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Amendment request: suspension of Beeblebrox

Original discussion

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

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Initiated by Just Step Sideways (formerly User:Beeblebrox) at 20:34, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

The Arbitration Committee has determined that Beeblebrox (talk · contribs) has repeatedly failed to preserve in appropriate confidence the contents of private correspondence sent to the Committee and the Committee's internal discussions and deliberations by making disclosures on off-wiki forums. These failures followed a previous formal warning issued to Beeblebrox in September 2021 by the Arbitration Committee concerning his conduct in off-wiki forums. Therefore, in accordance with Wikipedia:Arbitration/Policy § Conduct of arbitrators, Beeblebrox is suspended from Arbitration Committee membership for a period of six months from this date. During this period, Beeblebrox's CheckUser and Oversight permissions and his access to applicable mailing lists (including the functionaries' mailing list) are revoked. Following this period, Beeblebrox may request reinstatement of his permissions or mailing list access by applying to the Arbitration Committee. Beeblebrox may also regain access via election to the committee.

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

1. Beeblebrox's CheckUser and Oversight permissions and his access to applicable mailing lists (including the functionaries' mailing list) are revoked. Following this period, Beeblebrox may request reinstatement of his permissions or mailing list access by applying to the Arbitration Committee.

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request

• Just Step Sideways (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiator) (formerly known as Beeblebrox)

Information about amendment request

• Beeblebrox's CheckUser and Oversight permissions and his access to applicable mailing lists (including the functionaries' mailing list) are revoked. Following this period, Beeblebrox may request reinstatement of his permissions or mailing list access by applying to the Arbitration Committee.

• I would like this clause stricken from the decision and my oversight and VRT permissions returned.

Statement by Just Step Sideways

This not an appeal or an application, this is a request that the decision be ammended.

I am requesting this decision be ammended to strike out the part about revocation of my oversight rights for the following reasons:

• The 2023 committee suspended me as an arbitrator for six months even though my term was up in one month.That's fine. I totally did exactly what they say I did.
• They also stripped me of my functionary tools, without even telling me they were even considering that. I had no idea whatsoever that was even on the table.
• I am not asking for CU permisssions back as I did initially get that access as a result of my previous stint on the committee and I was never very active with it and don't really have any interest in sock hunting.
• Oversight is another matter. I have been a memeber of that team, indepentently of being an arbitrator, for thirteen years. To have the right stripped away without even being told revocation was being discussed seems unfair, arbitrary, and punitive rather than preventative.
• I have no idea if this distinction was known and considered in any way during the arbitrator discussion, but I feel it should have been.
• Revocation of an advanced permisssion should have a clear cause behind it, either inactivity or abuse. I don't think it should just be tacked on to a decision related to status as an arbitrator.
• I am not aware of any circumstance except for extreme abuse of the tool or extreme reveals of information covered by the access to nonpublic personal data policy which would result in revocation without even discussing the matter with the oversighter in question first, yet this is what happened in my case.
• I am not aware of what arguments were made in favor of revoking the permission, as, again, I was not even told this was being considered, so I can't even attempt to refute or even appeal in six months because I was not made aware of the existence of the possibilty of such a sanction, let alone the specific arguments in favor of it. The case presented to me that I was asked to respond to was entirely about me saying things off-wiki that I knew about because I was on ArbCom's mailing list. I was not asked anything about my tool access as a functionary.
• I don't think loose talk off-wiki about some ArbCom business is the same thing as violating the access to nonpublic personal data policy, which I am still (under my old username) a signatory to [1] and have respected. If there have ever been any serious accusations of misuse of this tool or actual violations of that policy, I am unaware of them.

So it is my position that this unexpected ancillary revocation of a user right without any stated cause or prior notice is patently unfair and unjustified. I therefore ask that it be stricken from the decison and my oversight rights and VRT permisssions returned to me. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 20:34, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Barkeep, I really appreciate how open and communicative you have generally been throughout this whole thing, both on and off-wiki, but that ends at "why was I not told this was even an option?" You guys knew I couldn't read your discussion, was I just supposed to intuit that you were going to go way further than I was actually told? Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 22:15, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

@Ivanvector:Beeblebrox has breached that legal document directly, by their own admission:That is not an accurate description of anything I said. In fact it is the exact opposite of what I said, as anyone can plainly see. The access to nonpublic data agreement covers personal information a user finds while using these tools, such as information that needs to be supressed, or checkuser data. It doesn't say anything about email lists. This distinction was also initially lost on some of the arbs, but they seem to have come to the same conclusion as the notice of the suspension does not mention the document you refer to, instead only mentioning ARBPOL. This is a fairly important distinction, so unless you can show me where it says in that document that it covers the ArbCom mailing list, I would ask that you strike this false accusation. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 01:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure how much more clear I can make this point, but yes, not being told revocation of my oversight rights was even being discussed seems pretty unfair. I don't think this is a case of "in an ideal world we would have" it is more a case of being decent and just. I was ready to be told I was kicked off the committee. I wasn't sure you all would actually go through with it but I accepted it was a possibility. Then I check my email and find I've been removed from everything,not just the arbcoim list but OS, CU, and VRT, all areas where I never breached any confidentiality. It's not the same thing and I do take it seriously.

I was told this was about my fitness to be on the committee, nobody gave me the slightest hint it was going anywhere beyond that. Its starting to feel like the committee didn't even think about telling me and assumed I would expect additional revocations, which I find ridiculous.

And it's not just that I have hurt feelings over it, I find it manifestly unjust. My sense of fairness and blunt approach to situations I feel are unjust are what got me elected to the committee in the first place, and I feel like if the coin had been flipped I would have made sure the commnittee at least told the person about to be sanctioned what the arguments were to justify further revocations, and would allow them a chance to reply. Instead this was rushed through much faster than most other arbcom proceedings and I was kept totally ignorant of an important aspect of it. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 02:12, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm rather shocked by Kevin's revelation that the Ombuds, possibly for the first time ever, have approved a public statement about an ongoing investigation that has not reached any conclusions. I cannot recall a time when anyone not on the commission knew what they were doing before they actually made a reccomendation to the office. I seem to be the subject of an ever-increasing number of exceptions to the normal rules, in every regard except for the rules I broke. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 02:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Having slept on it, let me clarify: I may have overstated my case in saying tool use has to be involved for the ANPDP to apply. It would obviosuly apply to any sort of personal information that was shared on a mailing list as well. I would not and have not shared any such information. In addition, no actual quotes from eny emails were shared. No names of other participants in weither discussion were shared. Nothing that actually needed to be secret was shared.

You may ask who I think I am to just be deciding what to share and what not to share. I was trying to be a different kind of arbitrator, in fact I ran on that principle, and was elected, twice. People seem to think I was reckless but I was actually very careful on the very rare occassions when I gave out certain details. No personal information that was non-public was ever invovled. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 19:47, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I know I'm probably past my word limit, but please bear with me. The question of what would have changed if I had known is not entirely academic. If I had been asked what I thought was expected of me were I to retain the tool, I could have made the point that PII or CU data was never the issue here. We could have at least discussed the subject. Would I have swayed anyone? Maybe, maybe not, but I wasn't given the chance, so we can only guess. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 22:13, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Ivanvector (Beeblebrox suspension)

The arbitration policy, under the subheading "Transparency and privacy", says that "[t]he Committee treats as private all communications sent to it, or sent by a Committee member in the performance of their duties." My understanding of what has been revealed about the decision is that Beeblebrox was suspended from the Committee as a result of publicly sharing information that is explicitly non-public. If that's not correct then ignore the rest of my comment.

Just Step Sideways attempts to pass off their advanced permissions as mere "userrights" as though their granting and revocation is equivalent to, say, pagemover or even administrator, but they are not the same. The holders of these advanced permissions are trusted editors charged with handling confidential and often highly-sensitive non-public information; that's why access to and use of it is governed by a formal legal document. Beeblebrox has breached that legal document directly, by their own admission: they have stated plainly (above) that they publicly shared information from a non-public mailing list. The fact that they don't believe that losing access to the tools is a fair consequence of this serious breach of trust only further demonstrates their unsuitability to hold these advanced permissions.

The oversight policy says that oversight access is "generally" only revoked for cause, not "exclusively", and says in plain English that permission may be revoked at any time. There clearly was cause for its removal in this case. Just Step Sideways can't be trusted with and should not have access to non-public information, not just for six months but ever again. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 22:20, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Responding to Szmenderowiecki's point about due process: functionary appointments are at the sole discretion of Arbcom, not the community. The procedural policy which you yourself quoted says "Oversighter status may be revoked by the Arbitration Committee at any time." That is a complete sentence: the entire procedure for Arbcom revoking access is the Committee's decision to do so. In fact the Committee can "do whatever it wants" with these permissions, and ought to when privacy is at stake.

@Just Step Sideways: as you said, the notice of suspension refers only to ARBPOL, and ARBPOL gives the Committee full and universal discretion to assign or revoke functionary permissions, and that is really the end of the story here. But to expand anyway: the access to non-public personal data policy requires agreement to the confidentiality agreement for nonpublic information, which describes nonpublic personal data as "private information, including private user information, which you receive either through the use of tools provided to you as an authorized Wikimedia community member or from other such members." The access policy also includes agreement to the WMF Privacy Policy, which under "Examples of What This Privacy Policy Covers" includes "Emails, SMS, and notifications from [the Foundation] or sent to [the Foundation] from [users]." Since the Arbcom mailing lists are WMF email lists and are defined as private by ARBPOL, all information available from that mailing list is private information covered by these policies. The access policy defines a complete list of the five ways that we are permitted to disclose information covered by the policy (under "Disclosure of nonpublic information"), and "posting on a public forum" is not one of those five definitions. The fact that you did obtain information from a private mailing list covered by these policies in your capacity as a privileged user and disclosed this information in a way not permitted by the policies is a breach of those policies, and so I will not retract anything in my statement. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 16:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement from The ed17

I fully endorse Ivanvector's statement above. Even if you ignore the legal aspects here, two of oversight's fundamental purposes are protecting people's privacy and ensuring they aren't defamed. Given the gravity of those issues, we as a community put trust in oversighters to hold the information they view in strict confidence. If this incident means that there is even a sliver of a doubt that Just Step Sideways/Beeblebrox cannot be completely trusted with private information, they should not and cannot have access to the oversight tools. Full stop. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 23:13, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement from Bradv

The access to nonpublic data agreement covers personal information a user finds while using these tools, such as information that needs to be supressed, or checkuser data. It doesn't say anything about email lists. This argument is beyond disingenuous. If someone emails the oversighters to ask that their real name be deleted from a page, the contents of the email are obviously to be treated with the same secrecy as the contents of the edits that need to be oversighted. Claiming that email lists aren't protected information would fly in the face of years of precedent, and would completely undermine all of our arbitration, checkuser, and oversight processes. Moreover, anyone who argues this point should absolutely not be allowed access to the oversight tools, as the proper functioning of this system relies on community trust that information sent to oversighters will be treated as confidential.

I urge the committee to reject this request now, and not to wait for the ombuddies to reach a decision. – bradv 02:37, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Szmenderowiecki (Beeblebrox/JSS appeal)

I understand the case is on hold, but I still want to register my dissatisfaction with the whole process. This reeks of judicial misconduct.

1. Beeblebrox, in their capacity as an arb, drops a hint at an adjacent forum to an it.wiki editor (here) by using non-public knowledge from the ArbCom mailing list. OP is suspended for six months from ArbCom, and apparently the hint (even if it was "the last straw") was worse than the obvious violation of basic due process that caused the user to be glocked without really knowing why (the appeal succeeded). He's not removed for procedural reasons.
2. In a private hearing, ArbCom removes CU, oversight and VRT allegedly without making clear this was on the table. WP:ARBPOL guarantees that parties will be notified of [a] private hearing and be given a reasonable opportunity to respond to what is said about them before a decision is made. But not only does ArbCom not deny that allegation, it doubles down on the (dubious) validity of its approach. I wonder how this squares with your statements back in 2022 that due process applies to sitting arbs.
3. WP:OVERSIGHT says that ArbCom may revoke the oversight permission at any time [but generally] only "for cause", such as abuse of suppression to remove items that do not qualify under the stated policy, or for unauthorized release of suppressed information (emphasis mine). The issue is misuse of private ArbCom communications. The connection to suppress tool misuse/abuse is at best tenuous.

ArbCom says they had no input into VRT removal - collapsing this point
ArbCom exceeds its authority when revoking VRT access because, as WP:VRT notes, membership in the volunteer response team is [...] purely determined by the VRTS administrators, not by ArbCom or the community. There's no indication ArbCom asked VRTS admins to remove access to VRT.

1. L235 on behalf of ArbCom strikes OP's username from ArbCom list in late November but a month later conveniently leaves out the suspended ArbCom member even though the distinction between "removed" and "suspended" had been discussed.

To be clear, the argument OP uses is a bit WP:WIKILAWYERy. Private communications should remain confidential. The breach was justifiable ethics-wise, though (see point 1). (We don't know about other breaches, it's OK, but because ArbCom didn't suspend Beeblebrox back then I don't assume they were severe).

I'd want to assume good faith and say these are innocent mistakes, but there's too much of them.

To all editors who say that "if a person is untrustworthy, we can remove them from all positions requiring trust, good that ArbCom just did it", I get your point and I would've normally supported it but procedural policies are there for a reason. "The ends justify the means" is not what ARBPOL says, and the community will also disagree with that notion. Just because ArbCom has full control over closed proceedings doesn't mean you can do whatever you want on the theory no one will know. Good the Ombuds Commission are investigating.

I ask the Committee to grant the OP's request and apologise to him. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 03:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Ivanvector, "at any time" means there are no fixed terms for oversighters, not that ArbCom can dismiss anyone arbitrarily, on a caprice, without explanation and/or at least the minimal due process. I guess that's where our interpretations differ.

Barkeep49, thank you for the courtesy, and sorry for the frequent changes, I just wanted to make sure my statement did not have logical inconsistencies or incomprehensible shorthands. I have nothing more of substance to say. Again, I appreciate your accomodation. If you notice what I said is factually incorrect, let me know. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 19:39, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by SMcCandlish (on JSS/Beeblebrox request)

All this focus on "I should have been told", looking into the past and what might have been a better process, is a lot of noise about water that has long since passed under the bridge. It is unlikely that the actual results would have been any different in any way had Beeblebrox been notified in advance of all the pending revocations and even been given a whole month to prepare an objection. He's had much longer than that to prepare the objection presented here now, and it appears unconvincing to much of anyone. I'm reminded of a certain MoS disruptor's years-long pursuit of "vindication" in the name of "justice" with a long string of revisit-the-past appeals which were all rejected and sometimes resulted in even more restrictions for failing to drop the stick. These sorts of "I must defend my personal honor and sense of fairness at all costs" antics tend to backfire badly in this environment, because our disciplinary processes are never about who is technically right about some nit-pick, but about protecting the project as a whole. In particular, the "fruit of the poisonous tree" principle of US jurisdrudence (i.e. that a regulatory action taken must be invalidated if the procedure used to reach that result was improper in any way, regardless of overwhelming evidence that the result was justified) does not operate on Wikipedia. ArbCom routinely reaches sanctioning conclusions that were not entirely what the sanctioned party was previously alerted might be part of the outcome; this is not evidence of any procedural impropriety in the first place.

I agree with the gist of others' comments here that a serious breach of confidentiality rules about one set of sensitive data automatically necessitates preclusion of that party having access to tools which require confidentiality about other sensitive data. This is a no-brainer, and ArbCom should reject this request immediately, regardless of any WMF-level examination of such a question from the corporate perspective. Which I think is also virtually guaranteed to come to the same conclusion anyway. But even if it didn't, it is already crystal clear that the en.WP community isn't going to buy an argument like "I broke confidentiality in this particular box, but can be trusted not to in these other boxes over here." ArbCom has no reason to wait for, or even care about the outcome of, a WMF Ombuds Commission discussion.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:35, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf (re Beeblebrox/JSS)

I find myself largely in agreement with SMcCandlish. The only relevant question is: Would the outcome have been any different if JSS had been explicitly told that their OS/CU tools were being considered for removal? As the answer is "no", that should be the end of the matter. The Committee has already noted that making it explicit is something that could be done better in future, and apologised for not doing so this time, so there truly is nothing more to do here. Thryduulf (talk) 12:40, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Robert McClenon (Beeblebrox)

I will make one change to a statement that Beeblebrox (JSS) has made, and that will make all the difference. He writes: Revocation of an advanced permisssion should have a clear cause behind it, either inactivity or abuse. I would revise that to say "Revocation of an advanced permission should have a clear cause behind it, either inactivity, abuse, or loss of trust." It is my understanding that the issue that has resulted in JSS's suspension from the ArbCom was a loss of trust, in particular of trust in the ability to keep secret details that needed to be kept secret. JSS appears to be arguing that the information that they disclosed that has resulted in their suspension was a different type of privileged information than Oversighters use and maintain. That is not important. If a government employee has access to two types of privileged information, such as DoD information that is classified Confidential and Secret (one type of sensitive information) and medical data that is protected by HIPAA (another type of sensitive information), and was found to have failed to secure classified information in a safe at the end of the day, they could lose their access to both classified information and HIPAA information, for having shown a lack of care or lack of trust. Robert McClenon (talk) 07:51, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.

suspension of Beeblebrox: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

• @Szmenderowiecki: you need to stop substantively changing your remarks at this point. In fact, other than striking something, you needed to have done that once someone substantively replied to you. If you have new comments to make I'm granting you a 250 word extension to make new comments, including (if you'd like) your most recent change, which I'm reverting. Barkeep49 (talk) 16:38, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Suspension of Beeblebrox: Arbitrator views and discussion

• I very much intended to say Beeblebrox/Just Step Sidweways should not have access to any confidential information for six months. That this was an appropriate response to the conduct in question because my loss of trust was a general one rather than a tool misuse. So for me how he got Checkuser and Oversight and access to the functionaries list is irrelevant. What's not irrelevant for me is that we have a bunch of new arbitrators. So while I am of the opinion that it should be all his permissions back or nothing, I am eager to hear from my new colleagues - and I've already privately expressed this to some of them so it shouldn't be a shock - if we got our sanction wrong in the first place. And so despite JSS saying it's not appeal, I'm willing given these unusual circumstances, to entertain one. Barkeep49 (talk) 21:58, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Just Step Sideways just so I'm clear, your issue is with not being told what was an option? Barkeep49 (talk) 22:18, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

  Thanks for clarifying JSS. I will take some time to think about what you've written here. Barkeep49 (talk) 02:16, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

  So after having given this some thought, reading the comments from others (arbs and other editors), and sleeping on it, here are my thoughts, which largely echo what several others have said.

  1. ArbCom should have done better at presenting what was being considered to JSS and JSS should have known removal of CUOS and/or functionary was a possibility because they understood removal as an Arb was a possibility (we've also been accused by one editor of taking away VRT, but that action was done by the people responsible for VRT and we did not direct it to happen publicly or privately). JSS has been the lead proponent of the concept of "admonish or remove sysop, but don't partially sanction" and taking away all the functionary bits is the equivalent action for this case (if people want to argue that suspension is a partial sanction, have at it, but that doesn't change my belief that based on his experience and beliefs towards others that JSS should have known this was a possibility, just as ArbCom should have done better at presenting what was being considered).
  2. However, JSS is still entitled to appeal any/all of the outcome. In fact I worked hard to make sure the outcome would allow that to happen right away in January because it was important to me as a matter of fairness, with a group of new arbs coming in, that he would have that chance. So regardless of how we end up here, I take serious any new information that we have gained during this appeal that we didn't have at the time of our original discussions with JSS.
  3. The oversight specific information and related thinking was not shared with us and is the new information I am considering here. I would summarize the information not previously presented as "JSS feels his use of oversight is independent from anything that he did as an arb, there is no evidence of misuse of the Oversight tool, so he can still be trusted to be an oversighter even if there are concerns about him as an Arbitrator." I do not find that compelling. My vote was primarily about preventing future occurrences of the kinds that had already happened. Future issues could just as easily happen from information gained as an Oversighter or from being present on the functionary's list. To quote JSS from the TNT case where he wrote, in voting to remove TNT's Oversight bit despite the lack of misconduct with that tool, Being a functionary is a position of the utmost trust, and I simply do not trust their judgement anymore. The only part of that I'd change is "anymore" to "at this time".

  I'm therefore a decline on this appeal absent some movement from my colleagues saying the decision itself was wrong (which I don't expect to be forthcoming at this time). JSS has a lot of hurt at what happened and it pains me to know that I could have done better to stop some of that hurt. I like JSS as a person and think, outside of this one flaw, he is an excellent arbitrator and thoughtful functionary. I hope JSS takes the time away he's said he was going to take and comes back in May/June with an appeal that addresses the core issues which led to my vote and which I wrote to JSS about and I produce below. Barkeep49 (talk) 16:09, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Excerpt from an email from Barkeep49 to Just Step Sideways (then named Beeblebrox)

I've been thinking about the largeness of the breaches and what I consider your overall very good to excellent record as an arb. But also part of that thinking was the presumption you would be able to course correct when presented with this direct feedback from the rest of your colleagues. The fact that in these emails you're [text removed because it's not been said publicly that I recall by JSS and so it is not mine to share] in general not sounding contrite is making me rethink that presumption. The only reason I'm not reconsidering my vote is because I do get the sense in that last paragraph that you're getting there. And it's in that spirit and with that hope I'm writing you this direct email in the hopes that it helps push you further.

• @Just Step Sideways: What I'm hearing is that you think we should have told you we were considering revoking CUOS, in addition to our telling you that removal from the committee was on the table. In an ideal world, I think you're right: we should try to be as communicative about the possible range of options as possible. But in this case "not ideal" is as far as it gets — I don't think it slipped to the level of "unfair". Removal (or suspension) from the committee in this case would necessarily have involved a decision that you're not currently suitable to access sensitive information, and I don't think it should have been a surprise that such removal (or suspension) would also involve removal of functionary-level access to sensitive information.
  Like Barkeep49, I'm more than willing to take the time to reexamine the decision so that the new arbitrators are able to review the decision and decide whether we were wrong on the substance. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 22:28, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

  In response to our email (after JSS submitted this ARCA), the Ombuds Commission informed us that we may publicly inform the community that yesterday, the Ombuds Commission told ArbCom that it intends to make a decision in its own case on Just Step Sideways (Beeblebrox) soon, subject to Legal review. "Soon" is a relative statement when it comes to global governance processes with complex cases, but in any event it may make sense to hold off on this ARCA request until the Ombuds Commission completes its review. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:10, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

  Just to be clear this is a summary, not a direct quote from anyone on the Ombuds. Barkeep49 (talk) 23:33, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

  Edited to make this more clear. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:35, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Just Step Sideways: regarding I cannot recall a time when anyone not on the commission knew what they were doing before they actually made a reccomendation to the office. – I don't think this is true. I have found at least one time during your most recent term on ArbCom that ArbCom was informed about the status of a case before the Ombuds Commission before legal review was concluded. And, as my colleagues have noted, neither ArbCom as a body nor any arbitrator acting individually directed or requested the VRTS account closure (other than, implicitly, the removal of the "arbcom-en-wp" group on VRTS).
  On the merits, like my colleagues, I would decline this request. I would also be open to a compelling request on the substance after the suspension period has elapsed. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 17:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

• Note that Szmenderowiecki did some retooling of their statement --In actu (Guerillero) ^{Parlez Moi} 10:45, 4 January 2024 (UTC)
• The warnings JSS has received in the past included both arb confidentiality issues and functionary confidentiality issues, though as I've said both privately and publicly, I do not believe there were any bright line ANPDP violations (and so I would consider removal of ANPDP to be excessive). For me at least, removal of functionary status was always going to accompany suspension as an arb. JSS, I say this as someone who has argued against an ANPDP yank: I do not trust you with functionary access right now, neither tool access nor list access. Maybe that will change in the future, I genuinely hope you'll give us a good appeal someday. But right now, I cannot and will not support restoration of any funct status. GeneralNotability (talk) 14:22, 4 January 2024 (UTC)
• I have a few comments to make—some general and some specific to this incident. I'll start with the general ones.
  I've gotten the impression from similar situations involving a functionary and ArbCom, that the functionary at one point or another appeared blindsided by the result. There may be multiple explanations for this occurrence. The less-charitable explanation from the functionary's perspective is that when ArbCom is considering sanctioning, or has sanctioned a functionary, there is already wide gap between ArbCom and said functionary. Such a result comes as a surprise directly because of this wide gap in mutual understanding. The less-charitable explanation from ArbCom's perspective is that we're collectively not good at handling such cases. With a normal arbitration case, there's at least some evidence phase, followed by a public proposed decision; thus, the subject of a remedy is aware of what is under consideration, and can make comments on the proposed decision talk to attempt to sway the decision. Something that involves functionary conduct doesn't lend itself to such a format. One solution is to circulate the actual proposed motion with the affected party prior to voting on it, which I don't think is presently done.
  As far as this specific case goes, having reviewing the discussions and evidence that led to the suspension, I don't find the outcome to be unreasonable. Considering the principle on functionary status passed in 2022, I think that removing functionary status in light of a suspension or removal from ArbCom is a logical step as well. In hindsight, the potential outcome could have been better communicated, but the end-result of loss of functionary status is not unreasonable.
  I agree with GN that there do not appear to be any bright-line ANPDP issues. In the context of regaining oversight access, there is nothing to me that suggests that there may be a risk of release of, for example, suppressed material. That's all to say I'm not a "never" on restoring oversight access, but I could entertain it at a later point, no earlier than when the suspension runs out. Maxim (talk) 14:33, 4 January 2024 (UTC)
• JSS, the ArbCom had some information, we consulted with the functionaries on that information. Your argument appears to be that you leaked that information as an Arb but did not do so as a functionary. That is complete nonsense.
  At present I'm not comfortable sharing confidential information with you under either role.
  As for the revelation that the Ombuds are conducting their own case, what is your preference, that we tell you why we're not moving forward on this, or that we prevaricate for weeks or months until they reach an end? Cabayi (talk) 15:58, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

For clarity, decline. Cabayi (talk) 09:03, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• User rights were badly named because they are not rights: they are privileges given to editors. No one has to have these tools and it is up to the community and Wikimedia organisation to determine who is given this access. Beebs/JSS states they did not know that removal of Oversight (OS) access was a possibility while the case was being discussed. ArbCom could have informed Beebs/JSS of this possibility, but I am not convinced it was necessary as sanctions can always involve removing user rights and, to emphasise, no one has the right to any tools. Regardless, this lack of knowledge does not stop Beebs/JSS from appealing that decision, which is what is happening here (even if in their statement they are calling their appeal an amendment, I still consider this an appeal).

For functionary roles like OS, the community and Wikimedia organisation decided that ArbCom could determine this access. One of the criteria for OS is trust: ArbCom and the community have to trust that all functionaries will not disclose non-public information. I believe this trust has been broken multiple times. Therefore, I am not willing to return the privilege of OS tools to Beebs/JSS at this time, regardless of the Ombud's results in this case. There are many areas of Wikipedia that Beebs/JSS can contribute to without the OS tools; I encourage them to pick some of these areas and start working to rebuild ArbCom’s trust, and by extension the community’s trust, for OS access at a later date. Z1720 (talk) 17:17, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

• For clarity's sake, decline per my comments above. Z1720 (talk) 17:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

• I have taken the time to review the private evidence and process around this, and broadly agree with my colleagues' comments above. The Committee could've done better at ensuring that JSS knew about and understood what was being considered, and the underlying reasoning. However, that doesn't in any way change the fact that there has been a critical loss of trust around private information. Precisely where that private information came from does not seem particularly relevant, merely that it is indeed private to roughly the same degree, and I believe here that it was. I am also not a "never" on restoring Oversight access, but any appeal would have to substantively address the issues that led to revocation for me to be swayed. As such, I would decline this amendment request. firefly ( t · c ) 17:20, 4 January 2024 (UTC)
• Much has been said above, so I will try to be brief. As mentioned by my colleagues, suspension of CUOS access is a natural result of suspension from the Committee, and I do not see any way around that connection. I see no issue with Just Step Sideways re-requesting VRTS access, specifically for the info-en and related queues, as those queues as mentioned are not strictly governed by enWiki or ArbCom. Primefac (talk) 18:48, 4 January 2024 (UTC)
• I am very sympathetic to the fact that someone should be aware of and have a reasonable chance to defend themselves against certain actions being considered, such as the removal of permissions. My opinion is that this oppportunity absolutely should have been afforded to them. However, I do not think that is enough to warrant amending the decision. Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/CheckUser and Oversight#Removals says that The Arbitration Committee may request that Stewards withdraw advanced permissions if they lose confidence in an editor's ability to serve as a functionary (that revocation was requested here). The loss of confidence is a valid reason for that removal, and for that reason I have to decline the request for amendment. - Aoidh (talk) 22:01, 4 January 2024 (UTC)
• I am abstaining from voting on this issue. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 22:06, 4 January 2024 (UTC)
• I'm deeply conflicted on this but ultimately I come down as a decline. I consider JSS a friend, especially after we met at Wikimania in 2012, and if it came down to it I would trust him with my personal information. He was an excellent oversighter and Wikipedia is a better, safer place because of his contributions in that field. But nobody disputes that he disclosed information that came into his possession because he was an arbitrator or functionary and more than once. That caused enough concern for last year's committee to remove him, and removal of advanced permissions is a reasonable and foreseeable measure along with that. Ultimately, oversight absolutely depends on trust and discretion—we need people to report things to us, and someone considering reporting something needs to have confidence that not only the reported material but the report itself and any ancillary information or discussion will be handled discretely. I think there's at least a significant minority of the community that does not have that confidence, so it would not be appropriate to restore permissions at this point. But time heals all wounds and trust can be rebuilt; this is explicitly not "never again". HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 23:15, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• This is a request for the Oversight permission; the description at WP:CUOS is helpful for making the decision. A high level of trust within the committee and the larger community is required for receiving the permission, and even if I don't judge whether the lack of trust is justified or not, a lack of trust currently exists. There is no other option to me than a decline for now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:18, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Amendment request: CTOP AN appeals

Original discussion

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

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Initiated by Tamzin at 20:43, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

Wikipedia:Contentious topics

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

1. Appeals and amendments

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request

• Tamzin (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiator)

Information about amendment request

• Appeals and amendments

• Either remove requirement to use {{Arbitration enforcement appeal}} at AN, or make template more flexible

Statement by Tamzin

Currently, Wikipedia:Contentious topics § Appeals and amendments says that AN appeals must use {{Arbitration enforcement appeal}}. This is, in practice, almost never done. This search (+ this check for multiple on a page) shows that the template has been used 14 times ever. Fittingly, the appeal template is not at all adapted to AN, so when it's used, either someone needs to modify it manually, or it gives incorrect policy guidance. Indeed, because of this, Firefangledfeathers recently assumed it was the incorrect template, despite being the one called for by policy. Not a criticism of them; I feel like I must be one of the only people who's even noticed this clause. After I learned of it a while ago, I took to splitting involved from uninvolved and leaving a reminder about the "clear consensus" standard, but not forcing the template, since no one else seemed to care. In my experience, nothing bad has resulted from this departure from policy, although there are discussions I can think of where segmenting comments in the involved section might have helped things.

The way I see it, there are two potential solutions:

• I've drafted a new version of the template, which changes output if it's at AN. Specifically, it combines the whole "uninvolved editors" section into one, since admins and non-admins are equal at AN appeals, while preserving the sectioning in the involved section, so basically a compromise between the theoretically prescribed format and what's done in practice. ArbCom could give its blessing to update the template accordingly, but this would only work if people cared enough to actually enforce the rule on using the template, which historically they haven't.
• Modify the appeals section to just say that AN appeals must have separate involved/uninvolved sections, link to Wikipedia:Contentious topics § Appeals and amendments, and quote the "clear consensus" threshold. This allows flexibility while still making sure critical procedures are followed. The proposed template change could (and probably should) still be accepted, just not made mandatory.

(P.S., the template currently says "clear and substantial", added by Extraordinary Writ, but I think that's a holdover from old wording?) -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe) 20:43, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

@Fff: It actually doesn't, because for whatever reason, the template doesn't impose any word counts on involved editors, and my change removes (in the context of AN) subsections for uninvolved editors. It probably should impose word counts on involved editors, though, both at AE and AN. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe) 20:51, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

@Barkeep49: Just to be clear, the displayed text in the sandbox is still the AE version, because the AN version only shows up at AN. I've added a demo parameter for AN, the result of which can be seen on the testcases page. This version maintains sectioning among involved editors, but allows it among uninvolved. I did that because uninvolved sectioning clearly makes no sense at AN (since at AE it's only used for non-admins); I didn't make a change to sectioning of involved editors because there wasn't an obvious reason to, but at the same time I have no strong desire to keep it. Certainly if we want the template to match current practice, that would simply be a statement up-top, one involved section, and one uninvolved section. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe) 23:08, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by EW

Responding to the ping: the recent reforms downgraded the standard for CT appeals to "clear consensus" (WP:AC/P#Contentious topics), but the standard for appeals from good old-fashioned arbitration enforcement actions under the standard provision is still "clear and substantial consensus" (WP:AC/P#Standard provision: appeals and modifications). No idea whether that was intentional or not, but that's why I made the edit I did. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 21:08, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Firefangledfeathers

Thanks T. I like the first solution. One advantage of mandating the template use is that it preserves the word limits encoded in the template. I'm assuming that's desirable. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 20:48, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Responding to Tamzin: Yes. The status quo is too messed up to continue. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 21:21, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

The word limit situation for AE appeals is also unclear. I've been confused about it for a couple years (see the unanswered Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive_6#Do_AE_appeals_have_word_limits?). Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 21:27, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Izno

This topic was previously discussed at the CT PD. IznoPublic (talk) 06:14, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.

CTOP AN appeals: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

CTOP AN appeals: Arbitrator views and discussion

• In practice, if there is a strong community consensus at WP:AN to overturn one administrator's contentious topic restriction, it is overturned independently of which template was used for the appeal. I'm thus fine with limiting the requirement to appeals at WP:AE; it is rather impractical for WP:AN. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:02, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
• I'm strong in favor of making a template that better fits in at AN. @Tamzin: did you keep the sectioning because you think it best or because you thought it more likely for us to approve a more incremental change? Because even that format is unsuual for AN and in reality uninvolved editors can, as uninvolved administrators do, just use normal/threaded discussion to discuss the outcome. Barkeep49 (talk) 22:13, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

  Thanks setting that up @Tamzin. I had misread the code and thought there was sectioning in the unvinolved section as well. Anyhow I'm in favor of adopting Tamzin's changes. I'm going to ping this on list but would also hope that this is something we could do through something closer to the normal editing process rather than a vote. But we might need to have a vote. Barkeep49 (talk) 23:13, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

• I am also in favour of the proposed change. I don't think the change is substantive enough to absolutely require a vote; instead, provided that there are no objections after a week or so (particularly from arbitrators), it could be safely actioned. Maxim (talk) 14:02, 6 February 2024 (UTC)
• I am all for making life easier for the folks doing the hard work. Like Maxim, if no one objects I see no reason not to implement. Primefac (talk) 14:13, 6 February 2024 (UTC)
• Fully in favour per my colleagues above. firefly ( t · c ) 15:22, 6 February 2024 (UTC)
• No objections to the proposal. - Aoidh (talk) 00:39, 7 February 2024 (UTC)
• no objections --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 13:18, 7 February 2024 (UTC)
• No objections to implementing Tamzin's draft. Z1720 (talk) 19:07, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
• I'm happy with Tamzin's draft. I think these discussions benefit from more structure than the average noticeboard discussion but perhaps not as much as at AE. I've always wondered why we have two different appeal mechanisms with two different standards but that's a question for another day. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:43, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Amendment request: Crouch, Swale ban appeal.

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

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Initiated by Crouch, Swale at 22:30, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

Special:Diff/1064925920

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

1. Special:Diff/817961869 (original ban appeal in 2017)
2. Special:Diff/1133851301 (2023 decline with advice on removing completely)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request

• Crouch, Swale (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)

Information about amendment request

• Special:Diff/817961869 (original ban appeal in 2017)

• Remove all restriction

• Special:Diff/1133851301 (2023 decline with advice on removing completely)

• Remove all restrictions per advice given.

Statement by Crouch, Swale

Can I have my editing restrictions removed completely please with a probationary motion of 6 months. I have successfully created articles at AFC from 2019-2022 (with almost no rejections) and created articles directly from 2022-2023 with none redirected, draftified, CSDed, proded or AFDed. I have suggested partly removing the restrictions or having an editing plan but users prefer to have these restrictions removed completely but if users prefer doing this that would also be fine. I know that in the past I haven't listened and got myself into trouble but that's normally because something I've been told seems to go against what Wikipedia actually says is OK or not or goes against something I've previously been told but if things are made clear and straightforward then any problems should be prevented by people being clear about if I need to stop/change something etc. Can I please have 1 chance to just have a go without restrictions. If there are serious problems which there shouldn't be the restrictions can be reinstated and/or the articles mass deleted or draftified. As previously noted I now have the ability to create good articles and its detrimental to the project to restrict the amount of articles I can create.

I will work first on the current missing parishes, see User:Crouch, Swale/Missing parishes of which there are around 350. No formal monitoring of me will be needed unless the community wants that as I am confident that I can create good articles without approval or supervision however to pace things and to show the community this I will (unless the community doesn't want this) create only 2 new (current) parish articles a week along with my 1 article a month on anything for the first 2 months and if there aren't any concerns after that I will create more than that and anything. I will still be able to create redirect and DAB pages though, the only 2 parish articles will only apply to article creation. After I have finished the current parishes project I will do the former parishes, see User:Crouch, Swale/Former civil parishes starting with creating category 1, then 2, then 3 and then a selected number of category 4 parishes as category 4 parishes may not be notable. I have been adding date to existing former parish articles and as of 9 December most category 1 parishes have such data.

There is a consensus that such articles meet WP:GEOLAND however there is also a consensus that the articles shouldn't be mass created with little content so I will make sure the articles are created with a reasonable amount of content. See Windermere and Bowness for example.

In terms of my page move restriction I have made hundreds of requests at WP:RMT and out of the small number that were contested I think less than 5 ended up as "not moved" demonstrating that I a was allowed to make pagemoves myself I am unlikely to make many problematic moves.

At the 2023 request I was asked to

• (1) Make a single request showing understanding why they are in place and what I have done to alleviate

  Y This is the single request here, I have shown that I haven't had problems with my creations and nearly all of my RMT requests.

• (2) Draft the appeal and show it to several experienced editors.

  Y Draft started in July 2023 at User:Crouch, Swale/Appeal and I've asked around 7 editors, all but 1 are admins and 2 of them aren't/weren't on arbcom.

• (3) Consider carefully all the advice I have been given.

  Y This appeal contains the advice I have been given.

• (4) Be aware that even though there is understanding of frustration that there is a limit on the number of requests I can make may result in a motion not to my advantage.

  Y Again this request contains the advice and includes the instruction to request removing completely with understanding of previous problems.

I'm not in any rush to make a decision on what motions will be made but I would like people to make sure that we can lift the restrictions even if it takes a while of discussion here. Is there any other advice or recommendations I should follow that would be useful to the project or to me to prevent any other problems not that I think there will be problems. If we think its not in either the project or my best interest to lift all or some restrictions then decline the request in whole or part but please provide a clear reason for this but as I have noted I honestly believe its not in the project or my best interest to have the restrictions, thanks.

• @Thryduulf: I did (though about 10 days later) add the bit about there being consensus that they are notable but that there is a consensus they should not be mass created with little content. I didn't really know how else I could word my appeal but otherwise it seems good apart from being a little bit whiny. Crouch, Swale (talk) 11:25, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
• @Mertbiol: I don't know how else I could have worded it, do you have advice on how else I should word it? Is there anything that you would like me to do if we accept this appeal that you feel would be helpful? I don't know what else I could have done for the parishes project, if I pester people or post it repeatedly to the same project/person it would probably be seen as disruptive. I did what I could have done and if people don't care then there is nothing else I can or should do other than just get on with it. As I said in my appeal there doesn't seem to have been problems with my creations that I have already done so is there any significant chance that if I was creating more there would suddenly be problems? I feel my appeal in terms of my editing plans etc is both acceptable according to our global consensus and to the best of my ability. Yes I accept that if I was creating lots of articles (as opposed to 1 a month or 1 a week with AFC) there is a higher chance of problems but I honestly believe that its unlikely there will be any significant problems. Wouldn't a suspended restriction meaning if there are any significant problems any admin (even in involved) can reimpose the restriction and mass delete the articles make you feel comfortable enough to give me a chance? and if there are problems which there shouldn't be we can just reimpose the restrictions. Crouch, Swale (talk) 17:18, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Mertbiol: WP:GEOLAND says that legally recognized places are generally presumed notable (even if defunct in terms of the former parishes), there may not have been a significant amount of interest in the project but that doesn't mean there is a consensus against it. Note that GEOLAND has been tightened in the last few years to exclude things like abadi but all current parishes and all pre 1974 rural parishes has their own local government even if sometimes limited. Crouch, Swale (talk) 17:53, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Mertbiol: The articles should exist (and its really strange that they don't exist) and I am able to create then with suitable content as demonstrated by my 1 a month creations and my AFC. Yes in my 2020 appeal I was advised (not required) to get consensus for creation of a large number of articles and I believe I have done what I should/could have done for that. You said this would be you're last reply but if you look at Windermere and Bowness (created a few months ago) and Shell, Worcestershire (created a few days ago) both of these for example are good and there seems no reason why I couldn't create more like that. Is there anything wrong with those pages? wrong enough that creating them or lots similar would be a problem? In terms of the other point about my efforts if I was applying to be an admin or even a template editor or bot operator and a request seemed a bit whiny then I could completely understand declining but I'm only requesting restrictions be removed and I'm not going to use a bot or similar to create I'm just going to create them normally. Crouch, Swale (talk) 18:32, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• @Aoidh: From Special:Diff/817961869 (in 2017) one account restriction, due to the socking surrounding my problematic editing. Geographical naming conventions topic ban, due to me making lots of RM discussions that were against policy and not listening to people saying not to make requests without doing more research etc. Page move restriction, due to my obsession with naming conventions that I would make lots of page moves of which may be problematic. Page creation restriction, due to me creating many poorly sourced/short articles on topics of dubious notability. As can be seem from my talk page in 2010 there were lots of these issues, if you look at my talk page now there aren't any complaints etc, note that the headings "Careless editing continuing" and "Links to dab pages" were complaints about another editor that I was asked to look at. Crouch, Swale (talk) 19:49, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Aoidh: I accept that I didn't address the point about the understanding why the restrictions are in place but I hope that about clarifies that, thanks. Crouch, Swale (talk) 21:07, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• @North8000: I think this is a good idea as long as we can review/appeal in another few/6 months but I'd note that at my previous appeal it was made quite clear to make a single request to remove completely. As I noted I am planning on for the first 2 months on creating 1 (current) parish in addition to my 1 article a month on anything. Is there anything on that plan you would want to tweak? In terms of notability and mass creation I'd note that I have a good understanding on England as well as Scotland and Wales and have worked a bit on Australia, Austria and Denmark. We have indeed discussed at Wikipedia talk:Notability (geographic features) the notability of such places at at User talk:Crouch, Swale/Archive 5#Iranian abadis it was pointed out to me about abadis not being notable despite being in censuses. So I can say that in parts of the world where I know less about the geography etc I may have less idea about what is notable so that is something I would need to be careful of. Crouch, Swale (talk) 21:07, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
• @HJ Mitchell: There haven't been any disputes AFAIK with splitting where I have been the one splitting parishes. There has been discussions about splitting districts but of the 2 that I have split myself (Corby, now defunct and Hove, defunct) these hasn't been any disputes, all the disputes like Blackpool and Worcester have been split by other users. The user who split these asked my at User talk:Crouch, Swale#Cheltenham about splitting and I suggested discussing rather than unilaterally splitting. Just because I have weakly supporting splitting a district from its settlement doesn't mean I would just go and do that myself without discussion which is what I suggested needed to happen before splitting. In terms of parishes the convention is to cover settlement and parish with the same name as settlement in a single article, see Talk:Waltham Abbey#The town is the parish. The parish article should be merged into the town article. where I pointed that out. I was in fact the one that wrote up that guidance after a RFC. Crouch, Swale (talk) 21:49, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
• @Cabayi: That was the "Original discussion" link at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification and Amendment/Archive 123#Amendment request: Motion: Crouch, Swale (2022) which for some reason isn't the correct one but still shows my appeal which had the 4 instructions. I accept that I haven't done much in terms of other approaches/collaboration with others as I don't know what else I could have done but I have followed the 4 instructions given at my previous appeal. Is there anything that you would like me to do if we do remove all or some restrictions? Crouch, Swale (talk) 12:06, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
• @Primefac: I have done exactly what I was asked to do and that's not good enough? How on earth? I am truly horrified about how I have been treated, about how much effort I have put in and how, I have put so so much of my life and hope into fixing this and nothing good seems to happen, no matter how much success I have in creating articles, it just feels like there is no point in doing anything right as nothing will even happen. In real life many people have said about me being patient and not looking my temper etc but this project has pushed me to my limits. I can't see for the life of my why all my efforts have got me nowhere, its just like there is no point on doing anything right here as it. No matter how much I do right and follow advice, restrictions etc nothing seems ever good enough, no matter what I do its just never good enough. I have reached the end here, I don't see why I should contribute to a project that is so so unreasonable and that no matter how much I do right just is never accepted. I suggest if we're not going to lift the restrictions to just reinstate the site ban which from what I can see could be done as a motion could be made to site ban me again. Crouch, Swale (talk) 18:12, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
• @Z1720: There won't be another appeal in a year's time as I will be site banned. Would you like to make a motion saying "From 1 December 2024 Crouch, Swale is site banned" or should I make that suggestion nearer the time? Either way I'm not going to say here with these restrictions. Crouch, Swale (talk) 17:25, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Z1720: Many people make small errors with text etc, even those with autopatrolled. See WP:IMPERFECT. I'd note I do usually double check facts etc when I add content but formatting is less of a problem. Crouch, Swale (talk) 18:31, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf

At User talk:Thryduulf#2024 appeal I was invited to give feedback on this appeal. I'm disappointed to see that, other than fixing a typo, none of the comments I gave have been acted upon and this still reads (to me) like something written by a whiny child who does not understand why what they did was wrong. I cannot recommend granting the appeal. Thryduulf (talk) 10:23, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Mertbiol

Crouch, Swale's response (11:25, 13 January 2024) to Thryduulf's comment (10:23, 13 January 2024) says it all. They concede that their text sounds "a little bit whiny", but they have done nothing in three weeks to fix the tone. If Crouch, Swale will not act on feedback from an experienced administrator, whose views they have purposefully sought, what hope is there that they will listen to any other editor? A very clear case of WP:ICANTHEARYOU.

Crouch, Swale asserts that there is consensus that the articles on their lists should be created - but this is not the case. The "What links here" function in the "Tools" menu makes this clear. The "former parishes project" has never been discussed on the talk page of any WikiProject or at any RfC. While it's true that in late 2021 and again in late 2022, they did raise the issue of "missing [current] parishes" at a number of English county WikiProjects, their requests were mostly ignored - an indication the lack of enthusiasm for their proposed new articles from the wider community. Doubtless, Crouch, Swale will claim that this RfC provides support for their wish to create hundreds of new articles - but it does nothing of the sort. All it established was that there was no appetite for creating them with a bot.

If I were in Crouch, Swale's shoes, I would have proposed (in the past three months) the "missing parishes" and "former parishes" projects at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography. If I'd received the support of editors there, I would have used those favourable comments to bolster my appeal here at ARCA. The fact that they have not done so, suggests that they feel that one or both projects (especially the "former parishes" project) might not be supported by the wider community. My fear is that if the Arbitrators lift the restrictions, Crouch, Swale will interpret this as support for their two projects and will use this to ignore and steamroller over any objections to their mass article creation programme. Mertbiol (talk) 14:14, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

@Crouch, Swale:

You wrote: "I don't know how else I could have worded [my appeal]" - if that is the case then you should abandon it.

You wrote: "I feel my appeal in terms of my editing plans etc is... acceptable according to our global consensus" - You do not have a consensus for your parishes projects - please stop trying to pretend that you do.

You asked: "I don't know what else I could have done for the parishes project..." I have already answered this above - "If I were in [your] shoes, I would have proposed (in the past three months) the "missing parishes" and "former parishes" projects at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography. If I'd received the support of editors there, I would have used those favourable comments to bolster my appeal here at ARCA."

You wrote: "if people don't care then there is nothing else I can or should do" - exactly - you should drop both parishes projects and find another area to edit in.

You wrote that you agree that appeal as it currently stands is "a little bit whiny" - if you can see the problem, why can't you address it? Why should I help you to improve your text if you have already rudely ignored an administrator's comments? Your problem is that you do not take onboard feedback. Once you are let off the leash, it would be impossible to stop you - you do not listen.

Mertbiol (talk) 17:38, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

@Crouch, Swale: This is my last reply to you. This needs to be left to the Arbitrators now.

Saying that parishes meet WP:GEOLAND is NOT the same thing as gaining a consensus for your parishes projects. Surely you can see that? Just because you can create an article for something, doesn't mean that you should. Mertbiol (talk) 18:10, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

North8000

The important consensus at GeoLand is to avoid mass creation of articles, because geoland arguably has a flaw that qualifies several million permastub entities that don't have articles. Crouch sees to view their targeted subset of those millions as "missing" articles and so they don't seem to understand the situation. I think that the current restriction (or maybe a slightly relaxed modification) is a good thing to encourage building more substantial articles. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 20:03, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Crouch, you didn't seem to get my point, the question isn't notability under geoland, it's avoiding mass creation, and geoland articles are the most vulnerable to that. The is just little-ole-me commenting, but seeing acknowledgement of this as a long term plan, and / or saying you'll only create articles with several references and substantial content would seem much more reassuring. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 21:34, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Barkeep, good points. Per my previous post, there is structural problem that fuels this issue. If we "just follow the SNG rules" geoland greenlights millions of new permastubs and it appears that Crouch views that as the only guiding concept. While their "transition" plan is OK in this area for it's short time period, they don't acknowledge understanding the other constraints which come into play such as avoiding mass creation and that building (only) substantial articles is a way to navigate this. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 00:05, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.

Crouch, Swale ban appeal.: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Crouch, Swale ban appeal.: Arbitrator views and discussion

• @Crouch, Swale: This request doesn't really address or explain the reason why the restriction was implemented in the first place other than saying "I know that in the past I haven't listened and got myself into trouble but..." If you wouldn't mind could you elaborate on why you feel the restriction was implemented and why its no longer necessary? - Aoidh (talk) 19:25, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

  Decline - I don't think that this appeal adequately explains why the restriction is no longer needed, especially when taking into account the prior feedback given on this point via prior appeals and by others that they specifically asked feedback from. The only thing said about why it is no longer needed is that their talk page now has no complaints (I did quickly find a concern being raised in 2022, but that was ~17 months ago). This "clean talk page" rationale is not a sufficient reason to remove this restriction. I have no strong opinion for or against a moratorium. - Aoidh (talk) 03:09, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• I'm disappointed. This appeal does nothing to address the reasons for the restrictions nor to explain what will be different going forward. The issue is not the article-worthiness of civil parishes but how you will handle any disputes that arise and cases where your preferred outcome is not the one that has consensus. To take an example of one dispute where I've seen your name pop up in the past, I don't want to see you splitting out articles on the civil parish from an article about a large town/small city where there is nothing distinct to say about the parish and where consensus or practice has been to cover both in one article. I hoped to see an appeal that would tell me how you would deal with these edge cases and disputes that might arise from them, and how you would handle it if they went against you. Apparently the answer is ignore everything you've been told and carry on regardless. Decline and recommend a moratorium on future appeals. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:18, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

  I likely won't have time to get to this substnatively for some time. Besides reading the appeal itself carefully, I'll want to revisit what I've said the last 3 years in these appeals. But no matter how lacking I find an appeal I can't imagine a scenario where I would support a moratorium on all future appeals. At most, for someone like Crouch, Swale I would support a "can appeal every 2 years" rather than every year so essentially an arb would only see an appeal once a 2-year term. Barkeep49 (talk) 22:27, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• "The Sixth Annual Crouch, Swale Amendment Request" sounds even less appealing than the fourth & fifth did. CS, in the diffs you would like us to review you cite Special:Diff/1133851301 which is Wugapodes' opinion on opening WP:AA3???

I previously asked you to (1) consider other approaches to achieving your goal and (2) collaboration with others. Can you show evidence of either? Neither point features in your appeal. Cabayi (talk) 11:47, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• To say that I am exasperated is an understatement. I said it in 2022 and I said it in 2023, but I will say it again, in as few words as possible: Be. Brief. Your initial request here was 778 words. Out of curiosity I wrote out what I would find to be a successful appeal; it was about 100 words.
  To the substance of your request: I genuinely would like to see your restriction lifted, but I cannot grant this appeal solely because you keep knocking on our door asking for it. The whole point of a successful appeal is to show that you understand why you were sanctioned, that you have held to those sanctions, and that you will not return to the editing that resulted in your being sanctioned in the first place. You have done none of those, instead you are still trying to defend yourself and justify your continued editing in the topic area. Thus, I must decline. Primefac (talk) 15:15, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  Just to nebulously comment on some of the things that have been said: I am not looking for a perfect appeal from Crouch, or specific keywords, nor do I think their area of interest of editing is problematic; no one really cares about these articles other than a desire that they be well-written and not mass-produced (the latter usually invalidating the former). As I have indicated in prior years, Crouch has done a reasonably good job of sticking to their restrictions, indicating that it is possible to not mass-create articles of this type. I am just somewhat concerned with what will happen if we take off the reigns. Primefac (talk) 07:58, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• There is in doubt that Crouch Swale's appeal leaves something to be desired. I am not surprised that it's causing my colleagues to decline his appeal. However, I can't help but wonder if the real problem is the community's ambivalence over geography based notability. It strikes me that absent a change one way or another - that is that these parish articles are desired or that they do not have notability and should only be created when there is another source of notability - that the current status quo of "they can be created but slowly" is as fair as possible to both the community and Crouch Swale and if this, rather than some set of magic set of appeal words from CS, which per Thryduulf's feedback I wonder if he's even capable of producing, is what's needed to get out of the current stalemate. Barkeep49 (talk) 22:16, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
• Decline This appeal does not address CS's understanding of why the block was put in place, and what will be done to avoid this mistake in the future.

I am also concerned about CS's competency to write articles; I was surprised that CS sought so much feedback for this request as it was not well written. Take for example, "demonstrating that I a was allowed to make pagemoves", a simple grammar mistake that should have been fixed before the request was posted. Another example is Shell, Worcestershire, mentioned above, which had a blatant caption mistake that I just fixed. I am not expecting perfection in the prose, but the original block was placed because of the stubby, low-quality articles that were mass-created. If mistakes like the ones above are present now, I fear for the quality of the articles that are created if the article creation limitations are removed.

My advice to CS: quality is just as important as quantity. Go back and improve the quality of the parish article you already created, and look at featured articles such as Brownhills or Warren County, Indiana to see what additional information can be added to parish articles. Come back in at least six months one year when you can show that the articles you created are without simple mistakes, and describe why the block was originally enacted and how you have corrected those mistakes. Z1720 (talk) 01:14, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Just noting that currently Crouch is only able to appeal once per year. Primefac (talk) 07:46, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Sorry about that, changed to one year. Z1720 (talk) 13:52, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• Decline The consensus for GEOLAND on its roughest footing in 2024 of my memory. Based on the totality of appeals by CS over the years, I have zero faith that they have the internal ability to balance their desire for completeness against the political realities of a collaborative project where consensus changes. Letting Crouch, Swale make 300+ stubs without any guard rails would further destabilize an already tense situation. --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 11:49, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
• Decline per the other votes to decline. I don't support a moratorium on appeals, but the same outcome of these yearly appeals, with the handful of first-time arbitrators every year coming to a similar conclusion, is very telling on its own. Maxim (talk) 13:47, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
• Decline per Z1720 mostly. firefly ( t · c ) 15:33, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Clarification request: Extended confirmed restriction

Original discussion

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

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Initiated by Selfstudier at 18:07, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

WP:ARBECR

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• Selfstudier (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)
• Anachronist (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• [2]

Statement by Selfstudier

Can it be clarified that the intent of WP:ARBECR is to prevent the participation of non EC editors in discussions such as Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/Controversy regarding the number of Palestinian casualties in the 2023 Israel–Hamas war

Another editor considers that a) Editors are allowed to make comments provided they are constructive and b) Non EC editors may file edit requests asking for their comments to be made. Can it be clarified that the purpose of the edit request exemption is intended to apply only to article talk pages (change X to Y).

@M.Bitton: I probably should have mentioned the most recent ARCA 18:48, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

@M.Bitton: Because it is the wording of WP:ARBECR that I would like clarified.Selfstudier (talk) 19:12, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

@Coretheapple, Barkeep, and L235: There was this discussion at L235 talk page re edit request and possible tightening up of the language. Selfstudier (talk) 12:05, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Anachronist

Relevant discussions:

• Edit request on RFPP that brought this to my attention
• Selfstudier's talk page

These discussions speak for themselves. An edit request was made in good faith, and after careful consideration, I accepted it. I felt this was related to the fact that the WP:RFPP edit request subpage has been used multiple times in the past to make good-faith thoughtful edit requests because Talk:Israel–Hamas war is currently extended-confirmed protected.

I'll add that the "superseded" term on Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Palestine-Israel articles 4#ARBPIA General Sanctions gives the impression that it's, well, superseded, and therefore not valid. I also disagree with it. I have never knowingly invoked IAR in my time on Wikipedia, but in this case my unknowing invocation of it seemed OK in hindsight.

Furthermore, if non-EC editors aren't allowed to make a comment on a discussion page, then protect the page. That would have avoided this unnecessary wikilawyering drama. ~Anachronist (talk) 22:20, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by M.Bitton

I believe that it's already clarified in this case (WP:ARBPIA4). Please see Superseded version of item B in which it states "Editors who are not eligible to be extended-confirmed may use the Talk: namespace to post constructive comments and make edit requests related to articles within the topic area, provided they are not disruptive.... This exception does not apply to other internal project discussions such as AfDs, WikiProjects, RfCs, noticeboard discussions, etc." M.Bitton (talk) 18:41, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

@Selfstudier: thanks, I wasn't aware of it, though I still don't see how it applies to WP:ARBPIA. M.Bitton (talk) 19:08, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Fair enough. I agree that the "Talk:" namespace is not as clear as it ought to be. A link to WP:MAINSPACE, or to what is excluded (WP:PRJ), would probably help (I think). M.Bitton (talk) 20:00, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

@Barkeep49: thanks. A link would definitely help. M.Bitton (talk) 20:33, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by ToBeFree

The "Wikipedia talk:" namespace is not the (article) "Talk:" namespace. The exception does not apply to pages in the "Wikipedia talk:" namespace. Thus, not even edit requests for AfD participation in the topic area are permitted. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:53, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Crouch, Swale

I don't think its a good idea to "ban" new users from such discussions meaning they can end up being blocked even when they haven't caused any problems. I think its perfectly fine to say anyone may revert any questionable comments to talk pages. I agree we need certain enforcement measures to prevent disruption but I don't think sanctioning people who have personally done nothing wrong is far and its going to put good new faith editors faith editors of contributing. As said I'm fine with allowing any admin even if involved to protect the discussion etc though. Blocks, protection and edit filters are technical, bans are social, we shouldn't generally use "social" means to deal new users, if a restriction can't easily be enforced with technical measures like page protection and edit filters its probably a sign its too wide. Crouch, Swale (talk) 20:41, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Sagflaps

originally made in reply to Crouch, Swale I will not formally put a statement, but as you said I had no idea this was even an issue until today, because there are no indications when editing the page that I am not allowed to do it. After reading through most of the background, it seems the spirit of this rule is to stop sockpuppeteers from inflating their perspective on Israel-Palestine discussions, so if it is the goal then it is not unreasonable to allow edit requests, and then the comment can be added to the page by someone with extended confirmed if there are no obvious problems. Sagflaps (talk) 20:56, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Zero0000

ECR is crystal clear that non-EC editors may not participate in AfDs in an ECR-covered area, whether their contributions are "disruptive" or not. This rule acts to reduce one of the biggest threats to the integrity of contentious AfDs, namely vote-stacking by off-wiki canvassing. Zero^talk 00:08, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

It would be good if the committee also made clear that restoring non-EC text to an AfD (or anywhere forbidden to them) after it has been correctly removed should not happen. If such restoration is allowed, edit-warriors will weaponise it by forcing in non-EC edits, thereby undermining the purpose of the rule.

To editor Sean.hoyland: Only a small fraction of the thousands of articles in ARBPIA are technically EC-protected. The difficulty of identifying the others automatically seems insurmountable. The best we can do is to allow any editor to remove forbidden edits, with an uninvolved administrator or noticeboard as backup for the (hopefully rare) cases where the removal is disputed. Zero^talk 03:58, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Sean.hoyland

Regarding Crouch, Swale's statement "if a restriction can't easily be enforced with technical measures like page protection and edit filters its probably a sign its too wide." and given that the rule appears to be non-ECR accounts may not participate in AfDs related to articles within the topic area, is there a reason why technical measures are not being used in every case e.g. I wonder why there are AfDs for articles within the topic area without WP:30/500 protection? Is it simply that people are not requesting it because it's not frictionless? There seems to be a misalignment between the rules and the protection measures deployed. The distribution of ARBPIA related WP:30/500 protection seems rather arbitrary/incomplete and the misalignment between the rules and the protection measures is certainly being exploited by some bad actors. Sean.hoyland - talk 03:29, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

To editor Zero0000:, we might be able to do a bit more. Figuring out ways to map the misalignment between the rules and the protection measures deployed, even if only locally within parts of the fuzzy "topic area" cloud, feels like something where progress might be possible. It's hard to map the boundary of topic area but there are probably many mappable regions within it. Most of us seem to have fairly reliable heuristics to decide whether something is inside or outside the topic area, which gives me hope that it's not a completely intractable technical issue. Sean.hoyland - talk 04:47, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Levivich

Perhaps adding something like If reverted, edits that violate this restriction may not be reinstated. to the end of WP:ECR(D) should be considered for arbcom's next omnibus motion. Levivich (talk) 22:31, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

@Barkeep49: I think your first comment quoted the old language of ECR ("may use the Talk: namespace to post constructive comments"), which is causing Core's confusion here? Levivich (talk) 01:05, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Coretheapple

I have no opinion on the underlying issue here. I just don't know. But I do have a question that came up on one of the talk pages. Precisely what kind of participation is allowed on EC talk pges? It is commonly believed, and Barkeep49 reiterated in his comment that Editors who are not eligible to be extended-confirmed may use the Talk: namespace to post constructive comments and make edit requests related to articles within the topic area, provided they are not disruptive. That is what the current boilerplate notice to new editors says.

However if you go to WP:ECR, you see that it was amended in November to exclude "post constructive comments." I assume this was removed deliberately. Am I missing something? Are constructive comments permitted notwithstanding the way it was edited in November? Also, if only edit requests are permitted, must they be in the proper form or can a non-EC editor make a request in a less structured manner. Please clear up my confusion. I hope this isn't a stupid question Thank you. Coretheapple (talk) 20:54, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Barkeep49 Thanks very much for clarifying on the request-form issue. That precise issue came up at one point and I waffled back and forth. What about the "constructive comment" omission in November? That also puzzles me. Coretheapple (talk) 21:07, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

I'd appreciate input from other editors and from the arbs on this point. Are "constructive comments" allowed from IP and new editors? I'm not asking out of the blue. It came up in this discussion in which a non-EC editor made a non-formal edit request. Given the visibility of these article I think it's important to get clear guidance on this. Let's say a non-EC editor or IP comes in and says "hey look guys, I have no specific request to make but I observe X, Y and Z." We have gotten that kind of input and I assume we will continue to do so. Coretheapple (talk) 14:06, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

ScottishFinnishRadish I agree with you. However, Arbcom needs to clarify its rules on permitted non-EC input, because right now "constructive comments" are not specifically permitted. And since they are not specifically permitted, and in fact that safe harbor was removed in November, there are going to be objections of the kind that arose in the discussion linked above. That said, I'm glad Barkeep clarified that informal requests are OK. That helps. I interpreted the rules more stringently and told a new editor to use the form. I then had to retract that. Coretheapple (talk) 14:42, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

One last point (hey, sorry for the length of this). I just was advised that Doug Weller asked about this at the arb clerks talk page a few days ago, but so far no response. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee/Clerks#ECP_in_the_a-i_area_and_use_of_talk_pages Coretheapple (talk) 20:16, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by EW (extended confirmed restriction)

When the talk page is protected, can non-extended confirmed users use Wikipedia:Requests for page protection/Edit? I would think the answer is obviously yes (and people have been continuing to do so even since November), but if we're applying the only-in-namespace-1 standard, I guess it wouldn't be allowed. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 21:18, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by ScottishFinnishRadish

Coretheapple, I know that when I see non-ec editors adding a statement about something that just happened with a reasonable source I let that slide because we can't expect everyone to understand how to make an edit request. I personally think that kind of contribution is fine. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 14:10, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Rhododendrites, I know that if I saw someone drafting something that was clearly intended for an edit request I wouldn't delete it immediately, but I would remind them about ECR and urge them to make the request sooner rather than later. This also has never come up, as far as I know. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 21:46, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Rhododendrites

I can see the argument to extend ECR to AfD. Elsewhere, the "talk space is the only exception" is also being applied to prohibit mention of the ECR topics in userspace sandboxes. It seems completely counterintuitive to me that we would prohibit someone from using their sandbox to draft material that might happen to be about an ECR topic, using their sandbox to draft an edit request, using their sandbox to experiment with wikimarkup/visual editing in a way that happens to include ECR-restricted topics, etc. I have trouble believing that was intended, so could the arbs clarify whether it was intended to apply to userspace, too? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 21:40, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

As to the why, just look at the state of the Arab-Israeli topic area even with this restriction in place - @HJ Mitchell: I don't follow the why. Why do problems in articles and even on talk pages mean a user shouldn't be able to mention anything to do with the conflict while experimenting in their own userspace? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 16:21, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf (re ECR)

Like Rhododendrites, I find it hard to believe that the intention of the restriction is to prohibit good faith non-EC editors doing anything at all, anywhere that happens to relate to an ECR topic. We shouldn't need to be relying on admins' discretion not to revert and/or delete material that is harmless and intended to benefit the encyclopaedia. All it takes is for one admin to implement the letter of the restriction and we've potentially lost a very good editor - when you've spent all day dealing with disruptive socks it can sometimes be tricky to realise that not every new editor is out to harm the project. However if the intent was to be that harsh, then I would strongly encourage the committee to rethink.

While you (arbs) are doing a good job of answering what the restriction is, you're almost completely ignoring the questions of whether edit requests on talk pages should be literally the only thing allowed and if so why other constructive and/or harmless activities are not permitted.

Whether you agree with restricting participation in XfDs or not, it is obvious why such a restriction might be in place. It is not obvious why someone should be allowed to make edit requests but not allowed to test whether their idea would be an improvement nor ensure that they have the markup correct. Thryduulf (talk) 01:04, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by kashmiri

For whatever it may be worth, I see no meaningful advantage of permitting non-XC editors to participate in AfD for articles remaining under discretionary sanctions, as they rarely offer additional perspective not already presented by other editors, while such a permission would be certain to attract a lot of disruption from SPAs.

On the other hand, I've seen quite a significant number of helpful, constructive comments in the (Article) Talk space that were reverted solely because the editor wasn't XC. I would like to take this opportunity to encourage rewording point [A] of the policy to the effect that non-XC editors may make constructive contributions also to (Article) Talk namespace, however, any disruptive edits may be reverted and could not be reinstated. — kashmīrī ^TALK 11:34, 23 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other editor}

Extended confirmed restriction: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Extended confirmed restriction: Arbitrator views and discussion

• Editors who are not eligible to be extended-confirmed may use the Talk: namespace to post constructive comments and make edit requests related to articles within the topic area, provided they are not disruptive. AfDs are not in talk space and AfD participation is not an edit request. Therefore non-ECR may not participate in any manner in those discussions. Barkeep49 (talk) 19:13, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
• Agree with Barkeep. Primefac (talk) 19:20, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

  Thryduulf, our repeated statements that the wording is accurate indicates to me that yes, talk pages should be literally the only thing allowed. ECR is only in use in very limited cases because we have reached the point where the number of non-Extended-Confirmed editors actually acting in good faith is vanishingly small. That being said, I do agree that a novice editor might start a draft on an ECR-prohibited subject without knowing they are breaking the "ban" on such activities, and I genuinely do not know the best way to deal with that; in my opinion outright deletion (via WP:G5 or otherwise) is inappropriate, but there is no good way to carve out a "good faith" clause in something like this. Primefac (talk) 14:10, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

• Also agree with Barkeep49. Maxim (talk) 19:33, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
• @M.Bitton: everything that isn't the Talk namespace (namespace 1) is prohibited which is broader that project space. A link would be good. It also requires a motion of the committee to change which is why I'm not just jumping to do it. Barkeep49 (talk) 20:07, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Coretheapple I don't think editors need to use the official template as long as they are clearly making an edit request. Barkeep49 (talk) 21:01, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

• Per Barkeep. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 21:00, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
• Agree with all of Barkeep's statements. Z1720 (talk) 21:49, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
• Barrkeep49's rationale is reflective of the current wording and (what I believe to be the intentional) intent of the wording. The Talk namespace is a very specific namespace, and is not as broad as "anything that is not the article namespace". - Aoidh (talk) 22:33, 6 February 2024 (UTC)
• Per Barkeep, AfDs are not conducted on talk pages. And if the reference to talk pages is ambiguous, the wording that the exception is for edit requests only is not. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:21, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

  @Thryduulf yes that is exactly what the restriction means; it actually makes me a little bit uncomfortable but it's very clear from how WP:ECR is phrased: "only extended-confirmed editors may make edits related to the topic area" and "Non-extended-confirmed editors may use the "Talk:" namespace only to make edit requests". As to the why, just look at the state of the Arab-Israeli topic area even with this restriction in place. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 15:22, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Amendment request: GamerGate

Original discussion

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

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Initiated by Aquillion at 01:48, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

GamerGate arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

1. Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GamerGate#Motion:_Remedy_transfer_to_Gender_and_sexuality_shell_case_(February_2021)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request

• Aquillion (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)

Information about amendment request

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GamerGate#Motion:_Remedy_transfer_to_Gender_and_sexuality_shell_case_(February_2021)

• Restoring the GamerGate CTOP (previously discretionary sanctions), separately from the Gender and Sexuality CTOP.

Statement by Aquillion

In 2021, the GamerGate discretionary sanctions (now CTOP) were transferred to a gender-and-sexuality shell case. The intent at the time, I believe, was just to rename it for clarity, not to meaningfully shift what the DS covered; GamerGate itself was declared a gender-related dispute or controversy to avoid this. And it covered most of what was under Gamergate, but it seems to have left a few things uncovered - disruption related to, or stemming from, Gamergate but not to gender and sexuality directly; and disruption on articles that were major focuses of GamerGate's ire without themselves being gender or sexuality. These articles have recently shown disruption similar to what led to the original Gamergate ArbCom case.

Some examples: Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory (see here explaining the connection; it was a major focus of Gamergate back in 2014, and the since-deleted article we had at the time was a focus for essentially the same groups of editors; see also discussion of it here) has seen a bunch of recent disruption, with multiple editors being topic-banned from it as a result.

More recently, and more importantly, Sweet Baby Inc. has been a major focus of disruption over a controversy from the same general group of people, with the people involved directly calling it "GamerGate 2" ([3][4]); a glance at the history there will show that the article is already suffering from heavy edit-warring. It has been semi-protected for two days, but I think it's clear that that alone won't be enough. See also discussion here.

I suggest amending the GamerGate DS case to explicitly restore its CTOP independently from the gender-and-sexuality one. --Aquillion (talk) 01:48, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Swatjester

I had not seen this request for clarification when I added the CTOP notifications to Sweet Baby Inc.; however I think it's pretty straightforward that it applies here. The WP:GENSEX remedy that says "all edits about, and all pages related to, any gender-related dispute or controversy and associated people" and that "For the avoidance of doubt, GamerGate is considered a gender-related dispute or controversy for the purposes of this remedy". That second part is not saying that the article is a gender-related dispute; it's saying that the underlying subject matter of GamerGate itself, is a gender-related dispute for the purposes of this remedy. Since the scope of Controversial Topics are to be "broadly construed" and per the explanatory essay on WP:BROADLY stating that ""Broadly construed" is also used when designating a topic area as a contentious topic. In particular, if there is any plausible dispute over whether particular content is covered by the scope of a contentious topic (for example, definitional disputes: whether a particular issue counts as a type of American political issue, whether a particular practice counts as a type of alternative medicine, etc), that is normally taken to mean that it does it seems pretty straightforward to me that anything related to the GamerGate controversy is covered under the GENSEX CT, as it inherently involves a dispute that is gender-related.

Now, could this all be easily resolved if the Committee issues a clarification? Sure, either more generally as to the scope or specifically with regard to the above article. Do I think that's strictly necessary? No, as I think the existing text already covers this pretty unequivocally. But since clarification wouldn't hurt, go for it I guess. ⇒SWATJester ^{Shoot Blues, Tell VileRat!} 08:12, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Sideswipe9th (GamerGate)

I can see both sides of the argument here. Aquillion makes good points that it can be confusing if non-gender related disruption stemming from GamerGate is covered by GENSEX. Swatjester makes a good point that the broadly construed language covers that, and implies that it does. Unfortunately that confusion does provide a potential narrow avenue for disruptive wikilawyering.

As someone who winds up issuing a lot of CT alerts in this content area, it does feel a bit weird to me that I have to add a clarifier after the alert that GamerGate is considered a gender-related dispute, which I feel is necessary to pre-empt any "why are you alerting me for GENSEX?" type of discussions. And I could see some value in there being a GamerGate shell case just to make it explicitly clear that yes, this is considered a CTOP.

But at the same time, GamerGate has been relatively quiet until recently. Yes there's still on-going harassment of some of their former targets (there's a reason why Brianna Wu is indef fully protected), and we occasionally see some disruption on the main GamerGate article but it is not that widespread. If the disruption continues at its current background level, I don't really see a need for an explicit GamerGate specific CTOP. However, the Sweet Baby Inc stuff could, as demonstrated by the sourcing from Aquillion, represent the start of GamerGate 2, and certainly I've seen a lot of sentiment about that on social media. If this does represent the opening salvo of GG2.0, we likely will start seeing more active and widespread disruption that has some overlaps with the current anti-trans and anti-LGBT+ disruption we see more generally in GENSEX, but also has a number of distinct elements in and of itself that aren't gender or sexuality related, even broadly construed. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:56, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.

GamerGate: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

GamerGate: Arbitrator views and discussion

• I agree with Swatjester's analysis. Barkeep49 (talk) 19:38, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
• Me too. This is exactly why restrictions are broadly construed. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:53, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
• I agree that is it part of it as well. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 20:40, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
• I agree with Swatjester and my colleagues above. firefly ( t · c ) 22:12, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Amendment request: Armenia-Azerbaijan 3

Original discussion

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

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Initiated by Olympian at 00:26, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

Armenia-Azerbaijan 3 arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

1. Link to remedy

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request

• Olympian (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)

Information about amendment request

• Link to remedy

• Removal of TBAN

Statement by Olympian

More than a year ago, I was topic banned from Armenia, Azerbaijan and related ethnic conflicts. Since then, I’ve fully acquainted myself with the principles and decisions of the case and adjusted my behaviour to not edit-war under any circumstance (the reason for my topic ban). I promise to follow the rules and principles of AA3 and all relevant judgements, and respectfully ask that my topic ban is lifted.

I didn’t stop editing as a result of the ban, rather, I kept contributing to and improving Wikipedia in other areas. Other than the countless random improvements I made, I also authored two new articles ([5][6]) and improved another to become a GA nomination. Moreover, I assisted an editor in authoring several GA’s as they frequently enquired regarding MOS, structure, sources, and copyediting.

In the AA3 case, it was agreed by the majority of arbitrators that I had erred by using a denialist source and that I had edit warred. Since then, I err on the side of caution in thoroughly checking each source. Moreover, I generally abstain from reverting others’ edits and am always the first to initiate dialogue with fellow editors to reach a consensus ([7][8][9]). I would also like to add that I don’t have a history of sanctions prior to this. – Olympian ^loquere 00:26, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi, Firefly. Indeed I have slowed down my editing because the topic covered by the TBAN is one of the few areas where I have significant knowledge due to years of reading on the subject. But since my ban, I've been trying to branch out more to other topics I know about but sadly haven't been able to contribute significantly due to IRL reasons – I started a new job and have been dealing with an increased workload from my studies. I am confident that I will not edit war again, as during the first time (during the case), I was not aware I was doing so, due to being unfamiliar with the policy. After the arbitrators pointed out my edit-warring, I acquainted myself with the edit-warring policy and what conduct constitutes it, and thereafter abstained from doing so in any form. – Olympian ^loquere 12:08, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by KhndzorUtogh

I was following the AA3 developments at the time, I was forced to comment myself once. When it comes to Olympian, I had my fair share of problems with this user; at one point, I suspected them of sockpuppeting. My suspicion was before the topic ban, but there is something that I wasn't sure about, yet I think it's of importance to the committee as it happened during the topic ban and raises some suspicions about Olympian's claim of not violating the topic ban - 2 months after the AA3 closure and Olympian's topic ban, a user named WikiHannibal posted this message on Olympian's talk which piqued my interest; the user was essentially complaining about an unverifiable info restored by Olympian about exodus of Azerbaijanis from an Armenian village (I had removed it prior to Olympian's restoration). About an hour and a half after that message, another user named Samiollah1357 restored Olympian's added content that WikiHannibal removed and complained about, with summary: "archived version of the source mentions removed information". I assumed Olympian didn't restore this as they would've violated the topic ban, and they had admitted it themselves, only replying 3 days later to WikiHannibal's concern saying: "Sorry, I'm topic banned so I can't comment on that." - only for someone else (Samiollah1357) already having restored the content 3 days prior, an hour and a half after WikiHannibal's complaint to Olympian. At the time, all of this seemed extremely suspicious to me and I had suspected either sockpuppetery or meatpuppetry proxy-editing, but I didn't want to open another SPI based on this one example as my earlier SPI with more diffs was closed with no action. To be honest, I didn't have much experience with SPIs either at the time. Regardless of everything, I think this is important info for the committee to consider in the context of this appeal.

And upon doing some more research into this, it seems to me that there is more stylistic evidence that Olympian likely either sockpuppeted or meatpuppeted via proxy-editing while they were tbanned: see that Samiollah1357 other edits in similar niche Armenian villages after Olympian's tban [10] (reverting me like Olympian), are very similar to Olympian's other restorations prior to the AA3 tban [11], [12] (again reverting me) in terms of edit summaries and nature of restoration, i.e., adding archived link to a removed dead url like with the first example involving Olympian's talk page. KhndzorUtogh (talk) 04:56, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.

Armenia-Azerbaijan 3: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Armenia-Azerbaijan 3: Arbitrator views and discussion

• Of the parties sanctioned in AA3, Olympian's conduct seemed the least-bad from what I can see - although edit-warring in the topic area during an arbitration case is of course manifestly unwise!
  Olympian - you say that you have not stopped editing after the TBAN, which is plainly true, however your activity has dropped significantly. I am slightly concerned that while you have avoided edit warring outside of the Armenia-Azerbaijan topic area, you would be at risk of doing so in an area where you would edit more intensely / with greater personal attachment. Could you speak to how you would avoid doing so?
  • Thinking out loud for my colleagues' benefit - I am wondering whether a suspended removal could work here? Remove the TBAN but allow any uninvolved administrator to re-impose it within the first twelve months. firefly ( t · c ) 11:23, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
• I would be open to replacing the topic ban with a version of the parole I created for this case --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 19:39, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
• I think a suspended removal is a good option here. I'm not against replacing the current topic ban with the probation remedy from the case, but it would a second choice, as I would prefer on appeals to not leave in place an indefinite sanction. Maxim (talk) 22:51, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
• I'm open to doing something and would slightly prefer a longer than normal suspension given the huge dropoff in activity where the total activity since the TBAN is less than any one of the 6 months before it. So 18 or 24 months rather than 12. Probation would be a second choice as I agree with Maxim that I think appeals should generally sunset if successful. Barkeep49 (talk) 23:30, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
• Looking at the proposed FoF discussion, the proposed remedies discussion and the appeal, I'd be fine with lifting the ban entirely. Yes, edit warring during an arbitration case about the article's topic is unwise. Olympian says they were unaware of having done so, which – see the complicated history part linked from the FoF – isn't an absurd claim to me. The 1RR would still be in effect to prevent this type of disruption. The proposed "Use of Sources" FoF didn't pass. This is not the type of ban I'd uphold in doubt. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:15, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
• Just to clarify on some of the above arbitrator opinions, are we referring to "probation" and "suspension" both as meaning any uninvolved administrator to re-impose it as written by Firefly, or are there differences in the wording choices here? I think we are ready for motions but I want to make sure I am not ignoring or combining other alternatives. Primefac (talk) 11:53, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
• I would concur in Firefly's recommendation. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 17:26, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
• I would also support Firefly's recommendation. Z1720 (talk) 17:30, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Motion: Olympian's topic ban rescinded with suspension

Remedy 3.1 of the case Armenia-Azerbaijan 3 ("Topic ban (Olympian)") is lifted subject to a probationary period lasting eighteen months from the date this motion is enacted. During this period, any uninvolved administrator may re-impose the topic ban as an arbitration enforcement action, subject to appeal only to the Arbitration Committee. If the probationary period elapses without incident, the topic ban is to be considered permanently lifted.

Enacted - Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 08:53, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Support

1. Swapped the wording to the one below with permission of firefly. I am ready to support --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 18:16, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
2. Primefac (talk) 18:17, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
3. Thanks Guerillero - I should've checked for a previous instance of this being done. firefly ( t · c ) 18:25, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
4. Z1720 (talk) 18:31, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
5. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:41, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
6. Aoidh (talk) 17:23, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
7. Barkeep49 (talk) 18:33, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
8. Maxim (talk) 19:10, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
9. Cabayi (talk) 17:27, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Oppose

Abstain

Arbitrator comments

Proposing without votes to allow for wordsmithing as this is something of a bespoke remedy. firefly ( t · c ) 17:40, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

The last time we did this it was worded "is lifted subject to a probationary period lasting twelve months from the date this motion is enacted. During this period, any uninvolved administrator may re-impose the topic ban as an arbitration enforcement action, subject to appeal only to the Arbitration Committee. If the probationary period elapses without incident, the topic ban is to be considered permanently lifted." and I feel like it is more crisp way of doing the same thing (keeping the 18 months for this one). If others disagree I'm not going to stand in the way --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 18:08, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, it's not that bespoke; I would favor the language suggested by Guerillero but there are plenty of other options to draw on if needed. It's not a big issue for me though. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 18:08, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

I prefer Guerillero's proposed wording. Z1720 (talk) 18:10, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Agree with the above. Primefac (talk) 18:17, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Amendment request: Conduct in deletion-related editing

Original discussion

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

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Initiated by TenPoundHammer at 21:13, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

Conduct in deletion-related editing arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

9.1) TenPoundHammer (talk · contribs) is topic banned from deletion discussions, broadly construed. This ban may be appealed twelve months after the enactment of this remedy, and every twelve months thereafter.
— Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Conduct in deletion-related editing § TenPoundHammer topic banned (1)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request

• TenPoundHammer (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)

Information about amendment request

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Conduct_in_deletion-related_editing#TenPoundHammer_topic_banned_(1)

• This (Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Conduct in deletion-related editing; I can't figure out how to format this template properly, as I get a redlink no matter what I do to the title) was passed a year and a half ago. I would like to appeal it per the condition of This ban may be appealed twelve months after the enactment of this remedy, and every twelve months thereafter.

• A limit may be placed on how many AFDs, PRODs, and CSDs I may place in a day or week (e.g. one a day, five a week, etc.)
• I may maintain a list of content I plan to nominate for deletion with evidence that I have done WP:BEFORE (in the case of articles) or otherwise understand why the content should be deleted.
• I am not to send material to AFD immediately after it has been de-prodded.
• If another editor argues "keep", I must refrain from personally attacking them if I disagree with their opinion.
• If an editor argues "keep" and presents sources, I must refrain from bullying them into adding sources into the article.
• Optional: Anything not intended for a deletion outcome (de-prodding, renaming a category), obviously vandalism or hoax (G3), or clearly done as maintenance (G6, G7, U1, fixing an improperly formatted discussion) may be exempt from the limitation.
• Optional: Another editor may volunteer to check my work and make sure if I am working within restrictions.
• If I am deemed capable of working within the restrictions for a period of time (e.g., one month), restrictions may be lessened. However, if I exhibit behavior in violation of the restrictions, actions may be taken as needed (e.g., return to full topic-ban from deletion).

Per Thryduulf, I have chosen not to pursue complex restrictions further, but instead demonstrate that I understand why my behavior led to an XFD topic ban in the first place. I would like to present my understanding of my ban and appeal it accordingly. Thryduulf suggested my conduct since the topic ban is conducive to lifting it, and I would also like to show an understanding, and attempt to resolve, my past tendentiousness, recklessness, stubbornness, and other negative effects on the deletion process as a whole. My past behaviors included massive queues of nominations which flooded the queues, caused sloppy errors in fact checking and other practices of WP:BEFORE, attacks on editors whose participation in said discussions I disagreed with, and so on. I would like to appeal to a partial or full reversal of this ban -- whichever is decided better for me -- to prove that I have learned what I did wrong since the topic ban was enacted.

(Comment: This template is severely borked and I don't know how to unfuck it. I've tried a million things. Can someone fix this please so it's readable?)

This is my first time doing something like this, so I don't know all the ins and outs. I was told it can be appealed so I am attempting in good faith to appeal it. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 21:55, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by TenPoundHammer

I was asked by ToBeFree (talk · contribs) to provide a view on what led to the topic ban. It's my understanding that my behavior in XFD included mass nominations which flooded the queues; aggressive behavior toward those who voted "keep" (e.g., browbeating them into adding the sources they found themselves, aggressively confronting them on source quality, general WP:BLUDGEON tactics); poor application of WP:BEFORE (likely stemming from the frantic pace in which I was nominating); and misleading edit summaries (e.g., saying an article was "deprodded for no reason" when the deprodder did explain their reason and/or added a source). No doubt my actions negatively impacted the opinions of other participants in such discussions, which instilled in me a feeling of bias against me that only made my actions even worse. I can also see how informing editors of active deletion discussions on relevant topics constitutes WP:CANVASSing, such as the entire "List of people on the postage stamps of X" debacle. I also expressed great frustration in my inability to properly execute any WP:ATD such as redirection, not thinking that maybe my attempts to redirect or merge content were being undone in good faith and not as some sort of vendetta against me. In general, these show a track record of being sloppy, knee-jerk, and aggressive, and trying way too hard to get my way in spite of what others think. And again, I can see how such actions have caused others to view me unfavorably even before the topic ban was issued.

I know this isn't the first time I've been here, and my deletion tactics have been problematic in the past. Ever since I was topic banned, the thought of "how could I have done that better?" was on my mind, and I'd been formulating theories on how I could have approached XFD better. It didn't help that I spent much of 2022 unemployed and I was not in a good mental state because of that. I feel that I am overall in a better state as an editor right now, as to my knowledge I have not had any conflicts with editors in the months since the topic ban. I also feel that I have formulated solutions to keep the previously mentioned problems at bay and take a more measured, less stressful approach to XFD. This is why one such proposal should the topic ban be rescinded was for me to keep a list of articles I intend to nominate, with proof of WP:BEFORE being done. I had attempted such a list before the topic ban, but it never got very far and I'm sure I was already too deep in the throes of my angry hasty approach. But now I've had plenty of time in which I feel I have sufficiently cooled down and can tackle a more systematic approach.

I did take some time to try and find sources for some TV articles I had questioned the notability of in the past. In just the course of a few minutes I was able to give Stump the Schwab a source, but found it difficult to find others and tagged it with {{notability}}. Ego Trip's The (White) Rapper Show I trimmed some plot summary out of and added a couple reliable sources which I feel are just enough to assert notability for the show. By comparison, Fast Food Mania did not seem to be a notable show, and I made a post here with my analysis of sourcing. This is the kind of behavior I wish to continue executing, so I can take a more measured approach with more time to present my findings or lack thereof before (if the topic ban is lifted) sending anything to XFD.

• @Aoidh: I have done so above in my statement. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 19:03, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

Since it was brought up on my talk page, I would like to know: is participating in WP:DRV (which I honestly forgot even exists) a violation of the topic ban as it stands? Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 19:06, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

Comment: If the result is to allow me to participate in XFDs but not initiate new ones, what would the conditions be to lift the topic ban entirely? I assume a second appeal after twelve months (the time established in the original topic ban), provided my behavior in the interim stays on point and no further problems arise? Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 01:22, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

• Comment I would appreciate some clarity on manners such as de-prodding, WP:REFUND, etc. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 20:47, 12 March 2024 (UTC)

@ToBeFree: So at what point is this considered passed? Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 21:42, 16 March 2024 (UTC)

@Firefly: @Cunard: I agree, blar'ing was not covered under the original topic ban. I stated clearly (or at least what I thought was clearly) in my edit summaries every time my attempts at a WP:BEFORE and why I think the redirect was justified. Some were obvious enough, such as a one-sentence stub on a song being redirected to the artist or album, that I felt a more elaborate edit summary was not needed. I also did not delink the articles as a courtesy to any other editors such as Cunard, in case they found something I missed. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 14:38, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

Are you done wikistalking me yet, Cunard? Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 16:27, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Uh yeah, if I'm making statements like the one above, then it's clear XFD is still too stressful for me to handle without fucking it up again, at least for the time being. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 03:26, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf (re TPH)

A complex list of things you can and can't do is unlikely to gain the favour of the committee - complex restrictions are hard for everybody to remember, complicated to work out whether specific behaviour is permitted or not, and generally easier to accidentally violate. Instead, something like narrowing the scope of the topic ban to allow participation in deletion discussions initiated by other editors but retaining the prohibition on you nominating pages for prod or XFD is more likely to gain favour. Any removal or relaxation though will only happen if you have demonstrated an understanding of why the topic ban was initially placed and your conduct since the ban makes it seem probable that your presence in deletion discussions will not be disruptive. I have not yet looked to see whether both are true. Thryduulf (talk) 02:49, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

@TenPoundHammer: your current restriction prohibits you from taking part in "deletion-related discussions", that includes DRV. Thryduulf (talk) 23:00, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to Izno's suggestion, although it would need careful wording, e.g. it should mention explicitly whether they are allowed to discuss the deletion of drafts, and what happens regarding pages moved into or out of a namespace they cannot comment on (for simplicity I would suggest not allowing comments regarding redirects that either are in or which target namespaces they cannot comment on). Thryduulf (talk) 02:27, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

@ToBeFree: wrote I'd say it clearly also prohibits complaining about someone's decision to nominate an article for deletion, challenging deletion discussion closures on the closer's talk page, starting noticeboard threads about deletion closures or participating in deletion reviews. I don't think it's clear that the proposed wording does prohibit all of those. I would read topic banned from initiating or closing deletion discussions. as:

• Clearly prohibiting:
  • Initiating or closing discussions at XfD
  • Initiating or closing discussions at DRV
  • Initiating or closing discussions challenging deletion discussion closures at noticeboards
  • Initiating or closing proposals, RFCs and similar discussions about the deletion of pages (e.g. new or expanded CSD criteria)
  • Adding proposals to delete to discussions about what to do with an article or set/class of articles
• Clearly not prohibiting:
  • Participating in any of the above types of discussion
  • Participating in discussions about challenged closures
  • Responding to queries about deletion discussions or comments left in such discussions
• Implicity prohibiting:
  • Initiating or closing discussions about (mass) draftification
  • Adding proposals to draftify to discussions about what to do with an article or set/class of articles
  • Blanking and redirecting pages or initiating or closing discussions proposing such
• Being entirely unclear about:
  • Nominating pages for PROD or speedy deletion
  • Endorsing PRODs placed by others
  • Deprodding or challenging speedy deletions initiated by others
  • Asking for clarification regarding the closure of a deletion discussion
  • Supporting or opposing proposals regarding the deletion or draftification of pages or types of page
  • Asking for deleted pages to be REFUNDed to draft or userspace

Accordingly I would suggest the topic ban be worded more clearly, perhaps something like: TPH is topic banned from:

• Nominating or proposing pages for deletion or speedy deletion
• Endorsing or declining proposed or speedy deletion nominations
• Challenging the closure of a deletion discussion (at DRV or elsewhere)
• Closing any deletion-related discussion
• Initiating or closing proposals to delete, speedy delete or draftify (types or classes of) pages (e.g. new or expanded CSD criteria)

They explicitly may:

• Participate in deletion and deletion review discussions.
• Challenge proposed or speedy deletion nominations by posting on the talk page.
• Seek clarification regarding the closure of deletion discussions.
• Request pages be REFUNDed to draft or userspace.

Thryduulf (talk) 16:19, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

@ToBeFree: The proposed restriction specifies the topic as only initiating or closing deletion discussions which is a lot narrower in my reading than it is in your apparent reading - e.g. PROD and CSD are not "discussions". The current restriction explicitly states "broadly construed" the proposed one does not, it is therefore reasonable to assume that its absence is intentional and significant. Certainly I cannot see any reasonable way to regard participating in deletion review discussions as prohibited by the proposal. Thryduulf (talk) 18:30, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

@ToBeFree the word "topic" is irrelevant to my comment because whether TPH is "banned" or "topic banned" from initiating or closing deletion discussions makes no difference to what they are and are not permitted to do. Thryduulf (talk) 18:55, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Jclemens

It would be reasonable to restore TPH to participation in existing XfDs opened by others, and this will give the community time to see how that interaction goes. That is, a good few months of collegial comments, working towards consensus, finding sourcing or describing its absence, honoring ATDs, and the like would go a long way to demonstrating that TPH is moving past the binary battles of the old school AfDs we both remember. I'm most concerned that AfD participation is too low to sustain good discussions on more open AfDs at a time, and this would prevent that as a problem. I have seen TPH's desire to improve the encyclopedia, despite our being on the opposite sides of a lot of discussions over the years, and I would be pleased to find the dip in participation quality called out in the case was an anomaly in a long-term editor's carer. Jclemens (talk) 05:32, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

Given Cunard's experience below, I am withdrawing my support and suggesting that the sanction be extended to include redirection. Jclemens (talk) 06:03, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Izno

I remain of the opinion that the ban from all XFD was overly broad. The FOF for TPH referenced article deletion exclusively. Another alternative stepping stone besides banning from nominations and lifting otherwise would be to retain the ban in these areas (AFD, CSD in main space, RFD in main space, CFD for main space categories?, PROD) while removing it from the other forums. IznoPublic (talk) 02:04, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Extraordinary Writ

If you do decide to lift this restriction, I'd encourage you to leave a provision allowing an uninvolved administrator to reïmpose it should it become necessary down the road. The appeal is pretty good, but the appeal in 2019 was also pretty good, so while I hope it won't happen, I think it's important to have a failsafe in case things go south again. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 02:36, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Cunard

I started a talk page discussion with TenPoundHammer a few days ago about TenPoundHammer's blanking and redirecting of Monkey-ed Movies (link), Skating's Next Star (link), Monkey Life (link), 2 Minute Drill (game show) (link), and Monsters We Met (link) for lacking sources. I was able to find sources for these articles so reverted the redirects and added the sources. I asked TenPoundHammer not to blank and redirect articles as it was leading to notable topics no longer having articles.. Cunard (talk) 18:57, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Between 11 March 2024 and 16 March 2024, TenPoundHammer redirected 18 articles. Of those 18 articles, 14 were about television series. I monitor Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Television so am focusing on the redirects of television series articles. I reviewed the first three television series articles that TenPoundHammer redirected: My Tiny Terror, Steampunk'd, and Window Warriors. I found sources for these articles and reverted the redirects. I have not searched for sources for the other television series but plan to do so later. It took me several hours to find sources and expand just three of the 14 television series articles that TenPoundHammer redirected.

TenPoundHammer is resuming the actions that led me to create Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive1101#TenPoundHammer: prods and AfDs, which was closed as "This matter has been escalated to the arbitration committee, which has opened a full case at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Conduct in deletion-related editing on this and other related matters" and is cited as "June 2022 ANI" in this finding of fact. TenPoundHammer is continuing to redirect articles despite my 3 March 2024 request to stop the redirects.

I ask that the topic ban be amended to prohibit proposing articles for deletion and to also prohibit blanking and redirecting pages. This remedy does something similar for a different editor in the same arbitration case. Reviewing this volume of redirects consumes substantial editor time. The redirects are leading to numerous notable topics no longer having articles. The redirects prevent the topics from undergoing community review at AfD, which TenPoundHammer is topic banned from. Cunard (talk) 08:42, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

I wrote "I have not searched for sources for the other television series but plan to do so later" regarding TenPoundHammer's redirects of 14 articles about television series between 11 March 2024 and 16 March 2024: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, and 14. After spending many hours searching for sources, I reverted all 14 redirects and added sources to all 14 articles. For several of the topics (such as Queer Eye for the Straight Girl and Dice: Undisputed), sources could be easily found with a Google search.

Between 20 March 2024 and 21 March 2024, TenPoundHammer redirected 33 articles. Almost all of those redirects are in the music topic area which I do not focus on. I am concerned about the large number of redirects of topics that could be notable. Wikipedia:Fait accompli is an applicable principle as it is very time-consuming to search for sources on so many articles. Cunard (talk) 09:51, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

TenPoundHammer redirected three book articles on 20 March 2024 and 21 March 2024: 1, 2, and 3. I reverted the three redirects and added book reviews. Cunard (talk) 11:24, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

Firefly (talk · contribs), you are the first arbitrator to comment in this amendment request since I presented evidence of continued disruptive editing on 18 March 2024. Should I present the evidence and request for expansion of the topic ban in a separate amendment request or keep it here? Cunard (talk) 10:44, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

@Firefly: I am responding to your question about "have there been any other negative interactions around these blankings". Before the 2 August 2022 deletion topic ban, TenPoundHammer nominated numerous articles for proposed deletion and articles for deletion. He also redirected numerous articles in 2022. This link shows the last 500 redirects he did before the 2 August 2022 topic ban. If you search for the text "Tags: New redirect Reverted" on the page, there are 189 results. At least 189 of the redirects he did between April 2022 and July 2022 were reverted.

I am not aware of other recent negative interactions around these blankings. This could be because blank-and-redirects get significantly less attention than prods and AfDs. Television-related prods and AfDs are listed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Television and Wikipedia:WikiProject Television/Article alerts. But blank-and-redirects are not listed anywhere so editors may not have noticed. I would have not become aware that TenPoundHammer had begun redirecting a large number of articles had he not redirected Monkey-ed Movies. He had previously nominated that article for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Monkey-ed Movies, where I supported retention.

It is unclear to me whether the existing topic ban includes proposing articles for deletion. I recommend that the topic ban be expanded to prohibit both proposing articles for deletion and blanking and redirecting pages since there is previous disruptive editing in both areas where he has prodded or redirected a large number of articles about notable topics.

Cunard (talk) 08:14, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

TenPoundHammer redirected the television show Las Vegas Garden of Love yesterday with the edit summary "unsourced since 2010, time to lose it". I found sources for the article and reverted the redirect. I found two of the sources (The New York Times and Variety) on the first page of a Google search for "Las Vegas Garden of Love ABC". TenPoundHammer previously prodded this same article in May 2022, and another editor contested that prodding. Cunard (talk) 12:16, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by BOZ

I'm going to back up the assertions by User:Cunard that we need to look into this habit of TPH of using WP:BLAR frequently on articles, although I am not sure whether it should be done as part of this request or if a separate request should be made. BLAR is not necessarily a controversial activity, but if an editor has been demonstrated to be redirecting articles on topics that can meet the GNG over and over again, then that is concerning. If we have an editor who has been topic banned from deletions, and that same editor uses BLAR inappropriately as an end-run around this topic ban, then we may have a situation worth further examining.

Processes like AFD and PROD will show up on Article Alerts pages for WikiProjects and on Deletion sorting pages and in other areas of Wikipedia where editors will be able to address for themselves if a topic is notable or not. With BLAR, if you have not watchlisted every article you might ever want to read or work on, it would be easy to miss an article being redirected. One of the few methods I have found to keep track of redirections is the Articles by quality log; for example, I have gone through Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Board and table game articles by quality log in a many-hours-long journey of painstaking research to find every article that was ever deleted or redirected from that WikiProject. I do not recommend this activity to anyone else, although for me I feel it was worth it. I know this is only one example, but one of the many redirected articles I encountered in this research was The Mad Magazine Game, which was BLAR by TPH in 2022: [13] This seems uncontroversial enough given the state of the article at the time, but when I asked Cunard to help me find sources on Talk:The Mad Magazine Game there were a plethora! BLAR does not require any WP:BEFORE activity, so it is concerning to me to think that a user can just redirect dozens, hundreds, thousands of articles that may turn out to be notable after all, and no one might ever correct this and the articles may stay redirected indefinitely. BOZ (talk) 17:13, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Ping @Cunard in case my attempted ping failed. :) BOZ (talk) 17:13, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Pppery

The BLAR situation misses the point entirely IMO. All Cunard has proven is that he is better at source searching than TenPoundHammer, but honestly Cunard is better at source searching than pretty much everyone, myself included. It might be wise for TenPoundHammer to slow down with BLAR-ing (or nominating for deletion if allowed to do so) articles, but I don't see why the situation there has anything whatsoever to do with whether he is allowed to participate in deletion discussions. I would appreciate it if the arbs opposing due to this would explain their reasoning, since I'm completely missing it.

A topic ban appeal is not the appropriate venue to impose additional restrictions that were not covered by the original topic ban, especially with reference to issues that predate it as BOZ's example does.. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 23:31, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Star Mississippi

Not as a pile on, but for the next appeal of either the topic ban, or further modification thereof should this pass. TPH, we've both been around forever. I believe you're editing in good faith but SLOW DOWN. There is no need to rush to BLAR/nominate 14 articles on one topic even if you can. The project will survive just fine assuming they're not BLPs. Keeping the project clutter free is not a day one job. Flooding an editor like Cunard or any other one who wants to save the articles just causes frustration. So whenever this is lifted, just take the time to pace it. Star Mississippi 00:14, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.

Conduct in deletion-related editing: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

• TenPoundHammer, the template should be fixed now. Feel free to adjust. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:51, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Conduct in deletion-related editing: Arbitrator views and discussion

• I'd prefer to avoid voting for customized, user-specific sanctions – there's either a topic ban or there isn't. Also, no formal sanction should ever be needed to require adherence to the policies against personal attacks, harassment or similar behavior. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:52, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

  Hello TenPoundHammer, no worries. If I see correctly, the appeal currently contains a list of proposed replacements for the existing topic ban, but it doesn't describe what led to the ban and how this changed in the meantime. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:58, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

  Thank you, TenPoundHammer, and sorry for the slow response. I'm fine with reducing the scope of your topic ban, as for example proposed in the first motion below. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:24, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

  TenPoundHammer, thanks for asking. Motions are majority decisions; looking at WP:ArbCom#Members,* we'd currently need 7 support votes for the motion to pass. There are 5 so far.
  (*This can be more complicated when an arbitrator is generally inactive but decides to join the discussion here, in which case they're "active on the motion" and counted as active here. Irrelevant in the current situation.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:06, 16 March 2024 (UTC)

• I am open to the idea of amending the TBAN so that it is a topic ban on initiating deletion discussions rather than a topic ban on deletion discussions as a whole. However, @TenPoundHammer: could you elaborate on how you would approach such deletions discussions differently than in the past? - Aoidh (talk) 11:51, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
• I am not immediately opposed to amending the topic ban following TenPoundHammer's reply above. Primefac (talk) 19:04, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
• My !vote is to modify the TBAN. I think a TBAN of initiating deletion-related discussions (that is, nominating articles for PROD, XfD, etc.) and closing deletion discussions is appropriate, but I am willing to lift their ban on participating in deletion discussions. I would also add the stipulation that any admin can reimpose the TBAN for all deletion discussions if they find that TenPoundHammer has returned to the bludgeoning and harassment conduct that led to the TBAN. Z1720 (talk) 01:02, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

• Re: Barkeep and reinstatement if concerns continue: I would rather that the reinstatement be indefinite, with TPH having to come back to ArbCom to get it lifted again, accompanied with an explanation of their conduct. I do not want to stop TPH from being able to appeal (as admin make mistakes, and TPH should be able to point that out) but also if TPH's full TBAN is reinstated I do not want it automatically lifted because of a time limit. Z1720 (talk) 01:40, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

  Z1720: I am suggesting that an individual admin could only reinstate for the first 12-18 months. So if no one does in that time, it would have to be reinstated by the committee or community rather than as an individual admin action. If reinstated it would then be indefinite. Barkeep49 (talk) 01:57, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

• I'm open to a modification along the lines of what Z1720 suggests (also not opposed to Izno's scope) though I would want the ability for an individual admin to reinstate for 12-18 months given the conduct issues from the case during discussions and the previous failure when a TBAN was removed. Barkeep49 (talk) 01:08, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

  TPH: it's probably better for someone who will be on the committee next year to tell you, but I would want at least 12 months of problem free editing and truthfully longer because of what happened previously when a topic banned was repealed. Barkeep49 (talk) 01:27, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

• This appeal shows the appropriate level of self-reflection and understanding of the problems. I think this is a classic case of a good editor with a blind spot in a particular area. I'm quite happy to consider lifting or loosening the restriction. I'd be happy with either allowing TPH to participate but not initiate, or with lifting completely with a caveat like EW's that means it can be re-imposed with minimal bureaucratic overhead. I could also see my way to supporting something a bit more nuanced if those two options don't gain traction. Not that I doubt TPH's sincerity, but this seems to be a big blind spot and complaints about TPH and AfD stretch back many years (I seem to recall seeing complaints back when I was first starting out 15 years ago). HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:55, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
• I would be happy with modifying the TBAN to permit participating in XfDs (but not starting or closing), with an uninvolved admin being able to reimpose the full tban within the first 12 months. Maxim (talk) 18:17, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Motion: TenPoundHammer topic ban modified

TenPoundHammer's topic ban (Remedy 9.1) is modified to read TenPoundHammer (talk · contribs) is topic banned from initiating or closing deletion discussions. This ban may be appealed twelve months after the enactment of this remedy, and every twelve months thereafter. An uninvolved administrator may reimpose a full topic ban on deletion discussions (broadly construed) within the first twelve months.

For this motion there are 11 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

Majority reference

Abstentions	Support votes needed for majority
0–1	6
2–3	5
4–5	4

Support

Feel free to wordsmith. Primefac (talk) 10:37, 6 March 2024 (UTC) Moved to oppose. Primefac (talk) 12:19, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

"topic" removed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:07, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

That is fine. Primefac (talk) 19:22, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

1. Support as written. Z1720 (talk) 14:32, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
2. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:13, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

   Aoidh (talk) 00:59, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Maxim (talk) 13:55, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

:# I think this is a reasonable enough solution. firefly ( t · c ) 09:07, 23 March 2024 (UTC) Striking while I consider the evidence around blanking-and-redirection, without prejudice to restoring the vote. firefly ( t · c ) 14:07, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

Oppose

1. (As I'd prefer to avoid supporting user-specific/custom restrictions and TenPoundHammer has understandably asked for how this discussion continues, I'll formally add an oppose vote here so my non-support is properly counted and we have 6 arbitrators who have already voted.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:11, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
2. The blanking and redirect issue places me here. --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 18:10, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
3. Per Guerillero - I'm not ready to modify this (with this wording at least) at present. firefly ( t · c ) 18:28, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
4. Per the redirect concerns and Special:Diff/1219160953. - Aoidh (talk) 04:05, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
5. I commend TPH for their candour in the diff given by Aoidh. It is not quite a formal withdrawal of the request, but still indicates to me that a bit more time away would be helpful. I will note that I still have no major concerns with the BLAR activities since they are easily overturned and so far have not been shown to be an area of dispute (other than people disagreeing with the redirect creation itself). Primefac (talk) 12:19, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
6. Per the recent votes above. Maxim (talk) 17:13, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
7. Per TPH's presumed withdrawal. Cabayi (talk) 17:35, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Abstain

Arbitrator comments

Generally supportive, but as written I don't think the motion includes PROD, which I strongly believe it should. Barkeep49 (talk) 15:37, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

If this motion doesn't include PROD, I'm afraid the current sanction doesn't either. And I can see that, as proposing deletion is meant for exactly the cases that are perceived to not require a deletion discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:54, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

The previous motion was broadly construed and this is not. If I recall correctly that's where the thinking was that it included things other than XfD. Barkeep49 (talk) 15:59, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Barkeep would you like to add "broadly construed" at the end of the first sentence? I would consider this addition to include PROD. Z1720 (talk) 16:05, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

That would also include CSD which I don't think is the current intent? Barkeep49 (talk) 16:06, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

I can't see that the current restriction applies to CSD or PROD and nor does this one. Ultimately I support largely lifting all restrictions but with the ability of an uninvovled admin to re-impose them. If there are issues with TPH's deletion-related conduct in the future we can look at them then. ArbCom retains jurisdiction over the matters it hears. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:12, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Topic bans are broadly construed by default, "unless clearly and unambiguously specified otherwise". ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:38, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

I'm fine with this. Note: As this is a topic ban, I'd say it clearly also prohibits complaining about someone's decision to nominate an article for deletion, challenging deletion discussion closures on the closer's talk page, starting noticeboard threads about deletion closures or participating in deletion reviews. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:20, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Thryduulf, if I understand correctly, you either believe that in the current case, the word "topic" shouldn't have the meaning described at WP:TBAN, or the word "topic" should be removed. While that's an option – a user-specific custom ban type – I personally wouldn't support it. A topic ban from closing deletion discussions, or less ambiguously, a topic ban from deletion discussion closures, does include discussions of such closures, e.g. at DRV. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:26, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Thryduulf, that would already be said by the text "TenPoundHammer is banned from initiating or closing deletion discussions". Adding the word "topic" then just adds confusion and ambiguity. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:41, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

I agree that neither CSD nor PROD are deletion discussions, and I'd say that assuming they're included in the original remedy is a bit far-fetched. Regarding "topic" and "broadly construed", the motion is currently demonstrably not clear enough about what is included and what is not. I'll strikethrough "topic" in the motion as it's either irrelevant or confusing or comes with unintended implications. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:03, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

I am fine adding "broadly construed" as it was in the original motion and does allow for less pigeonholing. I would also agree with those above who indicate that the original does not mention CSD or PROD so this one probably should not either. Primefac (talk) 19:23, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Ironically, now that "topic" is gone and my interpretation of the proposed ban is narrow, I personally would recommend against adding "broadly construed". To decide this, perhaps an example would be needed of behavior that is meant to be (additionally) prohibited. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:26, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Cunard - thank you for the ping. I have struck my vote for the time being. I am sympathetic to the idea of including blanking-and-redirecting as part of the new restrictions, although at that point I have to wonder whether we're reaching a point where it would be better to keep the original restrictions in place until they can be removed more cleanly... firefly ( t · c ) 14:15, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

Has there been any debate or otherwise negative inter-editor interaction as far as these redirects go? BLAR does not seem to be covered under the original restriction, so pointing to it as a "problem" to consider with regard to deletion-related editing seems odd to me. Primefac (talk) 14:17, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

I probably should have clarified that I've not come to a conclusion there, but wanted to pull my vote while I consider. I agree that it's not part of the original restriction, but I think it's reasonable to consider BLAR 'deletion-related editing'. Your point around "have there been any other negative interactions around these blankings" is what I'm looking for at the moment :) firefly ( t · c ) 14:26, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Amendment request: Skepticism and coordinated editing

Original discussion

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

---

Initiated by Seraphimblade at 01:58, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

Skepticism and coordinated editing arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

1. Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Skepticism and coordinated editing#Rp2006 topic ban (2)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request

• Seraphimblade (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiator)
• Rp2006 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• ScottishFinnishRadish (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• Rp2006 notification: [14]
• SFR notification: [15]

Information about amendment request

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Skepticism and coordinated editing#Rp2006 topic ban (2)

• Enforcement of restriction

Statement by Seraphimblade

Initially, this stems from an AE request filed by ScottishFinnishRadish ([16]), regarding allegations of repeated topic ban violations by Rp2006 even after guidance and warnings. As the AE request contains the details of such violations, I won't rehash them here. Arbitrator Barkeep49 indicated at the request that ArbCom has private evidence relevant to handling this request. Since this would mean that AE admins do not and cannot have the full picture, it's therefore requested that ArbCom handle it since they have access to that information. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 01:58, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Rp2006

In any reasonable court, the accused has the right to see the evidence being used against them and respond. Does Wikipedia believe it is above that policy, or will I have access to the "private evidence" mentioned with a chance to respond prior to admins sentencing me? Rp2006 (talk) 17:44, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Got it. Replied. Rp2006 (talk) 22:00, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Statement by ScottishFinnishRadish

If anything is needed other than what I provided via email and the statements I made at AE with examples of topic ban violations and numerous warnings let me know.

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.

Skepticism and coordinated editing: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Skepticism and coordinated editing: Arbitrator views and discussion

• I agree that sharing the private evidence with Rp2006 is appropriate and have supported the effort of another arbitrator to do so. Hopefully this will happen soon. Barkeep49 (talk) 18:22, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

  @Rp2006: you should have an email with the private diffs/links. If you didn't get it please email arbcom-enwikimedia.org and we will reply with it. Barkeep49 (talk) 21:18, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• I don't quite share the view of my comrades here. I think Rp2006 deserves some explanation, since he clearly isn't getting something. Such feedback must be provided in private here, which we're working on. Still, the continuing topic ban violations are not reassuring. You can't just violate a topic ban you don't like. You need to appeal it, or ask for clarification. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 06:44, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

Skepticism and coordinated editing motion

For violations of their topic ban and for continued editing which violate the conflict of interest guidelines, Rp2006 is blocked for 1 month. This block may be appealed only to the Arbitration Committee.

Enacted - Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 14:09, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

For this motion there are 11 active arbitrators. With 0 arbitrators abstaining, 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.

Majority reference

Abstentions	Support votes needed for majority
0–1	6
2–3	5
4–5	4

Support (Skepticism and coordinated editing motion)

1. I find the evidence of violations presented at AE to be clear and Rp2006's response unconvincing. In addition the Arbitration Committee has received private evidence that Rp2006 continues to violate our guideline on Conflict of Interest editing. While no remedy was passed about this, it was named in the finding of fact against them. As such I think the upper limit for a first violation of an Arbitration Committee remedy is appropriate (While the Committee is not strictly bound by that enforcement limit that individual admins/AE is, I don't see a reason not to abide by it here) Barkeep49 (talk) 14:51, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
2. This is proportionate per the evidence presented at the AE and what we've received. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 20:09, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
3. Primefac (talk) 11:05, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
4. Cabayi (talk) 14:54, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
5. firefly ( t · c ) 17:06, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
6. I would support an indef next time we have to intervene here --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 18:39, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
7. Aoidh (talk) 19:19, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Oppose (Skepticism and coordinated editing motion)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Clarification request: Palestine-Israel articles 4

Original discussion

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

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Initiated by ScottishFinnishRadish at 12:12, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Case or decision affected

Palestine-Israel articles 4 arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• ScottishFinnishRadish (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiator)
• Nableezy (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• BilledMammal (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• nableezy
• BilledMammal

Statement by ScottishFinnishRadish

Here's a simple one. The 1RR general sanction says Each editor is limited to one revert per page per 24 hours on any edits made to content within the area of conflict. Does content include talk page messages, RFC statements, user talk messages, or is it confined to actual in-article content? ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:12, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

@Maxim and Primefac:, see the discussion at User talk:ScottishFinnishRadish/Archive 30#Involved editors repeatedly shutting down RFC prematurely for where it has recently come up. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:41, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Kashmiri, that's just where WP:CTOP applies, not where individual sanctions that fall under CTOP applies, or in this case general sanctions that exist outside of CTOP. This means I could impose 1RR on a talk page that is part of the CTOP, or an archive, or any other page in that CTOP using the CTOP powers. It doesn't mean that the 1RR general sanction in the topic area applies to all pages in the topic area. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 17:15, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Kashmiri, not always and consistently. WP:ECR is a good example of this, even moreso before the most recent amendment. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 17:40, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Barkeep49, issues here could probably be dealt with fine elsewhere so I just note it. Where? My talk page, or WP:AE which is just me and Seraphimblade? ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 20:16, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Just to be clear, Wikipedia:Arbitration enforcement log#User sanctions (CT/A-I) is not an example of healthy patrolling of a topic area. It is essentially just me patrolling, and SB when it comes to AE. I've scaled back my enforcement because one admin shouldn't be wielding that large an influence alone over the topic area, and because the incredibly large opportunity cost of already time intensive actions.

I think the blocking of the RFC is disruptive, but should I alone really be the one who forces a content discussion and blocks or tbans editors who disagree, and then spend the enormous amount of time necessary to defend my actions? I've also held off on closing any discussions in the topic area because I shouldn't be determining the consensus that I'm going to enforce. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 20:53, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Nableezy

Statement by BilledMammal

Mainly out of curiosity, would it apply to hidden text within the article? I’ve always assumed it would, but I can see an argument now that it wouldn’t. BilledMammal (talk) 14:47, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

@Barkeep49: Just noting that there was discussion prior to the RFC (one, two, and I believe others), as well as multiple reverts back and forth regarding the disputed content by a variety of editors. BilledMammal (talk) 16:02, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Barkeep, where would you suggest dealing with it - would you recommend opening a discussion at AE or something else? (noting that SFR is, understandably, conflicted about dealing with it given how significant their exposure in the admin side of the topic area currently is, but that going to AE won’t get a much wider group of admins involved) BilledMammal (talk) 02:09, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

Statement by WeatherWriter

The incident referenced by ScottishFinnishRadish, which coincidentally involves BilledMammal is not the first times BilledMammal has been involved in a 1RR debate. Actually two weeks ago (23 April 2024), BilledMammal made two separate reversions ([17] & [18]) six minute apart. When the editor who was reverted brought this up on BilledMammal’s talk page as a violation of 1RR, BilledMammal directly stated it was “not a violation”. I stalk BilledMammal’s talk page, so I provided my own thoughts on it and I echoed what ScottishFinnishRadish said: One revert per page unless it is direct vandalism that is clear. Further on this incident & my full TPS comment at User talk:BilledMammal#WP:1RR at Israel–Hamas war. Full clarification on whether that was a true violation of 1RR would also be helpful, as BilledMammal did not self-revert and brushed the incident off as not being a violation. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 14:14, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Coretheapple

I don't think it really matters one way or the other, as both the articles and the talk pages in this subject are a disaster area, a kind of administrator-free zone in which incivility is rampant and WP:BATTLEFIELD conduct is normal. 1RR or 3RR won't make any difference on the talk pages. I think the substance of editor behavior, such as involved editors shutting down RfCs as BilledMammal complained about on SFR's talk page, is far more consequential. We're really here to discuss a side issue of limited importance. Coretheapple (talk) 15:39, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Barkeep49 True, the talk pages are a disaster area as I said, and repetition is part of the problem. Editors' time was wasted a couple of months ago in a lengthy, immense move discussion on Israel-Hamas war that commenced within days of a previous one was concluded. So yes, that kind of thing happens and it is just part of a general free-for-all atmosphere on these talk pages that includes repetition and also includes RfCs being closed by involved editors. One has to look at the whole situation, which includes a lack of administrator oversight. and incivility being treated as a suggestion and not as a policy violation. I view incivility as a kind of "broken windows policing" kind of situation. Once that breaks down, things get completely out of hand. Coretheapple (talk) 16:11, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Selfstudier

Perhaps we should not stray too far from the principal issue here, do the restrictions apply only to article content, I am satisfied that question has been addressed, remaining issues can be dealt with elsewhere. Selfstudier (talk) 16:15, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Statement by kashmiri

Our policies are straightforward: This [Contentious topic] procedure applies to edits and pages in all namespaces. When considering whether edits fall within the scope of a contentious topic, administrators should be guided by the principles outlined in the topic ban policy. (annotation b at WP:CTOP). Thus, whenever 1RR is instituted on a page within the CT framework, it applies to all the associated namespaces as well as to subpages and archives. — kashmīrī ^TALK 17:11, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

@ScottishFinnishRadish We might need to go back to MediaWiki definitions. Programming-wise, Talk, User talk, File talk, etc., are all separate namespaces, just like User, File, Template, Draft, Wikipedia, Help, etc. Logically, however, MediaWiki has been configured in such a way as to link a namespace titled X_Talk with every other namespace, and to allow easy navigation between them. We thus have pairs of User and User_talk, File and File_talk, (Main) and (Main)_Talk. Of course, we all know it.

Now, whenever we talk about editing restrictions, we always, consistently apply them to the namespace pair. Filemover is a permission to carry out moves of the pair File and File_talk. An interaction ban includes posting to the pair both User and User_talk. Move protection similarly applies to the entire pair, as do, explicitly, CT sanctions.

It would be weird, unintuitive and very confusing indeed should revert restrictions under CT sanctions be applicable only to half the pair, epecially when ECP restrictions under the same CT sanctions arguably apply to both – as if quoting that Talk should be considered an independent namespace. — kashmīrī ^TALK 17:37, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

@ScottishFinnishRadish Well, ECR restrictions apply to the entire pair. Only, a limited exception has been made to allow editors make a single post of a predefined type of content in the Talk namespace. This is an exception explicitly named as such, not a rule. Similarly, we have TPA revocation, with the term reflecting its atypical construction. But otherwise, we consistently extend restrictions, access levels, etc., to the pairs, even when X_Talk namespaces are not explicitly mentioned. — kashmīrī ^TALK 17:56, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

@M.Bitton, thanks for the quote from policy. I hope arbs will take a closer look at the policy wording and intent, and won't try to reinvent them here. — kashmīrī ^TALK 00:15, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

Statement by M.Bitton

I always assumed that it does. While The 1RR general sanction says Each editor is limited to one revert per page per 24 hours on any edits made to content within the area of conflict, the "area of conflict" is clearly defined in WP:PIA as edits relating to the Arab-Israeli conflict, to pages and discussions in all namespaces with the exception of userspace ("related content"). M.Bitton (talk) 23:34, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should opine whether and how the Committee should clarify or amend the decision or provide additional information.

Palestine-Israel articles 4: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Palestine-Israel articles 4: Arbitrator views and discussion

• I think that the intent of the sanction is to be specific to article content in the broad sense. More specifically, and in a technical sense, that means mainspace, but also anything that transcludes on the article (i.e. templates). My opinion is based on starting from the original 1RR restriction. Are there issues of edit-warring in this topic area outside of mainspace, such as in the example listed of talk page messages, RFC statements, or user talk messages? I would hope that normal edit-warring warnings and blocks could deal with that kind of edit-warring, but I suppose that if there is a topic area where such a hope is asking too much, it is this one. Maxim (talk) 12:38, 8 May 2024 (UTC)
• (edit conflict) Maxim beat me to the punch, but my thoughts largely align with theirs; while "page" does usually mean "anything", I do not think WP:TPO violations should be subject to 1RR (which if I am reading the inciting incident correctly, is what is being argued). Primefac (talk) 12:40, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

  ScottishFinnishRadish, that is the discussion to which I was referring. Primefac (talk) 12:42, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

  WeatherWriter, just noting that two separate reversions... six minute apart is only counted as one revert per WP:3RR. Primefac (talk) 14:32, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

• I generally agree with Maxim and Primefac in stating that it is specific to article content in the broad sense. I would add as a further example of content, without being a page edit, would be moving as the name of the article is clearly a kind of content (and is listed in the article history accordingly, rather than just in a log). Barkeep49 (talk) 14:43, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

  I think in most situations it would apply to hidden text. Hidden text is often used to say "Hey there's consensus for this" or "There is no consensus for that" and that would be article content in the broad sense. Barkeep49 (talk) 15:01, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

  @Coretheapple: After reading here I was inclined to take a dim view of editors preventing an RfC. But I do agree with the general point that RfCs are costly for editor time and so jumping into one without discussion shouldn't happen even in a contentious topic. Barkeep49 (talk) 15:56, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

  So after reviewing BM's diffs and the history of the edits around this RfC I take a dim view of editors preventing this RfC. That is, however, not what we're being asked to clarify and issues here could probably be dealt with fine elsewhere so I just note it. Barkeep49 (talk) 18:57, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

  BM: I have read SFR's statement about the sanctions log with interest, but I have been holding off saying anything because I am curious what my colleagues think. Barkeep49 (talk) 02:15, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

  So I spent some time today looking at 2024 AE reports in this topic area. And I am seeing a wider range of participating admin than just Seraphimblade and SFR (even though these two, especially SFR end up closing the threads). So to answer @ScottishFinnishRadish's question of where could probably be dealt with fine elsewhere is, I would say AE. One addendum/caveat to this comment: the more recent activity across all AE's (roughly the last 2 weeks) has been skewed towards those two. There could be any number of reasons why that is without suggesting trouble to me. So if that were to continue through the end of May that would be a different problem to look at than saying "AE doesn't have capacity to handle PIA issues" Barkeep49 (talk) 16:22, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

• I agree with my colleagues above. I think Barkeep's suggestion of AE is excellent to deal with concerns with RfCs or non-article talk pages could be problem-solved, and if AE is not able to deal with it the next step would probably be ArbCom. Z1720 (talk) 17:39, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.