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A fundamental part of dispute resolution on this website is that both sides of a dispute will have their behavior looked at. If I come to a noticeboard complaining that someone is reverting my edits, then of course 3rd parties will examine my edits to see if they should have been reverted or not. I can't come to a noticeboard and say that someone's reversions to my edits make me feel harassed, but you aren't allowed to look at my edits. In effect, this is exactly what Arb has done to Fram. A FoF states that all of the evidence is available on-wiki, yet no arb will point to any of this evidence to support the desysop. Yet the Arbs feel confident to cast aspersions against Fram and say they were hounding and bordering on harassment. From what's available out of the dossier, Fram's actions were 100% correct and supported by the community. In the case of Laura Hale, that user was editing for pay disguised as a Wikipedian in Residence, and widely protected by other editors involved in or supporting the scheme, as well as by an undisclosed personal relationship with someone very senior at the WMF. This has resulted in an unfair process that goes completely against the core policies of transparency and fairness. This Committee has done the community a grave disservice. [[User:Mr Ernie|Mr Ernie]] ([[User talk:Mr Ernie|talk]]) 19:51, 20 September 2019 (UTC) |
A fundamental part of dispute resolution on this website is that both sides of a dispute will have their behavior looked at. If I come to a noticeboard complaining that someone is reverting my edits, then of course 3rd parties will examine my edits to see if they should have been reverted or not. I can't come to a noticeboard and say that someone's reversions to my edits make me feel harassed, but you aren't allowed to look at my edits. In effect, this is exactly what Arb has done to Fram. A FoF states that all of the evidence is available on-wiki, yet no arb will point to any of this evidence to support the desysop. Yet the Arbs feel confident to cast aspersions against Fram and say they were hounding and bordering on harassment. From what's available out of the dossier, Fram's actions were 100% correct and supported by the community. In the case of Laura Hale, that user was editing for pay disguised as a Wikipedian in Residence, and widely protected by other editors involved in or supporting the scheme, as well as by an undisclosed personal relationship with someone very senior at the WMF. This has resulted in an unfair process that goes completely against the core policies of transparency and fairness. This Committee has done the community a grave disservice. [[User:Mr Ernie|Mr Ernie]] ([[User talk:Mr Ernie|talk]]) 19:51, 20 September 2019 (UTC) |
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:I assuming that the community will have the chance to 'restore' Fram's administratorship. [[User:GoodDay|GoodDay]] ([[User talk:GoodDay|talk]]) 19:57, 20 September 2019 (UTC) |
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Arbitration motion regarding Eric Corbett
Thank you ArbCom. I can now sleep safer knowing that a typo or two won’t be corrected. (to be clear I am referring to the handful of minor edits by EC’s alleged “sock”) Mr Ernie (talk) 15:00, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Well now, that is unexpected... Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 15:12, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Question. I see that Mkdw has blocked Abuwtiyuw 666 (talk · contribs) at the same time, which is clearly Eric. However, unless I'm missing something, that account doesn't look like it's edited disruptively, nor do its edits overlap with Eric, nor has it edited whilst Eric was blocked. Just to check - are there other accounts involved here editing "abusively", or is the indef purely because Eric claimed he'd retired in the middle of an ArbCom case? Black Kite (talk) 15:22, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) As we said in the motion, the indef was for sockpuppetry and not for merely retiring, and there was more than one account involved:
Eric Corbett...has been abusively misusing multiple accounts and disruptively editing while logged out
. I will note, though, that even had all edits been productive/non-disruptive, it would still be unacceptable for a person facing possible sanctions in an ArbCom case to "retire" and then begin editing under another account, as it would fall squarely under "avoid[ing] detection or sanctions". GorillaWarfare (talk) 15:38, 2 September 2019 (UTC)- It's also avoiding scrutiny with regard to his existing sanctions. – Joe (talk) 15:43, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks GW, it was just that there was only that account listed under "sockpuppets of Eric Corbett". Black Kite (talk) 15:49, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- My recollection is the Eric (understandably miffed by the Kafkaesque actions), decided to scamble his password. Once that happened, he could only edit as an IP or by creating a new account. Is there some requirement that he identify his old account? The policy says "should" not "must". I don;t see it as remotely " "avoid[ing] detection or sanctions".S Philbrick(Talk) 19:11, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- What you're describing is a WP:CLEANSTART, something that is prohibited for accounts under active sanctions and for those "currently or about to be formally discussed for their conduct (such as at an administrative noticeboard or in an open case with the Arbitration Committee)". Eric falls under both of those categories. GorillaWarfare (talk) 19:27, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) As we said in the motion, the indef was for sockpuppetry and not for merely retiring, and there was more than one account involved:
- Socking via a registered account & ips? the damage is done :( GoodDay (talk) 15:35, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Oh indeed, I was just intrigued to see whether he'd done any actual damage or not. Black Kite (talk) 15:37, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- He'd actually threatened to do that. So, that is sad (and it is, certainly Eric did a great deal of good work), but not terribly unexpected. I'm just sorry to see things end that way, more than anything, but I certainly can't criticize the ArbCom for addressing that. None of us are allowed to do things like that. Seraphimblade Talk to me 15:42, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Well, that's unexpected, but it does have the advantage of saving ArbCom and the community another dramafest. I guess this puts Wikipedia into the paradoxical position of having to thank Eric Corbett for going on a socking spree. An indef block is, of course, appropriate under these circumstances. Sandstein 15:53, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Sigh. He should have taken a break. Committed, vested contributors can and often do suffer burnout, we are terrible at helping with this. Guy (Help!) 16:10, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- I agree: he should have just stayed away for a few months. If he'd come back after a long break, even with an ArbCom decision hanging over his head, things would be different. Both for him & the rest of the community. Coming back to Wikipedia so soon after he claimed he was gone for good is simply not healthy behavior. -- llywrch (talk) 20:47, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- EC can only blame himself for this. He brought it on himself by being disruptive. Now he has been blocked. I support Arbcoms decision completely. BabbaQ (talk) 16:27, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- BabbaQ, I disagree. I'm not saying that Eric is totally innocent, but "can only blame himself for this" is laughable over-reach.--S Philbrick(Talk) 18:44, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- I think honestly that neither your or my opinion matter. As in the end the only one who has to take the consequences of his actions are EC. No one else can be blamed for EC’s behaviour except EC, though of course I can see that EC at times might have been baited. It is sad to see him leave like this, but I could see it a mile away. I will not comment on this any further, what’s done is dons.--BabbaQ (talk) 19:23, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Eric Corbett was baited, refused to take the bait, for which he should be applauded. Then inexplicably, someone filed an incoherent case request, and rather than throw it out with prejudice, the committee decided to re-examine his behavior. Kafka would be proud. As for your opinion, I'm sorry you feel it doesn't matter. I dont feel the same about my own opinion. I'm not blaming anyone for Eric's behaviour, but I sure as hell am blaming the community for its behaviour. And there's a lot of blame.--S Philbrick(Talk) 20:05, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Sphilbrick: Truth be told, I genuinely feel that the only reason people say my filing was incoherent was because I did write it for the community. I wrote it explicitly to ensure I had solid policy grounds for a full case. The goal of case requests should not be to play to what is popular in the community, but it should be written for the committee's attention only. As Mendaliv likes to consistently point out to people, arbcom is meant to adjudicate disputes which have received an unsatisfactory consideration from the community. Whether you believe Eric's restrictions were unworkable, or whether you believe he was being baited and left with little recourse; the committee was justified in accepting the case. I've still not been able to identify for Gerda an example of restrictions that have actually worked before, but I can certainly tell you that Eric's RFA restrictions were certainly the farthest from it and should have been repealed as obsolete. That will likely never happen now. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 20:45, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Eric Corbett was baited, refused to take the bait, for which he should be applauded. Then inexplicably, someone filed an incoherent case request, and rather than throw it out with prejudice, the committee decided to re-examine his behavior. Kafka would be proud. As for your opinion, I'm sorry you feel it doesn't matter. I dont feel the same about my own opinion. I'm not blaming anyone for Eric's behaviour, but I sure as hell am blaming the community for its behaviour. And there's a lot of blame.--S Philbrick(Talk) 20:05, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- This action was unwise in the same way that the FRAMBAN was unwise, and the two are inextricably linked. What the en.wp community of volunteer editors has learned this summer (winter, for my friends in the Southern Hemisphere) is that it's okay to produce crap content for the enyclopedia and that, above all else, we have to be nice to each other. Personally, I don't think filing multiple AE reports and an RfAr is nice; nor do I think that eviscerating a featured article (the word is mine, I admit I used before Eric did) is nice. I don't think it's nice to drop a snarky comment on a user talk page for no discernible reason; nor is it nice to file an SPI on an IP, who may or not have been Eric, for posting to a talk page. It's not nice that the committee was informed of the other account - the one that made a few copyedits. It's not nice that the committee decided to abrogate their duties, roll up their sleeves, and dig into the sequence of events that brought about the RfAr, but instead decided to indef block for abusive actions without giving the respect of being transparent about those actions. I'd like to see diffs of the abusive account. Because of what I do here I'll never be an admin and as such can never be an arb so I can't claim to understand the amount of pressure and abuse those roles entail, but I can empathize and it would be nice to see equal empathy for content editors who do, most of them quietly, improve the encyclopedia day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, bear the burden of a lifetime or stewardship or having to accept that eventually, sometime, someone will rewrite their work. But none of that is ever discussed on any of our fora; instead we fight, and fight more, and fight again, because the objective is to win. And, yes, I never thought it would come to this, but I have to say it's a toxic atmosphere.Eric shouldn't have done whatever he did, but each and every action others took that brought us to this point shouldn't have been taken either. In my view the Committee has taken the easy way out. That Eric might some day get indeffed has never really been in doubt, but this set of circumstances was truly mean. Nothing nice about it at all. And to top it off there's fight about keeping his user page, for fuck's sake.Apologies for the rant, but I believe very strongly that a frank discussion needs to take place in terms how to solve the various conflicting roles of admin vs. content; staff vs. volunteer; crap content vs. quality content; nice vs. mean. Victoria (tk) 19:38, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Victoriaearle: We're limited by the privacy policy in how transparent we can be with CheckUser blocks. Eric made abusive edits while logged out, so linking directly to diffs would be inappropriate. – Joe (talk) 21:24, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Joe, yes I'm vaguely familiar with how things work around here. Unfortunately, like the T & S mo, hiding behind privacy invites Streisanding. I've found one, but unless you have the full technical data on hand, (it's a function I've held elsewhere, not on Wikipedia, so know how it works) then in my view it's iffy. Regardless, also in my view, that's a very very long lag-time to drop the ban hammer, and furthermore I still firmly believe the Committee abrogated its responsibilities in its failure to consider the full sequence of actions. Nothing ever happens in a vacuum, but you don't need me to point that out. Victoria (tk) 21:53, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- That is going to be an interesting point Joe, I sincerely hope the Arbcom is aware of the legalities of this public statement. Saying “no legal threats” may prove in itself to be a hollow threat. I am far from convinced EC was a serial user of abusive socks, and you and the Arbcom, if indeed it is the Arbcom, has made a very serious allegation. Giano (talk) 21:31, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- As mentioned above, simply announcing his retirement while facing an ArbCom case and then switching to an undisclosed alt or logged-out editing would already be considered an abuse of alt-accounts under WP:SOCK, since it clearly allows him to avoid impending scrutiny. --Aquillion (talk) 21:45, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- " Eric made abusive edits while logged out, so linking directly to diffs would be inappropriate. "
- Trouble is, we proles no longer believe it when Party members say such things without evidence. We've seen what the Inner Party did over Fram, and for all those reasons which everyone knows and no-one can mention here for fear of instabanning. Congratulations ArbCom, you've now got all the trust of the British tory party in brexit week. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:25, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Any reason the committee couldn't oversight the IP address and then provide the diff(s) in question? Seems like that would provide some transparency while addressing the legitimate concern about privacy. 28bytes (talk) 23:30, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- (Redacted) (by myself) Black Kite (talk) 23:40, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- It would still violate privacy. I am not sure if I should explain how per WP:BEANS, but it would still reveal the IP address. --Rschen7754 23:52, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- I don't think this is what Rschen7754 is referring to, but I can say this bit safely; among other things, it would make the links between the account and the IPs visible to Oversighters who are not also CUs (such as myself), and who are not entitled to see the results of a CU. Vanamonde (Talk) 00:04, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Any reason the committee couldn't oversight the IP address and then provide the diff(s) in question? Seems like that would provide some transparency while addressing the legitimate concern about privacy. 28bytes (talk) 23:30, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- To be clear, this is not linked to the Fram situation, "inextricably" or otherwise. Those two decisions weren't even made by the same people. A lot of this whole thread involves trying to draw connections between incidents that really aren't related except that they happened in the same few months. Opabinia regalis (talk) 06:56, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Opabinia regalis apologies for speaking up, but I didn't use the phraseology lightly nor in a sense of hyperbole. Of course the circumstances differ; no two cases are the same. But there are striking similarities: each editor values quality content over quality social-interactions (well the second is subjective, but that's how they're perceived); each editor is considered an "unblockable"; each editor is thought to contribute to the "toxic" environment here; neither editor has been adequately "dealt" with in previous arb requests. T & S stepped in for Fram, but this board statement isn't writing on the wall. It's a clear reminder of the WMF's "strong statement against toxic behaviors", clearly says communities should take it as wake up call and deal with unblockables. What's not explicit is that if we don't, they will. The problem as I see it, is that at the time of the arb request it wasn't the perfect slam dunk case (clearly now it is; but that raises more questions than answers). The case was filed on 18 August, and at that time there didn't seem to be consensus to take on a sprawling case with many parties and undertake a full examination of the events that led up to that date; the request sat there and sat there, basically at no consensus; then a vote shifted it, but there was no consensus re scope; then an arb, who possibly has a COI, who's not been very active, and arguably should have recused, shifted the balance. Yet, still no decision, no consensus. In the meantime the committee "received" information re the new accts other activities (and, no, I'm not referring to the IP post on Eric's page), and voila, a slam dunk. So, yes, very different circumstance. What I'm saying is this: in my view it was incumbent on the committee to accept the case and examine the conduct of everyone involved, because there was a lot of bad behavior. By failing to do so, the committee abrogates its duty to the community and brings us closer, or rather places us squarely in a crossroads: how does en.wp define itself? Are we a social networking site or are we a crowdsourced online encyclopedia? The two are diametrically opposite. Are we independent or are we fully subjects of WMF, OFFICE and T & S. These are the issues that confront this committee and the next, and that's why I said the cases are inextricably intertwined. I get that none of you signed up for any of this and don't want if, but it's where we are. My suggestion is that the entire community work together to find solutions because, otherwise, I believe there's a possibly of sinking. Victoria (tk) 16:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- What I do not really understand and what you possibly can explain: Isn't it possible to create high quality content and remain civil at the same time? It looks like some users think it is not possible.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Simple answer, when on the shop floor (so to speak) where all the disputes originate, in the heat of the moment, when mud is flying: No. I've lost my cool more than once. But it's not a simple question nor is the answer simple. We need a balance; we need people to be more empathetic and inclusive; we need to talk to each other and not at each other (or even scream at each other); we need to learn mechanisms where it doesn't get to the point that things get out of hand and meek, mild editors like myself lose her cool and start spouting profanities. Plus, what's overlooked more often than not, is not the "bad word" part of civility but the drip drip drip of faux politeness masking passive aggression and an overwhelming drive to win at all costs. It's honestly withering and soul destroying. Victoria (tk) 16:47, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Ugh. No? Really? Anyone who argues it's not possible to contribute quality content while also being civil needs to reexamine their editing habits and their personal investment in editing. Grandpallama (talk) 18:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Grandpallama why not try editing Indian caste-related topics for a few months, adding and maintaining "quality content" and then report back as to whether you have managed to hold your temper and remain civil (whatever "civil" may mean). I know of no saints on Wikipedia but let's see if you can prove me wrong. - Sitush (talk) 20:00, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Grandpallama Or take a look at Talk:Cotswold Olimpick Games for the full effect of what happens when someone who is clueless starts wanting changes to be made to an FA and won't stop arguing their ridiculous point despite numerous people explaining that they are wrong. At least three (including me and Eric Corbett) have lost their rag at that one but the clueless is still allowed to persist despite five or six far more experienced people disagreeing with them. Now select some article in which you have invested a massive amount of time and taken through FA etc, then try to think how you would deal with matters if a trenchant IDHT person turned up. - Sitush (talk) 22:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Other people's bad behavior doesn't excuse one's own. And as I said, if you become so personally heavily invested in an article that you can't control your temper, you need to reexamine your editing habits. Take a break, walk away, let other people wrestle with it for a while. There are a multitude of problematic editors on WP, but if your emotional and/or mental well-being hinges on the quality of an article, something is wrong, and self-reflection is required. Grandpallama (talk) 13:06, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- Rubbish. Do you want an encyclopaedia that at least is an approximation of accuracy or do you want a social network? You cannot have both. - Sitush (talk) 16:14, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- What's "rubbish" is the bizarre false dichotomy that one must choose either civility or accurate content because they are mutually exclusive, or that one's self-identity is so inextricably intertwined with editing on Wikipedia that they cannot see the forest for the trees. Grandpallama (talk) 20:08, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
- The real choice is between trying to use a consensus-like process to deal with interpersonal issues, or having a hierarchy that empowers some users to deal with them. Having a hierarchy allows problems to be dealt with more quickly and expediently, without having to eat up a lot of other users's time building a consensus. There are of course disadvantages with having a hierarchy, but that's the cost of dealing with issues rapidly in order to prevent collaborative editors from getting frustrated with dealing with uncollaborative ones. isaacl (talk) 04:47, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
- Rubbish. Do you want an encyclopaedia that at least is an approximation of accuracy or do you want a social network? You cannot have both. - Sitush (talk) 16:14, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- Other people's bad behavior doesn't excuse one's own. And as I said, if you become so personally heavily invested in an article that you can't control your temper, you need to reexamine your editing habits. Take a break, walk away, let other people wrestle with it for a while. There are a multitude of problematic editors on WP, but if your emotional and/or mental well-being hinges on the quality of an article, something is wrong, and self-reflection is required. Grandpallama (talk) 13:06, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Victoriaearle: I agree with several of your points, but one quibble: Based on what do you describe Fram as "unblockable." Before the T&S ban, Fram had never been blocked, much less controversially unblocked; in fact, though I might be mistaken, I don't recall anyone even suggesting on-wiki that he should be blocked. Newyorkbrad (talk) 19:56, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Newyorkbrad:, yes, that's the oddity, isn't it? There are the two past declined requests, October 2016 Feb. 2018, but I didn't follow either. Certainly you know better than I, (I keep less than half a sleepy eye on Arb proceedings), so don't know whether those cases requested he be blocked or other actions. Fram certainly can't be accused of having a coterie of apologists and enablers following him around, yet in my view his attitude towards accuracy and quality in content writing parallels Eric's, as well as a similar, yet somewhat different, abrasive style of criticism (this from having DYK talk on watch for about a decade). Something about the FRAMBAN triggered the Board's declaration re "unblockables" and "toxic behavior" (sorry, don't have the tab open, paraphrasing broadly), so my impression is that he was thought to fit those characterizations. Victoria (tk) 21:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Ugh. No? Really? Anyone who argues it's not possible to contribute quality content while also being civil needs to reexamine their editing habits and their personal investment in editing. Grandpallama (talk) 18:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Simple answer, when on the shop floor (so to speak) where all the disputes originate, in the heat of the moment, when mud is flying: No. I've lost my cool more than once. But it's not a simple question nor is the answer simple. We need a balance; we need people to be more empathetic and inclusive; we need to talk to each other and not at each other (or even scream at each other); we need to learn mechanisms where it doesn't get to the point that things get out of hand and meek, mild editors like myself lose her cool and start spouting profanities. Plus, what's overlooked more often than not, is not the "bad word" part of civility but the drip drip drip of faux politeness masking passive aggression and an overwhelming drive to win at all costs. It's honestly withering and soul destroying. Victoria (tk) 16:47, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- What I do not really understand and what you possibly can explain: Isn't it possible to create high quality content and remain civil at the same time? It looks like some users think it is not possible.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Opabinia regalis apologies for speaking up, but I didn't use the phraseology lightly nor in a sense of hyperbole. Of course the circumstances differ; no two cases are the same. But there are striking similarities: each editor values quality content over quality social-interactions (well the second is subjective, but that's how they're perceived); each editor is considered an "unblockable"; each editor is thought to contribute to the "toxic" environment here; neither editor has been adequately "dealt" with in previous arb requests. T & S stepped in for Fram, but this board statement isn't writing on the wall. It's a clear reminder of the WMF's "strong statement against toxic behaviors", clearly says communities should take it as wake up call and deal with unblockables. What's not explicit is that if we don't, they will. The problem as I see it, is that at the time of the arb request it wasn't the perfect slam dunk case (clearly now it is; but that raises more questions than answers). The case was filed on 18 August, and at that time there didn't seem to be consensus to take on a sprawling case with many parties and undertake a full examination of the events that led up to that date; the request sat there and sat there, basically at no consensus; then a vote shifted it, but there was no consensus re scope; then an arb, who possibly has a COI, who's not been very active, and arguably should have recused, shifted the balance. Yet, still no decision, no consensus. In the meantime the committee "received" information re the new accts other activities (and, no, I'm not referring to the IP post on Eric's page), and voila, a slam dunk. So, yes, very different circumstance. What I'm saying is this: in my view it was incumbent on the committee to accept the case and examine the conduct of everyone involved, because there was a lot of bad behavior. By failing to do so, the committee abrogates its duty to the community and brings us closer, or rather places us squarely in a crossroads: how does en.wp define itself? Are we a social networking site or are we a crowdsourced online encyclopedia? The two are diametrically opposite. Are we independent or are we fully subjects of WMF, OFFICE and T & S. These are the issues that confront this committee and the next, and that's why I said the cases are inextricably intertwined. I get that none of you signed up for any of this and don't want if, but it's where we are. My suggestion is that the entire community work together to find solutions because, otherwise, I believe there's a possibly of sinking. Victoria (tk) 16:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Victoriaearle: We're limited by the privacy policy in how transparent we can be with CheckUser blocks. Eric made abusive edits while logged out, so linking directly to diffs would be inappropriate. – Joe (talk) 21:24, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- This isn't the first time that there have been such accusations: [2] --Rschen7754 19:55, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- George Ponderevo was a clean start until it was revealed. Then he quickly went back to his own account. That said, I'm not here to debate and won't. I believe, strongly, it was unwise of the committee to refuse to examine the events that elicited the RfAr. Victoria (tk) 20:00, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Victoriaearle: The George Ponderevo account was operated concurrently with Eric's other accounts, and participated in some of the same discussions. It absolutely was not a valid CLEANSTART. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 14:36, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- George Ponderevo was a clean start until it was revealed. Then he quickly went back to his own account. That said, I'm not here to debate and won't. I believe, strongly, it was unwise of the committee to refuse to examine the events that elicited the RfAr. Victoria (tk) 20:00, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- We (the community and not just ArbCom) need to find better, less rigid, ways to respond to productive users who just happen to have a moment of being angry over something. He should never have needed to scramble his password, but having done so, he should not have been propelled automatically into the category of "violated policy, must block". This was clearly not a run-of-the-mill SPI. There are situations where "indef block" is treated as the only option, when there should in fact be alternative options. I'm picturing in my mind a different outcome, in which each of the sock accounts were blocked but the main account was restored with a new password: would that really have left us worse off? (I'm not saying that ArbCom really had that option under existing policy.) Over the past several months, I've become very discouraged about Wikipedia, because I keep seeing productive editors being lost to the project, following the same pattern. An editor gets temporarily upset over something, makes a bad judgment, gets blocked (because: We must always block for that.TM), and then the situation escalates and the editor ends up leaving. It just happened a few weeks ago with Ritchie333, and with others I can think of not long before that. As I said, I'm very discouraged. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:46, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Tryptofish:, the comparison to the Ritchie situation isn't accurate at all. We have evidence, there, that the full nature of the sanctions being considered against him were not made clear to Ritchie beforehand, and that's a problem. EC knew damn well socking is prohibited, and did it anyway; and I truly struggle to believe that he was unaware of the variety of options that were available to him: most obviously, creating a new account and immediately disclosing it. That he chose not to do so is hardly ARBCOM's responsibility; nor is it on ARBCOM that EC felt hounded into retiring, which he did before the case was accepted.
Even now, he has the option of posting an unblock request from one of his new accounts; realistically, all he has to say is "I won't do this again" and there will be several admins willing to unblock. Vanamonde (Talk) 00:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)Even now, he has the option of asking ARBCOM for an unblock, and for it to apply to a new account. Vanamonde (Talk) 01:02, 3 September 2019 (UTC)- Vanamonde93, Per the block log, the only venue for an unblock would be to appeal directly to arbcom via email SQLQuery me! 00:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Vanamonde, you are missing my point entirely. I'm not talking about procedures. I'm talking about the culture. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:36, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- @SQL: You're right, amended; but it doesn't really affect my point. @Tryptofish: I don't think I am. I'm saying that Ritchie's block, and possibly even his IBAN, originated from individual incidents that could have happened in the heat of the moment; and I'd even agree that we need to change the culture of blocking immediately and/or indefinitely. In this case, the choice to edit for several days from IPs and undisclosed new accounts cannot be attributed to a moment of anger. Vanamonde (Talk) 01:02, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Not quite right, and I feel that it is very important (at least to me!) that I make what I have been trying to say as clear as I can. Before there was the (technical) socking, there was the scrambling of the password. Everything has a context. The announcement of the scrambled password and so forth was unquestionably something that occurred in a moment of anger. Now of course, each individual is, well, individual. So any analogy between EC and Ritchie will be imprecise, and vulnerable to "look here: this part is different!" But what they share is that they are both positive contributors to WP, and they both had understandable moments of anger that led to very possibly losing them forever. Opabinia puts it very well in her kind comment below: frustration and burnout. Remember: Ritchie was blocked because, in a reply to me on his user talk page, he vented about his own frustrations, and an admin (wrongly, in my opinion) blocked him for supposedly having violated an IBAN in his comment to me. And I'll raise this one editor further – in a way that will really get replies of "not the same"! MjolnirPants used an incivil edit summary when reverting a troll on his user talk page (oh, the horror!). The troll opened one of those ANI threads from hell that dragged on for days before the troll was indeffed – but some self-appointed civility police decided to briefly block MPants too because of that edit summary (and, to be fair, some past history). Then, as soon as the block was over, he was re-blocked for having expressed anger in his "unblock request". That got him even more angry (big surprise) and he wrote something that got oversighted and led to him being indeffed in an oversight block. Now I know that those who fail to see the forest for the trees will be quick to say that we should have oversight indeffs, and I'm not disputing that. So what's the common thread? Editors who are clearly not IP vandals get understandably frustrated with something. The way that we handle dispute resolution frustrates them further. The frustration leads to an error of judgment (minimal in Ritchie's case, significant in Eric's and MPants'). And then, lo and behold, we just have to block. As I said, I've become very discouraged about Wikipedia. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- This is what I've been saying: we need to improve content dispute resolution. As I discussed in an earlier version of User:Isaacl/Community/Fostering collaborative behaviour, it should not drag on indefinitely nor allow the issue to be rehashed ad infinitum without good reason, and should not allow loquacious participants to drown out everyone else. The cost of this might require introducing some sort of hierarchy to dispute resolution. I understand why many are adverse to this, but honestly trying to interpret rules by consensus just leads to endless discussion and thus frustration. (Again, see Clay Shirky's "A Group is its own Worst Enemy".) isaacl (talk) 00:46, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Tryptofish: I'm willing to get behind a lot of what you just wrote. I'd agree that we have admins overzealous with respect to civility (and rule-enforcement in general) when it's only a part of collaborative behavior (see my comment here for more thoughts on that). We also have non-admins who are drama-mongers, and who also seem to have more interest in catching people out for violating rules than in building an encyclopedia; as a result, AN/ANI is virtually always a destructive ecosystem. Setting these folks aside for a moment, however, the heart of the matter lies, I think, in a) how we tell a person that they're wrong, and b) in how they respond. I will grant that in both Ritchie's and EC's case mistakes were made with respect to (a); but, when it comes to behavior, there's a world of difference between the two of them with respect to (b). I have, at various points, disagreed quite firmly with Ritchie, but it didn't stop us from working together successfully; whereas I've seen entirely polite disagreement result in EC flying off the handle. I guess what I'm getting at is that yes, we as a community (and especially those of us responsible for enforcing our rules) need to look for ways to move away from enforcement for its own sake. We also need to force a culture shift with respect to what we consider bad behavior, and how we approach it in otherwise constructive contributors. I would contend, though, that we have a handful of editors capable enough to be productive contributors, who are nonetheless completely unable to consistently treat others respectfully; and dealing with them is a conundrum we are never going to be able to solve to general satisfaction. (If you reply, ping me, if you would.) Vanamonde (Talk) 01:38, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- This is what I've been saying: we need to improve content dispute resolution. As I discussed in an earlier version of User:Isaacl/Community/Fostering collaborative behaviour, it should not drag on indefinitely nor allow the issue to be rehashed ad infinitum without good reason, and should not allow loquacious participants to drown out everyone else. The cost of this might require introducing some sort of hierarchy to dispute resolution. I understand why many are adverse to this, but honestly trying to interpret rules by consensus just leads to endless discussion and thus frustration. (Again, see Clay Shirky's "A Group is its own Worst Enemy".) isaacl (talk) 00:46, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- Not quite right, and I feel that it is very important (at least to me!) that I make what I have been trying to say as clear as I can. Before there was the (technical) socking, there was the scrambling of the password. Everything has a context. The announcement of the scrambled password and so forth was unquestionably something that occurred in a moment of anger. Now of course, each individual is, well, individual. So any analogy between EC and Ritchie will be imprecise, and vulnerable to "look here: this part is different!" But what they share is that they are both positive contributors to WP, and they both had understandable moments of anger that led to very possibly losing them forever. Opabinia puts it very well in her kind comment below: frustration and burnout. Remember: Ritchie was blocked because, in a reply to me on his user talk page, he vented about his own frustrations, and an admin (wrongly, in my opinion) blocked him for supposedly having violated an IBAN in his comment to me. And I'll raise this one editor further – in a way that will really get replies of "not the same"! MjolnirPants used an incivil edit summary when reverting a troll on his user talk page (oh, the horror!). The troll opened one of those ANI threads from hell that dragged on for days before the troll was indeffed – but some self-appointed civility police decided to briefly block MPants too because of that edit summary (and, to be fair, some past history). Then, as soon as the block was over, he was re-blocked for having expressed anger in his "unblock request". That got him even more angry (big surprise) and he wrote something that got oversighted and led to him being indeffed in an oversight block. Now I know that those who fail to see the forest for the trees will be quick to say that we should have oversight indeffs, and I'm not disputing that. So what's the common thread? Editors who are clearly not IP vandals get understandably frustrated with something. The way that we handle dispute resolution frustrates them further. The frustration leads to an error of judgment (minimal in Ritchie's case, significant in Eric's and MPants'). And then, lo and behold, we just have to block. As I said, I've become very discouraged about Wikipedia. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- ...nor can the four months of personal attacks that preceded it. This isn't a story about the system failing Eric Corbett. At any point in time, he could have said "OK I won't do that again" (as he was repeatedly given the option to do in the second AE), and there would have been no sanctions, the Arbcom case would have been declined, and hell, MJL may even have been trouted or worse. EC, after taking a year break, did everything he could to get sanctioned, openly and repeatedly declared that he would say whatever he wanted to whomever he wanted, personally attacked anyone who disagreed with him about anything, and when all that didn't work, "retired" and socked. He ensured that he would be indef'd, one way or the other. He was not baited. He was not let down by the community. He got what he wanted, and he has no one to thank or blame but himself. – Levivich 01:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Sorry, Levivich, but this kind of post isn't a good look. A long-standing volunteer who has made a lot of high-quality contributions to the project, and established a network of positive relationships with other long-standing volunteers, but also caused a lot of friction and frustration, has left under unpleasant circumstances. Not really a good time for this kind of just-world stuff. Opabinia regalis (talk) 06:56, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- @SQL: You're right, amended; but it doesn't really affect my point. @Tryptofish: I don't think I am. I'm saying that Ritchie's block, and possibly even his IBAN, originated from individual incidents that could have happened in the heat of the moment; and I'd even agree that we need to change the culture of blocking immediately and/or indefinitely. In this case, the choice to edit for several days from IPs and undisclosed new accounts cannot be attributed to a moment of anger. Vanamonde (Talk) 01:02, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Tryptofish:, the comparison to the Ritchie situation isn't accurate at all. We have evidence, there, that the full nature of the sanctions being considered against him were not made clear to Ritchie beforehand, and that's a problem. EC knew damn well socking is prohibited, and did it anyway; and I truly struggle to believe that he was unaware of the variety of options that were available to him: most obviously, creating a new account and immediately disclosing it. That he chose not to do so is hardly ARBCOM's responsibility; nor is it on ARBCOM that EC felt hounded into retiring, which he did before the case was accepted.
- I've always thought we're unnecessarily fussy about "socks", and I didn't think the case request that prompted all of this was well-posed or should have been accepted. I probably would've supported another effort to, if not exactly "clean" start, try to return to content work under a less attention-grabbing name. (Though given the history, I don't think a negotiated restart would have worked out.) But come on now - socking around an arbcom case to which you reacted by retiring in a huff is not cool. We all know that; there's no doubt Eric knew that; under other circumstances with other users, arbcom failing to sanction that behavior would prompt a lot of posts on this very same page about how any socking at all is "deceiving the community", and how looking the other way or giving only a mild rebuke would be unfair "special treatment". Tryptofish and JzG above are right - the broader issue here is how poorly we respond to growing frustrations and impending burnout, and the unpleasant experience associated with involvement with our dispute resolution processes. Opabinia regalis (talk) 06:56, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- I believe you named the broad question precisely, and where can that be discussed? I am frustrated, missing Fram, Ritchie and Eric. What kind of a community are we to not use their great potential to create content? Do we thank them for having taught countless younger editors - such as myself - to do the same? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Gerda Arendt, as I've said elsewhere, in my opinion, this project has well and truly lost its way. It has become infiltrated by social snowflakes who consider it more important to obsess over pleasantries and political correctness than to write a decent article. However much Wikipedia likes to ignore it, and indicative of the whole Eric saga, Wikipedia has become more of a social network site than it has a serious encyclopaedia. CassiantoTalk 09:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Of course, other users are glad that the project is *finally* getting its act together to enforce its so-called policies (which can be ignored when desired by IAR too). Banedon (talk) 10:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Other stuff does exists, other users may act differently, but I never was "glad" when we lost a great editor, even if I was in conflict with him or her. The word has a sad ring in the situation. - I don't know if you the remember the situation when Eric was blocked because of alledged "gravedancing", but I made the admin apologize. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:11, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Indeffing a quality content creator like Eric for making "personal attacks" he didn't make to someone who baited him in the first place is a gross miscarriage of justice. If you can't see the injustice in that then I would consider people like you to be part of the problem. CassiantoTalk 12:02, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Try proposing an amendment to WP:CIVIL to allow exceptions if people are 1) a quality content creator and 2) baited. Let's see if the community agrees with you. If it passes, then you'll be the one saying Wikipedia is finally getting its act together, and I'll be the one saying it's well and truly lost its way; however I'm almost certain it will fail. Banedon (talk) 12:15, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- I believe you named the broad question precisely, and where can that be discussed? I am frustrated, missing Fram, Ritchie and Eric. What kind of a community are we to not use their great potential to create content? Do we thank them for having taught countless younger editors - such as myself - to do the same? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
The problem is that views may differ on how "abusive" this socking was and whether it warranted an indef block, especially in the context of EC's long productive service and the treatment he received from others. In light of the mishandling of the Fram and Ritchie cases (by T&S in the case of the former, and ArbCom in the case of the latter (possibly both)), many of us do not have confidence in edicts passed on the basis of backroom deliberations. It feels like highly productive contributors who have a tendency to be cantankerous / rub people the wrong way are being eliminated from the project. I urge ArbCom to consider what further details they are able to provide without violation of the privacy policy to justify their block of EC. WJBscribe (talk) 09:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- @WJBscribe: We can't talk about CheckUser evidence in public, simple as. Eric's sock account was tagged and is easy to find (slightly less easy given the section below, but still). As I've said it would be inappropriate to post direct diffs to his IP edits on a highly public noticeboard like this, but they are also not hard to find. – Joe (talk) 09:34, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- By your non-answer, I take it you've not actually found any alleged sock account other than Abuwtiyuw 666 (talk · contribs), who doesn't seem to have done anything other than a couple of minor typo fixes, since if you did have any evidence you'd be shouting it from the rooftops. ‑ Iridescent 09:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- The Arbcom has said "The Arbitration Committee has been made aware of and has independently confirmed that Eric Corbett, since his public retirement, has been abusively misusing multiple accounts and disruptively editing." I am not seeing any evidence of "abuse" or "disruption" in the edits made by this so called sock and/or the IP. The IP in fact claims to be Eric and even says "this really is me." So the Checkusers was not too onerously exhausted by the detection. Sandstein, with his usual sepulchre joy, talks above about Eric's "socking spree." If he thinks that's a spree, he should see my wife having a spree in Harrods. It's my belief that the truth of this matter is that the WMF "has made the Arbcom aware" because the WMF has had enough of Eric and decided to get rid of him one way or another, and after the last miserable fiasco, has decided to command the Arbcom to do their dirty work for them which is why the Arbcom and checkuser are appearing even more clueless and lacklustre than is its norm. Giano (talk) 10:36, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Good block and montion. EC had been given lots of chances over several years, so there's no excuse for him doing this. Nick-D (talk) 11:15, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- But what did he do? What's visible is uncertain (You've heard of joe-jobbing, right?) and vastly trivial. When we're having to argue the semantics of whether something even is a sock, rather than a legit non-disruptive alt account, then that is no reason to indef anyone. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:21, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Quite right, there were no disruptive edits, so that is Big Lie No 1. Furthermore, an IP saying; "It is I, Eric Corbett" when it is surprise, surprise indeed Eric Corbett is hardly misleading the community, unless the community wishes to be misled. So we come down to "the sock" or new account, whichever term you prefer, making some minor edits which were actually productive. That Eric scrambled his password in a temper in hardly news, that he now obviously wishes he hadn't is hardly news either. What is news is that the community don't want him coming back quietly as a sock or new account, but wants him to put himself publicly in the pillory and humiliatingly say "can I please come back, I promise to be a good boy and love you all?" It's this horrible lust for blood and humiliation which I find quite revolting, especially as I believe the WMF is behind this. Giano (talk)
- Giano, do not blank other editor's comments [3], however much you dislike me. Rules apply to you too. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
Thats enough of this back and forth, this conversation is quickly devolving into personal attacks, if this trend continues clerks will begin to sanction editors for failing to adhere to the no personal attacks, and civility policies. --Cameron11598 (Talk) 20:19, 4 September 2019 (UTC) |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
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English Wikipedia's draconian tradition on dealing with sockpuppeteers is a direct consequence of its lack of hierarchy in content dispute resolution. Because the community tries to use a consensus-like process, even though it doesn't scale up, it uses votes to determine strength of arguments. As a result, using multiple accounts as separate identities provides an unfair advantage in discussion. Greater leniency for sockpuppeteers is thus only likely to occur with changes to content dispute resolution that render the use of multiple accounts moot. isaacl (talk) 13:07, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Huh? We've always blocked socks on sight and banned people who use socks to evade scrutiny under controversial circumstances. Guy (Help!) 14:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Yes, I agreed that the community has always taken draconian actions against sockpuppeteers. isaacl (talk) 16:27, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
the community has always taken draconian actions against sockpuppeteers
Appropriately so. Grandpallama (talk) 19:00, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Yes, I agreed that the community has always taken draconian actions against sockpuppeteers. isaacl (talk) 16:27, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Unless someone from the WMF is going to come here and explain their instructions to the Arbcom regarding EC which on their present form is most unlikely, I suggest this section is now archived and filed as yet another monumental disruption causing cock up. Further debate seems pointless. Giano (talk) 14:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- The one causing the disruption is blocked. So I agree, let’s close this thread.--BabbaQ (talk) 14:56, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Yet again, you seem to have completely missed the point that was being made. You praise on Joe Roe's talk page is noted but, I think, very much the minority view: this iteration of ArbCom has been a disaster. - Sitush (talk) 17:40, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Since this case has closed, BabbaQ, you have systematically gone about "thanking" people for their great work for indeffing a productive editor from the site, here, here, here, here, here, here, and this where I've become bored in finding others. And I dread to think how many of these relate to Eric. I think you should now move on as you come across as someone who seems a little obsessed by all the drama. CassiantoTalk 18:06, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- I don't always agree with Cassianto, indeed sometimes I disagree completely [4], but in this case I agree that, yes, this is distinctly unpleasant behaviour. "Move on" would be the least of my comments here. Black Kite (talk) 18:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Well, wouldn't it be a boring existence if we all agreed with each other, Black Kite. I haven't clicked on your link, but I hope it doesn't include my use of a certain word I used earlier, as I've since apologised for that, many times over. It would be unfair for you to allude to the idea that I still agree with its use, just after I've apologised for using it. CassiantoTalk 19:34, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- It was that one, but I was picking at "snowflake" rather then the one I know you did apologise for. Black Kite (talk) 21:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Aaaand ... I got thanked by BabbaQ for this edit. They need to seriously consider whether their gravedancing is suitable behaviour here. Black Kite (talk) 18:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
I do believe there'll be Arbcom elections in December, this year. Hmmm. GoodDay (talk) 20:18, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- That is indeed very true, but sadly several of those that spiked the punch, spread the sawdust, and paid the band need not worry, the dance is only partially over. Seems our most outspoken folks don't come up for reelection for another year, so Sticks and Stones and all that. — Ched (talk) 20:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
Just stopping in here to note that the same Arbcom has now
- lost us a decent admin (Ritchie333) through absolutely insulting behind-closed-doors fumbling
- voted to accept an indefensible case against Eric in order to muck around yet again with an edifice of incompetent sanctions imposed by previous Arbcoms
- banned Eric because he wanted to resume helping the encyclopedia and they'd caused him to quit and caused it to be while under investigation, making this an offence
And my confidence that this same lot is standing up for Fram's rights—which are of course the test case for all of our rights—against the WMF is as a result minuscule. Shame on you all, committee members. You should all be recalled at once. You have proved you didn't deserve my vote, and managed to perform worse than I had thought you would. Yngvadottir (talk) 23:30, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- At least something will change this year. Of the eight Arbs that are up for re-election, four have already resigned. IMHO, at least three (and perhaps all) of the other four are what I'd call the sensible core of ArbCom. Hopefully Courcelles, who has done nothing useful this year and hasn't resigned, will also do the honourable thing ... Black Kite (talk) 23:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
- Another volley by an incompetent committee at a symptom, not a problem, and another great editor lost. Meanwhile Scottywong does another drive-by trolling without consequence or even a second glance. At least someone had the sense to revert him. What a disgrace. --Laser brain (talk) 00:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Cassianto, Sitush, etc - just curious: under what circumstances (if any) would you support an indefinite block of Eric Corbett? Banedon (talk) 08:36, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- As far as I'm concerned, the only reason anyone, let alone Eric, should be indefinitely blocked would be for obvious vandalism. I couldn't give a monkey's toss how rude someone is, so long as they write good content for the good of the reader. CassiantoTalk 18:22, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- I would suggest, kind sir, that your assertion (that you don't care how rude people are) is untrue, as evidenced by some of your recent actions. ‑Scottywong| [converse] || 21:34, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- Mr Ernie, please don't revert Scottywong's posts anymore. Apparently they don't see the difference between using profanities in a heated moment and kicking someone when down, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't be allowed to express this point of view. ---Sluzzelin talk 21:40, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- I would suggest, kind sir, that your assertion (that you don't care how rude people are) is untrue, as evidenced by some of your recent actions. ‑Scottywong| [converse] || 21:34, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- When the circumstances dictate, I assume, Banedon; and I think that applies to each and every one one of us. ——SerialNumber54129 08:43, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- As far as I'm concerned, the only reason anyone, let alone Eric, should be indefinitely blocked would be for obvious vandalism. I couldn't give a monkey's toss how rude someone is, so long as they write good content for the good of the reader. CassiantoTalk 18:22, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- I agree with several different comments above that may seem mutually contradictory.
- (1) While we need to retain content editors, we need even more to develop new ones. Experienced editors who react impolitely especially with disputes involving begineeers discourage new editors from participating. A general attitude of tolerating impoliteness is inapppropriate to a public site, of any sort, let alone one that is founded on the principles of encouraging open cross-culturall participation.
- (2) I also recognize that people occasionally act poorly. It's wrong to be impolite, but it's also an abuse of power to be draconic in punishing isolated fits of temper or slips.
- (3) Sockpuppettry is easily detected and is usually not disputably. Considering it as unforgivable regardless of the precipitating situation provides a convenient way for those in possession of power to abuse it.
- (4) Privacy is important, but only if it's real. Attempts to technically preserve privacy which do not actually prevent disclosure, or to supress evidence which anyone can easily find, arecounter-productive.
- (5) Acting in private is sometimes absolutely necessary for arb com (and, for that matter, for T&S). Acting privately because it's more convenient is an abuse.
- (6) The effective way to win arguments at WP is to tempt one's opponent into doing something that is considered unforgivable. The best way to counter this is to not regard things as automatically unforgivable, but to consider context.
- (6a)The effective way for someone who is acting inappropriately to gain sympathy is to tempt someone in authority to act unfairly.
- as it applies here:
- (1) I am in considerable sympathy with the view that the general way that EC (and Fram) have been conducting themselves here over the years is a net disservice to the project. This is no secret: with respect to one of them, I was one of the only two arbs to ever vote for even mild sanctions.
- (2). They should be judged by their actual long term behavior, not individual matters that were not outrageously disruptive. (and I do not think that a feeble and easily detectable attempt to use another account during the case is an actually seriously disruptive violation, as contrasted with such things as long-term sockpuppettry to violate the terms of use.)
- (3) We have no agreed standards for this, and no agreed ways of enforcing it. The attempt of the WMF to develop standards for us out of frustration at our lack of action proved to make the problem worse, as anyone familiar with bureaucracies could have predicted. We need to restore the focus to prevention: No-fault topic bans and mutual no-fault interaction bans are effectivuallly preventative. When two people are fighting, usually it's folly to try to see who started it. The thing to do is to separate the parties. DGG ( talk ) 08:01, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- @DGG: - the problem with this being that you'd actually have to get the community to accept that these could be no-fault, and thus not judge those with such placed on them. There's always going to be massive blowback against having one if editors think others will treat it as if it was earned by them being at fault. I'm not sure how you could go about doing this. Perhaps time-limited ones (say, 1 month) might be more viable. Nosebagbear (talk) 12:55, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- @DGG: The "problem" with Fram was that he was often outspoken in doing what he thought best for the project, whether that be calling out terrible ideas from the WMF (i.e. VE) or highlighting editors who were causing persistent issues (i.e. Laura Hale). Doing that, you're always going to make a lot of enemies, but I would disagree that Fram was ever a net negative. Highlighting deficiences in editing or governance cannot ever be wrong, even if you're not correct all the time. Black Kite (talk) 14:45, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- On that note, can I take it that
it would still be unacceptable for a person facing possible sanctions in an ArbCom case to "retire" and then begin editing under another account, as it would fall squarely under "avoid[ing] detection or sanctions"
means that Arbcom approves that any further appearances by LH can be blocked on sight? ‑ Iridescent 15:06, 4 September 2019 (UTC)- At this point, she is not named party of any active ArbCom case, so I would say it can not be automatic (not that I believe that this is a practical question).--Ymblanter (talk) 15:10, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- Even if ArbCom wanted to make her a named party, they couldn't as she has had the Laura Hale account WP:VANISHED. Black Kite (talk) 15:22, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- GW did not use the phrase "named party", so yes, according to the letter of what she wrote, Iridescent reads the room correctly. Of course, it would not happen: arbcom would not allow it. But as an exercise in backpeddling it would be like watching the Tour de France on rewind. ——SerialNumber54129 15:31, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- Vanishing is not a cleanstart, and if a vanished account returns the policy is to unvanish the former account. re our vanishing policy "is not intended to be temporary. It is not a way to avoid scrutiny or sanctions. It is not a fresh start and does not guarantee anonymity. Any of the deleted pages may be undeleted after a community discussion. If the user returns, the "vanishing" will likely be fully reversed, the old and new accounts will be linked". Unlike some I respect the letter and spirit of a certain recent vanishing, but should the vanished editor return, they cannot claim the rights of a clean start after vanishing. ϢereSpielChequers 15:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- Even if ArbCom wanted to make her a named party, they couldn't as she has had the Laura Hale account WP:VANISHED. Black Kite (talk) 15:22, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- At this point, she is not named party of any active ArbCom case, so I would say it can not be automatic (not that I believe that this is a practical question).--Ymblanter (talk) 15:10, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- On that note, can I take it that
- One commonality between Fram and Eric was that both had improved their behaviour or complied with specific sanctions over time, but both were targeted by people who seem convinced that they couldn't be rehabilitated or shouldn't be judged just by their recent edits. If we are to learn at all from recent events, we really need some sort of statute of limitations. We also, and here I have for once to disagree with DGG, we have to avoid falling into the trap of always assuming that a dispute has both sides at at least some fault. There are trolls and others who consider it an achievement to fell one of the tall trees in our forest, and tall trees that are surprisingly vulnerable to a few axe strokes. Sometimes we really do need to say that X started it and should not repeat their provocation. Even if someone has a bit of history here, we should aim to treat them fairly by their recent conformance to applicable policy. ϢereSpielChequers 15:26, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- I said "usually" it's not helpful to se who started, and I'm mainly referring to the sort of intractable disputes that get to an/i and arb com. There will certainly be instances, such as unprovoked attacks on a newcomer for not knowing some non-obvious rule, where it's pretty much one sided. But by the time we get them , it's often been the case that the newcomer has gotten angry also. At that point, however justified their anger, resolution is best served by keeping the two from interacting further. We will then still have to deal with people who frequently get involved in such attacks, because that's preventative in a longer run. But there is nonetheless too much consideration of what someone deserves, rather than how best to deal with them. We don't need to punish, but to stop and prevent disruption. That's the existing theory, in fact. It's not a new idea.
- As for your metaphor, tall trees are commonly thick. They do not fall at a few axe strokes. It's hard to even get near enough to affect them. People tend to put fences around them and protect them. But what you and I are saying is not incompatible--I'm talking about a shift in emphasis, not a revolution. DGG ( talk ) 18:32, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- See Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#Overturn_Bad_ArbCom_Action. Jehochman Talk 18:34, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
- What a tragic end. So Eric socked, but the sock was only WP:HERE to improve the encyclopedia. He could not stop himself from helping us. In light of that, I would have offered a chance at dialogue. starship.paint (talk) 01:25, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
- Oh, you all want justice for MJL. You say that EC was a good contributor. He was just ANGRY, and then....he...scrambled his password and wasn't very LEGIT? Abequinn14 (talk) 01:05, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
Request user page be restored
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Joe Roe blanked EC's user page citing WP:SOCKTAG [5]. SOCTAG says to tag the socmaster's page but does not require blanking. Regardless of one's feelings about Eric in general or this situation in particular Eric did contribute significantly to the project. This damnatio memoriae is way over the top. Please restore the user page and just place the block and sock tags at the top. Jbh Talk 16:15, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- To be fair to Joe, it does say "If confirmed by CheckUser, on the sockmaster's user page, replace all content with.." I would still have just tagged it and left the rest, though. Black Kite (talk) 16:18, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks. Missed that. Struck. Jbh Talk 16:19, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- So where were the disruptive edits? We know about the few IP edits, which were harmless and understandable steam venting, and also the minor typo edits by the blocked sock. Were those the only 2 accounts? Calling that disruptive is an insult to the actual disruptive editors and trolls. Mr Ernie (talk) 17:44, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
Sockpuppet tags and/or userpage blanking are never mandatory. They're generally only used internally to keep track of who is still making sockpuppets versus who can request a standard offer. In the event of real names being used, often the sockpuppet master's userpage is left alone or simply left empty. I rather doubt it's necessary to use {{sockpuppeteer}}
in this case, especially considering the block is an {{ArbComBlock}}
and thus can only be reversed by the arbitration committee. Reaper Eternal (talk) 16:41, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Reaper Eternal: I know Eric has many friends here but objectively there is a non-trivial risk of him using sockpuppets to cause further disruption. Is removing the tags not going to make it harder to spot that? Especially since there's no SPI entry of this incident of socking. – Joe (talk) 17:14, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- I can't say I've ever needed a
{{sockpuppeteer}}
tag in my time working SPIs and checkuser. Reaper Eternal (talk) 18:13, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- I can't say I've ever needed a
- @Reaper Eternal: I know Eric has many friends here but objectively there is a non-trivial risk of him using sockpuppets to cause further disruption. Is removing the tags not going to make it harder to spot that? Especially since there's no SPI entry of this incident of socking. – Joe (talk) 17:14, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- I was simply following the established procedure. The idea of yet again treating Eric differently to other editors because of his contributions does not sit well with me, but I won't fight it. – Joe (talk) 17:14, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- It is not the tagging I object to, it is the blanking. Also, the only time I have commented on EC I strongly advocated for his ban on the basis that all volunteer organizations I have ever worked with ultimately decide that they have no desire for the services of a volunteer who can not get along with others. This was several years ago but I definitely not one of EC's cheerleaders. I simply believe that someone who has contributed, in good faith, to Wikipedia should not have those contributions wiped from public view... It just seems small of us to me... Jbh Talk 17:43, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Looks like the page has been restored and no one has jumped to revert [6]. Thank you. Jbh Talk 17:54, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
At least one of three things should happen:
- Redefine sockmaster so that it covers realistic situations, and doesn't get used in a technical sense when it doesn't remotely apply
- Rewrite the procedures for dealing with someone in such a situation to make the blanking of a user page optional, and subject to common sense. It isn't remotely applicable here
- IAR to permit the user page to remain in this case.S Philbrick(Talk) 18:49, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
For what it's worth, I have no objection to the userpage content remaining. I get Joe's point, but since people feel strongly about the page content staying there and I don't feel strongly about it being removed, it's not something that's worth arguing over IMO. GorillaWarfare (talk) 18:56, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Really GorillaWarfare! I’m surprised you can’t bring yourself to acknowledge Eric Corbett’s truly outstanding content contributions to the project, perhaps the most outstanding of any editor ever over a very long period. Without condoning his short temper, would it really stick in your throat to admit that he is a very serious loss to Wikipedia’s content. Giano (talk) 20:08, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- I would hope nobody would deny this. It is a source of great sadness that he chose to flame out in this way. I didn't know he was formerly Malleus, but I liked Malleus back in the day, and enjoyed EC's contributions. He needed his own Bishzilla, I think. Guy (Help!) 20:18, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Did I imply he has not made impressive content contributions? Of course he has. GorillaWarfare (talk) 20:22, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- It is indeed a great sadness, and none of this sanctimonious, mealy mouthed grave dancing serves anyone well. Attempting to destroy his user page was an act that discredits those who sanctioned it, and says far more about them than it does about Eric Corbett. Giano (talk) 20:27, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
Resignation of Courcelles
- Original announcement
- I'd just like to say thank you to Courcelles for volunteering to serve and I look forward to working with you again in the future. WormTT(talk) 23:05, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
- I was sorry to read this. Thank you, Courcelles, for all you've done for the community. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:43, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Thank you to Courcelles of course - tons of hard work both on and off of Arbcom for many years, you have my thanks and appreciation. My observations have me wondering if we are at a record for the number of Arbs who have resigned (edit: and/or been removed) in one year. I wonder why we've seen such an exodus this year. Was there any sort of infighting that led to this? — Ched (talk) 23:46, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
- Ched, we have been under significant strain with such a difficult issue and have largely burned out. As for infighting, no, I haven't really seen that much at all. WormTT(talk) 23:53, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
- Indeed, there has not been infighting to speak of. The ArbCom workload is high (higher than it may appear on-wiki, given much of the work involves email), and not friendly to the competing (and often unexpected) demands on time that real life often throws at us. It's also emotionally draining; this year more so than any year I've served in the past. GorillaWarfare (talk) 00:43, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Courcelles, thank you for your recent and past work on the Committee. I've enjoyed working with you and hope to do so in the future, on or off the ArbCom. GorillaWarfare (talk) 00:43, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Courcelles, thank you. Drmies (talk) 02:24, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
Allow me to rain on the parade by expressing my sorrow that you chose to opine and vote in an Arbcom case in which you seem to have held a clear financial conflict of interest through marital relations to a Trust and Safety team member. That was a terrible decision and will be part of your legacy.Carrite (talk) 04:08, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Well, lacking a definitive answer, I checked in on Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/History. And while this has indeed been the roughest year in a long time with 5 resignations, it seems like 2009 still has the most with 6. But thanks for the replies regarding other questions I had. — Ched (talk) 10:06, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- With barely a dozen edits this year and having assured during your ACE2018 run that you would be available for AC work this year - not to mention COIN in the Fram case - this announcement is well overdue. Leaky caldron (talk) 10:52, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- I just want to express my gratitude for Courcelles's work over the years.--Wehwalt (talk) 11:11, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- I, too, very much appreciate Courcelles' contributions, and am sorry to see him go. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:20, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Me thinks there's yet another resignation about to occur. Bringing it to 6, this year. GoodDay (talk) 11:17, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Why do you think that? Jehochman Talk 11:34, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- I do believe Arbitrator SilkTork may be able to answer that. GoodDay (talk) 11:39, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Link? What’s going on? Jehochman Talk 11:47, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Jehochman just look at SilkTork's talk page. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 11:49, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Jehochman, check Silktorks talk page. WormTT(talk) 11:49, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Link? What’s going on? Jehochman Talk 11:47, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- I do believe Arbitrator SilkTork may be able to answer that. GoodDay (talk) 11:39, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Why do you think that? Jehochman Talk 11:34, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Even without another resignation this is the worst year - as we've lost 5/13 of the arbitrators as compared to 6/15 (hence the functionally unianimous agreement to revert to 15 in the RfC) Nosebagbear (talk) 11:44, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Purely on the numbers that may well be accurate. To me, the qualitative judgement on the AC decisions will always be the lasting legacy. It's a bit like the recurring Admin. meme - we are losing more than we recruit. An argument which immediately falls flat when the total value of the inactive Admins' activity amounts to zero. Leaky caldron (talk) 11:52, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- True that. ∯WBGconverse 11:55, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- There is a delayed action in this in that the point when we desysop an inactive admin is x months after they become inactive, not immediately after their last edit or admin action. But we usually don't know whether an inactive volunteer is on a multi week break, a multi year break or is permanently gone, hence the inactive who are desyopped for inactivity have not recently been active. But admins who have never been active are vanishingly rare, I'm pretty sure that admins who have actually not used the tools are rarer than admins who appear to have few or no admin actions because we only have logs for such actions since Dec 2004, and some of our former admins had their period of activity before then. Off hand I can't think of any Arbs who resigned without a period of on wiki arb activity, but as only fellow arbs would know about arbs offwiki arb activity, perhaps an arb could tell us if they can recall there ever being an elected arb who never contributed as an arb? ϢereSpielChequers 12:44, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- I can't think of one. Everyone is usually pretty enthusiastic in January and February.... Newyorkbrad (talk) 12:54, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Well, this explains a question I've long had, WereSpielChequers. On the AdminStats page, there are admins without any activity at all...I guess they were active before December 2004 and then went inactive. Otherwise, why become an admin? Liz Read! Talk! 22:25, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Hi Liz this gets complicated, and I may not have the whole story. According to User:JamesR/AdminStats we have 4,162 admins who have made at least one admin action. I'm aware of 2,168 admins via Wikipedia:RFA_by_month, to which we can add some admin bots, Jimbo and quite a few WMF staffers, not all of whom have (WMF) in their account name, plus one or two people who have moved their bit between accounts. That still leaves lots of people, probably more than a third of those 4,162 who are only listed on adminstats because of anomalies such as the bug that says people have an admin action when they have done a move over a redirect. Not everyone who has ever made admin has necessarily intended to use those admin tools that are logged in adminstats, most successful RFAs took place in the era before Rollback was unbundled, so it is possible that we have had some active admins who only used rollback and or view deleted. We also know that Admins from the early years who retired before December 2004 won't appear in these statistics. I've checked one of the admins who was desysopped before Dec 2004, and they don't appear on adminstats, but since they were desyopped for misuse of admintools it is a reasonable assumption that they used those tools. I do know of one admin who was "persuaded" to resign almost as soon as they passed RFA due to something that wasn't spotted in the RFA, and there may be other actual admins who genuinely have few or no admin actions. But I'm pretty sure they are rare, and I would continue with the assumption that the lack of logs from before Dec 04, and the inclusion of well over a thousand non admins in Adminstats, gives some people the false impression that we have many admins who have rarely if ever used the tools. Another way of looking at it is that about half the admins in adminstats have logged a significant number of admin actions, and that correlates with a high prportion of admins having at least a few hundred logged actions. ϢereSpielChequers 11:17, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
- User:Ffirehorse is an example of an admin who never made a logged admin action.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 14:23, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
- I had no idea that if a regular editor made a move over a redirect, that would count as an admin action. Technically, it is considered a deletion and it appears in the deletion log but I bet that regular editors were not cognizant of the fact that they were deleting pages and acting as admins. These moves happen daily and I guess that you are right, that is part of why AdminStats might consider these editors as "admins" if they conduct these moves. It's hard to otherwise imagine that there were ever 4K+ admins! Liz Read! Talk! 19:21, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
- User:Ffirehorse is an example of an admin who never made a logged admin action.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 14:23, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
- Hi Liz this gets complicated, and I may not have the whole story. According to User:JamesR/AdminStats we have 4,162 admins who have made at least one admin action. I'm aware of 2,168 admins via Wikipedia:RFA_by_month, to which we can add some admin bots, Jimbo and quite a few WMF staffers, not all of whom have (WMF) in their account name, plus one or two people who have moved their bit between accounts. That still leaves lots of people, probably more than a third of those 4,162 who are only listed on adminstats because of anomalies such as the bug that says people have an admin action when they have done a move over a redirect. Not everyone who has ever made admin has necessarily intended to use those admin tools that are logged in adminstats, most successful RFAs took place in the era before Rollback was unbundled, so it is possible that we have had some active admins who only used rollback and or view deleted. We also know that Admins from the early years who retired before December 2004 won't appear in these statistics. I've checked one of the admins who was desysopped before Dec 2004, and they don't appear on adminstats, but since they were desyopped for misuse of admintools it is a reasonable assumption that they used those tools. I do know of one admin who was "persuaded" to resign almost as soon as they passed RFA due to something that wasn't spotted in the RFA, and there may be other actual admins who genuinely have few or no admin actions. But I'm pretty sure they are rare, and I would continue with the assumption that the lack of logs from before Dec 04, and the inclusion of well over a thousand non admins in Adminstats, gives some people the false impression that we have many admins who have rarely if ever used the tools. Another way of looking at it is that about half the admins in adminstats have logged a significant number of admin actions, and that correlates with a high prportion of admins having at least a few hundred logged actions. ϢereSpielChequers 11:17, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
- Well, this explains a question I've long had, WereSpielChequers. On the AdminStats page, there are admins without any activity at all...I guess they were active before December 2004 and then went inactive. Otherwise, why become an admin? Liz Read! Talk! 22:25, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- I can't think of one. Everyone is usually pretty enthusiastic in January and February.... Newyorkbrad (talk) 12:54, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Purely on the numbers that may well be accurate. To me, the qualitative judgement on the AC decisions will always be the lasting legacy. It's a bit like the recurring Admin. meme - we are losing more than we recruit. An argument which immediately falls flat when the total value of the inactive Admins' activity amounts to zero. Leaky caldron (talk) 11:52, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
Note: Based on all of the above, and assuming the Committee is expanded back to 15 members in the RfC, there will now be eleven seats to be filled in the upcoming election, at least seven of which will not have incumbents. Newyorkbrad (talk) 12:37, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- The odds are in your favor. 🔥 Jehochman Talk 12:40, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Yeah well the odds are in NYB's favor anyway if he chooses to run. Over the last 10 ArbCom elections only 5 candidates have broken the 80% support mark. 3 of those were NYB, and the top 3 % supports are held by him. Barring some massive scandal involving NYB (which of course is highly unlikely), he can be on ArbCom whenever he wants to run for election. --Hammersoft (talk) 12:58, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Yeah, I am a bit worried about finding that many good candidates. —Kusma (t·c) 12:43, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- We won't. The average support of ArbCom members elected in this cycle will likely be substantially lower than in years past. With less support possibly comes more criticism of first time arbitrators. It might be a case of 'be careful what you wish for, you just might get it.' --Hammersoft (talk) 12:58, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Well I’m available. BTW, I understand that one of our many WP:UNIVALVED admins has thrown his, er, shell into the ring. EEng 14:28, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- As long as NYB is there to mentor, we're probably safe. Guy (help!) 14:29, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- I'd run if I had more mainspace edits. That's the main thing preventing me from getting any sort of position like this, I think.--WaltCip (talk) 14:49, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Just to call it out, those are seats that "may" be filled - it is possible that the election does not fill all seats. — xaosflux Talk 14:56, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Would that be a bad thing? — Ched (talk) 16:38, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Versus bad candidates? I'd say no, but this year has suggested that if we have another trying year we might as well switch to an appeals court-style triumvirate because we won’t have committee members enough for anything larger :P Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 17:05, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Would that be a bad thing? — Ched (talk) 16:38, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Just to call it out, those are seats that "may" be filled - it is possible that the election does not fill all seats. — xaosflux Talk 14:56, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- I'd run if I had more mainspace edits. That's the main thing preventing me from getting any sort of position like this, I think.--WaltCip (talk) 14:49, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks for your service on ArbCom, Courcelles. I hope you can get back to doing what you enjoy here. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 02:21, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Thank you for your time and service Courcelles --Guerillero | Parlez Moi 17:05, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Thank you for your service. —pythoncoder (talk | contribs) 22:30, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Yes, returning to the original topic is good. Thanks to Courcelles for carrying out one of Wikipedia's toughest jobs, and thanks to all the Arbs who carry out such a difficult duty on behalf of the community. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 07:39, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
- I don't believe that I interacted much with Courcelles, but I always thought the level-headed approach that he brought to ArbCom as well as his sysop work was refreshing to see. Best wishes, friend, and I hope you get well soon! OhKayeSierra (talk) 21:45, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
- My thanks to you for your work C. MarnetteD|Talk 01:25, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
- Thank you for your service and hard work, Courcelles. I hope to see you around . --TheSandDoctor Talk 06:29, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
Fram unbanned immediately (temporary injunction in Fram case)
Welcome back fram! 💵Money💵emoji💵💸 16:57, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
@Worm That Turned: shouldn't this appear at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Fram under temporary injunctions which currently states (none)? Also, did this pass per a "net 4" rule related to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Fram/Proposed_decision#Remedy_1a_takes_effect_immediately (4-0, with 5 active not voting)? — xaosflux Talk 17:05, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- Yes, this passed under the net 4 rule. Since the injunction stated immediately, I did so. I'll sort the temporary injunctions on the case now. WormTT(talk) 17:08, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
Welcome back! And on a somewhat related note, I leave to go to school and almost immediately all of the dramahs afflicting Wikipedia fix themselves. -A lad insane (Channel 2) 17:17, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
Good. Thank you WTT, GW, and the others who moved this forward. 28bytes (talk) 17:28, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- A step in the right direction finally, thank you. This should bring shame to the arbitrators that refuses to even comment on the injunction in some kind of bizarre attempt at filibuster. Alex Shih (talk) 17:44, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- Alex Shih, I don't believe there was any intention of keeping Fram banned longer - just an attempt to follow standard process. The entire case is backwards, Fram has started as banned and the agreement we had did not allow him to be unbanned. Normally there's no massive problem with carrying on to get the right decision, indeed it is a laudable outcome - but in this case it was unfair as Fram remained banned throughout. The people we had the agreement with were not the same people as actually banned Fram, so we needed to make sure that agreement carried over. So many problems with this case. WormTT(talk) 17:52, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- Worm That Turned, from reading between the lines, I disagree with your comment. If there was never any intention from all committee members to keep Fram banned longer, Mkdw would probably have been more explicit in their comment here rather than the ambiguous "
most of us
" as it is. Combined with Joe Roe's response here reflecting on the desire to "wrap up the whole case together
" rather than pass the injunction first despite of the obvious split in committee opinion over remedy 2d and 2e, in addition to another committee member's indirect admittance over not wanting to even hear what Fram has to say ([8]), I think it’s safe to assume that there are arbitrators that wants to make sure 1) Fram desysopped 2) Case concludes, before even considering unblocking Fram to allow them to participate in the PD, despite of having unanimously agreed that Fram should not have been blocked in the first place. Awaiting some of explicit statement from WMF, in my opinion only, is a reflection on the lack of desire to take responsibility over something that has overwhelming support by the majority of this community as it seems, in addition to several board members. Not to criticise on the cautious approach, but not everything has to be spelled out in explicit terms when so much politics has been involved throughout this case. Alex Shih (talk) 18:17, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- Worm That Turned, from reading between the lines, I disagree with your comment. If there was never any intention from all committee members to keep Fram banned longer, Mkdw would probably have been more explicit in their comment here rather than the ambiguous "
- Alex Shih, I don't believe there was any intention of keeping Fram banned longer - just an attempt to follow standard process. The entire case is backwards, Fram has started as banned and the agreement we had did not allow him to be unbanned. Normally there's no massive problem with carrying on to get the right decision, indeed it is a laudable outcome - but in this case it was unfair as Fram remained banned throughout. The people we had the agreement with were not the same people as actually banned Fram, so we needed to make sure that agreement carried over. So many problems with this case. WormTT(talk) 17:52, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
Question - Does WMF have the ability or authority to reverse this?--WaltCip (talk) 19:23, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- @WaltCip: The meta:Terms of use give the WMF wide latitude to do whatever they feel needs to be done to protect the wiki, including banning users as office actions. That being said, I highly doubt they would do something as contentious as rebanning Fram after months of scathing criticism and controversy from the community. OhKayeSierra (talk) 20:27, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
Thank you for doing the right thing. As I've said repeatedly, this si less about Fram and more about due process, which he certainly did not get. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:40, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- @Beeblebrox; it's quite true that Fram did not enjoy the protections of due process in this case, nor did the WMF or ArbCom follow due process. The case is a sham on the face of it because of this, regardless of whatever wrongdoings Fram may or may not have committed. If this case had actually been in court, I strongly suspect it would have been thrown out with prejudice because the prosecution (the WMF and to some extent ArbCom) refused to provide the defense (Fram) with the evidence against them. But let's be clear; Fram, nor any of us, have any right of due process here. The only thing we have here is the Terms of Use. We can either choose to abide by them or leave. What is quite chilling is that the WMF still maintains that it can hold evidence against you without your knowledge and potentially act on that evidence without your having any chance of rebuttal. It doesn't matter that the WMF has handed this case to ArbCom. The situation that created this crisis remains the same, only the symptoms of it are changing (Fram being unbanned). The disease remains. --Hammersoft (talk) 23:01, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- It would have been dismissed because WMF has plenary authority over editing rights on its websites. Guy (help!) 23:05, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- The WMF certainly does have such authority, but found out rapidly that exercising that authority has severe costs. My analogy though extended to it being outside of that situation, as if the WMF were only a plaintiff in a criminal suit and Fram the defendant, not the WMF being the plenary authority here. --Hammersoft (talk) 23:08, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
- It would have been dismissed because WMF has plenary authority over editing rights on its websites. Guy (help!) 23:05, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
Should User:EngFram be unblocked now? That account is still blocked by WMFOffice. Philbert2.71828 23:26, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
Two sides to every story
A fundamental part of dispute resolution on this website is that both sides of a dispute will have their behavior looked at. If I come to a noticeboard complaining that someone is reverting my edits, then of course 3rd parties will examine my edits to see if they should have been reverted or not. I can't come to a noticeboard and say that someone's reversions to my edits make me feel harassed, but you aren't allowed to look at my edits. In effect, this is exactly what Arb has done to Fram. A FoF states that all of the evidence is available on-wiki, yet no arb will point to any of this evidence to support the desysop. Yet the Arbs feel confident to cast aspersions against Fram and say they were hounding and bordering on harassment. From what's available out of the dossier, Fram's actions were 100% correct and supported by the community. In the case of Laura Hale, that user was editing for pay disguised as a Wikipedian in Residence, and widely protected by other editors involved in or supporting the scheme, as well as by an undisclosed personal relationship with someone very senior at the WMF. This has resulted in an unfair process that goes completely against the core policies of transparency and fairness. This Committee has done the community a grave disservice. Mr Ernie (talk) 19:51, 20 September 2019 (UTC)