Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2007-09-03/Arbitration report

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The Report on Lengthy Litigation

By David Mestel, 3 September 2007

The Arbitration Committee accepted five new cases this week, and closed four cases.

Closed cases

  • Great Irish Famine: A case initiated by SirFozzie, involving allegations including misuse of sources and harassment relating to Great Irish Famine and other Ireland/Northern Ireland articles. As a result of the case, the article was placed under the "mentorship" of three to five administrators, Sarah777's editing was restricted, and MarkThomas was placed on civility parole.
  • Attachment Therapy: A case initiated by Shotwell, who alleges that other editors have engaged in POV pushing and tendentious editing on attachment therapy and related articles. During the case, checkuser indicated that DPeterson had created at least four sockpuppets that were used to edit-war on these articles and create the appearance of consensus. As a result of the case, DPeterson was banned for one year, and the other parties were reminded to exercise care while editing articles as to which they may have a conflict of interest.
  • Armenia-Azerbaijan 2: A case alleging misconduct by various editors, some of whom were previously placed on revert parole in an earlier case, on articles relating to Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, and related matters. As a result of the case, those editors already subject to the revert parole were placed on probation (now sometimes referred to as "supervised editing") as well, and uninvolved administrators may impose identical remedies on any other editors who are identified as editing these articles aggressively and uncivilly.

New cases

  • Bharatveer: A case involving alleged edit-warring, incivility and personal attacks by Bharatveer on India-related articles.
  • The Troubles: A case involving a large number of editors on articles related to The Troubles. Some editors attempted to withdraw from the case when its scope was widened at the request of an arbitrator to cover the entire area rather than only the behaviour of Vintagekits, but in accordance with arbitration policy, these attempts, along with other changes to statements after the case opened, were reverted by the clerk.
  • SevenOfDiamonds: A case involving alleged abusive sockpuppetry and other misconduct by SevenOfDiamonds. SevenOfDiamonds vigorously denies the allegations, and alleges that MONGO has harassed him.
  • Digwuren: A case involving alleged POV-pushing and incivility by Digwuren and alleged sockpuppets.

Voting phase

  • Artaxerex: A case involving alleged POV-pushing, incivility and sockpuppetry by Artaxerex. Artaxerex denies the allegations, and alleges that Shervink and others are focusing on getting him blocked, and that certain editors push an Iranian nationalist POV.
  • Jmfangio-Chrisjnelson: A case involving alleged edit warring, hostility and incivility between Jmfangio and Chrisjnelson. A remedy restricting the editing of both parties has the support of two arbitrators.
  • Allegations of apartheid: This case concerns the conduct of various editors in connection with a group of articles whose titles include the words "Allegations of apartheid". It has been alleged that these articles were created in violation of Wikipedia:Do not disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point, after several deletion debates concerning Allegations of Israeli apartheid resulted in that article being kept. Issues have also been raised concerning comments made in deletion discussions and reviews. Several users who have created and edited the "Allegations of apartheid" articles have strongly denied any inappropriate conduct. Voting on most proposals is split, but an amnesty for past actions currently has a majority.
  • Catalonia: A case brought by Physchim62 involving alleged edit warring, possible sockpuppetry, and other misconduct by various editors on Catalonia, Valencian Community, and related articles. A proposal banning Maurice27 for thirty days has the support of three arbitrators, and one encouraging the parties to continue with the normal consensus-building procedure has five.
  • Boris Stomakhin: A case involving a dispute between Biophys and Vlad fedorov, involving alleged BLP and 3RR violations, block evasion, and edit-warring. A remedy banning Vlad federov for one year has the support of five arbitrators.
  • COFS: A case initiated by Durova based on a discussion at the community sanctions noticeboard. The case involves allegations of tendentious editing by various editors, sockpuppetry, conflicts of interest, and other user conduct issues on Scientology related articles. The proposed decision, which has the support of six to nine arbitrators, would ban COFS for 30 days for POV editing and require him to change his username and disclose any duties he may have to the Church of Scientology before resuming editing. A proposal banning Anynobody from harassing Justanother has the support of three arbitrators, and one placing Scientology articles on article probation has four.


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