Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests

The last step of dispute resolution is a request for arbitration. Please review other avenues you should take. If you do not follow any of these routes, it is highly likely that your request will be rejected. If all other steps have failed, and you see no reasonable chance that the matter can be resolved in another manner, you may request that it be decided by the Arbitration Committee.

Arbitration Committee proceedings

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Case requests

Currently, there are no requests for arbitration.

[edit]

Open cases

Case name	Links	Evidence due	Prop. Dec. due
Venezuelan politics	(t) (ev / t) (ws / t) (pd / t)	20 Apr 2024	04 May 2024

[edit]

Recently closed cases (Past cases)

Case name	Closed
Conflict of interest management	13 Apr 2024
Mzajac	7 May 2024

Clarification and Amendment requests

Request name	Motions	Case	Posted
Amendment request: Conduct in deletion-related editing	none	(orig. case)	30 April 2024
Clarification request: Palestine-Israel articles 4	none	(orig. case)	8 May 2024

Arbitrator motions

No arbitrator motions are currently open.

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

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

This is not a page for discussion, and arbitrators may summarily remove discussion without comment.

• Arbitration policy
• Administrator enforcement requested (shortcut WP:RFAr/AER)
• Developer help needed
• Arbitration template
• Wikipedia:Arbitration policy/Precedents

Current requests

Template

Involved parties

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

If not, then explain why that would be fruitless

Statement by party 1

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Statement by party 2

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Stevertigo

Involved parties

Party 1: Initiator

• Carbonite

Party 2: Subject of Arbitration

• Stevertigo

Other Involved Admins

• Geni
• Mackensen
• Thryduulf

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• Stevertigo
• Carbonite | Talk 13:24, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
• Thryduulf
• Mackensen
• Geni

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Stevertigo

Statement by party 1

This case concerns the abuse of multiple administrative powers for the purpose of gaining an advantage in a dispute. Stevertigo violated the blocking policy four times [1] by unblocking himself and the protection policy by reverting a protected page [2] to his preferred version. A RfC was posted and over 20 editors found Stevertigo's actions to be unacceptable. Stevertigo's brief response was mostly sarcastic and dismissive.

Statement by party 2

See Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Stevertigo/Statement

Statements by other involved administrators

• Thryduulf

  The statement I made on the arbitration request entitled User:CJK, User:Stevertigo [3] is relevant also to this request. I am happy to be considered a party to this request if the arbcom or any of the other parties wish it. Feel free to reproduce my statement there on this case if desired (like most of my edits, it is in the public domain).

  I am not certain why these requests are separate, and suggest merging them. Thryduulf 18:54, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (3/0/0/0)

• Accept Fred Bauder 13:30, August 10, 2005 (UTC)
• Accept. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:57, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• Accept. James F. (talk) 11:09, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

Ems57fcva

Involved parties

• user:Ems57fcva
• 216.112.42.61

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• Party 1: User talk:Ems57fcva notified on August 9, 2005
• Party 2: 216.112.42.61 initiated this request

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

If not, then explain why that would be fruitless

Other methods of conflict resolution are fruitless, the reason being that Ems57fcva has libelously falsely portrayed myself and my statements in a clever, calculated deceptive manner that demonstrates clear malicious deceptiveness on his/her part. Therefore, mediation is useless.

Statement by party 1

Statement by Ems57fcva

See this diff showing a sample of 16.112.42.61's edits. These are a set of mistatements and misconceptions, and were reverted by Joke137 because of it. Serveral other sets of his edits have also been reverted out by Joke137 and others.

See Talk:Cosmology#POV_vandalism_report_of_creationist_Joke137_suppressing_important_scientific_facts, especially the 5th paragraph.

See Talk:Cosmology#The_case_against_216.112.42.61_and_the_NPOV_tag, which is the actual source of this compaint. Note that I laid down the law on 216.112.42.61 here. Without respecting the boundaries stated, his edits cannot survive.

Alse see User_talk:Ems57fcva#Notification_of_request_for_arbitration.

Be aware that this editor has created RfC-s and RfA-s against Joke137, and for the Cosmology page in the past over the issue of whether Big Bang is true.

This is part of an attempt on the part of 216.112.42.61 to bludgeon Wikipedia editors into compliance with his views. Note that any opposition to his personal views is taken to be a "suppression of facts", and that my offer to work with him to find reasonable way to document the anti-Big-Bang views of what seems to be a fair number of astronomers and scientists only demonstrates my "malicious calculating nature".

In my response to his web link showing a reasonable level of opposition to Big Bang, I expresed doubt as to whether he could do more than generate another diatribe. I think that his response has shown my concerns to be well founded. Also note how 216.112.42.61 ended his message to me informing me of this action in User_talk:Ems57fcva#Notification_of_request_for_arbitration: If you all find in my favor, you are also guilty of "suppressing facts". This is not someone that we can reason with. --EMS | Talk 05:36, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by party 2

Statement by 216.112.42.61

On the page talk:cosmology, the wikipedia user Ems57fcva has libelously falsely portrayed my thoughtful and informative contributions to the wikipedia article 'cosmology' as NOT being thoughtful and informative, and furthermore as being mere diatribes (a gross falsehood). He/she has made those libelous statments in the guise of being considerate, so as to make the deception appear more convincing. Ems57fcva has also given small, nearly-insubstantial concessions in the guise of being considerate, so as to make more convincing his/her deception that other edits should not be allowed. Such a malicious deceptive salesman's tactic is completely unacceptable. It is therefore appropriate that Ems57fcva be banned from wikipedia.

My attempted edits of the cosmology article regard the big bang hypothesis. My edits only: 1. add the fact that Einstein based his cosmology-related beliefs on the assumption that the universe depends upon a balance between gravity and energy, and 2. eliminate the assumption that the big bang hypothesis has been proved, primea facie, by both the red shift and the cosmic background radiation. Thus, my edits are thoughtful and informative because they state the facts objectively. They are certainly not a diatribe.

This is not a content dispute. It is a matter of falsely portraying content so as to bias people against it, rather than considering it fairly. Most people that think blindly enough to support the big bang hypothesis despite the logic and evidence against it should also think blindly enough to falsely portray the opposition rather than facing it, due to the same character type causing both traits, so Ems57fcva's behavior makes sense, psychologically.

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (0/3/0/0)

• Reject, Ems57fcva has done his best to be courteous. Fred Bauder 13:26, August 10, 2005 (UTC)
• Concur with Fred. →Raul654 21:01, August 11, 2005 (UTC)
• Reject, I see no case, along with Fred and Raul. James F. (talk) 11:07, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

-Ril-

Involved parties

• -Ril-
• Bmicomp
• Dmcdevit·t

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

-Ril- has been informed

BMIComp (talk, HOWS MY DRIVING) 21:08, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Numerous people have requested that -Ril- change his signature [4] [5] [6] [7] Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)#Usernames, but he has stated that he will not changed it unless told to do so by the Arbitration committee. (From -Ril-'s user page) "I'm keeping it unless the arbitration committee ban it. Learn to cope. ~~~~ 11:52, 23 July 2005 (UTC)"

Statement by Bmicomp

-Ril-'s signature is ~~~~, which is identical to a feature of the software, the method for a user to sign a comment. Wikipedia:Username states, "No deliberately confusing usernames: usernames designed to cause confusion with other contributors, or features of the software. This can be confusing for users." The username policy also states that "In general, the same rules apply for signatures as for usernames." Multiple users have asked him to change his signature due to its confusing nature, but he has refused. It seems that -Ril- is disrupting wikipedia to make a point.

The following was added at 04:58, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Furthermore, -Ril- seems to be very aware of policy, but "games the system", interpretting the policy in its most literal sense in order to skirt the policy. For example, he has brought an RfC against UninvitedCompany for misuse of his sysop powers, because Uninvited blocked him for 72 hours for violating the 3RR rule. These reverts were actually over a 24 hour 21 min period, instead of 24 hours as per 3RR policy. -Ril- claim that Uninvited abused his admin powers in doing so. However, despite his literal interpretation of policy, -Ril- has on many ocassions reminded other users that wikipedia is about the spirit of the policy, not the word [8] [9].

-Ril- also has a history of tagging tags articles for speedy deletion, despite being warned that his actions were contrary to policy [10].

It seems that -Ril- believes he is entitled to 3 reverts per article per day, which can be seen from statements which he made in this RfAr and from his tireless reverting of articles. Many of the articles that he edits are religous articles and are inherently contraversial, however, -Ril- seems to revert with little discussion and little dispute resolution. He has also been blocked four times for violation of WP:3RR (~~~~_.2F_User:-Ril- George Bush, ~~~~_.2F_User:-Ril- The Bible and history Matthew 1 Wikipedia:Bible verses). Despite -Ril-'s claims otherwise, only one of these was unblocked because it was inappropriate [11]. With one of them, he e-mailed admins until he found one that would unblock him. [12] [13]

It seems that he has followed ("stalked") other user's edits, such as Noitall [14] and User:SimonP, people who had been involved in disputes/conflict with -Ril-, and he has reverted their edits on other articles after these disputes.

Note: for those who may contend that his signature is not disruptive, I had to nowiki part of two links because they contained -Ril-'s signature....

Statement by Dmcdevit

I'd like to involve myself as well (hope I'm doing this right). Ril's constant disruption has become a big problem. I'm sure others more knowlegeable can comment on Ril's multiple 3RR violations, his disruptive VfD nominations, and his failure to assume good faith, but I'll comment on his flagrantly disruptive speedy tagging. On August 4th, while going through the speedy deletes, I noticed an abnormally large amount of bad speedy tags coming from Ril (so many that I spent more time chasing after him and removing the tags than actually deleting real speedies) for imaginary criteria. For example, he tagged The Fuzz as vanity (Note that the recent CSD proposal included band vanity but it failed. There is general consensus to view this as evidence the community stongly want sall these at VfD, not speedied), Miss Rumphius as "vanity/advertising" (note it is not a person, and VfD is specifically not a CSD, it is often only a language cleanup issue), Halifax Commons as "advertising", Engers as "non notable + minimal content" (it was a perfectly valid geo stub), Bonnie Patterson as "not notable" despite the obvious assertion of notability, university president, Enclosed mall as "advert", Henry C.K. Liu as "vanity" despite the obvious assertion of notability. This was all in one short period of time. At some point in the midst of untagging all these I warned Ril to be more careful about CSD. I was dismayed when later in the day, after the warning, Ril continued, tagging again for "advertising" and warned him again in no uncertain terms. After an exasperating discussion (all of it here) in which Ril made various non-responses, Ril proceeded to ignore me. On August 6th, Kappa again warned Ril about his speedy tags, this time he tagged another valid geo stub, Crackington Haven as "advertising." Four hours later, Ril made no response to Kappa, but instead proceeded to tag Mega Man X Collection for speedy, saying again advert (Note that as of this writing, the subsequent VfD on that article has a unanimous keep). Kappa warned again. Ril refuses to respond. That same day, I saw CHERUB Forums, King Danny Wallace I, Dying To Live, and Ultimate Gaming Machine (UGM) all have Ril's speedy tags removed, and by three separate editors (Pburka, Kappa, and Vague Rant). I warned him again, convinced of bad faith at this point. Ril's response continued to skirt the issue (CSD vs. VFD), saying I wanted Wikipedia full of advertising. After my final comment, he stopped rsponding. Ril has shown bad faith and disruption in these actions and interations, forcing others to spend their time cleaning up after him and making the VfD noms he couldn't be bothered to do. His response to this has been full of arrogance, disregard for the community and policy, and unrepentance. I am convinved he has no intention of changing his ways. (Sorry, I don't know how this got so long.) Dmcdevit·t 05:01, August 10, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Noitall

You could duplicate everything Dmcdevit said and then add to it. Somehow, still for unexplained reasons, -Ril- decided to target me over a period of some 2 weeks. It was a very unpleasant experience. On just one of the pages, you can see the result at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/3RR (14 reverts). Since this issue does not directly address all of -Ril-'s other issues, I won't go into more. But note that I had a lot of difficulty figuring out which of his names to use, and one of them is incorrect. --Noitall 05:19, August 10, 2005 (UTC)

3 new points from -Ril-'s latest:

1. on his User page, he has the statement, "Please note, I am not User:Ril, User:--Ril--, nor User:()" (I don't even know if that will print). This is an acknowledgement of the confusion his signature causes.
2. typical of -Ril-: On three separate instances, he reverts 4 times, but just barely plans it so he does not strictly violate the 3RR policy -- he has never justified a single revert despite being asked more than 10 times -- and was blocked for 72 hours for it. Now he claims that his 2.5 reverts per day vandalism (just on one of the 40+ pages) is somehow justified.
3. typical of -Ril-: he chases me around for 2 weeks on the pages I was editing while I tried my best to ignore him (until he would disrupt each and every page) and he accuses me of trolling!! --Noitall 13:02, August 10, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by SimonP

It would be useful if someone could look into -Ril-'s persistent edit warring. In the last month alone he has been blocked three times for breaking the 3RR, and has gone over the limit on a number of other occasions. As noted above he has also begun skirting the policy by reverting at a rate just slow enough to not get him banned. Moreover these reverts are hardly ever accompanied by discussion, for instance despite reverting [15] four times in a few hours he has yet to reply on the talk page or when the issue was raised on his user talk page. - SimonP 14:00, August 11, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by party 2

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Bmicomp's comments

• The username policy applies to usernames, thus the name "username policy". My username is "-Ril-", this is not deliberately confusing, designed to cause confusion, or features of the software (I'm assuming this means "exploit features of the software" rather than "is not a design feature of the software", as that would cover all usernames).
• Several editors have non-english-alphabet signatures, for example, Sam Spade (¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸).
• No-one really copies signatures, otherwise there would be a lot more instances of sam spade's and Eequor's (ηυωρ). People copy usernames. My username is -Ril-.
• There is no policy forbidding unusual signatures.
• The arbitration committee only has the power to interpret policy, and establish precedent, not form new policy (such as a signature policy).

DmcDevit's comments-

(Just a few for brevity),

• King Danny Wallace I is an advert for a current, short, and not terribly notable, documentary running on BBC2/Channel 4 (I don't remember which) called "how to start your own country" - Danny Wallace is the (not terribly famous whatsoever) presenter.
• Enclosed mall, despite its title, has the content "Los Cerritos Mall - Los Cerritos Center, also known as the Cerritos Mall, is located in Cerritos, California. It is one of the southland's premier shopping centers". This is an advert.

Noitall's comments

• There is no 5 day 13RR (thats under 2.5 per day by the way)
• Removal of controversial edits which have no evidence supporting them, despite repeated questions on the talk page to ask for evidence, is entirely justified in accordance with wikipedia policy.
• User:--Ril-- and [[User:~~~~]] are sockpuppets designed to commit vandalism and blame it on me. User:Ril is banned permanently, and is a sockpuppet of banned user User:Lir. All 3 of these users are permanently banned.
• Dmcdevit has already told Noitall to stop trolling.

SimonP's comments

• All but one block against me has been lifted before expiry as being inappropriate.
• Part of the reason for the one that wasn't lifted not being lifted could easily be put down to the fact that the blocking admin (El C) put the wrong page on their watchlist rather than putting my talk page up, and was "high on Codeine at the time".
• The reverts involving SimonP concern his behaviour which does not reflect community consensus. After Theresa Knott stepped in at his request, stating to a degree that they did not reflect community consensus, I created surveys to determine what the community consensus was to see whether the community opinion implies the same as my opinion that his actions did not have consensus, or whether it implies that he was wholly justified. The current status of the surveys is that there is demonstrably no consensus for his mass moving (100s of articles at once) of request for expansion tags from article to talkpage (or vice versa), and that his views on the notability of bible verses are not supported by the community (i.e. the community agrees with me that it is not the case that most bible verses are sufficiently notable to have seperate articles)

Germen's comments

Mel Etitis' comments

Ta bu shi da yu's comments

Raul654's comments

• I did not state that Willy on Wheels should be promoted to sysop. I stated that Willy on Wheels had already, technically, been promoted to sysop (albeit without any bureaucrat making the necessary alteration), and would need to have a vote for de-sysopping against him, in the interests of due process.
• Jimbo said that he feels fairly strongly that the ArbCom election process was deeply flawed, and in the same edit "understsanding [sic] of the law and a judicial temperament are more important than popularity" [i.e. democratic elections], as well as appointing persons such as Jayjg over Mirv because with regards to Mirv, Jimbo "don't know him so well". This is what I stated at the edit Raul654 gives ([16]), and is therefore not false.
• Raul654's accusations would seem to make him an involved party (by virtue of making accusations, rather than considering the possible merits of accusations others have made), so I am requesting Raul654 to recuse as a result, and sign as an involved party (or withdraw the accusations, and remain arbitrator on this issue).

Recusal

Despite her involvement in the above criticism of my signature, I do not feel that Theresa Knott needs to recuse herself.

Non-existance of earlier steps in dispute resolution

• I can see why arbitrators with strong anti-Islamic POVs would want to accept immediately but;
• No RFC was filed against me whatsoever, at any point, nor has mediation been raised or suggested - earlier steps have NOT been tried.

~~~~ ( ! | ? | * ) 11:42, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (4/0/0/0)

• Accept Fred Bauder 02:31, August 10, 2005 (UTC)
• Accept. Also, his flagarantly false statements about Jimbo have me concerned, as well as his disturbing demand that we promote the Willy-on-Wheels vandal to sysop. →Raul654 03:03, August 10, 2005 (UTC)
• Accept. Behaviour seems to be a cause for concern in a number of areas. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:55, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• Accept. James F. (talk) 11:05, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

Rainbowwarrior1977

Involved parties

• Essjay (talk · contribs)
• Rainbowwarrior1977 (talk · contribs) a.k.a Musachachado (talk · contribs) a.k.a SamuraiBoywithaDrugProblem (talk · contribs) a.k.a. CelineDionFan82 (talk · contribs) a.k.a. Pamstar (talk · contribs) a.k.a 4.174.3.171 (talk · contribs) and many other IPs.

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• Essjay · Talk 12:36, August 9, 2005 (UTC)
• Left message on Rainbowwarrior1977's talk page and at the RfC -- Essjay · Talk 12:36, August 9, 2005 (UTC)

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Numerous editors have tried to informally resolve the matter. I filed an RfC, which Rainbowwarrior1977 attempted to have dismissed on the grounds that it covered more than one type of activity. He has refused to acknowledge his behavior, and shows no intention of acting in good faith during the RfC process, even when it was clearly noted that a failure to resolve the issues through RfC would lead to an arbitration case.

Statement by party 1

Rainbowwarrior1977 (together with his sockpuppets) has engaged in an extended and continuing campaign of disruption of Wikipedia, and he shows no intention of changing his behavior. Disruptive activities include personal attacks against other users, RfA fraud, article vandalism, userpage vandalism, misuse of CSD templates, sockpuppetry, disruption of VfD, insulting and/or attacking edit summaries, attacks on other users, particularly admins, who have corrected his actions, repeated lies and disinformation about himself in tandem with attacks on users who question his claims.

He claims to be a well-credentialed contributor (an attorney with a JD from NYU) with exhaustive contributions to Wikipedia; however, his edit count is 129, with only 43 edits to the articlespace. In the less than one month this account has been active on Wikipedia, he has managed to rack up an extensive body of evidence against himself, much of which is set out at the RfC. Rather than attempting to cooperate with other contributors and abide by site policy, he has attacked editors who have opposed his disruption and denounced them as abusive. (I personally have been accused of enjoying the opportunity to beat up on newcomers; I will let my hundreds of new member welcomes, including a welcome at User talk:Musachachado, and my reputation as an advocate of new members speak for itself on that one.) He shows a disregard for Wikipedia policy and for the standards of this community; despite repeated admonishments and the resulting promises to change, his behavior has not improved since his arrival.

I believe this user has no other goal than to disrupt Wikipedia and that he will continue to do so unless the Arbitration Committee acts quickly to stop him. Other editors have suggested that he is indeed an attorney, as he claims; that his edits to law-related topics are evidence of this; and that his vandalism was a phase from which he has now emerged. I (and others) reject this claim, as I do not believe it likely that a respected attorney would be vandalizing Wikipedia and claiming to be a fifteen year old. I also do not believe that one can be a full-blown vandal (at RfA) on Saturday and be completely rehabilitated and committed to making only positive contributions by Monday. I submit that what positive edits have been made are a smokescreen designed to provide him cover in the event of disciplinary proceedings, and I suspect that he will make every effort to abuse and threaten others and game the system in order to avoid disciplinary action. He is an abusive vandal who should be told in no uncertain terms that Wikipedia will not allow this conduct, and that should be reinforced by quick and decisive action by this committee.

Statement by party 2

I have indicated a willingness to apologise for my disruptive behaviour on talk pages. I have already personally apologised to a handful of users with whom I was trading barbed posts, such as User:Rusty2005 and User:Essjay.

I have been using Wikipedia for several months previously for researching geographic, cultural, and demographic information on various locales in the Carribean and South America that I had been visiting (I primarly live in Miami with my wife), but upon learning earlier this summer that "anyone could edit" the articles, my juvenile side got the better of me initially.

I freely admit that almost all of my early posts were disruptive. However, as with many vandalistic newbies, I soon realised the satisfaction that comes from legitimate contribution to Wikipedia. As time progessed I found that I was making mostly legitmate edits to the articles and restricting my juvenile antics to user pages. And now, having more fully interacted with many of the users, I realise that you mostly are a bunch of good guys; I think one of the things that really hit home with me is that many of the fellow users with whom I was arguing were actually Professors and other professional people, and not just a bunch of the proverbial "computer dorks."

Therefore, based on these sentiments, I apologise. If you note from my "Request for Comment" page, several users were taking my side even before I expressed my contrition. And I see they are right. I'm sorry.

And as much as Casito would like to imply I'm a pervert of some kind, the only reason I noticed "Purplefeltangel" was because she was listed directly above me at the WP:VIP page. [in this edit] And I didn't know she was a girl at the time either -- that's why I kept calling her "gentleman."

Statement by Zscout370

I first dealt with the user that is the subject of this request at his RFA. When it was removed, because it clearly failed, he just kept adding it back wanting to let the process through. I let him know on that RFA that it can be removed if the nomination clearly fails because we want to prevent people to pile on opposition votes and some have assumed the nominaion itself was in bad faith. Some time later, I got pulled into the RFC mentioned above. I agree with the person filing the complaint, instead of Rainbowwarrior trying to explain what he is doing, he is trying to avoid the situation by Wikilawyering the process down. Another issues, which was brought up, is that Rainbowwarrior said he was a banned user evidence. Though some others have been nice at the RFC and at the RFA to help this user and try to explain what is going on, but all of our attempts have been squashed with the Wikilawyering and it needs to stop, now. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 16:43, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Casito

I uncovered a number of Musachachado's early edits, most of which were sneaky vandalism, bogus translations, bogus sources, and misuse of templates with the intent of wasting others' time. I warned him about his actions on several accounts and IP's, and eventually listed him on WP:VIP and later on WP:RCP. He responded with a flood of vitriol, accusing me of legal threats on my talk page, and posting personal attacks on article talk pages, project pages, and in edit summaries. After instructing him never to post on my talk page again, he marked that page with a speedy delete tag, and accused me of policy violations. He continued to post on my page for some time even after being warned by administrators, leading me to believe that he has some peculiar fascination with me.

I suspect that he honestly thought he could be made an administrator, and his nomination at WP:VFA was an attempt to seek that power for malevolent uses, especially against me. I speculate that his interaction with User:Purplefeltangel has something to do with her being a 14 year old girl, as he posted on his user page that he was 15 around that time.

Musachachado is intelligent and clearly has some legal education. Ordinarily, this would result in a valued contributor. Unfortunately, he has a pathological narcissistic streak which prevents him from following the advice of more experienced editors as well as the rules in general.

I can say with near certainty that he will continue in his ways and create another sock puppet for the same purposes if his account is banned, so I recommend that his IP be extracted from the server logs and his Internet Service Provider notified.

⇝Casito⇝Talk 20:48, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by third party: Sasquatch

I have stated my opinions at the RfC and will summarize it here for clairty. First, I agree that Rainbowwarrior1977 has been abusive/disruptive and does not follow many Wikipedia policies either through not understanding them or otherwise. That being said, I also have to say he has made some surprisingly good edits to law related articles which suggests he is not always so disruptive. This Jekyll and Hyde personality has been hard on some users and should not be taken lightly. However, my Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Rainbowwarrior1977#Final_request_by_Sasquatch still remains valid for now should the ArbCom see fit to give this problem user one last chance (as that is pretty much all I am willing to give as well). Sasquatch

↔[[User_talk:Sasquatch|

讲]]

↔[[Special:Contributions/Sasquatch|

看]] 23:53, August 10, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by third party: Redwolf24

First of all I think it necessary to read Rainbow's RfC. There's some evidence there that has not surfaced yet at this RfAr. This user has caused dismay at RfA, first by nominating his (then un)blocked account, Musachachado with a sockpuppet. The RfA was delisted and later he was blocked (for Personal Attacks, etc.). Now Rainbow has admitted to being Musachachado. Later he would have another RfA (nominated by a sock AGAIN) and was delisted by either Essjay or Linuxbeak... I think he was delisted by both of them as he kept relisting his RfA, yelling at and attacking Essjay and Linuxbeak. In my opinion, arbitration is necessary. Redwolf24 01:14, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (2/0/0/0)

• Accept Fred Bauder 19:04, August 9, 2005 (UTC)
• Accept. James F. (talk) 11:04, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

User:CJK, User:Stevertigo

No other dispute resolution tried. WP:RFM is too slow and too non-binding to be effectual. I know because Im on it. St|eve 18:09, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by party 1

User CJK requested WP:3RR for my undoing of his reversions of my edits. My edits were contstructive, and CJK's were simply reversals, claiming "POV." Of each specific edit he made, which I contested, I made a point by point justification for my changes. CJK continued to claim on WP:RFP#Request to protect: Vietnam War and WP:3RR that I, not he, had violated the rule. Consequently I was blocked, while CJK was not. After page protection was finally implemented, I restored my changed which had been reverted by an anon with only 10 edits. I felt that leaving the page in an older state (by the act of an anon who had not participated in discussion) would be a device for regressing the article to a POV version, and reverting his changes was not improper —even if it violated an absolutist interpretation of WP:PP policy. For this Thrydulf (following strictine policy) reinstituted the block. User:TJive is involved in the editing/discussion as well, but has been largely constructive, and certainly capable of discussing the material —which CJK has repeated shown himself not to be (though he's perhaps closer to TJive's political views). Sinreg, -St|eve 18:06, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by party 2

Let's put this in perspective. On August 5 Stevertigo made large changes to the introduction paragraph in Vietnam War. I thought the changes were POV, as it implies "American Imperialism" was in the works. It is fine if he believes that, but I thought it was outrageously inaccurate so I changed a few words to make it more NPOV (note I did not immediately rv his contribution, just changed some wording). Steverigo reverted and brought the situation to the discussion page. I reverted and responded. Then, without even notifying me, he requested protection of the page on the grounds of "disagreement" (as if there wouldn't be a disagreement with his loaded claims). The dispute had barely gotten off the ground, and already he wanted his version protected. So I asked that the page not be protected because the dispute might be easily solved by other means. Back at the talk page I tried to hold a rational discussion with Stevertigo along with User:Trey Stone and User:TJive. For Stevertigo to apply the label "not constructive" is incredible considering I responded rationally to all of his points. That he favors TJive's responses more than mine is not my problem. Meanwhile, the page is blindly protected to the original version, but Stevertigo goes and protects to HIS VERSION, which is an obvious act of bad faith. I reported him to 3RR for his gross violations (even if you factor out my reverts which went over three and which I was subsequently blocked for). Then the "wheel war" began, and so on. Shortly after this arbitration was started (and I was not informed of it) I began a new series of talks, but I don't think Stevertigo really proved his point. I look forward to rational debate, but launching this arbitration without other steps in the resolution process because "its too slow" doesn't really cut it considering the dispute is not even a week old.

That said, I am not sure what this arbitration is going to accomplish. Is it to clear Stevertigo of adminstrative wrong doing? Is it to determine the substance of the Vietnam War? Is it to punish me for my "weasel wording"? Or it is a combination of these? I look forward to these answers. CJK 16:14, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by party 3

I am inlcuding myself in this as party 3, because my actions have come in for criticism in the section above, and I would like to present my side of the story. I feel that making myself a participant in this case (should it be accepted) is the fairest way to do this.

Prior to yesterday I had not edited the Vietnam war article. I was doing page protection work at WP:RFPP, where this article was listed.

Acting as I normally do in these circumstances, I looked at the history of the article and the talk page. The article history showed that there was a revert war ongoing, and the talk page did not reveal any active discussion on the matter.

This being the case I protected the article blindly, edited it to add the {{protected}} template, listed it at Wikipedia:Protected page and made a note of my protection in repsonse to the request at WP:RFPP. I did not check to see whether any editor had broken the 3RR or not.

I expected this to be the end of the matter until a request for unprotection arrived. I know very little about the Vietnam war, and it isn't a topic that I am very interested in and so I don't plan to follow the debate on talk closely and was not planning on acting as an informal mediator.

I then investigated other requests for protection, protecting Bogdanov Affair and Lifestyle anarchism in the same manner.

After this I checked my watchlist and was suprised to see an edit to the Vietnam war article. I investigated this and found that user:Stevertigo had reverted to their preferred version. While the version Stevertigo prefers appears much more informative, it is my feeling that because they are a party involved in the edit war this was a gross breach of the Wikipedia:Protection policy. They should have made a request on the talk page or of another administrator if they wanted the verison that was protected changed.

As a direct result of this I left a message about it at WP:AN and on Stevertigo's talk page about this, stating I was blocking them for 48 hours for this. By the time I had done this, they had been blocked for 24 hours for the 3RR violation, and then unblocked themselves with the comment "haven't saved edit yet". I felt that the blocks for breaking protection policy and the 3RR should run consecutively, and so I blocked for 60 hours.

I replied to Stevertigo on their talk page after they left a message there, and then went out for the night. When I logged on this morning, I had a message on my talk page that informed me of this RfAr and an RfC about Stevertigo's abuses of admin powers. Thryduulf 07:37, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (0/1/1/0)

• Recuse Fred Bauder 21:03, August 6, 2005 (UTC)
• Reject for lack of attempts at the earlier stages of dispute resolution. Further, Stevertigo's blasé discarding of it is worrying. James F. (talk) 11:00, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

DotSix

Involved parties

Party 1

• User:67.182.157.6, Calling himself "DotSix",

Also editing from:

207.200.116.* block of IP addresses:

• • 207.200.116.67 (talk · contribs)
  • 207.200.116.133 (talk · contribs)
  • 207.200.116.14 (talk · contribs)
  • 207.200.116.130 (talk · contribs)
  • 207.200.116.196 (talk · contribs)
  • 207.200.116.7 (talk · contribs)
  • 207.200.116.198 (talk · contribs)

172.19*.* block of IP addresses:

• • 172.195.53.33 (talk · contribs)
  • 172.191.98.226 (talk · contribs)
  • 172.192.66.3 (talk · contribs)
  • 172.197.102.120 (talk · contribs)
  • 172.191.129.191 (talk · contribs)
  • 172.193.154.102 (talk · contribs)
  • 172.193.218.186 (talk · contribs)
  • 172.196.121.225 (talk · contribs)
  • 172.192.86.66 (talk · contribs)

This list is a copy-and-paste from an RfC on DotSix, at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/DotSix - please see that page for evidence that these are DotSix's sock puppets.

Party two

• User:Banno (initiating)
• User:Rhobite - I'll be providing evidence here too and I can confirm that we've exhausted other methods of dispute resolution.
• User:Nathan Ladd

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

DotSix has been informed [17], [18]> He responded, rather curiously, on my scratch page, [19]

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

• Ongoing discussion on talk pages: Talk:True; Talk:truth; Talk:Truth/Archive 5; Talk:Truth/Archive 6; Talk:knowledge; Talk:epistemology

Seeking outside comment:

• RfC regarding Introduction to Truth
• Wikipedia:Wikiquette alertsset up seeking comments on DotSix's behaviour

• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/DotSix

Given the rejection of a "majority rules" explicated by .6 in the talk pages, it is doubtful that the results of a survey on the issue would have a positive result.

Mediation and advocacy have been discussed openly, at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/DotSix#Arbitration with users recommending to DotSix that he enter into mediation or obtain an advocate on his talk page [20], [21], [22]. DotSix has not expressed any willingness to go to mediation.

Statement by Banno

In Mid-June, DotSix commenced a campaign on a range of pages relating to epistemology. This commenced with a series of reverts to a POV version of the page True, followed by his repeatedly attempting to re-direct that page to Wiktionary:truth, despite it being repeatedly explained to him that this was both not possible and not in accord with Wiki policy. DotSix also commenced to label those who disagree with him "obscurantist" and "vandals" and engaging in an "obscurantist Jihad".

The debate then moved to Truth, Knowledge and Epistemology. His ongoing misbehaviour is listed at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/DotSix. These have included modifying or deleting other users comments from talk pages, including responses to RfCs; archiving material to extinguish discussion; name-calling

In addition he has attempted to modify Wiki policy document without discussion [23], [24], [25], including placing an NPOV banner on Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. He removed a VfD banner from Wikipedia:Tyranny of the majority, changing the appropriate policy to suit his claim that it should be on the discussion page [26].

He has also been using his sock puppets to circumvent the 3RR policy: for instance, he has reverted epistemology a dozen times in the last three days, using five different IP addresses.

In summary, his posts appear to me to be deliberately inflammatory. DotSix refuses to consider or provide evidence or citations to support his position, or to accept consensus. He is deliberately misusing Wiki policies to support his rather singular position, and when that doesn't work, he has attempted to modify policies to suit himself. He has accused those who edit his work of being a "Cabal", and repeatedly pestered those who have attempted to correct his misconceptions with unjustifiable accusations of bias or malice. He has demonstrated no willingness to enter into mediation, or even reasonable discussion, despite making demands on others to do so. Banno 09:03, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

---

As at 22:26, August 6, 2005 (UTC), DotSix continues to vandalise truth by re-directing it to True, and placing a brief POV definition there. User:Mysidia , User:Veratien, User:Asbestos, User:Ancheta Wis and user:-Ril- have attempted to discuss the issue with him on his talk page, receiving only an absurd response [27]. See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/3RR#User talk:67.182.157.6. User talk:67.182.157.6 has made 6 reverts on Truth with that IP, one with the IP 172.197.72.66 and two with the IP 172.199.120.111, within a nine hour period. Banno 07:45, August 7, 2005 (UTC)

---

172.196.117.124 (talk · contribs) is a sockpuppet for 67.182.157.6 (talk · contribs) (see Wikipedia:Requests for comment/DotSix) and is apparently being used to circumvent the block imposed by Sasquatch [28].

He has used it to continued to revert truth: [29], [30], [31]. Folks, this issue needs to be resolved as soon as possible and a block put on the IPs he is using. This is the only way to prevent vandalism to a range of articles and policy pages. Can we expedite the process? There appears to me to be no evidence in DotSix's favour, and he has refused to discuss the issue here - despite having edited on this page on another issue [32], [33][34]. Banno 21:13, August 12, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Rhobite

I've tried to suggest to DotSix that we mediate this dispute, but these requests have gone unanswered [35] [36]. I recently proposed a truce to DotSix: I would strike through my endorsement of his RFC and pledge to stop commenting on his behavior, if he stopped removing VfD tags and editing policy pages, among other requests [37]. His response to my proposal was ambiguous [38], but just today he continued to remove the VfD tag from Wikipedia:Tyranny of the majority [39], and he rewrote a section of Wikipedia:Neutral point of view [40]. This indicates that he has rejected my proposed truce.

In short, DotSix believes that he is allowed to edit the NPOV policy because it exhibits some logical fallacy. I've focused on this behavior because it's the worst thing he's done, but he's also removed other users' comments, mislabeling them as personal attacks. He's broken the 3RR many times, and he declines to get a user account. Many editors on Talk:Epistemology and Talk:Truth have tried to discuss his removal of content, but his responses are superficial: He usually just names some logical fallacies, calls everyone an "obscurantist", and says things like "Comment on content, not on the contributor" over and over again. There's no way to negotiate with a user like this - it's futile. Rhobite 17:32, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

Request for temporary injunction

I know the Arbitration Committee is overloaded right now but DotSix's conduct is a real problem. Today he has repeatedly removed other users' comments from Talk:Truth: [41] [42] [43] [44] [45] [46] [47]. I'd like to request that the ArbCom accept the case and issue a temporary injunction preventing him from editing outside of this RFAR and his talk page. Rhobite 02:36, August 12, 2005 (UTC)

I emphatically support this request. Banno 22:22, August 12, 2005 (UTC)

I support this too and have already started to block some sockpuppet IPs that the user is using to get around 3RR in this case (which is the norm). Sasquatch[[User_talk:Sasquatch|

讲]][[Special:Contributions/Sasquatch|

看]] 03:21, August 13, 2005 (UTC) So, using his sockpuppet 207.200.116.133 (talk · contribs) he vandalised the Requests for arbitration page [48]and the RfC [49]. What more is there to say? Banno 06:34, August 13, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Nate Ladd

DotSix has proved himself chronically unreasonable. He began namecalling with only his 8th edit. He has not once responded constructively to any disagreement in his entire history on Wikipedia. His repetoire of responses is limited to (1) hurling false accusations, (2) namecalling, (3) sarcasm, (4) repeating the edits that were rejected, and (5) repeating the behavior for which he was admonished.

Dozens of times he has accused other editors of committing fallacies. It has been explained to him repeatedly how he has misunderstood the nature of these fallacies and why these accusations are not legitimate. He does not try to refute these explanations, he just ignores them.

His ego has lead him to believe he has detected a fallacy in a definition of "knowledge" that no philospher in 2500 years of Western civilization has seen. When the errors in his thinking are explained to him (over and over again), he just ignores the explanation and repeats the edit. He has been invited to cite even a single philospher who agrees with him. He has failed to do this and repeats the edit. He has repeatedly deleted long passages from philosophical articles and replaced them with simple-minded definitions of controversial philosophical terms, declaring as he does so, that there is really no philosphical problem: he has found a simple answer that has eluded all philosophers in history.

His childishness prevents him from conceding any imperfection, no matter how trivial, in any of his behavior or edits. When it was pointed out to him that his description of Wiki NPOV policy was in error, he unilaterally changed the policy page so that it would conform to his description.

Even after the RfC on his behavior was started, his primary response has been to repeat the objectionable behavior the RfC describes. I mean literally repeating: deleting the same text from the same articles and talk pages. Obviously, he has no interest in actually resolving any issues.

His hypocrisy is so great, it borders on the comical: (1) He replaced someone else’s comment from a talk page with a sentence of his own. When a admin reverted this, he complained … wait for it … that the admin had deleted his comment from a talk page. (2) He put his first response to the RfC on his conduct outside of the Response section. In other words, he edited a section that he, as the subject of the RfC, was not supposed to edit. When his response was moved to the Response section by another user, he complained … that the other user had edited a section he was not supposed to edit.

His ego, his childishness, his obnoxiousness, his ignorance, his hypocrisy, and his utter disrespect for any views in conflict with his own make him impossible to negotiate with and impossible to reason with. Virtually all progress on the philosophical topics he edits has stopped dead since he became active in early July. --Nate Ladd 21:48, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by party 2

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Statement by an interested third party

I have recently become aware of this users actions and this users refusal to accept any criticisms against his actions and to step down his constant revertings. He uses multiple IPs to "game the system" against the clear community consensus and simply does not listen to other at all. I have recently protected both Truth (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) and the redirect at True (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) to prevent further pushing of his philosophical POV and have closed the VfD on Wikipedia:Tyranny of the majority as a clear delete but preserved the talk page at Wikipedia talk:Tyranny of the majority if needed for the following precedings. I think we need to draw a clear line on what is appropriate behaviour on Wikipedia and what clearly isn't so I strongly suggest the ArbCom take this case into consideration. Sasquatch

↔[[User_talk:Sasquatch|

讲]]

↔[[Special:Contributions/Sasquatch|

看]] 21:05, August 7, 2005 (UTC)

I was going to add my own third party statement but it would be repetitive of this, I have worked with Sasquatch neverendingly to deal with DotSix's POV pushing and bad faith redirects and certify that his statement is accurate and true. Jtkiefer ^{T | @ | C} ----- 17:23, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (1/0/1/0)

• Recuse Fred Bauder 20:53, August 6, 2005 (UTC)
• Accept. James F. (talk) 17:08, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Ed Poor

Involved Parties

Party 1 (Initiators)

• Rob Church
• Nicholas Turnbull
• Phroziac
• The Uninvited Co., Inc.

Party 2

• Ed Poor

Third Parties

• Kim Bruning (Involved admin)
• Benjamin Gatti (Affected Third Party having a vested interest in the outcome)
• Tony Sidaway (talk · contribs)
• Xiong (affected -- as are we all)

Confirmation of Parties' Awareness

• Rob Church 01:54, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
• NicholasTurnbull 01:55, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
• Phroziac (talk) 02:05, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
• Benjamin Gatti 18:52, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

• Ed Poor has been made aware: [50]
• Tony Sidaway became aware sometime in the 1950s; he is sitting up in bed listening to Radio 4.

Previous Dispute Resolution

Although several attempts have been made to resolve this issue ([51], [52], [53], [54]), none of them have been particularly successful. Ed Poor's deletion of the RfC page against him goes towards proving that he does not wish for any discussion in the matter.

• I agree that I cut off discussion, and that I was wrong to do so. I have undeleted / unarchived Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Deletion of VFD. Uncle Ed 15:47, August 6, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Nicholas Turnbull, Rob Church, Phroziac, and UninvitedCompany

Ed Poor is a very experienced Wikipedian, who has made an exceptional contribution to the project over the long period of time that he has been a Wikipedia contributor, and was consequently made an administrator (and indeed a "bureaucrat") by the community. He has been active in Wikipedia:Requests for mediation, as well as in article editing.

Recently, he took the controversial action of speedy deleting Wikipedia:Votes for deletion without consultation to the community or prior warning - that is, using the "delete" administrative function, not tagging it with {{delete}} for another administrator to delete the page. It is our opinion that, in his attempt to delete VfD, he nonetheless had a genuine belief that his actions were for the benefit of the community - however, it is not this particular action that we take issue with, as Wikipedia:Ignore all rules is an important part of our community, and such actions may be overlooked if they occur in isolation.

This page was restored by another administrator; however, the original action understandably caused consternation amongst some members of the community, and an RfC was drawn up by a number of Wikipedians to resolve the dispute. Sadly, pursuant to this event, Ed Poor has ignored the standard consensus on Wikipedia operations, and has not paid attention to feedback from the Wikipedia community as a whole about his conduct. He deleted the RfC, Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Deletion of VFD (archived version here) [55], on the purported grounds that it violated RfC policy; the double standard that he created by ignoring rules on one hand and enforcing the letter of them on the other is not acceptable. Another administrator restored this page; Ed deleted it for a second time. He unblocked himself ([56]) after he was blocked by a fellow administrator to provide breathing space for the dispute to settle. Ed Poor appears to have counted on his seniority and popularity to avoid discipline ([57], [58]), and thus seems to consider himself above the Wikipedia community in matters of action and procedure.

It is our opinion that Ed Poor has ignored the standard consensus on Wikipedia operations, and has not paid attention to feedback from the Wikipedia community as a whole about his conduct; he has consequently abused his administrator rights. This sets a poor precedent for the rest of the community, and threatens the entire spirit of collaboration and co-operation that Wikipedia is built on, and re-enforces the divide between administrators and users - creating an unpleasant double standard that must be avoided.

This statement is endorsed by the following:

• Rob Church 01:59, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
• NicholasTurnbull 01:57, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
• Phroziac (talk) 02:05, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
• The Uninvited Co., Inc. 18:53, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
• Uncle Ed 15:49, August 6, 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators please note: We have made a request to Ed Poor on his talk page [59] for an online chat meeting to discuss our collective differences with a view to withdrawing this RfArb, depending upon agreement between the parties. --NicholasTurnbull 00:03, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

This request has been accepted and an IRC-based mediation conference has been arranged for 5:30PM EST (11:30PM BST (GMT+1)) on 5th August 2005. Parties in attendance will be:

• Rob Church
• Nicholas Turnbull
• Phroziac
• The Uninvited Co.
• Ed Poor

Rob Church 07:19, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

It was decided at the conference that negotiations would continue. We will advise the ArbCom when an attempt at mediation has been completed, and whether or not further action is needed. We also agree to post the logs of these meetings. Rob Church 13:59, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

While the RFC page whose deletion was a primary reason for this request has now been restored and discussions there are continuing, no agreement has been made during the two IRC conferences that have been held. No further conferences are scheduled at this time. In the absence of any interest in scheduling further meetings, I believe that this mediation effort has run its course. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:47, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

I would like to point out that this is the opinion of User:UninvitedCompany, and not representative of the opinion held by the meeting as a whole or by other party members. --NicholasTurnbull 19:15, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

My views with regard to this are here. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:17, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Further statement by UninvitedCompany

Ed Poor is a long-time colleague of mine here at Wikipedia and I am saddened both by the overall course of events and by the fact that I feel compelled to participate in this unfortunate case. I believe that this case has importance to the community far beyond Ed's own actions. It is a core principle of Wikipedia that the community is the ultimate authority. I find that Kim and Ed's actions in trying to suppress discussion by deleting the RFC are an effort to whitewash this whole event and the community's reaction to it. It is an attempt to undermine the community, and a clear effort to pull rank and give the community a PowerAnswer rather than to seek reconciliation through discussion, compromise, and consensus. It is, in a very real way, the antithesis of wiki.

While I am hardly one of the first Wikipedians, I have been told that I have somehow become part of the fabric of the place; I am sometimes called an old-timer. I am participating in this case to make a clear statement that even though I may be an old-timer, and part of the same "cabal" as Ed and the other senior admins and bureaucrats, that in actual fact There Is No Cabal -- nor should there be. I'm not going to stand by and let this case be characterized as an old hands vs. new hands matter. It's not. This case is about the fact that everyone around here still must answer to the community, no matter how much they've contributed, no matter how long they've been here, no matter what level of access they have earned, and no matter who their friends are.

Finally, I point out that troublesome behavior from Ed is not new. The matter of William Connolley's near-promotion to adminship and Ed's temporary de-sysopping of several admins earlier this year are similar examples. There are others. The Wikipedia community has forgiven (and indeed forgotten) a great deal already, and I believe that a response of "aw, shucks, I'm sorry and I promise not to do it again" falls well short of the mark.

The Uninvited Co., Inc. 18:53, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Kim Bruning

The RfC in question was indeed not brought compliant to policy, Ed Poor's premature deletion of the page was actually due to an incorrect time conversion between EST and UTC. (That, and he should have let a neutral party do it, of course :-) ) This was corrected. After being quite thoroughly notified, the bringers of the RfC continued to fail to certify it, and the RfC was deleted at the due time.

I'd love to see IAR tested sometime, but I don't think this will be the case to do it :-) Kim Bruning 02:52, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Notes:

1. Though the RFC has been terminated, several users have moved it out of RFC space to circumvent RFC policy: [60]. Up to arbcom to decide if that is a valid application of WP:IAR
2. Ed Poor created Wikipedia:Requests_for_deletion very early on to allow people to comment on his actions.
3. I was the blocking administrator, and actually talked with Ed on the phone! I won't be pleased if anyone holds it against him that he unblocked himself after that!

Statement by Ed Poor

Please limit your statement to 500 words.

Okay, I don't care whether this request is "proper" or not. People want a reckoning, and that they shall have.

I was wrong to delete vfd. As a professional database programmer, I should have realized that it would place a great strain on the database, due to its lengthy history being moved into the "deleted page" table. In other words, I should have anticipated the 5-minute read-only block I effectively put on this wiki. So I plead guilty to negligence.

Secondly, I was wrong to assume that my intuitive sense of consensus - (which was actually lacking rather than present) combined with a light-hearted attitude of Ignore All Rules and Be Bold - would be sufficient justification for blasting away at a problematic page (and system). I should have brought up the matter for discussion by creating a poll (as Angela correctly pointed out) or gone through similar channels. Wikipedia has become too big for anyone, however "beloved" (as I immodestly regard myself) or dedicated, to make such a major change as I tried to do.

I promise not to do this again - or anything like it. Specifically, I will not delete an important page or one with a lengthy edit history again unless there is clear community consensus for this. If I cannot determine consensus on my own, I will ask another admin for help. Someone like Uninvited Company would be my first choice.

If my promise is not enough, well you can always put me on "no delete" parole or even de-sysop me. I don't care: if becoming an Admin is not supposed to be a big deal, than un-becoming a one should be no big deal either. Uncle Ed 12:42, August 4, 2005 (UTC)

About the RFC

I mistook the "end date" of the RFC by 4 hours. I thought it was 1:08 P.M. my time, but it was actually 5:08 P.M. my time. I am 4 hours behind Greenwich UTC. I figured that, with only one person certifying, that the RFC could be deleted exactly at the 48-hour mark but I made two errors: (1) I miscomputed the expiration time - which, by the way, I had calculated myself, since the RFC opener had neglected to put it in. (2) I missed the unwritten rule that one does not delete an RFC concerning oneself.

I guess this is why Kim Bruning kept blocking my account and telling me not to shoot myself in the foot (or the leg) - apparently she was planning to delete the RFC herself at the appointed (and correctly calculated) hour. I had no idea of this.

As for unblocking myself, what can I say? Kim blocked me to further some plan of hers which she declined to share with me. I'm not going to arbitration with her on this, as she has already apologized to me. I figured that if an Admin (a) blocked me with no justification and (b) apologized for this, there was no need to embarass her by demanding she unblock me when (as an admin in good standing) I could simply remove the block myself. (She asked me on the phone, "Do you want me to unblock you?" I said that it didn't matter and kind of thought it comical, getting an expensive international phone call from an admin wanting to know if she should unblock me! :-) Uncle Ed 02:08, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

The point that you continue to miss, Ed, is that the RFC shouldn't have been deleted in the first place. Not at the end of howevermany hours, not by you, and not by anyone else. There was ongoing discussion, and whether or not the RFC rules against unsupported listings were complied with or not (and I believe they were, for reasons I am happy to elaborate upon if requested), there was no reason to delete an RFC that was serving as the focus of community discussion. The Vfu Discussion shows that the community was overwhelmingly opposed to deletion, with no actual votes supporting the deletion of the RFC (though Kim voted neutral and there was one vote that, though an "undelete," appeared to be made in sarcastic jest). It is your ongoing, unrepentant insistence that deleting a community discussion about a mistake you made is OK (or, equivalently, would have been OK after four more hours), that led me to support this case in the first place. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:28, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

It took me a while to see your point, but I now agree. The request for comment was intended to generate comments and was successfully doing so.

"...the double standard that he created by ignoring rules on one hand and enforcing the letter of them on the other is not acceptable." Wow, I had no idea. I'm glad I re-read this RFA carefully, because I completely missed that point the first few times. Maybe I should step down (or be removed) from adminship until I learn to stop doing this AntiPattern. Uncle Ed 15:19, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

Kim Bruning's a guy. It's amusing that you did not notice that, after talking to him on the phone though. :D --Phroziac (talk) 17:40, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

I agree that I should not have deleted the RFC. I am sorry that I deleted it, and sorry that I let Kim "close" it. I see now that the RFC page was serving a higher purpose that I should not have interfered with; or ignored; or allowed to be curtailed. Therefore I have put it back, even if this is 'too little, too late' (see Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Deletion of VFD). Uncle Ed 15:53, August 6, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Third Party Benjamin Gatti

Sanctioning Ed Poor in this case could have a chilling effect on contributers being bold in addressing problems. The Arbitration commitee should investigate the alledged harm present in the current deletion process and upon a finding of real harm, ought to propose a remedy therefore and thank Uncle Ed for raising the alarm. The technical issues related to deleting a page are matters beyond the jurisdiction of the arbcomm and ought to be rectified rather than blamed on the user. Wikipedia:Wikiblower protection has been proposed and should be adopted as the accepted conclusions of the committee. The Policy is fair to all users and turns on the facts rather than on the personalities involved. Ed Poor should not be sanctioned whether he agrees to it or not because of the effect on the community at large - Killing the messenger is never the solution. Benjamin Gatti 19:10, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Here here. --67.182.157.6 23:47, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Curious 3rd Party (~~~~ ( ! | ? | * ))

I think Ed Poor was deliberately demonstrating that the current system allows total abuse a.k.a. a cabal, in deleting VFD and then deleting any attempts to question this. Warnings from history are very important. ~~~~ ( ! | ? | * ) 21:23, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by 3rd party: Nickptar

I don't see the need to prosecute Ed for this single act. While it was very poorly thought out, Ed has admitted it, has promised not to do it again, and has shown no pattern of disruption. I do think he should voluntarily give up adminship until this cools down, then renominate himself. If he did choose to do so, I would fully support his readminning. ~~ N (t/c) 21:58, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Statement by Tony Sidaway

Oh for heaven's sake, who brought this poxy, pointless, idiotic case? Grow up! --Tony Sidaway^Talk 08:21, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

Some comments on this statement have been moved to the appropriate place

Statement by Xiong

I don't doubt that there is an involved legal term, in bad Latin, that covers this case exactly. The facts of the matter are unimportant; the ostensible subject of this RfArb is petty, a constellation of secondary actions. The real subject is Ed's primary action: deleting VfD. That was a noble and bold act and has garnered much praise -- perhaps the largest number of barnstars awarded for any single click of the mouse. Ed has annoyed many, but these strong expressions of support -- as well as the following explosion of public debate on this contentious issue -- make it impossible to attack him directly.

Regardless of the technical merits of this case, any decision made here will be taken as condemnation or endorsement of Ed's primary action. I suggest that it is both wrong and unwise for ArbCom to commit to either. — Xiong熊talk* 20:10, 2005 August 7 (UTC)

Statement by a 4th party (Lubaf)

I'm not at all interested in this case (thus my 4th party status), but I'd suggest holding this case until Stevertigo's behavior on Vietnam war (see above) is resolved, as it's a much clearer case, and therefore, should give better contrast as to whether Ed's actions were innappropriate or not. Thanks,
Luc "Somethingorother" French 12:53, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Response by Stevertigo

I dont think its in the interest of fairness to pick and choose the order of cases to suit one particular view. Ed's action of deletion was done in the spirit of inclusionism (ironically) - to counter what was a greater percieved danger to wikipedia through deletionism. Certainly the act itself was somewhat unilateral, but then, much of Wikipedia's early success to date had been on rather unilteralist action, by editors well known for their dedication to Wikipedias core principle of NPOV.

As any beaurocracy grows, so to do contradictions develop between concepts of propriety and concepts of principle. War criminals can be found "innocent," while someone who steals pennies from a federally protected bank has "violated the law," and gets a life sentence. In this case, the act of unilaterally deleting a process page can be said to be inexcusable, yet, judging by the overwhelmingly positive responses of people on the mailing list, can also be said to have been in the spirit of consensus. Does foundational principle yield to mere matters of process? IAC, I am not alone in the perception that some beaurocratic shakeup and reform may be necessary, and that beaurocracy itself has made such BOLD changes unwieldy. In a sense this is a good thing, as it established continuity. But VFD in particular, in spite of the fact that its a necessary function, has had a long history of being misused and abused --providing only black and white solutions for greyscale issues and problems. Is the Arbcom interested only in enforcing existing rules, or making recommendations regarding changes of process? -St|eve 20:32, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators' Opinions on Hearing this Matter (3/0/1/2)

• Accept Fred Bauder 19:02, August 4, 2005 (UTC)
• Reject Not sure yet - Ed not only says above "I was wrong," but explains how he was wrong. I'm not sure what penalty would make the encyclopedia better David Gerard 21:50, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

  Changed to 'not sure yet' after discussion with some of those bringing the RFAr. I think Kim's explanation helps explain the issues at hand (the RFC and the self-unblock), but I'd like to hear Ed's own words on the subjects. I'll consider further before a firm 'accept' or 'reject' - David Gerard 22:35, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

• Ed doesn't seem to have commented on the real issue here (as set out above). That is, the deletion of an RfC about himself and the unblocking of himself - I'd like to hear more on these before voting -- sannse (talk) 22:15, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

  Accept. Given Ed's response on my talk page [61], there seems a lack of agreement over these actions that I think needs looking at -- sannse (talk) 20:48, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

• Waiting for further input from the parties as to how discussions are progressing, but, I must say, I fail to see how this really helps build the encyclopædia. James F. (talk) 17:04, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
• Accept, to consider the larger issues surrounding Ed's misuse of his admin/bureacrat/developer privileges. I didn't want to accept this, but it was his veto comment that decided it for me. →Raul654 17:46, August 10, 2005 (UTC)
  • I'm going to stay my above comment (e.g, for the time being it counts as an abstain). Ed tells us that he's nearing a breakthrough in his discussions with the people who brought this case, and in the light of that, I think we should wait before we consider this
• Accept. Ed's recent uses of his admin/bureaucrat privileges are of concern. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:51, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Keetoowah

Involved parties

• User:TheoClarke (initiator)
• User:Keetoowah

Keetoowah is aggressively incivil towards other users including, but not limited to, the making of personal attacks.

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Notification at User talk:Keetoowah of this entry.

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Keetoowah raised 15 February 2005 asserted that Keetoowah "makes violent personal attacks on other users." It received four direct endorsements in addition to the two editors certifying the dispute. Four other editors endorsed a harsher summary describing Keetoowah as "an obnoxious user". Keetoowah's response opened "Forget it. This is a Star Chamber. I'm not even going to participate. Waste of time." TheoClarke did not participate in this RFC.

Statement by party 1

TheoClarke believed Keetoowah to be pushing a POV at Ward Churchill and challenged this at Talk:Ward Churchill. Keetoowah responded with aggressive incivility. TheoClarke suggested that this was inappropriate. Keetoowah responded with more aggressive incivility including a suggestion that any UK national is unqualified to contribute to the Ward Churchill article. Keetoowah has displayed similar behaviour patterns towards other editors and shows no sign of ameliorating such behaviour. Given that these diffs may not be in full context, I feel that the best evidence would be a reading of Talk:Ward Churchill and its archives.

Addendum at 23:31, August 12, 2005 (UTC): Contrary to Raul654's perception that this is "a one time incident", it is part of a pattern of increasing aggression against more than six editors since Keetoowah's sixth edit in which he makes an argumentative response to a covert attack on Condoleezza Rice. Since this mild incivility, Keetoowah became increasingly aggressive at Talk:Condoleezza Rice and has also attacked Slimvirgin, Cberlet, Viajero, Fred Bauder, and zen master at Talk: Ward Churhill. The details of all these attacks were omitted from the first draft of this statement for brevity. For the avoidance of doubt: The February RFC was about incidents before those that prompted this RFA.

Statement by party 2

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Statement by User:Project2501a (interested third party)

You might also want to check out Talk: Condoleezza Rice concerning User:Keetoowah's behaviour. Project2501a 02:43, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (1/0/1/0)

• Recuse Fred Bauder 11:35, August 3, 2005 (UTC)
• Accept. James F. (talk) 16:49, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
• Reject. It looks like a one time incident. →Raul654 17:45, August 11, 2005 (UTC)

Requests for Clarification

If you need to clarify the precise meaning of a previous decision of the Arbitration Committee, your request should go here.

Archive

• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Completed requests
• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Rejected requests (unofficial)