Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Zer0faults/Proposed decision

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all proposed

After considering /Evidence and discussing proposals with other Arbitrators, parties and others at /Workshop place proposals which are ready for voting here.

Arbitrators should vote for or against each point or abstain.

  • Only items that receive a majority "support" vote will be passed.
  • Items that receive a majority "oppose" vote will be formally rejected.
  • Items that do not receive a majority "support" or "oppose" vote will be open to possible amendment by any Arbitrator if they so chooses. After the amendment process is complete, the item will be voted on one last time.

Conditional votes for or against and abstentions should be explained by the Arbitrator before or after his/her time-stamped signature. For example, an Arbitrator can state that she/he would only favor a particular remedy based on whether or not another remedy/remedies were passed.

On this case, no Arbitrators are recused and 3 are inactive, so 6 votes are a majority.

For all items

Proposed wording to be modified by Arbitrators and then voted on. Non-Arbitrators may comment on the talk page.

Contents

[edit] Motions and requests by the parties

Place those on /Workshop.

[edit] Proposed temporary injunctions

Four net "support" votes needed to pass (each "oppose" vote subtracts a "support")
24 hours from the first vote is normally the fastest an injunction will be imposed.

[edit] Template

1) {text of proposed orders}

Support:
Oppose:
Abstain:

[edit] Proposed final decision

[edit] Proposed principles

[edit] Negotiation in good faith

1) Users are expected to negotiate in good faith should a dispute arise. Repetitive assertions, circular logic, and references to inapplicable policies or guidelines are not acceptable.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. A good principle, but improperly applied in this case. Jayjg (talk) 19:50, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Banning for disruption

2) Users who repeatedly disrupt the editing of an articles or set of articles by edit warring or other disruptive tactics may be banned from those articles, in extreme cases from the site.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. Another good principle, but entirely unwarranted for this case. Jayjg (talk) 19:50, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
    It's the basis for probation. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Courtesy

3) Users are expected to be reasonably courteous to each other. This becomes even more important when disputes arise.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Jayjg (talk) 19:50, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  7. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
Abstain:

[edit] Journalists and published authors

4) Articles by established journalists and published authors may sometimes be judged by the reputation of the author rather than the venue they are published in, Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Evaluating_reliability.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
Abstain:

[edit] See also

5) Internal links in a "See also" section need only be of related interest.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Though use to make oblique comments is not great. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Per Charles. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. "See also" sections should contain directly relevant material, and should not be used to make arguments or points. Jayjg (talk) 19:50, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:


[edit] See also (2)

6) "See also" sections should contain directly relevant material, and should not be used to make arguments or points.

Support:
  1. Jayjg (talk) 14:20, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. "Related" and "relevant" are not substantially different. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  3. all parts of an article should contain directly relevant material, and no part of an article should be used to make arguments or points — see also NPOV ➥the Epopt 19:08, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. No policy basis for this Fred Bauder 19:01, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. 'Directly relevant' versus 'relevant': who can tell? Charles Matthews 14:43, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
  3. Angels and pins, m'dear. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Proposed findings of fact

[edit] Locus of dispute

1) Zer0faults (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) has engaged in editwarring and other disruptive editing [1]. His activities were opposed by Nescio (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) who seems to have abandoned the site.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. Both editors "disrupted" and "edit-warred" equally, from what I can tell. Also, I'm not sure how User:Nescio relates to User:Nescio* Jayjg (talk) 19:15, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Tendentious editing by Zer0faults

2) Zer0faults has engaged in tendentious editing [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9].

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. It looks like Zer0faults is resisting original research in many of these edits, e.g. [10] Jayjg (talk) 19:19, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. Content judgment. The edit warring and other findings are enough to support Probation, not bias. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  3. Per Dom. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Zer0faults has removed sourced information

3) Zer0faults has removed well sourced information [11] and [12].

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. The information is unquestionably well sourced, but for at least the second diff it also seems fairly POV and tangential. - SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. (Moved from neutral.) Dmcdevit·t 16:14, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. Well-sourced original research is still original research, and should be removed. Simon's point is correct. Jayjg (talk) 19:20, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
    "Well-sourced original research" is an oxymoron. The whole point about OR is that it can't be well sourced (though it could be sourced, e.g. crack-pot theories in the Random Journal of Crackpotism and Crack'd-pottery). James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
    On the contrary, original research is often well-sourced; it's not the sources that are the problem, but how one interprets them and puts them together - in other words, the arguments and connections one makes based on those sources. Jayjg (talk) 18:54, 15 September 2006 (UTC)
    Nonsense; you are mistaking synthesis of well-sourced items to create novel statements to be editorialising, rather than research. James F. (talk) 10:11, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

:# Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Failure to negotiate in good faith

4) Zer0faults fails to negotiate in good faith, engaging in repetitive assertions and circular logic [13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18], and [19].

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. The links show Zer0faults making entirely defensible statements regarding policy. Some of them also show other editors objecting to Nescio's edits on the grounds that they use unreliable sources. There is no indication here that Zer0faults was not negotiating in good faith. Jayjg (talk) 19:29, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Mutual discourtesy

5) Zer0faults and Nescio have engaged in mutual discourtesy [20].

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. Not seeing all that much discourtesy from either side. Jayjg (talk) 19:30, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Overly strict interpretation of Reliable sources

6) Zer0faults has adopted an overly strict interpretation of Wikipedia:Reliable sources [21].

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:51, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. Charles Matthews 19:09, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  3. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. Per Charles. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. I'm not on expert on that particular website, and from what I have seen I am not prepared to endorse it as reliable. - SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
    No, but if it's a mix of material, we don't want people just saying ICH is/isn't reliable - you'd have to look closer in a given case. Charles Matthews 19:09, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. It is a personal website with a decided slant. Jayjg (talk) 19:33, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:
  1. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Editing by Nescio

7) An examination of the evidence of improper editing by Nescio presented by Zer0faults Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Zer0faults/Evidence#Evidence presented by .7Bzer0faults.7D shows it to be generally satisfactory.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:58, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. To be clear it is the editing that is generally satisfactory, not the the evidence. - SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. The evidence does not show that. Jayjg (talk) 19:35, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. Not as unsatisfactory, I'd say, but not something to commend. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:
  1. Per Dom. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Edit warring over See also section

8) A number of the disputes between Zer0faults and Nescio were over inclusion of an internal link in the "See also" section of articles [22].

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:58, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Jayjg (talk) 19:35, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  7. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
Abstain:

[edit] Other editors support Zer0faults

9) Several other editors have supported Zer0faults arguments and edits: [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28]

Support:
  1. Jayjg (talk) 01:29, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. True Fred Bauder 19:04, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. Sure, but that has no bearing on how his disruptive behavior should be judged. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. possibly true but certainly irrelevant ➥the Epopt 19:09, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
  3. Red herring, ArbCom cases will bloat if we have to count heads like this. Charles Matthews 14:46, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. In other news, 6 billion individuals have so far failed to personally strangle the individuals concerned. This is not relevant. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] The article in question is now a re-direct

10) Other editors have turned the contentious article Zarqawi PSYOP program into a re-direct to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, which contains a paragraph on the subject in this section.

Support:
  1. Jayjg (talk) 19:43, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  3. True Fred Bauder 19:05, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 19:09, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Charles Matthews 14:47, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
Abstain:

[edit] Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

[edit] Zer0faults placed on Probation

1) Zer0faults is placed on Probation. He may be banned for an appropriate period of time from an article or set of articles which he disrupts by tendentious editing or edit warring. All bans to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Zer0faults#Log of blocks and bans.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:58, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. Completely unwarranted. Zer0faults editing was aggressive, but his objections had validity, and his opponent was equally culpable, if not moreso. Jayjg (talk) 19:36, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
    The validity of his arguments? The disruptive nature of his edits are very different from the purpose behind them. The first I'll judge, not the second. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
    Have we ever admitted this as a defence? I hope not. Charles Matthews 14:49, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
    The remedy is premised on the claim that Zer0faults edits were "tendentious" and "disruptive", which in turn is premised on the claim that he misapplied policy and did not edit in good faith. I argue above that the former is not true, and the latter is unproven and likely not true as well. Jayjg (talk) 18:06, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
    Jay, your disagreement with the rest of the Committee is noted, but the degree of said gulf might suggest it to be of a personal nature. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
    Not clear what you mean here. Jayjg (talk) 18:56, 15 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Proposed enforcement

[edit] Enforcement by block

1) Should Zer0faults violate any ban imposed under this decision they may be blocked for an appropriate period of time. All blocks to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Zer0faults#Log of blocks and bans.

Support:
  1. Fred Bauder 13:58, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
  2. SimonP 00:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
  3. Charles Matthews 19:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. ➥the Epopt 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
  5. Dmcdevit·t 04:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
  6. James F. (talk) 14:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Oppose:
  1. Inappropriate remedy. Jayjg (talk) 19:37, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Abstain:

[edit] Discussion by Arbitrators

[edit] General

[edit] Motion to close

[edit] Implementation notes

Clerks and Arbitrators should use this section to clarify their understanding of the final decision--at a minimum, a list of items that have passed. Additionally, a list of which remedies are conditional on others (for instance a ban that should only be implemented if a mentorship should fail), and so on. Arbitrators should not pass the motion until they are satisfied with the implementation notes.

  • The majority for this case is 6
  • Principles: 1, 2 and 5 pass 6-1, 3 passes 7-0, 4 passes 6-0. 6 fails.
  • Findings: 1, 3, 4 and 5 pass 6-1. 8 passes 7-0. 10 passes 6-0. 2, 6, 7 and 9 fail.
  • Remedy: passes 6-1.
  • Enforcement: passes 6-1.

[edit] Vote

Four net "support" votes needed to close case (each "oppose" vote subtracts a "support")
24 hours from the first motion is normally the fastest a case will close.

  1. Close. Dmcdevit·t 16:15, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
  2. Close. James F. (talk) 10:18, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  3. Close. ➥the Epopt 21:53, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
  4. Close. Charles Matthews 23:02, 18 September 2006 (UTC)