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===There is a cabal===
===There is a cabal===
See [[User:Abd/Cabal]] for complete evidence. Summary will be brought back here.
See [[User:Abd/Cabal]] for evidence. It is justified to consider as cabal-involved, for the purpose of this RfAr, the following editors:
*[[User:William M. Connolley|William M. Connolley]], party.
*[[User:Enric Naval|Enric Naval]], party.
*{{admin|Raul654}}
*{{admin|Stephan Schulz}}
*{{userlinks|Verbal}}
*((userlinks|Mathsci}}
*{{userlinks|Crohnie}}
*{{userlinks|Shot info}}
*{{admin|Woonpton}}
*{{admin|TenOfAllTrades}}

In addition, the following should be noticed in reviewing surrounding activity:
*{{userlinks|Hipocrite}}
*{{userlinks|Short Brigade Harvester Boris}}
*{{admin|TenOfAllTrades}}


===Original evidence re the specific issue between WMC and Abd===
===Original evidence re the specific issue between WMC and Abd===

Revision as of 00:58, 27 July 2009

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Evidence presented by Abd

WMC is User:William M. Connolley. Extensively revised, see previous revision.

In order to make clear what occurred in this case, I must first declare that -- please avert your eyes -- the emperor has no clothes.

There is a cabal

See User:Abd/Cabal for evidence. It is justified to consider as cabal-involved, for the purpose of this RfAr, the following editors:

In addition, the following should be noticed in reviewing surrounding activity:

Original evidence re the specific issue between WMC and Abd

Original evidence presented with the RfAr is below; this will be refactored as appropriate here for maximum clarity:

Summary
  • WMC was involved in immediate content dispute and long-term behavioral dispute with me.
  • He edited Cold fusion while protected, in expectation of controversy over it, and contrary to an expressed consensus.
  • Then he declared me banned from the article and its Talk.
  • Later, he blocked me for making a self-reverted harmless edit, contrary to his expressed prior opinion about harmless edits under ban.
  • In spite of charges of involvement, he insists that he remains the enforcer of an expired community ban, asserting it as indef.
History of prior dispute, mostly over use of tools while involved

Stored at:[1]

The present dispute;

Stored at: [2].

Further considerations and issues to be arbitrated

Stored at [3].

Evidence presented by GoRight

As stated in the request for arbitration, I do not intend to take a stand either way as to whether User:William M. Connolley's actions were appropriate, or not. I prefer to simply provide a raw chronology of relevant events with diffs and to defer to the arbiter's judgment on whether this evidence suggests an abuse of administrative privileges, or not.

A Basic Chronology of Relevant Events

NOTE: This chronology is currently incomplete. I intend to provide further evidence. When my editing is complete I will remove this notice.

From my personal perspective the following events are relevant to a proper weighing of the charges being made in this case:

Timestamp + Diff User Comment on Relevance
21:41, 6 March 2009 WMC WMC's previous statement regarding taking action against users for making helpful edits while banned.
23:09, 10 March 2009 WMC Advice on the topic of making minor edits in defiance of a ban given to SA.
Discussion at User_talk:ScienceApologist#Useless_advice. (Archived) **
14:28, 1 May 2009 Hipocrite Hipocrite's entry onto the Cold Fusion page after a period of at least one month with no edits by him.
Circa 15:00, 21 May 2009 Edit war occurs between Abd and Hipocrite.
20:42, 21 May 2009 WMC Protected Cold fusion for edit warring.
Circa 02:40, 1 June 2009 Edit war occurs between Hippocrite, Coppertwig, GetLinkPrimitiveParams, and possibly Abd. The ambiguity in the case of Abd is whether you are inclined to count his initial (presumably good faith) WP:BOLD edit as a revert in the WP:BRD cycle.
03:50, 1 June 2009 Causa sui Protected Cold fusion for edit warring / content dispute.
20:26, 5 June 2009 GoRight Proposal I made and the rationale I gave for the proposal. My closing "Thoughts from those actually involved here?" indicates that I had anticipated there be discussion of the proposal.
20:30, 5 June 2009 Hipocrite Hipocrite expressed supported my proposal. Note that no one else did.
22:25, 5 June 2009 WMC WMC's revert of the Cold Fusion page.
22:26, 5 June 2009 WMC WMC expresses that he is unsure if he is involved.
01:51, 6 June 2009 Abd Abd asserts that WMC should have respected the on-going polls rather than reverting to the version proposed by me.
Discussion at User_talk:William_M._Connolley#Your_edit_to_Cold_fusion. (Archived) **
02:38, 6 June 2009 GoRight My response to WMC where I indicated that he had previously protected the page but that I didn't see him as involved in the edit warring.
03:02, 6 June 2009 GoRight My surprise when I realize that WMC has already performed the revert of the page based on my proposal.
19:08, 6 June 2009 WMC WMC's acknowledgement that he had previously protected the page.
19:16, 6 June 2009 WMC WMC unilaterally declares the page ban on Hipocrite and Abd and expressed an approximate duration of 1 month.
19:59, 6 June 2009 Abd Abd's acknowledgement of the ban where he was notified, his notification that he considers WMC to be involved, his notification that he believes that WMC should have notified both Hipocrite and himself on their talk pages, and his indicattion that he did not plan to edit the talk page further.
20:19, 6 June 2009 WMC WMC's response to Abd's acknowlegement.
22:33, 6 June 2009 Boris Asks WMC if he should log it to avoid wikilwyering.
Discussion at User_talk:William_M._Connolley#CF_topic_bans. (Pre-trimmed) **
Discussion at User_talk:William_M._Connolley#CF_topic_bans. (Current) **
22:35, 6 June 2009 WMC Indicates he is not worried about it.
00:43, 7 June 2009 Cryptic C62 CF mediator asks if the ban extends to mediation.
Discussion at User_talk:William_M._Connolley#Cold_fusion_bans. (Archived) **
01:32, 7 June 2009 GoRight My first response to WMC on the topic.
02:10, 7 June 2009 Abd Follow-up messages to WMC.
05:16, 7 June 2009 Geoff Plourde A request for the policy justifying the bans.
10:31, 7 June 2009 WMC Responses to Abd and Geoff Plourde.
13:49, 7 June 2009 Abd Response to WMC.
23:16, 8 June 2009 Coppertwig Doesn't understand WMC's reply to Geoff Plourde and asks for clarification.
03:02, 9 June 2009 GoRight I point out the parallels between his ban and JzG's ban of Rothwell, as a couple of questions, and point out that he has not logged the ban.
07:33, 9 June 2009 WMC Responds to Coppertwig and myself. Points Coppertwig to User:Geoff Plourde. Indicates he will not log the ban.
04:13, 10 June 2009 Abd Asserts that WMC's ban is invalid and lists the reasons why.
Discussion at William_M._Connolley#Your_attempted_ban_of_me_from_Cold_fusion (Archived) **
11:17, 15 June 2009 Abd Abd's edit to Cold Fusion. His edit summary indicates that he will self-revert out of respect for his ban.
11:18, 15 June 2009 Abd Abd's self-revert leaving zero changes to the page.
13:09, 15 June 2009 WMC WMC's block of Abd.
13:10, 15 June 2009 WMC WMC's notification of the block to Abd.
Discussion at User_talk:Abd#Blocked. (Archived) **
14:14, 24 June 2009 Hipocrite Shows the rationale and promises that Hipocrite gave in his request to have the ban lifted. Note specifically the statement that he has "no desire to make any edits to the [Cold Fusion] page, or the talk page, or, honestly, the mediation".
22:47, 24 June 2009 WMC WMC's notification that he is lifting the Hipocrite's ban which states the conditions of lifting the ban and refers back to Hipocrites original request.
22:58, 24 June 2009 WMC WMC's notification on the talk page of Cold Fusion.
** Pointers are to the most current versions of the threads based on section headings. The discussion links appear in the edit which created the new section. If a thread is still "active" on a talk page it is referenced directly. If it has been archived then the version one edit prior to being archived in the history is used.

Note that not all diffs from the discussion links are provided in this table, only those most directly relevant (in my opinion) are included here. See the discussion links if you want to wade through everything.

Prior Interactions Among Participating Parties

NOTE: This section is currently incomplete. I intend to provide further evidence. When my editing is complete I will remove this notice.

Since the topic of there being a "virtual cabal" has been raised and to demonstrate any prior history between relevant participants in this case, I provide the following diffs for your consideration:

[To Be Provided]

Canvassing in pursuit of personal grudges and disruption of these proceedings

See edits by Raul here and here. The ensuing discussion occurs here. To WMC's credit, he declines to participate in Raul's plan.

Note that Raul may be planning further disruption at ArbCom if his efforts to pursue of me in this case (see here, here, here, and to a lesser extent here) are unsuccessful. See this which states "I think [GoRight]'s headed for arbitration regardless of the outcome of the Abd case."

I assert that Raul is disrupting these proceedings, at the very least, by keeping me tied up playing whack-a-mole with him rather than spending my time gathering the raw evidence that I want to which actually is pertinent to the case at hand.

Evidence presented by Coppertwig

Administrators normally do not have the authority to create bans by themselves

WP:Banning policy#Decision to ban lists 5 procedures for banning. None of them is a ban simply declared by an individual administrator without specific delegation from the arbitration committee. (Throughout this evidence section, when I say "ban" I mean all kinds of bans, whether site bans, page bans etc.)

WMC simply declared that there was a ban

As far as I'm aware, WMC didn't refer to any specific part of the banning policy or name any other specific procedure for banning. WMC referred to a userbox which cited Wikipedia:Trifecta; a ban reason which seems to me to be at odds with WMC's blocking of Abd for a harmless and self-reverted edit.

Declaring bans without proper process creates disruption

We can't expect all Wikipedians to agree on whether a given person should be banned or not, but I agree with MastCell [4] that there's a problem if we can't even agree on whether someone has been banned or not.

WMC muddied the waters by declaring a ban without following any of the standard processes, thus creating a situation where it wasn't clear whether there was a ban or not. This created disruption in the sense of multiple discussions using up editors' time.

Allowing admins to declare bans at will would harm the project

The banning policy does not say that an admin can create a ban at any time by declaring it, and for good reason. NPOV is best achieved by discussion and consensus among large numbers of editors with various POVs. If admins could declare bans at will, they would have too much individual control over article content, for example being able to ban all editors on one side of a content dispute.

An admin can warn someone that they will block them if disruptive behaviour continues, but I don't think it makes sense to warn someone that they will block them if they do any edit at all to a page, (even a harmless or productive edit), in the absense of a ban established by one of the procedures listed in the banning policy.

WMC was involved in page content and in dispute with Abd

WMC edited the cold fusion page with edit summary "Lets wind everyone up", at a time when there were two polls active on the talk page showing some support for other versions of the page. Abd then criticized that edit. WMC subsequently declared that Abd (along with Hipocrite) was banned from the page.

WMC wikilawyered by blocking Abd for a harmless edit

WMC blocked Abd after Abd did a one-character edit with edit summary " fix ref. will self-revert per ban." and self-reverted a minute later. WMC had previously expressed an opinion that blocking a banned editor for fixing spelling corrections etc. would be "stupid". [5]

Abd has been subjected to wikilawyering

I believe that some people dislike Abd because they disagree with his POV, primarily about two things (which I and I believe many other editors agree with him on, but Abd has the boldness to speak out about): enforcement of the principle of admin recusal, and inclusion in articles of material about (significant) minority POVs.

Three situations have been blown out of proportion in which Abd was temporarily confused about sequences of edits due to server problems and edit conflicts: Restoring a comment by Scibaby, which at first Abd didn't know was alleged to be an edit by a banned user (See the part in small font in the middle of the 2nd paragraph here [6]); moving Woonpton's vote in a poll, which Abd explained as intended to be productive but which was confused by edit conflict [7]; and an accidental interaction with another editor while editing the list of parties to this case [8]. The page-ban of Abd from cold fusion was triggered by the overblown vote-moving incident.

Cold fusion is not pseudoscience

Investigation of the Fleischmann-Pons effect is science: controversial science, fringe science, but not pseudoscience. Science by its nature investigates the unknown, and scientific method is being applied in making observations, publishing peer-reviewed articles, discussing proposed explanations, etc., whether or not anything much eventually comes of it. Steven Krivit has been called a "leading authority" on cold fusion in a press release from the American Chemical Society.

Talk page comments by Abd

Abd has ADHD, of a type which makes it extremely difficult for Abd to shorten his comments. [9]. People can ask me to provide summaries of Abd's comments. [10]

Declaration
I've associated with Abd in a number of contexts, for example I quote him on my userpage. I've previously commented on an edit by WMC in an arbitration request. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 18:24, 21 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Evidence presented by Stephan Schulz

Pseudocience is under ArbCom discretionary sanctions

ArbCom has put "all articles relating to pseudoscience, broadly interpreted" under discretionary sanctions. Such sanctions can be invoked by any uninvolved admin and include "bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; bans on any editing related to the topic or its closely related topics".

Dro(w)ning out any discussion

Communication with Abd is extremely frustrating. His "wall of text" is rambling and without focus. Here he essentially explains that he can't be bothered to write concise texts. I like reading - I own thousands of books and have read many more. But Abd's output is unmanagable. One example of the effect of this non-stop no-control text machine is impressively illustrated in Enric Naval's image: File:Discussion in cold fusion with comments of one editor highlighted.jpg.

Also see [11].

Abd's "Cabal" contains many editors of high scientific literacy

Without violating the privacy of editors, it's obvious from visiting the user pages and linked home pages that a sizable fraction of Abd's alleged "Cabal" members have higher degrees and often doctorates in the sciences. I know that many of them have published in the peer-reviewed academic press. Many or all areas of conflict originate from topics like global warming and, in particular, cold fusion, which require a good understanding of science and the scientific process. This suggest independent functional reasons, not a a conspiracy, as the base to the claimed (by Abd) common opposition to Abd's positions.

Evidence presented by Bilby

Progress to find consensus on a prefered version

Abd was involved in the second edit war which resulted in Causa sui protecting the article prior to WMC's actions. While Abd did not revert, the trigger was Abd re-adding (modified) content which had been central to the earlier edit war. Abd claimed consensus from talk for this, and there was discussion, but it isn't clear that consensus had been reached as many editors (most notably Hipocrite) hadn't engaged by that time, and the core issue (the reliablity of the primary source) was still unsettled.

After Causa sui protected the page, Abd started a vote for which version to revert the article to. Unfortunately he used an unusual methodology for wikipedia (weighted votes), changed one of the proposed versions after someone had voted for it, (moving their vote as part of this), refactored a vote to "unstrike" it against the wishes of the editor, moved proposals to a collapse box if he felt they weren't getting support, and as User:Noren said, the constant changes to the poll made it appear that Abd felt he owned the process. The result was that many of the main editors boycotted the poll, and Hipocrite started a new one. This also garnered little support, although less outright hostility.

In the end, Abd's claimed consensus for which version to revert to came only because Abd had placed votes for people, based on where they voted in the second poll, without their permission and by assigning weights to their votes which they had not agreed to. When WMC reverted to a version prior to the edit warring, there was no reason to presume that consensus was going to be found in the foreseeable future. - Bilby (talk) 05:59, 17 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Abd's editing at Talk:Cold fusion

Abd started editing the Cold fusion talk page in January, 2009 and was topic banned by WMC in early June. During that time he made 775 edits to the talk page. While there is nothing inherently wrong with extensive discussion, and many of these edits were useful contributions to the discussion, the combination of number and volume (as highlighted by others here) tended to drown out alternatives. Specific problems on Cold fusion include:

  • The "walls of text" noted by others here. While it is true Abd has ADHD, he has stated that he is able to reduce these posts, but chooses not to because of time constraints. However, he seems to have recognised this as a problem in other editors ([12] [13] [14]).
  • Cold fusion advocacy. Even when making useful points about the improvement of the article, Abd often fell into advocating for cold fusion rather than sticking to discussions about improving the article. ([15], [16], [17], [18]).
  • Repetition of points: much of the volume of the posts comes from straight repetition, with Abd restating issues that he has previously raised. For example, the Robert Duncan 60 Minutes story features in a number of his posts, including [19], [20], [21] and [22].
  • Abd and Hipocrite battled on the talk page. In particular, they started multiple polls ([23], [24] - these are different to the ones mentioned above) and edit warred over putting discussions in collapsible boxes.
  • There appears to be a tendency on Abd's part to separate editors into camps. This raised problems with finding consensus - for example, he argued that one poll was questionable, as editors "piled-on" along standard lines. This was clearer after Abd was banned, with his response to the AN/I discussion, arguing that a faction was opposed to his edits and that other editors who voted to support were "swept along".
  • At times, Abd engaged in borderline person attacks - such as his comments about User:Kirk shanahan.

Abd wasn't the only editor causing problems at Cold fusion, but the behaviour seems to me to have been tendentious and potentially disruptive, and arguably enough to warrant a topic ban. Similar views were expressed at the AN/I discussion. - Bilby (talk) 18:22, 22 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Evidence presented by William M. Connolley

But you can call me WMC.

Yet another unreliable chronology of events

Short version, for those not interested in the fine detail: CF and t:CF was a mess. I sorted that out. One person whinged but reasonable people ignored him.

In more detail:

  • A moon or more ago my attention was drawn to CF. It was a mess. It usually is - see the protection log, for example [25]. I protected for a week the then-current version, as it happened that of H [26].
  • The prot expired, edit warring resumed, CS stepped in and protected the page again [27].
  • Much tedious discussion ensued, and I think this is where the battlin' polls came in.
  • GoRight proposed a different version to be reverted to. He produced cogent arguments in its favour and for that and the amusement of agreeing with someone I've frequently disagreed with before and who often argues strongly against me, I reverted to his proposed version [28].
  • But I don't like page protection, so I looked for something better, and decided that the chief offenders were H and A (though in my heart I though A mostly to blame). So I banned them both, for an indeterminate period of approximately a month, from CF and t:CF [29].
  • The people rejoiced [30] [31].
  • Abd broke the ban, and disputed the ban from t:CF [32]. I deleted his commented [33] and warned him that any further violation would result in a block.
  • H was good.
  • A asserted that the ban didn't exist. I told him that it did [34].
  • Later, I blocked A after he broke the ban by editing CF [35]
  • A often seemed confused about the terms of the ban (links to endless discussion suppressed in the interests of sanity). At one point I had to remind him [36].
  • H asked to be unbanned, and I agreed [37]. Contrary to assertions elsewhere, the unblock was unconditional, though it came with strong advice to be good and to observe WP:1RR. Not editing CF was definitely not a condition of unblock.
  • I reviewed A's ban [38]. Since the ratio of useful edits to wikilawyering in the interim was well below 1%, I kept the ban in place.

Other stuff

  • Someone somewhere asserted that I invoked IAR for the ban. That is incorrect, and I've finally found the diff where I say so: [39].
  • Both CT and GR have noticed that I made a comment in the SA matter [40]. GR misrepresents what I said, so allow me to quote it here in full: If SA corrects a spelling error (or reverts clear and blatant vandalism) on a "fringe science" article, and someone blocks him for it, that will be stupid.. That was my opinion then. Subsequently arbcomm clarified its view of these "harmless" edits (see in particular Corens comments on 23:35, 6 March 2009 and others agreement). And so I advised SA that editing in this manner would not work [41]. Hence GR and CT's attempt to assert that my action in blocking Abd was inconsistent with my earlier statements is wrong. In any even, they were all unaware of my earlier comment until I reminded them William M. Connolley (talk) 23:05, 25 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Evidence presented by Enric Naval

WORK IN PROGRESS AGAIN. On tuesday I'll add more warnings received by Abd. I have gone through 2/3 of the archives of his talk page. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:29, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I refuse to go to mediation with Abd unless he agrees beforehand to abide by the result even if it's adverse

because he will only abide by "neutral" mediation[42][43]

Abd has received many good faith advice, warnings and complaints about his behaviour over two years

(since October 2007)

Moved here.

Abd had ample warning that he was going to get himself a topic ban

Moved here.

Abd has been warned after his topic ban that he is headed for an indef block

Abd believes that he knows better than other users

Sorry, but this reinforces his belief that he is not wrong, and it has to be stated.

  • more expert in group discussions both online and offline, first in December 2007[46], latest in April 2009[47].
  • has no science title, but feels more expert than Physics PhDs because he had Richard Feynman and Linus Pauling as teachers[48]

Abd accuses and harasses admins that warn him

  • To Raul654, [49][50], veiled threaths [51], direct threats "Be careful though, admins who read this. I'm not a newcomer, and biting me could be hazardous, like biting a poison frog. (...) you'll be safe as long as the block appears reasonable enough, even if it is incorrect. If not, though, expect to see proper process ensue"[52]
  • To MastCell, saying the he blocked Jed just to support JzG[53]
  • To JzG
  • To Jehochman, in March 2008, threatening with process [54][55], reply [56]

Abd reacts very badly to corrections

  • Raul654 doubts understanding of policy[57], met with disparagement (first sentence) and wikilawyering about policy (rest of the post)[58].
  • I proved how his comments filled and overhelmed the talk page[59] (image is linked in Stephan Schultz's evidence), met with derision, said this meant that he made a lot of work, banned me from his talk page[60].
  • When told to make shorter comments[61]

Abd's insistance in already rejected points has brought many editors to irritated frustration with him

The community had support not just for Abd's ban, but also for an indefinite ban

ANI thread on poll, ban review

Abd states ideas that are out of touch with reality

(unrealistic, showing lack of knowledge of how wikipedia actually works)

Abd thinks that:

  1. I risk getting banned for my edits at Cold fusion[76]
  2. NewYorkBrad put a lot at stake for making one comment[77] (second paragraph)
  3. he can void WMC's ban by not consenting to it[78]
  4. bad-faith cabals exist:
    • [In reference to ScienceApologist] His friends are trying to get me banned"[79]
    • [80][81]
    • discussion pointed to WP:TINC [82], refuses that he described a cabal while describing a cabal[83][84]
    • [85] the actions [of these editors] are imposible to understand without knowledge that a cabal exists (end of first paragrah), the cabal has been creating dissent by using blocks and bans to repress dissent in its goal of enforcing its miunsderstanding of policies (start of ante-last paragraph)
    • back in August 2008 before starting to edit cold fusion "Well, there is a kind of cabal, the real kind, which is mostly virtual and informal, which is clearly out to get me, but, apparently, they aren't in firm control"[86]
  5. I am an anti-CF POV pusher[87] (second section), in reply to my ban review. Just one representative example.
  6. the mediation backed 100% his content positions[88]
  7. Arbcom ratified his last case and only gave him some good advice[89] (3rd paragraph from the end), [90] (start of first paragraph)
  8. hoaxes should not be deleted, and hoaxers tolerated, here
  9. Jehochman could be blocked for saying that And edits disruptively [91]

Abd performs experiments with democracy

Supported Wikipedia_talk:Delegable_proxy, then experimental sock User_talk:The_Community. See the poll that got him topic banned experimenting with Range voting.

"I've spent the last nine months studying WP power structure"[92] (that means October-November 2007)

Abd sees no problem at all with any of his editing, and does not admit having a problem

See my last-last-last good faith attempt to solve the issue, specific examples[93], Abd sees no problem[94]

Abd thinks that long comments are not a problem because people can simply not read them

[95][96]

Abd sees no problem at all with his very long posts

[97]. resisted collapsings[98], assumes I'm trying to prevent people from reading his posts[99] (ante-last paragraph)

Abd says that he can't make shorter comments because he has ADHD...

ADHD userbox in his userpage, said publicly by himself since before February 2008 [100].

...but also says that he can be concise when he wants...

[101] (also thinks it necessary to make very long posts)

...and that he refuses to make them shorter

[102] (search for "As to the length")

Abd and other CF advocates have driven away editors from the article

[103] (first paragraph, when asked to make an edit to the article) (there are more diffs, but they are difficult to find).

Abd has also made good work and collaborated effectively

Several editors are grateful with Abd's work, got 24 supports in his second RfA, occasionally I collaborated well with him. Problem is not taking heed to multiple requests for his behaviour to change, and still not seeing any problem. Pushing issues past a reasonable point ran him into problems when accusing Fritzpoll of sockpuppeting here, then in Talk:Cold fusion and in the future since he's failing to interiorize advice to change his behaviour.

The community didn't find any problem with the blocks performed by WMC

Moved here.

Abd had already had WMC's possible desysoping and its cabal in mind in July 2008

July 2008, five months before editing Cold Fusion. "I'm trying to advise WMC how to prevent his being desysopped. If he relies on that circle of "friends and supporters," very good chance his days as an admin will be over. Or not. It's always possible that the oligarchy will win, temporarily"[104], got the idea of a cabal centered in WMC from media articles[105]

Evidence presented by Mathsci

William M. Connolley has acted properly as an administrator

WMC does not seem to have been involved in editing cold fusion or its talk page. When edit warring broke out, he locked the page at the "wrong version" and then issued page-bans to both Hipocrite and Abd for edit warring. Hipocrite responded cooperatively and the page ban was eventually lifted. Abd contested the page-bans as soon they were issued, with threats of an ArbCom case. The page-bans stopped the impasse created by Abd, whose edits were effectively filibustering on the talk page, almost amounting to WP:OWN. He had created non-standard methods of polling and discussion, which had already driven away editors such as User:Woonpton here.

Abd's account has regressed to that of single purpose fringe POV-pusher

For the last few months, Abd's edits have been almost exclusively related to cold fusion. In his edits he has revealed that has had off-wiki contacts with Steven B. Krivit and Jed Rothwell, both of them non-scientists who advocate cold fusion. Many times Abd has written that cold fusion is not a fringe topic but an "emerging science". He has, perhaps jokingly, suggested inviting the skeptical science writer Gary Taubes and retired physicist Eric Sheldon to join discussions there. The single most important question to be solved by this ArbCom case seems to be: is there some way Abd can reverse this apparent regression and get back to contributing to wikipedia in a more constructive and less confrontational way?

Abd has made unfounded statements about William M. Connolley and a cabal

Abd has repeatedly questioned WMC's authority as an administrator. Abd's edits contain innuendos that suggest that WMC is part of some covert off-wiki conspiracy. Since this case began he has written that WMC has been "coddling" me. Writing unsupported remarks of this kind seems to be exploiting a loophole in the civility code on wikipedia to make indirect yet non-sanctionable personal attacks on wikipedia. Allegations of a cabal provide an excuse for Abd to disengage from discussion and discredit any criticism during this case.

Abd appears to bear long-term grudges against various administrators

The administrators include JzG, William M. Connolley and Raul654.

Abd's escalation of disputes is needless and opportunistic

This was the case already in the Abd & JzG ArbCom case. As with the blacklisting issue, Abd threatened taking the case before ArbCom before going through the normal channels where the community can comment. In this case the community did comment on WP:ANI and multiple administrators and editors, not directly invloved in editing cold fusion or its talk page, endorsed the page-bans. Abd has written that he attempted dispute resolution in this case by trying to involve TenOfAllTrades as a mediator, a misjudged request that was immediately refused [106]. Abd did not then seek another mediator. See also [107]. In his timing of this request, Abd's edits show awareness that WMC has made recent blocks unpopular with a small but vocal group of editors, some under ArbCom sanction.

Abd claims to have scientific expertise but is dismissive and evasive to real-life experts

Abd's edits often unhelpfully dismiss editors with formal scientific training, while claiming familiarity with what's going on in research on low energy nuclear reactions and cold fusion from his reading over the last few months. Real-life experts, eg EdChem and Kirk shanahan in chemistry, are cautious and better placed to evaluate research in fringe areas. Abd has extended discussions of sources with these editors and others, sometimes with impenetrable walls of text which frequently sidetracked onto unrelated issues; he will abruptly abandon the discussion when his point of view is not accepted. On the basis of his userspace essay User:Abd/Majority POV-pushing and other edits, Abd apparently groups together all of those who disagree with his fringe POV-pushing. By dismissing critics as a cabal, the essay seems to be justifying a WP:battleground approach to editing controversial articles on fringe topics. Abd's attempt to make edits in namespace using pseudoscience like hydrino theory is pushing wikipedia to its limits.

Abd has tested the limits with banned editors Jed Rothwell and Scibaby

Abd's edits indicate that he has off-wiki contact with the banned editor JedRothwell and discusses the editing of cold fusion; on-wiki Abd has written that this cold fusion advocate is one of the world experts in the area although apparently he and Abd do not always agree. The Scibaby proxy edits have been mentioned by Raul654 on the workshop page. Like Abd's edit-revert tactic on cold fusion after his page-ban, Abd's edits test the limits of WP policy on banned editors; they seem unrelated to building a reliable and authoritative encyclopedia.

Abd appears to be supported by a small tag team

The members seem to be GoRight (talk · contribs) and Coppertwig (talk · contribs). Coppertwig has stated that she/he is willing to act as Abd's interpeter, but this does not seem to have happened in practice since Abd's two page-bans and does not seem a reasonable thing to expect.

Abd has failed to recognize messages from the community or ArbCom

Abd's edits show that he does not recognize that the community upheld his page-ban when Enric Naval opened a discussion on WP:ANI. His edits, including this case itself, also indicate that he has not apparently understood the findings of the Abd & JzG ArbCom case concerning his own actions. After the ArbCom case concluded, much time was wasted discussing lenr-canr.org at MediaWiki talk:Spam-whitelist; it was handled well by Fritzpoll and Dirk Beetstra.

My brief involvement on Talk:Cold fusion has been minimal and constructive

I made a total of 16 edits to this talk page for about 10 posts all related to the use of secondary sources, in particular an essay-review made available as sheldon.pdf on http://mathsci.free.fr.

Evidence presented by Spartaz

I have never been part of a cabal before....

[108]Its not as exciting as I thought it would be except of course there is no cabal and this is a classic example of Abd preferring to blame conspiracy and cabalism rather then actually listen to the comments of those that oppose him and take their comments on board. Wikipedia is a collaborative project and Abd clearly shows that they cannot collaborate with users who disagree with them. He is clearly well meaning and dedicated but I implore the arbitration committee to actually look at the impact his behaviour has on those he comes into contact with and do something to stop him harming the work of other editors. Please. Its long overdue.

Evidence presented by Raul654

Abd/GoRight mutual trolling society

GoRight and Abd have on multiple occasions attempted to derail dispute resolution proceedings against the other. That is to say, whenever one of them behaves so badly that the community begins proceedings to reign in disruption from one of them, the other shows up to make supportive comments.

Examples:


Evidence presented by User:Shot_info

There is no conspiracy

When you start accusing everyone of being in on a conspiracy, you shouldn't be surprised if they decide to confirm your paranoia by banding together against you - as Abd has discovered. Shot info (talk) 00:48, 21 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Evidence presented by Alex Bakharev (talk)

Cold fusion is pseudoscience

Cold fusion is a pseudoscience. A very good review of this teaching is done in Park, Robert L. (2000). Voodoo Science: The Road from Foolishness to Fraud. Oxford University Press. p. 230. ISBN ISBN 0-19-513515-6, ISBN 0-19-514710-3, ISBN 0-19-860443-2. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help). That our article does not make it clear shows that there is something wrong with the process. Abd not only pushes pseudoscience in the main space but also as I understand has some commercial interests in doing so. I am not follow the development of the article nor the attempts of WMC to restore some normality here but the later were obviously not strong enough to stop the madness.

Cabalism

Regarding the cabal accusations. I do have some off-wiki communications with many editors, some time it might be interpreted as cabalism (although I always stay for my action). I am sure that most of active wikipedians also have some off-wiki communications with others and somehow open to accusations in cabalism. However I can certify that I have no offwiki communications regarding the Cold Fusion article or abd, still I was inserted by abd into his cabal list. That might shed light how credible the list is. If one pushes pseudoscience then not all people who try to stop it are cabal members even if they are numerous. Alex Bakharev (talk) 02:14, 21 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Evidence presented by Viridae

WMC refuses to disengage from Abd

  • Despite being one of two opposing parties to this case, WMC removed a (quite long) comment of Abd's from Abd's section on the workshop page, and then edit warred to keep it removed:
    • Removal: [112]
    • Edit warring: 1 and 2
    • WMC had previously been warned for that kind of behaviour: [113]
    • He then edited the collapsible box Abd placed around the comment in question: [114].

Evidence presented by Woonpton

Misrepresentation of an incident

The vote-moving incident, which represented only a very small bit of the disruption at the cold fusion talk page but has been mentioned in this case by others, has been somewhat misrepresented, especially as to how the incident was blown out of proportion, and by whom. The incident was documented in an AN/I report. I refer to that report for the diffs and for a full account; my purpose here is simply to review how that incident has been mischaracterized.

The action at issue was Abd's move of my vote in his poll from the version I had voted for to a version which he claimed was the version I'd really intended to vote for. In an edit at 3:48, June 5 I objected to the move, struck my vote and its comment, and provided the diff of my vote which showed clearly that I had voted for the version I said I'd voted for and had intended to vote for. Then I took a break.

Abd's account of what happened next, repeated in several places, is at odds with the historical record. In a very long response at AN/I (which he later removed entirely from the page, leaving the record incomplete as archived) he repeated this claim: "I was definitely, for a while, quite confused, with one edit conflict with Woonpton after another." ... "Woonpton and I were in edit conflict after edit conflict as I tried to figure out what the editor wanted and to restore and undo any damage that I might have done." ... "This was all a transient misunderstanding, but, probably due to some prior and very strange conflict, it blew up quickly."''

The facts are these: I edited at 3:48 when I objected to the vote move, and didn't edit again until 4:51. The incident was indeed "blown up quickly," but the page history shows that between my edits of 3:48 and 4:51, the only person editing the page was Abd, who made seven edits to the page during that time, removing the struck comment that was appended to my vote, leaving the vote in place at the wrong version, then making an edit with the edit summary "Woonpton appears to have accepted the move" and then in another post explainingthat I was confused and had voted for the wrong version and that he'd placed my vote where it belonged, and even arguing that the version he had moved my vote to was an obviously better version than the one I had actually voted for. Nothing in this flurry of unilateral activity suggests that Abd was trying to "figure out what the editor wanted" and to undo the damage. Eventually he realized that the mistake was his, not mine, and that I had indeed voted for the version I said I'd voted for, but the misunderstanding could have been sorted out immediately rather than more than an hour later, if he'd just clicked on that diff instead of editing furiously to maintain the misunderstanding.

I withdrew my votes at that point and withdrew from the talk page citing a loss of faith in the integrity of the process.

As for Abd's comment (quoted above) that "due to some prior and very strange conflict, it blew up quickly" this "very strange conflict" he alludes to was no conflict at all, but a simple difference of opinion about the delegable proxy business from last year, which I hadn't even heard of until a month or two ago. He and I see that episode very differently, but I hardly see that as a "very strange conflict;" it's just a difference of opinion.

Response to Coppertwig: I'm not sure the statement that Abd's ban was triggered by this incident is supported by evidence; the announcement on AN/I of the ban stated that the ban was unrelated to the AN/I incident report; WMC to my knowledge has not mentioned this incident in his statements about the ban, and the chaos he found at the talk page that precipitated the bans was not related to this incident as far as I can tell.

State of the cold fusion talk page before the ban of Abd and Hippocrite

Following the above incident, and after I left the talk page, Abd moved the poll and the comments around [115][116]. Mathsci and Verbal complained about his actions re the poll, and Abd responded accusing Mathsci and Verbal of pushing an "anti-fringe agenda" and getting in the way of Abd's consensus-gathering process. "Don't like the poll above? You are not obligated to participate, nobody is. But please stop trying to disrupt efforts to determine consensus here."

Abd explained here what he was trying to do with the poll: My goal in this poll was to quickly estimate consensus. Range polling can be faster for this purpose than Yes/No polling, though it often reduces to the same if people just vote max (10) or min (0). The whole point of such a device is to avoid debate. This is standard in deliberative process for motions where debating the motion would defeat the purpose of the motion.

There were more objections to Abd's poll process and methodology [117][118][119] to his repeated moving of comments and sections [120] which made it difficult to follow the discussion, and to his misinterpretation of a vote [121]

Hippocrite then started a new poll. Abd put the two polls together, which made no sense from a measurement standpoint because they were scored differently. There were complaints about this action and about the accuracy of the matrix Abd put together to compare the versions. There was a [ call for the poll to be closed] which Abd responded to by saying that a poll could not be closed except by an administrator.

The disruption over the polls continued in the same vein for another 24 hours after that. At the time of WMC's decision, the polls [122] {http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3ACold_fusion&diff=294832717&oldid=294831592#Poll_to_find_quick_rough_consensus_for_change_under_protection] were a complete mess; there would have been no reasonable way to draw conclusions about consensus from them, especially from Abd's combined poll, in which he simply assigned points (10 or 0) on a ten-point scale for the votes brought over from Hippocrite's poll, which makes them unsuitable to be meaningfully concatenated with the votes that had been assigned points by the voters themselves. Abd has claimed, even on these pages if I'm not mistaken, that there was a version that had consensus that WMC should have reverted to; it's unclear to me how WMC could have intuited any consensus from the polls or from the surrounding tumult. As you can see the most votes that any version had were three or four, and there were several versions that had three or four votes, so the idea that a consensus had emerged is simply not supportable from looking at the polls.


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