensus (and it still says so) about what to do about naming the Republic in articles about Greece. Since it ceased to be a guideline, in September 2008, it has been fairly stable; this is because it claims to express an opinion, not a consensus. Looking at WT:MOSMAC will show that even when editors agreed on a text, they failed to agree on what it meant. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:38, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Can you provide any diff at any point in time where WP:MOSMAC said something different regarding how the country should be named in articles not related to Greece than what it said at its beginning? --Avg (talk) 22:44, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Why, yes; what it said in the beginning was a severely limited exception, justified in talk as using "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" only on such articles as those on the internal workings of the EU and the Eurovision Song Contest (international organizations which use the phrase themselves). This minor concession was made for the sake of peace; such editors as Avg himself then began to use it as a justification to revert war for "FYROM" everywhere in Wikipedia. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:08, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

MOSMAC has always said: Use FYROM in articles of organisations that use FYROM. Use ROM everywhere else. This was universally accepted. I think you will have a really hard time finding me changing ROM to FYROM in any article outside the abovementioned scope (and obviously articles relevant to Greece, but this is not what this proposed FoF refers to). --Avg (talk) 23:14, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This diff shows the intended scope; it is by User:Sysin, btw. Avg himself disagreed with this, here, arguing for universal use of "FYROM". Note that the point here, despite Avg's efforts to change it, is lack of consensus due to Hellenic nationalism, not disruptive behavior - a separate finding. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:23, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Avg's retroactive claim that he only meant articles relevant to Greece appears to be an invention; I do not see that he ever said so, and the phrase does not appear in WT:MOSMAC or its archives.
If he had said so, I hope I would have opposed it as fatally vague; what article mentioning the Republic is not (in some sense) relevant to its southern neighbor? I would certainly have opposed it as tending to create a bubble of private reality for Greek articles. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:31, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Pmanderson accused me of revert warring in articles where FYROM was not prescribed by MOSMAC. I have not done so. I have only stated by opinion in talk pages. I have never hidden I prefer FYROM to be used universally in Wikipedia. However I accept the current consensus and have never disrupted the project. My comment about articles relevant to Greece was to remind Pmanderson that in this proposed Finding of Fact I refer to consensus for articles not relevant to Greece. My hope is what "relevant to Greece" means is quite straightforward and will not be a matter of contention itself.--Avg (talk) 23:43, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

But the naming of Macedonia at Greece is the issue here. That was the original arbitration that had been agreed to here. The ChrisO issue is only a minor sideshow to this arbitration. Considering that 30 editors agreed on "Republic of Macedonia" at Greece and five non-Greeks opposed it, that would be a fairly clear "consensus" decision. (Taivo (talk) 02:55, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

There is no consensus over how the Republic of Macedonia should be named in articles about Greece

9) A straightforward description of the problem

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Avg (talk) 19:41, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. There in fact is a valid consensus, by everybody but the Greek faction. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:39, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In the naming poll there were at least 5 people with no links to Greece, you have never addressed this fact.--Avg (talk) 00:17, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Strongly Disagree; there was general consensus on how the article should be refered to. This notion was rejected by a certain ethno-national POV. Here is a good summary created by User:Future Perfect at Sunrise:

"Oppose" side (favouring "former Yugoslav...")

Aexon79 (t c), Apcbg (t c), Athenean (t c) (formerly Tsourkpk), Avg (t c), Biruitorul (t c), Cédric Boissière (t c), Colonel Warden (t c), Cplakidas (t c) (Constantine), CuteHappyBrute (t c) (formerly DefendEurope), Digwuren (t c), El Greco (t c), Girisha-jin (t c), Hectorian (t c), Ioannes Tzimiskes (t c), Jack forbes (t c), Kamikazi2 (t c), Kapnisma (t c), Michael IX the White (t c), NikoSilver (t c), Pel thal (t c), Politis (t c), Reaper7 (t c), Rizos01 (t c), Romanos V (t c), Sakis79 (t c) (xvvx), sysin (t c), Yannisk (t c), Yannismarou (t c), Δρακόλακκος (t c), ΚΕΚΡΩΨ (t c)
= 29 editors (discounting one that had only a single contribution, to this poll), of whom:
- 23 Greeks, 1 Bulgarian, 5 from uninvolved nationalities
- 2 users with only very minor contribution histories
- 1 administrator
- 10 users who have previously been blocked for Greece-related nationalist misbehaviour (edit-warring or incivility blocks: sysin, Hectorian, Kapnisma, Athenean, Avg, Reaper7, CuteHappyBrute, Politis, El Greco, ΚΕΚΡΩΨ)
- 3 users who have had sanctions related to other nationalist disputes (Digwuren, Biruitorul, Jack forbes)
- 1 editor that can be characterised as essentially a single-purpose Greek POV advocacy account (Avg)
- at least 9 other users with a strong, permanent contribution focus on Greece-related drama areas and/or Greek POV advocacy, though also some minor other contributions (Kekrops, Politis, CuteHappyBrute, Michael IX the White, Reaper7, Sakis79, sysin, Athenean)
- 2 formerly productive users who have lately reduced their contributions virtually exclusively to Greek POV drama (NikoSilver, Hectorian)

"Support" side (favouring "Republic of...")

Akhilleus (t c), AniMate (t c), Aramgar (t c), Arthur Rubin (t c), Balkanian`s word (t c), CalendarWatcher (t c), Charles Edward (t c), ChrisO (t c), Colchicum (t c), Doktorspin (t c), EdJohnston (t c), Enric Naval (t c), Ev (t c), Folantin (t c), Future Perfect at Sunrise (t c), Hans Adler (t c), Heimstern (t c), Husond (t c), JdeJ (t c), Jim62sch (t c), John Carter (t c), Kafka Liz (t c), Kwamikagami (t c), Local hero (t c), Man with one red shoe (t c), MatriX (t c), Pmanderson (t c) (Septentrionalis), SheffieldSteel (t c), slakr (t c), Taivo (t c), WereSpielChequers (t c)
= 31 editors, of whom:
- 2 (possibly 3) ethnic Macedonians, 1 Albanian, all others from uninvolved or unknown nationalities
- 14 administrators
- two national POV advocacy accounts (Balkania`s word, Matrix), all others active experienced editors in good standing and independent contribution profiles
- at least 4 active project-wide experts on Wikipedia naming practices
- users previously sanctioned for edit-warring: MatriX, Pmanderson, ChrisO, Balkanian`s word

The fact that there were only 5 "uninvolved nationalities" on one side and 28 "uninvolved nationalities" on the other side clearly shows consensus. PMK1 (talk) 01:22, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Seeing that again makes me sick. This is simply appalling. Anyway my comment was about the proven non-Greeks. They just do not fit with Fut.Perf.'s logic. According to his profiling, they are part of a "Greek faction". My argument was simply a proof of the absurdity of ethnic profiling. I do not endorse ethnic profiling and I will not enter into a discussion on numbers. My objective is simply to show how absurd it is, not to start debating based on it.--Avg (talk) 01:41, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. The numbers just don't lie. 30 editors agreed to "Republic of Macedonia" at Greece and five non-Greek editors opposed it. It should not surprise anyone at all that there are non-Greeks who might side with the Greek position. I would have been surprised if more non-Greeks had sided with them, but there will always be people on both sides of any issue. The key here is that the majority (30 out of 35) of non-Greeks in this poll agreed that Greece should not be a walled garden. (Taivo (talk) 03:00, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Avg, as is the case in society there are people with a range of views. Fut. Perf. should not be made to explain why these "uninvolved" nationalities voted against the proposal. Unfortunately you will have to back up the claims in the subheading. It is clear that there is consensus in the World Wide Wikipedia community; this however does not reflect the veiw of the Greek Wikipedian community. How much more clearer can these things be stated.

Note the administrator vote 14 vs. 1. The evidence is crystal clear. PMK1 (talk) 06:24, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Agree. Jd2718 (talk) 20:29, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ethnic profiling has occured

10) Editors opinions have been discredited based on their ethnicity or alleged ethnicity.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Avg (talk) 20:29, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Obvious. John Carter (talk) 20:53, 26 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ethnic Profiling did occur. It was done to establish the fact that a Walled Garden based on a ethno-national POV existed in Wikipedia. If anyone has noticed after the realisation that a Walled Garden existed this practise has not been used. Ethnic profiling has not feature here (workshop), the evidence page or the request for Arbitration. PMK1 (talk) 01:26, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

ChrisO and Fut.Perf. sabotaged MOSMAC and developed a parallel MOSMAC outside Wikipedia

11) ChrisO and Fut.Perf. did not work with the Wikipedia community on improving WP:MOSMAC, instead they sabotaged it, proclaimed it dead and collaborated outside Wikipedia with the purpose to present their own document, which they named WP:MOSMAC2.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

The "paralel" MOSMAC is another POV looking at the Macedonia saga. I suggest that everyone should read and observe it. It is a serious contender to replace the current MOSMAC and reflects the mainstream consensus of 2009. See: WP:MOSMAC2. PMK1 (talk) 01:24, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

This is substantially incorrect. At the point of [MOSMAC talkpage discussion], back in September, consensus clearly no longer existed, if it had ever. Pmanderson and I tagged MOSMAC as rejected, not Chris O, not Future Perfect at Sunrise. Jd2718 (talk) 03:22, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, and this was Chris' response at the time [73].--Yannismarou (talk) 09:52, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

more to follow

Proposals by SQRT5P1D2

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Disagree. Searching academic databases is extremely unreliable as a source for information about the common English name of Macedonia. First, much of any academic library's collection consists of works written before 1991, when the Republic became independent. All works written prior to that date, will, of course, use "Macedonia" to refer to the region or the ancient kingdom rather than to a non-existent state. Second, even immediately following independence, academic works naming Macedonia take a year or more to work their way through the publication pipeline, the actually cut-off point is about 1994 or so. Third, it is arguable whether a source written in 1995 is as important as a source written in 2009 in determining contemporary common English usage. Finally, academic sources are only reliable sources on the topic they cover. An academic source on Pleistocene megafauna is only a reliable source for information about Pleistocene megafauna, not on the linguistic relevance of "Macedonia". For the issue of the meaning of "Macedonia", these sources count as reliable sources no more than news reports or web pages. Indeed, we must also remember that the editorial policy of the publisher may override any usage by the author, especially if the publication is funded by an international organization or Greek publishing house that insists on "FYROM". The only reliable sources concerning whether "Macedonia" is the most common English name for the country are linguistic or geographical works. Far more reliable for determining what English speakers understand by the term "Macedonia" are contemporary news media reports, atlases, and general-purpose encyclopedias--all of which point to Macedonia being the most common English name of the country. SQRT's search completely ignores these facts, so his numbers are completely misleading. Only one U.S. publisher of atlases, for example, uses any label for Macedonia other than "Macedonia" in atlases published within the last year. And one minor correction, the population of Macedonia is only 2.1 million, not the 5 million that SQRT claims. The other 2+ million are in Greece. (Taivo (talk) 03:24, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Comment by others:

Proposed. Evidence coming. (note: I'm a proposed party) SQRT5P1D2 (talk) 03:10, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

We are optimized for lay readers, not for specialists. Academic sources may not represent common English usage well; academic sources from before 1993, or 1944, have limited claims to represent present usage.

There are a dozen distinct meanings of Macedonia, several of them vague, under Macedonia (terminology); most of them (but not all) mean somewhere between Thessaly and Serbia. None of them represent a "continuous tradition" of millenia except in nationalist schoolbooks (apparently on both sides of the present frontier). Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:45, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Member actions (principles 6-8)

2) WP:MOSMAC was used and abused to death, that's why permanent guidelines are needed in this matter. Whilst the country that claims the name of the region for exlusive common use did not exist sixteen (16) years ago, some Wikipedians felt that they should grant this name by distorting facts and policies. This is a unique conception, as Ireland is not considered the "common name" for the Republic of Ireland and China didn't move to People's Republic of China either. If Ireland is an island and China is a cultural region, by what standards Macedonia is the "indisputable common name" for a new sovereign country, instead of the common name of a region established for thousands of years? This is exactly the scope of disambiguation. Per WP:RS: "Academic and peer-reviewed publications are usually the most reliable sources when available" and they are available in this case.

Furthermore, the behaviour demonstrated by some parties is detestable. Wikipedia doesn't benefit by people taking advantage of other editors' absence, making fun of their beliefs, blanking articles, harassing newer members, presuming consensus and sluring ethnic backgrounds. Especially when they're experienced users and should know WP:ADMIN by heart.

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Disagree. See my comments above concerning SQRT's uncritical use of academic resources prior to 1993 in building his claims that "Macedonia" is not the contemporary common English name of Macedonia. (Taivo (talk) 03:32, 27 April 2009 (UTC))[reply]
This is an argumentative polemical rant, not a proposed Arbcom decision. There's no chance the arbs would ever consider this as part of the final decision. If the proposer wants to be taken seriously in this process, he'd better start drafting serious proposals, or shut up. Please keep the noise down. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:46, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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 ::Comment.  While this is a nice thought, in this case, the ethnic makeup of one side of the discussion was so heavily skewed in one direction that it becomes part of the discussion.  It was not a random group of editors who interpreted policy differently.  It was a solid wall of Greek editors who stood shoulder to shoulder with their homeland in its foreign policy.  That becomes a major factor in understanding why consensus could not be reached at [[Greece]].  One part of the meaning of ethnic profiling means predicting behavior based on ethnicity.  In most cases it is not accurate.  But in this case it was 100% accurate--not a single Greek opposed the national position.  ([[User:Taivo|Taivo]] ([[User talk:Taivo|talk]]) 06:35, 27 April 2009 (UTC))
 :::I'm sorry, but this proposal is nothing more than rubbish. It's been demonstrated several times that the way the straw poll broke down into two opposing camps along national lines is highly relevant to the case, and the side that doesn't want that fact exposed is trying to censor it by slinging mud at those exposing the fact and now apparently trying to get sanctions on them. [[User:Heimstern|Heimstern Läufer]] [[User talk:Heimstern|(talk)]] 06:49, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
+::::'''I strongly support this'''. Rubbish? Of course not. It should be '''of outmost importance''' to condemn such practices. The condemnation should also include ''any kind'' of list-making of editors in general. For the history, I wasn't in that poll but it broke down because of opposing POVs, not because of ethnic backgrounds. By the way, what is the practical position of those opposing this "rubbish"? Should we make an official [[blacklist]] of editors of Wikipedia that support Greece? Then what? Should all other editors first consult that list and then assume bad faith of anyone mentioned in there? Should the list become permanent and others made able to add whoever they ''think'' belongs there, for dubious reasons? The other side might have some names that could be listed in a similar list. They are just not yet scandalized enough to construct one, but they shouldn't be pushed. Doesn't it cross anyone's mind that people might have issues with lists like that? What happened to etiquette? Anyway, just read the [[WP:5P|five pillars]] it's all in there. And didn't Heimstern just used the word '''exposed'''?. Therefore it wasn't "public information"?
+:::: The part that I find really hard to understand is why the "supporters" of ChrisO's move find it weird that there were Greeks in that poll, and that they were aligned. It was a poll about the content of the article [[Greece]] - who did they expected to vote there and in what way? I found more interesting that the other side was equally aligned. [[User:Shadowmorph|Shadowmorph]] ([[User talk:Shadowmorph|talk]]) 11:00, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
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