Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William M. Connolley/Proposed decision

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WMC temp desysop motion

• Rlevse should now recuse from this case. Spartaz ^Humbug! 16:24, 9 August 2009 (UTC)
  • This is ridiculous. Here Rlevse implies that WMC's ban from cold fusion is invalid [1] when this is a key aspect of the arbitration case that still hasn't been determined - presumably because its imposed by a single admin and then here [2] asserting that the ban is still in place on their own authority. This is ridiculous and makes the proposal to desyspop WMC look extremely suspect if Arbiters can't even decide from one moment to the next what Abd's status is regarding Cold Fusion. WMC isn't involved with Abd outside the CF case and then only in an admin enforcement role so are yu arguing that you can be forced to recuse from dealing with someone just because they file an arbitration case? If so, its a charter for every malcontent and troll to to take any admin to arbitration just to force them off their back. Also, shouldnt Abd be banned formally from CF for the duration of the if you are positing that WMC's ban wasn't valid. What a mess. Spartaz ^Humbug! 16:23, 9 August 2009 (UTC)
    • Spartaz, I've moved your comment from the main page. If you and others post here, the arbs will read what is said here. As far as involvement goes, the very fact that we accepted the case, with WMC named as a party, and with WMC included in the title, means that the committee thinks (at first glance) that there is a case to answer. The evidence in the case may well show that not to be true, but until the case is over, Abd and WMC are very much involved in a dispute. This works both ways - Abd too needs to stop the behaviour that led to the events that led to him filing the case. Equally, Abd may be exonerated. But until the case is over, they both need to back off and concentrate on the case, and not replay the dispute. Carcharoth (talk) 16:39, 9 August 2009 (UTC) Updated: 16:49, 9 August 2009 (UTC)
• That Rl should recuse is now obvious. CHL recused, with apparent intent to provide evidence, although it wasn't clear to me why William M. Connolley (talk) 08:40, 10 August 2009 (UTC)
  • Possibly evidence related to Scibaby range blocks if the case headed in that direction. Also due to interaction with several of the parties. Cool Hand Luke 01:48, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

"Temp desyssop of William M. Connolley" motion (Mythdon's comment)

I have not reviewed any of the evidence of the case, but let me make this one comment about the motion.

To block someone who is a party to the same arbitration case as you is, uncalled for and non-legitimate because to do so, you're not an impartial administrator as you're an involved party to the same case as the person you block. William M. Connolley should have reported to another administrator who wasn't an involved party to the case if there was a need that Abd be blocked. William M. Connolley is not uninvolved if both him/her and Abd are a party to the same case, no matter what the evidence says. Such a block is biased, beyond doubt, and can affect the case in a harmful manner, and can affect the decision being made by the committee, because the user blocked will be unable to provide their evidence during the block or able to comment on the decision proposals by other users.

William M. Connolley being a party to this case terminates the title of "uninvolved", which administrators should have before blocking users, in order to maintain impartiality. Abd and William M. Connolley are parties to this case, and therefore, they do not have the "uninvolved" title if they block one another (note that Abd is not an administrator, however). William M. Connolley blocked Abd, but was a party to the same case as Abd, and therefore, William M. Connolley should not be allowed to act.

Wizardman, who is supporting the desysop makes a good phrase with "no question". There is indeed no question that this is necessary.

Therefore, I urge the Arbitration Committee to desysop William M. Connolley, at least until the specified time comes. What are your comments? --Mythdon ^{talk • contribs} 16:46, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

"I notice you've unblocked Abd. The obvious questions are: (a) why did you make no attempt to discuss this with me? and (b) given your evidence presented to the case, what makes you think you are uninvolved?" - A comment from William M. Connolley on Viridae's talk page. To ask "what makes you think you are uninvolved?" is not rightful to ask given the fact that William M. Connolley wasn't uninvolved his or herself when blocking Abd given the fact that they are both parties to the same arbitration case. William M. Connolley should not be question Viridae's uninvolvement when William M. Connolley wasn't uninvolved him or herself. --Mythdon ^{talk • contribs} 18:08, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Why on earth do you think he isn't allowed to ask questions? That's not how wikipedia works, and is the first step in WP:DR. Verbal chat 18:24, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Requested diffs

I am reposting this here as requested by Carcharoth (originally on User talk:Rlevse). Rlevse indicated that before posting his motion he had not located the diffs for the final conditions of the original page-ban and the role of Heimstern in the closing of the ANI thread, where the page-ban was approved by the community. Here are the diffs.

Here is the final exchange between Abd and WMC [3]:

“

Please reduce the ban to 30 days from the article only, and recuse yourself from further administrative involvement, and please notify Hipocrite of the ban, if you have not already done so. You hadn't last I looked. --Abd (talk) 02:10, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

I decline your request. I am happy to note that portions of the ban correspond to a voluntary agreement. Whilst I anticipate it lasting approximately one month, the period remains indefinite. Since the page is now unprotected, the version I chnaged it to under protection is now moot William M. Connolley (talk) 10:31, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

”

Here are the diffs where Heimstern clarifies the closure of the ANI discussion. [4][5] [6]

Here is what Heimstern said on July 19 when quizzed by Abd about the page bans [7]:

“ I am releasing all responsibility for this ban at this point, as I never intended to take on any responsibility for it at all. I believed myself to be making a purely procedural close of a discussion; in that belief it appears I was mistaken. It appears ArbCom will likely handle this, so I imagine it shouldn't be a problem for me not to get further involved in this. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 04:17, 19 July 2009 (UTC) ”

Mathsci (talk) 17:04, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

He has clarified it further in 9 August [8][9]. --Enric Naval (talk) 16:41, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Having read all of the above links it seems that the bottom line would be:

1. Heimstern clearly believed a the time that he wrote the close that the duration of WMC's ban was 1 month.
2. Heimstern considered his closing to be a procedural matter and he wasn't intending to compete with WMC over administration of the ban that WMC had imposed.
3. Heimstern noted clearly in his close at AN/I: "Abd has indicated that he will abide by the ban, not per the original banning administrator, but per the discussion/straw poll/whatever it was here."

Whether Heimstern accepted a role as the administrator of the ban, or not, is not really relevant. What is relevant is that prior to this point Abd had been disputing WMC's administrative ban as being improper and illegitimate and that this is the first time any community discussion of a ban had taken place. As Heimstern's close clearly indicates, it was evident to Heimstern that Abd was making a clear distinction between his acceptance of WMC's administrative ban and what he, Abd, was now accepting as a community ban based on the discussion that had taken place. None of this requires Heimstern to accept on-going responsibility for the community ban that was thus formed, but it does provide a uninvolved perspective on the situation as it existed at the time the close was written. --GoRight (talk) 23:56, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

True enough. In which case it is reasonable to assume that WMC's conditions might still stand, as Heimstern's "1 month" was based on a misunderstanding of WMC's terms and, as you say, Heimstern wasn't trying to compete with WMC for administration. Thus at the point of the second block, we were still in a situation of Abd disputing WMC's ban, WMC believing that it held, other editors going either way, and no announcement from ArbCom one way or the other. - Bilby (talk) 00:21, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Evidential basis

Is there an evidential basis for substantive ongoing harm to Wikipedia that would merit temporary removal of sysop powers from William M. Connolley? I ask this because none has been presented on the evidence pages. Such motions, in the absence of an actual removal of sysop powers due to misconduct, are rare. In view of the clear community consensus on the community ban, this proposal is very, very worrying and I urge the other arbitrators to resolve this issue quickly so as to minimize the disturbance such a shocking and unexpected proposal must inevitably cause. --TS 18:40, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd acknowledged that he was still some active ban by deciding his ban was over. He then made an edit, which was a violation of the ban. For that he got blocked by an, arguably, involved admin (of which Abd claims he is involved), William M. Connolley. As Abd is now again banned from editing Cold Fusion and Talk:Cold fusion, I don't see a risk that William M. Connolley will block Abd again, unless Abd again decides that the ban is not in place anymore. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 18:45, 9 August 2009 (UTC)(adapted arguably, I understand it can give a wrong meaning to my text. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 20:31, 9 August 2009 (UTC))

In what sense is William M. Connolley an "involved admin"? Even arguably? Does "involved" here take on a meaning not a million miles from "agrees with the ban"? --TS 18:55, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

I included that part because Abd says that William M. Connolley is involved, and arguably because I do not really believe that is the case. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 19:03, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd says a lot of things. Does that mean they're arguable? In many ways I think that question that goes to the heart of the case. --TS 19:17, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

(ec)That's an unusual usage of the term "arguably;" in my experience the term is generally used to qualify an opinion held by the writer, to introduce a proposition that the writer believes has merit but may not be universally agreed with; here you seem to be using it to mean the inverse: that the assertion has been made but that you don't think it has merit. I think the use of the term may confuse the reader as to your meaning, maybe consider refactoring for clarity? Thanks, Woonpton (talk) 19:18, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

It is really worrying to me that, without public evidence, at least three of the arbitrators are treating William M. Connolley as an involved editor. Is there some hidden evidence suggesting socking? --TS 19:25, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Accepting the case gives a presumption that there is a case to answer. For the duration of the case, parties should be sensible enough to halt the dispute and not repeat what led to the case in the first place. As far as I can see, both Abd and WMC have done just that (Abd by editing the cold fusion talk page, and WMC by invoking this ban that Abd contests). When we've finished reviewing the evidence and voting on the proposed decision, that will be the point when the parties are exonerated or not. In other words, there is an expectation that parties will adapt their behaviour due to being parties to a case, and allow the arbitration committee to hand down a decision, rather than acting as if there was no case in progress. Since this is all public (the fact that a case got accepted, and the norms of behaviour during a case), that should answer Tony's concerns that any of this is based on hidden evidence. Though that would be privately submitted evidence, not "hidden" per se. Ironically, private correspondence was submitted concerning socking in this case, but that was related to this. As far as I know, no other private evidence has been submitted. Carcharoth (talk) 20:26, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

I apologize for any unnecessary disruption resulting from my edit to Cold fusion; however, I did not believe that there was any legitimate ban in place, the community ban having expired, but WMC had claimed on Workshop talk that his ban was still in force and he could prove it. So I withdrew my voluntary ban extension, which I had stated I would honor precisely in order to avoid disruption, while that was being all the while derided as ridiculous. However, the ban was based on charges re editing style, etc., possibly -- it never was clear -- so I thought that if I rigorously avoided anything questionable, no walls of text, no tendentious argument, the only risk was that WMC would insist on his right and "prove it" by blocking me. Since I considered it valuable for the community and myself to understand if he really would be so foolish, in spite of all the warnings and the sheer obviousness of it, I was willing to be blocked to find out. I'd say it was highly efficient compared to all this massive discussion. WMC had many legitimate possible responses, probably the most open and least disruptive would have been to ask for an injunction, as Rlevse did effectively issue by banning me pending resolution of the case. He could have gone to AN/I, though I think that the chance that a neutral admin would have blocked me for that edit was very low.

I have no problem with Rlevse's action, it's what I'd expect from an even-handed arbitrator. Regardless of what the actual content of my edit was, it's obvious that my presence at Cold fusion is seriously upsetting some editors; to determine whether or not this is due to a defect in my behavior, or to a cabal, or to some combination or other factor, could be quite complex; I congratulate whoever was behind the mentor proposal, because it finesses the problem, allowing an individual to investigate and actually solve the problem. In any case, pending, an injunction against editing, or the ad-hoc equivalent, Rlevse's simple statement, makes perfect sense.

Not only could I have figured that out for myself, I did figure that out for myself, that's why I voluntarily extended the ban. However, by doing so I was "enabling" WMC by protecting him from the consequences of his bluster. What he would do to me, openly, he could and has done to many editors, under much less scrutiny. Scibaby, 300 socks and counting, can be tracked back to his block by WMC, who had been edit warring with him, as I recall. If I had time, I'd have documented all this....

Tony, you seem to be under the illusion that "involved" means "content involved." The involvement in this case is long-term dispute over ... adminstrative recusal. Plus immediate dispute over WMC's edit reverting to the May 14 version of Cold fusion. Plus immediate dispute over his right to unilaterally declare a ban and then, based on his own ban, block for behavior that would otherwise be illegitimate to block for. I.e., non-disruptive edits. There are a lot of editors who seem to think that, yes, he could do this. So it was important to assert my right to edit the article or its talk nondisruptively, which exists unless that right has been taken away by the community, through a consensus of uninvolved editors, or by ArbComm or in the enforcement of ArbComm discretionary sanctions, none of which applied here. --Abd (talk) 11:07, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd, when you say above "Since I considered it valuable for the community and myself to understand if he really would be so foolish, in spite of all the warnings and the sheer obviousness of it, I was willing to be blocked to find out." Did it not occur to you that this was all very WP:POINTy and generally not going to be looked apon favorably by people, like, oh, say mooning the jury? 198.161.174.222 (talk) 18:42, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it occurred to me, and I rejected that under WP:IAR. I wasn't mooning the jury, I was intuitively arranging, so to speak, a field trip for them so they could see what I was claiming in a way that a megabyte of text could not accomplish. WMC could easily have arranged for this little demonstration to fail. He didn't, and his inability to respond according to recusal policy was precisely what it was necessary for ArbComm to see. Absolutely, my edit was irregular, the normal "least disruptive" action would have been to continue my voluntary ban, but, remember, it was being claimed that my voluntary abstinence was moot, and that the ban was real and did not depend on my consent. I decided to confront that, not by an action that was a disruption in itself. I am not responsible for, nor did I anticipate, the edit warring by another party to this case that ensued on talk cold fusion, for which see

• WMC revert (on his theory of an absolute ban, he considered the community ban "irrelevant.")
• Enric Naval revert he said he was reverting me, but he was actually reverting Viridae.
• Enric Naval revert of GoRight
• Verbal comment "I would remove it if it was added, as it would be proxying for an editor banned from this page by a member of the arbitration comity, and has a long standing ban from these pages."

At the time of the edit, I was not banned by an arbitrator. That ban was declared and accepted by me afterwards as very reasonable, pending resolution of this case, after Viridae had unblocked me and had reverted my edit back in. There were two possible ban actions that applied: the declared ban of WMC, and my position is that admins may declare bans but may not enforce them absolutely, i.e., declaring a ban does not create a right to block by an administrator that did not already exist, a block for a nondisruptive edit, which is different from community or ArbComm bans, and there was also the community ban closed and clarified as "one month" by Heimstern, and thus expired; the "one month" closure was clear and accepted by Enric Naval at the time, and not challenged until well into this case, based on claims of confusion of the closing admin (by some; WMC claimed that the community ban was irrelevant, that his own declaration was sufficient.)

The edit itself was very reasonable (and not at all what was claimed about it, it did not reassert the allegedly rejected sources, but rather only pointed to Talk page discussion of those sources, which are secondary sources), but I simply did what I believed I had the right to do, edit that page. Once. After I declared withdrawal from my voluntary consent to a ban continuation, I did not jump to edit the page, I simply stopped believing that I was banned, and when I saw a question appear that I could answer more fully than anyone else there, I edited. In the end, one picture is worth a thousand words.

This incident also demonstrated, before the Committee, if it looks at it, the long-term behavior of Enric Naval and Verbal, both of whom previously reverted other editors who restored, partly or fully, on their own responsibility, material from the allegedly banned JedRothwell (editing IP as he had since 2006). The claims made about me in Evidence about "proxying" for banned editors was based on these incidents. As with Coppertwig in this one, and GoRight beyond a single revert, I did not edit war over such removals, beyond an initial revert. (If an editor is, in fact, banned, the initial revert by Enric or Verbal would not be an edit warring revert, but in this case, that initial revert was by WMC. On this theory, a restoring revert from an automatic removal per ban, by Viridae in this case, is not an edit warring revert, but later reverts may be considered such. --Abd (talk) 18:06, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it occurred to me, and I rejected that under WP:IAR. I wasn't mooning the jury, I was intuitively arranging, so to speak, a field trip for them so they could see what I was claiming in a way that a megabyte of text could not accomplish. - Black is white. Up is down. Night is day. War is peace. IAR, assuming you consider it to be a rule (I don't), is a narrow thing for helping to improve articles. Abd stretches it like taffy to cover all sorts of misbehavior on talk pages, in the Wikipedia space, off wikipedia, etc. When confronted with his misbehavior, Abd cites IAR to claim that rules don't apply to him because he doesn't think they should. It goes a long way towards explaining those 100+ ignored warnings and why he still doesn't think he did anything wrong. It's also a pretty good indicator of why the current proposal is wholly inadequate for dealing with him. Raul654 (talk) 18:26, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Comment s from me

On my talk page, Rl said While I am still looking into the details... and then there is some confused stuff about a 'it appears the one month ban by Heimstern. There was no such ban. I'm curious as to whether he has finished looking into the details. I asked that on my talk page, but he hasn't replied. Meanwhile Carcharoth suggested discussiong things here, so perhaps we should.

So, my view: one of the main questions in this case is my ban of Abd from Cf and t:CF. My view on this is in my evidence, which (snark) unlike many other peoples isn't too long to read. Alas, that hasn't stopped people not reading it. So: So I banned them both, for an indeterminate period of approximately a month, from CF and t:CF; A asserted that the ban didn't exist. I told him that it did; I reviewed A's ban [10]. Since the ratio of useful edits to wikilawyering in the interim was well below 1%, I kept the ban in place. If arbcomm cared to suspend that ban, they should have said so. Had Abd wanted arbcomm to declare it suspended / invalid for the duration of the case, he could have asked them. Rl now appears to have re-enacted "the" ban [11] but has failed to say what he means by "the" ban. Arbcomm (or at least, the small portion of it that speaks) has now told me not to block Abd during this case. I think that is the wrong decision, but I admit Arbcomm has the right to make it, so will abide by it.

Meanwhile, Arbcomm (but not perhaps Rl [12]) should consider the role of Viridae. He is without doubt involved in this case (having presented very one-sided evidence) and yet unblocked Abd without pretence of communication. A glance at his contribs suggests that he ahs unblocked and run [13] - certainly he isn't answering talk page messages.

William M. Connolley (talk) 19:43, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

"Arbcomm (or at least, the small portion of it that speaks) has now told me not to block Abd during this case. I think that is the wrong decision, but I admit Arbcomm has the right to make it, so will abide by it." - that is good enough for me. I will now oppose the temporary desysop, but would ask that you please do not take any actions with respect to Abd while the case is still open. As I said above, by accepting the case, there was a presumption that both you and Abd had a case to answer. You were in dispute and the resolution of the dispute is something that we are now attempting. It is difficult to do that if the parties themselves try to resolve things during the case, or the community try and resolve things during a case. Please, you, Abd, and everyone, just present the evidence (or finish presenting the evidence) and let us decide what the evidence shows. That's how this process should work. Put down the tools (wrt Abd) and edit buttons (Abd wrt to cold fusion) while the case is in progress, and go look at the proposals made by the drafting arbitrator on the workshop page. I would propose injunctions on both WMC and Abd to formalise this, but I hope you both have enough sense not to carry on with your dispute while the case is still open (since the drafting arbitrator has started posting proposals, we should be not too far away from a proposed decision when voting will start). As for "the small portion of it that speaks" - there are 14 of us in different time zones, so if you think all of us should respond to everything happening in the arbitration pages, that will be a difficult expectation to meet! Carcharoth (talk) 20:11, 9 August 2009 (UTC) Sorry, forgot to answer the questions in the final paragraph - if you have concerns about Viridae's actions, please enter that into evidence and make proposals on the Workshop page. Carcharoth (talk) 20:28, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Carcharoth, WMC declared his ban about two months ago. In all that time, I made two edits to Cold fusion. One was during the period of the community ban, and I had, as you may recall, suggested self-reversion as a solution to the problem of the complication of ban enforcement by "harmless edits." The occasion was a strong ban, an ArbComm -declared one, and the community clearly did not care to block for technical ban violation. I truly believed that the consensus was solid that I was safe making that one-character edit, self-reverted; contrary to what Enric now asserts, there was no provocative intent or intent to test at all, then. This time, this one time, was different, for reasons I explain below. I am now banned from the article by Rlevse, for obvious reasons, the same reasons that would make you think an injunction might be needed. But it is not needed. I was under a phony ban for at least a month, a ban declared by an involved administrator with a huge axe to grind with respect to me, personally, and you saw the one edit I made come down, and I announced it in advance (that I might be making such an edit). Originally, Rlevse said something about "it might be wise not to edit those pages until the case closes." I think he realized that this wasn't a ban, and that a ban was appropriate, pending, so he did make that explicit. I will not violate that, and I'll say right now, if I edit that article or its talk without the permission of an arbitrator or the closure of this case, whichever comes first, any admin may block me, I waive even claims of involvement. I can say that because I'm not going to do it, period. You don't need to go through an injunction. I'm essentially enjoined, by Rlevse, acting quite properly. --Abd (talk) 12:19, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Statement

WMC and Abd are the two primary named parties in this case, which is still open and they have a history with one another. This makes them involved to a high degree. Therefore one taking an admin action against another should not have happened. That makes WMC's block of Abd an involved block and honestly, I'm amazed anyone thinks otherwise. As for Adb, he clearly should not have edited the Cold fusion page simply because he knew it'd cause lots of drama. Mathsci admits "I think it would be hard to determine how long the page-ban was for" so that there's confusion on the issue and disagreement amongst the parties is understandable (cf the case evidence page). As Carcharoth says, I could have taken more time on this esp in regards to my initial statements to Abd but I was stepping in as no clerk was immediately around and it is ArbCom's responsibility to make sure that the involved parties of the case don't go around committing the same errors during the case that brought them to arbitration in the first place. If a party to an arbitration case thinks it is in order for him to ban and/or block his opponent during the case something is drastically wrong and it needs to be dealt with promptly. The CF page ban is a core of this case and to prevent further drama I've explicitly banned Abd from the CF article and it's talk page for the duration of the case. If the final decision rules on that, that'll take precedence, otherwise the page ban would then be in the communitie’s purview. There are other arb cases where arbs presented evidence on the evidence page (or PD talk page) and did not recuse (dates delinking, Aitias, and Geogre-WMC as three examples. I posted the evidence about the block to ensure it was documented and then in three editing sessions made a timeline of the events that led up to it so that all users could use it as a chronological reference. Prior to this case I can not recall any significant involvement with either Abd nor WMC. Furthermore, I have no axe to grind with either side. So the question becomes "does today's event in me trying to maintain order on the arb case and trying to document it mean I should recuse?". I do not think so. I have not used my admin bit. I was attempting to restore order, and ensure that both parties stepped away from the cliff. I could have posted this chronological evidence on the PD talk page and no one would have thought anything of it as this has been done many times before by other arbs, such as in the Scientology case. But instead I decided to post it on the evidence page and built a chronology with date and time stamps there because I thought the timing very important. I built this all from diffs supplied by users on both sides of the issue from various case pages and talk pages. Arbs often put something together like this in order to make the issues clearer to them. I do not think that in this instance it requires me to recuse. Note: posting on my own talk page and the case PD talk page. Respectfully to all, — Rlevse • Talk • 00:11, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your statement. When you say "no clerk was immediately around" it sounds like a momentary thing. In fact this highly contentious case was left unclerked for over a week, despite the fact that Hersfold notified arbcom that he would be absent, and that I requested by email to clerks-l on 2 August that a clerk be appointed to stand in during Hersfold's absence. When parties see that the case is being left to spin out on its own with no supervision it's hardly surprising that some of them (on both sides) run amok. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:30, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

You are correct. I did not mean to imply it was only momentary. Lately the clerks have been in short supply (vacation, recusal, etc). Their availability lately has been spotty and we all hope that will change soon (like when summertime is over ;-). — Rlevse • Talk •

I have some ideas about how ArbComm could easily deal with this, but I won't clutter this page with them. If asked and notified of the question, I'll respond in situ. --Abd (talk) 16:34, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I can't see how Rleve's conduct is problematic here, nor why he'd need to recuse. Indeed he seems to acting with restraint; I don't see anyone defending the behavior that instigated Rleve's actions. IronDuke 01:32, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, here you have one defending the behaviour. WMC imposed the ban on Abd before the case started, Abd started the case to contest the ban, the ban was still standing until the case ended, Abd had already defied the ban before to see if WMC would block him, Abd has recognized that his edit was testing WMC's limits and he had to know that WMC would block him for defying the ban again. And, yeah, WMC shouldn't have fallen in the trap by blocking him. --Enric Naval (talk) 02:18, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Whilst Abd should not have edited the page during this proceeding, there was absolutely no reason for a block by WMC. WMC could simply have notified the alleged violation or alleged inappropriate action here. Why did it have to be him? For what my opinion's worth, Rlevse has done absolutely nothing wrong here, and both WMC and Abd come out of this looking very bad. Fritzpoll (talk) 06:41, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Rlevse is absolutely correct - contrary to the posts on WMC's homepage, Rlevse did not need to know any detail of the case to censure WMC; the simple knowledge that there's an open Arb case between these two parties is more than sufficient. Any action by WMC against Abd at this point, be it correct or not, is highly inappropriate and has drawn very strong attention to himself and the objectivity of his actions. Similarly, Abd's editing of the CF article at this time is provocative, to say the least. Both parties would do well to take some advice for a change instead of constantly trying to give it. Socrates2008 (Talk) 11:23, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

True enough. At the same time, it is important to keep track of the context - as Abd has mentioned before and after the event, he edited to goad WMC (or another admin) into a block. That it worked speaks badly of WMC. That he tried it speaks badly of Abd. - Bilby (talk) 11:40, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

More accurately, in response to repeated insistence by WMC that his ban was real, and he could prove it, thus aggressively asserting confidently his view of the very basis of this RfAr, I did decide to stop enabling him by voluntarily refraining from editing those pages. I did not then go there to defy him. I simply set his "ban" aside, and when an occasion presented itself, did not stop myself from commenting on the Talk page. I was very aware that there is much claim that my participation there is with walls of text or domination, or POV-pushing, or whatever, so I carefully avoided any possible reason (I thought!) for the edit itself to be considered disruptive. WMC's response to this edit was actually a very typical WMC response, and so all this may have been quite useful. It allowed WMC to demonstrate, in front of ArbComm, when a lot of attention has been gathered, how far he goes. If there were not other credible allegations of use of tools while involved, I'd agree that desysopping might be extreme. In fact, however, there is no shortage of such allegations, WMC has been warned before by ArbComm for involved tool use, and essentially dismissed that warning as wimpy (I think that's in my Evidence), and one of his blocks-while-involved led ultimately to the Scibaby range blocks, which are doing massive on-going damage. --Abd (talk) 16:33, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Let's be very clear - you stated, outright, just prior to editing the page and as part of your declaration that you intended to do so:

So if WMC blocks me for a nondisruptive edit, it demonstrates, in itself, involvement (attachment to his own prejudice about an editor). If another administrator blocks me for a nondisruptive edit based on WMC's ban, and not on the edit itself, it would demonstrate affiliation, that is, another admin doing for WMC what WMC might not be able to do himself. Elsewhere that's called "meat puppetry."[14]

Without even bringing in later comments, (not to mention off-wiki ones), you were very clear that you were thinking very much about the responses that your actions would engender. Let's not pretend otherwise. - Bilby (talk) 17:04, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Enric Naval claims that I "started the case to contest the ban," and therefore "the ban was still standing until the case ended." I stated my reasons for the case with [15]. It doesn't mention contesting a ban, rather, the case was about the usual administrative recusal failure, and a few other issues. I was not asking ArbComm to lift a ban, but rather to judge whether or not WMC could legitimately declare and enforce one. If he could, then, yes, the ban existed and perhaps, indeed, I'd have to ask for it to be lifted. But if not, the ban was unreal, a fantasy. There was another reason for making that edit which may actually be the most significant: it was psychologically necessary. Contrary to what some may think, I do suffer from massive criticism. Having a dozen editors writing volumes every day about what a terribly disruptive editor I was does have an effect, and I was seeing way too little support from the community. My belief is that I'm working to develop and support real consensus, which sometimes involves anticipating it and acting to bring it out. Were all these editors right? What if I'm deluded?

I needed to find out, and if I was deluded, so seriously deluded, the best thing for me and for the project would be to be indef blocked, and quickly. I needed to know, personally. So I found out.

Thanks, Wikipedians, all of you. I'm grateful. I may be wrong about this or that, but I'm not completely deluded. I was correct, WMC could not carry out his threat to block me if I edited the articles, and get away with it.

And if ArbComm wants me to "take a hint" from the decision by reading between the lines, I'm afraid I'm unlikely to do that. The ADHD is real, and we tend to read literally, we don't understand "between the lines," or at least not well. If ArbComm has expectations of me that are not being stated, and they aren't for behaviors that come naturally to me, the committee may be disappointed. I'm not demanding anything, just pointing out what works and what doesn't work. As the proposed decision stands right now, I have some level of mixed feelings, because I'd hoped to be able to address the Scibaby situation and other matters that came up, but I don't think I have the time, that ArbComm has the time, and that this case has the time. Other than that, just as some fear, as it stands, I consider this a kind of victory, that ArbComm is affirming a very important policy, admin recusal. I have one regret here, about the edit to cold fusion. If I had not made that edit and WMC had not blocked me, perhaps the issue would have been resolved at a lower level of involvement. I'd say that WMC should not have declared that ban, period, given his prior involvement, and I proposed in the Workship that recusal on request should be routine. (IAR still applies, though, and no admin should allow the project to suffer damage simply because of recusal rules; but the problem is really continued, insistent recusal failure.) --Abd (talk) 12:04, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

(Since Abd says that he has problems reading between the lines, I have tried to be crystal clear here)

Abd, in the same link, there are other two sections above called "Summary" and "The present dispute" where it's clear that it's all about the ban and only about the ban (or, rather, about you causing disruption because you couldn't get support for your version of the article, getting banned for that, and then trying through all means to get the ban lifted).

Also, "I was correct, WMC could not carry out his threat to block me if I edited the articles, and get away with it.", that's called causing disruption in order to make a WP:POINT and prove that you were right. That's not good. We are not here to prove that we were right about some rule, but for writing the encyclopedia.

Abd, sorry that you have problems with ADHD, but Wikipedia is not therapy (and please don't tell me that it's "only" an essay, specially when some sections like "Unintended consequences" fit so well this situation). If you boast about having 15 years of online discussion experience, then you are going to be expected to have learned to behave online during those years.

I would like to remind you, and to remind the arbs, that Wikipedia is exclusively about writing an encyclopedia, period. And the issue here was that Abd was getting in the middle of writing one of its articles, and that this is the only issue here, and that everything here arises from Abd insisting in the middle again, and that I come to wikipedia exclusively to get good articles written, and that this is the reason that I oppose Abd's return so much. Everything else is missing the point that the only goal here is writing the encyclopedia, the ultimate goal is not the strict enforcement of some social club rules. So get Abd topic banned, or banned, or very restricted in some way, or whatever is necessary to let the writing of the encyclopedia continue. And, I shouldn't need to say this, don't punish the admins that do the things that are needed to keep the encyclopedia being written, specially if they acted on request of the editors that were enforcing content policies in the article. --Enric Naval (talk) 16:36, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

A curious statement, Enric. So you seem to feel that when you and Abd disagree over what should or should not be included in CF that (a) you are completely in the right, and (b) Abd is completely in the wrong? And so much so that you believe that Abd must be banned? And further still that the end you have set your sights on justifies any means to attain it (i.e. "don't punish the admins that do the things that are needed to keep the encyclopedia being written, specially if they acted on request of the editors that were enforcing content policies in the article" regardless of whether they are justified or not)? Strange because when I read the CF talk page I see Abd also claiming to be "enforcing content policies in the article", specifically but not limited to WP:NPOV and WP:RS and WP:V. Are you suggesting that your interpretation of those policies is the solely correct one and that those who disagree with your vision should be banned? I don't wish to put words in your mouth here, so please correct any bits I have gotten wrong. --GoRight (talk) 03:25, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

@Rl: I have no axe to grind with either side [16]. I have not used my admin bit - weaselling. You have made threats to block. William M. Connolley (talk) 16:11, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Oh c'mon WMC irritability is not the same as partiality. You could at least assume some good faith? Given the biggest failure of arbcom is to do much having someone a bit impatient might even get something done here. --BozMo talk 20:56, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

WMC was clearly in the wrong and should not have blocked ABD himself. As for Rlevse having to recuse himself for pointing that out, telling WMC not to do it again, and informing him of the penalty if he does so..…well that’s ridiculous - and I'm sorry, but the diff provided by WMC above is certainly not even close to being evidence of Rlevse having an axe to grind against him. There's absolutely no reason for Rlevse to recuse himself from this case, he acted appropriately and has done nothing wrong. This entire issue has been blown way out proportion. Dreadstar † 02:27, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

"Clearly" perhaps but also not yet written down in any policy. If we want sub judice (during Arbcom cases) rules on Admin behaviour by all means lets write them but as far as I can possibly tell at the moment the only limitation on Admin behaviour is using tools to gain advantage in a content dispute (not the case here) or using tools where there is a conflict of interest (not the case here since a COI arising from use of tools does not seem to be included). Let us not forget that tools exist and are presumed to exist for the good of the project. Use of tools to slant a content dispute (e.g. banning someone to stop them voting on an AfD) is clearly wrong. No one has yet said that this use of tools by WMC was unjustified just that he should have wasted someone else's time about it in the circumstances. Now that's all understandable if you take a troll playground view that blocks are about punishment, vindictive etc but we go to lengths to say blocks are not punishments, they should not be imposed if articles are already protected because they exist to protect the project etc. From the clean view of project we aspire to there isn't an obvious COI on this block. If even in a world where witness tampering is impossible because history is recorded Arbcom or others feel that such blocks may intimidate witnesses or something then we should pass a policy. I don't know which way I would vote but we need to focus on the projects interest not squabble boards. --BozMo talk 06:13, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

How about Wikipedia:Administrators#Misuse_of_administrative_tools - With few specific exceptions (like obvious vandalism) where tool use is allowed by any admin, administrators should ensure they are reasonably neutral parties when they use the tools.? Since you ask for a policy, I believe that is quite a relevant one, and is not undone by the exceptions in WP:UNINVOLVED. If you think that WMC can be a neutral party when applying a block to someone who he is engaged in an arbitration case with, then we're not going to agree here. Why couldn't he just post to AN or ANI if a block was required? Fritzpoll (talk) 07:29, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

That's a better policy on relevance, thanks, but it is still rather subjective. AFAICT in this particular case Rlevse stated categorically that he was not reviewing the reasons for the block (for example he was not checking to see if it was an obvious exception) but he was objecting that a block should not have taken place in any circumstances by WMC. Wizardman supported but cited only WP:BLOCK which does not apply. WMC is one of the more rules-based administrators on the project; excepting unannounced policy changes I have not seen him break an objective WP rule in years, only there is a certain Judge Dredd tendency. I do not doubt if he posted to ANI other admins would have stepped in and blocked. Whether Arbcom's decision to hear this case should force this step was arguable but now he has agreed to anyway. --BozMo talk 08:34, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, BozMo. Administrative bans are really warnings, and when an editor perceives that a warning is being issued by an administrator who is involved or has some axe to grind, the warning is likely to be disregarded. Had WMC followed recusal policy, he would indeed, if he believed the edit to violate some policy, have gone to AN/I to ask for a neutral administrator to handle it. A neutral administrator would have been very unlikely to block for that edit. Rather, what would have been the likely outcome would have been either acceptance of the edit as non-disruptive (just look at the edit!), or a warning to me to not make such edits while this case is pending, to avoid possible disruption (and it is not necessary, with a pending case, to make a decision about whose fault this disruption might be). I think a block, absent a warning from a neutral administrator, would have been very, very unlikely. This points out how following recusal policy can prevent much unnecessary disruption, and the arguments that recusal rules unduly inhibit the ability of administrators to prevent disruption are thoroughly bogus. I have seen one case where an administrator recused when faced with obvious disruption, and damage resulted; in that case, in fact, I'd have suggested, because of the emergency nature of the disruption, that the admin protect the involved page, or block the editor reverting his close of an abusive AfD renomination. Instead, the admin did not respond to the reversion, but went to AN/I, which report was successfully diverted into a debate over the notability of the article, and, because the AfD was left open, it attracted comment and really couldn't be closed, and it became a huge battle between factions, the "procedure" faction and the "to hell with procedure, is the topic notable or not" faction. Recusal rules do not prevent Ignore all rules action, they would merely would have required that the admin to go immediately to AN/I after reverting, protecting the AfD, or blocking the editor for disruption, and then recusing. Had the admin blocked this editor for disruption, it would have saved a lot of trouble later; this was User:Allemandtando, nee User:Killerofcruft, a sock of User:Fredrick day, essentially banned as a result of this and subsequent incidents. --Abd (talk) 16:20, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Questions/Observations

Irrelevant comments removed. WorriedScientist (talk) 18:31, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Please comment under your main account, if you have one. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 18:34, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Question about "talk page in any Wikipedia space"

I have a question about one of the terms in Abd's editing restriction. What is a "talk page in any Wikipedia space"? Do you mean only "Wikipedia talk:...", or does this include things like ANI? Cool Hand Luke 15:44, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I would interpret that to mean "any namespace ending with 'talk:'", and thus not necessarily noticeboards, however I'm not certain. I'd also point out that as written, this appears to be "one post per day period" instead of the usual "one post per day per page"; I'm not sure if this was intentional. Hersfold non-admin^(t/a/c) 16:16, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Oh! I misread that emphasis. It's not "any talk page in any Wikipedia space," but "any talk page in any Wikipedia space." Now that I see that, I agree with your interpretation. Cool Hand Luke 16:24, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I know you're recused, but if that is how it was meant, an alternate may need to be proposed that makes this clearer; and makes the noticeboard issue clearly laid out as well, since those are generally held to talk page guidelines despite usually not being talk pages. Hersfold non-admin^(t/a/c) 18:54, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I'll message FloNight. Hopefully she can clarify what she means before there are many other votes. Personally, I think a standard once-per-page-per-day limit would suffice, but if I thought it was prudent to limit a user in this way, I would also include the noticeboards. Cool Hand Luke 22:44, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I intended the wording to mean "any" name space ending with talk. FloNight♥♥♥ 00:14, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Once-per-page-per-day is standard, but referring to 1RR, which I have rarely, if ever, violated on any Talk page, and it is unusual in article space (but there is some unclarity for me on the meaning of revert; bald reverts are obvious, but what about attempts to satisfy an objection by making a new edit with, say, better sourcing?). 1 edit per day will simply push me toward one big edit instead of a number of smaller ones. I can handle that, easily, but is this really what ArbComm wants? The biggest problem with the proposed set of remedies is that it does not seem to be based on specific misbehavior but rather on a vague concept of overall misbehavior as alleged by one of the parties, Enric Naval, who has edit warred on Cold fusion Talk, and repeated it the other day. I will, however, review the exact evidence cited and update my evidence if needed. (I believe I responded, but only with a draft.) On the technical point, if it were meant by "any talk page in any Wikipedia space," any talk page at all, then the words "in any Wikipedia space" would be redundant. Rather, I did read it, at first, as referring to WP talk space specifically. But then the complaints were mostly about Cold fusion talk. So the remedy doesn't make a great deal of sense to me. Mentorship, no problem, I'm looking forward to it. --Abd (talk) 23:54, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Insufficient

On the workshop, there is broad community support for FOFS that Abd engaged in meatpuppetry, wikilawyering, that he drove away subject matter experts, that he made personal attacks against other users both on and off wiki, that Abd uses talk pages as off-topic discussion forums, and that he has disrupted the dispute resolution process where other users are concerned. This proposed decision does nothing to curtail any of these misbehaviors. Is the arbitration committee planning to actually deal with these problems? If not, then what was the point of asking for evidence and workshop commentary? Raul654 (talk) 15:56, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

The broad community support appears to be against your definition meatpuppetry (see especially the uninvolved comments at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Scibaby). If ArbCom wants to act on this claim, they should clarify that meatpuppetry requires actual coordination between the users, not merely agreeing with a few edits from a banned editor. I've no comment on the rest, but this wasn't WP:MEAT. Cool Hand Luke 16:09, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Nice try to rewrite the meatpuppetry policy, , but your claims didn't fly when GoRight proposed it on the workshop. Wikipedians are not permitted to post or edit material at the direction of a banned user, an activity sometimes called "proxying," unless they are able to confirm that the changes are verifiable and have independent reasons for making them... Users are generally expected to refrain from reinstating edits made by banned users in violation of the ban, and such edits may be viewed as meatpuppetry. - were Abd's edits verifiable and made independently of Jed and Scibaby? No, they were not - in the latter case, he restored a talk page edit verbatim minutes after Scibaby made it. (So his actions were neither verifiable nor independent of Scibaby's) So he did violate the rules, your own attempt to rewrite them not withstanding. Raul654 (talk) 17:37, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

"So his actions were neither verifiable nor independent of Scibaby's" - This is a perversion of what the policy actually states as was demonstrated in my workshop proposal, [17]. In the case of the talk page edit there was nothing that needed to be "verified" so that part of the policy was rather moot, and the policy states that Abd had to have "his own independent reasons for restoring the comment", not that his edit had to be "independent of" Scibaby's edit, whatever that is supposed to mean). In the case of restoring the comment on my talk page, Abd's independent reason was, obviously, to ensure that I saw the comment. Nothing more, nothing less. This does not make him a meat puppet of Scibaby. --GoRight (talk) 05:14, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia's rules are descriptive, and we do not treat restoring an occasional edit as "meat puppetry," as at least three independent commentators noted at your now-archived SPI attempt. This activity cannot sanely be called editing "at the direction" of a banned user. Read the policy again: verifiability and independence doesn't matter because the editing is not at the direction of Scibaby: it falls cleanly outside of the definition. Cool Hand Luke 17:56, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

we do not treat restoring an occasional edit as "meat puppetry," - who said anything about occasional? Abd spent weeks/months acting as Jed's mouthpiece.

This activity cannot sanely be called editing "at the direction" of a banned user. - the half-dozen or so editors on the workshop who unanimously rejected GoRight's proposal would beg to differ with your claims about policy. As does the typical interpretation of the policy, as applied at ANI, where explicit communication is *NOT* needed to infer meatpuppetry. Or, as the banning policy I cited above (which you apparently failed to read) says Users are generally expected to refrain from reinstating edits made by banned users in violation of the ban, and such edits may be viewed as meatpuppetry. Notice it says nothing about being told what to do by the banned user. Acting at someone's direction doesn't necessarily mean they tell you what to do and you do it -- it's more than suffecient to follow their lead and restore their edits, as Abd and GoRight have both done. Raul654 (talk) 18:15, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

GoRight's proposal was ludicrous. Evidence of direction is not needed for meatpuppetry, that's the whole point of the policy. Coppertwig's comments there capture what the policy is meant to prohibit: evasive socks and apparent canvassing. This is not an example of such apparent direction. Apart from the occasional revert, they're clearly different users acting for their own purposes. MEAT is not meant to be a cudgel to ban users for holding similar POVs, your attempts notwithstanding. Cool Hand Luke 18:22, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

"GoRight's proposal was ludicrous." - Gee ... thanks?!? Obviously I have a tendency to disagree with this. --GoRight (talk) 05:41, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Coppertwig is not a partisan. Read his remark; I think it's the most sensible construction of MEAT in the lot. Cool Hand Luke 06:36, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

GoRight's proposal was rejected because it was a backdoor attempt to rewrite policy to excuse his own violations; it was rejected becasue it was flatly contradicted by policy, which does not require communication. (Despite his own attempts to rewrite that same policy a few days earlier) Per the banned policy I just cited, restoring a banned user's edits is by itself evidence of meatpuppetry.

"Per the banned policy I just cited, restoring a banned user's edits is by itself evidence of meatpuppetry." - Well, except for all the exceptions to that rule which are already IN the policy. --GoRight (talk) 05:58, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

They're clearly different users acting for their own purposes. - their own purposes? Hardly. Restoring another user's edits means you are editing for his purposes, and when that user is banned, restoring his edits is proxy editing and is prohibited. Or, to look at the bigger picture, banned means just that -- no longer allowed to participate on Wikipedia. The meatpuppetery policy does not mean "Go ahead and make the edit, and some like minded editor might restore them." It is not an invitation to restore comments from banned users, although you'd never know that given how frequently GoRight and Abd do it. (Not to mention their multitude of other misbehaviors) Raul654 (talk) 18:42, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

"Restoring another user's edits means you are editing for his purposes" - So, when you restore someone else's edits in a content dispute (say WMC's, or KDP's, or SS's) on some global warming page, you are saying that you are nothing but a MEAT puppet for them and that you are editing at their direction? That seems prima facie ridiculous. --GoRight (talk) 05:58, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I'd concentrate on their other misbehaviors (with a focus on how it harms the encyclopedia), rather than wikilawyering some selectively-quoted language from MEAT. I don't deny they've been disruptive, but this MEAT theory has been rejected by the community enough times.[18][19] The arbitrators apparently have no desire to adopt it. Cool Hand Luke 22:15, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

The guiding principle here is that you don't restore banned user's edits. The wikilawyers are the ones who are trying to undermine that not-hard-to-understand principle by trying to carve out exceptions where none exist. GoRight did violate the meatpuppetry policy, on many occasions, and I see no reason to pretend he didn't.

"The wikilawyers are the ones who are trying to undermine that not-hard-to-understand principle by trying to carve out exceptions where none exist." - Proven wrong by your own statements: "GoRight has highlighted basically every caveat and exception in the above policy ...".

I don't deny they've been disruptive - gee, how generous of you, to concede what is perfectly obvious to everyone else.

but this MEAT theory has been rejected by the community enough times.[20][21] - Did you actually read the links you posted? The second one found (a) GoRight violated the 3rr, and (b) If there are general behavioral issues or ongoing problems that need to be dealt with, they should be dealt with at a noticeboard other than this one. "Go somewhere else" is hardly a rejection. As for the Scibaby sockpuppet investigations, exactly three people chimed in there, and one of them (A-tren) is a long-time GoRight apologist, and one of them (Cla68) arrived because he saw it posted on WR. So you're claiming consensus based on exactly one independent person's opinion. Raul654 (talk) 03:00, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Raul, please retract the "long time apologist remark". I have defended GoRight because you have been repeatedly attacking him for over a year, using what I consider to be baseless accusations. I have not defended him when I believe he is wrong (there have been a few occasions where I have criticised him) and I largely don't agree with his POV. Please strike your "apologist remark". ATren (talk) 23:05, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I have defended GoRight because you have been repeatedly attacking him for over a year, using what I consider to be baseless accusations - I think you just proved why my description is accurate. Anyone who cannot, from his behavior in this case alone, see his misbehavior is wearing quite a set of blinders. Raul654 (talk) 23:09, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

"So you're claiming consensus based on exactly one independent person's opinion." - And you are claiming consensus based on what, exactly? The fact that your attempt to paint me as a meat puppet failed? And let us not forget that the administrators who investigated that report and made the final determination were likewise uninvolved and independent of myself. But more importantly, if the existing policy is description of community practices and therefore descriptive of a broad community consensus on those practices, then the exceptions articulated in that policy already enjoy prima facie consensus. --GoRight (talk) 16:41, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't counting Atren—I know he's not uninvolved. Rjanag, Nathan, and Cla68 (who was not solicited from WR). Not to mention the clerks who collectively passed on your theory (and NuclearWarfare in particular). This is not MEAT—not at the direction or in collusion with another user. Cool Hand Luke 06:45, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

The arbitrators apparently have no desire to adopt it. - Wow, quite an impressive non-sequitur. Abd is guilty of many misbehaviors (his wikilawyering, his personal attacks, his disruption of cold fusion articles, his ignoring warnings, his disruption of the dispute resolution process, etc) that the arbitrators are not dealing with. Using your bizzaro logic, do they think he's innocent of those misbehaviors too? Raul654 (talk) 03:01, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I made no such argument: my statement is advice. Adopting your stale MEAT theory requires and unpalatable, mistaken, and counterproductive view of a policy that's been grossly misused in the past. Sanctioning the other misbehaviors does not. You should focus on those points because they're better arguments not based upon tenuous and idiosyncratic policy assumptions. Cool Hand Luke 06:34, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Congratulations Arbcom, I hope you are looking forward to the next Arbitration case brought by Abd against some hapless fellow who makes a small mistake in the wrong place at the wrong time. I'm going to dig out my copy of war and peace instead of wasting my time contributing to the next one - at least that is well written and has a coherant and interesting narrative to follow. Probably shorter too. /sarcasm. Spartaz ^Humbug! 16:17, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Should it happen that I survive this mess, I will note that I have only brought one ArbComm case, this one, plus I would have brought Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Abd and JzG if Jehochman hadn't beaten me to it. The editors complaining about my behavior here include (initially it was almost entirely them) those who previously called for me to be banned, for raising the issue about JzG, during RfC/JzG 3, as shown in my evidence, and that includes Spartaz. If I ever raise a frivolous and harassing RfAr for a "minor mistake" by an admin, or by anyone, please put me out of my misery. My view, however, is that no clear example of recusal failure is minor, unless nobody was hurt by it. I actually oppose the desysopping of WMC, for my view is that, generally, ArbComm should suspend administrative privileges for recusal failure, and it should do so promptly and without fuss and without blame, until it is satisfied that whatever failure there was will not repeat, the basic condition satisfying that would be that the admin shows understanding of the problem and would therefore recognize and recuse in the future under similar circumstances. It is precisely that condition which remains absent for WMC (and it did for JzG as well, which is currently moot). --Abd (talk) 18:19, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Given that Abd doesn't listen to warnings (from other users or the arbcom), doesn't think he's done anything wrong, and is looking very, very hard for any bit of vindication he can pull out of this case, I think the chances that he is suddenly going to see the light and improve his behavior are nil. And Spartaz says, given the current remedies, Abd arbitration round #3 is inevitable. Raul654 (talk) 19:07, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

From his POV, Raul654 is correct. The issue hinges on balance. If my behavior is bad from start to finish, then the only reasonable remedy would be a site ban. If my behavior is good from start to finish, flawless, then I should get a barnstar and profuse commendations. If my behavior is mixed, with some good and some problems, then the good should be noted (don't forget that, Arbs!) and the problems addressed with solutions that have some hope of success. I see mentorship, particularly mentorship with teeth, as a solution that should satisfy reasonable concerns. Discretionary sanctions covering a problem article is an excellent idea. The meat puppetry claim has long been used in an attempt to exclude POV as distinct from misbehaving editors, and "broad community support," mentioned at the top of this section, is the "faction cooperating in the frustration of policy" staring itself in the belly-button, but I'll deal with that below. --Abd (talk) 21:46, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

The track record of mentorship voluntarily undertaken by problem editors is checkered at best. The track record of mentorship agreed to during Arbitration in order to avoid stronger sanctions is, so far as I know, uniformly negative (though I'm willing to be enlightened if there are success stories I've missed). Given the historical futility (and worse) of this approach, why should it satisfy "reasonable concerns" in this case? MastCell ^Talk 22:01, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Picking up on a point Raul made: "I think the chances that he is suddenly going to see the light and improve his behavior are nil". I think this can be applied to more people than just Abd. Rather than focus just on one side or the other, try and step back a bit and look at all the behaviour here (that is what arbitrators have to do when considering the case), and consider what all parties (both Abd and WMC) and those who have heavily participated here, could do to improve their behaviour (or internalise lessons learned), even if it is only the smallest of changes. Then we might start getting somewhere. If anyone thinks that their behaviour will be totally unchanged as a result of this case, that would be good to know as well. Carcharoth (talk) 23:32, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

You are justifying treating both sides in this case equally when they are clearly not equal. Five minutes worth of reading on the evidence and/or workshop page gives a clear indication of where the vast majority of the disruption originates, and it is from Abd. WMC might not have showered himself in glory, but any problems he might have caused pale in comparison to the problems caused by Abd. Yet, this decision punishes WMC for trying to reign in Abd's misbehavior, while doing absolutely nothing to remedy Abd's numerous misbehaviors. He still doesn't think he did anything wrong! He's already using this decision to claim vindication! So now he gets to pick the apologist of his choice to act as mentor, "negotiate" secret terms, and continue on with business as usual.

This decision is a slap in the face to everyone who has had to deal with Abd. What was the point of compiling the evidence if you're not even going to pretend to read it? Why did Bainer bother posting his proposals on the workshop if he was going to ignore the unanimously negative feedback they got and repost them here verbatim? As it now stands, another Abd case is inevitable. I would start compiling evidence now, but given the way the committee has handled this case, I'm not sure if it's worth it. Oh, there's lessons to be learned here, but I'm pretty sure they are not the ones you want people learning. Raul654 (talk) 02:31, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Yet, this decision punishes WMC for trying to reign in Abd's misbehavior, while doing absolutely nothing to remedy Abd's numerous misbehaviors. Agree. Wizzy…☎ 06:38, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm certain that my behavior will improve. As to others involved, some may improve, some may degenerate as they burn out, and it's up to them. Thanks, Carcharoth. My suggestion is that all parties (construed narrowly and broadly) start to more actively seek broader consensus, instead of being content with imposing their views, or the views of a faction, on Wikipedia. Consensus is powerful and resolves disputes instead of burying them. I can accomplish nothing without consensus, whatever I do that is actually opposed to consensus will be transient and disappear. What I do with consensus is likely to survive me. It will not require any continued effort on my part. --Abd (talk) 00:03, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

As Mathsci said when you proposed this principle on the workshop, [this is an] attempt to justify the pushing of a fringe viewpoint by slowly tiring out mainstream. So much for improving your behavior. Raul654 (talk) 02:11, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Raul, it appears that you have some kind of dispute with me, and that I don't seem to be getting it. I know that you are an experienced editor, highly so. Can you suggest how we could resolve this dispute? Do you think we should discuss it directly, or do you think we would need a mediator? Hopefully, I will have a mentor soon. Do you think we should wait until then? I probably should have asked about this before now. Thanks. Looking forward to your response, --Abd (talk) 22:09, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

You you cause much disruption, and from this comment above, and your continued disruption of Blacklight Power while this case has been ongoing, it's clear that you still don't understand that all the problems that occur wherever you go trace back to you and you alone. "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves" - Julius Caesar (I, ii, 140-141) Can you suggest how we could resolve this dispute? - Yes, when you start behaving appropriately. Or when you are banned. One of these in evitable and I have a pretty good idea of which one it is. Do you think we should discuss it directly Given your comments in the past couple of weeks over in this WR thread about me personally, and others in this case, I doubt your new-found desire to work-through differences amicably is anything more than a cynical attempt to curry favor with the arbitrators now voting on this decision. Furthermore, as you have to date shown absolutely no ability to take in feedback or suggestions from others, I have no desire to engage in such a fruitless waste of time with you, your mentor, or a mediator. Hopefully, I will have a mentor soon - Hopefully, the arbcom will come to its senses and craft a decision that actually addresses your misbehavior instead of foisting the responsibility on a mentor and crossing their fingers. I probably should have asked about this before now. - there are many things you could have done differently in the many months leading up to this case. Raul654 (talk) 22:35, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

For the record, I've asked Raul to provide evidence of Abd's alleged recent disruption on Blacklight Power. He responded with a link to this edit as "disruptive". That comment was short (5 lines on my browser), and simply pointed out a new paper on the topic. In his comment, Abd acknowledges that it may or may not be significant. It was resolved after a dialog of about 5 comments total, and Abd agreed with others at the end. This is not disruption, it's discussion, and the only disruption here is the Raul's allegation that Abd's mere presence on that page is disruptive. I've asked Raul to withdraw that claim. ATren (talk) 18:37, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I have replied to Atren's latest apologia for Abd here. Raul654 (talk) 21:34, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

For the record, I've been consistently critical of Abd for his verbiage (see his talk page for example). But don't let that fact interrupt Raul's stream of unsubstantiated accusations. It seems that anyone who disagrees with Raul is either an "apologist" or a Scibaby meatpuppet. :-) ATren (talk) 22:46, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Raul, you make a series of extreme statements that could be rather easily deconstructed and demolished. "Nothing of value," for example. This is a public place, should we start privately? You may email me. Until then, though, I have to see the above as a rejection of an attempt to resolve a dispute, which then sets up the precondition for an RfC. I'd rather not go there, and I might even be prevented from going there, but someone else might. "New-found desire." AGF, Raul, remember that. I'm seeing that you have no intention to seek consensus, but prefer to continue a dispute with a profound belief in your own rightness, as has been often said to me about you. I'd rather find out for myself. Are you sure? Let me put the mediation thing a different way. Is there any editor whose advice you might trust? Any editor. We could start there, this might not make a good mediator, if the editor thinks like you, but maybe we can find a path, someone whom that editor trusts, etc. As I previously wrote to JzG, as I previously wrote to WMC, I think you are headed for losing your admin bit. Administrators should be shining examples of neutrality, sobriety, and meticulous avoidance of pushing their own POV. I'd say your behavior during this case has been the opposite. You can, as did JzG and WMC, ignore my advice. It's your privilege, but, remember, I gave the advice to JzG and, originally, to WMC, when I was totally uninvolved. I'm not uninvolved here, but I doubt that my involvement has made me totally stupid. I don't intend to continue a conversation here, you can reply on my Talk or by email or here, your choice. Thanks. --Abd (talk) 23:45, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

you make a series of extreme statements that could be rather easily deconstructed and demolished - feel free to present some evidence to that effect. If it's anything like the evidence you've prsented in this case, I'm sure it will be verbose, incoherent, and utterly unconvincing. This is a public place, should we start privately? You may email me. - to quote Barney Frank, discussing your misbehavior with you would be like carrying on a discussion with a dining room table. I have no desire to waste my time. I have to see the above as a rejection of an attempt to resolve a dispute, which then sets up the precondition for an RfC. - here's the thing, Abd. Your threats (veiled or otherwise) don't scare me at all, because you have no credibility whatsoever. AGF, Raul, remember that. - I seem to remember a guideline somewhere that people who invoke AGF to defend themselves are almost always not acting in good faith. And, as the AGF policy says point blank - This guideline does not require that editors continue to assume good faith in the presence of contrary evidence. The mountain of evidence pertaining to your bad faith undermines your demands that people assume good faith on your part. I'm seeing that you have no intention to seek consensus - On the contrary, there's a large consensus where your behavior is concerned, and I'm part of it. I have no desire to seek "consensus" as defined by you in the workshop - namely, that you get to post walls of text, re-hashing old issues ad infinitum, until you exhaust the competition. Let me put the mediation thing a different way. Is there any editor whose advice you might trust? - it's not an issue of finding a suitable mediator. There are plenty of editors here who I would trust to be fair and impartial. But as I have said twice now, I neither the time nor inclination to deal with *you*. Since you didn't listen to first 100+ warnings you got, I see no reason to expect that mediation would produce a different result. As I previously wrote to JzG, as I previously wrote to WMC, I think you are headed for losing your admin bit. - see above, re: your threats don't scare me. Administrators should be shining examples of neutrality, sobriety, and meticulous avoidance of pushing their own POV. I'd say your behavior during this case has been the opposite. - I think the latter sentence is a textbook example of the Dunning–Kruger effect in action. You can, as did JzG and WMC, ignore my advice. - Anyone misguided enough to take advice from you deserves what they get. you can reply on my Talk or by email or here, your choice. - this will be my last statement on the subject. Raul654 (talk) 05:41, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Hopefully, except for a little. There are plenty of editors here who I would trust to be fair and impartial. Please name one or more of these trustworthy editors. The more the better, it can make it easier to find connections. Don't worry, I won't harass them! The purpose of mediation is not to convince one party that the other is right, it is to find agreement. Your comment, Raul, assumes, completely and confidently, that you are right, completely and totally and without any oversight or error, and that I am utterly and completely wrong, useless, disruptive, and the only chance for any resolution of this is that I either go away or completely revise everything about myself. It is, indeed, hard to find anything to mediate there, there has to be some starting point of agreement, and I find it a tad difficult to discover agreement with what I see as your view. Am I wrong about it? Can you think of some possible common goal? How about the welfare of the project? Do you think it might be enhanced if we could find agreement? It is August as I write this. Can we agree on that? --Abd (talk) 06:32, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

"Your comment, Raul, assumes, completely and confidently, that you are right, completely and totally and without any oversight or error, and that I am utterly and completely wrong, useless, disruptive, and the only chance for any resolution of this is that I either go away or completely revise everything about myself." - Yes, that's a fairly accurate statement of my beliefs. (I would take issue with completely... without any oversight or error - I'm human and make mistakes, like everyone else, so it's always possible that I've made a mistake. But I believe with a high degree of confidence that I have not made any significant errors in characterizing your behavior.)

"It is, indeed, hard to find anything to mediate there" - well, I guess we do agree on something after all.

"I find it a tad difficult to discover agreement with what I see as your view." - I don't find this surprising.

"Am I wrong about it?" - No.

"Can you think of some possible common goal? How about the welfare of the project? Do you think it might be enhanced if we could find agreement?" - If the product of your editing on the cold fusion articles is any indicator, I think we define "welfare of the project" very differently. I consider your editing on cold fusion articles to be highly detrimental to the welfare of the project. The articles are in much worse shape now, full of pseudoscientific nonsense, and the experts who could fix it have all left because of your behavior. I'm fairly sure you do not agree with this view. Therefore, we cannot agree on advancing the welfare of the project, because your view of what is to the benefit of the project is diametrically opposite of mine (and most everyone elses').

It is August as I write this. Can we agree on that? - Yes. Raul654 (talk) 17:03, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Good start, Raul: We both agree that the problem is that the other party is utterly convinced and immovable, unwilling to listen, highly detrimental to the welfare of the project (yes, I do think that about you), and, as to our own errors, you claim a "high degree of confidence that I have not made any significant errors in characterizing your behavior." I may not have such a high degree of confidence. For example, I'm aware of damage that your activity has caused, but may not be so aware of the other side, the value of your work.

At the same time, you assert certain facts, particularly my cold fusion behavior, that could be independently verified. I presume that you consider your assertion there is about something "significant," you do assert it that way. So we have one specific dispute that could be mediated, and we have also, an additional possible agreement. I believe that if I were responsible, as you claim, for filling the article with "pseudoscientific nonsense," a topic ban would be in order, or maybe even a site ban. Would you agree on that as well? The difference between us, then, in this, is a disagreement over content, if I take what you say at face value, which I will.

We could save a lot of trouble, though. There is consensus that cold fusion is not "pseudoscience," and, even if it were, facts that are found in reliable sources belong in the project, though where and how is a separate question. I'm not aware of any pseudoscience currently in the article, and you did use the present tense. If you were to check this out, and try to make it specific, this might all become very simple for the first step. Perhaps you would admit an error, thus disproving what I've been told about you. Admitting an error wouldn't get rid of the rest of your claims, just one. But we can't deal with thirteen if we don't deal with one.

There is only one cold fusion article at present, thought there are some biographies of cold fusion personalities. Perhaps, Raul, you are thinking of Blacklight Power? That is not a cold fusion article, Blacklight claims energy generation from a non-fusion source, and there is only a peripheral connection, which I wrote about on Talk there the other day. Perhaps you had that in mind? If I've contributed any "pseudoscientific nonsense there," I'd appreciate knowing about it so I can immediately remove it, before I'm banned.

Do you agree that there is a specific dispute here, agreement on which would benefit the project. (If I have, inadvertently or otherwise, inserted pseudoscientific nonsense, and that is shown -- it has not been shown by any evidence in this arbitration, to my knowledge, though some not familiar with the literature and the principles, such as yourself, have made claims like that -- then there is a negative and harmful behavior that I could stop, and if the process showed that to an independent observer, and I continued, I'd be easily sanctioned, even without discretionary sanctions, a benefit. On the other hand, if I didn't do what you claimed I did, then you would, of course, recognize that you'd gone overboard with criticism, right? And would that not be a benefit as well?

Further, if you don't want to discuss this with me, perhaps you could suggest someone with whom I might discuss it, who would pass on to you any questions or suggestions your trusted editor thinks you might want to look at? Or someone who might be open to communication from someone else about the issue? Of course, an arbiter could ask these questions, but I'm not trying to impeach you, Raul, I actually am trying to resolve the dispute, because I would much rather work with other editors than fight with them, fighting is highly inefficient, we end up wasting all our time getting nothing done. Right?

Suppose, Raul, that I were the disruptive monster you seem to think I am. Suppose I'm banned, and I can blame you for it somehow. (I wouldn't, but, remember, you think I'm totally unreasonable, and unreasonable people do think that way. I get this "muslim scum" vandalism from one.) Could it be that you could spend a few minutes now and save years of dealing with me playing the other side of "whack-a-mole," which is probably much more fun than your side? It's not that I would do this, in fact, I wouldn't, but ... you have done with others what you are doing with me, and they have figured out how to play that game, causing great collateral damage. Could it be time to start trying other options? How about it? Ask your friends! --Abd (talk) 19:40, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Agree with Raul. Yes, statistics alone don't give the full picture, still, of Abd's total edits only 15% are in the article namespace [22]. Only GoRight can beat that with 13% [23] SPLETTE :] ^{How's my driving?} 22:56, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

← If mentorship is being seriously entertained, then please provide some mechanism for a rapid review by ArbCom. I don't want to name names, but in previous cases ArbCom has "settled" for mentorship; the mentors don't view themselves as "police"; the problematic behavior resumes; and those affected are left with no recourse other than to start another lengthy, unpleasant round of litigation from scratch. MastCell ^Talk 04:10, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I assume that mentorship is going to pass, and I ask that my mentor have one of two things: (1) ready access to ArbComm or (2) ready access to an individual arbitrator selected by ArbComm to interface with the mentor. As well, if I have a problem with my mentor (unlikely), I would appeal to the committee or to the selected arbitrator (better). This communication would be private, non-disruptive. If anyone has a complaint about me, they would be encouraged to communicate this, first, directly with me. If there is no satisfaction from that, they would bring in my mentor. If my mentor does not respond within a reasonable period of time, this would be evidence of abandonment and would be communicated to ArbComm, either by email (best, probably, up to ArbComm, as is all of this) or at Arbitration Enforcement, because if I have no acting mentor, that would be a situation requiring remedy. Clear? However, if we expect mentors to be "police," it will fail, that is predictable. If the Committee wants to establish police, it could appoint a supervising administrator, a kind of "probation officer." But it is not clear that this level of bureaucracy is needed. Any neutral administrator may sanction me for misbehavior, any editor can request such and it can receive rapid review at Arbitration Enforcement. --Abd (talk) 21:58, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

The mentor is not there to act as your apologist or translator. The person complaining about your behavior is under absolutely no obligation whatsoever to talk to your mentor, nor does your mentor have any responsibility to apologize or justify your inappropriate behavior. (And, for that matter, given that you ignore all warnings you have ever gotten, I don't think the complainer has any obligation to talk to you about your misbehavior first, either. Your long history of disruption everywhere you go means, IMO, the complainer would be perfectly justified taking it straight to ANI or RFC.) In short, the mentor's *only* job is to keep you, and you alone, in line. And in the eminently likely event that the mentorship doesn't work, there's Abd arbitration round #3. Raul654 (talk) 22:08, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Raul, I'm unaware that I have an invincible shield that prevents me from being blocked by a neutral administrator. Iridescent blocked me without any negative consequences, and, in fact, I have numerous times praised her for how she handled it. WMC blocked me the first time for a ban violation, and, while I agree that he should not have done it, I didn't make a stink about it. The second block, sure, I knew it was possible or likely that he'd block, but I didn't, again, make a stink about it, and, in fact, I didn't have to do anything to be unblocked. Disruptive? Hah! There is no obligation to talk to a mentor as you seem to think I required. Rather, a mentor is a ready-made person to talk to, if you want to. Someone who has my ear, whom -- ideally -- I have chosen as someone I trust, and who is also responsible to the community and hopefully has the ear of ArbComm if I truly refuse to listen. If you don't want to talk to my mentor, you can talk to anyone you like, including yourself.

(By the way, I intend to choose a mentor even if not required by ArbComm.) If I violate policy, as you have claimed umpteen times, have you forgotten what involved editors do when they have a problem? There is DR process, and if there is an urgency, there is AN/I. I know that both of those are foreign to you, but, really you ought to try it sometime. DR works, if you are reasonable. The alternative is to push your block buttons any time you feel angry or contemptuous, or loudly complain without actually doing anything about the problem. The difficulty is, Raul, that you -- or WMC -- would have had a doozy of a time convincing an uninvolved admin that I did something blockworthy, except maybe at one point, May 21, when you or another might have been able to convince someone that I violated 3RR, and maybe the lack of warning would not have prevented it. Fortunately, that was an extraordinarily rare approach (or crossing) of the 3RR line. You didn't even list edit warring in your list of issues below. It's in the proposed findings, but I can't figure out what it's based on. May 21? Any other incidents?

If I was "meat puppeting," why didn't you file an SSP report? Or, if you were so foolish as to consider yourself uninvolved, why didn't you block me? What is so difficult about it all? I could tell you, but I don't think you want to hear it from me. So you won't. --Abd (talk) 02:56, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I've come to interpret mentorship as "something arbcom does when arbcom has to do something but doesn't know what to do," along with issuing 1RR restrictions when a case has nothing to do with excessive reverting. It's similar to the way that the default response of a university administrator is to form a committee. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 04:49, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

If that is the default response of university administrators, maybe we should consider it! I agree with MastCell that establishing some rapid review procedure is a good idea. It may already exist and simply hasn't been made clear. --Abd (talk) 05:00, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Above, Abd writes I have to see the above as a rejection of an attempt to resolve a dispute, which then sets up the precondition for an RfC. . This is yet another transparent hint/threat of process and bad outcomes against someone speaking out against his behavior. It should not be tolerated. He seems not to understand that saying such things to those you are in dispute with is not appropriate, perhaps he doesn't even understand his own true motivation for writing it. Perhaps he thinks it is "good natured" advice?? Whatever the reason, such insensitivity (to put it kindly) is worse than any incivility, and he clearly shows no signs of stopping. He has already and recently upset a valuable and well meaning editor, ChrohnieGal, with similar attempts at intimidation masquerading as advice. [24][25][26]. She was greatly affected and stressed by it, as other users have been by Abd's threats and rudely didactic posts, and he's still learnt nothing from it. Arbs, none of the proposed remedies seem to be getting the point across. He is very obviously unwilling to interact productively with a large cross section of Wikipedia users and does a lot of damage as a result. Please increase the ban length, the current sanctions over his head and all the comments in Evidence has shown no change in his behavior, or increased self awareness/awareness of others. Phil153 (talk) 13:11, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Is this for real?

Has anyone thought through the implications of Principle 6, regarding the need to avoid "reasonable but inaccurate suspicions" of coordinated editing? So, constructive editors are now guilty until proven innocent when accused of being a cabal. Maybe we should just surrender the project to Randy in Boise and be done with it. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 16:46, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Yep. As I said in the Workshop, that proposal directly conflicts with the secret of Wikipedia's success - collaborative editing. If that principle is accepted, we need to abolish WikiProjects (since they exist to facilitate "collusion") and watchlists. Talk pages too, since they're prime venues for collusion. And FAs. Can you imagine - you decide to completely re-write an article that's a FAC. All around you there's collusion going on. Oh the horror! Guettarda (talk) 17:15, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

This proposal does not seem to be related to any particular finding of fact or remedy. It would be helpful if the Arbs could explain what particular conduct that they are attempting to address with this proposed principle. I too am concerned about how this statement might be gamed. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:39, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I see the principle as a sound attempt to address the "cabal" issue. That there is an appearance of a cabal is actually not deniable, I did not invent the term as applied to the particular faction involved, it is found in media source and was routine on Wikipedia Review, and there is evidence most recently added to my Evidence page showing clear appearance and a little more, some level of conscious coordination, not in a formal sense, but as a sense of "us" vs. "them." I did not need to establish the "reality" of the cabal, it is an instinctive social phenomenon that has, in my view, resulted in long-term damage to Wikipedia, and that is not to blame the individual editors for what is, after all, simple cooperation (as with WikiProjects). What is damaging is when this cooperation becomes tribal and exclusive, as it clearly has in this case, and that is what my cabal evidence shows, I believe. Solving this problem is difficult, and beyond the ability of ArbComm at this time, in my view. But this principle begins to recognize the problem, which becomes most visible with tag-team reversion, where a series of editors make bald reverts, and where that same series of editors repeatedly does this in the same articles or family of articles. Even a single bald revert is to be avoided, but they are sometimes necessary (and not only with vandalism). We can't prohibit them, but in order to deal with the problem, we need to be able to at least recognize it. An action which is prohibited to a single editor does not become desirable, or maybe not even allowable, when it is performed collectively by a confined set of editors, each contributing a piece. Neutral editors, yes, fine.

I would prefer, myself, a deeper approach to the cabal question, that explicitly acknowledges the appearance of a cabal. I used the word "cabal" because I realized that always pussy-footing around "mutually involved and supportive exclusive faction" was, shall we say, not conducive to understanding. If a better single term had occurred to me, I'd have used it, but the meaning I gave to cabal is actually quite within standard usage, and it is only a more extreme meaning ("conscious, evil, secret plotting") that is objected to, and for which I presented no evidence, because I have seen none. --Abd (talk) 18:49, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I don't believe that "guilty until proven innocent" is at all what that principle is trying to get across - it's simply a reminder that various actions can be taken different ways, that misunderstandings can occur, and users should make sure that they are aware of their own actions such that they limit such misunderstandings. Do any of you have a suggestion as to how it can be reworded, if you feel it is too easily gamed? Hersfold non-admin^(t/a/c) 18:51, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I stand by the "guilty until proven innocent" wording. All that's needed to be in violation of this principle is for someone else to have a "reasonable suspicion." The burden of proof is on the accursed to show that not only were they not acting as a cabal, but that they could not "reasonably" have even been suspected of acting as a cabal. (Let's not even get started on what "reasonable" means...) Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 20:57, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Given that Abd has already chimed in above to use this principle to claim vindication for his unsubstantiated (per FOF #12) cabal allegations, I think it would be best to scrap the principle entirely. Raul654 (talk) 18:55, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

The man who insists that 2+2=5 will suspect that everyone who says that 2+2=4 is in a cabal against him. And, just as he knows that 2+2=5, he will know that his suspicions are reasonable. This principle, if passed, would put real teeth into his suspicions. (After all, his opinion about which suspicions are reasonable is at least as valid as anyone else's opinion, isn't it?) Thus this principle would tend to work to the advantage of POV pushers who are outnumbered. Also, if those who disagree with him do adjust their behavior to avoid the appearance of coordinated editing with others who agree with them, then they will have just coordinated their editing. So, any attempt to obey this part of principle 6 would be a violation of it. So, no, it is not a good idea. Cardamon (talk) 20:13, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

This finding is probably not helpful for the reasons Cardamon points out. Everyone considers his or her own suspicions "reasonable", so such a finding will not deter inappropriate accusations. I do think that Abd's employment of these proposed findings, in the face of a proposal specifically branding his allegations as unreasonable, may be useful context in drafting the decision. MastCell ^Talk 21:34, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Let me point out that Flo and Bain have voted THE SAME WAY on SEVERAL PROPOSALS. They are also KNOWN to use BACK CHANNELS of communication. Block them now, I say! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:52, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

But these issues are far more nuanced than 2+2=4. Determining the weight of a particular source is complicated and inherently swayed by each individual's POV. I would even suggest that those who believe their opinion is as straightforward as 2+2=4 are the root of the problem, because they are never going to reach consensus on something as fuzzy as reliability of sources when they believe their own opinion is infallible. ATren (talk) 02:14, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Note that I never said that the case against cold fusion is as straightforward as the case against 2+2=5. I used 2+2=5 as an example because I wanted a simply stated, clearly wrong position that (I sincerely hope) has no supporters on Wikipedia.Cardamon (talk) 20:47, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

Except, of course, for extremely large values of 2. - Bilby (talk) 00:33, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Go to some real world trial and try to get rid of judge by pointing out that you have already appealed against his/her previous decision so you find him/her involved. You will uncover it is not easy this way. Is it because neutrality of real world judges is of less importance? Hardly, they do decide about real lives and real properties. But that is just it why judical system do not entitle parties to veto judges easily because this way you allow the unscrupulous ones to fish for their demanded judges and balance quickly disappears. Taad Laet (talk) 23:05, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

In real world courts, Taad Laet, at least in the U.S., recusal by judges because of prior cases is common. Newyorkbrad is a lawyer, perhaps he might comment on recusal, and correct me if I'm wrong. Recusal for any reason that could lead an observer to conclude that a judge is biased is normal. However, Taad's comment is off-topic here.

To return to the topic, the comments above demonstrate the "mutually involved and supportive exclusive faction." They are based on an extreme interpretation of the principle proposed, which is then rejected, it's a classic debate technique, used when one does not accept the basic purpose of some proposal, so one exaggerates it and then suggests how ludicrous it is.

"Cabal" does not establish the illegitimacy of any particular cooperation. That a group of editors cooperate to maintain Global warming, which is where this all started for me, is not illegitimate in itself. We, in fact, could use more of that, but there are certain caveats, and as long as we deny that such cooperative groups even exist, we cannot deal with the problems.

Nobody has proposed blocking or banning anyone because they are a member of a "mutually involved and supportive exclusive faction." However, it does affect our judgment of their lack of involvement, as an example. If you are an administrator, and are a close friend of an editor, and if someone, you believe, is uncivil to this friend, and you block the person, and especially if you block severely (i.e. with a disproportionate term, or with unnecessary insult as part of the block), you have quite possibly violated the purpose of recusal policy. In real life, a judge who is a friend of the victim in a case will normally recuse.

Nobody should be sanctioned for prior "cabal" behavior, nor for future "cooperation," per se. What the proposed principle does is to start to make it possible to warn administrators, in particular, for an appearance of impropriety, that they should recuse. If this principle had been previously passed, what would have happened when I and others warned JzG, long before the RfAr came to pass? What would have happened when I warned and others warned WMC about use of tools while involved, even before the JzG affair? I was neutral at first.

I proposed that it should be routine for admins to recuse upon request, and I still maintain that this is highly desirable. (Routine does not mean "without exceptions," IAR continues to apply.) It does not allow editorial misbehavior to continue unchecked, there are easy alternatives and, I keep pointing out, "recuse" is not a synonym for "unblock." It means that the admin stops touching those buttons personally, and becomes like any other involved editor, free to request administrative assistance if needed. Which, I find, when the case is clear, is very, very easy, it takes minutes at RfPP, for example. It's when the case is not clear that an admin can decide that their special knowledge is essential to understanding what is to be done with a certain editor. And that "special knowledge" is another word for "involvement." Bad idea.

If you can't convince a neutral administrator, if needed, you, possibly, should not push a block button, but it also is not a problem if no disruption results. True vandals don't cry "bias," normally, it's a total waste of time for them. And the response to a cry of "bias," where misbehavior is clear, is quite likely to be a more severe sanction from a neutral administrator. --Abd (talk) 00:25, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I would like to just make a comment about this cabal stuff which I admit is very upsetting to me. I ended up on this cabal as you can read on Abd's evidence (so he says), for iVoting in the fringe case, for supporting his and Hippicrit's ban from Cold fusion and my comment at the very beginning of this case when I didn't think that this case was needed and it should have stayed with the community. The reason though that I am on this cabal list is easy, because I supported Abd and Hippicrit's ban as an uninvolved editor. My question on Abd talk page asking about what he was talking about in regards to some mediation that failed from the start led to more conversation [27], a lot more on my talk page. That question and answer discussion went at the beginning quite well until I felt threatened by Abd for even daring to comment any more about this case to him or anyone else. The conversations there was getting strained but this comment took me by surprise "If you are going to argue that editors should be banned, and especially before ArbComm, there might be some blowback. --Abd (talk) 10:35 pm, 26 July 2009, Sunday (24 days ago) (UTC−4)" Abd boldly made comments like this to me and others as ways to itimate and it worked with me. My time at this project is spent peacefully for the most part. I try to help when I can in different things but I do vandal patrol and have a handful of articles I watch, verification of this can be seen in my contributions. I didn't know most of these editors who were named in the fake cabal. I actually started looking them all up and boy did Abd put a list of very smart and accomplished editors together, a list that I no way should be involved in. They write articles, do FAC reveiws, do so many things that I've never ever thought of doing. Also I'd like to point out that I've never touched any of the Global warming articles or the Cold fusions ones because my lack of knowledge and education tells me to stay away from there and let others more knowledgeable take care of them. Abd's screaming cabals like he has through this case and apparently now for years (seen through difs provided and doing my own reading to try to understand.) is totally WP:UNCIVIL. I seriously don't understand why anyone is taking this seriously from him. But Proposal 6 shows that some are taking it seriously and my read is that if it passes then I am in danger for doing anything now that would give any appearance of collusion because I may agree with editors. I agree that the comments about cabals needs addressing but it needs to be put away as not a serious anything. I for one do not like being associated like this and feel that if this passes I can easily have an editor wikilawyer and say 'oh look a cabal member, lets get her blocked for collusion and/or bad behavior. I will not edit in fear like this, no one should. Sorry but I had to make my say on this cabal garbage now that I know that the arbitrators are reading and listening. New York Brad, thanks for acknowledging that you do read what is written. I am having problems accessing the work page so I couldn't say so until it was sent to me via email. Please, put this cabal to bed, make it a civility problem using it or something but please don't give this ugly accusation any teeth. Thank you for your times, --CrohnieGal^Talk 11:58, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Crohnie, you deserve a response. When an editor becomes involved on one side in a highly contentious dispute, long term, the editor should not be surprised to be named as involved in some way. Just barely, less than any other, you met the minimum standard I set for describing an editor as "cabal," when I compiled the list, which simply means "generally involved on one side of an issue," in this case, rather than specifically involved, which is easier to show when true. (And it carries the implication that the involvement is with a POV or general content or behavioral position that is, if pushed, contrary to policy.) You were never at risk, and you remain not at risk of being sanctioned out of this. There is no danger from "agreement." There would never be any danger from making a comment in a discussion stating your position, as long as it is civil, even if it were blatantly "cabal." If you were to participate in tag-team reversion, there might be a danger, but I'm sure you would be warned first, and I haven't seen you do that. And the other "danger" is that a !vote from you in some process might be discounted as "involved," by a closing admin, or perhaps by ArbComm -- which is why all the cabal evidence was presented. That's all. --Abd (talk) 16:38, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Details on Crohnie involvement by Abd

There had to be at least two prior incidents showing likely prejudgment,[28][29] plus specific involvement in the present arbitration[30] (or surrounding activity, not applicable with Crohnie). Looking a little now, for signs of the kind of "tribal" affiliation that I've called "cabal," I found other expressions of support for ScienceApologist (not necessarily in a bad way), plus [31], a Keep AfD which contained a high concentration of very recognizable names, you voted last, "per Enric Naval," where the views expressed are typical of the cabal approach to pseudoscience: insistence on strong reliable source for positive information, perhaps peer-reviewed RS, but willingness to use weak sources or synthesis for negative. All that the "cabal" allegation means, in the present case, is that you should not be considered neutral or uninvolved. "Blowback" referred to a general principle, and was, in context, absolutely not a threat of any kind, since the "blowback" had already occurred: you were previously mentioned. I was explaining why that happened, not warning you about future retribution. At the time of mention, and your first protests, you were not even "accused" of being a cabal "member," you were simply listed as having participated in the AN/I community ban discussion, with an explicit disclaimer that this, by itself, proved nothing; it was only one discussion, and Short Brigade Harvester Boris, a deeply involved "cabal" editor, long term, had taken it upon himself to tell you about that, thus framing it all in a frightening way. In spite of repeated assertions on your talk page, by me, that there was no risk to you, personally, of accusations of "collusion" or any call for you to be "blocked," you repeat those fears here as if I had threatened you with this. It is, indeed, your apparent ready assumption of bad faith on my part, and your readiness to ignore offenses by "cabal" members, but seize on whatever seems to be a problem on my part, that characterizes "cabal membership." It's "us" vs. "him" or "them." I'd say that the rest of your participation in the RfAr generally -- but not in every detail -- confirms this. There are exceptions, and those point out your lack of solidarity with the cabal, I didn't see such exceptions from "hard core" cabal members, until WMC finally blew some fuses with his block of me during this case, and even then it was transient, with, eventually, me being blamed for baiting WMC into doing what came very naturally for him. Hard core members supported everything negative about me, added plenty of it themselves, and opposed every suggestion from me, no matter how reasonable. The importance of consensus in measuring level of NPOV? Abd's self-serving promise to wear us all out with walls of text and endless debate. Eh? Endless and ineffective commentary, inflicted on unwilling participants, is hardly a way to expand consensus, and any "consensus" that appeared because of editors dropping out due to "walls of text" would be not only transient, if that happened, but it doesn't happen at all. It's a myth. Editors, especially experts, drop out because of frequent reversion of their work on articles, or personal attack, not from too much commentary. --Abd (talk) 16:38, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) Abd, I am going to have to politely ask you to refactor the bad faith assumptions that you make above that can be seen and in the hide box. You are assuming bad faith in me for the last time. I didn't and I don't follow anyone. I look at difs and I also do my own work prior to coming to any conclusions, thus the long conversations we had on my talk page. Your "blowback" comment was used to intimidate me and I'm not the only editor who feels that way as can be seen on the evidence page under Phil's Evidence here titled 'Abd mentions process and hints at bad outcomes to those who oppose his positions or actions:' Most of the rest of the stuff has nothing to do with me, I didn't say most of what you have said above. I repeat, and maybe you hear me now, I am not and never have been working in concert with any other editor in a way as you above describe to. You are violating policy esp. civil then you have the nerve to tell me "(And it carries the implication that the involvement is with a POV or general content or behavioral position that is, if pushed, contrary to policy.)" I was uninvolved at the time of the ANI, I am not now for obvious reasons. I'm sorry but Abd has me angry and I will not respond to anything else he has said. Would someone, Hersfold or an arbitrator please make Abd do the right thing and refactor the above comments. Thank you in advance, --CrohnieGal^Talk 18:43, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Crohnie then went to User talk Hersfold and requested clerk intervention. I responded there. I attempted, above, to allay her fears, but obviously I did not succeed. "Pushed" in the comment she cites above refers to edit warring or use of tools, not to the mere expression of opinion. There are those who support blocking for "POV-pushing," I am not one of them. --Abd (talk) 21:47, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I have no idea what you are talking about in this statement. "Pushed" in the comment she cites above refers to edit warring or use of tools, not to the mere expression of opinion. There are those who support blocking for "POV-pushing," I am not one of them. Also, please leave my edit alone, thank you. Yes I went to Hersfold, and no it's not me assuming bad faith, though I guess now maybe I am. My apologies to everyone, --CrohnieGal^Talk 22:11, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

explanation of not "leaving" Crohnie's edit "alone." by Abd

Well, your edit, Crohnie, had a missing close bracket in a URL, which then causes the next link after it to be broken. It took me some time to figure out why my link wasn't working. Probably your edit previously caused another link down the page, placed before your edit, to be broken. I suppose I could have simply started my edit with a close bracket, leaving the entire remainder of your post as link text; instead, I did insert the close bracket and the word "Evidence," hopefully improving your edit in appearance. Did it not? If you disagree, you are welcome to fix it, obviously, it was done thinking you might appreciate it. Fools rush in, apparently, assuming good faith and expecting the same in return. Tell you what I'll do. I will, after saving this, do a self-reverted pair of edits, making it the way I could have fixed it without touching your text, then I'll bring it back the way it is now. Anyone who prefers it to be without my unwanted helpful edit may simply revert that, I consent to that, and I won't touch it, and, in the future, I will avoid such actions. Otherwise I will assume that it was proper. Normally, I would not dare to touch your writing, but where text causes damage because of formatting errors, it's an exception. That's why we have WP:IAR. Other editors have fixed my formatting errors in this case, and, far from complaining about it, I thanked them, no matter how hostile they may have been in other ways. Please, Crohnie, your assumption that everything is poison is damaging you. --Abd (talk) 23:01, 19 August 2009 (UTC) Actually, I was wrong. There appears to be a bug in the softare, or at least I could not find a way to close out Crohnie's URL without placing a close bracket immediately after it. Every link down the rest of the section was damaged, and later close brackets, after her edit, were ignored. I could have simply placed the bracket without the word "Evidence" but then her text wouldn't read properly. I'll continue to try just for fun, but I don't think it's important at all, which is why this is placed in collapse! --Abd (talk) 23:18, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I assume from the context above that you mean "intimidate" and not "intimate". Having read both your original statement and Abd's explanation of his actions, and given that Abd has been perfectly clear about his methodology in this case (and that you have been previously made aware of it, [32] and [33]) I am sorry but there is absolutely nothing that should be considered intimidating in his comments. Offering cogent explanations of one's position and clearly attempting to allay one's fears is not the typical style of one who wishes to intimidate anyone. Quite to the contrary, in fact. Continuing to persist in the claim of his having bad faith intentions is ridiculous, IMHO, and that itself borders on a show of bad faith, also IMHO. This is all especially true given your own accusations/implications toward others, [34]. --GoRight (talk) 22:35, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Another comment from the Abd cabal? Hal peridol (talk) 01:32, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Watch out, you can be blocked for making unsubstantiated accusations of cabalism. Trust me, I know. --GoRight (talk) 01:54, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

If I might interrupt this lovefest for a brief return to the original point, the principle in question looks set to pass unanimously. What on earth are these guys thinking??? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:48, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

To be honest, I am sort of curious as to why you even consider this to be an issue. It looks like a slap on the wrist to both sides to me. The admin part is boilerplate don't use your tools while involved ... or just as importantly don't even APPEAR to be using your tools while involved, and the second part is don't make yourself look like a meat puppet. What's to complain about? Or am I looking at the wrong Principle 6 here? --GoRight (talk) 02:03, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps people are hanging their hat on the word "reasonable". If coupled with the proposed finding that Abd's cabalism accusations are unreasonable, then perhaps this makes sense, although this finding will likely be cited as vindication by Abd regardless of any accompanying disavowal of his cabalism "evidence". Interestingly, there are several more substantial examples in this case of users "repeatedly editing in apparent coordination with other editors". But either those are obvious to other "reasonable" observers, or they're not; in the latter case, it's not worth harping on. MastCell ^Talk 17:23, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Concern regarding "Bans" finding

I'm concerned about Stephen Bain's endorsement of the proposed finding on bans, which reads:

Policy as it stands does not authorise administrators to impose bans by themselves, absent available discretionary sanctions. Wikipedia policy need not be written - the description follows the accepted practice - but there needs to be some actual indication that a practice is indeed widely accepted and utilised before it can be considered policy. For example, one would expect to see substantial evidence of the practice being used and supported, or well-received efforts to document the practice. In this case there has been no indication shown that there is such a widely accepted and utilised practice.

At the outset of this case, when the issue of administrative authority to impose such bans was under discussion, Thatcher, Shell Kinney, and myself all clearly indicated that we had used this approach, and that it had been an effective and relatively drama-less part of our admin toolbox (discussion). Without being overly self-congratulatory, I think it is fair to say that the 3 of us are administrators with generally positive records and experience in addressing and resolving difficult disputes. I am therefore at a loss to understand the assertion that "there has been no indication shown that there is such a widely accepted and utilised practice."

Part of me thinks that it might have been useful for the drafter to contact or poll at least a handful of sysops who work at administering difficult on-wiki disputes, to see how widespread this practice really is. On the other hand, I'm to blame since I didn't submit any formal evidence documenting the ongoing and successful use of this practice. I will plead only 2 mitigating factors: 1) it did not occur to me that ArbCom would seriously entertain the idea of unilaterally overturning an active and previously undisputed standard practice, and 2) the evolution of this case depressed me to the extent that I couldn't muster the will to post any evidence. If the description does in fact follow the accepted practice, then I don't see how this finding is tenable. MastCell ^Talk 22:12, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I'd have to say that this finding disappointed me the most, though I was surprised by many of the workshop motions that were carried over. Bainer's initial proposals seemed completely out of touch and I don't see that's been tempered much by the copious feedback received at the Workshop. As MastCell points out, there were several assertions during discussion on this case that administrative page or topic banning was a widespread and accepted practice. I'd posit that whomever proposed the finding didn't put much effort into investigation. General sanctions don't yet exist for every contentious area on Wikipedia and they shouldn't need to - clueful admins with a mind to help out in difficult areas can re-purpose sanctions already determined by ArbCom to help in similar situations. These bans, unlike ArbCom sanctions, are open to simple community review as happened in this case - more importantly, the community absolutely upheld this ban. Perhaps best illustrating this point is the fact that not a single person commenting during the community review batted an eyelash - if these bans were unique or untested, surely someone would have noticed? Its telling that the only participants contesting the ability of an admin to ban are the banned user and two others who support him so blindly that they are unable to see any fault in any of his actions - this is not a solid foundation for a FOF.

Second to this is a swath of findings/sanctions that seem to put disruption of ArbCom over disruption of the encyclopedia. Sorry guys, we all love you, but you're taking yourself too seriously if you're ready to admonish people over a single case of edit warring simply because it occurred on these hallowed pages. That you let the case get away from you in such a manner should prompt consideration of how the system is failing heated disputes such as this. Put down the stick and back away from the horse - we get that you were properly shocked that, left completely on their own, personal disputes simply fester. Lets use that energy to talk about how to prevent a repeat occurrence instead. Shell ^babelfish 23:18, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

MastCell, could you (and others) give examples of what happened when page or topic bans imposed by admins were contested? Was an independent review of the page or topic ban carried out if requested, and what has the standard of discussion and evidence presentation been like? i.e. How formal or informal were such bans? Carcharoth (talk) 23:23, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Oy. Now you're asking me to do work instead of just talking. :) It has been months and perhaps even a year since I've undertaken anything beyond an occasional half-hearted administrative action. But let's see what's in the archive... TStolper1W (talk · contribs), an editor with a conflict of interest having issues at Randell Mills (curiously, I notice in retrospect the overlap with cold fusion...) back in 2007 when I was more active. Randell Mills is now a redirect, so take a look at the relevant page history. The following is reconstructed from what I can find on-wiki, since my memory of past events is worse than Alberto Gonzalez's.

• Taken to WP:AN/I by another editor here. Little or no response (except for me). I notice that the situation has previously been brought to AN/I, but no one seemed to care about it (here). I look over the situation and decide that while a block might be warranted, I'd prefer to start with an article ban and allow talk page edits (see User talk:TStolper1W#Notice).
• Subsequently, the editor takes up the same cause at hydrino theory (also now a redirect). After some aimless discussion at WP:COIN (can't find link), I impose 1RR on hydrino theory here. Not sure where things went after that.

Sorry, I think there are better cases in my archives, but I'm not up for digging right now. I think this is a reasonable example, though - an editor with a conflict of interest and a previous block for edit-warring and abusing Wikipedia to promote his claims. Multiple requests for outside eyes at AN/I were essentially ignored (here, here, here). I thought these were reasonable approaches (restriction to talk page, 1RR) that stopped short of a block. Maybe Shell or Thatcher have better examples handy. OK, you can desysop me now. :) MastCell ^Talk 00:27, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

If I may, let me make one small distinction here. In your example, MastCell, you are citing explicit policies and specific violations of those policies as being the basis for the bans you issued. This seems perfectly reasonable. As far as I can tell no such reasonable counterpart exists in the case of the WMC ban of H and Abd. WMC merely declared a ban to be in place and deflected queries regarding the basis of his declaration. This make his ban clearly distinct from the type of thing you are mentioning here. --GoRight (talk) 06:07, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

But that's exactly my point. The proposed finding does not make the distinction you propose. I'm not defending WMC's action; I'm concerned about the overall effect of this finding going forward. It would outlaw any administrative page or topic ban. MastCell ^Talk 20:24, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I was quite surprised to see this interpretation by Stephen Bain. I ran for arbcom with the platform that admins would do more sanctions and relieve ArbCom from needing to do as many cases. In my opinion 3 years ago, they were being used well by admins and we needed to encourage more admins to wade into these situations and do them. The point of us (ArbCom) doing "discretionary sanctions" was not to authorize admins to give editing restrictions, but to point out the areas of Wikipedia where admins were needed to step in more often. I see no reason that a Community discussion needs to happen to make an admin's editing restrictions against an user valid. In any case, I feel that we are overstepping our role by binding the Community to stick to a narrow rigid interpretation of policy. FloNight♥♥♥ 00:47, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Examples of topic bans

1. Here is a discussion that led to the imposition of a 3 month topic ban, here is a discussion one month later where the banned editor asks for the ban to be lifted.
2. A community ban from DYK (first discussion, second discussion), The most important underlying problems were concern about plagiarism and writing articles that just weren't right. The intent of topic banning her from DYK was to get her to slow down and do a better job herself, instead of depending on the rest of the community to repair her articles to an acceptable standard after the page has already been on the main page. Lifted upon improved behavior (warning, loooonnnnggg discussion, interesting list of participants).
3. Topic bans reimposed by the community after Arbcom topic bans had expired.
4. Topic ban proposal that failed after discussion. Note that there is no objection to the idea of a community-imposed topic ban assuming it had been supported by evidence.
5. Topic ban Reviewed and endorsed, you can follow the links posted at the review back to the original ban.

It appears to be more usual that topic bans are proposed and discussed on the admin noticeboards before being enacted by a closing admin, although that may be an artifact of my search method. I do not have any problem with an admin applying a ban first and then bringing it to the noticeboard for review. As I said on the Evidence talk page,

“ The correct course of action is to bring the ban up for discussion at the admins' noticeboard, and there is no need to edit to edit the article--no need not to respect the ban--during the discussion. If there is consensus for the ban, then so be it. If there is no consensus, then editor B can edit the article sure in the knowledge that another admin will unblock him if Admin A fails to respect the outcome of the discussion (and there will be no shortage of admins to contact based on that discussion, if there truly was no consensus to ban). Admin A's conduct could then come under scrutiny for acting without community consensus...Finally, I submit as an axiom that any editor who can not stop editing an article for 48 hours while a ban is discussed deserves the ban. ”

Thatcher 17:11, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

While I agree that an inability to postpone editing for 48 hours normally shows a problem, that is hardly proof that an editor "deserves a ban." Nevertheless, in our present case we aren't talking about 48 hours, we are talking about an ultimately indef ban as was declared by WMC. There are lost steps in much of this discussion. I've agreed that an admin may "declare a ban," but simply claim that this declaration does not create any right to block that did not already exist without the ban (assuming a warning, and admins may block without warning, it is merely discouraged). To say, generically, that there is "no need to edit the article" is to deny that need ever exists, because if need exists, it must exist at a time, and that time might come during the supposed effective time of the ban. So an admin may do as Thatcher describes, that's not being denied, but should the editor make a harmless correction, as an example, during the discussion at the noticeboard, and the same admin blocks, that is a block for defiance, not a block for actual disruption, and that's punitive and shows involvement by the admin. Rather, the admin would properly bring the edit, if concerned about it, to the discussion for review and possible block by a neutral admin. By asking the community to support a declared ban, the admin is no longer strictly neutral but is asking for support of a prior action. What Thatcher reports, that it is much more common for a ban to be discussed first before being declared by a neutral closing admin, based on evidence and arguments, matches my experience.

In the present case, there was no emergency. There was a problem with the article being protected in a damaged state, but Hipocrite and I had already agreed to a voluntary page ban on the article, pending, in order to facilitate fixing the article, it could simply have been unprotected so it could be fixed by others. If WMC had asked me to abstain from editing the Talk page as well for a few days, or had gone to AN/I to request a ban, I'd have either abstained from editing entirely, or would have confined myself to a notice as to what was happening. WMC, by using a sledgehammer, a "month or whenever I feel like it" ban, to resolve a fairly simple problem, made it all worse, and, by continuing to insist upon his right to remain in the position of ban administrator, created this case. Note that if he had gone to AN/I, say, and asked for a ban, he might have gotten it, because of the phenomena I've described, I'd have probably appealed to ArbComm but the appeal would have been of my ban, and would have included no charges of admin abuse by WMC, his situation would have been like that of the rest of the "cabal," I might have claimed "involvement," but only as needed to follow WP:BAN, i.e., "consensus of uninvolved editors." There were very simple ways to have dealt with whatever legitimate problem existed, but they were not chosen, and requests to take one of those paths were ignored. If we leave it ambiguous about the declaration of "bans" by administrators, we will encourage other admins to fall into this same trap. I'm not out to punish WMC, I am much more concerned about future incidents that don't involve me at all. It's even possible that by continuing to offer my opinions here, I will sufficiently irritate some arbitrators to increase the risk of a ban decision for me, but I have to take that risk. I do follow IAR, which requires me to place the welfare of the project above my personal editing "career". --Abd (talk) 22:20, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I really hope the Arbitrators are reading every word you write, abd, because there are some things you just don't get. If Admin A bans editor B from editing an article, and editor B edits the article, that is a violation of the ban and is absolutely blockable by any admin including Admin A. Period end of sentence. There are no exceptions for "minor", "helpful", or self-reverted edits. Partly because "minor" and "helpful" are often in the eye of the beholder, and partly because boundary testing by banned editors is simply not tolerated. Your argument is not grounded in any serious interpretation of any policy or practice. Topic bans imposed by Arbcom are not subject to this special "minor helpful edit rule"; editors whose accounts are blocked are not allowed to make minor helpful edits. Why do you think this rule uniquely implies to admin-imposed page bans? As a matter of course, blocks and bans are enforced at the admin's discretion, a block might not be placed for various reasons even if there is a clear violation. But if it looks like an editor is gaming the system, or testing boundaries, even by making helpful edits, then a ban is appropriate.

The other thing I have to object to is your characterization of WMC's page ban as "month or whenever I feel like it". The wording is, after all, available to every one. The solution which will please no-one is: User:Hipocrite and User:Abd are both banned from editing cold fusion, and its talk page, for an arbitrary time of approximately one month, during which time we'll see if a stable version developes. There are at least two specific durations listed there, one month and when (and if) a stable version develops. Had you not appealed to the noticeboard, you could have contacted WMC after a month and asked him to lift the ban. If the article stabilized beforehand, you could ask then. Since you appealed to the noticeboard, the ban was confirmed for a month duration. Why is this confusing? Thatcher 22:49, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd didn't appeal. Enric Naval took the ban to the noticeboard to get community review. Admittedly, Abd was the second person to reply to Enric Naval's post at ANI, but the point stands that when a big step like that is taken, it should be the banned person making the appeal or request for review, not someone doing it on their behalf. Carcharoth (talk) 23:57, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Let's remember here that Abd announced beforehand that he was going to defy his ban to force WMC to block him, so it was clear that he wasn't going to take that step, he was just going to plunge forward. --Enric Naval (talk) 02:08, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

@Thatcher: WMC's original wording made it appear as though 1 month was the target, but his subsequent comments and actions have made it clear that he considers the ban to be indefinite until he decides it is over, which I suspect will be never. WMC stated somewhere that it was indefinite and his supporters have pointed this out. Indeed the month is long past and WMC still asserts that the ban is in place. So no, there was no clear statement of one month OTHER than in the close of the AN/I discussion. --GoRight (talk) 06:10, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Thatcher, thanks for those examples. That is helpful. To pick up on one point here that I think is important, you say: "I do not have any problem with an admin applying a ban first and then bringing it to the noticeboard for review." That sounds too much to me like an admin carrying out an action and then going to a noticeboard for validation or rubber-stamping of their decision (especially if that noticeboard is AN or ANI). The correct action would be for the admin carrying out the banning action (whether page ban or topic ban) to inform the editor so-banned to, in the first instance, talk to them (the admin) about the ban if they have any questions or objections, and to let the editor so-banned know where to appeal. That gives the editor who is page-banned or topic-banned the opportunity to make their own appeal in their own time, rather than letting the admin (or other editors) present the appeal in the form of an "endorsement".

Sure, both editor and admin might describe the circumstances differently, but consider the situation where an admin turns up at a noticeboard and presents such a ban for community endorsement (maybe while the editor so-banned is not around). There is a very real chance that there will be pile-on supports before the editor who is banned has had a chance to say anything. This is similar in some ways to admins who carry out a controversial block, and then immediately start an ANI thread to (take your pick) defend the block/pre-empt someone else starting the thread/allow a genuinely independent review.

If an admin feels their actions are solidly based in policy, there should be no need to start a noticeboard thread to get their actions endorsed. They should be prepared to wait for any appeal or objections, and defend their actions at that point, rather than trying to pre-empt things by turning it into a community topic or page ban.

Compare the situation of a page or topic ban to that of a block. We have the {{unblock}} template that in theory attracts an uninvolved admin to review the block. Now imagine the blocking admin placing the 'unblock' template on ANI and asking the community to endorse the block. That is what you are proposing be done with admin-placed page and topic bans. As I've said, that is not ideal. What is needed is to allow a page-banned or topic-banned editor the time and space to make their own appeal, and for the banning admin to take responsibility for the ban (and the consequences if the ban was inappropriate), rather than asking the community to endorse the decision (that is a waste of time for the community until the banned editor is ready to appeal).

In other words, the culture of asking noticeboards to endorse decisions made by individual admins undermines the responsibility individual admins need to take for their actions. Carcharoth (talk) 23:51, 19 August 2009 (UTC) More in next post...

Interesting argument about endorsement vs appeal, I had never thought of it that way. Thatcher 00:24, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Never ever? What about the point that admins should stand by their actions and only defend them when objections are made, rather than asking for community review and endorsement? Can you imagine an admin turning up at a noticeboard and saying "I've banned editor Jones from this page, and they've objected. I've told them they are free to appeal to this noticeboard. Before I present my case for the ban, I will let editor Jones have his say first. Once we've both had our say, could the subset of the community who is present at this noticeboard please discuss the page ban and either endorse it or reject it. I suggest allowing at least 48 hours for the discussion (timed from the point where we've both had our say) to ensure a wide range of editors see the discussion, and an uninvolved admin can then close the discussion and enact the result. Oh, and if you participated in the previous discussions on the talk page, have heavily edited the page in question, or have any past history with either of us, please state that so the closing admin can take that into account." Does that sort of thing happen often? [That's a rhetorical question.] The last bit, about people disclosing their prior participation and history with the parties, is too idealistic, of course, but you can hope. Or an admin being told they are going to be "taken to ANI" following a controversial but necessary block replying "sure, no problem, just make sure to leave a link to the discussion on my talk page so I can give my version of what happened", as opposed to the pre-emptive "I've blocked you, and I've started an ANI discussion about it here". Carcharoth (talk) 00:46, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Oh, I do recall blocking someone for revert warring and being harrangued, "don't you know that when you block an established editor you are supposed to post it for review?" But I suspect that was a special case. Best not to go into it. :) Thatcher 00:59, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Following on from my 23:51 19 August 2009 post above, there is an alternative approach, which is that of imposing a temporary page or topic ban until there has been a community review. But that still runs up against the problem of admins (or editors on the 'other side') presenting the case for the ban first and (even with the best of intentions and efforts to be objective) skewing the result their way (this 'first mover advantage' is seen in RfCs as well, where the first view posted often gains disproportionate support compared to later options). In my view, the only real way around this is to either: (a) wait for the banned editor to submit their own appeal (there is a certain logic to this, since as the restricted party, it seems fair that they get to present their case first, and also because in a review by the community, some will be more willing to wait to hear what the banning admin has to say, than they would be to wait for an allegedly disruptive editor to answer allegations made by an admin); or (b) arrange for the banning admin and the banned editor to prepare their arguments and present them together (or, more practically, to hold off from discussion and any expression of support or opposition, until both sides have presented their case for or against the ban). This might seem incredibly bureaucratic, but it is standard practice in many places on and off Wikipedia to let the main parties to a decision have their say before commenting for or against that decision. Some of these points were being made by Abd, but they rather got lost in the noise, I fear. Carcharoth (talk) 00:02, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

If you look at these two discussions [35][36], Abd was nagging WMC while refusing to bring the matter to either Arbcom or ANI, and then he announced that he was going to defy his ban, so I had to drag him to ANI before he made some POINTy disruptive edit. I had the same problem with JzG's RfC, I had to nominate his draft for deletion, ask that he was given a 30 day ultimatum, and then having to remind him to fill the RfC after those 30 days. Lesson learnt, next time I'll let him defy his ban and get himself blocked. --Enric Naval (talk) 02:01, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

This is so remarkable I'll interject this: Enric nominated that file for deletion? Take a look and see who nominated it. That editor hasn't edited since the beginning of May, except for one odd edit Aug 8 to Cars-R-Coffins. Or is he still editing? Doesn't matter, really, but that was one weird comment. That was not a draft RfC, it was evidence that had been presented to ArbComm already, in the RfAr/Clarification filed by JzG, and it had some impact. Sure, the eventual RfC used much of the same evidence, but it required a lot more work. I'm a volunteer, I can only do what I can do. Enric created an AN/I report, one guaranteed to be disruptive, to avoid a minor alleged POINT violation? Editing a page properly isn't a point violation, that's a total misunderstanding of WP:POINT. --Abd (talk) 03:45, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

@Enric: "... so I had to drag him to ANI ..." - No, you didn't have to drag him there. In fact your opening of that thread was totally premature and disruptive. WMC had declared a ban, Abd had denied the ban, neither had taken any action. Without having taken any action (i.e. Abd editing the page or WMC blocking Abd) there was really nothing to discuss. It was totally disruptive on your part, IMHO. --GoRight (talk) 06:32, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

P.D.: I think, Carcharoth, that you don't realize until what point all this mess is Abd's exclusive fault. --Enric Naval (talk) 02:11, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Carcharoth, by the way, is writing what I'd write if I had the skill.

Consider what would have happened if Enric had not gone to AN/I, and I assure the Committee that he did not do so to protect me. He had already declared that I should be banned, long before. I would have eventually edited Talk, probably. Likely WMC would have blocked me. I would have put up an unblock template with careful evidence, but the primary evidence would have been that the edit I was blocked for was not disruptive, because you can be damn sure that I'd have been extraordinarily cautious, as I was when I edited Talk during this case. I'd say, 90%, I'd have been unblocked promptly (as I was during this case without even requesting it). And the ban would have been history, if WMC had blocked me again, it would have been open and shut to ArbComm, very simple case. If he didn't block me again, no ArbComm case, far, far less disruption. It got vastly more complex because Enric took it to AN/I. There was no actual disruption at the time, just my notice to WMC that I was withdrawing my voluntary cooperation. Two editors in dispute. My being blocked for a harmless edit is very little disruption, and I was willing to allow that in order to quickly resolve the dispute. If the matter went to AN/I, it probably wouldn't have been me to take it there. I would not have taken WMC to ArbComm over a now-moot violation of recusal policy against me, personally. Somebody else took my first WMC block to AN/I, the block where I was truly surprised to be blocked, because of strong precedent I had observed, which also caused damage to a completely different editor, PJHaseldine (who had been making self-reverted edits while under a community ban, and it had been working, there had arisen cooperation between him and an editor who had sought for him to be banned.) The pile-in at AN/I in that other discussion led to the conclusion that any edit was a ban violation, even self-reverted edits, which in the case of the other editor was preposterous, it was thinking like this that WMC previously called "stupid." He'd been right. I did not put up an unblock template for that block, because there was a community ban, which would have been very difficult to challenge at that point, and the block was only for 24 hours. Challenging blocks on the basis that an admin is biased is a formula for rapid denial of the request. Maybe I'd have gotten a sympathetic response, based on the harmlessness, but with a community ban, that would be more difficult, and for 24 hours, it wasn't worth the work and the risk. --Abd (talk) 03:29, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I totally agree, which is why I claim that Enric was being needlessly disruptive by taking a dispute in which he was not even involved to AN/I. --GoRight (talk) 06:32, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

← I'm a little concerned by the talk of "first mover advantage" and by the idea that asking for noticeboard review is somehow a strategic ploy. I can only speak for myself, but I find these sorts of community review essential as a sanity check. I have regularly submitted my actions to WP:AN or WP:AN/I for review, not out of a desire to get "the first word" in, but out of a desire to see if people think I've acted reasonably.

Most applications of administrative tools are gray areas; this place is notorious for inducing a loss of perspective; and I genuinely want to know if I'm imposing sanctions that the community disagrees with. Under those circumstances, I find it extremely useful to submit actions for review on the noticeboards. If the "first mover advantage" is as substantial as Carcharoth supposes, then we have a problem with our noticeboard culture. But the solution is not to discourage one of the only avenues open to admins to get a sanity check on their actions.

I see Carcharoth's point that it may be preferable to submit proposed actions rather than present a fait accompli for endorsement. As a counterpoint, noticeboard discussions tend as often as not to bog down in back-and-forth between involved parties and to reach no clear conclusion. In those cases, I believe that the outcome should default to the administrator's judgment. After all, admins are theoretically selected on the basis of trust in their judgment. In a case where there is truly no clear consensus or compelling argument either way, it seems logical to defer to that judgment. MastCell ^Talk 17:36, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Findings regarding recusal

While I'm not comfortable with a few of the proposals, I guess it depends on what direction the votes go. But I'd like to suggest that a finding for or against (obviously, I lean towards against) the claim that WMC was involved prior to banning Abd would be wise. As I see it, the case was brought on three questions:

• Is an admin permited to topic ban a user?
• Should WMC have recused based on prior involvement with Abd?
• Did Abd warrant being topic/page banned?

In the end these issues seem to have been largely dropped in favour of WMC's behaviour during the case and his behaviour in the past, (an approach I'm uncomfortable with), but currently there are two proposals tackling the first issue, there are some that tackle the third, yet the only proposal which tackles the second is Allegations of a cabal. My concern is that a finding in relation to WMC's behaviour in the case will be read as supporting the claim that he was involved prior to the case, and this is likely to prove problematic. - Bilby (talk) 00:25, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, there are lots of reasons to consider WMC as involved. Certainly he wasn't involved in the article, directly and defenses of him based on his not having edited the article for a long time missed the point. My claim of involvement centered upon two pillars: one was personal dispute in the past, mostly over his use of tools while involved and his long prediction of and support for a ban of me, as most clearly manifest during Wikipedia:Requests for comment/JzG 3. He wasn't "neutral." He may be asserted to be "content neutral," but that then takes us to the second pillar, the cabal. The cabal was defined based on content positions, as to general principles. In the actions he took with respect to cold fusion and me, he was supporting cabal editors, as they have supported him whenever his prior actions-while-involved were questioned. "Cabal" simply refers to habitual support that reflects a bias, a preference for the positions of friends and an identification of others as "outsiders," them, not "us." Absolutely, I'd like it for ArbComm to address this issue, but it is a complex one; my plan had been to present specific proposals, but it became personally impossible for me, I was overwhelmed. I'm content to have been able to raise the issue without being immediately banned!

To answer the questions posed by Bilby, my views:

Strictly, no, an administrator has no right to block an editor for a nondisruptive edit, and there is only one exception: bans. An administrator cannot create such a ban, alone, and then strictly enforce it by blocking for a nondisruptive edit. Administrators may block for ban violations, but only for bans where they are not involved, where there has been community or ArbComm process establishing the ban. Discretionary sanctions are a subcategory, but WMC did not depend on any discretionary sanction, and no such sanction existed. (I approve of the establishment of discretionary sanctions for Cold fusion. It's about time, actually.) An administrator may, however, say, "I'm banning you from the topic," but this is really only a strong warning that the admin considers all edits to the topic, or nearly all, to have been disruptive; however, the misbehavior should eventually be specified, and, hopefully, addressable by the editor. It is this kind of ban which has been considered common practice, and I'm pointing out, it's an error to treat this the same as the other kinds of bans.

Were it not for the enforcement problem, we would not block for nondisruptive edits even if they did violate a strict ban, because this would be, clearly, punishment for past misbehavior. But because we ban to avoid problems, and we don't want to have to consider each edit, it is impractical to require specific nondisruptiveness for true ban violations, because we want such bans to be community enforced, by neutral administrators. Thus we do allow (but we don't require!) that admins block for harmless edits under ban. In fact, blocks by neutral administrators for such edits seem to be rather unusual. While it is possible I would have been blocked for the edit to Cold fusion that WMC blocked me for, it is probably unlikely that a neutral administrator would have made that decision. I might have been warned not to repeat it. Or not even that. I didn't see any administrator warning ScienceApologist for making spelling corrections, only his friend, Hipocrite, and he certainly wasn't blocked for those edits, he was eventually blocked for clear expression of disruptive intention.

Yes, WMC should have recused. His edit under protection was an improvement over the version as protected, and that, alone, would not have been a problem. However, his ban of me was based on his very strong prior opinion about "walls of text" and my alleged meddling in policy; I'll note that he specifically suggested I stay away from policy for a month and maybe, then, he would consider lifting the page ban. Page bans by specific administrators are problematic if maintained for any substantial time, they create involvement and a coercive relationship, it's a formula for recusal failure. WMC was attempting to coerce me, to keep me away from policy by holding forth the carrot of being able to return to my favorite topic if I "behaved." I don't know what he was thinking. Recusal policy is more important to me than any particular article, I am not an SPA, I merely focused recently on a topic where I became particularly qualified, semi-expert.

I have yet to see any evidence that I did anything at Cold fusion that warranted being page-banned. Certainly WMC did not present such evidence at the time, even when asked by another editor, and that's in my Evidence. Nor was a bannable offense cited in the AN/I discussion that community-banned me. I have been unable to understand FloNight's proposed findings; perhaps my mentor will explain it to me, if they pass and I'm still around for it to matter!

Bainer has it more accurately. Definitely, my style is a problem for some people, that is undeniable. Whose fault that is does not really matter. (I also support the principle about good faith not being a reason to not sanction. There could be rank incompetence, for example, and the welfare of the project require even a site ban.) If I want to work for consensus, and I do, then problems with my style must be addressed. It's unclear to me that a page ban, or any ban, will accomplish this. However, please note, if I were allowed to make self-reverted edits, if these edits were explicitly declared to not violate my ban, and that any registered and responsible editor could revert them in, taking responsibility for their appropriateness, I could handle any ban and still do my work. And it would address all those complaints about my long posts and claims that nobody reads them but they drive "experts" away (I doubt it!). However, I still wouldn't, based on evidence presented, understand the ban, in comparison to how other editors are treated, and sanctions against me for pursuing what was my right, ArbComm consideration of administrative recusal failure, could be chilling to others who see such abuse. Indeed, I encountered, during this process, an editor who told me, by email, that I was right, but he wouldn't be presenting evidence because he expected there would be retaliation, he didn't want to end his wikicareer.

The original case was filed based on recusal failure. It was not filed as a ban appeal; at the time of filing, I had no reason to doubt that the community ban had expired, so there was only WMC's allegedly involved ban, so determining recusal failure would address that, or alternatively, the same would be accomplished by holding that administrators cannot unilaterally ban, i.e., threaten to block an editor for a nondisruptive edit. --Abd (talk) 01:25, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

This is why I believe a finding on whether or not WMC was involved prior to the ban is worth adding. Clarity would be valuable. Every issue raised above has been addressed in the proposals bar this one. Personally, I stand by my belief that insufficient evidence was presented to show prior involvement by WMC, but that is for ArbCom to decide now. - Bilby (talk) 01:42, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

The above is the reason why currently suggested remedies for Abd are insufficient. It's the classical WoT, with the same classical Cabal allegations, the same wikilawyering, and the same waste of everybody's time as before. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:11, 19 August 2009 (UTC) (for the Cabal)

Thanks, Stephan, you make my point, efficiently. This is the edit summary for the comment above: "TLDR".[37] If he did not read it, how can he confidently describe the contents? This kind of knee-jerk assumption and repetitive, automatic response, is exactly what a "tribal affiliation" generates. Multiply this by a dozen editors piling in to a discussion, you get serious participation bias, and repeat it over many incidents, "cabal effects." Without any specific "collaboration," but the effect just as if there were. --Abd (talk) 11:40, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

What this shows is that you are incapable or unwilling to recognize sarcasm (or, to be fair, that my sarcasm is too obscure). It also shows that you are prone to jump to wrong conclusions and overgeneralizations. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:13, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Unlike anyone else? What was the sarcasm, the TLDR or the text above? Go ahead, defend your own sarcasm, it's befitting. That has been, indeed, the norm during this case. I'm not being sarcastic. Remember, TLDR on Talk or other discussion pages is the core of the only basis that is reasonable at all for my being banned from anything. If my comment above is truly too long, then, of course I should be sanctioned. I agree with Bilby that it is up to ArbComm to decide now, but I don't agree that insufficient evidence has been presented about WMC involvement, but I do see it as possible that it has been buried in the noise. I have offered to answer questions from arbitrators, and I remain open to that, but none have been asked that I can recall. --Abd (talk) 18:50, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

You're somewhat incomprehensible. I'm not claiming you are being sarcastic. What "has been the norm during this case"? My "TLDR" comment was sarcastic and your reasoning from it faulty in assumptions and execution. I don't need to defend the occasional sarcastic comment - why should I? And no, your walls of text are not "the core of the only basis that is reasonable at all for [you] being banned from anything". What is similarly disruptive is your permanent use of veiled, semi-veiled and open innuendo and threats against nearly any editor who has a different opinion from you. May I suggest that you spend part of your energy to reflect on your behaviour towards Crohnie, retract your comments about her, and apologize profusely? Ask some people you trust if bringing her into this can possibly be justified in any way if you cannot see the absurdity of this yourself and don't trust me on this. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:10, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm getting plenty of advice from people I trust, Stephan. You, unfortunately, are not one of them. I'll still listen and consider, but .... did I bring Crohnie into this RfAr? How did she show up here? Have you reviewed the history in detail? Did I attack her and she responded? The matter of my comments is before Hersfold, and he'll decide, I assume. --Abd (talk) 02:59, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

That's why I suggest you ask somebody you do trust. Your loss. I bet. Yes. I disagree with the implied point. Sufficiently. Yes. Maybe. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:43, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

The entry of Crohnie into the RfAr: [38][39][40]. Before I ever mentioned her with [41], edit summary: (→Evidence presented by Abd: add some lists. To be refactored, many names may not ultimately be relevant.) Her name was, at that time, merely on a list of those who endorsed my ban. That's why I don't trust you, Stephan. You aren't careful enough to tell me the truth. Crohnie has apologized on my Talk, I have no beef with her. --Abd (talk) 11:31, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

If you have no beef with her, then I'm sure you won't mind striking her name from the cabal list as a gesture of your good faith. She has no business there. The statement above, "Her name was, at that time, merely on a list of those who endorsed my ban" is disingenuous at best, because the list was under a main heading "There is a cabal" and to suppose that she would have seen your edit summary, at a time when there was so much activity on the evidence page that a person would have had to be watching the page constantly to catch all the edit summaries, is to make an unreasonable assumption. At any rate, that old news seems not very pertinent to the issue at hand, which is that she is listed today on the final "cabal" list and you continue to insist on her "cabal" involvement, even with proposed findings being voted that say that you haven't provided adequate evidence to back up your accusations about other editors.

I'm personally sorry that Crohnie apologized, because I don't think she had anything to apologize for; she was upset about unsubstantiated accusations that were being made about her, and she had a right to be outraged, without apology. I can understand that she may have felt sorry about losing her cool, but the issue remains: there's no real basis for her being on that list. In the thread above, you tell her that her being placed on that list "carries the implication that the involvement is with a POV or general content or behavioral position that is, if pushed, contrary to policy" which is a strong accusation to make against anyone. I checked her contributions; she is exactly as she says, a person who reverts vandalism, so the idea that she is pushing a POV of any sort on the encyclopedia is just not tenable. The only thing that got her on that list is that she supported the page ban of Abd from cold fusion (as did I and most of the people who had participated on that talk page, although most of us didn't comment on the ban review) and that she has commented on this case. To express an opinion that Abd does not like is not against policy, and to advise someone that her expression of such an opinion implies that she is involved "with a POV or general content or behavioral position that is, if pushed, against policy" is not a collegial way to respond to someone who is simply pointing out problems with your behavior. Abd says he wants uninvolved commentary, but as soon as anyone makes a comment, he uses the comment as proof of their involvement. It's a no-win situation for people commenting in good faith, and it's no wonder that people have chosen to opt out of the process, or out of the project altogether, rather than subject themselves to the accusations and misrepresentations of fact and mushrooming verbiage that follow any good faith comment that Abd doesn't like. This is disruptive to collaborative editing and destructive to the creation of a neutral and reputable encyclopedia; this is a problem that must be dealt with to prevent further disruption and destruction to the project. Woonpton (talk) 16:12, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Sigh. Presumably the "cabal" list. That list is not a set of editors with whom I have a beef, though, to some extent, it is a list of editors who have -- or had, when contributing to this RfAr -- a beef with me. It is a set of editors who, I claim, can be considered "involved" in certain matters, even if they don't have specific article involvement. It is not reprehensible to be involved. Notice the "if pushed." (i.e., by edit warring, or possibly by uncivil and tendentious argument or the deliberate presentation of deceptive evidence, etc.) I have not seen, with Crohnie, an example of such activity. (There may be such, but I haven't seen it, and I didn't assert it.) It's like having a conflict of interest or a strong POV. It's not an offense in itself. I've repeated this over and over, ad nauseum, but it isn't heard. And I'm the one who supposedly doesn't listen? The "accusation" that Woonpton describes is one that is probably true to some degree for most active Wikipedia editors, in one place or another, in one way or another. Normally, administrators with such an involvement will recuse, and nobody even has to ask them. Some don't, and there is the problem. Further, bans require, per WP:BAN, a consensus of neutral editors. If a group of editors can be identified as always voting in the same way in similar discussions, where it is reasonable to suspect that some "tribal affliliation" is involved, a tendency to assume that one's friend, A, is right, as opposed to A's opponent, whom one does not know or dislikes, I'm claiming, there is a prejudgment or bias, and the editor is not "neutral." Not "to be disregarded," but "not neutral." Sure, it's very difficult to do this analysis, but it is necessary to start looking at this, which is why I raised the cabal issue. Crohnie was not "guilty" of anything, and her mistake, what she apologized for, was taking it all so personally. I'd tried to explain to her, many times, that she was not in any danger from that listing, but she kept asserting I was trying to intimidate her. It was very, very frustrating, but, apparently, with Hersfold's help, perhaps, she calmed down and let go of it, for which I congratulate her. I'll repeat it, I have no beef with Crohnie, and my offer to help her was sincere and stands. Anything she asks, I will consider. Watch an article for her while she is in surgery? Sure. Send her wikiflowers when she comes back? Sure. Help her research some topic? Sure. No beef means no beef. But she's still "involved" on those issues, unless she changes her position, and she certainly need not do that because of any danger from me! She never was in any such danger.

On the cabal list: at the time that Crohnie was first "mentioned," was compiling the cabal evidence, it was explicitly in process, and the evidence consisted of largely unfiltered lists of editors, with an explicit comment that not all these editors would be considered "cabal." An explicit exception was given, Beetstra, for example, who !voted to ban me during RfC/JzG 3 -- why are editors suggesting a ban of an editor who wasn't the subject of the RfC? To intimidate? Think about it! The claims I made in that RfC ended up being consensus at ArbComm. Beetstra gets excited, that's all, and has no pattern as was shown for the other editors who ended up on the cabal list. Beetstra is uninvolved, generally, though he's started to have prejudgement about me, personally, which is a personal issue, not one with a cabal, which we will presumably address directly, time permitting. If I'm site-banned, well, I probably wouldn't bother! I have every confidence, though, that Beetstra and I can work it out. I've been very successful with this with editors who were pretty upset with me, but one at a time, and not WMC, though maybe I didn't try hard enough. What I've tried with Raul654, pursued diligently, might have worked with WMC. I'm still learning how to do this. With Raul, well, it's not over yet. He seems totally intransigent, but there are tricks up my sleeve to move around that, I don't know how deep his opinions go. What do you think, Woonpton? Note that my effort is not to convince an editor that I'm right. Consensus doesn't work like that. It is to come to an agreement that resolves a dispute, so that both sides win. I know how to do it without requiring the other editor to read my famous walls of text. We'll need help, and that's what I'll be working on finding. Any volunteers? --Abd (talk) 17:40, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Content dispute?

I noticed Stephen Bain wrote Blocking a user you are edit warring with so as to 'win' the content dispute is a large error in judgment. That's true as far as it goes, but it's not clear what specific content dispute you're referring to. Clarification would be helpful to us onlookers. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 02:54, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Exactly my thought. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:18, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Good question. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 12:46, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't know which situation he was referring to, but this would apply, for example, to the blocking of an IP during this case that I refer to in my evidence. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 22:48, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

"Purported"

Can we do away with the word "purported", please? I have occasionally applied topic or page bans where no Arbitration remedy exists, and topic and page bans appear to be accepted by the community when reviewed on the appropriate noticeboard. Most often such bans are applied after discussion, but sometimes topic and page bans are applied first and then brought to the noticeboard. To me, the use of the word "purported" undermines the entire concept of topic and page bans when applied outside of Arbitration remedies, and as long as the community is accepting of these bans, it is not Arbcom's place to undermine them with loaded language. It would be more appropriate to say, "WMC applied a topic ban, which was later affirmed by discussion on the noticeboard" or "WMC placed (or even declared) a topic ban on abd, which was later confirmed" (to distinguish from the case, "Smith applied a topic ban, which was overturned by the community two days later after discussion.")

Admins apply blocks and bans, which may be affirmed or overturned by other admins. Calling the page ban "purported" gives it the stink of illegitimacy, which it does not deserve, especially as it was affirmed by consensus. Thatcher 13:50, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

While "purported" remains neutral on the legitimacy of the ban, in theory, attributing the ban specifically to WMC, as with "declared a page ban" does adequately express the situation, even more so if it is noted that the validity of his ban was challenged. (And not just by me.) My view is that admins cannot "strictly" ban, i.e, independently set themselves up to block for non-disruptive edits. Thatcher, if you personally banned someone, then blocked them for an edit that was useful or harmless in itself, you acted improperly, in that sense, but the usual case is that the block is for continuation of disruptive behavior, not for harmless edits, and that is proper. So probably most blocks for violation of "administrative bans" are proper. Using the term "ban" for both kinds of bans (administrative warnings and community/ArbComm strict bans) is what causes the confusion over this. It might be better to use "strict warning," such as "I am strictly warning you that I consider your involvement with (topic or page) disruptive, and by continuing to edit in that topic, you are risking a block from me. Please discuss this with me before making any more edits that might violate this warning, I will not warn you again."

Noticeboards don't use deliberative process, they are terrible places to make decisions where there is any controversy. Involved editors pile in, quite effectively, because they already have their minds made up and can quickly comment. Truly neutral editors will see the report and not comment until later, if at all, unless evidence presented is clear (and the first evidence they see is typically presented by the complainant). I'd urge a review, for the present case, of the AN/I report that resulted in a community ban for me, apparently confirming WMC's block. One of the reasons I knew this was headed for ArbComm, and the reason I asked for a rapid close, accepting the ban, was that I knew this would have to be resolved by ArbComm, for most of the editors voting to confirm the ban had already called for me to be banned, previously, with RfC/JzG 3, as shown in my evidence on the "cabal," and that included WMC, so his mind, as well, was already made up and he merely found an opportunity to express it, as did most of the others.

So, sure, even most of the time, an administrative ban may be just what the community, upon even careful deliberation, would confirm, but the exceptions can be doozies. Truly, we won't know if the ban was actually properly confirmed ("consensus of uninvolved editors" is how the policy reads currently) until this case determines a ban or not, and it seems that, at this point, there is not yet any ArbComm consensus for that, there is difference of opinion (from a very small sample). RfC/JzG 3 showed that there can appear to be a clear community consensus (2/3 majority in that case, 25 editors supporting that I be banned, vs. about half that, not) for something that a wider community, which ArbComm represents, would not confirm, and did not confirm, upon examination of evidence and arguments, indeed, the opposite. I've seen problematic "community bans" before, based on biased discussions at AN/I, the "uninvolved editors" requirement is frequently ignored in closes. --Abd (talk) 15:11, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

We could go with stated Abd was banned or declared Abd to be banned if a simple statement is not good enough. Given that the act of banning comprises solely the statement, I am not clear on why this matters or even of what a "purported" ban would consist. - 2/0 (cont.) 15:37, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Since the ban was subsequently confirmed during discussion, it is simply misleading to say anything implying that the ban's legitimacy was or is in question. --TS 16:12, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Two different bans. Yes, WMC declared a ban. Yes, a group of editors on AN/I confirmed a ban. However, WMC's ban was a bit confusing. A month. Or not, whatever he felt like in a month, based on his judgment of my entire wiki behavior, in matters that had nothing to do with Cold fusion, the pages covered by the ban. And I already knew, and the record shows, what he thought of that other behavior (his prior opinions, expressed, about my warnings to him about usage of tools-while-involved, when I was completely neutral, and his prior comments supporting that I be banned, in RfC/JzG 3, all of which is in evidence, are the basis for my claim of involvement, not his POV on the article itself, beyond the relatively minor matter of dispute over his edit under protection, which was based on political considerations and his "amusement," I believe he used that word.) (WMC is quite honest in the sense of being frank. If anyone was surprised at his block during this case, they hadn't been paying attention to what he'd been writing. I still couldn't be sure that he would go ahead and block, but he simply went ahead and did what he'd been saying he could do.)

So when the editors piled in at AN/I, and I knew that this was going to have to go to ArbComm anyway, because, from prior experience with the RfC mentioned, I could expect maybe 2:1 for a ban even after neutral editors started showing up. I asked for speedy close for several reasons, and I stated them. One was to obtain a neutral closing admin, who would have the authority to decide on matters like term. Heimstern popped in and said he was granting my request, and declared the ban. He was then asked by Enric Naval, a party to this RfAr, what the term was. I wrote that if the term was one month or less, I would not challenge it, I would be completely content with his decision; if it was more than that, I'd want to talk about it and consider my options.

Heomstern chose one month, and Enric Naval accepted that, as did I, and nobody challenged that at the time. Challenges to this only arose during this case (other than WMC's continued insistence that he remained in charge, and he ignored the closing admin's statement). Two different bans, one a community ban that expired more than a month ago, the other by WMC that he claimed remained in effect, to be personally enforced, and which did not stand, and that was demonstrated during this case. If a strict ban by an administrator is a bad idea, one allowing an editor to be blocked for a non-disruptive edit, a community ban that places a single admin in the position of being an ongoing sole judge of an editor's behavior would be worse. I'd have been at ArbComm absolutely ASAP. But that isn't what happened, and I doubt that a neutral administrator would have so concluded.

There is a third ban, declared by Rlevse, which was, explicitly, only pending resolution of this case, declared after the blocking flap that demonstrated that WMC was inclined to completely disregard recusal policy, no matter how blatant the situation, which I knew already but which was difficult to prove. That ban I likewise accepted as reasonable. So when we talk about "the ban," what ban? Which one? There were three. All were page bans, but with different terms and maintained in different ways. Two were placed by neutral parties: Heimstern and Rlevse. One was placed by an admin with an axe to grind, not about Cold fusion, but about me. I think it's pretty clear. Any questions?

On the other hand, I don't see any disagreement at all about "declared by WMC." Hopefully, the decision will address the issue in detail of what administrators can and cannot do on their own "declaration," aside from emergencies. --Abd (talk) 19:42, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

The most correct move would have been to take myself the ban back to ANI after one month, but since Abd was saying that he would respect the ban and since he said that he wanted to appeal it to Arbcom.... I certainly didn't expect him to declare at mid-case that the ban didn't exist and try to post again at the page.... Had I known how this would end I would have dragged him to ANI for community endorsement of an indef ban on the page (which I suspect that I would have gotten) so that he couldn't wikilawyer his way out of his ban. --Enric Naval (talk) 20:19, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Being taken to AN/I twice by Enric Naval, as would have been the case with the above, and unless a second ban were declared by a "consensus of uninvolved editors" -- which I read as meaning editors who do not already have an axe to grind with an editor to be banned -- the only difference would have been (1) Enric Naval would have been made a party immediately by me, instead of adding himself as he did, and my evidence would have focused on his abundant misbehavior, as it has not, and (2) there would have been an active community ban, during this case, and I would not have made that edit to Talk:Cold fusion. Arbitrators have noted that my continuation of abstinence from editing that page was voluntary, and if it was voluntary, I could change that, and I did, providing notice in a very public place as well as, I think, on my Talk page. That is not "wikilawyering" at all. From the beginning of this mess, back in January, Enric Naval has taken an intransigent position, and he came to the point of edit warring a few days ago on Talk:Cold fusion, basing his repeated reversion of the restoration of my comment that had been removed by WMC, as against other editors, not me, on his claim of a valid ban. There has been no authoritative confirmation of an valid ban standing at that time, and quite a bit of evidence and opinion to the contrary, hence Enric's action during this case would,in fact, be sanctionable, at least by admonishment, and should not be ignored. --Abd (talk) 22:37, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Further, the claimed right to total exclusion of material from banned editors, even when restored by independent editors, is one of the issues raised in this case. To my knowledge, that right never existed. Editors are allowed to revert content from banned editors, but not to edit war with other editors to keep it out! --Abd (talk) 22:40, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

My "intransigent position" got built over time as you kept ignoring first gentle advice, then requests, then warnings, and finally formal warnings, and you kept flooding the talk page with increasingly fringe proposals, until the talk page became an exercise in frustration, and working in the article became plain imposible as you kept opposing every change that could possibly make CF look bad or fringe, and you kept opening new discussions while leaving old discussions abandoned, and mixing topics in your new posts. As WP:TINC says, you had no "enemies" but you managed to create a lof of them over time, congratulations. --Enric Naval (talk) 01:21, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

P.D.: Notice the quotes in "enemies" and let me define it as "people who you managed to completely piss off so much that they no longer welcome you here", with "here" being Cold fusion and its talk page, with possible future extension to all of wikipedia if keep refusing to learn to behave. --Enric Naval (talk) 01:35, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd is back engaging in wikilawyering, and also making wild and unsupported claims that there was some kind of "piling on." We simply must ensure that this blatant attempt to delegitimize our Wikipedia processes is knocked down. --TS 22:06, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Tony's comment ignores the evidence that was already presented. I'm willing to answer questions from arbitrators should any doubt that "piling on" is a real phenomenon. The evidence is there, but perhaps I didn't explain it well enough or provide enough detail. I've done analyses like this in the past, it's simply a lot of work, but if it is important, I'll do it. I can show it with incidents that don't involve me at all. --Abd (talk) 22:37, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Suppose I present a petition to my workplace cafeteria demanding that they stop serving meat, and it fails. Later I present a petition demanding that they only buy meat products from a list of approved humane vendors. Should anyone take seriously the claims of "pile-on" or "cabalism" if the same people signed both petitions? Thatcher 22:51, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

It might be selection bias at work. Ideally, you would want to not ask the questions at the same time of day when the same people are in the cafeteria. There is a lot to be learnt from the way people in the real world carry out surveys, or carry out medical studies, in ways designed to avoid bias in the results. Wikipedia isn't very good yet at really surveying properly for opinions, or presenting things in such a way as not to skew the results. Carcharoth (talk) 00:28, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

But RFC participants are not a random sample of Wikipedians and have never pretended to be. Of course the people who self-select to comment on Abd's RFC are likely to self-select to comment on a page ban, and are likely to have the same views. But that's not evidence of a cabal, that's evidence that Abd has annoyed a bunch of people. Abd can't legitimately argue that the page ban is invalid because the people who endorsed it are the same people who commented against him at his RFC. Thatcher 00:37, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. But it might be an argument to move further up the dispute resolution ladder. If it was exactly the same people, there might be a case for asking that at the next stage, some attempt is made to get uninvolved editors commenting. If someone went to three different venues to raise an objection to an action taken against them, and the same five people turned up at each venue and argued against that editor, is that forum shopping or wiki-hounding? Whenever I look at a discussion, it is the truly outside views, from those not previously involved, that I look to, in addition to the opposing views. There is always a good argument, in my view, for getting fresh views at each stage of a dispute. Rehashing the same arguments between the same people just perpetuates a dispute and often escalates it or makes it personal. Carcharoth (talk) 00:56, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

It's almost worth all the hassle, getting here, to read Carcharoth's responses. I could write a book based on them, and may, but won't present the draft here today! --Abd (talk) 02:17, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Isn't moving up the dispute resolution ladder moving up to a more self-selected group in most cases? It takes a level of determination to get to be an arb, for instance, which is usually coupled with a strong sense of how things should work. These senses of how are markedly different, but there are still biases among a self-selected group. Carcharoth for example was the one who waded into some specific numbers on the issue of Abd's excessive verbiage. Probably the right person to do it since he had the perspective of someone who had similar concerns about excessive verbiage raised about him. Allowed him to provide another perspective, a useful one. If you ignore either the involved or the uninvolved you're making the same mistake to me. The truth is like something you can't see, but it casts a shadow. Every different perspective is like a light that hits it, giving you more to deduce from. Even if you go find that one ideal light, you still only have one shadow. You've got to apply the principle of charity and assume that what someone is saying makes sense from their perspective, and then try and figure out how what you think and what they think can be about the same thing. WorriedScientist (talk) 08:42, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

DR process moves up to wider groups. It starts with two editors talking about a dispute and attempting to resolve it themselves. It moves up with the involvement of a third, hopefully neutral, editor, who can mediate informally. Yes, every "group" is self-selected, except ArbComm. ArbComm is elected. (Technically, appointed, but routinely respecting votes in an election.) There is no proposal to "ignore" involved editors. Where arguments matter, which is the norm, the identity of the editor who presents the argument is ultimately moot. It is only where we are trying to make decisions based on some estimation of how the overall community would deal with a problem that we become concerned with "involvement." A biased subset does not represent the community well. So we make some attempt to consider only uninvolved editors, and, I assert, we don't go far enough in that. Usually it doesn't matter, but the exceptions can be problems. --Abd (talk) 03:08, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

DR process seems to peak in terms of wider groups somewhere around the Noticeboards, when the case is proposed, and then again when the decision is announced. It actually moves to less visited pages and the meat of the DR seems to get done not at the peaks, but these less-visited pages. Arbcom is not drafted (which is good), so while the election mitigates the self-selection, it does not totally eliminate it. There is no ignore involved editors proposal, but the valuation of the input of involved editors is a component of this case and the discussion around it. You made a value judgemnent about the input of involved editors with your poll for one. Everyone and every subset has their biases and the best anyone can do is try and be honest with themselves and those they communicate with about why they think things. But you can't take reasoned disagreement and call it unreasoned bias just because someone is involved. And I think that is happening to some degree - it should be about the reasons not the involvement. WorriedScientist (talk) 16:42, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Has anyone, in this case, toted up the names on the ANI thread and the RFC? Are the any noteworthy new voices? Thatcher 00:57, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

There was no "Abd's RfC," there was RfC/JzG 3, which was written by me and certified by Durova and others. I did show, at two different places, the names. I will organize it better and link to it. --Abd (talk) 02:17, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

extended comment by Abd on how involved factions, piling in quickly, influence outcomes

Thatcher, the RfC is one that was very narrowly focused, it laid out the evidence that was later presented before RfAr/Abd and JzG, it was all clear. (And, as a result, the ensuing RfAr quite easy to deal with.) The people !voting for me to be banned were mostly very familiar names. They were denying what ArbComm later confirmed, and they were asserting (about me) what ArbComm later rejected. Neutral editors will also be influenced to join a consensus. The problem is that editors who don't recognize a cabal will read the arguments given and AGF, they will assume that it is unbiased. As you imply above, Thatcher, if so many editors are mad at an editor, why, this editor must be doing something wrong. Maybe. Maybe even usually. But not always. To actually review a set of comments as Carcharoth describes and filter out who is involved from who is not involved is quite time-consuming, and to independently investigate a case that appears, say, on AN/I, is likewise a big job. It often doesn't happen at all. I looked recently at the !votes in the discussion that banned NYScholar, and found that, if I set aside the comments of those who had previous conflict with NYScholar (in my primitive search for it), there were lots of !votes left, but from over 73.33% for the ban (the closing admin presented this proof of consensus to four-place accuracy!) before considering involvement, I think it was one vote more than half that were against the ban. Further, looking at the later !votes, which tend to be more neutral, for reasons I've explained, about two-thirds were opposed to the ban. Now, this doesn't mean that the ban was wrong! Those angry editors do count for something, but, to me, it meant that a strict site ban was probably not the best solution. I offered to help, but NYScholar was essentially too stubborn to help (in ways and for reasons that remain mysterious to me), and because I was unable to gain the cooperation I'd hoped for from the original complaining administrator, I couldn't do anything. But the example stands as one where an analysis of the votes indicated that this was not a "community ban," but an "administrative ban," one supported by a discussion but not by a consensus of uninvolved editors, with certain increased flexibility. With a neutral administrator actively monitoring, an administrative ban can be quite a good solution, and the admin can precisely target it and adjust it, in cooperation with a mentor. (The closing admin first claimed that he had closed based on the votes, that it wasn't his decision, but the community's, but then later claimed that the decision was based on the preponderance of the arguments, which would be characteristic of an administrative ban, community bans being rather unusual in Wikipedia decision-making in having a suggestion in the policy requiring "consensus of uninvolved editors," a separate and additional requirement, never considered by the closing admin at all, over "preponderance of evidence and argument.") I come across cases, from time to time, and investigate, it takes many hours, and when I present the evidence, it often shifts the result, but the norm is that nobody ever does that who is neutral. Where is the motivation? It is a major flaw in our system, until we raise up a class of editors whose job and calling it is to investigate conflicts neutrally and present what they find, and another class with specific skills in dispute resolution and finding consensus between opposing parties. Real life, there are people who are really, really good at that. If we had that, my guess is that most of what currently takes a mess of a noticeboard tangle could be resolved in small discussions, as is contemplated in DR, as small as two plus a facilitator. If the evidence were all laid out, and we have a tremendous advantage over RL courts, unimpeachable evidence is the norm, it being only interpretation that is a problem, faced with clear step-by-step process, editors would abandon indefensible positions fairly quickly, and, where not, everything would be ready for ArbComm, maybe with an RfC in between, just to broaden it. Usually, as it is, with what we have, the results are approximately correct, that's why we've gotten away with such a mess for so long. But when mistakes are made, they can be big ones. We do better at ArbComm, because AC has some semblance of decent process, still a mess, but much better than exists elsewhere. --Abd (talk) 02:17, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

• Sorry, didn't read. Simple question. You say "most of the editors voting to confirm the ban had already called for me to be banned, previously, with RfC/JzG 3, as shown in my evidence on the "cabal,"". I would like to know, from you or someone else, if there were any participants in the ANI page ban discussion who did not advocate banning you at Guy's RFC, so I can read their comments in the archived discussion. Thatcher 02:24, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Just as a clarification, there seems to be an ongoing claim that there was a request to ban Abd at the JZG 3 RfC/U. The Outside view by Spartaz stated "I firmly believe that ABD needs to drop this now and stop wasting our time. I suggest that if he cannot do this he should be topic banned from anything to do with Guy, Cold Fusion and Black/White lists." The suggestion was that Abd should be topic banned if he fails to modify his behaviour, not that he should be topic banned immediately. Thus the support was not for a ban per se, but for a ban in the future if things don't change. - Bilby (talk) 02:49, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I was just looking at that; the statement was supported by 29 editors, more than any other statement on the RfC except for Guy's response to the RfC, which also received 29 support votes (and no, not the same 29, although of course there was overlap between the two). And by the way, since Abd's assertions about the "cabal" seem to be getting more credence here than they deserve, in spite of the FoF that says there's no credible evidence establishing the existence of a cabal, and since I've been named as part of this "cabal" which seems to be continually redefined as the case goes on, and which now seems to be denoting "people who piled on to ask for a topic ban for Abd," I'd like to make it clear that I did not comment either in the JzG3 RfC or in the AN discussion confirming Abd's page ban from the cold fusion talk page. Woonpton (talk) 03:08, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Here you go, from Wikipedia:Requests for comment/JzG 3, Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive544#need_review_of_the_topic_ban_of_two_editors_from_Cold_Fusion. (I have eliminated any editor who was named in the RfC or who endorsed any view. These 'strict' exclusion criteria caught a number of editors who did not endorse the limited, future, potential topic ban described by Bilby above.)

Comments from editors who don't appear on RfC/JzG3

Endorse the topic ban for both editors. This is getting tiresome between these two. Additionally, Abd seems to clearly be on a WP:POINT-making streak, and additional action may need to be taken, unrelated to his involvement at Cold fusion, but related to his disruption since than, such as taunting admins to block him and reneging on a perfectly reasonable voluntary self-ban for no good reason. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:39, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Support the ban. Abd's comments on the subject seem to be rather poor attempts at justifying his behavior or finding a loophole that would excuse him. If he's interested in resolving the issue, there's a mediation open that he can participate in. Shell babelfish 07:13, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Endorse. From the back-and-forth I've read, apparently Abd is unable or unwilling to express himself concisely, and has additional problems with bowing to consensus once consensus is reached. The harangues I've waded through add little to the discussion in which they're placed, and seem to serve to quite annoy those who are working to actually improve the article. Unitanode 13:03, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Endorse particularly in the case of abd, about whom i think its a pity this isn't indefinite. Really, some bold admin should do the encyclopedia a favor and just make it a permenant ban from the topic now and save a lot of time and tears.Bali ultimate (talk) 13:06, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Support. I've been watching this ongoing dispute since around the arbcom case with Jzg and Abd. I have never edited the article in dispute but I have been watching the developements due to my interest in the WP:REHAB project and doing research for the project. Watching Abd wikilawyering like s/he has been is very sad to watch. I did read all of the threads here including Abd's long response below. I don't understand why Abd keeps bringing Hipocrite into discussions here since he is not disputing the ban. I think from all I've read that Abd has worn out the patience of the editors at this article and pretty much every where else. I find some of what Abd has said to WMC about taking it to arbcom or other places about the ban is crossing WP:NPA and WP:CIVIL. Abd has to stop the WP:TE and WP:Wikilawyering. If this does go to arbcom, I am guessing they aren't going to be too pleased to see another case so soon. So yes I think it's time for Abd to find something else to do and leave this alone for awhile. If not, than maybe a wikibreak maybe in order to think about what everyone is saying. Thanks for listening, --CrohnieGalTalk 13:15, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Endorse. I've also been watching this dispute, and the broader issue regarding Abd's behaviour, for a long time now, though I have deliberately tried to stay out of discussions myself. I basically agree with ChronieGal's comments above. I find Abd's involvement very disruptive and I endorse the topic ban. It's most unfortunate that instead of accepting the topic ban in good faith he chose to waste our time with lengthy attempts at Wikilawyering his way out of it. I'm also very concerned about Abd's behaviour more generally. Every time I see his name he seems to be at the center of some contentious dispute with someone and I honestly feel that he is on a fast track to some sort of broader sanctioning, perhaps even a ban, because of his disruption. It's very sad and regrettable because I do believe that he has good intentions and means well but the community's patience and tolerance for this sort of behaviour isn't limitless and if he continues in his current vein it seems inevitable to me that the community is going to have to deal with much broader sanctions than just a topic ban. I feel the community's patience is starting to be exhausted and I would urge Abd to reconsider his behaviour on this project and to spend some time quietly editing the mainspace in some non-controversial subject areas without involving himself in any disputes and arguments with other editors. Sarah 02:45, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Interestingly, none of those endorsements specified any time limit for the ban placed by WMC. For the record, there were no previously-uninvolved editors who objected to the ban. Two editors offered objections: Abd and GoRight. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 02:57, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

That's correct. I appreciate the work that TOAT did in compiling this. It's also true that there was no specification of any particular bannable behavior, just general impressions reported. It's also true that the comments noted by TOAT included reference to opinions formed during the JzG case, where the editors assumed that if there was disruption, and I was part of it, it must be my fault. Nobody has mentioned that Durova certified the RfC and Jehochman filed the RfAr. Also, two editors specified that they were endorsing a "one month ban." Just not the ones not excluded by TOAT's criteria.

The AN/I report was filed at 02:49, 11 June 2009. I requested speedy close at 17:58, 11 June 2009, because I knew, for sure, by then, that the best I'd be able to do, keeping it open, as I certainly could have -- supporters would have started to notice, for starters, beyond GoRight, and I did not canvass -- was maintain disruption for longer, with results being iffy. That is only 15 hours. I specifically asked that supporters not comment there, it would merely increase disruption. I do recommend reading the report carefully, especially after gaining some evidence-based understanding of the events preceding. --Abd (talk) 05:39, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

list of all editors with time of first edit, description and some analysis by Abd

The editors, in sequence of first edit, were: Enric Naval 02:49, 11 June 2009 (UTC) (filed complaint) Jayron32 03:39, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Endorse the topic ban for both editors Abd 03:42, 11 June 2009 (UTC) GoRight 04:02, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Bilby 04:12, 11 June 2009 (UTC) reviewing that ban before things escalate any further seems wise to me ... Endorse one-month. MastCell Talk 04:00, 11 June 2009 (UTC) This is mostly ArbCom's fault, for not making it clearer in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Abd and JzG that Abd's approach was problematic seicer 04:26, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Endorse the current topic ban for both editors as well. Mathsci 06:31, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Endorse topic ban ... By trying persistently to rebrand cold fusion as "emerging science", he has become a disruptive fringe POV-pusher. Verbal 06:42, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Abd is hostile, and longwinded rants such as his were directly criticised recently by ArbCom, as was Abd's failure to use DR correctly. II 06:57, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Support one-month ban. If Abd is really motivated, he/she can spend that time gathering materials to replicate cold fusion... [153 peer-reviewed papers replicating excess heat, some exact replications, and it's pretty expensive, I have, in fact, looked into it. The SPAWAR co-deposition technique is probably the cheapest and is reported as 100% reliable, no problems with palladium microstructure. Excess heat and radiation every cell, and quickly. It's the CR-39 radiation detectors and processing them that is expensive. Calorimetry is also quite a pain if one is not an expert.] Shell 07:13, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Support the ban. ... If he's interested in resolving the issue, there's a mediation open that he can participate in. [I was participating at that time, and that continues, unless I'm topic banned.] Hipocrite 12:44, 11 June 2009 (UTC) I didn't read the walls of text below this from Abd, I'd merely like to say that any conclusions he has drawn about me or the reasons I have done or not done something are disuputed by me. Unitanode 13:03, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Endorse. From the back-and-forth I've read, apparently Abd is unable or unwilling to express himself concisely, and has additional problems with bowing to consensus once consensus is reached. Bali ultimate 13:06, 11 June 2009 (UTC) i think its a pity this isn't indefinite. CrohnieGalTalk 13:15, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Support. I've been watching this ongoing dispute since around the arbcom case with Jzg and Abd. TenOfAllTrades 14:23, 11 June 2009 (UTC) You included explicit threats of escalation directly to ArbCom, and intimated that WMC was risking his admin bit by crossing you. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:52, 11 June 2009 (UTC) Just to clarify, the action Abd refers to as WMC "edit(ing) the article under protection" was solely to restore the article to the pre-edit war version as suggested by GoRight. [SBHB was correct, but GoRight then clarified this further.... the version WMC chose was not "the" pre-edit war version, but one from more than two weeks earlier, with quite a bit of work undone by WMC's edit. In fact, what had happened was that the article had been, for about two weeks before that, steadily regressing under pressure from Hipocrite, and any improvements -- as later validated in some cases -- were promptly reverted out by Hipocrite -- and I'd stopped even trying for a while, leading to an appearance of stability. But the article was again stable after the first edit war and there was no dispute over that.] comments after request for close: Count Iblis 01:20, 12 June 2009 (UTC) Abd's only option now is to contest this ban in the US federal court system. Sarah 02:45, 12 June 2009 (UTC) Endorse. I've also been watching this dispute, and the broader issue regarding Abd's behaviour, for a long time now, though I have deliberately tried to stay out of discussions myself. Heimstern Läufer 04:30, 12 June 2009 (UTC) (closer) Comments Note that I have never claimed that the community ban was invalid. I accepted it, it was valid. It also expired, more than a month ago. On the matter of term: Enric Naval called the term, in his filing, "one month," and then noted that WMC later modified it to indef. What editors would retain from this is unclear. Two editors explicitly endorsed a one-month ban. One editor considered it a pity that it was not indef, showing a belief that the proposed ban was one month. No editor showed a belief that they were endorsing an indef ban. A few did suggest more severe remedies, but Heimstern's decision of "one month" from the discussion, and from my acceptance of one month as well, was very reasonable, and accepted by Enric at the time (on Heimstern talk). No coherent evidence of misbehavior was presented, rather, each endorsing editor seemed to have different opinions of what the offense was. It is likely, then, that early !votes, especially, would be based on prior impressions, and I'd been quite visible due to RfAr/Abd and JzG, with many assuming that I was disruptive merely from that. Any non-administrator who challenges administrative abuse or a strong faction is likely to gain a reputation for disruption. Jayron32 was the first person to endorse the ban, at a point when I had not responded, and he referred to a "POINT-making streak." No allegation of any actual POINTy behavior had been made at that point. Later, POINT violation was alleged about the edit leading to the first block, but I've presented evidence that I had strong reason to believe I would not be blocked, it was not a POINT violation. The only reasonable claim of a POINT violation has been for my edit during this case to Talk:Cold fusion and, I claim, that likewise was not a point violation -- but on this I will concede a reasonable appearance. Jayron 32, however, already had a "streak" in mind two months earlier. When I scroll down the AN/I report page, I can see names of editors. Most reports, I do not recognize the names of most of those commenting. This report leaps out at me. This is characteristic of AN/I reports; it's natural, but dangerous. People comment on cases that interest them. Why are they interested? Most AN/I reports only attract a few comments and they are rapidly resolved. But some become long discussions; and these attract editors with axes to grind, prior judgments ready-made to express, and this phenomenon is not at all limited to situations involving me. Very few of those commenting show that they have actually done research, few bring in additional evidence, they just comment off-the-cuff, plikely with already-formed impressions, or sometimes ad-hoc, and when I've become familiar with a case, I can see that these comments are too-often quite ignorant, have missed important points, etc. This is a generic process problem that I'm sure skilled closing admins are aware of. They are the reason we don't "vote." --Abd (talk) 05:39, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Anyone reading Abd's post above should note that some material is quoted from the AN/I discussion verbatim. The complete comments of some editors have been included, while Abd has cherry-picked phrases and sentences from others. He has added his own emphasis in places. For comparison, the comments which I quoted are quoted in their entirety, exactly as they appeared on AN/I. My list includes only the editors who were completely uninvolved in RfC/JzG3 (by even the most elastic definition of 'involved'). I had a free half-hour, so here are some more statistics.

• 19 editors commented (plus one closing admin).
• 6 editors had no prior involvement, all endorsed the ban;
• the closing admin (also uninvolved by any definition) confirmed the ban;
• 2 editors (Abd and GoRight) offered an objection;
• 11 editors (who had been mentioned or involved in RfC/JzG3) endorsed the ban.
• For those interested in length of comments, the total discussion included

• 45900 characters of wikimarkup from those 20 editors;
• 13700 characters and three subsection headings from Abd;
• 9600 characters from GoRight;
• 6200 characters from Enric Naval, who filed the AN/I request and was the most verbose 'anti' editor;
• 4600 characters from the six uninvolved editors;
• 700 characters from the closing admin;
• leaving 11100 characters of discussion (including some rather elaborate sigs) from the ten remaining 'cabal' members.

Abd and GoRight between them generated 51% of the pre-close discussion; Abd alone was responsible for 30%. 'Cabal' members (including the opening statement) added 38%, 13% of which (about a third) came from Enric. Totally uninvolved editors managed to squeeze in the remaining 11%. Make of the analysis what you will. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:49, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't see any problem with TOAT's analysis, it adds to mine, though some of the data presented doesn't present obvious significance to me. Yes, my quotations were cherry-picked. There were certain points to make, and I selected comments that showed those, out of the many comments made. For example, I made sure to include all reference to length of the ban. There was no comment that explicitly considered the ban being endorsed to be indefinite, or subject to WMC's discretion, and three comments that clearly endorsed a one-month ban. One of these expressed a desire to approve an indef ban, that it was a "pity" that it was not, which shows clearly that this editor perceived the declared ban as being one month. I recommended a reading of the full report, after having become familiar with the underlying facts in this case, because then an arbitrator can see the state of knowledge of the !voters and what they were basing their votes on. --Abd (talk) 21:41, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

So much for learning from this case. Abd in one swoop has managed to skew a discussion that clearly went against his point of view so that can claim he was in the right and go even further to call everyone opposed to him ignorant, hasty, ill-informed or worse. This is a version of consensus I am just not familiar with. Shell ^babelfish 17:04, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Heh... thanks, Abd. I'd forgotten that I put the blame squarely on ArbCom. What a well-selected quote. :) MastCell ^Talk 17:52, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Mastcell you traitor, I'm gonna sanction you real bad :) Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:46, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, I did predict that you guys would be duly punished by a case not unlike the current one... MastCell ^Talk 20:53, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I thought you'd be amused! Sure. Until certain systemic problems are addressed, cases will arise over and over. It's a mistake to blame Wikipedia problems on individual editors or even cabals. The problem is the system, certain deficiencies, almost always, and ArbComm is presently the only means we have to address systemic difficulties with any coherence. What is today, a "cabal" would be, tomorrow, a purely useful part of our structure, if we play it right. However, as long as we deny that cabals exist and have certain negative effects, we will be unable to accomplish this. --Abd (talk) 21:47, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

General comment

I expect to be voting on this case by tomorrow. I will be reading the threads on this page and taking the input there into account in casting my votes and posting any alternative proposals. I know that there will be rolling of eyes that I am the one saying this, but comments that are reasonably straightforward and succinct will have the greatest likelihood of influencing me and, perhaps, the other arbitrators. There is also no need to repeat on this page any point that has already been made on the workshop more than eleventeen times. Thanks to all, Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:52, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry. Did you mean "eleven"? Mythdon (talk • contribs) 22:53, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

No, eleventeen is an Indeterminate number between "For God's sake shut up already" and "Why did I run for Arbitrator?" Thatcher 22:56, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

;-) Paul August ☎ 22:59, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I've never heard of "eleventeen" before. Mythdon (talk • contribs) 23:03, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Try Wikitionary: eleventeen. Paul August ☎ 23:16, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I use Wiktionary a lot. Mythdon (talk • contribs) 00:01, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I never edited the workshop...Thatcher 22:54, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Eleventeen is bigger than Umpteen or is it the other way around? How about a Finding of Fact on that issue? --Abd (talk) 23:29, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

• How about everyone shuts the &%¤# up and leaves the arbiters to try and make sense of this trainwreck. Spartaz ^Humbug! 05:55, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
  • WP:CIVIL - Please read. Mythdon (talk • contribs) 06:12, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

To Newyorkbrad: You need not worry about the length of your posts as much as you think. I've seen you keep consice when you need to and rambling on when nessesary. If you write long, its probably important. If Abd writes long, its just how he writes. I've learned from experience to look forward to reading your walls of text and to fear his. I think the main difference is that you TRY to stay on topic and consice and people respect you for it. He outright refuses to try, and people consider that a disrespect to them. 198.161.174.222 (talk) 17:56, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Desysop

Temp desysopping seems to me to fall into the punative category. If an admin has lost the trust of the community to the point where desysop is required, they shouldn't have the tools returned without a demonstration that the trust of the community is regained. If they haven't lost trust to the point where permanent desysop is required, temp desysop is simply a punishment. Viridae^Talk 23:22, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

No, we do not give punishments, but rather write remedies to fix a problem. I view it as "an involuntary break" that will benefit WMC and the Community after the case closes. He is someone that wades into these area more often than the average admin, and so he is more likely to be involved in messy situations with errors. Rather than an admonishment alone, I think that he needs some time away from doing this work now. This sanction, followed by restrictions will make it easier for everyone to move on when the case closes. If the problems continue after his return then a desysop with return of the tools through a RFA would be needed to show that he has the trust of the Community to do admin work. As well, I'm not discounting ArbCom sanctions will also have a similar effect as a punitive sanction as a side effect. This is similar to how preventative blocks also have a punitive factor to them as well. FloNight♥♥♥ 12:26, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Good point, though not commenting on William M. Connolley's case. Mythdon (talk • contribs) 00:03, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

(ec)I agree with Viridae. I've proposed that, when an admin fails to follow recusal policy, ArbComm suspend the status until the admin can satisfy ArbComm that the offense is not likely to continue, presumably by showing, as a minimum, an understanding of the problem such that threat of "punishment" isn't the only reason the admin refrains. Suspension would be a public thing, showing how seriously we take recusal failure, but the "satisfaction" could be, and probably should be, private. It can be difficult, sometimes, for a person to publicly admit an error, but administrators are also extremely valuable resources for the project, and we should provide an open path, relatively easy, to "rehabilitation" without humiliation, that at the same time fully protects the project, and that does not depend on the function of "admonishments" -- which, frankly, don't work if the admonished adminstrator does not understand the basis.

The same principle could apply to any sanction or admonishment or advice. ArbComm gave me advice in RfAr/Abd and JzG. It's entirely possible that I did not understand the advice. I can certainly say that I tried to follow it. Were any steps taken by ArbComm to ensure that the advice was clear and understood? If I started acting in ways that showed a failure to follow the advice, was I warned by anyone connected with the committee? No, but for me to say this is not to complain about the committee, for the committee may not have the resources to do what I'm suggesting; however, becoming aware of the problem might lead to solutions. There has been much moaning on these pages about the uselessness of admonishments, and I'm sympathetic. Telling someone that they did a Bad Thing rarely does much good. Making sure that the message has been effectively communicated and understood, which probably requires personal back-and-forth, is what has the potential for effecting change.

I would be happier with a remedy that "Abd is topic banned from Cold fusion until the Committee is satisfied that he will not repeat offenses there," than "Abd is topic banned for one year." If I can show, and have shown, that I understand and therefore am unlikely to re-offend, to continue the ban even another day is punitive. On the other hand, if I don't understand, one year is not enough and probably will just increase resentment or various negative beliefs about Wikipedia, on my part and maybe that of others. ArbComm can delegate the "negotiation" involved, with the delegate bringing back any proposals for changing sanctions. It can be quite efficient. --Abd (talk) 00:06, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

(multiple edit conflicts) In practice, temporary desysops are for cases where it is recognised that an admin has gone too far, and that message needs to be sent to other admins, but the admin has done and does good work, and a full desysop might risk that admin either not asking ArbCom for the bit back later, or running an RFA and failing. A temporarily desysopped admin could run for RFA anyway, but the temporary nature of the desysop argues against that course of action, whereas a fully desysopped admin will often run and fail, or lose interest in the project or in being an admin. Of course, a temporarily desysopped admin who gets into trouble later, will almost certainly be desysopped with prejudice. In a way, temporary desysops (there haven't been that many of them) are more like a final warning for admins. Something in-between an admonishment and a full desysop. I personally appreciate the arguments that it should be all or nothing, but that makes adminship too much of a big deal. It should be easier to remove and restore the admin bit, and temporary desysops are part of that process as far as I'm concerned. Carcharoth (talk) 00:14, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Not that I am commenting on William M. Connolley's case, but, let me say this. If an administrator does not get the job done, then shouldn't they lose their privilege as one, and be required to show that they've regained community trust? "A full desysop might risk that admin either not asking ArbCom for the bit back later, or running an RFA and failing. " - In case that happens, we'd just have to deal with it, and, if they haven't learned their lesson, actually be happy with it. "I personally appreciate the arguments that it should be all or nothing, but that makes adminship too much of a big deal. " - Adminship is a big deal, but not so big of a deal that it should be restricted to a special set of users like Oversight and Checkuser are. Ryulong was an example of an administrator who tried to clean up the mess, but yet when that mess is cleaned up, he created another mess. If you cant get the job done as an administrator, you should not be an administrator. Mythdon (talk • contribs) 00:21, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Mythdon, you shouldn't be commenting on Ryulong. That almost certainly breaches your ArbCom sanctions (you are under conduct probation with respect to Ryulong). Could someone please check that and deal with this, please? Carcharoth (talk) 00:57, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I thought I was allowed to comment on Ryulong. Am I restricted from interacting with or commenting on Ryulong? I've struck the comment. Mythdon (talk • contribs) 01:08, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Did I make a personal attack, or an inflammatory remark? Mythdon (talk • contribs) 01:24, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Simplest for you not to bring him into unrelated discussions, even as an example. It's just not worth it. As you've been told many times before, if you have questions about what the remedies and restrictions in your case mean, then ask at arbitration enforcement. They are the admins who will be interpreting the remedies. If they can't agree on what the remedies mean, then ask one of them to file a clarification. Please don't file a clarification yourself. And please don't answer here. If you want to discuss this further, go to arbitration enforcement. Carcharoth (talk) 01:27, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Mythodn, taken on its own, the comment is a needlessly inflammatory one. Takne in conjunction with your behaviour recently it becomes a case of violating Wikipedia:BATTLE#Wikipedia_is_not_a_battleground. Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:03, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, okay. Could you please explain why you requested enforcement even after I struck the comment? Did you not notice that I struck it? Mythdon (talk • contribs) 02:06, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

advice for Mythodn from Abd, comment about administrator error

Mythodn, let me highly recommend that you lay down and play dead. Or figure out something to apologize for and do so profusely. That is sincere personal advice that assumes you value the ability to edit here. Your comment above was gratuitously offensive, both with the specific remark about a specific administrator, completely unnecessary here, but also with the general principle you proposed that implies that administrators who make mistakes should not be administrators. This is a wiki. Mistakes can be fixed. The basis of my case here, was not that an administrator made a mistake. Everybody makes mistakes. It is that he -- I claim, ArbComm decides! -- continued to make the mistake after it was pointed out and he had abundant opportunity to fix it, with many legitimate options open. Unless an error demonstrates serious and irremediable incompetence, not merely a mistake, admin privileges should not be removed simply because of error, but only if we expect that a serious error may be repeated. Basic rule: if an arbitrator starts yelling at you, so to speak, and especially if you have two yelling at you, and especially if it is Carcharoth and Casliber, and you want to debate the point, do so quietly and privately, maybe by email. If it's really important, sure. Speak truth to power, but you should be prepared for the fact that most people who try this get incinerated, because the "truth" they tell isn't. If you are going to do it, make sure your own behavior is unimpeachable. Now. If I can just figure out how to follow my own advice..... I try, but I do make mistakes. --Abd (talk) 02:51, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Ok, now I am intrigued - "especially if it is Carcharoth and Casliber" - means, erm, what exactly :) Casliber (talk · contribs) 07:20, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Please do not expect comments from me to have an "exact" meaning! However, I'd stand with it. If you and Carcharoth tell me to go soak my head, I run, not walk, to a sink, fill it with water, and immerse my head. The full response I wrote, iin collapse below, started with this direct response, but then "wandered" into discussion of this case and both the excellent qualities of the apparent decision as it is shaping up, a possible problem with it if one remedy passes, and other related matters. What I'll ask is that if any arbitrator reads the full comment and finds it useful, that the arbitrator bring it or part of it out of collapse, or bold it, I consent to whatever refactoring is considered useful. Otherwise I have no desire to impose my Walls-o-Text (TM) on any arbitrator. Reading this is certainly not obligatory. --Abd (talk) 21:08, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

full comment by Abd, long

(I did this with a stream of snowmelt once when a friend, irritated with me, said "Go stick your head in the creek." I recommend it under the right conditions, which probably include good physical health. Ah, she was beautiful ....) If you tell me to shut up, I shut up, immediately. If you tell me to sell all my stuff and move to a commune in Texas, well, I'd have to think about it.... If you tell me to believe such and such, I'd say that belief isn't something subject to volition and I can't go there. But I'd still think about it.... Specifically, Carcharoth has my total trust in terms of understanding of the wiki in theory and practice, as well as general intelligence and cautious, thoughtful consideration. Add to Carcharoth an independent voice, about whom I have no held negative impressions and some positive ones, also an arbitrator.... I'd have to be awfully certain before I'd oppose such. It's hard to imagine, and I have a very active and fertile imagination. It's been claimed that I don't listen to advice. I "listen" to all advice, but I can't follow what I don't understand or don't have the tools to apply. Further, some of the advice or "feedback" that I don't appear to listen to comes from hostile editors who don't understand my motives, goals, experience, or understanding. That doesn't mean that they are wrong, just that I'm obviously not sufficiently prepared to "get it." Along comes someone like Carcharoth to explain it to me, or someone Carcharoth recommends, and it becomes much easier. Jehochman once held the view of me that is common among cabal editors, as expressed here, such as that of Raul654 (though not nearly so extreme) and he gave me a warning, once, that was soaked with this attitude. That warning turned into a block by Iridescent. In a self-RfC, a process I more or less invented, and which worked, created to advise me, I began examining, first the warning. Was it true? Very small consensus, among friendly editors. No, it was not true. Okay, that's a basis to expand, so I went ... to Jehochman, and invited him to review it. He declined. A lot of text, I understand, why should he waste his time, water under the bridge, etc. Ah, but not water under the bridge for me, for the feelings underlying that had never been addressed and they would lay around, bumps under the carpet, to trip over. So I wrote, well, this is a dispute between you and I, can you suggest a mediator? He wrote, "Carcharoth." (This was before Carcharoth was elected to ArbComm). At this point I knew that our dispute was resolvable. I enthusiastically accepted, and we both went to Carcharoth talk and asked for mediation. Carcharoth accepted, but said that it might be some time before s/he could get to it. After some time, we asked again. Carcharoth wrote, "Can't you guys work it out?" So we did. There were no more problems between Jehochman and I, the contrary. We cooperate excellently and, indeed, pleasantly. What happened? It's a very important point. We agreed on a single thing, initially mutual respect for Carcharoth, probably helped along by a skillful reframe of the problem as being due to our collective failure, for to answer "No, we can't" to Carcharoth would have been an admission of incapacity, and we are both men, and as such normally disposed to never admit total personal failure. (That can be a problem, to be sure, but here it was turned to good use.) If you can get two contending parties to agree on a single thing, you have started to resolve the dispute. You build from there. Depending on how deep the dispute is, it may take more or less work, but as soon as two people dedicate themselves to finding consensus, they can, I have never seen it fail. It gets more complicated when there are more than two contending parties, which is why the best DR is between two people, with a third person, if necessary, functioning to catalyze or facilitate consensus. Then, if there is a third, the most congenial of the two with the third works on including the third, and it can expand. (If the a facilitator abandons the goal of consensus between the two and instead aligns with one party, we have a three-person mediation, a new facilitator would be needed.) What blocks this, most often, is a belief that "consensus" is going to be the view of one party or the other, that the problem is to convince the "wrong" party of the "truth." And then sometimes what passes for dispute resolution on Wikipedia seeks to blame one of the parties. Blame never resolves disputes, unless it is voluntarily accepted, i.e., "I was wrong, I didn't see ... etc." Or "I was in a lot of pain that day and I wasn't thinking clearly." If the entire Wikipedia community screams at me that I'm wrong (it wouldn't, because the "entire community" is either asleep or, if awake, it is far wiser than that, so let's reduce that to, say, a dozen editors !voting to ban me in an AN/I report), that I'm a problem, it's not going to convince me that I'm a problem, only that they have a problem with me. Did any of these blaming editors, complaining about my behavior, try to mediate a dispute with me? Even once? The only one who attempted any mediation was Hipocrite, and he stacked the participants, but, hey, I can deal with that, and I accepted. And two minor disputes have been resolved very satisfactorily and we have turned to a larger and more important one. DR works. But far too many declare bans, push block buttons, or jump to AN/I. Can you recall an incident when someone became convinced that they were wrong because someone accused them of misbehavior at AN/I? What happens is that some people will shut up, become more careful, but not that a dispute is actually resolved. (I'm sure that it happens that people accept and "get" criticism at AN/I, but I'm also sure that it is a relatively rare exception, and, more likely, an ultimate resolution, if it comes, comes despite the AN/I "community" expression of blame.) What would the "entire community" do, if it were awake? It would identify someone I could respect, someone who has the ability to communicate with me, to understand me and to respond as I may uniquely need, and it would send that person with its message. Ahem. It would provide me with a mentor. Sometimes we choose mentors for the wrong reasons, maybe even most of the time. If the job of the mentor is seen as to simply force the editor to accept what the editor doesn't understand or has been fighting against, to be an assigned "probation officerit will probably fail." (However, some real-life probation officers are quite good and function more like a good mentor, without enabling bad behavior.) Rather, if we frame the job as seeking consensus between the editor and the community, with the mentor being a facilitator, the possibility of success is far higher. The mentor, seen this way, should have sufficient trust from both the editor and the community to be able to moderate and mediate the communication, the same as a mediator between two individuals. At present, the only way for the community consciousness to express itself coherently is through ArbComm, so the mentor should be acceptable to ArbComm and the editor, and the more that "acceptable" has the kind of "Yes!" that I experienced when Jehochman suggested Carcharoth, the more likely is success. But this carries with it a corollary: that the "community" is not a fixed position or decision, but that it is living, and can adapt to what will represent expanded consensus. So the mentor must have access to ArbComm, and, for efficiency, it could be to a single arbitrator, who would then suggest, to the Committee, possible modifications of findings or remedies. The goal is always increased consensus, not pandering to minority opinion, giving up what is important to satisfy "POV-pushers" or the merely stubborn. The key is to reduce difficult and complex problems to discussions between two consenting people, where finding consensus is far more efficient and far less disruptive and tedious. It can still be work, but work undertaken voluntarily. This is, all of it, very traditional process stuff, applied to Wikipedia. Notice how it would apply in my situation. I'm alleged to be very difficult, and incapable of controlling my writing, with "walls of text." A mentor who could not handle walls of text would be a bad choice for me. (I know of a mentorship where the editor was a voluminous writer, and the mentor appears to have had no tolerance for it. Bad choice. It failed, as could be predicted, and the mentor ended up supporting the ban of maybe not impossible, I saw evidence of willingness to change. We didn't find out, because we site banned the editor, even though willing new mentors appeared.) I have, by the way, served as advisor to people who were much worse than me with voluminous writings, several long emails each day, day after day. Even where the volume is truly too much, there are ways to deal with it, very simple ways. So, suppose I'm topic banned, based on a finding of tendentious editing. With the mentor, we explore this. Where did I go wrong? What's likely is that I was ineffective or less than skillful in certain ways, but that there were other problems having nothing to do with me. So we could address my problems, and if the result would be that the mentor considers the ban no longer necessary, or even considers it harmful, the mentor would go back to ArbComm and report this. No consensus between us, nothing goes back to ArbComm (or possibly a negative report.) Until then the ban would stand, and if the mentor asks for it to be lifted, or possible adverse findings rescinded (ArbComm does make errors of fact from time to time), ArbComm would decide. Privately, but announcing the result, and not based on pestering from me. If ArbComm is going to change an FoF, it might announce it and allow time for additional evidence to be presented. But a nondisruptive path would be opened, and nothing would be presented for general comment unless ArbComm had already decided to take it seriously, so comments in the nature of "This is totally stupid, why is it even being considered to unban this useless POV-pusher" would promptly and properly be removed by a clerk! Because ArbComm would have already decided that it wasn't totally stupid! And it just wants the community to have a chance to prevent some possible error. (Or, if it's clear enough, ArbComm simply decides without holding a "hearing.") I do know that there are FoFs in the present proposed decision, with some support, that are factually incorrect or that are an imbalanced view. But to contend with this now would be to simply create more disruption. I would much rather trust in the ability of ArbComm to correct errors than to insist upon perfection in the ArbComm decision. I remain ready to supply evidence for anything I have written, but only, for the most part, on arbitrator request. Overall, as the decision is shaping up, it validates my decision to bring the matter here, and I see this as-yet-vague decision as improving the situation. Not as much as it might have, but definitely more than other means that might have been open to me, such as asking for an AN/I review again. It's not hard to imagine what would have happened with that, just look at this case! Editors are generally more restrained before ArbComm, and this case is actually not an exception! Discretionary sanctions for Cold fusion is excellent. Confronting WMC's long-time use of tools is excellent. Suggesting to administrators that they avoid the appearance of impropriety as well as actual impropriety is excellent. Insuring that I have a mentor is excellent. Topic ban for anyone involved, not excellent, and unwarranted on the facts, especially as apply to me. (There are some editors for which I'd think a ban reasonably appropriate, based on behavior before the committee, but I would not have, for any article editor, sought sanctions, because I don't see sanctions as resolving disputes, and resolving disputes is my goal.) In summary, we have already, before me, banned the most knowledgeable editors, experts in the field or related fields, who have participated in the article: ScienceApologist, Pcarbonn, and JedRothwell. (We also blocked IP that appears to have been expert, that was one of JzG's actions, he thought it was Rothwell from the apparent POV, but he didn't geolocate and he missed that the characteristic Rothwell signature, always there was missing.) I was skeptical in January, I firmly believe in NPOV, RS, and UNDUE policies and place them above my own POV -- and I have POVs! -- ; all that happened is that, having the general science background, I read the sources, and became convinced that this wasn't just pathological science. Are we going to continue to ban everyone who actually studies the field? If my behavior there was inappropriate, the specific problems should be addressed, before it is concluded that overall participation is impossible. Pulling the plug on participation for those who actually do the reading is chilling, and who therefore try to improve the article according to what they find, civilly and according to guidelines, is guaranteed to result in a deficient, impoverished, and slanted article. Discretionary sanctions, by all means! Enforced by neutral administrators. That's all we need. If Cold fusion had been under discretionary sanctions in May, it would have been easy to deal with Hipocrite, I doubt that article protection would have been needed even once. With the edit warring on June 1, he'd have been blocked instead of the article being protected, his behavior was totally outrageous that day, and if any arbitrator does not understand why I say this, please ask! So: mentorship for me and my problems and discretionary sanctions for the article and its problems, and a clear reminder by ArbComm, to a series of administrators who have been denying it, that administrators are required to recuse when involved, and that it is wise to recuse when there is even an appearance of involvement. And possibly more. That's not bad at all! TIA, ArbComm. --Abd (talk) 21:08, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

• Comment — I'm not sure of the extent I'd support a desysop in this case. The reason being is that I feel somebody's status as an administrator should be based on whether or not the community trusts them. WMC may have made some poor judgment calls sometimes (and definitely his block of Abd during this case was exceedingly ill-advised), but a desysop (of any sort) strikes me as more of a punitive measure than a preventative one, for one thing. More importantly, for the most part the community appears to still have confidence in him as an administrator (as far as I know).[42][43][44][45] I note that none of these links are the best demonstrations of "consensus" but the only people who are opposing him tend to be people who've had prior disputes with him (not that this automatically makes their opinion any less valid of course). I will say this, though; his block of Abd during the case was a very bad call, and nothing like that should happen again (and really, I doubt it will; WMC is not stupid). Master&Expert (Talk) 06:33, 21 August 2009 (UTC) And I'd like to say that otherwise, I am pleased with the job ArbCom has been doing this year, insofar as it relates to desysopping problematic administrators. Master&Expert (Talk) 06:40, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Unaddressed issues

I decided to cross references Abd's misbehaviors discussed on the workshop with the remedies being proposed here. (Note that I am not considering the mentorship, because while theoretically its yet-to-be-negotiated terms could deal with some of these issues, the track record of arbcom-imposed mentorships is dismal. As such, I am discounting it a-priori)

Type of Misbehavior	Arbitration remedy
Meatpuppetry/proxy editing on behalf of banned users	Nothing
Wikilawyering	Nothing
Disruption of dispute resolution proceedings (both his own and those involving others)	Nothing
Personal attacks	Nothing
Ignoring Warnings	Nothing
Driving away subject matter experts	Abd is banned from the cold fusion article, any content related to cold fusion, and any talk page discussion related to cold fusion for one year. So one year of peace on cold fusion articles only, then nothing.
Revert warring	Abd is limited to one revert per page per week for all contributions across Wikipedia (except for undisputable vandalism and BLP violations), and is required to discuss any content reversions on the page's talk page.
Drowning out others with numerous overly long talk page posts	Abd is limited to one post per day to any talk page in all namespace except for posts that are approved by his mentor(s)
Using talk pages as off-topic discussion forums	Abd is limited to one post per day to any talk page in all namespace except for posts that are approved by his mentor(s)
Making veiled threats against others	Nothing
Falsely claiming the existance of a cabal against him	Worse than nothing - he's already using principle #6 to claim vindication.
Conducting breaching experiments	Nothing
Fringe POV pushing	Abd is banned from the cold fusion article, any content related to cold fusion, and any talk page discussion related to cold fusion for one year. So one year of peace on cold fusion articles only, then nothing.

In short, this decision as it now stands is grossly insufficient. Raul654 (talk) 22:57, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

As a bit of an outsider in this whole mess, I'm inclined to agree that Raul654's concerns about Abd, many of which are shared by me and other editors, aren't really being addressed. At this stage I'm not really sure why we're not considering banning Abd altogether, and I will probably propose a community ban sooner or later if he continues to cause trouble. Even if his hostile attacks on other good faith editors were not enough to support such a ban, his steadfast refusal to heed community feedback and stop communicating his concerns through endlessly rambling "wall of text" screeds would suggest that he is not committed to engaging on Wikipedia in a constructive way. His complaint that time constraints prevent him doing what others do all the time really isn't good enough. He should make the time or stop wasting ours. --TS 23:17, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Agree with Raul654 - At this stage I'm not really sure why we're not considering banning Abd altogether Agree with TS. Wizzy…☎ 06:53, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

As a semi outsider I should point out that I agree with Raul and TS. The sets of motions up for voting are totally at variance with reality and do little to nothing to solve some of the serious problems presented to the committee. Protonk (talk) 23:52, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

One of the things you learn after a few years is that "arbcom" is not a monolith. Only a few have weighed in so the case isn't over yet.

As for the infamous Principle 6, if it passes I'm going to do what I always do when confronted with a profoundly idiotic requirement: ignore it. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:17, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Principle 6 is sort of ludicrous. Superfluous to those who need no convincing and not terribly persuasive to those who do. Protonk (talk) 00:23, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Which principle are you talking about --> "Use of administrative tools in a dispute"? Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:41, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

"Avoiding apparent impropriety". --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 00:49, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

...and especially the requirement to avoid "reasonable but inaccurate suspicions" of being a cabal. That's perverse. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:55, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

(ecx2) Principle 6, the one Abd has already claimed as validation and vindication of his whole "cabal" concoction; read the thread above "Is this for real?" for his views on the subject.Woonpton (talk)

Cas - principle 6 says "or an editor repeatedly editing in apparent coordination with other editors in circumstances which might give rise to reasonable but inaccurate suspicions of sockpuppetry or meatpuppetry". As I read it, that would mean that the "apparent coordination" between Hesp, you and me at Proteaceae last month is something that "all editors" should "strive to avoid". (To make matters worse, that wasn't even "apparent coordination", it was actual coordination, since the problem was discussed beforehand at WT:PLANTS#Proteaceae fringe theory. It isn't a matter of what's intended, it's a matter of how people will interpret it. Guettarda (talk) 01:24, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Proposed principle 6, should it pass, is something none of us can ignore. I really hope it doesn't pass, but this and past Committees have passed similar principles that enable the worst kind of off-site trolling to carry as much weight as their own findings of fact. I have little doubt that this arbcom will continue the same tradition of crippling Wikipedia's community processes. We must simply accept that those handling Wikipedia's most grievous problems in a manner endorsed by the community and in keeping with Wikipedia's written policy will always be subject, in retrospect, to the argument that we didn't pay sufficient heed to what the trolls on forums deliberately set up as attack sites will make of it. This will be the case until finally the Committee recognises that it cannot appease the trolls, whose openly declared aim has always been sabotage. --TS 01:04, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Some of us may be missing the background here. Could you be more explicit? Carcharoth (talk) 01:27, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Principle #6, here - All editors, and especially administrators, should strive to avoid conduct that might appear at first sight to violate policy. Examples include an administrator repeatedly making administrator actions that might reasonably be construed as reinforcing the administrator's position in a content dispute, even where the administrator actually has no such intention; or an editor repeatedly editing in apparent coordination with other editors in circumstances which might give rise to reasonable but inaccurate suspicions of sockpuppetry or meatpuppetry. - this is a ridiculous proposal, tantamount to saying that people are guilty until proven innocent. See this discussion elsewhere on this page for more detailed discussion. Raul654 (talk) 14:17, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Only too glad to elaborate, Carcharoth. The Committee must know that such a stupidly broad proposal is a gift to trolls. It only takes the possibility that someone will falsely claim that an editor's or admin's action is against policy for the editor or admin now to have the duty to avoid that action.

That proposed principle is against Be bold in editing and also against our longstanding principles of placing trust in our administrators. Requiring them to jump through hoops like this is counter-productive and if passed I hope this principle will be steadfastly resisted and ignored by future arbitration committees as I am sure it will be resisted by the community. --TS 00:42, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Self-RfC

I thank Raul for listing unresolved issues, this is part of what I asked him to do above. I intend to take his list and use it as a starting point for a new self-RfC in my user space. A self-RfC is for my advice primarily, but secondarily for the advice of others who choose to review the evidence, arguments, and conclusions, i.e., local consensus, and its utility for that additional purpose will depend on how fairly I allow it to proceed. A self-RfC, like a general RfC, binds nobody, but it can help to discuss issues carefully and completely. Because the primary purpose is for my own advice, I can run it as I choose (within general guidelines)(and if I were prevented from running it here, as was attempted with my first self-RfC, I would move it off-wiki. I'd rather it be here. -- the editor who tried to kill the first self-RfC with a noticeboard report was blocked by JzG. If anyone thinks I had a grudge against JzG, well, that is not what happened.)

Raul and anyone will be welcome to participate, but no obligation, and, of course, I will, in my own user space, enforce civility rules strictly, as I could if I move it off-wiki. (If it goes off-wiki, it will be a mailing list and I'll announce -- or someone else will announce -- how to subscribe.) Nobody should ever be forced to read anything I write.

I will let the clerks decide what part of the above comments are allowable. I'm not complaining. That doesn't mean that I consider all the comments above acceptable, the contrary, but only that I don't personally believe that we find consensus by repressing dissent. Until and unless enforcement of civility policy is uniform, I'm not going to personally insist on it. --Abd (talk) 01:42, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I have opened up the self-RfC at User:Abd/RfC/RfAr/Abd-William_M._Connolley. There is a top-level RfC page at User:Abd/RfC that explains some of what this is about, but it is not necessary to read that to participate. All editors are -- at least initially! -- welcome. The issues above by Raul were refactored into Questions which could be answered Yes or No, but, as we proceed, Questions are subject to amendment. No !voting is to be done on a Question until it has been determined that the presentation of evidence and argument is complete, and then all who have participated will be notified that a poll has been opened; as it is now, the issues above have been presented as questions but the questions will not be considered until they have been moved and seconded by two independent editors, one of whom could be me. I transferred the questions as a courtesy to Raul, but he did not actually suggest that I or my process consider them. Someone who signs under a question as it is, will be considered to have suggested that the question is worth considering, and then there must be a second or I'm not going to waste my time and the time of others with the gathering of evidence and arguments. I thank in advance any editor who chooses to participate in this. I do not intend to debate any of these questions here, though I remain very willing to answer questions from Arbitrators. --Abd (talk) 02:32, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I don't doubt that during this RfC you will continue show the same humility, good faith toward others, and openness to criticism that has been your custom. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 02:47, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

An RfC where the person being discussed is in control of the content is worse than useless - I can't see any value in this process. By their nature an RfC needs to be open to allow people to make comments as they see fit, not to have them removed based on the interpretions of the person being discussed. If there is going to be an RfC, let it be a normal RfC outside of your control. Or don't bother. - Bilby (talk) 02:51, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

It is not an official RfC. It is merely a way for Abd to gather feedback on himself so that he may internalize it. It is not an official Wikipedia process by any means. Please correct me if I am wrong on this point, Abd. --GoRight (talk) 03:02, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

You are correct, GoRight. I used this before to gather opinion before I proceeded with dispute resolution with Jehochman. It worked. I'd propose it for others who might think that some wrong had been done. The idea is to seek advice that the editor can trust. Does anyone here imagine, after all that I have written, and what has been very visible on these case pages, that I could trust a standard RfC? Anyone who wants to could file one, if there is a proper certifier. I do wonder, with all the claims that I'm a total dead weight on the project, disruptive, meat puppeting (boy, if I'm a meat puppet, and so incredibly disruptive, who is this master disruptive editor behind me?), POV-pushing, where is the RfC? Where is the extensive block history? Where is the attempt at mediation by those who have so loudly and for so long called for me to be banned?

RfCs have no power to sanction. If they work, they advise the editor. If not, they prepare for ArbComm. A self-RfC, unless badly and over-controlled by the editor running it, will work to advise the editor. Period. I may not like the advice, but I have the power to make sure that it isn't some railroaded process. And then I can proceed with a better understanding. Basically, if I dominate the RfC in such a way as to warp the advice, I shoot myself in the foot. What is developed there will be useless, I might as well just talk with myself. I would also accept, if one were available, a neutral moderator; an RfC of the kind I'm working on, can be run in any user's space. Since I'm skilled at this kind of thing (in RL), and since I truly to want to understand what the community will think when it can consider issues broken down, one question at a time, I'm doing it myself, but this might also be done by one editor for another. Crucial would be that the editor being advised, for whom the advice is primarily intended, trust the process.

Just exactly how much was GoRight supposed to trust the process at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/GoRight? Please, if any arbitrator doesn't understand what I've been writing about, review that RfC in detail, and look carefully at the evidence and related pages I prepared for it. I was neutral at that point, GoRight supports me because of what I did there. The filing itself was embarrassing, for any administrator to have written, and for another to have certified, and for a certain list of editors to have endorsed. That was my first encounter with the c****. I don't think they forgot. Or maybe they did.... WMC usually claims that he doesn't remember stuff, and maybe he's right. Usually, though, people who don't remember things specifically, still remember the feelings. --Abd (talk) 03:30, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Your rules state "I retain the right to remove any material here that I find, in my sole opinion, to be disruptive of the process or otherwise unhelpful." Making it so that you pick and choose the questions being discussed and the comments being made invalidates the process. Yes, a normal RfC allows all sorts of opinions to enter - but that's the point. - Bilby (talk) 03:50, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

My "rules" allow all sorts of opinions to enter, but, because the purpose is to advise me, I may remove, after consideration and opportunity, edits that don't seem to be useful. They are still there in history, and I might even just move them into collapse. It depends. Will this help someone else,or myself, reviewing later, to understand what happened? If I leave in place a barrage of irrelevant or uncivil crap, it will discourage new editors from participating. That RfC is not going to look like the Workshop or this page.

Basic principle: the one advised is sovereign over the advice process. (Not necessarily over the advisor.) A doctor has no right to advise me about my health unless I consent, and I can walk out of the room if I want. We have no right to demand that ArbComm hear our complaints, and frivolous and disruptive posts can be and are, removed, under ArbComm authority. Every user has this right to control -- within limits -- their own user space, for their own legitimate purposes, and being advised, by editors seeking to help in good faith, is certainly legitimate. I'm not going to remove a Question that has any possible legitimate basis, unless nobody seconds it after a reasonable time. Standard process. You might note that I put up all of Raul's list as possible Questions. Got any others, Bilby? Take it there, please, and stop complaining about the possiblity that I might stupidly overcontrol the process. Now, I believe I have the right to do this, as long as I'm not blocked. If I'm blocked, I'll do it off-wiki. Get over it. If you think it's a bad process, go to the RfC talk page and tell me why. Not here, any more, please, or it tempts me to respond. --Abd (talk) 18:14, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I hope it works out for you, and that you get good advice. Good luck with it. - Bilby (talk) 08:21, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Let's be honest here. An RfC (especially the crippled mockery of one which Abd proposes here) isn't going to resolve these issues. These questions are already before ArbCom. Abd has as much as announced that if Raul pursues any sort of sanctions against Abd for his continuing and increasingly bizarre and disruptive approach to dispute resolution then he's going to drag us right back here for RfArb/Abd3. The ArbCom has a responsibility to the community to make good use of its time and ours. My prediction is as follows: If Abd's behaviour continues unchecked, frustrated editors will not wait for the third Arbitration. A lengthy community-endorsed block or ban will be placed based on discussion at AN/I. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 03:10, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Nope. Since Raul has loudly proclaimed, again and again, that he's got a problem with me and my editing, I decided to do what I should have done long ago with other parties to this case. I tried it with WMC, but never with Enric Naval; I figured that if he had a problem with me, it was his responsibility to follow DR, which he never did. That's one of the mistakes of mine that I've identified. I should have responded to Enric's repeated complaints proactively. Enric is not completely unreasonable, he does come to reasonable agreements, often.

So, seeing all this crap from Raul, I decided to try it with him. It was not a joke. And, yes, I think it is about time that someone remind Raul that if he stubbornly persists in behavior that would get just about anyone else blocked, and quickly, he is not bulletproof. But I doubt that I'd be the one to actually pull the RfC trigger. I might certify if asked, based on what happened here today, and assuming that some kind of resolution doesn't appear. I've done what I can, and can't go further without some response. I suggested that Raul name someone, anyone, whom he trusts, who might be able to help. If he does that, then there are further steps that can be taken. I am following WP:DR, by the book, or maybe even better than the book. I claim that it works.

And I did point out that I gave advice to JzG and to WMC about use of tools while involved, they blew it off, completely, and they ended up admonished (JzG) and it looks like more will happen to WMC. I did not do that to them, TOAT, they did it to themselves. I had no power to punish them or "retaliate." So many have focused on my "disruption," but the RfC on JzG was certified by Durova. The RfAr that followed that was filed by Jehochman who was really trying to be neutral. I became aware of the extent of despair in the community over WMC's actions through the comment of Jennavecia that I report in the last piece of evidence I set up here. If there were no basis to what I was saying, I'd have been dead meat by the time of RfAr/Abd and JzG, or, if I survived that, this RfAr would have been rejected, I'd perhaps have been blocked for this or that, and it would have been over. I have confronted administrative abuse, and that is a dangerous path, I do not recommend it for everyone. I could easily end up site-banned for it, and that is the risk I take.

I trust ArbComm better than any other Wikipedia process, but ArbComm is not perfect, plus I make mistakes, and when one is in the spotlight, a small mistake can loom large. And I do this, most definitely, under Rule Number One, but also in compliance with policies. Did I violate a policy? Please, if so, and if it is not listed in User:Abd/RfC/RfAr/Abd-William_M._Connolley, ask a question about it there. It will be addressed, thoroughly.

I don't seek out excuses to do this work. It is, in fact, a pain in the neck, I'd much rather be researching and working on Cold fusion, which I actually did a bit of today, on my Talk page, especially in response to a "warning" from MastCell, which I think got resolved. I happened across JzG's abusive blacklistings and sincerely thought that he'd listen to a friendly suggestion.... WMC sought me out, I didn't go after him. I warned him about other actions while involved, and he blew it off and I didn't go and complain. I just carried on with my business, until he went beyond all bounds and he insisted that, even after the community ban expired, even after all the obvious dispute between us, he could still block me for any edit to the pages under his ban, disruptive or not. Too far. Not acceptable. And wrong. He couldn't. Not without sanction. --Abd (talk) 03:57, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

... So many here are complaining that I warned WMC for a true hazard, warned him against doing what could get him desysopped, and which might well end up succeeding in that. I will here and now warn all administrators who have been strenuously arguing against recusal policy, that if they do the same, and continue it and insist on it, as WMC did, they too are in danger of losing their bits. It does not depend on me, personally. I might get it done a little faster if I'm involved, that's all. Or not. Someone else may be better at this than I, and if I'm gone, we might find out. You know who you are. Ignore this at your own peril, if you care about your admin bit. Most administrators readily and instinctively recuse when involved. It is only a few who do not.

One of the real problems is that as administrators burn out, they become less and less patient, I think that's what happened with JzG. He was ready to retire anyway. But it's difficult to let go, and so ... JzG became highly uncivil first, then, when that got a reprimand, he stopped getting mad and started getting even. It was really the same thing. He needed a break, and he took it, maybe he will come back refreshed. We need to address burnout directly. So many problems, so little time. Up to you, Wikipedia, if you want me around. --Abd (talk) 17:56, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Is there any reason this RfC will be any more successful than the last self RfC you created? Protonk (talk) 07:10, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, given that the last RfC was quite successful, I can't say! --Abd (talk) 20:12, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Can I ask a stupid question here?

(Yea, yea, cue cat calls about how I ask a lot of them ...)

But seriously, given the proposals on the table for the proposed decision, will we actually be able to say whether WMC can still enforce his ban on Abd, or not? Somehow with all the principles and finding of fact and proposed remedies I have somehow lost track of the most fundamental question of all, can WMC (or any administrator in general) simply declare a ban on another editor without community discussion? After this is all said and done, will we actually have a decision on whether WMC's purported indefinite ban of Abd from Cold Fusion is valid, or not? What am I missing here? --GoRight (talk) 02:59, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I read proposed principle 4.0 as being against administrator declared topic bans (on the grounds that it only refers to page bans, and seems to limit community sanctions to those), and 4.1 as generally allowing administrator or community imposed topic bans, given that administrator bans can be questioned at the admin noticeboard. The question of whether or not WMC was involved hasn't been addressed, and the question of whether Abd warranted a topic ban is possibly in FoF 11, although it isn't directly addressed. - Bilby (talk) 03:31, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

There is a critical difference between an administrative ban and a community ban or ArbComm ban. The latter are recorded at WP:RESTRICT and there is no provision there for recording administrative bans. Administrative bans are enforced by the administrator declaring, and for another administrator to block based on a violation of an administrator's ban, without an independent determination of the disruptiveness of the violating edit, would be a violation of our principles of individual administrative responsibility. So, my opinion: the community ban is expired, unless the closing admin actually retracts the one month close, in which case there was no close and no community ban, and for a closing admin to increase a fixed-term ban based on later events is dicey. I showed above that the comments in the AN/I report support most closely the interpretation that editors thought they were supporting a one-month ban. WMC's ban does not exist, whether it existed in the past is moot. He cannot enforce it. I'm currently banned by Rlevse, pending, without any determination of the ultimate necessity of the ban, just to avoid dispute during this case. When this case is closed, that ban is history as well. Obviously, ArbComm can ban, and it's possible that it will, but I would hope that it considers such a ban based on an independent review of the evidence, not merely on the opinions expressed at AN/I. If ArbComm does not ban, I'm not banned, at this point. Someone could start up another community ban discussion, but I can tell you what my argument would be: Cold fusion is covered by discretionary sanctions (I assume that will pass, I certainly support it), and any problems there can be directly addressed by any neutral administrator. There is no problem if I'm not banned. I still can't disrupt the article, if I were so inclined! --Abd (talk) 04:56, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Finding of Fact 3.1

I'm more than a tad concenred about the wording of 3.1:

On 5 June, William M. Connolley edited through protection on cold fusion, reverting to a version from three weeks earlier with the edit summary "Lets [sic] wind everyone up", an action and comment that needlessly escalated the dispute.

While I accept that the edit summary was bad, I don't see why the action is being questioned. And yet it is getting support. Perhaps I'm misreading something, but as I see it:

• Abd stated very strongly that the page was protected in the wrong version due to Hipocrite gaming the system, thus rewarding one of the edit warriors.
• Policy is very clear on what can be done if one edit warrior is rewarded by the protected version: "administrators may also revert to an old version of the page predating the edit war if such a clear point exists".
• A clear point did exist, and was nominated by GoRight.
• It had the support of the edit warrior in question - Hipocrite.
• Thus WMC reverted to that version.
• Shortly thereafter page protection was lifted, by WMC, allowing other editors to revert back as they wished.

So what I don't understand is what WMC did wrong, other than a poor choice of edit summaries? Reverting was within policy, it answered Abd's previously raised concern (in multiple forums) about rewarding an edit warrior, it had the support of Hipocrite, the version was nominated by a neutral party, the version was stable and pre-dated the edit war, and reverting didn't prevent continued discussion to find consensus on a final version. - Bilby (talk) 03:20, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Okay, Bilby, here is the problem with the May 14 version. Going back to May 14 confirmed all the edit warring of Hipocrite. May 14 was a result of steady revert warring and wearing down of the article by Hipocrite, which wasn't confronted until May 21. Out of May 21, came some improvements. Nobody complained about the May 21 protection, because it was only for one week, and the only controversial edit that remained, my last one, was reverted by KimDabelsteinPetersen just before the protection. So, basically, progress had been made, and material that had been controversial was accepted, as balanced, and stable. May 21 was a stable version. There was also no controversy over the version of May 31. Both polls, taken together, showed no expressed opposition to either version, there were five editors, including the two supposed edit warriors (though I didn't edit war on June 1), who effectively agreed to both May 21 and May 31. There were other editors, including myself, who preferred June 1, where the material that had been reverted out on May 21 by KDP was reinserted with modification that had been negotiated in Talk in the meantime. One of the editors who preferred June 1 had not yet commented on May 21 or May 31 could be easily inferred to find those versions acceptable, and I include that in the five. He later confirmed that.

However, Hipocrite actually didn't like the material accepted on May 21, it involves the controversial hydrino theory. But it is sourced and notable. Hipocrite, in fact, would have preferred, I assume, the version he'd set up earlier, May 14. When GoRight arrived and, unfamiliar with the topic and the history, proposed May 14, based on a very superficial appearance of stability, Hipocrite jumped for it. So there were five editors who suppored May 21 or 31, May 31 was not under contention, and May 31 would have been the logical version to revert to if one wanted to take it back to "pre-edit war." WMC, instead, saw his old nemesis, GoRight propose May 14, and his overall POV friend, Hipocrite, propose the same. So it "amused" him, as he later said, to go for May 14. If he actually looked at the content, he'd see this very controversial theory about hydrinos, which people like Mathsci utterly reject and I've been condemned for supposedly pushing, and so, I'd guess, he'd not like it. That's speculation, and it is not debatable, from my POV, that May 14 was an improvement over as-protected. But that only speaks to how bad the as-protected version was. Zero support. It was in my poll.

WMC would never have been brought here over his edit under protection, it is merely a detail, a small contributing factor. His snarky edit summary is typical for WMC, no surprise to those who know him. It does show, however, that he did not expect consensus, and an edit under protection should be one that is expected to enjoy consensus. He knew there would be objection. That's a problem, Bilby, and a clear one. That revert, coupled with his ban of me from cold fusion, caused the loss of those rather hard-won changes. I do not support hydrino theory, I think it is not what is happening in cold fusion cells, and to me it is about 50-50 overall, total fraud or major discovery, but not about cold fusion. But it is covered in reliable source and it is notable. And so it should be there. The two actions together did damage to the article which still continues. There are others who might restore it, but, frankly, there has not been a very good example of how safe it is to restore sourced material from sources seeming to favor cold fusion, and editors who prefer to avoid conflict have learned to stay away from Cold fusion, and that covers many very good editors, including some scientists.

As it is, take a look at the present article, at Cold_fusion#Proposed_explanations. There are at least three seriously notable theories that have been proposed for the effects. As Storms notes, no theory has been widely accepted, but a theory does not have to be widely accepted to be reported as a "proposed explanation," it merely need be notable, covered in reliable source. I believe that there are more, Edward Teller, for example, proposed a theory based on a hypothesized particle he called the meshugganon. Perhaps a joke, but Teller was supportive of cold fusion at the time, and I have two reliable sources for it on my desk, plus [46]. Read the article. It basically implies that there are no theories, as it stands.

I'm certainly not perfect, but WMC banned the most knowledgeable editor working on the cold fusion article actively. There are various scientists who have started to help, but, for whatever reason, they've done little. Coppertwig is a scientist, and has done a little. PCarbonn and ScienceApologist are both scientists, both banned. (SA was not banned from CF Talk but didn't contribute there, and I understand why. We have to look at this ban thing.... --Abd (talk) 04:36, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

In my opinion, the most knowledgeable editor who is working on the cold fusion article is User:Kirk shanahan Cardamon (talk) 18:21, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Absolutely the best response here so far. What about Shanahan? He doesn't work on the article, he has been considered COI, and he has no agreement with Wikipedia guidelines. He has been a strong critic of cold fusion since the early 1990s (I researched it). He has (two?) papers published that are critical of cold fusion calorimetry, on the calorimetry issue he is very knowledgeable. And very biased toward his idiosyncratic opinion. His theories have received some response from researchers, so there is secondary source notability established, but there is no "mainstream" secondary source recognition of his ideas, and they are pretty much considered preposterous (rightly or wrongly) in the CF research community. His knowledge of the other issues, such as heat-helium correlation and the recent neutron findings, and he does comment on them on occasion, seems shallow and based upon instinctive rejection without evidence, a common problem in the field, i.e., claiming that there were no controls with the recent neutron findings (wrong) and claiming that if calorimetry could be bogus, and that helium measurements could represent helium leakage from ambient or contamination, then heat/helium correlation was therefore useless, as being based on possibly invalid measurements (wrong, that's the power of correlation, it can detect likely causal connection through major measurement noise; if the excess heat measurement is not real, why would it correlate, at a very significant Q value, with the measured helium? (In fact, correlation validates both otherwise doubtful measurements, showing that the hypothesized artifact isn't real. And the correlation reported in secondary RS is very strong.) I made sure that Shanahan's work was in the bibliography (it had been taken out, and not by myself or Pcarbonn). I had his deleted article User:Abd/Calorimetry in cold fusion experiments userfied for work (I agree that there should be a separate article, this is a major topic, with a huge amount of primary and secondary peer-reviewed source, and much of his work was good, fix the sourcing and a bit of POV, Pcarbonn had done some work on it.) I may be the only editor who understands his Calibration Constant Shift theory (the title does not tell it all). I would work to maintain his presence as an advisor. But "the most knowledgeable"? In some ways, more knowledgeable than I, in others, less. And where it counts for articles, knowledge of the state of the literature, and in a shifting field, the current literature, I think I'm beyond him. It doesn't really matter. Is there any other editor who is on the positive side for cold fusion who knows the literature more? That's really the issue. For the other side, could we get ScienceApologist back, please? If he'd just come on over for talk, and if I'm only on talk (say, I'm article-banned), it would be fine. We'd get the job done, I'm confident, particularly with discretionary sanctions in place. What a relief! --Abd (talk) 19:05, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

"the most knowledgeable editor working on the cold fusion article actively". What is the basis for this assertion? Mathsci (talk) 05:01, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Knowledge - and in particular, self-professed knowledge - has never been proof against a ban. Knowledge is somewhat orthogonal to successful editing here. A collaborative mindset, communication skills, inexhaustible patience, and equanimity in the face of vitriol are the essential skill set. Knowledge is nice, but not essential. That's the Wikipedia party line, anyway - taken to the extreme, you get swords and skeletons, but that is arguably exactly what has happened at cold fusion. MastCell ^Talk 05:13, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Absolutely. My claim is that the environment at Cold fusion is hostile to experts who actually know the field. I'm not exactly an "expert," I'm simply far more knowledgeable than the usual editor at the article. Mathsci, as far as I've been able to tell, knows nothing of the research literature, if he does, he's not revealed it, and he doesn't edit the article. I can tell when someone is knowledgeable. Enric Naval is hopeless as far as understanding, I could prove that if needed; but he does some good work digging up sources. Working on Oppenheimer-Phillips process with ScienceApologist, I had no doubt whatsoever about his knowledge, and the only issues were how to communicate that effectively. Whom would Mathsci propose as an editor working actively on the article with more knowledge of the literature than I? I'm not saying this thing about "more knowledgeable" to toot my own horn, I only have about six months of reading on the topic, and no formal training beyond a good basic physics background many, many years ago. Mathsci might have the capability of understanding the cold fusion issues, but I see no sign that he's applied himself. Cold fusion is at present an experimental field, with theory only under development, and cold fusion was only very speculatively predicted by Fleischmann from quantum field theory -- and he thought that the level of fusion would be below detection, but he decided to try looking for it. I.e., knowledge of quantum mechanics, which Mathsci might have, would be practically useless or worse than useless. It would tell you that cold fusion is impossible, because QM is based on two-body analysis, which is only accurate in a vacuum or plasma, not in condensed matter. I asked Mathsci to look at some math, Takahashi's work on Tetrahedral Symmetric Condensate (what I consider the major contender for a reasonable theory), and he did nothing. I asked a quantum physicist friend, who was interested, but who hasn't gotten back to me. It is not easy stuff. It's quantum field theory, which is notoriously difficult. Look, as to expertise, I'm simply asserting it, but I think that any editor who has interacted with me with an open mind has walked away with that understanding. That would include Coppertwig, who is a scientist. Why do you think Coppertwig has supported me? It includes quite a few other editors not involved with the article. Hey, why don't you ask JedRothwell? He probably knows the literature better than anyone else on the planet. Oh. Banned. He was COI, for sure, confined himself to talk since 2006, but was a bit, shall we say, blunt. As experts often are. I am not the one who has driven away experts. Lay that one on Enric Naval and JzG. Oh, yeah, and on MastCell. Hey, MastCell, how about checking out if the sky falls if you unblock JedRothwell? Not that it matters a great deal, Rothwell hadn't used that account since 2006, but your block gives Enric Naval an excuse to revert out any IP contribution to the talk page from Jed -- he always signs them -- as a "ban violation," even if the edit is perfectly helpful, which some of them are. How about allowing Enric to take the edits out if he thinks them problematic and another editor can bring them back in if the other editor finds them useful? --Abd (talk) 06:13, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Just an aside - can you please stop insulting Enric's understanding of material? You seem inclined to do it on both Cold fusion and in relation to the Oppenheimer-Phillips process, have done so many times, and it is bad form. - Bilby (talk) 07:25, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I wouldn't say that if I could not prove it, Bilby, but that would take quite a few words, and I'm writing too many already. If an arbitrator thinks it important, I'll respond in detail. Briefly, though, look at Enric's work on Oppenheimer-Phillips process before I started working on it, during that, and until ScienceApologist rode in to the rescue. You think I'm insulting him? Look at what he wrote about me. I'd been "deauthorized." He was insisting that I discuss, in Talk, obvious bloopers, such as writing about the "molecules" of a deuteron. There were other discussions, before, on Talk:Cold fusion, about edits to the article, where Enric showed that he didn't understand basic scientific concepts, such as correlation. Look, he doesn't represent himself as an expert, and "ignorance" can actually be helpful. If the editor is teachable. Usually, he eventually gets there. He still hasn't with "correlation." --Abd (talk) 11:55, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

My point is that your constant statements, made in many locations, that Enric is unable to understand the material, is an attack. I don't care whether or not you believe it - I do believe that it is bad form to keep making it. - Bilby (talk) 12:19, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) This completely misses MastCell's point. In addition Abd has not really answered my question. Mathsci (talk) 06:36, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

The six months of reading was about four hours per day, having bought a pile of relevant books, plus a donation of the expensive American Chemical Society Low-Energy Nuclear Reactions Sourcebook, the most recent (2008) major publication in the field, and having discussed the topic with many people, on and off-wiki. I don't see a sign of anyone else having done, now or before, that kind of work, banned editors excepted. People who do a lot of research on a topic tend to develop a POV, if they didn't have one before, and if we ban people for POV, we basically reduce the expertise backing our articles. The knowledge that is most important for actual editing is knowledge of the sources, and a non-scientist can gain that knowledge with hard work. That's JedRothwell, in fact, in the extreme. He has a copy of almost everything ever published in the field, which is a huge corpus, well over 3000 documents, his web site only has about a third of it because of permission problems. When I want to know what's in a difficult-to-find document, I ask Rothwell. I.e., I'm a "meat puppet." Some wiki we have here.

I was given the donation by Oxford University Press because I had earned the respect of one of the editors of it. I worked for that, I earned it. Mathsci, how much have you worked for this article? You gave me a copy of one very interesting review of Storms, by Sheldon, which I interpreted rather differently from you, you seized on a skeptical comment in it, but the review, overall, was practically glowing. That's the only positive contribution I can see, and I thanked you for it. --Abd (talk) 12:30, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I added the TOC of the ACS Sourcebook to Talk:Cold fusion and offered to assist any editor who wanted information about the contents. I had barely begun to use material from the Sourcebook, which is peer-reviewed reliable source, some primary (original work, including exact replication of the Energetic Technologies work in Israel that was recently covered on CBS Sixty Minutes,) and some reviews of the field, i.e., peer-reviewed secondary source, our gold standard, when I was banned. The ban was a lousy idea, quite damaging. Sure the article became quiet. Graveyards are quiet. --Abd (talk) 12:37, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

It's quite unlikely that 4 months of intensive reading can make somebody into an expert, even less so in a fringe topic. As MastCell has said, "knowledge" is irrelevant. It is important to be able to identify academic experts who have made statements in secondary sources. This might not be so easy for those without proper training in academic research or full access to journals. They could easily make mistakes. Mathsci (talk) 12:57, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

@Abd - Most of what you wrote seems to be off-topic. That said, if I understand correctly, you're arguing that the May 14 (15?) version, that WMC reverted to on GoRight's suggestion, was no good because it was the result of changes made by Hipocrite? Yet when I looked at the history, I noticed that you had made the last significant edit, and that almost all of Hipocrite's edits had been reverted - often by you. Indeed, the most frequent editor in the weeks leading up to that date was - surprisingly - you. The point is: WMC reverted to a version that had remained stable for 5 days, the longest single period for literally weeks. The next stable version was only stable for less than 24 hours (May 21), and then the page wasn't stable until it was protected. So WMC's action meets the criteria as outlined in policy. It met your desire of removing the language that you opposed in the lead, and (as you mentioned) it was better than the version protected. The only difference between it and your May 21 version were some wording changes in one paragraph. And it in no way prevented further discussion to find consensus on a final version. As far as I can tell, the only significant problems with the revert were that it was chosen without reference to the warring polls, and that you would have prefered a different wrong version. That said, I agree - this is not a major point. So, on those grounds, why is it an FoF? - Bilby (talk) 06:56, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I did a lot of work on May 10. That was hours of research and writing, reverted by Hipocrite. May 11, Kevin Bass restored it. Hipocrite reverted. Kevin Bass restored. Hipocrite reverted. That day, I restored it based on discussion. Verbal reverted. The version of May 14 was not stable, with an active controversy that then broke out in edit warring again on May 21. However, May 21, last standing edit, at protection, was Hipocrite's, where Hipocrite finally took one of the sections he'd been reverting out and added balancing sourced material. The sources were not of equal quality, but this was definitely better than the previous bald reverts, and this version was stable when protection came off. The next edit warring, June 1, was over re-insertion of the remaining material he'd been reverting out, after discussion on Talk, modified with additional sources and wording from Enric Naval. I'll stand with my analysis. --Abd (talk) 11:55, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

So the problem with May 14 is it was without new content you had added, in spite of the edit warring to include it? Material that was still lacking as of May 21? Seriously, the point still holds - it was the first stable version prior to the edit warring that led to two page protections, given that it remained unchanged for five days. Reverting always annoys someone. But reverting met policy by removing the edits that Hipocrite apparently made to game the system. While I accept that you don't like the version policy recommended, this does not amount to needlessly escalating the dispute. It is a standard response to edit warring. I understand why you, Abd, see it differently. I don't understand why some in ArbCom do, and I'd like to know what evidence they're using. - Bilby (talk) 12:46, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Just to be clear on one more point. "Content that I had added." Sure. Content added before May 14, reverted out repeatedly by Hipocrite, edit warring against me and Kevin Bass. Added again with additional sources May 21, reverted out repeatedly by Hipocrite, -- and I finally did more than one bald revert on May 21 -- but finally one section was accepted with acceptable balancing material by Hipocrite. That was consensus, without opposition, and that is what WMC removed. It had been very hard to get that single section in, but consensus had been found on that, and, I predict, consensus will be found on the remainder, unless every editor who becomes aware of these changes, understands them, and is willing to confront the article ownership by Enric Naval and friends is topic banned. hydrino theory isn't even covered in the mediation, because at the time mediation started, that section wasn't in controversy. It was in the article as protected.

Most editors, in fact, who might be qualified, stay away, and what happened to me is an object lesson, the final page of which is being written in this case. "Consensus" doesn't mean that Enric and Verbal and Hipocrite wanted the section in, enough to do it themselves. It means that it was accepted as properly sourced and balanced. The editors mentioned have a POV that determines what priorities they place on article content. Providing more information about what people working in the field have proposed as theories is way down the scale for them. Otherwise why, for so long, have we had an article with "proposed explanations" that gives none except for "experimental error" and a general comment based on passing mention in a tertiary sources that "all theories" are "ad-hoc." Any notable theories? May 21 had one, and there is another that was added June 1. Notable. Secondary source, including peer-reviewed (on the June 1 addition). Negotiated language with Enric Naval. It's preposterous, Bilby, and I believe that any neutral editor who takes the time to research it will agree. Our ordinary process eventually gets there, but not if one side is banned. If I misbehaved, please, ArbComm, address the misbehavior, specifically. A topic ban, on this topic, for me, is a sledgehammer, -- unless it is only a ban from editing articles, in which case it would be harmless. If I can propose changes and work on the Talk page, and especially with the help of a mentor -- which I will have in any case, whether ArbComm orders it or not -- I can do what needs to be done and all the work I put into this subject won't be wasted. --Abd (talk) 15:56, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Very simple, Bilby. The version of May 21, as protected, was stable. the new content had been accepted by Hipocrite and everyone else, there was no active protest, by editing or on Talk. Nobody attempted to remove anything from it when it came off protection, and nobody protested that the "wrong version" had been protected, unlike what happened with the June 1 protection. The version of May 31 wasn't controversial, it had a few additional changes. Both versions, proposed by Hipocrite in his poll and then added to mine for one-stop comparison, were unanimously approved by all involved editors who left comments as of WMC's revert (five). Even though May 31 was only "stable" for one day, none of the subsequent changes materially affected it, until WMC's revert. Reverting to May 14 undid progress in the article that was without objection. WMC was aware of the discussion, and his motive for May 14 has been explicitly stated, and it was not to return to a consensus version, he knew that it would be controversial. Standard response to edit warring and protection is to wait for a consensus from involved editors, not to pick a version approved by one edit warrior, barely proposed and not discussed, when many more were involved. "Policy" did not recommend that version, GoRight raised it for discussion (he did not approve it) and only Hipocrite actually approved it at the time. Verbal later approved it. Support for it in my poll -- it was added because of WMC's action -- was very weak, compared to May 21, 31, or, for that matter, June 1 before gaming. It was difficult, to be sure, but normal editorial process was working, even with the presence of Hipocrite's provocations. WMC's intervention wasn't needed, nor was it asked for, AFAIK. (However, when WMC was asked about Talk ban notification of Hipocrite (never done), there was a hint of off-wiki communication, with explicit mention by WMC of "deniable." It's unclear what that means. If anyone cares, I'll dig up the diff.) --Abd (talk) 13:28, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

We've been over the polls. I still disagree with your claim about their state. But again - policy states that administrators may revert back to the last stable version prior to the edit war in order not to reward edit warriors. The last stable version, which lasted for 5 days, was May 14. WMC reverted to that. May 31 was stable because on May 22 the page was protected, was unprotected around May 31, and the next edit war didn't start until June 1. WMC's revert didn't prevent further efforts to find consensus about what to revert to. It didn't prevent requests to make changes. It was within policy. And it met your repeated request to remove the version that was protected. I know you didn't like the chosen version. But it was a perfectly reasonable move for an administrator to make. And that's my concern. I'm done - as per normal, further discussion will clearly get as nowhere. - Bilby (talk) 13:54, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Forget the "polls." What did the editors say? I don't understand what Bilby means about disagreeing with the "polls." I didn't refer only to the polls. I did not request that any edit under protection be made. I requested unprotection at RfPP, pointing out that both editors who were supposedly edit warring June 1, Hipocrite and I, (actually, the basic edit warrior June 1 was Hipocrite, but I agreed to try to facilitate unprotection) had agreed not to edit the page, but that was denied, so I was working to find explicit agreement, quickly, on a version to revert to so we could go back to RfPP and get an edit, and we weren't quite there, though, in fact, there was probably enough to make a single proposal on Talk for the May 31 version, already with no opposition, quickly get confirmation of that, and go to RfPP. At most, another two days or so. Later comments and votes confirmed May 31 as accepted by all. Even though that version was on first sight "stable" for only one day, if you look at the edit contents, the content of May 31 was stable (with very little difference from May 21, not under dispute), and edit warring on June 1 was only over additional content. Talk about wikilawyering! The above is a content-free argument by Bilby over "stability," as if an article version wasn't stable, completely rejected, because some small new section was subject to edit warring over insertion/reversal. We have to stop meeting like this. --Abd (talk) 15:36, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

As I said, I'm done. You continue to miss my main point - that WMC's actions to revert to the first stable version that predated the edit wars was within policy. And that such a revert didn't stop anyone from continuing to find consensus, requesting a change, or otherwise following normal DR. But what's the point of continuing to discuss it? If I bite (yet again) on any of the off topic stuff, we'll just wander further away from my question - which is now happily lost in the verbiage - and the cycle will continue. If an arb feels like pointing out to me - and it is an honest question - why WMC's action to revert under policy to a stable version was escalating the problem rather than a standard admin action, I'd appreciate it. And I acknowledge that it might be - I just can't see how, other than clearly upsetting one of the edit warriors. But first they'd have to find my question. - Bilby (talk) 15:53, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes. The revert did not stop everyone from finding consensus, but then he banned a major worker on the article, the only one bringing in significant new material, carefully researched and sourced, which did. The mediation is progressing, but glacially. It is far more efficient to run WP:BRD. I could ask others to make edits to the article, but I haven't. Short Brigade Harvester, you may now do the honors: --Abd (talk) 18:02, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Bilby (and everyone else), can you please refrain from responding to Abd unless absolutely necessary? This page is becoming just as bloated and wandering as the Evidence and Workshop pages, meaning that the arbs won't read it. You're never going to persuade Abd of anything, and each response only gives him an excuse to add more kilobytes. Let him have the last word -- otherwise your points will get buried under all the back and forth. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:49, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Edit-warring on the request for arbitration

A finding that I edit-warred on the RfAr is shaky, based on the diffs presented and the reality. There are three diffs presented of mine. Two represented attempts to add parties to the case, which, whether it was proper or not (it was certainly not obviously improper, two of the additions stuck for a time, and I was never told that I could not do that by a clerk or arbitrator), wasn't edit warring. The edit warring was in the removal of them by others. So unexpected was this to me that when Mathsci removed his name from the list, and I came back to add the notification diff, I saw his name missing, and it did not even occur to me that he would have removed it, so, thinking that I'd made some error in saving the edit, since I had the window open, I put it back. Rather silly to add the notification without the name, eh? Technically, that was a partial revert, but the intention was absolutely not to edit war. --Abd (talk) 13:01, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd's edit summary when he added my name said "okay, Mathsci insists". This followed my own posting [47] two days earlier on the request page. I ended this post with a reply to Abd: In response to Abd's idea of including me as a party, I will add that almost all my interactions with Abd have been on the talk page of cold fusion where, with other trained scientists, I have tried outline how to use and identify academic scientific sources properly. I have been unsuccessful, because as with EdChem and Kirk shanahan, Abd is evasive about issues of secondary sources. Unlike Abd almost all my namespace edits are in uncontroversial mainstream areas in the sciences and the arts (e.g. the most recent The Four Seasons (Poussin)). That was clearly an explanation of why I played little or no role in these events and it was therefore inappropriate to include me as a party.

I will apologize a third time for breaking ArbCom etiquette by twice removing my name within a period of 20 minutes. Mathsci (talk) 13:39, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

No claim is being made here that my addition was "proper." No arbitrator or clerk has stated that it was "improper." Mathsci defends an action, though, that was clearly improper, based on moot arguments; this wasn't mere etiquette, it was edit warring on a process page, where there is hardly ever any excuse. Mathsci was involved in certain ways, and there are proposed sanctions being voted on, so what he was doing was edit warring over something completely moot, i.e., as having commented, he was already possibly an effective party, I was just making it explicit. I did not present evidence, but his behavior here reflects prior behavior, it wasn't particularly anomalous. The off-wiki "incivility" (I oppose that finding and sanction, on principle as to off-wiki behavior, but I could show on-wiki incivility and harassment, there simply isn't enough time in a day for dealing with a mass of editors as distinct from one -- as with RfAr/Abd and JzG) was begun by Mathsci, and discussion had been going on for some time before I arrived to respond (on Wikipedia Review).

Parties can be added at any time; my understanding was that they may be added in the Request up until the Request is closed to open a case or it is rejected, and I've seen no contradiction of that, and they may later be added by motion, but it is actually only a minor point, and the only "advantage" that Mathsci gained by removal of his name was that his comments couldn't be put in the more featured responses by parties on the Workshop. It was pure, POINTy edit warring, as if a named party could unname himself. --Abd (talk) 15:18, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I have explained the context, not given any excuses but apologized again. Casliber wrote on the PD page that I appeared to be exasperated and I think that was a very accurate way to describe things. As for the thread on Wikipedia Review, it was started with reference only to me, WMC and Enric Naval: Abd was not even mentioned before he arrived. The discussion initially was a rehash of the running joke on WR that WMC, Charles Matthews and I are the same person (groan) ...Mathsci (talk) 15:53, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't mentioned? The name of the thread is Abd-William M. Connolley, The Cabal strikes back. (The Cabal, what cabal? It was considered obvious there. What were they striking back for? Grep doesn't say, but I will. JzG.) The post starting the thread quotes editors mentioning me, WMC, Enric Naval, and Mathsci. My name is mentioned in that first post, fairly brief, thirteen times. Mathsci, in his first post, refers to the Sheldon paper, which is about an incident between him and I. (He provided me with a copy of a paper that showed the opposite of what he had been claiming it would show. Very useful paper, to show the overall positive reception by a mainstream scientist of Storms' The Science of Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (World Scientific, 2007), rejected as fringe by the cabal editors, and I thanked him.) My first comment in that thread, quite a time later, was mild by WR standards, I noted that he was being more civil there than on Wikipedia. His response implied that I was lying in the RfAr. Mathsci then got very, very personal in his responses, referring to my age, as implying serious disability, and it went downhill from there. And I responded in kind, which is more or less expected there. It's a bit like a rough bar, WR. My view is that off-wiki behavior should not be brought on-wiki, period -- excepting true (and illegal) harassment, which this didn't rise to, but I find it very odd that I'm being admonished for incivility, apparently based on the WR comments, and Mathsci's prior admonishment, originally parallel is being downgraded to a reminder by the same arbs !voting to support my admonishment. Very strange indeed. Are these arbitrators actually reading the evidence? What's the evidence for my incivility that doesn't also cover Mathsci's? A single quote ripped out of context by Raul654 on a talk page at one point? What? --Abd (talk) 16:39, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I've been rereading the conversation at Wikipedia Review, linked above. If anyone is interested in my approach to Wikipedia, what I believe I was doing, the basis for my actions, and, as well, the development of the "incivility" asserted in the findings, it's all there, very frankly laid out in detail, with no attempt to conceal or cover up anything. I'm responsible for what I wrote there, I wasn't joking about my intentions, though there is also banter, the "incivility stuff" that should be understood in context. A lot of reading, to be sure, but I'd recommend that arbitrators understand what they are doing, and reading that could be useful for background. Read it all, not just my comments or Mathsci's. It includes frank comment by many Wikipedia editors (and editors are identifiable, I think you must disclose editor account to register), and there is more at WR thread about Scibaby. There are comments in both places that would be utterly and absolutely out of place on Wikipedia, and arbitrators will, I assume, understand that. On WR, an editor may simply say what they think, they may be playful or serious. As I point out in one discussion, among very bright people, such as among undergraduates at Caltech, where I first encountered this, what would ordinarily be considered rank incivility is normal chit-chat, banter. A warm body would understand that, dork! (Exact quote from normal undergrad Caltech banter, ca 1963, a "warm body" was defined as someone who could tell the difference between day and night.) Context for claims of incivility are very, very important. Yes, there was true incivility there, but judging it would require much more depth of analysis than simply looking at what words are used. Here, on Wikipedia, if I need to, I would call someone "uncivil." There, I'd simply say that the person is being an "asshole." The meaning is quite the same. What seems to be approved most on WR is being bold, insightful, direct, frank, and without restraint. I'd say that's good, if confined to willing participants. My walls of text are unpopular there, but it's also clear: some read them and appreciate them, and one long comment in the Scibaby thread was actually edited down, and very well, by another editor. I'd been thinking of bringing it here and putting it in my evidence or arguments. It's civil. --Abd (talk) 17:03, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

If the finding of incivility is based on your comments at Wikipedia Review, then it should be removed. It is a mistake to apply Wikipedia-specific behavioral policies to outside sites. While obvious exceptions might be made for harassment or egregiously offensive material, it appears in this case that neither party took the off-site needling particularly seriously. It would thus be all the more odd for the Committee to step in and take offense at off-site postings when neither of the "targets" of those postings appears particularly bothered by them.

ArbCom itself set a reasonable bar here, in a previous case:

"A user's conduct outside of Wikipedia, including participation in websites or forums critical of Wikipedia or its contributors, is generally not subject to Wikipedia policies or sanctions, except in extraordinary circumstances such as those involving grave acts of overt and persistent harassment or threats."

I realize there's no precedent and no stare decisis here, but it's worth considering whether those principles ought to apply to this case. MastCell ^Talk 20:34, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with MastCell. I don't think I attacked Abd off-wiki; I poked fun at him for his ludicrous statements about a Cabal. This is however completely irrelevant to wikipedia. Indeed on wikipedia at no stage during this ArbCom case did I make any kind personal attack on Abd to my knowledge. As part of the normal functioning of this case, I have criticized his actions on wikipedia, which are extremely problematic and are being repeated here. If I had indeed made any kind of personal attack, needless to say at least two thirds of the workshop page would have been devoted to it. That is not the case. One other thing to bear in mind is that I have created two fairly detailed namespace articles since this case began. That is already far more than Abd has done in his lifetime on wikipedia. 22:19, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

(<) If Mathsci was rrefering to this thread, it has to be said his description of it is so far from the truth as to be inexcusably misleading. Glenbow Goat (talk) 18:14, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Glenbow Goat (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - their first edit. Or is it? Mathsci (talk) 19:12, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

General comment 2

I note with regret that my request that comments on this page be kept succinct and non-repetitious has not been adhered to. Although I will read through all the comments before voting on the case tonight, this situation substantially reduces the value of the discussion to the arbitrators. Newyorkbrad (talk) 21:02, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

The total length of the page is 340,000 characters. Abd's contribution to this runs (at the moment) to just over 160,000 characters. He is singlehandedly responsible for 47% of the text here. Suffering great fatigue of spirit, I couldn't bring myself to tally GoRight's comments as well, but he is almost certainly the second-largest contributor.

It seems superfluous to note that participating in any form of dispute resolution with Abd is doomed to be painful and exhausting, and that the wall-of-text wear-them-down approach shows no sign of abating. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:04, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

"Suffering great fatigue of spirit, I couldn't bring myself to tally GoRight's comments as well, but he is almost certainly the second-largest contributor." - Really? I've barely said anything on this page. If you haven't tallied my contributions here, how can you make this statement? Also, are you factoring out quotes I include for context? For example, this post is almost 1/3 to 1/2 quotation. --GoRight (talk) 01:50, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I actually skim through large amounts of text, trying to pick out the important points. Because I do this, I don't have a problem with large posts, and when reading long threads, I do try to focus on what individuals say, rather than the volume (i.e. if someone only says one thing that is very relevant, I try and pay more attention to that than to walls of text from one person). It is part of the skill-set arbitrators need to develop to deal with large cases (whether all arbitrators do develop such skills, I don't know). See speed reading and skimming. Having said that, I accept that most editors and arbitrators can't be expected to deal with large amounts of text, so (regardless of the good or bad quality of what Abd says), I'm going to be pushing for some form of remedy that limits that specifically for Abd and in general for all cases. There are some arbitrators, of course, who can type away for quite a while as well - picking the right moment to do that is something that requires judgment, and I hope that most arbitrators that type long posts know when they are going too far. Abd, on the other hand, seems to type lots most of the time, which is not good. What is more of a problem (from several people here) is the amount of repetition and contradiction. That impedes comprehension as much as length of posts does. Carcharoth (talk) 23:14, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Brad, one thing I find useful, is if a point comes up that you are not sure about, instead of looking up long discussions or contradictory evidence, it is sometimes quicker just to ask one or other of the parties a direct question. That is what I will be doing if I need reassurance from either of them on any particular point. Carcharoth (talk) 23:25, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I have to agree with Newyorkbrad on this one. The fact that some participants here have nearly entirely ignored NYB's earlier message and have blithely continued on in the same vein disturbs me more than the content of the posts themselves. As to speed reading, I find that it is only useful when reading for pure content, not context; even still, minor points can be missed, particularly if they are somewhat off the core topic. Risker (talk) 23:44, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I want to apologise for adding to the volume on that score - I bit when I should have known better. It happens, but that doesn't excuse it. - Bilby (talk) 23:59, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Since TOAT is so fascinated by the net edit sizes

Since TOAT is so fascinated by the net edit sizes, here are the net edit sizes of this talk page: Net Edit Sizes by User As of 01:50, 22 August 2009 Abd 161851 43.9% Raul654 21189 5.7% Carcharoth 19339 5.2% Thatcher 13575 3.7% Bilby 13391 3.6% MastCell 11850 3.2% GoRight 11486 3.1 % TenOfAllTrades 9414 2.6% Enric Naval 6857 1.9% Mythdon 6455 1.8% Crohnie 6129 1.7% Mathsci 5796 1.6% Woonpton 4922 1.3% Short Brigade Harvester Boris 4835 1.3% Cool Hand Luke 4697 1.3% Tony Sidaway 4457 1.2% Rlevse 3962 1.1% William M. Connolley 2826 0.8% BozMo 2756 0.7% Shell Kinney 2660 0.7% WorriedScientist 2644 0.7% Phil153 2445 0.7% Stephan Schulz 2334 0.6% Master&Expert 2320 0.6% FloNight 2090 0.6% Hersfold non-admin 1985 0.5% Beetstra 1536 0.4% Guettarda 1306 0.4% 198.161.174.222 1173 0.3% Fritzpoll 1171 0.3% Cardamon 1075 0.3% Casliber 1023 0.3% ATren 976 0.3% Spartaz 860 0.2% Socrates2008 767 0.2% Dreadstar 695 0.2% Taad Laet 630 0.2% Splette 563 0.2% Protonk 525 0.1% Risker 511 0.1% Viridae 496 0.1% Wizzy 491 0.1% Coppertwig 437 0.1% 2over0 379 0.1% Verbal 326 0.1% IronDuke 281 0.1% Paul August 256 0.1% Hal peridol 136 0.0% Malcolmxl5 131 0.0% Ryan Postlethwaite 36 0.0% So much for TOAT's "[GoRight] is almost certainly the second-largest contributor." If we were to subtract off the parts where I tend to quote what I am responding to for context, TOAT has almost certainly posted more here than I have! Why this matters, I haven't a clue. --GoRight (talk) 02:37, 22 August 2009 (UTC) You're right. I was going by impressions, and over the history of the entire case you've made a large number of posts; I hasn't realized that you had been much more restrained of late. (Recall, as well, that you were the second-largest contributor to the discussion of Abd's ban on AN/I, after Abd himself.) I apologize for my mistaken impression. In turn, I would also urge caution in interpreting the statistics. By far the largest single post I made to this page – representing more than half of my total character count on this page – included 4700 characters of verbatim quotations in response to a specific query from Thatcher. In any event, your statistics (how did you compile those? It must have taken ages!) confirm my main point — Abd has added an astoundingly disproportionate amount of material to this page. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 03:13, 22 August 2009 (UTC) "It must have taken ages!" - Depends what what you consider to be "ages". Judging from the timestamps on when I first replied to you and then made the first post of this material it was less than 45-50 minutes. I just took the talk page history as of my 01:50 post, dumped it into an editor, tweaked the content to simply leave the user's name and the page size as of that edit, then dumped that into Excel. A few calculations and some copy pastes, and viola, a ready made table. Some part of that time was converting it to wiki table syntax (which I did with the same editor, notepad++). --GoRight (talk) 03:24, 22 August 2009 (UTC) Looks like TOAT wasn't that far off. The actual second-largest contributor has only 2.6% contributions more than you :) SPLETTE :] How's my driving? 03:46, 22 August 2009 (UTC) But of course that's like a whopping 184% of what I contributed and that doesn't account for my use of quoting. --GoRight (talk) 05:21, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Brief thoughts in lieu of posting to the workshop

Taking Raul's list of concerns, adding my own thoughts.

Type of Misbehavior	Arbitration remedy
*Driving away subject matter experts	Proposed one year ban from cold fusion and related. Raul complains this is only for one year but the community has shown a capacity for reinstating expired bans when they continue to be needed, or an amendment can be filed.
*Revert warring	Proposed 1RR per week. Seems sufficient.
*Drowning out others with numerous overly long talk page posts	Proposed one talk post per day per page. Seems sufficient.
*Using talk pages as off-topic discussion forums	Proposed one talk post per day per page. Seems sufficient.
*Fringe POV pushing	Proposed one year ban from cold fusion and related. See above.
*Wikilawyering	This does not seem to require a specific Arbcom remedy, rather, it requires admins handling Abd issues to apply a robust filter. Take enough input to make an informed decision, then make it. The talk page limits will help somewhat here.
*Falsely claiming the existance of a cabal against him *Conducting breaching experiments *Disruption of dispute resolution proceedings *Personal Attacks *Ignoring Warnings *Making veiled threats against others	These I think are legitimate concerns. You have proposed finding him in breach of your advice, and so you are escalating to admonished. It seems to me that a general conduct remedy is required. All of these issues fall under the general heading of Wikipedia:Disruptive editing. Abd meets several criteria defined in that essay, you can see for yourself on this page. Also interesting is this discussion of whether to lift a topic ban on someone else, Abd has only two articles in common with the editor in question and yet he (and GoRight to a lesser degree) monopolize large chunks of the discussion with irrelevant arguments on side issues (and Abd was blocked for harassment). I suggest a remedy that Abd may be blocked for disruptive editing on any page and over any issue, with a requirement that he be warned on his talk page by an admin that is conduct is disruptive and that if he persists he will be blocked--for each incident. In other words, show him where the line is that he has crossed or is in danger of crossing. You could require that he not involve himself in any dispute or argument to which he is not an original party without approval of his mentor, but I don't think the mentorship will work. You could require that he not involve himself in any dispute or argument to which he is not an original party period, but that will only address some of these issues. It may also be advisable to apply that to other editors in this case.
*Meatpuppetry/proxy editing on behalf of banned users	This is an extremely dangerous issue and you approach it at your peril. Raul wants a clear instruction that replacing edits of a banned or blocked editor is a bannable offense and the edits may be reverted without considering their merits. This incidentally would help him in his crusade against Scibaby, whom he blames GoRight for being a meatpuppet of. But principle 6 as stated contains a presumption of guilt until proven innocent. As applied to admins, it could have supported sanctions against Crum375 and SlimVirgin, who has similar opinions and interests on animal rights articles. It would also apply to Raul654 and WMC on global warming articles, where they share a common activity and point of view. On editors it could apply not only to the fringe science people, but mainstream science editors, the "IDCAB", Jewish, Palestinian, Armenian, Azeri, and every other interest area. If as Brad says, there was no coordinated editing, and no relevant findings of fact, better to drop the principle. Apply sanctions to named editors (if they deserve it) or apply discretionary sanctions (article probation) to articles that seem to be targets for disruptive editors no matter what side they are on.

--Thatcher 01:01, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Thatcher, I know you've posted here "in lieu of the workshop", but since you've clearly studied the case, it might be helpful to me and other arbitrators if you were to draft a proposed remedy that you think might be suitable here. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:16, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

• Yuck. OK, I'll give it a think. Thatcher 02:20, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

OK, tear it up. Thatcher 05:21, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Regarding the one talk page post per day, I think it needs a word limit to deal with the wall of text problem. As written, Abd could respond to multiple threads in a single edit, with long posts at each point. He could also raise multiple points in a single huge post. A 500 word limit should be plenty to say whatever he wants. In fact, a short word limit per talk page per day (250 words?), instead of a post limit, might be more effective, and encourage the development of brevity and focus. It would also allow timely conversation in areas where Abd is collaborating productively. Phil153 (talk) 01:35, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

If we are going to start imposing daily word count limits, they should apply equally to all editors, not just Abd. --GoRight (talk) 03:05, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Sure, when you can show me another editor who can write as much in 3 days as 39 other editors combined, I'll proposed a restriction for him, too. Understand me clearly: today's featured article, Noël Coward, is 74,000 bytes. Abd could have written it twice in the last 3 days just based on his posts to this page alone. It is a form of monopolizing the conversation and driving other editors away, even if that is not the intent. Thatcher 04:21, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I understand that you don't want Abd writing MORE than other editors, but you can't reasonably restrict him to LESS without giving others an unfair advantage in these discussions. If other editors are allowed 1500 words a day, he should be allowed a comparable amount. Letting others have unlimited posts and holding him to 500 words per day would be completely unfair. And for what it's worth, Enric is no slouch in the verbiage department and he is every bit as strong minded as Abd is (see his evidence for support of those points). If you restrict Abd's word count but not Enric's, merely as an example, you are clearly skewing things in Enric's favor. Factor in the numbers of editors on each side in these discussions and it becomes even more unfair. I'm just sayin' ... --GoRight (talk) 05:01, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

A word limit is conceptually appealing but would be cumbersome to apply. This would be the case both in practical terms (who will count the words every day?) and with regard to the inevitable lawyering over whether 501 words is a substantive violation, whether quotes of others' material should count, and the like. The one edit per day restriction is clear and readily enforceable. It's not a burden to skim a single large block of text; the problem is when there's an incessant barrage of them. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 04:59, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Both you and Phil make good arguments on each side. Thatcher 05:24, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Very simple solution - 500 words is roughly 2000 characters or 2500 bytes. Limit him in terms of those. Neither is subject to wikilawyering, and the byte count is automatically calculated in the page history, in fact. Raul654 (talk) 16:34, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

On the Meat puppet issue above, are you in favor of allowing Raul to label anyone who expresses a skeptical POV against AGW as a meat puppet of Scibaby and, ultimately, indefinitely blocking them? If not, then what is your guidance on "how different" some expression of skepticism has to be from ANYTHING that Scibaby ever wrote in order for it to safe to be uttered again? You know how he will use this, the question is whether you (ArbCom) are going to let him or not. --GoRight (talk) 05:11, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

a) not part of this case, and b) the policy (not WP:MEAT but Wikipedia:Ban#Editing_on_behalf_of_banned_users) has been in place and able to deal with this for a long time. Thatcher 05:35, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd statistics

Analysis of Abd edits to this page

In support of some possible findings and proposals I was asked to post on the workshop, I decided to count up Abd's contributions to this page, by length (since the history gives the page length before and after each edit). Abd has 75 edits to this page to date. Working backwards, I only got as far as 00:03 on 19 August before I gave up (that's 73 hours, or a little over 3 days ago).

• Since 00:03 19 Aug, there have been 286 edits to this page, 60 by Abd (21%)
• Since 00:03 19 Aug this page has grown from 83 244 bytes to 337 090 bytes (increase of 253 846)
• Abd has contributed in that time, 122 643 bytes, or 48% of the total.
• His mean post size is 2452 bytes, or approximately 270 words (using the old typing standard average of 8 characters plus one space per word)
• His longest post is 8684 bytes, or 964 words.
• He averages 1668 bytes per hour (185 words) and 40046 bytes (4449 words) per day. Thatcher 02:14, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Just a correction, character to word conversion is about 5.7, including spaces. Method: copy/pasting a few Abd posts into Word/Writer. Phil153 (talk) 02:23, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Hm, I get the same figure over the whole page, too. Then using a figure of 6 bytes per word, Abs's mean size is 408 words, longest is 1447, hourly average is 278 and daily average is 6674.

Average of all others editors, 158 words per post. Thatcher 04:16, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

If this is intended as evidence to support a workshop proposal, could I ask that it be moved to the Evidence page? This is (supposed) to be for discussing the PD, and since there are no proposals addressing this directly, it's in the wrong place. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 04:21, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I have posted a workshop. Ring up a clerk, they can do whatever they want with this. It's not really used directly in my workshop, if it was, I might have analyzed the whole case. As it is, I find it astonishing that Abd has the time to essentially write a featured article every two days. Thatcher 05:23, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Some of this methodology is suspect. I absolutely agree that Abd posts too much too often, but I won't stand by and see statistics mangled! :-) "Average of all others editors, 158 words per post" - when you have a long tail of small contributions, this sort of average is misleading. Medians and modes are better as a first approximation. The main point here though is that no correction has been done to weight for number of editors responding to Abd. If five editors respond to something Abd says, and Abd replies to all of them, you will naturally see Abd posting more. Similarly, this analysis lacks a control. You need to compare to other cases where there are "few" against "many" (in this case, about 3-4 against 8-10, I think). The extreme I can remember is a case where there was one (Aitias) against many (3-4 others). In such cases, the minority side will end up saying more, mostly to rebut what the other side says. That may not be ideal, and I have raised before several ways such situations could be addressed within the word limits, but it is difficult to get an approach that fits all cases. For the record, I agree with the points GoRight raised above. If you are going to limit someone, you need to not unbalance things so that those arguing against them get to say more. My view is that multiple people arguing on the same "side" should (with faint echoes of WP:MEAT here) get a combined "quota", though the problem there is that this can divide people into camps that battle it out, and you will always get people that want to claim a middle ground, or speak for both sides, or speak as an independent voice. Ideally, everyone would speak as an independent voice, but in practice that tends not to happen as people gravitate to one side or other of a dispute (funnily enough [note sarcasm], disputes tend to get resolved when that doesn't happen, and someone tries to be objective and to see the valid points made on both sides, if any). Disputes that may have started small will gather more and more people on either side as the dispute rumbles on, eventually arriving at arbitration if it is not resolved. Because of this, it is hardly surprising that at each stage of the dispute, the "usual suspects" turn up on both sides. This can give the appearance of a cabal, but it is not. It is rather an artifact of the dispute resolution process where the same disputes get rehashed and reheated until (if not resolved) someone takes it to arbitration. Carcharoth (talk) 12:44, 22 August 2009 (UTC) Yeah, I know, long post - I will be voting on the case later today, and will cut down on posts to this page...

Thatcher, I did analyze the whole case (at least the whole case at the time I did the analysis, on August 12-14 or thereabouts), in response to a question Carcharoth asked, if there was any truth to the assertion made by someone that Abd and his followers were responsible for the bulk of the verbiage on the case. I didn't realize (hadn't noticed) that the history gives the size before and after each edit, so I did it laboriously by hand, pasting groups of posts into a text counter and tallying the results; it took me two long days. At that time, the case (evidence and workshop, not counting posts by clerks and arbitrators, and not counting talk pages) contained 1,157,202 characters of text, of which 794,948, or 69%, were contributed by Abd, GoRight, Coppertwig, Ikip and Objectivist. In other words, "Abd and his followers" had contributed more than 2/3 of the text in the case, or to put it a different way, Abd and his followers (principally Abd; the others added relatively little in comparison) contributed more than twice as much text as all other contributors to the case combined.

Also, as a rough way to test the hypothesis that Abd's verbiage was necessary in order to respond to multiple commenters on the "other side", I took the top five posters on each "side" in order to make a roughly reasonable comparison (Abd, GoRight, Objectivist, Coppertwig, and Ikip) (Raul,WMC, Stephan Schultz, Enric Naval, and Bilby) and counted the responses of just these two groups of contributors to the proposals that came from the two "sides". The "Abd group" contributed an average of 4,025 characters of text to the "Abd group" proposal sections; the other group together contributed an average of 2,727 characters to these sections. To the proposals offered by opponents, the "Abd group" contributed an average of 3,802 characters of text per proposal, the opposing group contributed an average of 2,673 characters per proposal. In other words, the "Abd group" spent more verbiage defending their own proposals than they did answering proposals from the other side. The idea, promoted again and again in this case by Abd, and apparently taken at face value by some arbitrators, that the reason Abd had to write so much was that his opponents were simply overwhelming him with a deluge of things he "had" to respond to, is simply not supported by the data. The deluge is coming from the other direction.

I am troubled by the battleground mentality here that assumes that this really is a case of Abd against the cabal, as if there were some reality to this cabal idea, and so it makes sense that Abd should have to fend off all these other 39 people, singlehandedly. This is an absurd idea. Abd listed me in the cabal, but he put me there, I didn't put myself there. Yes, I have concerns, as an outside observer, about the quality of content in areas of fringe science, but I don't always agree with the methods or the positions of others who share that concern. My voice is an independent voice; I am on no one's side but the side of the encyclopedia, and if you discount my statistics because I'm in the "cabal" that just reinforces and exacerbates this misguided idea that this is a battle between Abd and the rest of the world. I got no response from Carcharoth when I answered his question with these figures, which is why I'm presenting it again here, because I'm not sure anyone saw it. (If I could remember where that was, I'd link it, but I don't, and haven't the heart to look through the case again to find it.) Woonpton (talk) 14:57, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Thatcher, FYI: Hersfold is the clerk. :) hmwitht 16:12, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Carcharoth, I don't think limiting Abd's post volume will disadvantage him with regard to other, unrestricted editors. I certainly wouldn't conclude that fewer posts equals a weaker position in a Wikipedia debate. Lengthy and frequent posts are not necessarily more convincing - if anything, just the opposite. My experience has been that editors able to express themselves concisely and selectively are much more effective than those compelled to post lengthy point-by-point rebuttals ten times a day. Susan Sontag proposed that "as the prestige of language falls, that of silence rises." In that respect, limiting Abd's posting is less a punishment than a firm push in the direction of being a more effective editor. MastCell ^Talk 23:03, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe. I'd assumed that a mentor would help me in that direction, and if I survive this RfAr as an editor, I'll be "hiring" a mentor in any case, and normal situations would not call forth anything like what this RfAr did. Look at my filing in RfAr/Abd and JzG, or, for that matter, my filing here.

I'm not particularly concerned about limitations on the number of posts, or the volume, if it's properly designed. I rather doubt that a good design is likely under RfAr conditions, though, that's why mentorship is better (mentorship with teeth!). MastCell, I don't post "lengthy point by point rebuttals ten times a day," but when people say I do, sometimes I respond that I don't. If you look at the bulk of my writing here, I'm not "rebutting," mostly, I'm asserting, I'm discussing what are really major policy issues and long-term Wikipedia problems. Sure, I've got a problem with length. Or some editors have a problem with my length, does it really matter whose problem it is?

I'm much more concerned about the possibility of a topic ban. I've written that I could handle a full site "ban," excepting only my user space, and continue to contribute very positively, if I were allowed to make self-reverted edits outside my user space, which completely address the alleged length problems, if you think about it. I do wish editors would think about it, i.e., about the actual problems and how to actually address them in ways that reflect cooperation instead of coercion and punishment and blame. The latter never works, long term, it just sets up a whack-a-mole situation. Don't worry, I won't sock, but someone else will pop up if I'm gone and the core problems are not addressed. --Abd (talk) 00:40, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree that you don't tend to post long point-by-point rebuttals. I meant that as a generic illustration. Your style is different. You make good points at times, but they are buried within a stream of consciousness that leaves other editors at a loss to respond to them. MastCell ^Talk 02:39, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Net Edit Sizes (Bytes) of this Talk Page as of 23:27, 22 August 2009

Net Edit Sizes (Bytes) Name Net Edit Size Edit Count Average Net Edit Size Average Words 2over0 379 1 379 42 Casliber 1023 4 255 28 Short Brigade Harvester Boris 5487 21 261 29 Cool Hand Luke 4697 17 276 30 Viridae 496 1 496 55 Cla68 258 1 258 28 Paul August 256 2 128 14 MastCell 11850 16 740 82 Woonpton 8570 8 1071 119 Phil153 2664 5 532 59 Beetstra 1536 4 384 42 Dreadstar 695 1 695 77 Malcolmxl5 131 1 131 14 Raul654 21691 33 657 73 Carcharoth 22057 23 959 106 GoRight 16632 26 639 71 Verbal 326 1 326 36 Socrates2008 767 3 255 28 Tony Sidaway 4457 19 234 26 Mythdon 6455 17 379 42 Hmwith 285 1 285 31 Coppertwig 1202 3 400 44 Guettarda 1306 2 653 72 Hersfold non-admin 1985 3 661 73 Mathsci 5796 12 483 53 TenOfAllTrades 10536 7 1505 167 Thatcher 16539 33 501 55 Splette 1332 4 333 37 Taad Laet 630 1 630 70 Enric Naval 6857 12 571 63 Rlevse 3962 2 1981 220 Crohnie 6129 4 1532 170 198.161.174.222 1173 2 586 65 Bilby 13554 24 564 62 WorriedScientist 2644 4 661 73 Shell Kinney 2660 2 1330 147 Hal peridol 136 1 136 15 92.39.200.29 0 1 0 0 Master&Expert 2320 3 773 85 Coren 398 1 398 44 Spartaz 860 3 286 31 Risker 511 1 511 56 Stephan Schulz 2334 8 291 32 Fritzpoll 1171 2 585 65 Ryan Postlethwaite 36 2 18 2 Newyorkbrad 1418 3 472 52 Ikip 602 2 301 33 BozMo 2756 3 918 102 Hersfold 522 1 522 58 Abd 161851 75 2158 239 Cardamon 1075 3 358 39 Wizzy 491 2 245 27 IronDuke 281 1 281 31 ATren 2333 4 583 64 FloNight 2090 6 348 38 Protonk 700 3 233 25 William M. Connolley 2826 3 942 104 This assumes Thatcher's character to word conversion factor of 8 characters and 1 space per word, truncated to the nearest whole word.

I don't see any sign that anyone has considered two things: what is collapse and what is not, in terms of statistics, surely what is in collapse is not as "dominating" as what is not, collapse is similar to having a subpage. Are subpages counted? Just a question! The other thing not considered is that if I'm writing a lot here, I'm actually writing much more and deleting much of it before saving, hard as that may seem to believe, and that I can write quickly when I know a subject and don't have to do research, and that I have often written a full comment like that, relatively quickly, edited it some, then saved it in collapse with a summary outside. Sometimes I'm interrupted and don't have time for that, but I've certainly done it for the longest posts. On the other hand, writing and collecting evidence and diffing is astonishingly time-consuming. And, yes, there have been days, practically weeks, when everything was neglected to try to respond here. It was utterly and completely insupportable. I'd be much better off, personally, being straight-out site-banned, if this were to continue! Fortunately, it won't continue, one way or another, and I won't allow it. I do know how to work much more efficiently, it just takes time to set up. --Abd (talk) 23:20, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Somebody has to say it, and I will say it nicely as I am able to: please spend more time thinking and less time writing. If you do this you will write fewer words and more people will understand you. You write too much and the quality is too low. This harms the project. --TS 23:27, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

If you think it is an issue, why not give us the stats? You have 36,795 characters in collapse boxes, 6344 words, or 22% of your edits. Why should anyone consider whether the final result is cut down from your drafts? I don't understand. The way I see it, you are responsible for what you choose to put down on a page, the rest is irrelevant. It's like posting a post full of bad language and incivility and saying "but you don't know how many curse words I removed from my draft before posting!" Phil153 (talk) 23:45, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Geogre-William_M._Connolley#William_M._Connolley

RE: Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William_M._Connolley/Proposed decision#William M._Connolley admonished

Wasn't this the exact same kind of admonishment that Connolley got in the George case before?

If this is all that happens, I really fear there will be yet another arbcom soon. Ikip (talk) 14:08, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, looks like a "Stop! Or we'll say 'Stop!' again." Could ArbCom clarify how many admonishments each Wikipedia editor can receive before an escalated corrective action is taken? Cla68 (talk) 14:29, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

In particular, the statement "William M. Connolley will not be allowed to use administrative tools ... in areas where he is involved" in William M. Connolley on probation makes it sound as if normally adminstrators are allowed to use tools when involved, resulting in a weakening, rather than a strengthening, of the principle of admin recusal. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 15:54, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Not really. We often explicitly restate the "obvious" in remedies; telling someone specifically to not do X doesn't imply X is usually allowed. If a cop pulls you over and lets you go with a "Don't speed again" warning, nobody else can read into this that speeding is generally allowed. — Coren ^(talk) 16:11, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Oh, OK. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 23:27, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

But this isn't what you'd call a minor or one time offense. — Rlevse • Talk • 03:32, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, the second time that cop pulls you over for speeding, you get a ticket - not just another warning. And in this case, it's more like a DUI. Dreadstar ☥ 06:04, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Disruption before ArbComm, don't desysop, suspend until satisfied no risk of harm, comment by Abd

It was fascinating to watch the clerks in this case tell WMC to stop, then when he did it again, stop, we really mean it, then he did it again, nothing. There was a round of edit warring that hasn't even been noticed by the arbs, apparently, with User:Rootology just before the latter retired, removing the RfAr notice from User talk:Hipocrite. Raul654 did something inappropriate at one point, and the clerk put up a very deferential note suggesting he might not do that. No deferential notes for anyone else, but still no teeth. Except against GoRight. GoRight was maybe a bit out of line, but, in fact, not as out of line as what became routine in this case. I'm not blaming the clerks, they had a difficult job and have been given, in my view, not enough guidance from ArbComm, which itself seems to be flopping about like a fish out of water part of the time. Bainer did a great job of drafting, even though I do disagree with some of what he put up, it was mostly quite good, he had done substantial homework, and I was going "YES!" when I read it. (I'd have been willing to cheerfully accept the problems to gain the benefits for the project.) Then other arbitrators popped in with proposals which indicated, shall we say, less knowledge of the evidence and history and policy implications. There are still arbitrators who have not !voted, and they may make the difference. I hope that this means they are carefully reviewing what's been done. There is some tendency for later votes to be better considered, as might be expected. (Bainer, as drafting arb, had put in a lot of time, I'm sure.) But one point: ArbComm should not desysop, unless it is totally clear that an admin cannot be saved. Rather, ArbComm should suspend an admin bit, rather easily, when there is cause for concern, until ArbComm is satisfied that there is no significant risk to the project from restoring it, and it can make that decision privately. Suspending, short term, is the same as desysopping, but it is not in any way punitive, it is purely protective, it requires no determination of blame. only an appearance of a problem causing concern. Anyone offended by being suspended upon a reasonable appearance of a problem may well not be qualified to be an admin, on that basis alone. (It's routine to suspend a police officer who shoots somebody, for example, until a finding is made on justification.) The idea that this will inhibit administrators who are working on difficult areas is actually preposterous. Suspension, especially brief, would not be a problem, and if an admin does fail to properly recuse, all they'd have to do is recognize the error. And if they can't do that, I'm afraid, they might appear to be cleaning up a cesspool, but are instead making it worse. We do not clean up cesspools by banning people who poop. Everybody poops. We clean them up by establishing healthy process that converts sewage into clean water by digesting it. When ArbComm accepts a case about admin recusal, it should routinely suspend or restrict admin privileges (such as "no blocks"). If it is accepting the case, it is finding that there is cause for concern and investigation, and thus it has decided that there is the problem of an appearance of bias. Right now the issue should be, does WMC understand what the problem was with the blocks or other admin actions that ArbComm confirms were problems? If so, and he is considered competent to act based on that knowledge, his admin access would be restored (had it been suspended, as it probably should have been). To my knowledge, though, he has never agreed that he made a mistake, so on what basis can we determine that he's not likely to do it again, perhaps with some variation. Not Abd, but how about GoRight or Coppertwig or Ikip? He dismissed his last RfAr reprimand and restriction because it was mind-bogglingly specific, the equivalent of his coming out of this RfAr with only a "Don't block Abd" restriction. What is personal involvement? Does WMC understand? Indeed, it seems to me that half the administrators commenting here, arbitrators aside, don't understand. That, indeed, is why we are here! ArbComm is beginning to make this more clear, with the principle about appearance, but look how much argument there was against that! For symmetry, as an example, ArbComm could have page-banned me pending the outcome of this case, i.e., accepting as well the appearance of a problem with my cold fusion behavior, should that have been requested by a party. What if ArbComm had enjoined me against editing Cold fusion and WMC against blocking anyone related to this case? What if ArbComm had enjoined anyone, including Enric Naval, another party, against taking actions that presumed a specific outcome of this case, as he did, edit warring on Talk:Cold fusion after Viridae had unblocked me and restored my edit? Just questions. What I see is that ArbComm is having the opportunity to witness, brought before it, massively disruptive behavior, of far more serious and even broader import than some long posts by one editor, and it is largely ignoring it, which does not, unfortunately, bode well. --Abd (talk) 00:11, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Editing restrictions

To make proposed remedy 3 more clear, I suggest:

• Where it says "and any talk page discussion", specify "[including/excluding] discussions outside talk space, such as AfD".
• Where it says "and is required to discuss any content reversions", specify "and wait a reasonable length of time for replies before reverting" if that is what is meant.
• Where it says " is limited to one post per day to any talk page":

  • Change "any" to "each" if that is meant, or insert "in total" if he's limited to only one such post per day on the project.
  • Specify "[including/excluding] his user talk page and userspace".
  • Specify "[including/excluding] discussion-style project pages such as noticeboards, AfD etc.

As one who tends to think like a mathematician myself (no offense to mathematicians; this is not a claim that any two such think alike) I can sympathize with Abd's need to have things stated clearly; it's not a matter of purposely being obtuse. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 14:39, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

• With respect to the 1 revert per week limit, this is a standard remedy applied in many many cases. There is no requirement that an editor on 1RR discuss reverts first, only that he explain the reason for the revert, and that he is limited to one per page per week. Note that this does not mean he can revert the intro once, and then the history section once over a different issue, and so on. One per week per page only. Editors placed under restrictions who are confused about the terms should seek guidance from admins who are experienced at arbitration enforcement requests. Thatcher 17:38, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

From someone who has clashed with WMC

I'm here to express my strong opposition to de-sysopping WMC, even temporarily. I strongly believe that proposed remedies 6 and 6.1 would be bad for Wikipedia in the long term.

There are a few articles at Wikipedia that are cesspits: they attract trolls, SPAs, and edit-warriors, they fill up with NPOV and OR, and they stink up this encyclopedia. It is not realistic to expect people cleaning up such an article to behave like paragons of the wikipedic virtues. (For example, it will be hard to AGF about the people who made the mess.) Rude/provocative edit messages and talk page comments are only to be expected, though not welcomed. I say that the proper response to minor misbehavior should be admonishment and (more importantly) encouragement, in the hope that the cesspit cleaners will do better when the next cesspit appears.

In an ideal world, non-admins would be able to clean up these articles. In practice, troublesome editors will rarely change their behavior unless admins are involved (at least in my experience, after 3000+ mainspace edits). So we need admins who are willing to wade into cesspits, and we need to make some allowances for people cleaning up cesspits. Getting rid of those few really bad articles is worth making some of our contributors unhappy, even if we chase away someone who might have become a good editor.

The best cesspit cleaner I know of is WMC, who has tackled Cold fusion twice and United States and state terrorism, to the great benefit of the project.

Of course, there are still lines that must not be crossed. (Blocking everyone who questions your edits, for example, would always merit de-sysopping.) But none of the proposed findings of fact suggest to me that WMC stepped over that line. CWC 19:41, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Even worse, if WMC gets de-sysopped what message is that going to send to other admins in terms of stepping in and sort out controversial articles? De-sysopping WMC would significantly harm the project. SPLETTE :] ^{How's my driving?} 20:35, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Admins are not supposed to "sort out" controversial articles in the sense of directly or indirectly determining content. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 22:49, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Your point? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:07, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Coppertwig, you know exactly what I meant. And as for this case: WMC wasn't pushing any particular POV at Cold Fusion. Are you suggesting Cold Fusion and it's talk page were in a perfectly good condition and that an administrator's action was uncalled for? SPLETTE :] ^{How's my driving?} 23:13, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

I'll answer that. WMC has been pushing, using his admin tools, a general anti-fringe POV, a content position, for a long time. He had no specific content involvement at Cold fusion but rather a factional involvement with a number of the regular editors, past and present, and with me. The condition of a Talk page means little and is difficult to judge, but an active Talk page probably means an editor or a number of editors putting in some serious work. As to the article, the condition of the article has been and is poor, but not in the direction that Splette is likely to think, and it has not improved any faster than it was improving before I was banned, and, in an important way, it regressed from where it was before the edit warring of June 1, when WMC took it back to May 14. The objections that many have to the article, as expressed in this case, are simply ignorant. There is nothing in the article favoring cold fusion that is not solidly sourced, to my knowledge. What missing is the solidly sourced material that is much more extensive than you would understand from seeing the article. We could probably have ten articles of the CF size, if we started using what is available in RS. (Both skeptical and otherwise, by the way.)

This is the problem. Someone who has not reviewed the sources may well think that the CF article is "full of pseudoscientific nonsense," as Raul654 asserted a day or two ago. But, given that the article is essentially controlled by skeptical editors, and has been since December when Pcarbonn was banned, why has that material survived? The answer: it hasn't, there is no pseudoscience there, at all. If there is, please take it out! Who is going to stop you? --Abd (talk) 00:25, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd, the problem is that there are tons of work to do. We have a "to do" list at the top of the talk page, and another one at Talk:Cold_fusion#To-do_list. Each point requires massive research and understanding.

About the article regressing since 1st June, I reply here. --Enric Naval (talk) 16:43, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I and a lot of other editors made much the same argument at the second Macedonia case a few months ago, in which those who stood up to nationalist POV-pushers were sanctioned. The simple answer to this seems to be that ArbCom has, whether by self-appointment or convention, been established to enforce Da Rules. When weighing a case, I find AC approaches it as a simple matter of who broke Da Rules and how many times and how severely and then metes out sanctions accordingly. While this is probably a fine way to run a social network, it's pretty hit-or-miss when it comes to building an encyclopedia. Indeed, as AC doesn't deal in content disputes, but only conduct issues, it's really a subset of Da Rules that gets enforced: our behavioural policies are effectively given a higher spot on the totem pole than our content policies when one reaches the ArbCom level. It's difficult to take stands against POV-pushers (I know from experience), and many of those who do have lapses in behaviour. Should we then sanction them just as harshly as if they were not standing up against those who are watering down out encyclopedic neutrality? A person who can honestly answer yes to that question is effectively deciding that Wikipedia is less an encyclopedia than a social experiment. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 15:10, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I have not looked very closely at this case and am not commenting here on the specifics, but for the record as it were, and in response to the comment that started this thread, when WMC came to United States and state terrorism he did nothing but make a difficult situation more difficult. People who hated that article love what he did, sure, but that doesn't mean it helped, and it certainly doesn't mean it was appropriate administrative action. WMC protected the article and then proceed to delete abut 40% of it he didn't like—very much without consensus. Later he proceeded to block two editors with whom he was edit warring. All of this was round about last April or May as I was going through RFA and/or shortly afterward. I was absolutely appalled by WMC's behavior, and actually pointed out to him that had I suggested it was right to edit after protecting an article, or block a user with whom I was edit warring, I would have been soundly (and deservedly) rejected at RfA. My subsequent attempts to discuss issues relating to that article (with which I had already been involved) with WMC went absolutely nowhere, and seldom have I seen an administrator less responsive to criticism of their actions, or less willing to re-think something they had rushed into without evaluating the situation.

In my view WMC is a practitioner of cowboy adminship (I doubt he'd take offense at that phrasing, though I'd prefer to think of an apt Britishism rather and than the American term cowboy), and I think there is no place for that on this project—despite how popular it is in some circles (generally when the cowboy admin in question is on your side). I've dealt with problematic areas of the encyclopedia as an admin before too (particularly the Obama articles), and never have I found it necessary to protect pages and then edit, block others with whom I am edit warring (why would I be edit warring anyway?), or ignore the first hint of criticism when it inevitably comes my way. Problem articles need admins with a firm hand willing to warn, separate editors from each other, mediate disputes, and block or topic ban if necessary, but there are good ways and bad ways to go about doing that. WMC seems to often employ the latter, and I find it hard to believe that anyone could suggest otherwise. The multiple ArbCom cases, dozen or so ANI threads, and heavy criticism from fellow admins are not a coincidence, and nor are they part of some strange cold fusion/anti-global warming (or whatever) conspiracy to take Connolley's bit. The simple fact is that he creates or exacerbates about as many problems as he solves. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 19:56, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

CWC, I was personally blocked by William Connolley, because of an edit war with connolley on an article which you describe as a "cesspit". I am very offended by this comment. It actually reflects more on your extreme biases than the articles you slander.

Connolley announced on Raul654;s page that it was "Time to start a major flamewar," admitting he was an involved administrator, and that the current block policy prohibiting involved admins from blocking editors was a "problem".[48] and then blocked me.

I exhasitevly detail the repeated abuses of Connolley.

Thank God the arbcom is finally addressing this repeated abuse. Thank God all wikipedia's don't act like Connolley does. Otherwise you would see membership plumet. As protective admins block editors who dare to contradict them on "their" pet pages. Ikip (talk) 20:16, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Response from CWC: I too have been blocked by WMC. But the only permanent effect of that block was an entry in my block log. (The great thing about WikiMedia is that almost any action can be undone.) I still say that WMC's 'cesspit cleanups' greatly outweigh his vexing actions at this encyclopedia. (The underlying question is about conflicting Wikipedia philosophies: should we encourage nice behavior over cleaning up 'cesspit' articles, or vice versa?) Cheers, CWC 10:33, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

"Nice behavior" and "cleaning up 'cesspit' articles" (or, as I would prefer to put it, proper admin behavior and dealing with problematic, battleground articles) are not at all mutually exclusive. This is the point in my previous comment, and what CWC and others are positing is a false choice. Edit warring, inappropriate blocks, protecting pages and then editing them, etc., are not, in my experience, at all necessary in order for admins to deal with difficult articles. When admins engage in those kind of behaviors, their fairness can (justifiably) be called into question, and their efforts to deal with difficult articles can end up being counterproductive. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 14:55, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Responses by Abd to the proposed decision

In case anyone is interested. It is not done, but some of the most important parts are. Please don't edit the user page itself, but make comments on the attached Talk page if desired. I don't intend to get into extensive debate, however, and may edit or change my responses both as I understand better and as proposed decisions and arbitrator votes change. Thanks. --Abd (talk) 23:09, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. That was relatively short and easy to read, and a great help in clearing up some aspects of all this. If WMC is around, it might help if he makes some statement in response to the new parts of the proposed decision (I'm aware of what he has said above and in evidence). Everyone else has probably said more than enough by now (I've read what has been said above and in evidence and most of the workshop). So I'm going to go and vote now. Carcharoth (talk) 01:04, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I just finished it; thanks for your encouragement, Carcharoth. Now I'm going to go do something else. Good luck, ArbComm, and thanks, all of you, you are volunteers, arbitrators, administrators, editors. --Abd (talk) 03:08, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd's userspace comments do not explain why he added my name with the edit summary "okay. mathsci insists". Since he mentions comments on WR, which I think are irrelevant to this case, I have made a temporary list of his comments to me (with a preface) here. Again WP methodology cannot be used to analyze an independent and external online discussion forum. Abd does say there that I "write nice articles". Although I was against the initiation of this ArbCom case (since, as NYB commented and as the findings have shown, at that stage things could have been better handled by the community), I made it absolutely clear in my evidence that if Abd would make "writing nice articles" his priority, life would be better for him and everyone else on WP. I still hope this happens. Mathsci (talk) 08:27, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Hey, at least Abd has finally recognized that he defied the ban during the case to see if WMC would block him and get him into trouble in front of Arbcom. And he says that he was surprised by the block, but later asserts that the block was a demonstration of how WMC's conduct is constant and predictable and that "there was nothing new or unusual about [the block] except the context". Actually, he was "allowing" WMC to "demonstrate his position in a way that would not be missed" and to "demonstrate what he was made of"[49].

And he insists that this is a content dispute, that he shouldn't be blocked for making self-reverted edits to pages he is banned from, that the evidence in the case demonstrates that there is a cabal, that he only edit-warred in May 21, that WMC banned him because of WMC's POV and not because of Abd's disruption[50] (search "and when I started in earnest"), etc. And then he adds that he should be allowed to pick his own mentor, that he didn't receive any "good-faith feedback", etc. As he did in Talk:Cold fusion, he keeps dragging the old pet peeves long after he was told to drop them, and keeps picking up new ones along the way.

And "That there are arbitrators who will take that kind of position [that WMC wasn't misusing his tools] points out to me that there is another cabal. A bigger one and possibly even more dangerous. (...) It is, again, common knowledge, but who says it on-wiki that doesn't get banned?"[51] (this is from just yesterday). Ha. Another cabal? And some arbs are members of it? And that those arbs disagree with Abd's assesment is indication that they belong to this cabal? And you get fully banned if you as much as mention it? I'd say that Abd is now picking constructive ideas from the good old fellas at WR. Abd's good ideas get lost in the noise, but so do the outrageous conspiracy theories that are increasingly directing his behaviour. Honestly, Abd, wtf. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:05, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

All arbitrators are members of it, it is easily identifiable, but less than 0.1% of registered editors are members of it, and only about 1% of its members are arbitrators. A sample of opinion on many issues from this cabal would often be quite different from a sample of opinion from other editors, but if this cabal were to disappear, with no other changes, Wikipedia would be in big trouble. If non-cabal members were to disappear, Wikipedia would also be in big trouble, could not survive. When it recognizes and factors for its own bias, Wikipedia benefits. Enough clues? I don't think anyone gets banned just because of mentioning it. That was hyperbole. However, there is a substantial set of editors who are trying to ban me for mentioning a smaller cabal. "Cabal" is not a "conspiracy theory." Period. Cabals function right out in the open and are visible to anyone with sufficient experience who opens their eyes and looks. Please stop repeating "conspiracy theory" over and over. And over.

Yes, I direct my behavior according to what I actually see. Guilty. --Abd (talk) 13:50, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Has anyone involved in a case ever did something like this, set up a duplicate page to vote with the arbs? I haven't been commenting much mainly because the length of this page is also starting to cause problems for me and I'm not the only one who is having problems downloading long pages. Thanks, --CrohnieGal^Talk 13:08, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Abd does stuff nobody did before. Guilty. I have invested in a modest supply of tar and feathers, available immediately. --Abd (talk) 13:50, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps Abd is suggesting that all administrators form a cabal; the administrator corps seems to fit all the criteria that Abd has laid out for the larger cabal he is positing. Of course, though, the suggestion that En-wiki administrators have a monolithic opinion about anything at all is absurd, as any skeptic can prove to himself or herself by reading a day's postings on ANI. In general, the word "cabal" has taken on so many connotations and derogatory overtones on Wikipedia that it has become one of those words that rarely adds any useful content to a thread and hence, except in humorous contexts, should rarely be used. Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:51, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Lucky guess. But "cabal" does not mean "monolithic opinion." I'd say that the defacto banning of the word "cabal" from our discourse is part of the problem, for control of language is an aspect of repression. However, there is a social phenomenon that I described, I have no doubt about its existence, and it is totally predictable and natural. And harmful. Do you deny that factional affiliation, preference, and prejudgment exist? Have you actually looked at the evidence, I could ask, but, in fact, if you've been here as long as you have, and haven't noticed all by yourself, I begin to wonder. Very much I begin to wonder.

The administrative cabal has a POV, a natural bias, manifested as a tendency to "circle the wagons" when any administrator is criticized, a tendency to forgive in administrators actions that would get any non-admin blocked quickly, unless that editor has developed substantial support. It is characteristic of any privileged group, granted excess power over others, it begins to justify itself. Remember, "cabal" does not equal "bad." It simply means that there is a bias, a prejudice, that can be harmful if not realized and factored for. Which isn't happening, that's obvious, because there isn't any way to even talk about it. Carcharoth has written that this should have been brought up in the abstract, not in the middle of a case, but, in fact, bringing up in the abstract would have been totally useless. If we can't discuss specifics, we cannot discuss the abstract.

It's rapidly becoming moot for me. --Abd (talk) 03:32, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Cabal has a specific meaning, one which I'm sure you actually mean, but you don't wish to actually level the accusation at specific people. FWIW, "cabal" doesn't mean there is a bias, a prejudice, that can be harmful if not realized and factored for. A cabal is a small group of secret plotters, a clique; the plots, schemes and intrigue of such groups. Of course, this is what you actually mean with your thousand word accusations against various editors (who seem to be linked only by the fact that you say so and they edit this thing called Wikipedia). So when you insist of using the word cabal - it has a specific meaning. If you mean something else, use that word - if you don't know it - find it. But given that you have used cabal a number of times now, it's clear that you actually do wish to use it in it's correct context, but don't wish to be penalised for calling editors out for it. Shot info (talk) 06:24, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

@ Newyorkbrad please, if what you say above you believe, why has this been allowed to continue to be used to discredit a bunch of editors that can be seen not to be involved with each other? The use of cabal should have be stopped immediately. Now editors who feel discredited by all of this, no matter how this case turns out, are talking about leaving the project. How many editors have to retire? Thank you, --CrohnieGal^Talk 12:14, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Remedy 3

Arbitrators, please be careful in your votes on remedy 3. If you want to pass parts 2, 3 and 4, but not parts 1, 5 and 6 (which seems to be the case given the comments and the proposal of 3.1 and 3.2) then either a majority of you need to say so in your votes, or you also need to split out those parts for a separate vote. Passing 3.1 and 3.2 with a divided vote on 3 will lead to confusion over the mentorship and topic ban that will surely end up as a clarification or amendment request in short order. Thatcher 13:42, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree. Unfortunately, once voting has started on proposals thrown up by different arbitrators with the best of intentions, it is difficult to cry "halt!" and get things started again in a more organised fashion. I'll see if I can get FloNight and Casliber to try and reorganise their proposals into something that makes more sense. My approach would be to split out part 1 of remedy 3 (the admonishment part, which clearly doesn't belong in a section titled 'editing restrictions'), to vote separately on parts 2, 3, and 4, and to then either defer the details (parts 5 and 6 of 3, and all of 3.1 and 3.2) or vote on the details as part of a constellation of possible restrictions. I would also note that some arbitrators are still voting abstain when undecided, when they should be putting themselves in a holding area for that vote because abstaining lowers the majority. But it takes time for the clerks to train us out of bad habits... Carcharoth (talk) 19:37, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

It's also worth noting that many of Thatcher's proposals, which he wrote at Newyorkbrad's request, are still languishing on the workshop. Raul654 (talk) 19:39, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Process note. Temporary confusion about what passed shouldn't be a problem, because, technically, nothing has actually been approved until the case closes, and arbs vote on closure. Voting to close should indicate satisfaction with the results as then stand. Until the vote to close has passed, arbs may adjust their votes to make the decision clear. That a clerk states that a motion passes isn't the final decision on that, just a note for information.

The problem here is created by simultaneous consideration of multiple conflicting motions, something traditional process avoids like the plague. To resolve any confusion, a ratification vote should be taken, that confirms that all decisions are accepted (and a motion to close has that effect). To be clear, multiple-choice votes on conflicting possibilities should be avoided, this can lead to voting paradoxes, but there is no paradox if questions are Yes/No questions that do not conflict, and in traditional process, voting is repeated until one option has a majority over all others. Traditional process only allows one question to be considered at a time, and the question then is amended by majority vote until it is in the form most accepted, the question is called to close debate, then there is a vote on the final motion.

In good real-world practice, to vastly increase efficiency, a skilled chair anticipates consensus and bypasses the process details that are only occasionally needed. A chair may propose a motion thought to represent consensus and then state that the motion passes "if there is no objection," and with on-line process I've generally allowed as much as a week for objection to appear before such a decision is considered a done deal. That was to allow for participant schedules. If participants are available more reliably, it can be shorter. It is possible that ArbComm process could be improved if there is a functioning chair for each case. The chair would recuse but vote to break ties. Or ArbComm could appoint an independent facilitator.--Abd (talk) 20:10, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Or possibly arbitrators could warn each other what they are about to post to the proposed decision? Carcharoth (talk) 20:22, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe Thatcher could remind Brad about that? The dilemma here is that trying to reorganise the structure of the current voting could make things even more confusing. I almost think it is worth binning what is there at the moment, taking another look at what Thatcher suggested, and coming up with something that both incorporates everything worth voting on, and lays it out in a clearer fashion. To my mind, remedy 3 (part 1) should be voted on as an alternative to remedy 4 (grouping the admonishment options together). Remedy 3 (part 2), the topic ban, should be voted on as a completely separate remedy (it is, after all, the cause of this case). Remedy 3 (part 3) and remedy 3 (part 4) should be voted on as alternatives or component of remedy 2 (thus grouping all the mentorship options together). Finally, remedy 3 (part 5) and remedy 3 (part 6) and 3.1 and 3.2 should all be voted on separately under the title "editing restrictions", as these are all general editing restrictions. I favour separate voting. I suspect other arbs favour voting for "package deals". Hopefully it will get sorted out. Carcharoth (talk) 20:23, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Separate them out I think is better. I had realised Flo's incorporates elements of others.Go for it Carch. Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:56, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I would separate them all out into 3.1 through 3.x, then as the arbitrators vote they can strike their votes, or indicate some other preference, for 3.0. Thatcher 02:35, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm carefully considering Thatcher's proposals, as well as a more rigorous one. I appreciate the time he put into the drafting, which is reflected in the detail of the proposals. Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:46, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Remedy 3 is an "omnibus" remedy, and, as such, it's destined to failure. Please break it down and vote all the points by separate.

Also, at this pace, Abd's ban from Cold fusion will not get passed due to technicalities (point 1 not being a remedy, not agreeing with some other point, etc). --Enric Naval (talk) 10:47, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Update

Okay - been busy IRL all day and am getting to this now:

• Part 1 of remedy 3 is covered (partly) by remedy 4
• Part 2 I have just listed separately as remedy 3.3
• Part 3 is already covered in remedy 2
• Parts 4 and 5 I have listed separately as 3.4 and 3.5, and 6 is similar to Thatcher's proposal which I placed at remedy 3.1

Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:48, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Just one little thing. Remedy 3.3 should explicitly allow participation in User_talk:Cryptic_C62/Cold_fusion (the mediation page in cold fusion). --Enric Naval (talk) 17:08, 25 August 2009 (UTC) See [52]. If my petition means that Abd is not banned from CF then I withdraw it. The benefit won from Abd participating in mediation is offset a lot by the disruption of him not being banned from CF. --Enric Naval (talk) 04:22, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Apologies for not getting to this sooner. I've now partially struck my reference to this, but I am going to post and more length here about my concerns about this initial offer and its retraction. Firstly, I'm not sure why you think that participation in mediation should be conditional on a ban being passed. That sounds to me like a deal of the form "we will let you participate in the mediation if you stay away from the article and talk page". But the converse seems also to apply: if Abd is not banned from cold fusion, you don't want him to participate at the mediation? This seems illogical to me. But more to the point, as my colleague Newyorkbrad pointed out, such a request should be made by Cryptic C62, the mediator, not by others. There is also a concern that Enric Naval bringing up the mediation risks crossing the streams between arbitration and mediation. Rather than make 'offers' conditional on certain conditions being met, I suggest that a better approach would have been for Enric Naval to point out the mediation, and ask whether participation in that for Abd needs to be clarified, to notify the mediator, and (as a participant in the mediation himself) to then step back at that point. Carcharoth (talk) 10:21, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

No problem. My own apologies for withdrawing a proposition that you had used for your own vote.

The mediation page has more strict restrictions than the restrictions placed on Abd (in particular, only one topic at a time, so Abd can't start new topics while old ones are still being discussed, and long off-topic posts can be summarily deleted by the mediator or simply collapsed or archived until the topic is raised), so Abd was contributing well to that page, so he should be allowed participation at that page. I'm mostly interested in how to get articles written, so I'm not proficient in wiki politics, and the subtleties of mediation-arbitration intersections are unfortunately lost on me (my excuses if I was trying to mix oil and water with a rough approach). I suggest issuing the ban because it's necessary to stop Abd's disruption at cold fusion, and, then, after issuing the ban, someone can talk to the mediator to see how/if he can still keep participating at the mediation, and clear any rough parts with the mentor(s). (a discussion between the mediator and WMC made clear that Abd's participation in the mediation was independent from the ban). --Enric Naval (talk) 23:39, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Evidence regarding use of tools while involved by WMC

Evidence which was in my original evidence by oblique reference (regarding prior involvement between WMC and I) has been expanded, the evidence subpage was completed today, being a history of edit warring and use of tools relating to an October incident with Global warming, when I briefly attempted to work on that article. The evidence subpage is linked from my RfAr/Evidence section, but a direct link is User:Abd/Connolley Abd involvement. This was originally talk attached to an evidence page created by Ikip, hence the discussion at the top.

This history should be read carefully by any arbitrator seeking to understand why I raised the issue of a "cabal." WMC shows awareness of an "us," being the group of editors and administrators maintaining and protecting Global warming against those "sticking their oars in" and meddling, i.e., myself, Jennavecia, and many others through the history of that article. For an earlier analysis of edit warring history in the global warming family of articles, and compared to the !votes in RfC/GoRight, see User:Abd/GoRight. This is where I began to see the social pattern I've called, for the purposes of this case, the "cabal." The differences in position at the RfC, between the "cabal editors," here initially defined as those who had edit warred with GoRight, and the neutral editors (and I was completely neutral when I compiled this, it was before any conflict with WMC or any familiarity with other members of the "cabal"), was striking.

A finding regarding the "cabal" is not crucial to this RfAr, it was asserted simply to show that there is a standing bias, a kind of involvement, at work, that is not a specific article involvement, but which is broader than that, and this is necessary in order to understand why this case spun out as it did, and other events in the history examined here. However, the incident I point to with this section shows not only the kind of activity I've called "cabal," but also two examples of preferential use of tools, including an article unprotection by WMC claiming that it was not needed because he and other admins had the situation under control (they did, because they can edit war and nobody will stop them, and they can, and did, block when needed, as Raul654 blocks Logicus in the middle of this.)

I've put this up not because I believe that stronger sanctions are needed, but because it should be clear that WMC's drastic actions during this case are not momentary lapses or isolated behaviors. Please notice Jennavecia's despair, expressed on WMC talk, as linked, that anything could ever be done about his behavior, and please consider how difficult it was, and at what cost, I raised this.

I did not "go after" the cabal (I would not have, I saw it as entirely too dangerous), but they came after me, after RfC/JzG 3 -- which wasn't about the cabal as such, and I began that sequence uninvolved. I have not shown the pattern of harassment which began then, but there is only so much time in my days; the harassment began with Hipocrite, primarily, but continued when WMC arrived, having been provided with an excuse by Hipocrite's baiting, edit warring, and other disruption. He was already involved, and it had nothing to do with Cold fusion, as such. It was payback. --Abd (talk) 21:34, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

If There is No Cabal, please site-ban me.

It's remarkable that we have an acronym for a denial, TINC, pointing to Wikipedia space.

• If TINC, then my community ban at AN/I was based on uninvolved editors, per WP:BAN, and, while it expired, there is no reason to believe that the basis for it changed, since it was not evidence-based, but was the strong view of many such editors, who had noticed my work, with only a token opposition.
• If TINC, then a host of uninvolved editors here have sought for me to be banned.
• If TINC, I am obviously disruptive, and there is no reason to believe that this will change.
• ArbComm is the only body that can address the problem of a cabal, because a cabal, if it exists, can disrupt any other process, and if ArbComm concludes that TINC, then it must protect the project against disruption.
• ArbComm does not make content decisions, but a consensus of independent editors can make such decisions, and therefore, if Abd is content-opposed by such a consensus, and he remains active, he is POV-pushing and should be topic-banned.
• This is why he raised the issue of a cabal, because, if TINC, he has no case at all, WMC is supported by consensus and Abd's firm position is that consensus is our only valid decision-making principle.

There is, though, as well, WP:TIAC, which is accurate but unapplied. Reading it and the linked Iron law of oligarchy, which, remarkably, I had not seen until this moment, I see confirmation of what I've stated, that cabals are inevitable, though I see, and have been working on, a way to structurally harness the power of cabals, to retain their positive ufunction and restrain their harm, and I spoke about this in New York, and, clearly, some Wikipedians are starting to get it.

Therefore, I ask ArbComm to review my claim that there is a cabal, which I carefully defined as a group of editors which should be considered involved with each other, such that involvement in an issue of one may be suspected to be involvement by the others, and, if there is no such involved faction, please clearly find so, without reference to the red herring of pejorative meaning (improper collaboration, mutual meat puppetry, monolithic opinion, etc.) overlaid upon the term "cabal," because that is not what I claimed and was not the basis of my case, sanction WMC only for his misconduct before ArbComm, and do not bother with complicated remedies, simply site-ban me. All us will benefit.

If there is a cabal, or group of editors who should be considered as mutually involved, on the other hand, then the massive disruption during this case becomes , not "incomprehensible," as it was called by an arbitrator, it becomes clearly understandable and to be expected.

And if there is a cabal, then ArbComm should review its findings and reconsider before closing this case. I am not disruptive, I am anticipating consensus beyond the cabal, properly and patiently persevering in spite of obstacles, as has been shown in many incidents, and as would eventually be shown with most of the unresolved issues, including my work with Cold fusion. The cabal bypasses normal dispute resolution process, it is one of the characteristics of the cabal I identified, because DR process can be tedious or time-consuming, and why bother if "we all know you are wrong"?

DR, though, actually resolves problems instead of burying them through bans, exclusion, and wearing out opposition. It buries the problem, turning it into fertilizer, not banned editors, the blocked undead who continue to haunt us.

My prolixity is, because of my own history, triggered when facing such social groupings, I apologize for that, and have no problem with remedies that support me in becoming more focused and effective, and I appreciate ArbComm's attention to this issue.

I am now going to go hide under a rock. I'm on wikibreak. Someone tell me by email when it is safe to come out. --Abd (talk) 11:40, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Therefore, I ask ArbComm to review my claim that there is a cabal - they did.

which I carefully defined as a group of editors which should be considered involved with each other - yes, you have repeatedly harped on the fact that your carefully worded definition of "cabal" was not the same as the common meaning, and that your definition was not meant to insult or make false implications. Nobody believes this claim for a second.

if there is no such involved faction, please clearly find so - they did.

I am not disruptive - The mountain of evidence contradicting this claim aside, Abd probably believes this to be true. Arbitrators should carefully consider this fact when crafting their decision. Abd is truely unable to appreciate the damage he's caused. This is why warnings, suggestions, admonishments, and other unenforcable remedies simply don't work.

I am now going to go hide under a rock. I'm on wikibreak. Someone tell me by email when it is safe to come out. - if only Abd would actually follow through on this. Instead, he gives it lots of lip-service] while continuing to make personal attacks and bury others in verbiage. Raul654 (talk) 15:13, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, Abd, but you don't get to redefine simple English words to suit your own definition. I can define "ice cream" as an oven-baked breadlike food covered with tomato sauce, cheese, and various vegetables and/or meats, but that won't turn a pizza into ice cream. According to every dictionary I've looked at, the term "cabal" implies secretive plotting and scheming. There is no evidence on which to base such a finding. Risker (talk) 15:18, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

How about this? If TINC then you are being disruptive and a bunch of editors want to end the disruption but would prefer that you do so voluntarily instead of being blocked, but will block you if they have to. Some people are asking you be banned, most are just asking you to recognise what your doing is disruptive and be more cooperative. This is the closest I have seen you come to realising this. So if TINC then you don't have to hide under a rock, this is just one of many chances you have gotten to self-realise and improve your ways. Take it.198.161.174.222 (talk) 17:58, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

In all honesty - I'm getting a little tired of all the pussy footing around Abd and his accusations. If anybody started leveling these accusations outside of here, they would be blocked quick smart. It's not helping the project at all that Abd is hell bent on his "your a cabal" accusations and I think that he should do two things. 1. Retract the statement and 2. Stop accusing people of it. And if he declines either, then he has shown the Community that his usefulness to the project is over - goodbye. Shot info (talk) 00:24, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

FloNight's withdrawal?

I'm not sure I understand why FloNight's taking a wikibreak should require his/her withdrawing votes already cast and delisting from the case altogether as an active arbitrator, when the case is almost finished. Maybe a clerk could explain that to me? I'd appreciate it, thanks. Woonpton (talk) 17:14, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

I have an unexpected serious real life matter that needs my immediate attention so I can not participate in ArbCom work now. If I don't mark myself inactive then the majority will remain higher and the new proposals will be harder to pass. I hope that helps explain the change. FloNight♥♥♥ 17:20, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Also, if new information or arguments came to light, such as the new proposals on Abd's conduct, or new discussions of WMC's admin status, her old static votes might not reflect what her final position would have been had she been free to consider the new information. Thatcher 17:24, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, Flo and Thatcher; I think I understand now. Woonpton (talk) 17:41, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

A comment on bans (assumed to mean topic and page bans)

This comment was originally intended as a reply to comments by User:Risker, but the author (TS) has decided to put it here instead.

To Risker:

Thanks for your reply to my comment on bans, in the Abd case workshop. I'll take the liberty of interspersing my reply with a copy of your own comments.

You wrote:

Tony, there is no question that the community can decide to impose page or topic bans, and it has been done regularly for some time now.

Yes, we're agreed on that.

The question that Newyorkbrad proposes to put before the community is whether or not an individual administrator can impose a page or topic ban without discussion on the applicable noticeboard. Please do not conflate these two methods of page/topic banning editors.

Well, somebody has to be first to declare the ban. I'll try to explain what I meant in the comment to which you replied. I said:

I strongly oppose this. The most likely outcome of the Committee passing a motion like this or anything else falsely implying that William M. Connolley acted in a controversial way or in a way that was not fully supported by consensus is to send a message to the community that the community cannot decide on bans in an informal and flexible manner as it has done for years now. It would be as if the infamous "votes for banning" era had not taught us anything, and the Committee was asking us to go back to the bad old ways.

(I have added bold emphasis to the above in order to highlight what I'm discussing below).

Firstly I will say that while I don't think Andrew M. Connolley's actions in announcing the ban were controversial, I agree that this is the very principle in question.

Secondly I think it's clearly established that subsequent discussion supported the ban. Just so you know. We could disagree on that too, and of course if you do then that's a good reason to treat this as a matter of poor judgement by an administrator who has (we probably both agree) often shown poor judgement in marginal cases.

I use the phrase "informal and flexible" because I believe that the smooth running of Wikipedia cannot be assured either by rigid adherence to written instructions or by appeal of every dispute to a central committee or overseer as was the case in 2004.

I used the term "votes for banning" because I couldn't remember the name of the wretched noticeboard we used to run for the purpose of community votes on banning. In earlier, more innocent days, a rather more draconian process known as "Quickpolls" had a similar purpose. It turns out that the later incarnation was called "Community Sanction Noticeboard", and it was closed as a result of this discussion. Of course the problem is that when you provide a formal way of banning editors you end up attracting a certain kind of editor and you encourage a certain kind of discussion. And we decided that is really wasn't healthy.

So we have to declare a ban, but it isn't always a good idea to have a vote or discussion in advance of the ban.

If an administrator declares a limited (topic or article or other) ban on an editor it doesn't stop that person editing, whereas implementing a block (which any administrator can do) stops that person editing. If anybody declares a ban without consensus, that fact will very soon become evident. The advantage of the latter is obvious, for it does not stop the editor affected by the ban editing within the limits of the ban, and with all the legitimacy of a non-blocked editor, continuing to push his case on the wiki.

This is why I object to the suggested deprecation of declared bans: they can be contested with ease and they afford to any competent editor the ability to contest the ban without excessive bureaucracy.

Discussing a proposed ban in advance is good, and should nearly always be how we do things. Sometimes, though, really, when somebody is either taking the piss or clueless, you have to allow somebody to jump in and say "this is time to call a halt; does anybody disagree?" --TS 23:28, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

These are fine arguments for changing the policy, but they are not evidence that what you discuss is already sufficiently widely supported in the community to be unwritten or de facto policy. --bainer (talk) 02:02, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

As far as I'm aware this is the current policy. You surely don't imagine that we need to write stuff down in advance of doing it? --TS 02:28, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

No, the description follows the practice. But as I said on the proposed decision page, you need some evidence that a practice is actually widely accepted and utilised before it can be considered policy. This might consist of a significant number of instances in which the practice had been used and supported by the community, or well-received efforts to document the practice. The say-so of editors on this page, no matter who they are, is not enough. The closest we've come to such evidence in this case is Thatcher's examples above, but they are examples of the community discussing and then imposing bans, which are a different matter. Maybe admins being able to do whatever they like is the currently widely accepted practice, but noone has tried to demonstrate that it is, they've merely asserted it (or argued for it, as you have done here). --bainer (talk) 04:46, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

First off, Tony, I ask you to change this heading to specify that we are discussing topic and page bans; I would expect you to agree that banning an editor completely from the encyclopedia is not what we are discussing here, and even if it was, there are established methods for documenting and appealing such bans. As far as I can tell, there has never, even once, been such an emergency to page- or topic-ban an editor that it could not be discussed in an open forum, such as WP:AN or WP:ANI beforehand, or at least shortly after the page/topic ban has been applied. I also disagree with my colleague Carcharoth, in that I think any editor should be able to request the review of a page/topic ban, regardless of whom it affects, particularly when there is a lack of clarity, as there was in this case. With the exception of this case, almost every example we have seen of admin-applied topic/page bans have been discussed either before or shortly after in an open community forum. No, I never want to see the Community Sanction Board reinstated; it was its very separateness from the busy but widely viewed AN and ANI pages that made it so dangerous, and the same principle makes topic/page banning editors by little more than a message on the page of an article or an editor's talk page equally as concerning. Topic/page bans need to be publicly discussed and posted because other administrators need to be aware of their existence. Whether or not there was support for this particular ban is almost a moot point, Tony; once a cogent case was made for it, there was support, but there was absolutely nothing stopping WMC from obtaining that support beforehand, and ensuring that admins other than himself were aware of the page ban and were willing and able to enforce it. Risker (talk) 04:45, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

In reply to Bainer I strongly disagree with the notion that an administrator or editor action can only be considered to be within policy if it has already been discussed in the past or has a history of being performed in the past. I'm simply at a loss to understand why anyone would suggest such a thing, for it would sabotage the very processes of innovation and initiative that are the sources of new policy.

In reply to Risker, firstly I don't see any difference in principle between full and partial bans, and my arguments here apply, for the most part, to both. And also, you appear to be arguing for a change in policy to require administrators to discuss their actions in advance. We have no such policy. The disadvantages of such a bureaucracy should be obvious--and that's why we don't have it. The cost of an administrator announcing a ban that is not accepted by the community is very, very small, even less than for a block. --TS 17:15, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

AMC?!? William M. Connolley (talk) 21:58, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

But my dear Polonius, are you referring to the organization of Mexican scientists, a particular example of cultural pabulum created in my home country, or the old-timey steam car created in the English metropole? Regardless of the intended meaning of your three letter missive, I was pleased to learn of the existence of the word "obfustication" from your edit summary. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 22:48, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Ah ha! I see Tony mistakenly referred to you as "Andrew" above, hence the "AMC." It does seem to be a popular acronym though (those Argentina-bound Arbs mentioned in the thread below might instead consider a trip with the Appalachian Mountain Club—sorry it's another Mark Sanford joke), and I always enjoy a good Shakespeare paraphrase. It's funny how often the words of Polonius are cited as wisdom, "To thine own self be true" being the primary example, when of course WS obviously cast that character as a foolish old man, caring but devoid of substance. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 23:02, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Latest mentorship proposal

Something may need to be clarified in Carcharoth's latest mentorship proposal. It reads in part "Abd's mentor(s) shall be appointed by the Committee within one month of the closure of this case." Then it goes on to say, "The Committee retains discretion...to review the selection of the mentor(s)." The first part sort of implies that the Committee will choose the mentor, while the second implies that Abd gets to choose his mentor and then the Committee has the right to veto the choice. Whatever the intent, I think it would be best if it were stated unambiguously. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:55, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

The intent is that the Committee choses the mentor(s), but can review its own selection (i.e. replace the mentors if needed). The only bit where Abd would get any input is developing the terms of his mentorship, but that would be done in his userspace, and the baseline would be the other restrictions passed in this case. Essentially, if my proposal passes, Abd is immediately banned from everywhere except his userspace, and is expected to start from scratch again in thinking about how he interacts with others on Wikipedia, and can only do so subject to the other restrictions passed, and under the supervision of a mentor. If Abd can't do that (change the way he interacts with others), then this isn't the right place for him. He may indeed be the first to agree with that conclusion, but this is intended as a chance to show whether he can do anything in-between all or nothing. Carcharoth (talk) 01:37, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

OK, thanks. Might I suggest replacing "Abd's mentor(s) shall be appointed by the Committee" with "Abd's mentor(s) shall be chosen by the Committee"? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:42, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Thatcher's proposals still missing

The current proposed decision is better than it was in its initial stages, but still only addresses a fraction of the misbehaviors identified in the evidence and on the workshop. Although this page was substantially re-organized yesterday, a number of Thatcher's proposals, including those that are IMO the most important and effective ones, are still missing. Namely:

• The "no proxy editing" principle [53]
• The FOF that Abd has edited disruptively [https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William_M._Connolley/Workshop#Disruptive_editing (the current proposal says he edited tendentiously on cold fusion articles, which as Thatcher's FOF shows, is only the tip of the iceberg where his behavior is concerned)
• The "no disruptive editing" restriction [54]
• The ability to extend the remedies as needed [55]. This is especially important if the arbitrators want to avoid Abd arcbom case #3.

Is anyone planning to propose these? Raul654 (talk) 15:52, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

I've been tied up in the real world and will be carefully considering all of Thatcher's proposals, along with those made by everyone else (especially my colleages on the committee), when I have more time, probably tonight. Please also note that several of the arbitrators are at Wikimania in Argentina this week, which, as previously announced, may unfortunately slow progress on committee work for a few days. Newyorkbrad (talk) 16:05, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Hmm. A trip to Argentina takes precedence over important official business. Why does this sound vaguely familiar? :P MastCell ^Talk 16:56, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

The active arbitrators are among the hardest-working unpaid volunteers we have, and WikiMania is not just "a trip to Argentina." --TS 17:03, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

I trust your comment is tongue-in-cheek, MastCell. We're all volunteers here, and to be in the position of continuing other aspects of Wikipedia work while meeting hundreds of other Wikimanians (and no doubt being pestered about what's "wrong" with Arbcom) is something of a busman's holiday. In addition to the Committee members attending Wikimania, several others have "real-world" commitments that must be honoured. After all, having to take time to look for a new job/spouse/home/client will only adversely affect our availability. ;-) Risker (talk) 17:07, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Relax, I think it's just a Mark Sanford joke.--Cube lurker (talk) 17:09, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Duh! I should have kept my eyes peeled for that. --TS 17:21, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

My fault. It was a poorly conceived and US-centric reference to recent events in South Carolina, as Cube lurker mentioned. I didn't mean to question anyone's commitment - far from it. Sorry for precipitating any misunderstanding. MastCell ^Talk 17:26, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

In cases like this a friend in college used to say something that rhymed with "chuck 'em if they can't fake a toke." Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:45, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Eh. I had a friend in college who used to say that if you're not funny in real life, you shouldn't attempt to be funny online. I seem to have proved him correct. MastCell ^Talk 18:07, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

I got the joke :) (but I'm not going to Argentina) Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:00, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Misc comments from WMC

I've been on hols, so I've missed a pile of exciting things as well as some very dull walls of text. You'll forgive me, I hope, if I haven't yet read through all of the vast weight above. Some initial comments:

• 4.1) ...When enacting an editing restriction that includes a ban on an editor, administrators should take reasonable steps to ensure that the editor is notified of the particulars of the ban and its duration. - if this is a ref to my original ban, then it is vague (as I said off in the proposals page). If you mean, use the editors talk page, say so. As far as I'm concerned, I knew A and H read the t:CF, so I knew they had been notified, and experience bore this out. As for duration, if this is intended to mean that bans must be of fixed duration, then say so. Otherwise, I'll assume it means you must accurately describe the intended duration, which I did. So without clarification, this proposal would have made no difference.
• 3.1) On 5 June, William M. Connolley edited through protection on cold fusion [7], reverting to a version from three weeks earlier [8] with the edit summary "Lets [sic] wind everyone up", an action and comment that needlessly escalated the dispute. - this is wrong. There is no evidence that the edit summary (or indeed the action) escalated the dispute. The edit summary is merely a jocular reference to WP:WRONG.
• William M. Connolley then lifted the ban of Hipocrite on 24 June [14]. is mildly misleading. It omits H's request for unblock, and fails to note my assertion of attentiveness to complaints.
• 8) Following the expiration of the topic ban against him, Abd voluntarily submitted to an extension of that ban - wrong. My ban of him had not expired, and the "voluntary" submission concept is meaningless.
• 13) ... Oppose ... As the arbitrator who drafted that remedy in the prior case, I disagree that Abd did not change his behaviour. - this motion isn't about (complete) changes in behaviour, thus disagreeing that Abd did not change his behaviour is off the point. The point is, was Abd in violation of the previous remedy?
• 14) Is fairly weird. NYB has done 1 and 3. 2 is utterly weird - once an article is down to semi, anyone can edit it. So what exactly is the point there? 4 was indeed an error, but seems to fit a rather different idea of "involved".
• 6.1 Support, WMC works in many heated areas of WP where many admin will not work. He needs recognition for being willing to wade into these situations and give good support to the editors that are adding good content - to point out the obvious, (temporary) desysop is not support. Quite the opposition, it is opposition.
• William M. Connolley will not be allowed to use administrative tools in... areas where he is involved - this is odd. This is supposedly one of the fundamental principles, no? Restating it here, as a special requirement on me, is bad, because it implicitly weakens the requirement on everyone else.

William M. Connolley (talk) 22:28, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for these responses. To take your points one by one:

• I agree with you that finding 4.1 should be clearer about notification. This is why I said: "I would also quibble with "reasonable steps" - in my view, talk page notification of such bans, and logging them somewhere, is a must." To take what happened in this case, did you consider that talk page notifications and logging the ban somewhere visible would help other people become aware of this situation, such as other editors reading Abd's talk page, or other admins coming to warn him about something else, or someone looking through Abd's editing history when preparing a user request for comments, or an admin dealing with the cold fusion page some years later (when maybe you and the current editors of the page are not around)?

• Could be. However, since (as you know from the evidence) Abd edited t:CF, I removed it, and told him on his talk page not to do so again. So any admins visiting his talk page would have been well aware of the situation. As for other admins dealing with CF later: it seems to me that they would have an easier time finding the ban in t:CF than off in smoe random editors talk page.

• The problem with that is that both user talk pages and article talk pages get archived, and it can be difficult to search through them, particularly as you can't rely on a user to archive warnings they get, but if a user talk page notice exists, it is much easier to refer back to. As you know from the workshop, I pointed out the number of archives of the cold fusion talk page, which again makes it difficult for efficient organisation and looking back through them for topic bans. If you read the procedures used under discretionary sanctions (which are likely to be passed for cold fusion as a result of this case), you will see that explicit provisions for logging actions and how to appeal are provided. Are you familiar with how discretionary sanctions have been used in other areas? If you are, are you confident you would be able to apply discretionary sanctions in a proportionate manner to new, current and previous editors of this article, and carry out the notifications and log them, and participate in any noticeboard discussions that arise from such actions, or would you be happier leaving this for other admins to deal with? Carcharoth (talk) 01:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• This has descended into pointless minutiae, and doesn't belong here. If arbcomm wants the users talk page to be used; say so. If not, don't. So far, it hasn't William M. Connolley (talk) 08:29, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• If you are not getting a clear answer from ArbCom, why not start a discussion asking the community whether admins should formally notify editors on their talk page of page bans or topic bans, and log them somewhere? [question: what is the difference between having all admins do this, and having discretionary sanctions imposed across the whole of Wikipedia?] As far as the rest of what I said goes, you haven't answered my question on whether you know how discretionary sanctions work and whether you will be logging your actions taken under that, or whether you will be stepping back and letting others impose discretionary sanctions if needed. That is clearly not pointless minutiae. Carcharoth (talk) 15:20, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

• Regarding finding 3.1 - given a chance to write a different edit summary, one that is less jocular, what would you have written?

• per WP:WRONG. Don't forget this was all backed on the talk page per GoRights suggestion. Do you still support the notion that this inflamed the dispute, and if so on what evidence?

• It may not have actually inflamed the dispute, but using such edit summaries has the potential to do so. There are other articles you may find yourself dealing with, where such an approach will inflame things. This is why I, and presumably the other arbitrators who support this finding of fact, want to see you avoid such conduct in future. Does that make things clearer? Carcharoth (talk) 01:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• Yes, but it still leaves the actual finding wrong, as I said before this is wrong. There is no evidence that the edit summary (or indeed the action) escalated the dispute. You've failed to address that. If you mean, "had the potential to", please say so in the finding William M. Connolley (talk) 08:29, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• That is a good suggestion. I will propose an alternative for voting with that wording. If my fellow arbs fail to vote on it, presumably it will be because they think it is semantics over minutiae. If they do vote for it, then that is all well and good and everyone will be happy. Carcharoth (talk) 15:20, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

• Returning to finding 4.1 - "fails to note my assertion of attentiveness to complaints" - attentiveness to whose complaints? Hipocrite's? Abd's? Other editors? Did you treat everyone's complaints with equal merit and respond to them all?

• You're not reading what I wrote. My message to H re his unblock [56] states The ban on you is lifted, initially for a trial period of one week. During that time I will be particularly attentive to complaints about your editing, on CF or t:CF especially but elsewhere as well.

• I do remember reading that at some point, and I see what you mean now. Apologies for the misunderstanding. Carcharoth (talk) 01:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• Excellent. So your response to my original point, that the finding is misleading, is...? William M. Connolley (talk) 08:29, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• ...that I've opposed this finding on other grounds. I suggest you take up your points with the arbitrators who have supported this finding. Carcharoth (talk) 15:20, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

• Finding 8 - are you saying that your admin ban was something independent of the community discussion that Enric Naval had started, and was not replaced by it? Surely that is a recipe for confusion. What would your response have been if Abd (rather than Enric Naval) had started that discussion, and done so in order to get your ban overturned (rather than just reviewed), and the discussion had been closed the way it was? Would that have replaced your ban with the community ban, or would you have continued to assert that your admin ban was still in place? My view is that the ANI discussion made things more confused, not less, and I think that this is in large part because you did not take part in it. I would presume it was closed before you had a chance to say anything, so to make this clear, I would like to ask if you had any intention of taking part in that community discussion of a ban that you had imposed?

• I am indeed stating that my ban was not replaced by the community discussion. It was confirmed by it. You (and most of arbcomm) do indeed seem to be confused on this point, presumably taken in by Abd's revisionism. What would your response have been if Abd (rather than Enric Naval) had started that discussion, and done so in order to get your ban overturned (rather than just reviewed), and the discussion had been closed the way it was? (1) who started the discussion doesn't matter a lot (do you think it does?) (2) Hermstein has stated that his close was entirely procedural. If the initial request had been to overturn, but the comments been the same, then their would have been a clear consensus not to overturn but to support the ban, so the result would have been the same: the original ban remained.

• To take your direct question first: "do you think it does?" - please see my vote and rationale for finding 4.1 and my caveats in my comment to principle 4.1. I've taken another look at the discussion that you said confirmed your ban, and I see Enric Naval (who started the thread) saying: "I brought it here so it's no longer a topic ban by WMC, but a topic ban by the community". Enric was explicitly asking for the ban to be replaced, not confirmed. If you disagreed with that, why didn't you say something at that point? Also, Enric Naval's opening post in that thread made some criticisms of your actions. Did you consider posting to the thread to explain things, or were you happy to take a back seat and let the noticeboard discussion reach its own conclusion? If I had been closing that thread, I would have questioned why you had not taken part in it. Now, turning back to the thread, and putting aside my concerns expressed previously about the ANI discussion, you will see about halfway down two editors (II and Bilby) saying "Support one-month ban". Now do you see how Enric Naval taking this to a noticeboard, with the best of intentions, increased the confusion? What should have happened is that Abd and Hipocrite accepted the ban, or appealed it. Others getting involved *before* such an appeal was only likely to confuse matters. In my view, the discussion should have been closed as "Abd has requested the discussion closed and WMC has yet to make a statement. The original bans by WMC are still in place. Abd and Hipocrite should prepare appeals for that if they wish to contest them, and WMC should make a statement at that point. Enric Naval is asked in future not to pre-emptively escalate such discussions to a noticeboard." As it was, the post-thread discussion then got sidetracked into confusion over the length of the ban, and which one was valid or in effect. All that could have been avoided if Enric Naval had not (though as I said, it was done with the best of intentions) brought the issue to a noticeboard prematurely. Carcharoth (talk) 01:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• The ANI discussion: I said nothing because I didn't need to say anything; the ban was confirmed, largely. I agree there was confusion there, and it was probably regrettable that EN took it to ANI rather than Abd. I'm reluctant to accept that this mattered, though. I agree with your Abd has requested the discussion closed and WMC has yet to make a statement. The original bans by WMC are still in place. Abd and Hipocrite should prepare appeals for that if they wish to contest them, and WMC should make a statement at that point. So it appears to me that my original statement re (8) remains valid, so I don't understand your (or indeed anyone else, but you're the only one talking) vote in favour of it William M. Connolley (talk) 08:29, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• "I said nothing because I didn't need to say anything" - I'm not sure everyone would agree with you there, but I'll leave this by presuming that if asked you would (unlike others who stand on a point of principle) have turned up and said something. As for my continuing support of finding 8, that is because you really should have known better than to block Abd during a case - you should have recognised that you needed to raise the point that you considered the ban still in place for someone else to consider and if needed block. Others (including non-arbitrators) have said that elsewhere, so I won't belabour the point. Carcharoth (talk) 15:20, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

• Finding 13 - you have a point here. I think Abd was in partial violation of the prior remedy, as he had taken (or tried to take) some of the suggested steps, but not all of them. I think he should have been told more clearly in the prior case to take advice from others before starting anything like that case or this one again. As such, I can't support the current wording of the finding (it is oversimplified and needs more nuance).
• Finding 14 - I abstained on this, so I'll let others respond to you on those points if they will.
• Remedy 6.1 - I think FloNight was saying there that those are mitigating factors. I share her views, in so far as I think you do good work, but you do have a tendancy to seem more than a bit jaded at times, and take actions which with hindsight might have been better dealt with another way. Can I ask if you've ever realised you might be losing perspective when dealing with something and have backed off and asked another administrator to help?

• I don't think that is good enough, as numerous commentors on this case have said, so I won't repeat. There is *nothing* in this judgement that gives support to admins wading into these situations and a vast amount that discourages. It is nice to see FN saying this, but very discouraging to see just the useless statement which contains no supporting remedies and does contain opposing remedies. Lastly, Yes.

• The point of the case is indeed whether and to what extent admins should "wade in" to situations. Do you accept that admins can go too far when they wade into situations, and that this can in itself be harmful to the editing environment? There is a wide spectrum of ways in which different admins deal with different situations, so my question to you would be: what is your approach when an admin takes an action you disagree with, or says they disagree with an action you have taken? Carcharoth (talk) 01:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• Admins can certainly go too far - is that really in dispute? If you want to see what happens when an admin disagrees with me, you could read the discussion on V's talk page re his out-of-process unblock of A William M. Connolley (talk) 08:29, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

For those who don't have their secret decoder ring handy, V = Viridae and A = Abd. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 13:17, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Hust! Don't reveal the Kabal Sekrets or we'll expell you. Meanwhile, to be more specific, User_talk:Viridae#Abd_unblock William M. Connolley (talk) 13:23, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• The incident I was thinking of here was where Jennavecia protected the global warming page and you unprotected it and disagreed with her about her actions (see here). That was one example I found of your approach when an admin takes an action you disagree with (you reversed the action without discussing it first). Are there others? If you want more examples of admins disagreeing with your approach, note the comments by Bigtimepeace on this talk page. What do you think an admin should do when a fellow admin strongly criticises them like this? Carcharoth (talk) 15:20, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

• The bit about "uninvolved" is emphasised for you because the premise is that you sometimes (at least) and often (at worse) fail to recognise when you may be getting too close to something, or acting inappropriately. Not all of the assertions made on the evidence pages are valid or unbiased examples, but there are some there that clearly show you going too far. You must be aware that you have attracted controversy for some of your actions. Would you, with hindsight, have changed the way you handled any of the incidents mentioned in this case?

• Too much fishing. You'll have to be more specific, or you'll just get a useless "yes".

• OK, I will come back to this later, if there is time, and pick out some examples of what I'm referring to here. If you want a question specific to this case, it would be: what do you think could have been done differently that might have led to the issues here being resolved or calmed down before they reached arbitration? Carcharoth (talk) 01:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• I think A always wanted to go to arbcomm - he likes it. So there was nothing *I* could have done to stop him bringing the case. The question is, what would have made the case one that you didn't accept, which would have been the correct result William M. Connolley (talk) 08:29, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

• Then the question becomes why have others taken positions against you and your approach during this arbitration? Remove Abd from the equation. What would you do to address the concerns raised by others? Or do you suggest that they've all blindly followed Abd in his assessment of your actions? Carcharoth (talk) 15:20, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

If you would like to copy these questions somewhere else to answer them, please do, but I think some of the points I've raised above, in response to what you've said, go to the heart of your actions that led to this case, and to why evidence was presented against you. In case this seems too inquisitorial, I did say I'd be asking the parties questions if I had time, but, in the end, I've read more than enough of what Abd has had to say, and I'd now like to read what WMC has to say. If anyone else wants to comment, they should feel free to do so, but ideally I'd like to see WMC's response first. Carcharoth (talk) 23:48, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

• Thanks. I would say that this case, to date, has been far too uninquisitorial William M. Connolley (talk) 08:38, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

• Well, hopefully I won't ask too many more questions, but I do find it helpful to ask parties what they will change (if anything) about their conduct. If Abd is reading this, a *short* reply from him on what he would change might help at this point. Carcharoth (talk) 01:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC) The above was written in draft form this morning, before others arrived at this thread. The request to Abd to make a short statement saying what he would or will change about his conduct still holds, but please keep it short.

• I'll write one, Carcharoth, probably tomorrow night. Thanks for asking. --Abd (talk) 03:35, 28 August 2009 (UTC)
• I'm still working on it, it is not simple or easy to give an answer which is both short and accurate. It should be done tonight, I hope. --Abd (talk) 20:37, 29 August 2009 (UTC)
• Responded below, Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William_M._Connolley/Proposed_decision#Response_to_Carcharoth.27s_question_about_what_I_would_change. --Abd (talk) 16:27, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

• I completely agree, and were ArbComm to function as the last stop in dispute resolution, actively digging up the basis for disputes, instead of becoming, as it has, too much a panel watching and judging a gladiatorial contest, it would resolve rather than only adjudicate. As it stands, the factions will part, each convinced of its own opinion, with little actual consensus found, but merely coercive injunction for limited damage control. This is guaranteed to fail, real world and on-wiki. It could easily be different. --Abd (talk) 11:32, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

• Abd, I'm impressed - that was clear, concise and to the point. I happen to completely agree with you as well. I hope the brevity and clarity of your comment means you're taking some feedback on board - here's hoping to more of the same in your future :) Shell ^babelfish 12:05, 27 August 2009 (UTC)
• @C: Well, hopefully I won't ask too many more questions, but I do find it helpful to ask parties what they will change (if anything) about their conduct - you miss the point. Arbcomm is unsufficiently inquisatorial about the evidence presented to it William M. Connolley (talk) 08:29, 28 August 2009 (UTC)
• As it stands, the factions will part, each convinced of its own opinion, with little actual consensus found - Arbitrators, *please* make a note of this. Despite the crystal clear FOFs documenting his misbehavior, Abd is essentially admitting that once this case is over, he will consider himself vindicated no matter what the decision says. This very much goes to the heart of the problem, that Abd doesn't think he did anything wrong and doesn't listen to warnings. He's also once again pushing this crackpot notion of consensus by attrition, which the community rejected almost unanimously. Raul654 (talk) 14:35, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

  "Abd is essentially admitting that once this case is over, he will consider himself vindicated no matter what the decision says." - This is, of course, NOT what he actually said or implied. --GoRight (talk) 19:32, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

• Thanks, Shell. Actually it reflects that I thought about it all night and worked on it for a hour this morning. Then I read Raul's comment and wasted the rest of the day analyzing the Workshop proposal he cites on NPOV and consensus as a measure of it, because Raul and his friends have deceived themselves and others for years on this "community consensus" thing, and it is so central to this case. It was, instead, a strong majority of involved editors, expressing predictable opinions supporting their collective position; see [57]. Other than two arbs commenting, there weren't any truly uninvolved editors discussing it, the most neutral would be Beetstra and Minkythecat, who aren't neutral here even if not associated with the group I identified as involved-by-affiliation. The arbs were much closer to neutral, or even completely so, and they did not reject the core, and if they had, we'd be having a word with Jimbo, something would have gone terribly awry that might require the Hand of God. --Abd (talk) 20:45, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

• I really hope the arbitrators' eyes have been opened by this last comment by Abd. He continues to believe that the community consensus is actually "a strong majority of involved editors." This is closely related to his tendency to avoid consensus-building processes such as dispute resolution, in which proposed finding 13, which is likely to prevail, finds him in violation of a past remedy. He spurns good-faith feedback by attributing unpalatable opinions to illegitimate processes, and in his eyes the achievement of this arbitration will be to cement that view as confirmed by the Committee--even though that cannot have been the intent of the arbitrators. I fully expect to be identified by Abd as a member of the mythical Cabal in future arbitration cases, although my only association with the identified members is that I sometimes agree with them, just as I sometimes agree with members of the Committee. --TS 23:31, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

If the Committee dealt with these cases simply by topic-banning everyone involved, with extreme prejudice, that would probably work wonders in helping editors find ways to work more congenially with each other since they would, presumably, not want to go to arbitration. Since that isn't the case, I guess the editors involved with this particular topic are going to have to self-motivate themselves to find some way to work together better. I assume everyone involved in this case is here to build an encyclopedia, right? Cla68 (talk) 00:11, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

I think I agree in principle with your arguments. However you include me in the list of those who should be topic banned and that really makes things problematic. You cast far too wide a net. Moreover as I said the tenor of your comments is to push the false claim that this case is about cabalism. --TS 01:56, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Why topic bans should be on the table for everyone involved

This discussion shows the partisan bickering and conflict that has been ongoing in certain science-related articles, especially climate change, for some time. The conflict involves use of admin tools to protect one side's POV, as happened in this case. If you look at the Lawrence Solomon talk page, you will see that it all comes down to a content dispute. One group of editors want the text to read one way, and another group has a different opinion. Then, admins who support one side over the other get involved. Please consider topic bans for everyone, you can include me if you like. Seriously. Cla68 (talk) 00:30, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Many contributors here (like me) don't edit cold fusion so your point here and above is not easy to understand. In addition you are also going completely off-topic. Mathsci (talk) 00:39, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

I will gladly self-topic ban from Cold Fusion, if the arbs feel that would help matters. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:44, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Mathsci is right, I should have been more clear. I guess I'm asking the Committee to expand the scope from Cold Fusion, to any science articles that editors GoRight, ABD, WMC, Raul654, SBHB, Stephan Schulz, Tony Sideaway, Mathsci, SBHB, me more recently, etc., are active on. If not, you'll probably have these editors back here in front of you eventually. Topic ban us all for failing to work together adequately. Cla68 (talk) 01:06, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't part of Abd's original Cabal list, but now I'm mentioned twice in Cla68's list. Movin' on up! Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 02:13, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Your arguments are still impossible to fathom. I don't edit namespace science articles with any of the editors here. Even if you included yourself as a precaution, what you write is quite perplexing and might be taken by some to be offensive. If, as appears to be the case, you're unfamiliar with editors' namespace contributions, perhaps it would be better not to discuss them here. Mathsci (talk) 01:23, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Cla68 has given the game away by naming me. My only involvement in this case has been to make a few edits on the workshop and some talk pages. I have not been involved in any problematic editing on science articles. He is simply promoting Abd's false claim of cabalism. --TS 01:27, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

He apparently does not know the difference between science and fringe science. Mathsci (talk) 01:30, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

It doesn't make any difference. We could lump together cold fusion and science-related articles if we wanted, but the same policies still apply. The charge in this case has been pushed strongly and persistently: that those who see Abd's editing as problematic and in need of curbing are part of a minority caucus. It is simply false. There is no symmetry here, and Cla68 hasn't demonstrated (nor does the Committee appear to accept) that such symmetry applies. --TS 02:05, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

I've made a comment to the clerk. Mathsci (talk) 02:08, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

What I would suggest is that at this late stage in the case, comments by those who have only started commenting on this case recently (e.g. Tony Sidaway and Cla68), are not, on balance, helpful. All it will do is increase the amount of postings to this page, and as SBHB said earlier, that makes it less likely that arbs will read the relevant parts of this page before completing voting. If anyone has general commentary outside the scope of this case, they should post it elsewhere. Carcharoth (talk) 02:33, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

<-Cla, it is very late in the case for this sort of thing. As a former clerk, last minute attempts at major changes in scope never work out well. Best to let things settle down a bit, gather your thoughts, marshall your diffs, and open a new request. Thatcher 02:41, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm in full agreement with Carcharoth and Thatcher here. Cla68, if you feel there is a severe issue that needs handling by the Arbitration Committee that is not being addressed here, please wait for this case to close and open a request for a new case then. Coming here at this stage and saying everyone commenting on this case should be topic banned is not at all helpful and needlessly provocative. Please back off and retake your seat in the audience. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 04:36, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Much too late. Cool Hand Luke 14:57, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

You know better than anyone else here how to contact me if something needs to be done, Luke. I'm not omniscient nor omnipresent, particularly with my college semester starting up now. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 17:18, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

I thought it was clear I was agreeing with Thatcher, hence the offset level. Cool Hand Luke 18:53, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

My deepest apologies, I didn't catch that. You didn't deserve that sort of response. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 18:58, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

No, it's ok. One of my persistent problems is using too much ambiguous speech. I would be much clearer with just a few more words. Cool Hand Luke 19:21, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

I've some extras, if you like. Take any you need. --Abd (talk) 00:44, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Remedy 8

Even if it was intended as otherwise, this remedy is grossly unhelpful in my opinion because arbitrators supporting this proposal are importing the minutia from this situation into policy. Whether this is a conscious choice or not is a different matter altogether. It's beyond obvious that the community's interpretation (expressed very well by MastCell) has been fairly wide, and obviously quite different from Carcharoth's, or for that matter, a few other arbitrator views. But it's just not practical to document every set of circumstances where bans can be imposed without prior discussions, at this time, or within a clumsy time limit of 1 month, or even longer. At the moment, good judgement is sufficient. So why insist on interfering with community processes through this urging?

Remedies here are supposed to be enforcible for the benefit of this dispute; remedy 8 does not help this case. Please leave the community to sort it out at a more appropriate time, in our own way (i.e. not now and not from this case). As has been said elsewhere, discussion precipitated from this case is likely to have case specific overtones that will never make good general policy. Ncmvocalist (talk) 08:01, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

In my experience, remedies "urging" the community to do something rarely gets results. This is because not much of the wider community follows arbitration closely enough to read these remedies. What is needed is for a suitable period of time to be allowed to elapse (to avoid reacting to specific cases), as Ncmvocalist says, but still for someone to drive things forward (the community is made of individuals, so an individual action is still needed to start things going). The best way to do this is to post to the policy or guideline talk page, and to notify enough places so that a broad cross-section of the community is aware of the discussion, and to proceed from that point. Referring back to the case would not be helpful at that point. If the community discussion says that no changes are needed, then that is a good result: new discussion has bolstered the policy. If changes are needed, then that can happen. Possibly an alternative to "urging" is to pass a finding saying "the current policy says nothing on this matter". The conclusion from this is that ArbCom are having to intepret things without any guidance from policy. On a more general note, Ncmvocalist, there is a list of "urged" remedies floating about somewhere. It would be useful to have a copy of that on-wiki. Would you like a link to that so you could review all remedies of that type and see what actually happened to them and how useful they were? Indeed, this sort of meta-analysis of arbitration is something it would be very helpful if the community could help out with. Carcharoth (talk) 12:44, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Sure, a link would be good - I'll review as time permits. But I still feel it is important that you and your colleagues (including whomever came up with the original proposal) reconsider your votes on this. Carcharoth, your first sentence is not compatible with why you'd cast a vote to make this proposal pass. Noting that current policy says nothing on this matter is obviously preferrable to spelling out obvious (or ill-considered) remedies to the same issue. The community would more likely respond to a finding where necessary, and others may also understand more clearly why remedies are passing in the way that they are (or not). I need not spell out which types of accounts will push agenda across even more areas in Wikipedia as a result of this remedy passing in this case. I don't believe the aftermath of any previous cases involved the community having to bear such a cost. Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:33, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Moving this case forward and reasons for delay

I would normally post this to the arbitration mailing list, in order to try and get voting on this case moving more quickly, but I'm posting here instead so that the parties to the case have some idea what the hold up is. There are 11 active arbitrators on this case, eight of whom have voted or started voting (FloNight voted but then moved herself to inactive and indented her votes - she explained that earlier). Of those eight, not all have voted on everything yet, and I'm making a list and posting that to the mailing list so the active arbs can complete their voting. The main reason for the delay though is the reduced arbitration committee activity, with several arbs being mostly away or inactive during this period. The three arbs who have not yet voted are: FayssalF, John Vandenberg and Roger Davies. John Vandenberg marked himself inactive three days ago. I am trying to confirm whether or not this applies to this case (I think it does, but it won't affect the majority). Roger Davies has been active today (but might not be returning to activity on arbitration business until after Monday), and FayssalF was last active 23 August 2009. I think Fayssal may be intending to vote in this case, but if not, I will ask that he move himself to inactive (he was last active on 23 August 2009, but he did say he would be away, so it is not an unexpected absence). Having said that, the following proposals that are in voting have five or less votes: findings 3.2, 4.1, 5.1; remedies 2.1, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 3.5; and enforcement 1.1. I'm going to point the rest of the committee to this list and try and get voting moving again on this, and clear up whether and when Fayssal, Roger and John will be voting. But it is possible that not much more movement will be seen on this case over the weekend, and it might not be finished and closed for another week or so. So if you are or were wondering why things are moving slowly, those are the reasons, so please be patient. Carcharoth (talk) 20:02, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

It's not the pace that concerns me - it's the direction, or lack thereof. A lot of the oppose votes seem to rationalize: "unnecessary because remedy X will take care of this problem". But then remedy X is not passing. If this case closes with nothing beyond admonishments, then it will be worse than a complete waste of time. The history of several major parties in this case suggests that they are unadmonishable. Discretionary sanctions are worse than useless; any admin considering implementing them where they are most sorely needed will be wikilawyered to death, and the wording of these remedies gives them absolutely no cover against someone capable of expending virtually limitless energy to creating and prolonging litigation. MastCell ^Talk 06:15, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

There is, of course, the simple explanation that the arbitrators are not Borg and that we do not yet agree on what the correct response is. The proposals, alternatives and discussion you see in the votes is an attempt to hammer this out.

Arguably, we could have held this discussion on the Arbs' mailing list or wiki — and present a unified decision after the fact — but then we'd be castigated for presenting a decision as a fait accompli or as work of a secret trial. — Coren ^(talk) 14:18, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Absolutely. Even now, I'm missing signs of a vigorous debate. Every few days someone agrees or disagrees, sometimes with a short remark. Only very occasionally is one of them really substantial. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:27, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

On this we can agree. Nice, eh? The solution is reasonably obvious to me: careful, open (visible) process. Possibly subpages. Avoiding "verdict first, trial after." Scope should have been restricted, instead of combining different disputes (i.e, referring immature parts of a dispute back to the community and normal DR process, and isolating remaining separable issues into specific cases. Here, was my alleged abuse at Cold fusion really relevant to whether or not WMC was willing to block while involved? Sure, the block could be justified under IAR, maybe, i.e., "he deserved it," but .... if nothing else, it would create an appearance of biased action, which is clearly to be avoided. By combining the issues both become obscured.) There should be thorough examination and solidity on findings of fact, and, I'd argue, a majority should not be enough for a finding of fact, unless a decision must be made, in which case it should be recognized that it might be necessary to revisit a finding later. Proposed principles should be solid as well, principles should enjoy high consensus, which does seem to be the case with most, but sometimes the high consensus may be obtained by sweeping important and relevant issues under the carpet. Where community discussion reveals a significant split over a principle, it should be addressed with special care.

There should be no rush to decide; rather, if something is urgent, injunctions should be proposed and decided quickly using summary process; because they are temporary in effect, it is less important to get them absolutely right. (An injunction can be issued by a single arbitrator subject to rapid review on request -- or even by a clerk, pending.) --Abd (talk) 15:58, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

What does "adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia" mean under discretionary sanctions?

In the context of the passing discretionary sanctions on the cold fusion article, is "the purpose of Wikipedia" to have articles which (A) reflect the current state of the peer-reviewed secondary literature, or articles that (B) preserve and defend the exclusive bias of those who believe that all of the scientific questions surrounding cold fusion were closed back around 1990, and any suggestion that cold fusion is a novel physical phenomenon, that "basic questions of fusion reactions in solids seem to be successfully explained", or even debate on the subject are all too fringe for inclusion and must be excluded points of view? Because I was sure I it was (A) until I read a post by one of the arbitrators in the previous arbitration case on cold fusion, which implied in no uncertain terms that the purpose of Wikipedia -- as far as cold fusion goes -- is (B). Clarification on this point would be helpful. 76.254.71.129 (talk) 03:07, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

The question is a valid one (though option B has been overstated). There is a conflict between RfAr/Cold fusion and RfAr/Fringe science. I was "pushing" for implementing the findings of RfAr/Fringe science, which require (A), as was Pcarbonn, earlier on, before that case was decided. However, what I've called the Cab has been pushing for (B), roughly, and argued that way in RfAr/FS. By guidelines and founding principles, the answer would be (A). I have been going over the present proposed decision today and reviewed the evidence provided in the finding that I'd edited Cold fusion tendentiously. One piece cited was evidence from Enric Naval in RfAr/Fringe science, arguing against what became the principles asserted in the decision.

This is the finding of fact, Abd_tendentious_editing, and it's the fourth citation, We can't take every peer-reviewed source seriously. That refers, then to Evidence of Enric Naval] presented in RfAr/Fringe science. A majority of arbitrators, here, signed on to a finding of fact of alleged tendentious editing on my part, evidenced by a statement made in a previous arbitration, when I was not involved. I can see why, to someone not familiar with the literature, it could look like I was pushing a fringe POV, but that's because, for years now, all the peer-reviewed literature on the topic assumes or supports that low energy nuclear reactions are a reality. I am not aware of any counterexamples. The "researcher" Enric mentions is Dieter Britz, a skeptic who maintains a database of articles on cold fusion, in cooperation with Jed Rothwell, who has written an analysis of the Britz database with more detail than the IP Enric diffs from his RfAr/FS Evidence. The balance of peer-reviewed publication, since 1989, favors cold fusion, it's been documented at a whitelisted page at lenr-canr.org. --Abd (talk) 04:47, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

This line of defense has been the subject of several million bytes of text at Talk:Cold fusion and here. I don't think it needs to be rehashed an eleventeenth time, even if an IP poses a ludicrous have-you-stopped-beating-your-wife question in ignorance of the notice at the top of the page. MastCell ^Talk 06:06, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

At least you are willing to identify yourself as opposed to further debate. Too bad you aren't Harry Reid. 76.254.71.129 (talk) 15:53, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but as someone who sees a similar type of bias on a daily basis in the global warming pages this is not a ridiculous question. The goal posts are constantly being moved. First it was WP:RS. Then it was "only peer reviewed sources." Then when skeptical peer reviewed sources started being presented it became "only peer reviewed sources that the majority approves of." The same thing has happened at Cold Fusion as far as I can tell. The goal posts are moved to where they are needed to exclude the minority POV. It all looks perfectly reasonable from the outside, of course, but it is not. It is very self-serving. --GoRight (talk) 07:12, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

At least at global warming, the majority approves of the peer-reviewed articles also approved of by their secondary reviews. It is some quirk of history that the majority of credentialed cold fusion editors have generally been opposed to the secondary peer reviewed sources, probably due to their relative scarcity. However, secondary sources on global warming have a long track record of understating the severity of the problem, so even there, continued debate is essential for the continued health of the article. 76.254.71.129 (talk) 16:25, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

AFAIK, MastCell, this is the first time that this dispute has been clearly framed as a conflict between two recent ArbComm decisions, and the first time that I've concisely challenged the specific evidence cited in the proposed decision. Arbitrators should ask themselves why they signed on to that evidence, were they aware of what they were approving? Is it because the subject header Enric Naval gave it implied I was dismissing peer-reviewed sources? (The opposite! He and others have been dismissing peer-reviewed secondary source, which he justified in that "evidence.") GoRight is correct, except that the situation is reversed with the topics.

With Global warming the majority of editors, scientists overall, and specialists in the field are aligned (which still doesn't mean that skeptical RS should be excluded, only balanced), whereas with Cold fusion the non-specialists may still be typically skeptical, but specialists have moved on (and "specialists" doesn't mean just "fringe researchers," it means experts selected by the U.S. Department of Energy, peer-reviewers at mainstream journals, an initially skeptical prominent physicist, Robert Duncan, recruited by CBS Sixty Minutes to review the field, and the American Chemical Society, the largest scientific society in the world, publishing, with Oxford University Press, the peer-reviewed Low Energy Nuclear Reactions Sourcebook.) If I'm wrong about the balance of peer-reviewed RS, it should be easy to show. I could have taken a much stronger position than I did, I was allowing weak sources to balance strong ones, in the name of consensus and gradual change. --Abd (talk) 12:52, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe I haven't been clear. I'm not "opposed to further debate" about cold fusion or global warming, or about our sourcing policies as they apply there. I am opposed to further (ab)use of this particular venue to carry on that debate. First of all, these are content matters where the Committee is unlikely to take a meaningful stand; more to the point, none of these arguments are new. Posting more repetitious material in this venue about how cold fusion has been unjustifiably dismissed doesn't strengthen your case; if anything, it lends credence to the "tendentious" finding. But do as you like. MastCell ^Talk 16:41, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

How can you say that you are not opposed to further debate and in the same paragraph claim that material "about how cold fusion has been unjustifiably dismissed" is "tendentious"? What is the appropriate venue for asking the Committee to strike down the special exemptions to the usual reliable source criteria which have been the longstanding practice at cold fusion? 76.254.71.129 (talk) 16:49, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Low Energy Nuclear Reactions Sourcebook is certainly a prestigious source, and any reasonable editor should think it would sway the Committee to see what a terrible assault they have been making on the truth, on the quality of the encyclopedia's content, over the years with their misguided attempts at trying to make cold fusion conform to the "skeptical" view which turned out to be all too gullible to the fringe on the opposite side. But maybe it's too dificult for them to look? Maybe it's just too embarrassing to say:

Yes, the Committee was misled and we made some mistakes. There is always room for improvement. So we are going to make it all up by saying from this point forward, the article needs to conform to the encyclopedia's reliable source criteria, not some measure of how much popular press individual articles in the peer reviewed literature have received, or any other arbitrary exception to the rules. There shouldn't be any exceptions to the reliable source criteria, not for articles on physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, religion, politics, voting methods, race, or any other subject. If there's a controversy, it should be settled in accordance with the best peer-reviewed secondary sources, not the opinion of persistent editors with an axe to grind, not by persistent editors with a conflict of interest, not by paid editors, and not by anyone who isn't qualified and willing to review the best peer-reviewed literature available on the subject. That's what we mean by "the purpose of Wikipedia."

What's the worst that could happen if the Committee took a principled stand? Some guy who works at a hot fusion lab might get worried about their funding five years down the road? So what? They've been promising the world for decades now, so they're worried about their funding anyway. The economy is going to be a lot less likely to let them land on their feet if the encyclopedia is edited according to whim instead of respect for the truth. It's a choice we all have to make, and the Committee can continue in their rut, and just have it come back to them again if they do. Because truth can't be banned. 76.254.71.129 (talk) 16:45, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Response to Carcharoth's question about what I would change.

It took two full days of work, but I personally consider that effort well-spent, whether or not anyone else reads the full response. I took the RfAr proposed decision page and responded to the findings and remedies, in detail, but then collapsed my original discussion and added specific brief "lessons" or plans about future behavior. That part is fairly short. I may come back here with a very brief summary under this. The response is at User:Abd/What I intend to do differently. --Abd (talk) 15:13, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Summary:

• I would follow WP:DR proactively, instead of assuming that the one with the complaint should follow DR. I would not allow unresolved complaints to pile up, creating an impression of unresponsiveness.
• I would be even more careful to avoid edit warring. (I already have a voluntary 1RR restriction, rarely violated -- but, note, I don't consider a revised attempt to post a section, edited to satisfy apparent objection by another editor, expressed with original revert, say by adding additional sources, to be a "revert." It's normal editorial negotiation and highly efficient in a cooperative environment.)
• I would solicit advice from a mentor before undertaking possibly controversial actions of weight.
• I would avoid long discussion posts on talk pages, except on user talk for consenting editors.
• Where I have much to say of relevance, I would say it using, as appropriate, collapse or links to user pages or the like. I might use self-reversion, reverting a long post, replacing it with a brief summary and link to history for those interested.
• I would continue to confront, within boundaries (including mentor consent), the problems of factional affiliation/involvement and Majority POV-pushing, again proactively, using dispute resolution at the lowest level that works. (I would not pursue DR unless I had support, i.e., the dispute was over more than my own isolated opinion.)

Did I forget anything? --Abd (talk) 16:18, 31 August 2009 (UTC)