Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee

Thoughts

Please feel free to leave any thoughts you have on this. Obviously, still a draft. Lawrence § t/e 17:03, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Could you add a section on scale problems? I believe arbcom have had internal discussions on this in the sense of what happens as arbcom gets bigger, and as wikipedia gets bigger. In fact, it might be an idea to ask if arbitrators would be willing to tell us what they have discussed themselves in terms of arbcom reform, so that we avoid re-inventing the wheel. Also, the role of Jimmy Wales might be relevant. Finally, that new committee that arbcom set up to report back to them on nationalist editing (I think). That should be mentioned. Plus any other new stuff that I've forgotten. Hey, why not discuss the recent change for format on the arbitration pages (asking people to submit full proposed principles, findings of fact and remedies, rather than separate PP/FF/R). Um. The clerking system as well, though there doesn't seem much wrong with that. Maybe the request system as well. Oh, and the voting rules, some of which may seem arcane or need better explanation to some. But maybe this is going to far. Start at the top and work down, picking out the major issues. Carcharoth (talk) 17:29, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Asking the AC directly is a good idea to weigh in on the draft, I'll post it on that page. I was tempted to get down and dirty into the minute details, but then the format alone would be massive. My idea for wider, sweeping topic sections would be to allow people to fit in those bits. I might think something in the AC is wonky, but another 100 users may not... Lawrence § t/e 17:36, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

This is the kind of thing people do when all else fails. I've been disappointed with several recent decisions also, yet the immediate cause for today's misery is something that's much easier to fix than getting an undertaking like this one off the ground. Namely, community sanctions need to be better defined and standardized.

A community ban is a block that no admin is willing to undo is a concept that went into policy in summer 2005--when this site had a tenth of its present registered accounts and just a few hundred admins. It isn't scalable. Particularly, that weakness in the banning policy dovetails with vagenuess in the definition of wheel war in a way that made today's debacle inevitable. This is a dynamic that crops up whenever we have a high profile controversial community banning proposal. The difference this time is that we're used to kicking the situation over to ArbCom, and now we're stuck because it's already been there.

As a community, we've been stuck in the dark ages about community sanctions. Wouldn't it be better in general to have some standardized way to intervene earlier with milder sanctions? Suppose we did 1-3 month topic bans before things reached this point? Although I haven't followed all the details on the early history of the Mantanmoreland case, imagine how things might have gone if a brief topic parole had been applied in first half of 2006?

Suggest you put this on hold for now and see what we can do about those areas. It's easier to revise a policy than to haul all of ArbCom into RFC. Durova^Charge! 17:36, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

This isn't really a specific reaction to the Mantanmoreland situation. You got railroaded quickly through your RFAR. The IRC RFAR was basically the RMS Titanic. The Waterboarding RFAR and the Mantanmoreland one both basically went out of their way to not address major concerns of the community. Out of the recent ones I've stuck my eyes on, only Bluemarine has worked out completely well. 1/5 is not so good, and that's just me. My other reasoning for this was that an open-ending RFC will show what the community expects of the AC, and the consensus(s) if any will be the mandated changes the AC must take on in it's service to us. It seemed like a simple elegant solution for any possible problems like that. If 1-2 months after the RFC opens someone goes to them, and says: "200-300 users here have instructed that the AC is doing this, this, and this this way from now on," thats it, and some problems fixed. That is the hope. Lawrence § t/e 17:42, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, then put the 2-3 months and numbers of votes you hope to get, in the document. And make it a specific timescale and forbid people to moan about currently open cases. If this is going to be open for 2-3 months, it certainly does need to be rock-solid. Carcharoth (talk) 17:48, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I would say 3 months, actually. Though I wouldn't be unhappy about 2 months. Carcharoth (talk) 17:49, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I tagged it for 3. Lawrence § t/e 20:59, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I see your point. If you haven't looked at it already, try Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Matthew Hoffman. Durova^Charge! 02:18, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Who to ask for feedback

I see that the current list of what links here shows who has been asked about this. Any more? Noticebaords? Or do you just want individual feedback at this stage? (I came here from FT2's page). Carcharoth (talk) 17:31, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Since it's still a draft, I was figuring on starting small, then working out by "word of mouth". This is the sort of RFC that needs to leave the gate rock-solid when I hit the move button and kick it over to Wikipedia space. Lawrence § t/e 17:34, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Omnibus

I've seen a bunch of ways that ArbCom has failed. The most recent IRC case was a disaster... a spectacular case of private interests prevailing over the public good. However, when a person does an RFC like this, the effect will be to catch all sorts of voices. The unfrozen cavemen of the ethnic struggles will talk about how they hate it, the long time content people will talk about how they hate it, the people who think the only problem is people using bad words will talk about how they hate it, etc., and yet all of these people will be hating different, and sometimes diametrically opposed, things. Therefore, we can all agree that the mess is a mess, it's in the clean up that we fail.

I would point, however, to one thing above all others for its reason: it is not elected. Because it is selected, not elected, and selected by someone without a day-to-day experience of the project and the mechanics of the place, the selection basis gets highly suspect, even if it isn't necessarily corrupt. I.e. the persons.

A second thing is the lack of any appeal structure and the lack of accountability for bad decisions. These are both horrible given the size of the project and the necessary narrowness of any one user's point of view. Utgard Loki (talk) 17:55, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

In regards to selected vs. elected, that as anything on any local Wikimedia project can be changed by the local community so long as whatever is changed does not interfere with the core Foundational principles. The community can easily convert it to a straight election if enough support the change. Lawrence § t/e 17:59, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I think the selected/elected issue is largely a semantic one; in the past couple elections the top vote-getters (by percentage) have gotten seats. If there's a problem with the committee being out of touch, then the community really only has itself to blame. Mackensen (talk) 20:45, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

This seems really ambitious. It needs a lot of preface to make it very clear what is going on, and since it's a deviation from normal RFC process, it needs explanatory info on why following the deviation is appropriate and what the deviation is achieving. It's going to be hard to maintain an orderly process, and moreover, hard to justify. None of that is to say it's a bad idea, just that I'm dubious without a lot of preliminary work. I do wish it well. ++Lar: t/c 18:06, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I still agree with what I wrote here back in March. Further, I'm not sure now is the time for this. Some reexamination of ArbCom and their remit might be in order but perhaps not this very second. ++Lar: t/c 05:55, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Why? What's wrong about this specific moment? If they're going to continue things alone the lines of BLPSE and the sourcing adjudication board, then the best time to do this is now rather than wait for things to get worse ... Celarnor ^{Talk to me}

Unlike Lar, my position has moved considerably since March. If it had been entirely my choice I wouldn't have taken this live today. But Lawrence Cohen's parting wish was going to be honored, and quickly. And really it's been looking increasingly likely that the RFC would occur. I ask experienced Wikipedians to join me in setting the right tone for it. Durova^Charge! 06:27, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

my statement

The statement I just made could conceivably be put under "Statements about what does not work well in the current Arbitration Committee process". I'll leave it up to Lawrence. daveh4h 18:18, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I rv'd your statement and put a "RFC not open yet!" note on the page. Sorry! We're still trying to figure out the RFC format. Lawrence § t/e 18:28, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Mackensen's ramblings

Broadly, this RfC will fail for the same reasons that it has been brought forth--our current processes don't scale and we lack mechanisms to manage "interests." I've thought for some time the community in its present form was at least ungoverned and perhaps ungovernable. In this RfC, as has been noted above already, you'll hear from every interest who believes ArbCom got it wrong at some point in the past--content editors, administrators, BLP folks, nationalists, deletionists, etc. Heaven knows Arbcom makes non-optimal decisions all the time, but speaking as a party to these deliberations it comes in no small part from an inability to grasp complex situations and determine the best outcome for the project. I'm not convinced any body of 12-15 men and women, no matter how gifted or how well chosen, could accomplish this in a satisfactory manner.

I think solution, sadly, lies in an expansion of the existing hierarchy beyond strictly technical rights. At the moment, the structure is, vaguely, Administrators-->Arbitration Committee, with the CheckUsers floating around on their own. Back in 2005 it was still possible to talk about administrator consensus, but it was a smaller body and shared a common outlook. I miss those days, but they aren't coming back.

A few months ago a couple of us kicked around the idea of delegating block review from ArbCom to a body of users, with final authority/final appeal still resting with ArbCom. What might also make sense is replacing the RfC system with something akin to the American appellate system: groups of users/administrators with powers to ban users from articles or to take other steps short of bans, with appeal to Arbcom. In other words, taking review out of the hands of administrators/the community en masse and investing it in an appointed or elected body. This frees the community to focus on content issues.

These are ramblings. While I think it's an idea worth considering I'm not convinced of its efficacy. I do know that Arbcom cases with talk pages in excess of 300KB symbolize failure. Mackensen (talk) 21:00, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

My 2 cents are that Arbcom is overworked and understaffed. If this RfC does go through, I'd support the idea of splitting up some of Arbs functions (like the fact that users with multiple non-violating accounts can register them with Arbcom!) and maybe even having Arb panels instead of a full body of 15 possible for each case, but that would be a discussion for the RfC. MBisanz ^talk 06:52, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I was under the impression arbcom have had internal discussions about this and other issues. It would be nice if they could update us on this, and let us know if there has been progress on this. Carcharoth (talk) 12:12, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

The Committee is, generally speaking, lethargic on any matter having to do with abstract, long-term reform. I think the initiative in any significant reform of the hierarchy and the pseudo-constitutional system we have will need to come from the community as a whole if it's to go anywhere in practice.

(And I do agree with Mackensen that a more developed hierarchy is likely to be the best long-term solution. This goes beyond the failures of the Committee in its normal tasks, incidentally; there are other areas in which we play no role—policy formulation, content disputes, and so forth—in which the size and non-homogeneity of the community is beginning to make traditional approaches infeasible. In the long run, the community ought to consider how it wants such decisions to be made, and set up the necessary infrastructure to make that work.) Kirill 13:28, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Dealing with scale? Or can anyone come up with a better name. Do we have a name for long-term strategy pages? Essays? Carcharoth (talk) 16:47, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I'd call it Wikipedia:Devolution, but that might be begging the question. Mackensen (talk) 23:00, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Very sensible proposals. Thanks, Mackensen. I think we kicked around the idea of delegation in early 2006 (mini-arbcoms akin to circuits was one method of doing it that I considered). I'm cautiously happy about your proposals as outlined above, although still a bit iffy about the arbitration committee' idea of a sourcing committee (once a dodgy source gets the imprimatur, it might be difficult to revoke!) --Jenny 00:27, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

being an arbcom member is status and not a responsibility

In my opinion, a majority of arbcom does not bother to read and understand all the evidence in every case and this has been true for as long as we have had an arbcom. Most are just admins that have leveled up. WAS 4.250 (talk) 11:31, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Ouch. Whose fault is that? But this comment may be a bit premature. ++Lar: t/c 17:52, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

It's not just laziness--in many cases the combined size of the evidence and workshop pages are simply beyond the capacity of a volunteer to grasp. I stood down at the last election because I didn't have the time to do the job right. Moreover, there's three or four open cases at once, each demanding attention. Again, I think that's an argument for splitting up responsibility. There's no reason for the committee to hear all cases en banc; in practice, one or two people take the lead in a given case anyway. Mackensen (talk) 18:25, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Note that in the last election I asked a leading question about splitting up to handle more cases, it was not very well received (for example Raul654's answer or NewYorkBrad's answer)... perhaps it's time to revisit that. ++Lar: t/c 22:28, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

On this very note, I had an idea that I mentioned to Brad that I need to try to write up tomorrow. It was for basically two types of AC cases. By default, all cases, period full stop, would a "Closed" format. Arbiters must announce the scope and things they will look at when accepting the case based on opening statements and linked early evidence. Slightly processy, but it would allow cases to be much sharper and focused. To add additional facets to the case, parties or whomever would propose requests to workshop, with why it should expand, to cover what, and with backing evidence. The AC would then decide in public there to expand or not on the valid points and questions. Each case would carry an "In a nutshell..." type header template so people know what questions the AC is considering. If an entire case hinges on, "Did Lawrence Cohen and Mackensen collaborate to frame Jimmy Wales for the Lindberg baby?" only evidence related to this is accepted. Everyone knows the proposed decision will revolve around this alone. But it can expand to a 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th question, if a demonstrated need exists. Save us a crapton of time. If the AC decides to accept the case as an "Open" case--the IRC cases and Mantanmoreland cases probably would have, given the scale--it's like now, and anything goes. A "Closed" case is a precise trial, an "Open" case is a Senate investigation and hearing. Open cases would be infrequent to rare. If the AC feels it needs to, it can easily convert a Closed case to Open partway through, if the need arises. Lawrence § t/e 18:46, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

RFC section survey

OK, I have these sections now in this order.

• 1: Statements about what works well in the current Arbitration Committee process

Obvious.

• 2: Statements about what does not work well in the current Arbitration Committee process

Obvious. Set seperate from "what works well" section on purpose, to allow more specific statements on both sides.

• 3: Clarifications on limits of what the Arbitration Committee can't do

This one has funny wording, but it's deliberate I think. The AC as a body I think can try to do anything--whether the community lets them, who knows? I see comments all the time though that the AC can't or doesn't do such and such, often conflicting slightly. Needs clearing up.

• 4: The Arbitration Committee and scaling

Made this a dedicated section as well--this seems to be a major concern going forward.

• 5: Arbitration Committee change and reform

Ideas about how to fix, change, or reform the AC and it's processes, aside from scaling matters.

• 6: Views and statements about this RFC

Views and statements about the RFC itself.

• 7: Discussion

Standard discussion section for RFCs, directing people to post here on talk.

I'm hesitant to break it up too much more. An RFC with a million top level sections will be a waste, but I think these are general and specific enough to start out. What do you all think? Lawrence § t/e 19:04, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Broadening the scope, making this about governance in general

The following proposes a somewhat dramatic shift of focus. I like what Lawrence has started here and am fine with sticking with something along these lines, but I'm suggesting we take it even further.

As Lar says above this is quite ambitious, but if it's going to be ambitious already why not throw caution to the wind and make it extremely ambitious? We could turn this into a community-wide "Request for Comment:Wikipedia Governance." Obviously discussion of the Arbitration process would be a huge part of that, but there's much more we could be talking about. Comments above already suggest a broadened scope would be good. Mackensen, MBisanz, and Kirill suggest devolving responsibilities to whole new subsets of users (which presumably would be "new processes" of the kind we are to avoid discussing in the "Arbitration Committee change and reform" section of this page) and others have raised the issue of election vs. selection which goes to questions about democracy, voting, and Jimbo's role that involve more than simple ArbCom elections.

As Durova and Carcharoth say the overall problem here is one of scale. Wikipedia is just too big to run the way it was run three years ago, and we need to have a big, honkin', community-wide conversation about that and what we should do as a result. Said conversation should last for months and bring in as many people as possible. We could run the proposal by Jimbo and the ArbCom and, if they are game, get their imprimatur so more folks would be inclined to participate. We would maintain very strict civility rules (maybe using a few different admin "clerks" a la ArbCom) and insist that the discussion not drudge up any old grievances, but rather confine itself to analyzing what works now and why, what doesn't work now and why, and what we might do about it going forward (general note: I think we would want to confine the discussion to issues of governance, not of content - they are obviously related but ultimately distinct).

I would also suggest that if we engage in a process like this (and if we don't do it now I think/hope it's inevitable that we'll do it some day) that we rid ourselves of some of Wikipedia's traditional skepticism of "experts" and consult some folks who have ability to shed real light (not heat) on the issues we will be discussing. Obviously we all have our areas of expertise (I can tell you quite a bit about the history of hip-hop and of American foreign policy during the Cold War, just ask!) but few of us know much about how to effectively organize massive online communities devoted to an intellectual project. Actually probably no one is a true expert on that, but there are certainly some people I'd much rather hear from. Why not consult organizational psychologists, anthropologists, sociologists, political scientists, and folks in similar fields? I think we would especially want to hear from those who have studied large online communities, or even large communities in general. The best place to start finding such people would be among Wikipedians, as I'm sure we have a number of folks with expertise in these areas. We could have some of these editors provide us with suggested reading lists that would educate those of us who are not experts and, more importantly, ask them to prepare white papers that deal specifically with Wikipedia in its current state as it relates to questions of governance. Obviously all of this "expert feedback" would not determine what we decide to do - the community would do that - it would just help us to make highly informed choices. Otherwise I feel in a conversation like this a lot of us (myself included) would be shooting from the hip without knowing what in the hell we were talking about.

So that's my BIG IDEA. Maybe it would function better in a different venue, though personally I think simply broadening the scope here would work well. There's been a lot of anger about certain recent ArbCom decisions and I think something needs to be done to address that which is why it makes sense that Lawrence set up this RfC. It seems to me though that this is a good time to have a Wikipedia wide conversation about how this remarkable project will actually function in the years ahead - better sooner than later. Thoughts?--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 19:43, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

A complete, community-wide discussion about the future of Wikipedia? If it could be done without becoming a battleground, this could be one of the best ideas I've ever heard. Dr. eXtreme 19:12, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Possibly relevant links

• First ratification vote (talk)
  • Presumably on a revision dated 5 February or earlier. This one as edited by Jimbo Wales adding a link to the vote seems likely.
• Second ratification vote, by the community
  • The vote is on adopting Wikipedia:Arbitration policy "as it stands in the edit of 14:15, 30 Mar 2004"
    • There is no edit so dated. My guess, based on timezone issues, is that it is actually this edit, dated 13:15 UTC of that day, that was understood to be the subject of the vote.
  • The vote was intended to run from 2 April 2004 to 9 April 2004.
  • The vote was not closed until the end of 2005.
  • At the end of 9 April 2004, the count was 28-4 with one abstain.
  • The final count when it closed was 49-15 with two abstains.
• changes since then - what legitimacy, if any, do these have if ratification was required to adopt the policy? Are there any substantive changes? I don't see many at the first read through.
• Wikipedia:Arbitration_policy/Procedure_for_changing_this_policy indicates the existence of several past community efforts to change the way Arbcom does things.
• Wikipedia:Arbitration_policy/Proposed_amendment_revote - a number of the proposed amendments had broader support than the original ratification. There was a requirement for WP:100 votes with an 80% majority in two weeks that was not met, but the original ratification vote did not even come close 100 votes in the year and a half it was left open.
  • Specifically:

    A1 vote count was 77-4.*

    A3 vote count was 40-3.

    C1 vote count was 54-4.*

    D2 vote count was 46-2.

    *One of the support votes was an account which had no edits before or since outside the vote.

  • Note that there was a strict 500-edit requirement for suffrage in the ratification vote that did not apply to the amendments. I have not taken this into account, but note that users with under 500 edits could note their opinion in the "other support" section of the ratification vote, and only one vote is present in that section (others did, but their votes were moved into the main support section as their edit counts rose).
• Wikipedia:Arbitration_policy/Proposals may also be relevant

—Random832 17:20, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Does anyone think that any of the above (A) constitutes an irregularity at all or (B) is enough to call the legitimacy of the committee into question? I think A, I'm not sure one way or the other on B yet. --Random832 (contribs) 15:29, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Accountability

One issue I have with the present ArbCom process is the lack of accountability to the community. Committee members are appointed for three year terms, which is nearly an eternity in wiki-time. There has been much discussion about overriding or extending specific ArbCom decisions or indecisions. However, comparatively little seems to have been said about individual ArbCom members. Shouldn't there be some sort of mechanism for dealing with ArbCom members who have lost the faith of the community, and thus should be removed from their positions? I don't see where in the proposed RfC the possibility of instituting recall procedures would be added, but I see this as a necessary and long-overdue addition (as is admin recall, for that matter, but that's another discussion). I believe recent cases provide ample illustrations for the need for this addition, but believe this is not the place to present it at present. Please let me know if I am in error. Jay*Jay (talk) 08:44, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, no, there shouldn't be any means of removing ArbCom members between terms. That would completely destroy ArbCom's ability to rise above petty political squabbles and deliver its unbiased, honest conclusions without fear of retribution from "the community." ArbCom is our judiciary, and while there is precedent for judges to stand for re-election from time to time, there is no precedent for allowing the deliberative process to be placed under threat of popularity contests. FCYTravis (talk) 16:58, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Of course there should be a means of removing members between terms - and especially since they are so absurdly long. I am not suggesting that it should be a popularity process or a !vote, but if there is a genuine situation where the judgment of a member across a group of situations no longer enjoys the support of the community, that member should be removed. Relying on Jimbo to act in such a case is ridiculous, since this is a community- and consensus-based project. The US has procedures for removing Governors (recall elections) or Presidents (impeachment). Commonwealth countries can (and have) removed judges by parliamentary actions, and governments have even been removed. I am not suggesting a process that is easy to implement or which could be used as a weapon - it would probably require a substantial group to initiate - but none of that changes the fact that accountability is a reasonable check on the scope of the discretion enjoyed by ArbCom, and an appropriate inclusion in a balanced system. In WP terms, a process determined by bureaucrats where reasons for arguing that actions fall outside the reasonable bounds of discretion (and not simply that an editor disagrees with an action) would seem appropriate to me in the abstract. Jay*Jay (talk) 17:39, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

ArbCom members are not Wiki-politicians. They are Wiki-judges. I vehemently oppose any attempt to further politicize our dispute resolution process. It is not for no good reason that U.S. federal judges are appointed for life, and may not be removed except in cases of true malfeasance and corruption, through the impeachment process. We do not remove judges because we might disagree with their conclusions in a particular case. Such a process would be one step further toward mob rule over deliberation and thoughtfulness.

Three years is not "absurdly long." ArbCom is a deliberative body, and any shorter period of time would compromise their effectiveness. ArbCom is there precisely to take long-term views and provide perspective based on experience, not on hot-button fervor.

Just as in the case of administrator recall, which has been repeatedly rejected by the community, there is not a single example which can be pointed to as to why we would need this process. Who would be recalled? Why? What grounds would be sufficient to say something's "outside the reasonable bounds of discretion?" There is no evidence that any ArbCom member has ever done something which would justify being recalled - so why would we invent something to answer a question nobody has asked? FCYTravis (talk) 17:50, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I am not suggestion removal based on disagreements over conclusions in any one particular case, as the expressions (empahses added) judgment of a member across a group of situations and actions fall outside the reasonable bounds of discretion (and not simply that an editor disagrees with an action) make clear. Further, US federal judges' decisions are reviewable by the Supreme Court. Supreme Court actions can be overturned by legislative action. All three groups are constrained by a constitution. ArbCom decisions have very few of these sorts of limitations - the discretion allowed at present is essentially unlimited. Imposing a restriction of discretion within the broad region which might be considered reasonable to the community is neither overly restrictive nor unreasonable. Where reasonable people may disagree, discretion is fine - but consistent behaviours that lead to substantial disquiet about the competence of an ArbCom member should not be ignored if they were to exist. You note that federal judges can only be removed for true malfeasance and corruption - at present ArbCom members cannot be removed by the community, or by fellow ArbCom members, or by any other formal process even then. Such a situation is unsatisfactory and (I would contend) unjustifiable. Discussing whether provision should be made for some recall mechanism is perfectly reasonable, and this is not the place to debate what mechanism might be supported for adoption. Jay*Jay (talk) 18:04, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Supreme Court decisions cannot be overturned by a mere "legislative action" as such. They can only be overruled by amendment to the Constitution - which is composed of legislative actions, but is far more involved of an undertaking than passing a law.

You need to define how the "judgment of a member across a group of situations" being "outside the reasonable bounds of discretion" would ever be actionable. You need to define what those "reasonable bounds of discretion" are.

"Significant disquiet" among a group of people is no reason to remove a judge. Earl Warren aroused "significant disquiet" among people when he led the Warren Court to a series of decisions which shattered precedent, along with segregation and discrimination laws.

I would support a mechanism which allows for ArbCom members to be impeached by ArbCom upon evidence of specific acts of malfeasance, corruption or abuse of office. No popular-vote system based on challenging an arbitrator's "discretion" is acceptable. That goes down the path of mob rule - which is precisely what the ArbCom was invented to prevent. FCYTravis (talk) 18:16, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Just as a factual note... Supreme Court decisions can, and have been overturned by legislative action. Not all Supreme Court decisions are based on constitutional arguments. For example, the rulings requiring the EPA to regulate CO2 emissions are based on statute, and could be overturned by legislative action. --Barberio (talk) 23:53, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

As anyone who has ever taken any kind of elementary political science course can tell you, there are multiple recourses for the people to disagree with SCOTUS. First, they can just decide to ignore it; SCOTUS has no command authority to any military or law enforcement agencies, State or Federal. If everyone disagrees with it, they can just keep going about their business. Second, the legislative body can continue passing the law; SCOTUS does not have ex post facto priveleges either; as long as Congress continues to pass a law, then it is still in effect until SCOTUS says otherwise; once declared unconstitutional, they can simply pass it again and wait for a case to elevate itself to the court. These are fairly simple elements of a system of checks and balances to prevent the abuse of power. Unfortunately, Wikipedia has none of these. All we have is one authority that does whatever the hell it wants, and everyone else is powerless to stop abuse until the next election rolls around; unless you count the Foundation as a check, but they would only step in under the most egregious of circumstances. It can't be relied on as an effective check to ArbCom's "everyday" abuses of power. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 00:06, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

I will also note that judges, including Supreme Court judges, can be impeached, or otherwise removed.--Filll (talk | wpc) 00:00, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

I would counsel against taking lessons from American political science as a model for Wikipedia. The Committee isn't really a court of law and its authority isn't really subject to challenge in quite the same way. It might be interesting to sit down and write a history of those occasions in which Arbcom's authority has been successfully challenged. I suspect (from my own personal experience) that the majority of such challenges would turn out to have been in implementation. Legitimacy is often questioned, usually by people with some kind of agenda to push, but the broader community is unlikely to fall for that. --Jenny 00:19, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

The fact that the Committee's authority isn't subject to challenge is exactly the problem, and is exactly why you wouldn't find a lot of challenges to their actions. You can head over to BLPSE and find lots of people thinking that it's a terrible idea, isn't going to work, and is a gross abuse of their authority, but the community is powerless to stop it. I suspect that if ArbCom had ever done this kind of thing before, they would have met with similar reactions. Assuming what you've said elsewhere is correct, at this point in time, they can do whatever they want whenever they want. While it might to be nice to put yourself in a fantasy world where everyone works together nicely with encyclopedic quality being the most important thing, everyone has different ideas about what that means. We don't vote on ArbComm members to act as a policy creating group. We vote on them to handle disputes and editing conflicts that have become extremely escalated. If the community isn't able to come to consensus about policy, then perhaps a policy creation group is needed. But we certainly can't have the same entity both creating policy and interpreting it; that's a recipe for disaster. It creates complacency in that group (especially with their long term of office), reinforces a mindset of unlimited power and then further reinforces that by actually giving them unlimited power with no substantive check on their actions by either the group that elected them or another group elected by the community to serve as an oversight. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 00:44, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Ah. Here I've just told you I have personal experience of successfully challenging decisions by the arbitration committee, and now you're telling me that the problem is that the Committee cannot be challenged. If I, a not particularly powerful or significant user, can recall two successful challenges in which I played a significant part, what does that say about your knowledge of the facts about the Committee's authority?

Moreover arbcom has long been the final arbiter on interpretation of policy and policy enforcement. I don't know how you somehow forgot this. If arbcom says we can enforce the BLP to the fullest extent of our abilities, that's their decision to take and good luck to them. --Jenny 01:18, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Tony, you were an exceptionally powerful user once upon a time. :) Can you please provide links to these two times you overruled or challenged successfully an Arbitration decision? rootology (T) 01:53, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

I was never more than a humble OTRS volunteer (a role I resigned from when I felt unable to do justice to a very arduous job). I changed the Stevertigo RFA into a rather pointed request for a decision rather than the call for mob justice that had been ordered. The reconvened and desysopped him. I asked the Committee to reconsider a topic ban on a good editor after it became clear that the ban was both unworkable and counter-productive. They reconvened and commuted the ban into some kind of parole or probation. I'm sure there are far more successful challenges to the Committee's rulings than these two in which I was involved. --Jenny 04:20, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Re Motion to Suspend

Taking this discussion off the main page; It is, perhaps, as untimely to place this Request on the behest of a retiring volunteer upon their resignation as it is in view of the OrangeMarlin matter having contemporaneously being dropped upon the community. An undertaking to file the Request at the appropriate time may have been sufficient (I acknowledge your better understanding of the creator of the draft than I)? The request is filed, as was promised, and now I am suggesting it be suspended until recent events are digested - and hopefully concluded. I certainly would wish to participate in this RfC, but in areas which are unlikely to get the attention they deserve at the present moment. LessHeard vanU (talk) 08:42, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

I would disagree. This RfC is still very fresh and the OM matter is within the scope. I questioned this at first, but after consideration, I see no reason why suspending this until one incident is resolved is really necessary. — _Maggot^Syn 09:00, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, I think enough people have either voiced an opinion in the RfC and have started contributing to it, or have directly opposed suspending the RfC, that further discussion on if we should postpone are moot. --Barberio (talk) 16:21, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Moved conversation

• • Without opinion for or against the motion, please bear in mind that this RFC has been in preparation for four months and bringing it live was the parting request of the retiring Wikipedian whose user space it had been in. Ideally I would have not have timed it for today, but his wish was going to be honored and was certainly not solely based upon a single day's events. Durova^Charge! 08:26, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
  • Can I ask when the opportune time will arise? Or will we just keep resetting the clock each time the ArbCom make another blunder, and never have an RfC?
  • None of this is out of the blue. I specificaly gave the ArbCom clear questions to answer a week ago about how they were handling things, and there were clear signals from the community that there was a great deal of discomfort with the way ArbCom were handling things. However, instead of listening to the weight of opinion directly delivered to them by concerned parties, some members of ArbCom instead spent their time organising a 'secret trial'. They have clearly lost touch with how Arbitration is supposed to work, and the system has broken down.
  • I'm firmly opposed to suspending this RFC, when your car breaks down in the middle of the wilderness, you don't 'wait around a while to see if it fixes itself'. --Barberio (talk) 10:35, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
    • a better time would be in a couple of weeks when feelings are less heated. Not hours after the trainwreck on WP:AN. (Durova - I realise that) Viridae^Talk 10:46, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
      • The ArbCom have been train wreck, after train wreck, after train wreck for some time now. There is no sign that ArbCom have taken on any of the criticism and community opinion, and seem set to simply go on as they have been. This can only lead to more and more heated feelings, not less! There has to be a point where you say "Enough. They obviously can not fix their own problems. Time for others to step in." --Barberio (talk) 10:52, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
        • Personally I believe we definitely do need this RFC, but to allow a short delay until the current situation has been resolved and all the information is out in the open is why I am supporting a suspension. This will allow the RFC to go ahead with all the facts available and hopefully not get completely focused on this particular incident but instead be more wide ranging on ArbCom as a body. Davewild (talk) 10:57, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
          • Per Davewild, and particularly the last point. LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:43, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
• To address the opposition to the suspension based on their not being a time limit I think it is pretty impossible to set a time until we know how quickly ArbCom are going to resolve the current situation and how quickly all the necessary information is revealed to the community. This may or may not reveal wider issues with ArbCom. Certainly, personally, I would say not more than two weeks and 1 week (or even less) might be ok depending on this being resolved very quickly. We are not talking about an indefinite postponement here. Davewild (talk) 13:04, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  Sidaway has proposed an indefinite suspension and punting the problem to unspecified future 'policy discussions'. I think this is a 'stick our heads in the sand and maintain the status quo' option.

  I also think that any suspension will simply be followed by another suspension due to what ever next drama crops up, and another suspension after that, and so on and so on and so on... The subject has been brought up now, an RfC is current, it has community input, so far the only 'Drama' is being generated by those calling for delay. I simply can't understand why the call to suspend the RfC, unless it's a call to punt a difficult problem into the long grass. --Barberio (talk) 13:32, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  Indefinite wasn't part of the proposed motion, but there has been so little traction on either of the "close" motions he put forward I guess he was getting a little lonely... LessHeard vanU (talk) 14:45, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  Look at the timestamps. Snideness is unattractive, and snideness based on sloppiness is ugly and silly. --Jenny 04:30, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

As an example of how the problems have been tidied under the rug for too long, I first suggested panels of community arbitrators to reduce work-load back in 2007[1]. It was dismissed by claiming that the "work-load problem is greatly reduced now so we don't need to do this yet". --Barberio (talk) 14:23, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Is there any reason to believe that the workload has not decreased? The other day I compared the current arbitration case workload with that two years ago when I was an arbitration clerk, and the number of active cases now is only a fraction of what it was then. Most of the arbcom page is given over to minor legalistic quibbles and challenges from previous cases--most of which I notice with some gratification tend to be ignored by the arbitrators.

Rather, I suspect that the signs of unease coming from certain quarters of the community have arisen because the Committee now has more time and energy to devote to strategic thinking about systemic problems.

To put it simply, a lot of destructive behavior that had previously gone under the radar is being targeted. Those who are feeling the heat are desperate to cause a diversion, while others are simply puzzled at this new departure: an arbitration committee equipped to deal with longstanding conduct problems and willing to do so. --Jenny 01:12, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Evidently, though, the targeting of such behavior is viewed as problematic by at least some members of the ArbCom. When a gaffe of the magnitude of the "there-was-a-secret-trial, oh-wait-there-wasn't, was-too-let's-discuss-it-for-days-on-end" debacle, one has to wonder whether the ArbCom indeed is fit to be strategically thinking about longstanding conduct problems. It looks as though they can't even keep their own house in order. Dr. eXtreme 04:31, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't think the OrangeMarlin announcement had anything to do with the attempts to handle systemic problems in the BLP--at least, not on the face of it. Arbitrators are human and will make occasional mistakes (large-scale public gaffes like FT2's seem to be exceedingly rare). This kind of problem is minuscule and is very unlikely to harm Arbcom's ability to handle the Encyclopedia's long term problems. It will only appear to loom large to those who are already convinced that something horrible has happened to the Committee, and I don't think they're likely to prevail in the face of the strong evidence that the Committee has been operating substantially more efficiently over the past year than it ever did in the past. --Jenny 05:04, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Second moved discussion

• I'm not specifically opposed to this, but it's poorly timed. An arbitrator made a mistake at the same time as some people were becoming confused over a remedy made in a recent case, and there was even a belief in some quarters that the Committee had exceeded its powers. This has been interpreted by some editors to signify lack of confidence by the community in the arbitration committee--an interpretation that I believe to be spectacularly wrong. Discussing the arbitration committee is a good idea in the circumstances.
  • The format is poor--at least it was initially. For instance, some opinions placed at the top of the RFC were represented as facts. I've reformatted them as opinion and I invite whoever wrote them to sign the opinion.
  • As an RFC it's nominally part of the dispute resolution process--of which the Committee and (on appeal) Jimmy Wales are the final decision makers. I don't think this is a wise choice. The policy-making strand would be the more obvious path, because if we change arbitration policy we will have to do so as a community.
  • However it's a good idea to discuss the arbitration committee.
  • I invite editors interested in making new policy concerning the Arbitration Committee to take a look at Wikipedia:Arbitration policy/Procedure for changing this policy (noting that there isn't yet an agreed procedure for doing so).
  • Obviously we don't want to risk the kind of open warfare that would result from a weakening or loss of the arbitration committee's powers to resolve disputes, so I suggest that proposals for change be considered with care for continuity.
• --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 13:14, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  • RfCs are not solely for dispute resolution, and you are mistaken to state that RfCs are nominally part of dispute resolution. RfCs are regularly used to discuss policy, hence the existence of Template:RFCpolicy_list. --Barberio (talk) 13:22, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

    Good point: the automated RFC notice mechanism is sometimes used to flag up policy discussions on the talk pages of policy documents (which is where we discuss policy changes). So technically, yes, the term "RFC" is sometimes used as part of policy change. However, my comment on the unsuitedness of the format of this particular document stands. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 13:32, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

    The format is, I think, as good as it'll get for discussing major policy. If you have alternatives, please detail them. Calling to punt the discussion elsewhere is not productive discussion, as you haven't detailed where it will end up, and in what format it should be.

    Until we have a clearly outlined and better discussion format and location, this is where we should be discussing things. Please do not attempt to derail discussion by fragmenting things into multiple policy pages, and different formats of debate. --Barberio (talk) 13:38, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  Policy changes are discussed on the talk page of the policy concerned. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 13:55, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  Again, you're not providing a better alternative to this centralised discussion. --Barberio (talk) 14:13, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  The alternatives already exist and I have delineated them. Policy discussions take place on the talk pages of the policies. The motion that has the broadest support so far (and by a mile) says "This RFC is premature and unfocussed. It is unlikely to serve any useful purpose." Maybe it's your turn to listen to what people are telling you. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 16:42, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  RFCs don't have motions, they are not signed up to, and this is not a vote.

  RFCs have statements that others endorse, or make limited endorsements to. And you should note that some of the endorsements to your statement also said "But we should give it a try anyway.", and that those who did endorse it were endorsing only that they thought the RfC likely to cause ineffective drama. Not a single one of them endorsed your attempt to close the RfC. Few supported the suspension.

  Right now, it looks evenly split between those who want suspension, and those who want to just get on with it. With the note that one supporter has withdrew, and the last few endorsements have been in opposition. It looks well like this RfC will continue, and discussion about suspension should be closed.

  If, in the future, drama and ranting occurs and productive discussion is disrupted, then we might revisit steps needed to let cool heads prevail. But at the moment, the only drama generation is over if the RfC should continue. It seems to me that the cool heads are prevailing at the moment tho... --Barberio (talk) 16:57, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

• It looks to me as if you agree with me that an RFC is unlikely to result in any binding policy change. This is presumably your aim, so if you want to achieve that aim I suggest that you take some advice. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 16:59, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  Please do not make personal attacks. If you persist in trying to disrupt proceedings by making personal attacks, I'll start removing the comments where you make them, and you may ultimately be asked to leave. --Barberio (talk) 17:03, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  I've made no personal attacks. Please avoid making false accusations. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 17:06, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

(restore indent) Centralized discussion is already occurring here. I'm sure it will move on to the appropriate policy talk pages at some point, but let it occur as a result of a natural process migration. Amerique^dialectics 17:00, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

• Seems like this discussion is needed. Tony, let it run it's course naturally, you don't need to try to dominate this. It was noted that other Wikipedias have even outright deleted their local arbitration committees, so seems like if everyone decides to do something binding here, then binding it is. rootology (T) 18:03, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
• I have struck my endorsement of "my" motion, chiefly since the consensus is that the process is already underway and is thus moot - but also because my original intent of a few days pause to allow a conclusion to the OM matter from clouding the issue has been co-opted into a different vision. I wish to have no part in any proposed indefinite suspension (otherwise I would have endorsed the Motion to Close). LessHeard vanU (talk) 20:36, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

• Tony, some people have lost confidence in ArbCom as a body. I, for one, lost confidence in ArbCom wen they passed the "Sourcing Adjudication Board" remedy without first proposing it to the community. I wouldn't be strongly opposed to the dissolution of the committee at this point, but I think that we can come up with solutions to limit their abilities to modify normal power and procedure without at all hurting their ability to arbitrate an individual case. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 20:38, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  I think that the Committee and the Community could learn from a discussion of what's working and what isn't. However it's obviously going off half-cocked. Suspending the committee? It's plausible that Jimmy might do so in really dire circumstances, but that's not what is happening here. There would need to be some pretty strong evidence that the Committee was making things worse, or had lost control. Well there's evidence that elements of both the Community and the Committee are panicking over minor stuff, but that isn't really the kind of thing that will make Wikipedia's final dispute resolution mechanism unworkable. --Jenny 22:01, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

  I don't think that it's become bad enough that we need to go down that route, and I'd hate to see it go; it serves a very useful purpose. Hopefully, we never have to do that. Hopefully, things like this will clarify some things, and bring facts to the committee that they may not otherwise have known. Unfortunately, it's pretty clear that ArbCom needs some work and some reform. In the long run, if keeping a safe, stable editing environment requires the suspension of the committee until a more reasonable model can be worked out, then it might have to be done; hopefully not, because it would, as you say, make the dispute resolution mechanism extremely difficult. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 04:41, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

re collapsing of Motion to Suspend (ec and now the discussion here)

Oh, for fucksakes... it has not succeeded, but there is some decent arguments (which was the reason I struck my endorsement) there that will inform the newcomer to this matter - and it makes the above discussion orphaned. I am not embarrassed to have proposed it, and think it still adds to the debate. So much for transparency... LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:09, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

The discussion is still there, just in an expandable box.

In my time as an editor, I've seen far far far far too many discussions derailed by endless threaded discussion about the discussion itself instead of the original point of the discussion. I'd don't think we should allow that to happen here.

Some people wanted to suspend the RfC, they proposed it, it was given a days worth of discussion, and a lot of words spent on it. A lot of people made their voices known, and a decision was taken to continue the RfC. We really don't want to spend the next week talking about if we should suspend the RfC for a week do we? --Barberio (talk) 21:19, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Suggest using collapse boxes for old talk page material more than new talk page material, and being more conservative about applying them to the main RFC discussion. Durova^Charge! 21:49, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

• I apologise for my language, and would comment that I recognise the actions were performed in good faith. LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:56, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
  • Thanks. :) Durova^Charge! 00:27, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Meta-Discussion

I'm considering making liberal use of {{Collapse top}}+{{Collapse bottom}} on current and future meta-discussion about the RfC itself, to focus discussion on the Arbitration Committee, and avoid spiralling drama threads. --Barberio (talk) 13:46, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Previous discussion over drafting of the RfC has been collapsed. I'll hold off on collapsing other meta discussions (including this one) for now. --Barberio (talk) 13:52, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

I think thats rather pointless. Your collapsing old discussions. We archive those. So just create an archive, seeing as how most of this discussion was prior to this RfC going live (from LC's userspace). — _Maggot^Syn 14:50, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

This is just collapsing the meta discussion on the draft which we should keep for a while. We can move to archiving later... --Barberio (talk) 15:18, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Please don't do that. It's annoying. --Jenny 21:20, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Okay, what's annoying is saying I'm going to do something non-destructive and primarily cosmetic. Stating the clear sound reasons I'm going to do it. Leaving it most the day on a high traffic page that people are reading. Then doing it. And only *then* getting objections from someone who had every opportunity to object.

Can you explain why I shouldn't collapse extraneous meta-discussions into boxes? --Barberio (talk) 21:27, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

What's annoying is that you're making it difficult for people who, like me, want to read, and perform textual searches on, the discussion page and the RFC. There's no apparent reason to conceal, or to archive, comments in this RFC or in the talk page at this very early stage, and doing so would be an unusual step. I don't think you've explained why it is a necessary one. You didn't get any objections from me because I'd no idea what "collapsing" meant until I saw it. --Jenny 21:44, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

No Kafka

Support common sense in dispute resolution. Durova^Charge! 02:23, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Lulz were had. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 02:30, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

"Lulz were had." This is funny, as is the picture on the right. I am not privy to the rest of the joke, however; I have no idea about Kafka's characters, or about how and why arbitrators should (not) resemble them. Could someone please explain? The discussion, at least in its early phases, seems to take much for granted. Waltham, The Duke of 07:50, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

The image refers to Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee#No_Kafka, which seems to refer to his novel The Trial where a man is arrested, tried, convicted, and executed without ever being informed the name of his own supposed crime. Durova^Charge!

I'm assuming its meant to be a reference to secret in absentia trials at ArbCom. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 08:48, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

And other stuff where people get yanked into a case wondering huh? Durova^Charge! 16:10, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Off topic.. but is this picture appearing with inverted colors for anyone else? -- Ned Scott 09:08, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the photo shews as a negative and the No smoking bit is in black (I do use the greenscreen gadget, and had assumed it was a result of that). DuncanHill (talk) 11:23, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Some browsers might have trouble viewing it (I got a couple of complaints it didn't show at all last night when I first uploaded). Looks fine to me. Durova^Charge! 16:09, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

With the greenscreen turned off, it still appears as a negative (Safari 3.1.1 on WinXP). DuncanHill (talk) 16:10, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Weird. I wonder whether I set it to a color scale that doesn't reproduce well on all systems. Apologies for any inconvenience. (It's Sunday morning in my time zone and I'm still on my first round of coffee). Durova^Charge! 16:56, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, I like it anyway, and the negative effect is actually rather appropriate for these Kafkaesque times :) DuncanHill (talk) 17:00, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Arbitration Committee performance review

I've begun a statistical survey of ArbCom activity. See this post for the first installation. This type of information should be useful to help the community evaluate our present situation. Seeking assistance with data collection; please contact me if you'd like to help. Best, Durova^Charge! 06:12, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Looking at the data, I see that you note the marked drop in arbitration cases. Indeed it is astonishing how few ongoing cases there are at any one time being heard by the modern incarnation of the arbitration committee.

Even more remarkable is the drop in requests for arbitration. It seems that when I visit the arbitration page these days there are always very few new case requests (as I write there seem to be two substantive requests, at a stretch, and two weeks ago there was just one), whereas if I look at the same period a year ago I see seven requests (excluding one request to re-open a closed case) [2] and if I go two years back I see six. Most of the page currently seems to be requests for tweaks to existing cases, clarifications or appeals. This looks to me like a sign of a Committee that is on top of its job in a community that doesn't feel it has to run to the arbitrators as often as it used to. Whilst some other commentators may want to put a different complexion on things, it's hard to think of a more parsimonious explanation. --Jenny 06:41, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Actually a survey of requests for arbitration is one of the things on the to-do list for the review; would you like to undertake it? Obviously all the cases that actually opened will be there. The goal is to compare those against cases that didn't open. In order to keep track of cases that opened on the second or third attempt (and a few other statistical parsings) that will mean keeping track of the named parties in each proposed case. Individual usernames won't be published in the study--just cases and trends. Durova^Charge! 06:58, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

If I saw much value in it, I might be interested in doing work like that. Since case applications and acceptances both seem to have decreased markedly, however, I don't think there's much mileage to be had from examining past history where things were different. The process seems to be well matched to the requirements at present, and there seems to be enough slack for the arbitrators to countenance some quite extensive high level stuff in the background--believe me, I wish we'd had arbitrators able to get involved in stuff like this back in 2006.

Now if somebody could show me that we were heading for higher caseloads and we needed to work out how to recognise long term trends in order to reduce the overall burden over time by far-sighted effort, I'd jump at it. But it looks to me like that mountain has already been climbed. I think people are now beginning to complain that the arbitrators are now sticking their noses into things that, before, they never felt able to tackle. Feisty arbs, I like it. --Jenny (recently changed username) 07:31, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

One thing that may have been on the upswing is requests for clarification. Would you like to survey that? Durova^Charge! 08:08, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Somebody might like to do that. My subjective impression is that requests for clarification tend to be used for two different functions: to ask for clarification, and to mount a rhetorical challenge to arbitration committee decisions. The recent request by Barberio [3] illustrates the latter. Winding back three weeks (at random) I notice that there were two active requests for clarification of the other sort. Typically two or three arbitrators will give brief personal views on the detailed circumstances and their expectations. It obviously isn't onerous work for the arbitrators, who are not obliged to respond in any case. I expect the rhetorical challenges to increase over time as this area of the page becomes known as a good platform for barrack-room lawyers who fancy making their mark.

It might be interesting to find what a more comprehensive survey throws up. --Jenny (recently changed username) 18:54, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Formatting broken

What broke it? It's got that line/weirdness down the left side like AN had. rootology (T) 18:24, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Collapsed discussions

Although I appreciate seeing myself defended (I really do), the purpose of this RFC is process level issues and general reform. A principal danger in the undertaking is of things fracturing into microdebates about individual cases.

I ask that these collapsed discussions remain collapsed. Those who wish to continue posting of course may do so, yet I seriously ask you to rethink where these discussions are headed: are you likely to change anyone's mind this way? Is it likely to make anything better?

It's more important to me to see ArbCom operate well than to have my own case reheard. I have and will continue to speak up for anyone on behalf of fairness and good process, if a Wikipedian under arbitration scrutiny is getting handled badly. Everyone who knows my record knows I do this without regard for personal or political allegiance.

Please consider this pledge, and reconsider whether to debate individual grievances at this time. With respect toward all, Durova^Charge! 23:30, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

The removal of the mess in the "Responses" section of White Cat's section is fine, but I don't agree with the removal of his comment (which was perfectly okay).

I don't understand the collapsing of the other two sections. They seem to be perfectly fine discussions to me. Could you explain that? --Jenny 20:37, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, the editors who were participating in the other two discussions have accepted the decision. One even posted afterward that he regretted the exchange. Since they don't object and all the material remains open and available, let's let it be. Durova^Charge! 21:05, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

No problem here, but I'm reading them and scratching my head wondering what the problem was. There was a lot of bad feeling against arbcom at the time of that Guettarda discussion, and the things said are understandable if not particularly praiseworthy. The discussion of my "under the radar" comment seems to have been universally polite. --Jenny 21:10, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

a lot of destructive behavior that had previously gone under the radar is being targeted

Extended content

Quoting from above: "To put it simply, a lot of destructive behavior that had previously gone under the radar is being targeted. Those who are feeling the heat are desperate to cause a diversion, while others are simply puzzled at this new departure: an arbitration committee equipped to deal with longstanding conduct problems and willing to do so. --Jenny 01:12, 29 June 2008 (UTC)" There is a lot of truth in that. People need to behave better. WAS 4.250 (talk) 18:36, 29 June 2008 (UTC) People definitely need to behave better. But changing standards can cause a lot of confusion. And in any case, trials with no chance of a defense are a bad precedent. And first with the Durova case, and then with the MatthewHoffman case (and probably a few other cases), and now the OM/ON case, that is the direction Arbcomm has been moving in. Don't look at evidence. Don't allow a defense. Just make up your mind, even if you do it too quickly and come to the wrong conclusion; who cares. And then kick butt around here!! Only problem is, Wikipedia depends on the goodwill of volunteer editors. And that is a fragile thing; if they destroy it, then Wikipedia is history.--Filll (talk | wpc) 18:59, 29 June 2008 (UTC) Yes. Expect a lot of confusion as WP:IAR is phased out in actual practice (that's been underway for a few years now). We are too big for people to do everything in their power to make wikipedia better. Because different groups of well meaning wikipedians have different ideas about what is best for wikipedia and the resulting un-rule-y clash is good for no one except the popcorn vendors. WAS 4.250 (talk) 19:25, 29 June 2008 (UTC) So Wikipedia is to become a paradise for civil POV pushers? The repeated loss of expert editors has not arisen because those trying to maintain content in line with core policies have occasionally been uncivil. And some of the martyrs in the Orangemarlin case have been behaving in the way that has driven good editors away. . . dave souza, talk 19:36, 29 June 2008 (UTC) No. We do not have to choose between civil POV pushers and uncivil NPOV pushers. I'll bet you can work out an alternative you've left out. WAS 4.250 (talk) 20:45, 29 June 2008 (UTC) Well I will tell you my alternative. Until such time as I can edit without being attacked, I am staying away from those articles. And if they go to h_ll, so be it.--Filll (talk | wpc) 20:48, 29 June 2008 (UTC) "Ignore all rules", as it's been practised since the early days of Wikipedia, is in no danger. Failing to observe nuances of process is far less important than working well with the community and producing good work. Conversely, the multiplication of formal processes has predictably led to opportunities to manipulate those processes as a means to a non-encyclopedic end. The latter problem is part of the class of problems that have been increasingly addressed by arbcom over time. Predictably, also, procedural objections to arbcom's prosecution of policy have multiplied as the abuse of proceduralism has been addressed. --Jenny (recently changed username) 20:59, 29 June 2008 (UTC) My comment, on which this section is based, isn't related to FT2's recent error in the case of Orangemarlin. That was regrettable, must not be repeated, and cannot be excused as a necessary part of enforcing Wikipedia's policies. The diversions to which I refer are the recent calls, apparently based on an alliance of editors dissatisfied with the outcome of a variety of arbitration cases, to toss the dice in the air and hope it comes out with a more malleable dispute resolution committee, one that will reach the "right" outcomes. ne that won't prosecute the biographies of living persons policy to the utmost of its considerable powers, and so on. --Jenny (recently changed username) 20:53, 29 June 2008 (UTC) Let's be clear. I believe in being civil, and take great care to be civil. What I see is editors putting considerable effort into dealing with tendentious pov pushing, slipping up occasionally, and being hammered as an example – to show that tendentious pov pushers are welcome, and that hard working editors are expendable. The example was already made with the MatthewHoffman case, leading to new forms of destructive behaviour by those uninterested in science. If you're pleased with the results then so be it. I've no complaint about reasonable and proportionate action to encourage civility, but shotgun justice and excessive sanctions just set up civility as a way of gaming the system. . . dave souza, talk 22:23, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

On "Addendum to View by Guettarda"

Extended content

I've brought this nascent discussion here from the main page --Jenny (recently changed username) My main point was that there's something wrong with the culture of the arbcomm, a problem that was illustrated by the fact that they decided to give FT2 opportunity to respond, leaving it to Jimbo to try to calm the community. The committee is an arm of the community, not a body that's separate from the community. The "solution" that they have come up with shows this even more starkly. Rather than dealing with their own problems (an arb who posts fake "decisions", a major fuck up that allowed it to happen) they just vacate the decision and fast-track the issue. And, to add insult to injury, they don't even bother to abide by the rules they came up with for this case; after posting a statement that says that the arbs will wait 48 hours to decide whether to accept the case or not, Charles votes to accept. Let's get this straight: giving FT2 a chance to respond was a failing of arbcom in your opinion? On "calming the community", well I think the passage of time, a bit of sleep, and a lot of people waking up feeling a little sheepish about what they wrote last night, has the necessary calming effect. --Jenny (recently changed username) 20:17, 29 June 2008 (UTC) FT2 posted a fake "decision". Kirill said as much. But we were left with two conflicting accounts by arbs - all we knew was that one of them wasn't telling the truth. We were left with this pervasive uncertainty while the arbcomm circled the wagons. It would have been pretty simple for any arb to say what Jimbo said - we don't do secret trials. That would have cleared the air while they sorted things out. Instead, they said nothing, forcing Jimbo to intervene. This was a failing on their part - that they prioritised one of their members at the expense of the whole community. Guettarda (talk) 20:39, 29 June 2008 (UTC) It is possible, indeed it is almost the rule, for different people to have different opinions based on the same facts. I do not think it is a good sign, that you seem to be unwilling to accept that two of our best users can honestly disagree with one another on the implication of a discussion. Kirill and FT2 apparently agree that their accounts are factually consistent but they differ in interpretation. This much was apparent to all editors of good faith on Friday night. You and one or two other people leapt to conclusions. Whilst that was regrettable, there's not a lot anybody could have done about it, given your initial decision to abandon the assumption good faith. The community was never jeopardised by your actions or by arbcom's decision not to rise to the bait, but some of them may have been misled by your interpretations in the meantime. That they may have been is also regrettable, but again, the community at large is unlikely to have decided that the opinions of a few over-excited editors outweighed the available facts and the assumption of good faith. --Jenny (recently changed username) 21:56, 29 June 2008 (UTC) That's nice. So it's just a few over-excited editors who thought that arbcom had announced the decision of a secret trial without any opportunity for defence, or even the courtesy of telling the accused? And it's only fair to leave the accused and the community under this "false" impression while taking plenty of time to decide on how to present this regrettable occurrence? How about showing some good faith in people who edit here? .. dave souza, talk 22:12, 29 June 2008 (UTC) I'm not sure what you're driving at. Is the community at large responsible for the false and unfounded beliefs of a few of its editors? --Jenny (recently changed username) 22:25, 29 June 2008 (UTC) That "initial" decision was to hold a secret tribunal and to declare all other evidence "unnecessary". Sorry, but I would have expected every single arbiter to balk at this, and not a single one to go ahead with such an obviously unjust scheme - even if, somehow, he or she had been convinced that all the other ones thought this to be a good idea. "I'm just following orders" or "I'm just doing my job" went out as an acceptable excuse several decades ago. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:16, 29 June 2008 (UTC) Stephan, you still seem to be retaining the same false assumptions of Friday night, which have now been comprehensively laid to rest. If you want to make accusations, it's usually a good idea to accumulate evidence, and it's normally considered unwise to persist in an allegation that has been refuted. --Jenny (recently changed username) 22:22, 29 June 2008 (UTC) Well, we might debate about the exact meaning of "secret tribunal" and "decision", but the fact remains that OM was handed down an ArbCom sanction out of the blue, with no chance of commenting on the evidence or the proposed findings and remedies. And, to quote User: FT2: "Please note that no further evidence is required" - that's from the original and initial posting of the evidence page.[4] And for good measure, appeals are also prejudged.[5] Every single Arbiter who was aware of that should have protested (I'll gladly believe that few shared that understanding), and no single arbiter should have consented to or implemented this. If I misinterpret the situation, be more specific. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:40, 29 June 2008 (UTC) What's disturbing about the above is the extremely narrow, selective representation of the facts of Friday night, as if nothing else happened. It's as if everything else went down the memory hole, even though this snapshot of the relevant discussion shows that you were one of the first to respond to Kirill's announcement. I suppose it's possible that you didn't see FT2's follow-up. If you were in bed by 2am, you would certainly have missed Josh's announcement, thought the latter, I daresay, came late afternoon-to-mid-evening for most active Wikipedians. --Jenny (recently changed username) 22:50, 29 June 2008 (UTC) Jenny/Tony, I've just stated the surface facts of Friday night, and I've not seen anything comprehensively laid to rest. It's a really good idea to accumulate evidence and subject it to careful cross-examination. What a pity that wasn't done with Orangemarlin. . . dave souza, talk 22:27, 29 June 2008 (UTC) I'm getting a distinct whiff of sour grapes. Your "surface facts" appear to incorporate assumptions not adopted by other editors who saw the same facts. --Jenny (recently changed username) 22:39, 29 June 2008 (UTC) The arbitrators either knew that they were discussing a case in secret with no opportunity for defence (in which case they are ethically challenged) or they didn't know what they were up to (in which case they were incompetent). The statements from arbitrators to date do not appear to me to allow any other interpretation. DuncanHill (talk) 23:17, 29 June 2008 (UTC) <undent>I have no idea what went on here. But whatever it was, it does not look good. --Filll (talk | wpc) 13:29, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

View by White Cat

Moved from RFC main page; personal grievances below. Please contact me if you disagree with the decision to move to talk and collapse. Durova^Charge! 20:28, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Since my statements seem to have been comprehensively misunderstood by all other parties involved, I'm happy with the removal of the response section. However I feel that White Cat's comments should be replaced on the page (without the existing response section, or at least without my comments) and I'll avoid commenting on it. The kerfuffle was no fault of White Cat's and I apologise for being the unwitting agent of what happened subsequently. --Jenny 20:31, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I've already posted to White Cat's user talk. If he requests this move back to the main RFC I'll comply. Durova^Charge! 21:02, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Extended content

This section will be expanded, please hold on to your shorts in the meanwhile :) For now I want to start a section so as not to edit conflict like crazy. I'll expand this on the upcoming days. (This post is currently incomplete) I hereby state my experience as I experienced it. I have been involved with arbcom since my earlier days on wikipedia. The intention behind this post is to point out what is broken with arbcom as I see it. From my experience arbcom was less than helpful in resolving any dispute to date. I will give general and specific examples alike. What I say below applies to arbcom and arbitrators in general. It does not apply to each and every one of them. I personally believe all arbitrators act in good faith however the culture behind arbcom is currently the source of the problem. Communication A key problem with arbcom is communication. Getting a straight answer from arbcom is more challenging than you may think. For example many cases to date has expired (they were neither rejected nor accepted) because arbitrators ignored inconvenient cases. A claim is that such issues are discussed privately, even so it shouldn't be too hard to "reject" or "accept" a case with a satisfactory rationale. I have made countless appeals to arbcom of which none (I do not recall any) got a satisfactory reply. In real life one of the most incivil and disrespectful action you can do to a person is ignoring them when they are talking to you. Such an act will be more frustrating if the person in question is already frustrated by a dispute they are asking for your help. This is the first thing to be fixed. On the accepted cases, some arbitrators do not even make a single workshop comment. Some arbitrators go out of their way to avoid talking with people involved with the case they are overlooking. I could care less what arbcommers tell each other on their own private mailing list. However I would want to see a "filtered" (filtering out sensitive and/or private material) discussion showing what kind of ideas were discussed. Arbitrators could still stay anonymous in such a thing (arbitrators could be given nicknames like "arbitrator 1") -- Cat chi? 16:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC) Inability to resolve disputes Arbcom does not act as a part of dispute resolution. Arbcom tries to let users come up with solutions by themselves which is the very point why they are consulted. Arbcom does anything but resolve disputes. Perhaps this is to avoid content disputes. Last thing we want is an oversight body that dictates our content. Armenia-Azerbaijan rfars Consider the rather infamous ongoing case of Armenia-Azerbaijan rfar as an example. I was not involved with either one of these cases. I payed very little attention (near to none) to both cases. Both cases on Armenia-Azerbaijan have been officially closed - yet there is very little resolution. Content issues aside (Oh my sanity!)... There had been problems on the matter of enforcement of the remedies. Arbcom remedies were written in dealing with resurfacing sockpuppets of disruptive users involved with the case. There are plenty of such accounts. I helped nail a number of them though most of the credit goes to the checkusers. However truly uninvolved new users on these topics are almost treated like criminals. Certain sources (Turkish government, Turkish newspapers, or any other Turkish site) have been ruled unusable even on non-controversial topics. While there is no such consensus for such a thing, the people enforcing the arbcom remedies (namely Moreschi and several others) have ruled to this end. I think it is safe to say the overly harsh worded remedies by arbcom didn't resolve the dispute. Episode and Character rfars Arbcoms involvement with the RfAr on Episode and Character related articles was not satisfactory. The first case had no purpose whatsoever. Arbcom looked into the case rather superficially. The underlying issues were not addressed. Arbcom decided to let the community decide on this. What I would have liked to see on that first case was a ruling to halt all mass removals/additions/taggings. In other words a remedy to halt all aggressive behaviour. Arbcoms overly lightly worded first case appeared like a nod to both sides to continue whatever they were doing. On the second case despite objections arbcom refused to extend the scope of the case to include "video game" related articles which had became the target of the Episode/Character war as the arbcom case addressed non-video game related "television related" articles (re communication section above). I think it is safe to say the lightly worded remedies by arbcom didn't resolve the dispute. Conclusion from the above to examples I think arbcom lacks a level of balance in the remedies they pass. It is either way to light or way to harsh. This contributes to the problem and does not result in a resolution. Arbcom is particularly unhelpful on topics not covered by mainstream "western world" publications have little to no regulation. See: User:White Cat/Wikipedia is badly broken -- Cat chi? 16:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC) Arbcom cannot be criticized Criticizing arbcom is like suicide. You will be declared a "troll" the instant you complain about arbcoms inability to fix anything. In my case this "troll" declaration came from random from an arbitration clerk. The culture of treating arbcom as if it is the best thing since sliced bread has contributed to this problem. This RfC is probably a step in the right direction. All my past attempts to initiate a discussion like this either on various talk pages, the mailing list or IRC had been shot down. -- Cat chi? 16:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC) A rather amusing point If WP:DR fails to resolve this dispute with arbcom, will this be put in front of arbcom? On the technicality of the issue - yes. Arbcom reviewing a case on itself... It is not like there is a body acting as an oversight to arbcom. -- Cat chi? 11:48, 1 July 2008 (UTC) Responses Without the patience and care of the arbitration committee, I believe White Cat would have been chased off the wiki years ago. They haven't been able to work miracles, but they have intervened when it has been both possible and necessary to do so. --Jenny 19:23, 30 June 2008 (UTC) See? I am attacked the second I post a remark. Re: "Arbcom cannot be criticized" remark. Why would I be chased off of wiki? What is your rationale? I am tired of seeing people who pretend there is nothing wrong with arbcom. This is an RFC over arbcom, not me. -- Cat chi? 19:26, 30 June 2008 (UTC) White Cat, I suggest you ignore "Jenny" (also known as Tony Sidaway). Tony, please don't disrupt this RfC any more than you absolutely have to. DuncanHill (talk) 19:37, 30 June 2008 (UTC) I'm not attacking you, I'm stating my opinion, based on my observation of the patient and careful treatment you have received from Arbcom. For which I am grateful, because I wouldn't like to see you chased off. Duncan, you're probably not aware that I am White Cat's former Arbcom-appointed mentor, and nobody's troll. --Jenny 19:42, 30 June 2008 (UTC) The former modifier is telling. Tony, I contacted White Cat with concerns about the direction his intented proposals appeared likely to head, but I wouldn't dream of patronizing him publicly by arriving as soon as he posted and suggesting this longstanding Wikipedian doesn't know his own good. Strongly request a refactor; please take dirty laundry indoors and return to the hamper. DurovaCharge! 19:51, 30 June 2008 (UTC) I may just do that (refractor). However what I tired to do above was discuss two seperate cases which arbcom was either too harsh or too light in their ruling. I let you Durova to review and refactor my post above as you see fit so that it gets the message across. I am a bit busy in real life and I would truly appreciate such a service. Should you decide to do this, please comment out a copy of the old text so that I can take a look at what you changed :). I merely want to make sure the right message is conveyed. -- Cat chi? 20:15, 30 June 2008 (UTC) Apologies for the confusion; that refactor request was directed at Tony. Although refactors all around might be a good thing (I'll gladly withdraw my comments to this thread if others agree to do the same). DurovaCharge! 20:22, 30 June 2008 (UTC) Durova, the former is telling is an odd way of putting it. Yes, I was his mentor a long, long time ago. There is no dirty laundry here. White Cat has been targetted by some very ugly customers over the years, and I'm glad to have been able to help him to overcome those attacks. -Jenny 20:24, 30 June 2008 (UTC) Not banning White Cat is one of the worst things ArbCom have done, ever. This is what I mean by not paying due attention to encyclopedicity: anyone who doesn't understand that Turkish government sources are not good ones when it comes to articles relating to the Armenian Genocide really has no place here. Moreschi (talk) (debate) 20:16, 30 June 2008 (UTC) Moreschi, requesting a refactor in even stronger terms than I asked for one from Tony. Please take it outside, gentlemen. This is a peaceful bar. DurovaCharge! 20:23, 30 June 2008 (UTC) Um, no. White Cat is just abusing this RFC to hurl the same unjustified abuse at ArbCom that he was doing a month ago on WT:RFAR, WP:AN, wikien-l, foundation-l, and god knows where else. Heaven knows ArbCom deserve criticism, but this is not it. Moreschi (talk) (debate) 20:25, 30 June 2008 (UTC) I am the one abusing? By doing what? Telling what I think? You chose to not comment on what I said and instead decided to rain accusations at me. That tells a lot about you. -- Cat chi? 11:26, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Auto archive

The talk page is getting a bit long. Unless anyone objects, I'll switch on auto archiving for this page, using the following,

{{User:MiszaBot/config
|algo = old(7d)
|archive = Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Archive %(counter)d
|counter = 1
|maxarchivesize = 60K
}}

Which is archiving threads with no new comments for a week.

--Barberio (talk) 21:27, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

No objections from me. I proposed this earlier one, as opposed to collapsing. — _Maggot^Syn 21:29, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Seems okay to me. --Jenny 21:30, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Good idea. Durova^Charge! 21:38, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm good with a week. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 23:46, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Please do not forget to create an archive navbox. --Dragon695 (talk) 01:29, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't think this will work. Top-level sections are constantly being expanded. A better solution would be to split off and transclude the largest section when the article gets to 300KB, repeating as necessary. #Arbitration Committee change and reform is already at 133KB, which is about half the size of the article. The full article weighs in at 339KB, big enough for a split.

As a point of comparison, Line of succession to the British throne is 340,885 bytes, and attempts to split it along logical lines have failed due to lack of consensus. On the other hand, my bold split of Wikipedia:List of missing journals, which once weighed in at 405,693 bytes, was accepted by the community. There are key difference between those two articles and this one though: This one is changing rapidly and this one is a discussion page. Another key difference is that when I split List of missing journal articles, the English Wikipedia still didn't have edit-top-section as a user preference. Still, spits by major sections are probably in order if things get big enough to cause browser failures. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:40, 1 July 2008 (UTC) Oops, I misread, I didn't see you were talking about the talk page. Yes, by all means, set up archiving on the talk page. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 17:23, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Quick comment on the archive method proposed....it only archives sections that have no date stamps within 7 days. So, only when a section has in fact, gone stale. And it does it automatically, we don't have to pay attention to it. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 03:16, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I know, which is why it probably won't work as intended. If it archives old sub-sections where the parent or sibling sections are still active, it will do so and separate them from the context of their parent section. This is bad. If it does not archive sub-sections independently of the top-level sections, very little will be archived anytime soon, defeating the purpose. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:30, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

It does do only the level 2 sections (those with 2 =='s as the marker). when I quickly scanned down the page, I saw 5 or 6 sections that have information only from March when the draft of this was being assembled at first. And most of the sections here are only level 2's, so there will be limited potential for break ups, though some of the longer sections might have large stale portions, such is life. The idea is to set aside only that stuff which is really stale, not just make the page smaller. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 14:26, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

• Hang on. Barberio is talking about the talk page. Davidwr is talking about the associated front page (he linked to a section of it and is talking about sizes of that front page). The front page needs to be split up, as it is far too big now. The talk page may also need to be split among the subsidiary pages, but this one needs to remain as a centralized talk page, and talk page archiving will also help. The front page, though, can only be managed by manual splits to subpages. Carcharoth (talk) 15:50, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
  • For example, the talk page is 105 kilobytes, while the front page is 366 kilobytes. And please don't refer to this RfC page as an "article". Call these pages "the RfC page" and "the RfC talk page". Carcharoth (talk) 15:56, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Motion to split this RfC into sub-articles

At close to 400KB and longer than the longest article, this RfC is getting hard to keep track of and hard to use in certain browsers. With that in mind, I propose splitting it by section, into:

• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Statements about what works well in the current Arbitration Committee process
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Statements about what does not work well in the current Arbitration Committee process
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Clarifications on limits of what the Arbitration Committee can't do
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/The Arbitration Committee and scaling
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Arbitration Committee change and reform
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/The Arbitration Committee's Responsibility to Others
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Views and statements about this RFC
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Comments by FT2
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Arbitrators prepared to answer a few questions
• Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Motions to close or extend this RFC

With the main article consisting of just transclusions, notices of transclusions, and the organization, introduction, See also and Discussion sections.

Any considerations, objections, or !votes in support before we do this? davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 17:32, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I've changed your links to subpages of the RfC page, not the RfC talk page. I agree that some splitting is needed, but would suggest leaving the introductory statement where it is - that is unlikely to expand much. Would also suggest transcluding (to allow dynamic updating) a short summary section from each subpage back to the main page. The summaries of the motions to close, for example, would list the ones that were open, and the current counts. Carcharoth (talk) 17:42, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the fixup. I'm okay with leaving the introductory statement along with the see also and discussion sections. I envisioned transcluding the entirety of each subpage into the main article, so anyone loading the main article would see pretty much what they see today, except for a note at the top of each section saying "the following is trancluded from ___." If you envision transcluding just a summary that is fine but I'm not sure how to go about doing it technically, without creating entirely separate pages for the summaries. I'm also not sure how to keep the summaries up-to-date without human effort. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 19:15, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't think transcluding the entirety of the subpages would help, as people's browsers and computers still have to load the same amount of text. In terms of editing and edit conflicts, sections avoid this just as well as subpages. The point about splitting the discussions is to keep things under control and to keep things organised, as well as avoiding bloating by stuffing everything into one page. Carcharoth (talk) 19:24, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Good idea - this RfC was always going to be big. However, please add a box of sorts listing all the subpages for easy navigation. -- _{Escape Artist Swyer} ^{Talk to me} _{The mess I've made} 20:45, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

A split-and-transclude method would be okay for me. --Jenny 21:50, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Proposal: Create the articles above, and put a short summary at the top of each of the pages. Surround the summary with <includeonly></includeonly> tags, then transclude the sub-articles and provide a "see more" link to the main article. This will satisfy Carcharoth's issue, reduce article size, and not be overly complex. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 04:09, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

• Just do it. Stifle (talk) 09:44, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

  Barring an emergency, I'm going to wait at least 24 hours before the original proposal above. The input so far has been useful. It's also the polite thing to do. It's 417,643 bytes now. It was 380,966 bytes bytes then. If it grows another 13K in the next 6 hours that probably won't kill too many more people's browsers. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 11:03, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

• Okay folks I've done the first one. I'm not sure I like the results though, it interrupts the flow of reading. It's easy enough to make it look like the old way by removing the "noinclude" tags from the subst'd article. What do you think? davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:37, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

• Can you put links to them all on the RFC main page? rootology (T) 02:33, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I added this one;

• [[*Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee/Arbitrators_prepared_to_answer_a_few_questions

which would benefit from some more eyes - I think it could be a useful addition to this process, and am heartened that the arb.s are up for engaging 'on-wiki' in this way too! cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 02:36, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I updated Arbitrators_prepared_to_answer_a_few_questions to match the other spun off section then transcluded its summary as I did with the other one. I also added an "organization" section that includes a link to a real-time list of sub-pages. I updated the list on this talk page so it matches the table of contents. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:25, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

WP:BROWNACT

this section is a placeholder for further discussion on this suggestion Low Sea (talk) 21:06, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Totally off the wall question but ...

has this discussion hit the magic 100 Wikipedians yet? Low Sea (talk) 21:18, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

The main page at this point has had 132 editors, including 1 IP. The talk page has had 37 editors, and none of these were anons.--Filll (talk | wpc) 21:43, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

It might have, though these days almost any discussion of any importance approaches and may surpass the "100 Wikipedians supporting something" barrier--even some AfDs I closed a couple of years ago were well over that level, both for delete and for keep! --Jenny 21:48, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

This talkpage has been viewed 1099 times up to yesterday, per [6]. DuncanHill (talk) 21:51, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

And 4709 views for the main page. DuncanHill (talk) 21:53, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I suspect if it was better organized and easier to read, and better advertised, it might easily get many times many more editors and views. This is a topic of some serious interest. Is it being widely advertised in prominent places?--Filll (talk | wpc) 21:54, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

It's linked fairly comprehensively, from WP:RFAR, WP:VPP, WP:VPM, WP:CP, WP:CENT, WP:WATCH, WP:Editor integrity, Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Orangemarlin and other matters, Wikipedia:Arbcom electoral reform, a score of pages in Wikipedia talk space, and a dozen or so in user talk space. --Jenny 22:35, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Asking arbs to engage

I've dropped a note to talk pages, and asked arb.s to consider engaging here. Thoughts, feedback, and help with that page would be much appreciated.. Privatemusings (talk) 04:05, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

"apologize where beneficial to do so"

What the hell does that mean? If they made a mistake, they should apologize. DuncanHill (talk) 09:48, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

... yes, where beneficial to do so. ;-) —Giggy 09:54, 2 July 2008 (UTC) I have no idea either. Maybe ask Jimbo? Nobody else has used the phrase.

In whose opinion? You screw up, you apologize. You don't play games and decide not to apologize because you are glad of the harm done by your mistake. DuncanHill (talk) 09:56, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I agree (did you see my small message after my sig?). I think it's best you ask Jimbo what he's talking about since he's the only person who's used that phrase. —Giggy 09:58, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Ooops! Didn't see your extra bit! DuncanHill (talk) 10:00, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

I've asked Jimbo on his talk page. Still, at least he hasn't explicitly stated that honesty would not improve the situation, which is the position of one notable arbitrator. DuncanHill (talk) 10:13, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

My interpretation of Jimmy's statement is that sometimes it can be beneficial to apologise and take the blame even where none is due. Sometimes that's the right thing to do. Like when a woman passes wind noisily and her husband says "oops, sorry, must be those beans I ate for lunch". :) --Jenny 10:33, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

"I am sorry if my words were unclear." This is an example of an apology one could make even if not completely convinced of having made an error. Obviously, you are correct: if someone has made a mistake (with negative consequences for someone), then they should apologize. And if you are absolutely convinced that you are right and have done nothing wrong at all, then a pseudo-apology can often just make things worse. But there is a very broad middle ground in human interactions, in which you are not sure. You did your best, but something went wrong somewhere. Fighting to prove that you were right is often just annoying and pointless, and the source of further friction. An apology in such circumstances, even a conditional apology like my example, one which acknowledges the complexity of judging various situations, can be quite beneficial.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 13:23, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Which reminds me of the old Private Eye cartoon parodying the Punch style of the 19th century –

Enraged host – "Dammit sir, do you realise you just farted before my wife?"

Insouciant guest – "Deuced sorry, old chap, didn't realise it was her turn."

dave souza, talk 11:12, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

See Non-apology apology. Like a white lie; it can be both a social lubricant and an excuse to dissemble. 17:47, 5 July 2008 (UTC)WAS 4.250 (talk)

FloNight's response to the RFC

Dropping a note to say that I've been reading the RFC and other comments about the Arbitration Committee written on various talk pages. Thanks for the feedback. Since I'm just returning from a month long break, I have loads of catching up to do, in addition to addressing the happenings related to the Orangemarlin case and other ArbCom announcements. I plan to to respond as soon as possible. FloNight♥♥♥ 20:03, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Discussion seems to be winding down

Things seem to be winding down. The ARBCOM has a lot to filter through and I don't envy them.

Date - size - 24-hour edits - increase:

• 00:49, 28 June 2008 - start - 14,757 bytes - start
• 00:00, 29 June 2008 - 327 - 92,113 bytes - 77,356 bytes
• 00:11, 30 June 2008 - 364 - 218,542 bytes - 126,429 bytes
• 00:00, 1 July 2008 - 388 - 345,927 bytes - 127,385 bytes
• 00:31, 2 July 2008 - 107 - 388,683 bytes - 42,756 bytes
• 01:11, 3 July 2008 - 131 - 445,507 bytes - 56,824 bytes*
• 01:12, 4 July 2008 - 104 - 471,862 bytes - 26,355 bytes*
• 00:51, 5 July 2008 - 125 - 515,147 bytes - 43,285 bytes*

*split over multiple files

Interestingly, first 3 days of July in total have almost exactly the same number of bytes as each of the last 2 days of June, and approximately the same number of total edits in any of the last 3 days in June.

Since things seem to be winding down, I recommend 2 or 3 arbitrators plus several other editors get together and distill this down to size, and report those comments that had wide support and draft recommendations for guidelines and policies. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:06, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

You do realise that the 4th is an American holiday, right? It's a little premature to say it's winding down because people don't talk during a holiday weekend =) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 01:26, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

There are comments by about 150 editors to date, but no single proposal has more than 43 endorsements (about 30% of those who have edited the page) [7]. The 43 endorsements were for a proposal "No Secret Trials" which affirms the existing arbitration policy which has been explicitly supported by Jimmy Wales and the arbitrators. A suggestion by SirFozzie on reducing arbcom term has 34 endorsements. Although these proportions cannot represent community consensus, they nevertheless highlight areas of significant concern.

Taking into account opposition, no other proposal yet has as many as 30 net endorsements (20% of all those who have edited the page).

I suggest that, if consensus on any one proposal is likely to become apparent, it has not yet become so, and those that have significant support seem to express a sentiment that is already part of the arbitration policy.

There's no harm in holding off to ensure that this represents community consensus, or to await a further summary proposal that would attract community consensus. I see no reason to rush to close this.

Meanwhile, however, I don't see any reason to act as if paralysed. I think it would be nice if the arbitrators tweaked the arbitration policy to record the fact that even giving the appearance of a secret trial can be very controversial.

Also at this stage we might want to move to the arbitration policy talk page and discuss a process for changing arbitration policy. By adopting a process for arbitrator selection into that policy, it would be possible to vary the term.

An alternative approach (and much, much less tortuous) would be to ask Jimbo to accept suggestions on changing the election process, as it seems that he has traditionally done this in the past according to what is in essence a procedure of his own choice. --Jenny 01:50, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

While I agree with much of what you said, I don't agree that the numbers indicate lack of consensus. Given the size of the RFC, we can't expect participating editors to endorse every proposal they agree with. — xDanielx ^T/_C\^R 04:27, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

"Unless closed by a consensus supported motion, the RFC will be open at least 3 months from when it goes live, and may be extended beyond that by continued activity or a motion to extend." -- The Red Pen of Doom 02:00, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

There have been numerous proposals that got a majority of support, and no other Wikipedia process or vote attempts to judge based on total number of people looking at the page. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 02:54, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

• I, for one, based on the "three months" thing, had every intention of coming here in a month or so, reading at my leisure, and then supporting whichever bits I wanted to. There is no need for everyone to comment on all the proposals here right now, still less for anyone to prematurely close this. Carcharoth (talk) 03:06, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree there is no consensus to close this Rfc. I think it should be left running for the full 3 months. Jimbo asked arbcom to proceed slowly. The community should do the same thing. : Albion moonlight (talk) 06:36, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

I will probably support more of the proposals now that it is being split into pieces so I can read them more carefully and ponder them. There is no rush, as far as I can tell.--Filll (talk | wpc) 16:16, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

No, there's no rush. To gather a sense of community consensus, I think we should let it run for a while. I oppose the idea of a fixed period. There's no reason why this discussion should not be open-ended. I think that it was misconceived, however, and that more progress is likely to be made on the individual policy pages, where policy changes can be proposed in a more focussed manner.

The problem with this RFC is, as with all RFCs, many proposals are made and few of them get significant amounts of support; moreover as the RFC grows larger it becomes more difficult to handle. Some excellent work has been put into splitting the RFC into sections, but the existing framework provided by our policy pages is being ignored with the result that there is much redundancy. --Jenny 02:50, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Due to my recently finishing the first draft of a novel, and having to organise the start of the editorial revision process, I've not been involved here as much as I was at the start. However, I do intend to keep up my attempts at introducing some sensible reforms.

On the contrary to idea that this is winding down, I think it was just that some of the early concerns risen were very quickly taken up by those interested, and this has slackened back a little while we go over things.

I do think we can report some early results. We have quite a few recommendations that have a significant amount of support and little opposition. "No Secret Trials" has already been accepted as a mandatory requirement of the process. But we also have the strongly supported recommendations that Arbitrators state their own opinions as individuals or pluralities not as 'The Arbitration Committee', and that the Arbitration committee is strongly restricted in its ability to create or alter policy. We also have strongly supported statements that the 'inactive arbitrator' problem seems caused by 'burn out', which could be helped by reducing the terms of sitting members, or adding extra members. --Barberio (talk) 21:14, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Um, a proposal "No New Policy" has 21 net supports. Do you suggest that this indicates community consensus for a change in arbitration policy? Obviously I don't care if the proposal passes because the committee has seldom, if ever made policy, but still... wouldn't we want a stronger indication of support for such a change in policy when it's so obvious that it could be misinterpreted by someone who disagees with a remedy? --Jenny 21:28, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

"View by Celarnor (2)", which is a stronger recommendatory that ArbCom stay out of policy all together, has 26 'net' supports. I'd recommend against playing this numbers game. The ratification of the Arbitration Policy itself was only a 'net' support of 33.

Do remember these are recommendations for policy yet to be created, which people can choose to support, and not a vote. When we get to creating a new arbitration policy, we can start talking about how many votes are needed to ratify it. --Barberio (talk) 22:06, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

We don't do votes. The arbitration policy was ratified by 26 endorsements, you say? Fine. That was a lot of endorsements at the time it went live. At this stage it isn't quite a "numbers" game, except where I remark that the RFC has only been open for nine days, only 160 people have edited the page. That the proposal you champion above has 26 endorsements indicates that most people editing the page haven't supported it. That it doesn't address what the arbitration committee did in the recent case: to wit, to pass an enforcement measure delegating certain of its powers to admins as it does in nearly every case it hears, is only the icing on the cake. To represent binding consensus, any proposal on Wikipedia must make sense in the context in which it is made. For clarification on that, see below for a copy of the response to your request for clarification, posted here by Daniel. --Jenny 14:06, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

...I'm sorry, lass, but you're being really... difficult to work with just now. You seem determined to stop any and all changes to arbcom policy, and are claiming that everyone who ever toucnd didn't vote for something should be counted, not as neutral, but as oppose. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 05:03, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Not really. I'm just saying that 30 or 40 or so people supporting something doesn't equate in any way to community consensus. I'm sure all reasonable people will be able to see that this is the case. Indeed that is the reason we generally don't take straw polls on major decisions. --Jenny 16:59, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

If you are saying that, once this RfC is done, everything with a reasonable number of votes should be written up into a proposal and brought forward to the community for approval (much like the main page redesign), then I could agree with you. If you are instead saying they should be ignored completely, then I would strenuously disagree. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 03:20, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

This is a long Rfc. It takes a while to read the proposals, think about the implications, and respond to them. However, I think it'll be fairly clear which statements the community broadly agrees or disagrees with and which ones have no clear support or opposition. Give it time. --Regents Park (sink with the skaters) 23:46, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Request for clarification: Scope of the Arbitration Committee to create new policy and process. [8] [9]

The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Statement by Barberio

Recently, two 'remedies' have been passed by the Arbitration committee that seek to establish new policy and processes affecting en.wikipedia content. This is a both a step beyond their usual remit of only responding to user behaviour issues not content issues, and only recommending that the community develop new policy to address issues.

I can find no part of Wikipedia:Arbitration policy that enables the Arbitration committee to do so, and I suggest it goes against the spirit of wiki policy. The exact wording in the Arbitration Policy states that all remedies MUST be in the form of "User X is...". In essence, remedies were intended under the policy to apply to individuals. It has been stretched over time to cover groups, but now it has been stretched far beyond it's original intent.

Again, I must make this clear, Wikipedia:Arbitration policy as currently written bars the Arbitration Committee from making remedies that cover more than a single person. I also suggest that those who voted for the Arbitration committee's current make up were not informed, and may not approve, of this extension of the powers of the committee's members.

Can the arbitration committee members please explain to the community

 * Where the power to mandate these new policies and processes comes from;
 * Why they did not feel the need to consult with the community, or allow for community discussion;
 * How they would react if the community rejects these new processes;
 * and any sanctions on editors they may enforce for failing to accept these new processes.

I would prefer individual, and full explanation of their decisions from each arbitrator. I think it would also be fair to ask the dissenting arbitrators to explain their positions too. I do think this issue is important enough to the way Wikipedia is supposed to work, that all arbitrators must explain their actions to the community, beyond a simple 'aye or nay' vote. --Barberio (talk) 12:47, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

From the weight of opinion being expressed both here and elsewhere, I think I can state that community consensus is forming around the following points -

• These remedies constitute either new policy, fundamental changes to current policy, or at the very least creation of new processes that must be followed
• The community wishes to retain primacy in creating policy through consensus unless mandated to assume policy by the foundation
• The arbitration committee have departed from the original intent of the arbitration policy by moving from remedies targeted at individuals, to remedies targeted at groups and subject matters, to remedies targeted at the entire community.

I welcome, and urge, comment from the Arbitration Committee to address these issues. --Barberio (talk) 19:31, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by MBisanz

I take this opportunity to point to m:Foundation issues which is a list of issues made by the Wikimedia Foundation that are beyond the debate and alteration of the local communities. Point five reads in part: "The Arbitration Committees of those projects which have one can also make binding, final decisions such as banning an editor."

I therefore submit that if Arbcom is the final binding authority, it may make its decisions however it chooses and may make them as broad or as narrow, as novel or as regular, as it feels necessary. MBisanz ^talk 13:23, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Comment to Barberio by InkSplotch

I think it's fairly straightforward here...I've never seen anything to suggest the Arbitration policy is either prescriptive or proscriptive. It establishes the remit and scope of ArbCom, and if anything is truly binding the sections Scope and Rules are it. The rest seems fairly descriptive of the process, informing others what to expect. In this case, that particular remedy does follow the "similar to" format described, neither does it violate the scope or rules clauses of their remit. I think you've a bit of an uphill battle here, needing to establish fully that:

• The aribitration policy is a binding, proscriptive document.
• That these remedies violate the spirit of the policy.
• That these remedies are, in fact, new policy themselves.

I've been following the discussions in several places, from the talk page of the Footnotes:Proposed Decision page over to the BLP pages. Personally, I don't like the remedy as written, and fear it's far too open to abuse. Procedurally, I think it belongs more under Principles than Remedies (something I decided on reviewing the BDJ case earlier today) and I wonder if it would have raised as much fuss there (I suspect so). The more I see from current and former arbs, the more I think I understand why they wrote these remedies, and I'm being swayed that they're not actually "new policy." I still think a good bit more effort needed to go into the writing of things to get this point across, and minimize attempts to wiki-lawyer things.

Barberio, I've seen you passionately argue on these topics before. I think you could have some constructive input over on the BLP talk pages. Trying to strike this down as procedural on this page, however, is just plain wiki-lawyering and it won't really fix anything. We might need more discussion before we all understand one another, but the issues here are real and they're not going away. --InkSplotch (talk) 13:49, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by WAS 4.250

Arbcom rightly has binding authority over behavior disputes between editors that the normal resolution processes fail at solving. It is quite a stretch to say that the case that was brought represented a behavior dispute between editors that normal process failed at and that this ruling is a response to. It is an ill conceived, poorly written, unjustified, variously interpreted terrible ruling that will create and has created drama. In the future it is very likely to create NPOV violations that can not be fixed without even more drama. To embolden admins in this way either creates a honeypot to catch and desyop admins or it is a get out jail free card that will create even less incentive for acting responsibly. WAS 4.250 (talk) 14:01, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ned Scott

Unfortunately I don't think much good will come from this request for clarification. We're asking arbcom itself if arbcom can do this or not.. This is a good example of why we need some form of checks and balances. However, I still encourage editors to leave comments here, as the discussion itself my pressure arbcom into re-thinking the issue (as it has in the past when the community got in an uproar over a past decision). -- Ned Scott 21:52, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Carcharoth

Taking a different tack on this, the history of the Arbitration policy is quite interesting, especially how it was actually put together, and especially when you compare it to how things work now. The initial version of the policy was posted over four years ago on 1 February 2004. See here. I think the version that was voted on (see oppose votes 12 and 14 at Wikipedia:Arbitration policy ratification vote for early uses of "arbitrary"... <ahem>) is here. Anyway, aside from the history lesson, what I really wanted to try and point out, was whether the policy document has actually changed to fit current practice (ie. is it descriptive rather than prescriptive?). Judging my the last year's worth of edits, tweaks are made on a fairly regular basis. Though I will note that this citation tag has remained in the policy since November 2007. There was also an edit war in September 2006 over whether the Arbitration Committee itself should be able to rewrite the policy, plus some other issues. See: [10], [11], [12], [13], [14]. Currently, the bit at the top says: "This page documents an official policy on the English Wikipedia. More so than other policies it should not be edited without considerable forethought and consensus among Committee members." That current version stems from this edit. Just some examples of how the policy has been tweaked over the years. Carcharoth (talk) 01:02, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Tony Sidaway

• Sir Thomas: "Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?"
• Roper: "Why, yes! I'd cut down every law in England to do that!"
• Sir Thomas: "Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down--and you're just the man to do it, Roper!--do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?"

• From A Man For All Seasons by Robert Bolt.

A challenge to provisions made by the final dispute-resolution apparatus of this community should be treated with care. The arbitration committee is elected and it is in our interests, while telling it when we think it may have made a mistake, to ensure that we do not challenge its legitimacy. We don't want to have to face those winds. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 01:26, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

And of course I forgot to say that we're scheduled to hold another arbitration committee election later this year. About half a dozen arbitrator seats will be up for election. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 03:02, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by brenneman

These questions need to be asked.

I too have spent some time recently reviewing the history and role of the Committee, and in particular its response to community input. While I do not believe that this is the appropriate venue, some general threads are already appearing in this very short discussion:

• The tension between policy as "what we do" and "what is written." This is the premise of this entire request, no?
• The tension between Wikipedia as a functional collaborative community and the foundation-level ability of ArbCom to rule by fiat.

The community (and the 'Pedia) have grown enormously. It's well and truly time to go back to first principles: Asking what is the function of the Committee, what problems are they intended to solve, and what the best way to move forward is. Arguments that suggest that we simply cannot disband the committee are well, simply avoiding the substance of this debate.

The most beneficial, the most "wiki" way forward is to have a wide-ranging discussion with the community. You know, the one that actually writes the encyclopaedia?

brenneman 02:08, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Dragon695

Some arbiters are saying that this is similar to remedies imposed on a collection of articles that have been made for awhile now. I just have to disagree with them on this one. The number of BLPs alone is a magnitude of 100x what any of those previous collective remedies covered. To make matters worse, WP:BLP has become like a cancer, creeping into articles and subjects which have very little to do with BLP at all. However, because a living person is mentioned, the entire article is covered by BLP in the minds of some BLP extremists. So, with that factored in, this general remedy is in the order of 1000x what previous general remedies covered. I'm concerned that arbiters are not paying attention to how some very well protected administrators game the system using these policies and general remedies as outlined in C68-FM-SV evidence. Look at what happened to Cla68 when he tried to call out SlimVirgin on her wrong-doing, he was crucified. Did you know that SlimVirgin popped in over at the BLP Special Enforcement talk page to let us know that she would not be abiding by the statement of ArbCom that only uninvolved administrators should apply this remedy, since the word univolved contradicted language in WP:BLP? This is exactly the kind of thing that I and many others feared. If you refuse to revisit this decision, will you please, please, please make it clear that only uninvolved administrators are entitled to invoke this remedy. --Dragon695 (talk) 16:29, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Kendrick7^talk

I second what Dragon695 says. While anyone can remove problematic information per WP:BLP, involved admins should not be handing out long term blocks, especially where it's easy and commonplace to dress up content disputes as BLP issues. I don't understand why ArbCom can't understand the problem with turning our encyclopedia into a bunch of little fiefdoms. You'll drive off productive editors when they realize they are essentially serfs. If the Middle Ages taught use one thing, it's that feudalism is a crappy way to run things. -- Kendrick7^talk 18:26, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Septentrionalis

I have misgivings about the wisdom of both delegations made here. The BLP delegation has been sufficiently discussed; but ArbCom would do well to observe that even advocates of a sweeping BLP policy are decrying this as precipitate, permitting admins to cut down all the protections of consensus by shouting "BLP!" We will see what happens.

But the Sourcing Adjudication Board has the potential to be even worse. The reasons why not to have been discussed in the Homeopathy case: they boil down to: the SAB members can be, and probably will be, carriers of POV themselves. One of the worst editors I know of, now largely departed for Citizendium, was (and Citizendium acknowledged him as) a professor at a small college, with a creditable academic output. This did not prevent him from collecting and citing sources for his Point of View which actually said something quite different; I believe he had put the words he wanted through Google Scholar and did not check whether the sources found supported him when read in context and in full.

We need to do something about source disputes; but there is no reason we cannot do them in public: ask uninvolved editors with access to good libraries what the sources say, and have quotes posted on this puiblished Wiki. Please don't consult privately with volunteer editors and emit sanctions based on the result without hearing the other side. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:15, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Robster2001

I have no opinion, at this time, about the BLP or SAB policies themselves.

I simply have a question about the process -- until now, the Arbitration Committee has acted as Wikipedia's judicial body, limiting its role to enforcing existing policy.

With the BLP and SAB decisions, the Committee has assumed legislative authority, which until now has been vested (for the most part) in the community. And it is doing so not in public view, but in two obscure arbitration cases. There are many editors who will be affected by these major policy changes that will have no idea that they have been implemented, and no idea where to look for them.

Realistically, would any non-involved editor (the huge majority of them) know to look for a new sourcing policy in the remedies to a case about Homeopathy articles?

If the Committee intends to become a policy-making body, it should do so in the full light of day -- not by adopting policies in hidden corners of policy-wonk territory, then expanding them out to the greater Wikipedia population.

Even the best-intentioned, and best-designed, policies will fail when adopted in darkness. After all, it's easy to ignore a rule that nobody saw being passed.

Wiki-wide policy simply should not be made this way. It will cause unnecessary dramatics, and divert attention from the merit of the policy to the merit of the process, as this arbitration request has already proven.

There are, of course, larger governance issues on en.wikipedia -- specifically, policies haven't really adapted to the growth of the service -- but that discussion is out of scope here. One hopes that discussion will, eventually, take place.

Some good points here worth addressing.

I would not wish to see the Committee becoming a legislative body (in the usual public sense). Sometimes it will need to reach a binding decision how best we communally work towards achieving our already existing goals, or the processes and standards that existing norms will be operated and measured by, and this is one of its tasks. We do that every time we set out principles in a case, since 2004 - "this is how to think about it in the context of communal standards, norms and policies; this is where the users went wrong". This may be one or two users, or an entire area.

In that sense the committee is doing a role similar in its core to other forms of arbitration - namely, taking a serious situation where multiple sides fail to find a way forward, hearing all sides, and giving a binding statement of the way forward (processes, practices, decisions on areas of contention, etc) that will be adopted in light of their inability to do so themselves. It also does this to make clear if a case arises in future, the standards and expectations it will use to rule on it, so that the community as a whole becomes aware and has fair notice of the standards we would feel best to apply/expect if needed.

On your main points I concur. I have this interesting observation on it, though. At Arbitration, we see a gradual ratchet of cases over time - as we learn to handle routine cases, they get more and more handled by the community so the difficulty of cases we see here and the issues they bring, will steadily and perennially increase. That's the nature of our work, and a good thing too, it keeps us on our toes as the project progresses and shows the lesser cases that used to flumox the community are now readily handled by it much better - they don't need arbitration nearly as often. But by the same token, the community needs to understand that there is a second ratchet over time too - a quality ratchet. Thinking "these articles are sort-of-okay(-ish)" might have been fine a while ago, but the community too needs to learn to demand of itself and its corpus, that higher standards of vigilance and expectation really are possible - it's not just words or "nice ideas". They are genuine expectations that benefit the project and which have had huge debate and little action. As we are constantly stretched, so is the community, and quality is one area where a number of editors are unfortunately just a bit too happy to go along with "last years standards" or "whatever gets by". Not good. Must change.

Having considered the nature of the problem, the solution we adopt to BLP disputes is a broad one, but still purely a remedy. This one's called "special enforcement" and past wide reaching admin tool discretion for unresolved issues were called "general sanctions" is secondary. It's the exact same approach we've adopted to get action on many perennial disputes since 2007, and we feel that the community having produced no workable idea, it's time to try ratcheting a stronger variation of it on this other problem area, too. Basically, "expect to be required to meet a higher standard against our norms and communal policies when it's a BLP - regardless whether it's conduct, judgement, collaboration, or handling of concerns". We haven't say what BLP content should look like, just that we expect to see more realization and greater seriousness that a higher standard of baseline is needed and now expected, for editors (admins and non-admins alike) wishing to engage this area. As ever, WP:AGF and good editorship/adminship is fine. But it must be with more careful thought and better working together, than often in past years. Guidance to follow.

Some thoughts... and thank you for the comments. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 13:39, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Alansohn

When the community takes a dispute to arbitration, and the issue is accepted by Arbcom, the rather reasonable expectation is that Arbcom will deal with the subject of the arbitration. That it may "impose binding solutions" is explicitly listed in Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee, but so is the clearest directive that it "is the last step in the dispute resolution process". The arbitration used to impose BLP special enforcement had nothing to do with BLP or the inability of administrators to impose solutions related to biographies of living people using its existing arsenal of remedies.

I would have loved to hear what Arbcom thinks about inclusion of brief quotations in footnotes -- the nominal subject of this arbitration -- but Arbcom decided that the subject of footnoted quotes was a content dispute outside of their purview. The original arbitration then became a fishing expedition, with editors from all over coming up with subjects that they wanted reviewed and addressed by Arbcom, regardless of how tangentially-connected or utterly irrelevant they were to footnoted quotes, the titled subject of this arbitration.

Under bizarre circumstances that I have already discussed elsewhere, Arbcom decided that enforcement of WP:BLP was the issue it needed to address here. The only problem is that BLP was never an issue among the editors involved in the arbitration. No editor or administrator had ever raised any BLP issue with the articles in question between the involved parties. The BLP issue was somehow related to an article that I had last edited in January in which (as I still see it), BLP was used improperly as an excuse to keep thoroughly-sourced, neutrally-worded material out of an article.

Without any apparent discussion of the actual case or alternate remedies that might have addressed the article it had chosen to address, Arbcom decided that super-duper triple secret probation ("special enforcement") was needed to solve some unknown BLP-related problem that was never a subject of the arbitration nor a proper matter of dispute in any article raised at arbitration. Arbcom chose to decide an issue that it had no legitimate jurisdiction over to address as part of the arbitration.

Most of the efforts in signpost and elsewhere to draw people to discuss "special enforcement" provide no context or explanation of the supposed issue, the remedy Arbcom came up with or the drastic and chilling effects it will likely have if ever used. That so many in the community feel confused, flabbergasted or duped is a simple matter of an inability to understand why BLP special enforcement solves the issue of footnoted quotes, a still festering problem.

Simply stated, Arbcom chose to legislate from the bench on a topic which was not under dispute, and on which it has no jurisdiction.

Arbcom needs to clearly explain why it chose to accept a discussion on footnoted quotes that it acknowledged was a content issue. Arbcom needs to explain why it chose to address the BLP issue in the first place, which article had a BLP issue as a subject of the arbitration, how the proposed remedies "solve" the purported "problem" and how faith in Arbcom to be the last resort in dispute resolution when it seems to be issuing extremely broad dictates on topics that are not matters of dispute. Alansohn (talk) 19:24, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:DGG

Recent events make it all he more necessary for this to be discussed, though possibly not here: ArbCom cannot be the final decider of its own remit and limitations. The foundational principle seems to show a limited scope, and if it is not clear enough it can be changed. it did not always exist--arb com was not in existence from the beginning of the project. DGG (talk) 19:39, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by User:Martintg

Kirill's proposition to delegate ArbCom authority to admins is in fact a change in policy and the dispute resolution process; it effectively curtails general dispute resolution processes and arbitration as a last resort between individuals, to be replaced by a regime of "discretionary sanctions" applied arbitarily by admins across entire communities of editors on the basis of, what is in essence, racial profiling:

"The current trend of "general" remedies—which is to say, remedies which do not explicitly specify the editor(s) to whom they apply, but are instead left open such that other parties (typically administrators) may apply them without consultation with the Committee—is something that emerged from the large number of cases involving ethnic, national, and political conflicts that were heard throughout 2007 and into early 2008. The fundamental problem encountered there was that problems with editor conduct were not primarily an artifact of the individual, but rather of the group to which he belonged; in other words, the issue was not with the quirks of a specific editor, but with a statistically substantial portion of all editors who were members of some external national, ethnic, political, or other group."

"Attempts to deal with such cases by sanctioning each involved editor individually (as was done in, say, Armenia-Azerbaijan) were largely ineffective, both because new editors would continuosly arrive and engage in the same problem behavior, and because the ease of creating new accounts meant that editors who were the subject of sanctions could evade them with minimal effort. Short of instituting drum-head trials and increasing the current caseload by an order of magnitude or more, the arbitration model simply cannot scale to deal with such scenarios adequately; and so we decided to delegate a portion of our authority to the administrator corps in general, allowing them to essentially issue remedies in our name."

Working at the coalface I can unequivocally state (and examination of ANI and other boards confirms this) in the case of Baltic states topics, there is simply no veracity in the claims that individual sanctions have no effect, of disruptive new editors continually arriving or sanctioned individuals recreating accounts to the extent that it is a problem demanding a radical solution. In fact the reverse is true with good editors leaving the project in the case of the Baltic states. There is no rational basis now for the application of such sanctions across such a broad area of Eastern Europe. "Eastern Europe" is just too broad an area. Despite repeated requests for clarification of scope, and no clear concensus or even discussion about the need from the community and opposition from former ArbCom member NewYorkBrad and others, [15], [16], why is Kirill doggedly attempting to push this through for the third time? Martintg (talk) 07:13, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Alex Bakharev (talk)

It is my believe that Arbcom does have power to interpret our policies and to make binding decision based on their interpretation. Arbcom has no power to create policies by itself nor it has a proven track of success in creation of those policies. Both policies under question are good proposals that should be discussed and most probably amended by the community. Arbcom might have its word if there will be any dispute over these proposals unresolvable by lesser WP:DR means. It is important that the proposal being adopted by the community rather than Arbcom on two levels:

1. On the procedural ones - it is a violation of separation of powers and creates a wrong precedent
2. On the pragmatic level - Arbcom members were elected for their might in the dispute resolution not on their might in the content creation. Many of them are not fully familiar with all aspects of article creation and the whole range of possible problems there (I suspect no single individual on wiki could claim such a familiarity anyway). Thus, the projects written by such a committee might have significant deficiencies.

In short I propose to consider those two policies as excellent proposal ready to be edited and discussed by the community Alex Bakharev (talk) 01:27, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Messedrocker

This is how I see it.

The goal of the Arbitration Committee is to be decisive when others cannot. I have no problem with the Arbitration Committee creating policy if it resolves the argument at hand. Once the community has come to its senses, they can decide to do away with the created policy if they well please since it's not the Arbitration Committee's mission to create lasting policy, but rather to solve disputes (even if that means temporary policies are created).

It is unwise to put a blanket ban on Arbitration Committee-created policy.

MessedRocker (talk) 02:28, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Arbitrator views and discussion

I suggest that you re-read the policy and also review our previous rulings for examples of remedies. Your statement does not reflect the actual wording or the spirit of the ArbCom's policy. In past ruling we have made Findings and Remedies about Wikiprojects and the Community. And our policies, like most Wikipedia policy, are descriptive not prescriptive. FloNight♥♥♥ 12:57, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

In responce, a direct quote of the portion of the policy,

Remedies will be of a form similar to: "User X is cautioned against making personal attacks even under severe provocation." "User X is limited to one revert per twenty four hour period on article A." "User X is placed on personal attack parole for a period of Y; if User X engages in edits which an administrator believes to be personal attacks, they may be banned for a short period of time of up to Z." "User X is prohibited from editing group Y of articles for a period of Z." "User X is banned from editing Wikipedia for a period of Y."

Can you please highlight which part of this allows for remedies that create new policy applicable to the entire wiki? I also directly dispute your statement, the arbitration policy by it's very nature is one of the few proscriptive policies. --Barberio (talk) 13:17, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate your interest in discussing a concern, but you are mistaken in your interpretation of that section. That section of the policy describes the format of the written ruling and not the content of the ruling.

And by custom and practice, ArbCom writes the description of our policy. As always, I'm interested in listening to the opinions of users and will make my decisions after careful reflection on what is best for the Community per my understanding of community norms and policy. FloNight♥♥♥ 13:43, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

I apologise for being forceful... But you are merely saying I am mistaken, but not saying why I am mistaken. You are making an empty argument, and an appeal to authority.

Again, I ask the simple question to which you now appear to refuse to answer.

Where in the current WP:Arbitration policy are you empowered to create new policy and processes in a remedy? --Barberio (talk) 13:54, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

This is a fairly unproductive line of reasoning, at best. If you prefer, you may interpret every "general" remedy that we have passed as a statement of intent that we (a) shall desysop and/or ban editors that do not comply with it and (b) shall not to desysop and/or ban editors that do comply, both of which we are perfectly empowered to do by your interpretation of the policy. Kirill ^(prof) 03:14, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Overlooking, for the moment, the purely semantic matter of how general sanctions may be written in a way that complies with a one-editor-per-sanction model—as I've mentioned above, this is perfectly doable (albeit with more paperwork for us), but I don't think people are that interested in an extended discussion of ruleslawyering—I'd like to comment on the more substantive points raised here.

The current trend of "general" remedies—which is to say, remedies which do not explicitly specify the editor(s) to whom they apply, but are instead left open such that other parties (typically administrators) may apply them without consultation with the Committee—is something that emerged from the large number of cases involving ethnic, national, and political conflicts that were heard throughout 2007 and into early 2008. The fundamental problem encountered there was that problems with editor conduct were not primarily an artifact of the individual, but rather of the group to which he belonged; in other words, the issue was not with the quirks of a specific editor, but with a statistically substantial portion of all editors who were members of some external national, ethnic, political, or other group.

Attempts to deal with such cases by sanctioning each involved editor individually (as was done in, say, Armenia-Azerbaijan) were largely ineffective, both because new editors would continuosly arrive and engage in the same problem behavior, and because the ease of creating new accounts meant that editors who were the subject of sanctions could evade them with minimal effort. Short of instituting drum-head trials and increasing the current caseload by an order of magnitude or more, the arbitration model simply cannot scale to deal with such scenarios adequately; and so we decided to delegate a portion of our authority to the administrator corps in general, allowing them to essentially issue remedies in our name.

It's worth pointing out, then, that this method has been common practice since at least the middle of 2007 (and far longer, if we include the old "article probation" as a general remedy), with no general sentiment that it was incompatible with the stated purpose and structure of the Committee. The current situation is essentially an application of it to a type-of-article scope (i.e. BLPs) rather than to a subject-of-article one (i.e. articles dealing with Armenia-Azerbaijan); it is fundamentally following the same well-established model of delegating our authority in order to be able to handle the disputes in the area with some reasonable expediency. It is not "making policy" any more so than the other remedies of this form were; rather, it's simply a (quite necessary) form of delegation. Kirill ^(prof) 06:36, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, you've explained how you got to this point... But this is not an argument in favour of letting the arbcom continue assuming powers by these extensions.

Let me illustrate... There's a path that goes up to a cliff edge, that we're walking up. It's a perfectly safe, level path, except it gets a bit lumpy and dangerous near to the cliff edge. Someone might walk along that path, each step automatic leading on from the one before.

But most people stop once they get to the edge of the cliff.

Perhaps I might suggest that the Arbitration Committee went just a bit too far in assuming powers to make subject-of-article remedies without first consulting with the community as to if they had those powers. I'm comfortably sure that the community would have granted those powers, but they would most probably limited them to areas of correcting editor conduct, not creating new policy and processes.

The major point I feel you're ignoring is that this fundamentally changes ArbComs role. From now on, if this stands, ArbCom will be rule makers, not rule enforcers. And not only that, but rule makers who don't have to listen to community consensus. And I don't think that was what you were elected to be. Arguing that it was a 'gradual assumption of new rolls based on previous actions', is not an actual argument in favour of assuming this new role.

Again, can you please give the community some valid reasoning as to why you should be able to create new policy and processes? Otherwise, I think the community might decide you are not?--Barberio (talk) 10:35, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

As I've said, there's no new policy being created here; this is merely a delegation of our existing, traditional authority. Kirill ^(prof) 17:46, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Comment by FT2:

There are two questions asked here - the remedies, and the committee's remit - and the precursor to this dialog took place largely on the mailing list ^{[17] - 'Arbcom legislation'}. I wrote an answer to the question, "what is the role of the Arbitrators in this project", on the wikien-l mailing list (actually two: an email + a wording fix). That covers a large part of the answer. Broadly speaking, Wikipedia is not just "the community", and "whatever the community decides" is not the be-all and end-all on Wikipedia. The community is only half of the equation. The other half is "a project to write a neutral encyclopedia". The Arbitration Committee is one of the project's key checks and balances. Elected by the community, with authority above the community on a number of matters ^[18], it is invested from the same level and same origins that gave consensus decision making to the community as its core decision-making process. Part of its purpose is to ensure that the actual needs of encyclopedia writing and the focus of the community on its intended project, as embedded in its various policies and norms, are not accidentally marginalized in favor of wiki socio-politics and/or society-building experiments ^[19], MySpace, and "drift".

If you pause and think what the request of this post is asking, it's attempting to contend that we may not introduce strong enforcement of BLPs (often our most sensitive articles) as a remedy for a range of communal BLP disputes, when it is plainly necessary, and when the community has repeatedly failed to reach a means to do so by dialog. That is exactly part of what this committee was founded to do. It is precisely one key role of the community-elected Arbitrators acting in their role as handlers of the community's most difficult disputes, to find ways forward that promote the aims of the project and the aims of its policies on such disputes. "We can't ensure good BLP enforcement for biographical articles, but you (arbcom) aren't allowed to make it happen either". No. We are a community together. Our role is to give a ruling to allow progress on "last resort" areas of serious dispute. We have all communally watched this one area try to be given higher quality with stronger enforcement expectations, against substandard editorship for a long time, and it needs a hard shove. This, with better guidance, may help. If not, guess what - we'll figure another way. One way or another, BLP's are being brought up to their intended aim of very high standard articles. There will probably be a sea-change of culture on this, from "well, its okay (maybe)" to "is it really impeccable?" Users can understand that shift, and the reason for it - or not.

The other thing is, this is not policy change. BLP has always been expected to be that way, as ideally all articles are. This is about achievement and laxness, it's about enforcement, and about process provisions to deal with the persistent concerns over under-enforcement or mis-enforcement of these existing policies. Nothing here changes how an article should be written, what standards are expected, what BLP or NPOV mean, what a reliable source is and whether we should have a policy on these. Both of the cited remedies are purely about remedying divisive issues between administrators (and in this case also non-administrators), whereby the community may apply some policies in a patchwork manner at times, or some policies may not be enforced as strictly as the project needs, because of uncertainties and failure of consensus-seeking about what to do in difficult cases. These are both remedies which give extra tools to support the enforcement and best interpretation of existing policies and norms, exactly like all rulings in complex disputes are intended to achieve. They are Arbcom doing one of its most difficult roles - grasping the nettle and using norms and policies to find ways to guide the project through a difficult problem that no other part of the community has been willing or able to fix to the standard we feel it needs to be brought.

Our response to the cases brought to us by the community is,

1. for BLPs (passed) - be much stricter, and we will post guidance shortly on what exactly BLP policy's best interpretations and practices seem to be, in order to indicate what we have in mind on that, and
2. for sourcing (proposed) - to take our authority to resolve all dispute topics (which does include content disputes, but which we strongly avoid applying) and use it to establish some kind of "last resort" arbitration (exact format being discussed and subject to decision) for determining if a source is being properly cited and represented in a dispute.

Cross reference Arbitration policy ("The Committee reserve the right to hear or not hear any dispute ... The following are general guidelines... but the Committee may make exceptions.... will primarily investigate interpersonal disputes..."). Cross reference other broad-approach remedies such as "general sanctions" that have gone into wide use, and been adopted by the community as workable. Cross reference my initial view as stated during the case itself ^[20] and at the time of initial proposed close (May 31) ^[21] to see that I have zero problem stating a view honestly held, and then doing so again, and that I would not say this unless I did concur.

Like the wider community we are not 100% sure what will ultimately prove "best". Unlike the wider community, on this occasion, we are less easily driven to doing little about it, by the limitations of large-scale consensus seeking and endless dialog. If in response, the community can produce a convincingly stronger and better regime driving higher quality, that does the job needed to meet the high standard we have communally committed towards, then these remedies may possibly become redundant. So far, despite varied attempts by a number of individuals and megabytes of dialog over a period of years, that has not happened. I will be pleasantly surprised if the community finds a better solution, but until such time as a better way is proposed, accepted, and works, the arbcom solution (subject to development and tuning in light of experience) is the current way forward on these key areas of quality and dispute. If this remedy leads to the community actually realizing the standards that can be achieved, and figuring out and agreeing a still better approach that actually works, then it will have achieved its ideal goal, and I hope that will be the case. Sometimes an issue can drift interminably, and an common effort is only really made when something serious happens giving a sense of urgency. That now exists; enforcement of high standards of editing is here, now, today; users (whether admin or otherwise) should take that on board today, and begin learning better collaborative and editing skills, if they wish to edit our BLP articles going forward without administrative action.

I hope this remedy works. I don't often speak strongly this way, but these things matter and we all know it. They are central to our writing, and the expectation of high standards - enforced to a matching high standard of fairness by experienced users and admins - must become adopted as a working new reality. If not, we'll find other ways to fix it. A discussion today reminded me just how people sometimes don't realize that we can greatly improve quality and handling of our BLPs (or they may only have a vague ill-thought-out concept of it as a theory read on some policy page or a simplistic "delete it all" idea). If they did, perhaps they would realize that we can, and should, strive for that -- not just talk about it.

With hopes that I am doing my best by taking a stance on encyclopedic content quality first, and willingness as always to listen to comments. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 23:53, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Nuclear Option.

Pending action on Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/C68-FM-SV/Proposed decision and the proposed dismissal of the case, I am considering going for the nuclear option here.

If, as I suspect will happen, sufficient ArbCom members vote for this dismissal, I will add a new section to this RfC, titled "Extraordinary Motion of No Confidence". The text of the motion will be, "In light of recent activities, the community can hold no confidence in the current Arbitration Committee. Suspension of the Committee is warranted until new members are elected."

This is a strong step, but I think the some members of the current ArbCom have failed to take on board any of the criticism directed at them, and are damaging the dispute resolution process by their activities. If they don't see sense soon, it may be time to push the emergency stop button. --Barberio (talk) 13:54, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Who appointed you king, John? --Jenny 16:58, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

"edit this page", same as you or I. :) rootology (T) 17:05, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Barberio, please split any such motion into two parts: One, a procedure by which the editors of Wikipedia can call for a fresh set of elections, and two, a straw poll to gauge if any such formal procedure is likely to gain support in the present situation. The "procedure" may be something as simple as "During extraordinary situations, the ARBCOM can be asked to resign en masse by a no-confidence RfC which gains BIGPERCENT support and a margin of support of at least BIGMARGIN. Any such RFC will last between SHORTNUMBEROFDAYS and LONGNUMBEROFDAYS and will be advertised on LISTOFPAGES. Prior to such an RFC, a petition must be posted to SOMELOCATION and must have the support of at least SOMEREASONABLEMARGIN and at least SOMEREASONABLEPERCENTAGE, with the petition being active at least SOMENUMBER but no longer than SOMELONGERNUMBER of days" or it may be something much more involved. If you go the simple route, this is how it might look: During extraordinary situations, the ARBCOM can be asked to resign en masse by a no-confidence RfC which gains a net of 60% support and a margin of support of at least 100 more "support" than "oppose." Any such RFC will last between 15 and 30 days and will be advertised to all logged-in users for the duration of the comment period. Prior to such an RFC, a petition must be posted to WP:RFC and have the support of at least 60% of editors with a net margin of 20. The petition will be active for at least 7 but no more than 14 days." I'm not picky on the wording, only that some agreed-upon procedure exists before moving forward. In any case, I'll probably recommend against any no-confidence motion, but it is important that we have a means to do so in the event of a runaway committee. Personally, I think some of the ideas now under discussion, such as shorter ARBCOM terms and shorter intervals between elections, combined with the lack of a total disaster the likes of which would have everyone screaming "resign," make any discussion of "throwing everyone out" at this time premature. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 19:38, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Could we perhaps instead put Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee#IV._Redress into immediate effect, and apply it to the current Membership. This would also allow those members who do disagree with the current status quo an opportunity to say so. It does seem like some arbitrators need to be recalled to prevent further damage to the creditability of the dispute resolution process. --Barberio (talk) 20:17, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Nothing from this RFC can go into effect until the RFC closes. However, if you open an RFC strongly encouraging one or more members to voluntarily resign, and it becomes obvious the discussion is going heavily against them, I strongly suggest they will step down. I don't see such a lopsided RFC happening though. Too many of the "silent majority" will step in to say "no need to resign." davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 20:45, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm one of them. Yes, I am one of the first to suggest that we need shorter terms and that the public view of the ArbCom is that things are not running exactly smoothly. However, short of gross misconduct (I'm not talking about making unpopular decisions, I'm talking a new Essjay level scandal) I do not support recalling an Arbitrator mid-stream. Arbitrators must feel free to make unpopular decisions if they feel it necessary. They come from the community, but are not required to simply be mirrors for the community. If that was the case, we would just disband the ArbCom and do everything straight voting/popularity contest. SirFozzie (talk) 20:58, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

The assertion if you open an RFC strongly encouraging one or more members to voluntarily resign needs clarification: I opened the RFC and I have not encouraged one or more members to resign: I reserve judgment and at some point in the future I may do so. Durova^Charge! 21:03, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

I think rather than a global "vote of no confidence" for the entire ArbCom, we need a well-defined "impeachment" procedure for removing individual ArbCom members for gross misconduct. Like real-world impeachment, an ArbCom impeachment should be very difficult, but it does need to exist as an option, as the recent events show. Moreover, I don't think that impeachment powers should be given to a single person, such as Jimbo, but to the community as a whole, whose trust ArbCom needs in order to operate effectively. E.g., off the top of my head, one can require both a community vote and, say, a vote of the current bureaucrats (or admins?), with sufficiently large majorities required in both cases. Nsk92 (talk) 21:18, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm thinking this may be premature, also. I was looking around at several formal procedures for recalling state officials, and I'm thinking some sort of similar system could be adopted on WP, with well-defined parameters and procedures for all proceedings. An RFC could be looked at as a petition for initiating a recall process, but it shouldn't be looked at as the whole process. Amerique^dialectics 21:20, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

I am certainly not suggesting that RfC may ever be all of the procees; it should be harder than that to remove a member of the ArbCom. But I do think that a well-defined process for doing that is needed, even if it is very rarely used. Regarding "recall" vs "impeachment", I prefer "impeachment". A "recall" suggest the possibility of removal for making unpopular decisions without breaking their mandate (e.g. like the recall of Gray Davis in California). I don't think that a removal from ArbCom on such grounds should be allowed. Similar to real-world judges, ArbCom members should be allowed to do their job without having to be in a constant "election campaign" mode. However, removal for serious misconduct is a different matter and that is what the term "impeachment" implies. Nsk92 (talk) 21:43, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) This link in particular is especially explanatory:[22] Under the section labled "Petitioning," the idea of a scalable minimum # of signatories required to initiate a recall process, "based on a formula, generally a percentage of the vote in the last election for the office in question" seems especially adaptable to the WP system for electing Arbs.

I think Jimbo could be impeached, but I can't see "impeachment" language applied to Arbs. Recall petitions against judges are not unheard of, though, although they do take on the character you describe: [23] Amerique^dialectics 21:51, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

We're a very long way from impeaching Jimbo or even declaring a vote of no confidence in the arbitration committee. 29 new editors commented on the RFA yesterday as a result of a link being added to the watchlist. Let's continue to gather opinions and see if we can find out where the consensus lies. --Jenny 09:54, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Befuddled of Hampshire

I think I'm just an ordinary user and to be honest, I'm completely bemused by all this. There seems to be a great deal of comment, I haven't got time to read it all and I find it very hard to ascertain by skim-reading which way it is going. Its difficult to see the wood from the trees. I'm not even sure what the debate is about in the first place. Is it really that important a subject ? There's not a lot of point consulting the Wiki membership on this sort of question, as all you'll ever get is the enormous confusing document that now exists. Attempts at democracy amid what is essentially a managed anarchy aren't likely to succeed. Can't the Arbitration Committe and Jimbo Wales reach some sort of agreement ?Hethurs (talk) 16:26, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Your points are fair, but the flaw comes in the final phrase: both the parties of Jimbo Wales and the ArbComare the community, editors like you and I. It's not for either of those two to come to consensus; it's the community ArbCom arbitrates that needs to find consensus here. -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 17:03, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

There have been significant problems, and the Arbcom is very uncommunicative when contacted about them. Frankly, if the Arbcom were able to self-regulate, and deal with problems, they would probably have done so by now. Communication is the biggest issue: It is very hard to get answers out of them - or even recognition that a question has been asked - for even fairly trivial matters. For instance, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Homeopathy/Evidence was deleted in the middle of a case (which just closed), and only in the last week, after it was brought up in this RfC, did the arbcom agreed to look a it and figure out what's going on. They still haven't done anything about it. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 05:05, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

I think the point was that this page is linked as a watchlist message, when the vast majority of less-regular editors have no idea what the arbitration committee is, and have little reason to care. The odds that anyone randomly clicking on the link to this page is going to be interested in the 500kb+ of nonsense are very low. - Bobet 07:33, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

What is going on?

Can anyone please tell me, in a few sentences what's going on here? Guy0307 (talk) 08:16, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

zOMG drama. Who needs sentences? :-) —Giggy 08:57, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

In late June, an arbitrator made an error in posting an arbitration case, complete with remedy, in the case of an editor who apparently had serious and longstanding conduct problems. The user had not been contacted prior to this. This was immediately repudiated by another arbitrator, it was vacated and Jimbo has confirmed that it has no status. The arbitration committee has held an internal inquiry and decided that its methods were at fault and the error was a result of poor communication. The conduct problems have been resolved, for the time being, by a mentorship arrangement involving the user.

This RFC which had been in preparation for some time was released during the accompanying on-wiki commotion, and it's been running for twelve days or so. --Jenny 10:00, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

The arbitration committee is a group of people who handle some long-standing editing disputes. They made what some people consider a wrong decision, which was made worse by discussing the issue outside of Wikipedia, instead of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration and its subpages. This resulted in the discussion you see that's irrelevant to a vast majority of users of this website. If you don't know what it's about, it's very likely that you shouldn't care. - Bobet 10:18, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

While you may or may not care, this is an opportunity to understand what the arbitration process is all about and give your input, independent of the correctness or wrongness of the decision(s) mentioned above, on defining that process better. The dispute may be raging around it, but the RFC is relevant to any serious editor of wikipedia. In essence, the Rfc seeks to define what Arbcom can and cannot do and it is fairly easy to scroll down the page, read individual comments, and express your opinion on the ones you agree or disagree with while ignoring the ones you don't care about.--Regents Park (sink with the skaters) 11:43, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Summary Sections

Please don't add summary sections yet. It causes problems when people add new statements, but don't add them to the 'summary', and the person writing the one line summary may accidental misrepresent the statement.

Summarizing all of this will be a very difficult task, and one ideally left till the end of the RfC process, where we can take weight of consensus into account. --Barberio (talk) 14:09, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Summary with intent to produce a new Arbitration policy.

I've started the process of collating together what's been agreed with by a significant amount of people into a page so we can eventually distil it all into a new policy.

Please see Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee/Summary.

Once you cut out it down to the items that only got a healthy amount of support, and trim away all the threaded discussion, it starts to look like we do actually have the foundation here for a workable arbitration policy. Which I think is a demonstrated success for this format of RfC! --Barberio (talk) 16:20, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

After sorting through them, we have four contradictions in supported policy changes. All to do with changing how many members get elected and for how long. I think we'll need to run a straw poll to identify which of these changes has the most support. I suggest running it as an Approval voting including 'No Change to Policy' as an option. This would mean one poll between expanding the number of members elected per election, and no-change; And a second poll between different 'terms and tranches' options and no-change. --Barberio (talk) 14:11, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

I would argue that the first of the non-actionable ones is actionable: Policy change being to declare that, except in exceptional circumstances, 1 week must be given for evidence preparation. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 18:25, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

You're probably right. Go ahead and move it to the right place, and put in a policy change box. --Barberio (talk) 18:55, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Altho, having said that, reading it over again, you didn't explicitly say that in the statement people were agreeing with, so I think it's unfair to say such a policy change has support because people might not have agreed if you'd put in a "1 week must be given for evidence preparation" statement. --Barberio (talk) 18:59, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Since we'll need to have further discussion to resolve the conflicting policy suggestions anyway, you can always put up your suggested policy to address the problems identified in the statement during that. --Barberio (talk) 19:04, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Started a draft poll at Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee/Poll. --Barberio (talk) 18:54, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Committee expansion and elections

I've started a thread at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2008#Terms and seats looking to enact or at least move towards creating a larger committee. There's some issues over what this will mean in practise. Thoughts welcome. Hiding T 15:31, 14 August 2008 (UTC)