Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive135

Request concerning Ceco31

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement : Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:49, 22 May 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :


 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced: WP:ARBMAC discretionary sanctions


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :
 * 1) renewed edit-warring on Bulgaria
 * 2)
 * 3) edit-warring on Attack (political party)

warned (and blocked) on 6 February by
 * Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required) :

Ceco31 was blocked for 3 months and warned under Arbmac for permanent edit-warring on Bulgaria-related articles back in February (after this AE report). This month, barely returned from his block, he has immediately resumed the same type of edit-warring, on several articles, partly with the exact same content reverts (e.g. this edit repeats this from immediately before the block).
 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :

At this point I'd suggest an indef block or topic-ban from all Bulgaria-related articles. Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:49, 22 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Update: Note that even after this report was filed, Ceco31 has continued edit-warring, breaking 3RR on Bulgarians with this additional revert, and also continuing reverting on Attack (political party), with this  edit that also introduced a blatant piece of source falsification (presenting a source that merely showed that the party sits in the middle of the parliamentary assembly as if it supported the claim that their political position was "center" rather than "far right"). Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:20, 22 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :

Discussion concerning Ceco31
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Result concerning Ceco31
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''
 * This appears actionable to me; as the edit warring is sustained and warnings have duly been given. I would favour an indefinite topic ban. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 13:09, 22 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Considering the continued edit-warring and misrepresentation of sources after this report, I'm imposing another 3-month block and an indefinite topic ban.  Sandstein   15:35, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Arbitration enforcement action appeal by Apteva

 * Appealing user : – Apteva (talk) 18:42, 15 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Sanction being appealed : and from advocating against the MOS being applicable to article titles.

This was applied at the request of one editor with no supporting evidence, and was apposed by a non-involved admin as being non-content neutral. See Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement. While it is obvious that MOS and article title policy cover different aspects of Wikipedia, it is a fringe theory that MOS does apply to article titles. It is not something that I have advocated or opposed to any undue length, and no diffs were presented to indicate that taking a stand one way or the other was a problem. Logged at Arbitration/Requests/Case/Article titles and capitalisation


 * Administrator imposing the sanction :


 * Notification of that administrator :

Statement by Apteva
The sanction is absurd, meaningless, and without merit. Were it to stand I would call it "the sky is blue topic ban", a ban against stating an obvious fact. As noted, the issue at hand was not my behavior, but the persistent "gratuitous comments on contributor[s] in discussions", and it sets a bad precedent to automatically give out sanctions to the complaintant in addition to or instead of the complaintee. Doing so has a chilling effect on bringing complaints, and is contradictory to the good of Wikipedia. Not one diff was presented that I was "advocating against the MOS being applicable to article titles", and even if I was, there is nothing wrong with that. Advocating the opposite is what would be bizarre, but it would also not be sanctionable. The topic ban simply follows the typical approach of "topic ban everyone who disagrees with us and then pretend that we have reached consensus." I request that this additional ban be lifted, as unsupported, misguided, and unwarranted.

"The arbitration process, and admins generally, have no authority over content issues, including over the question as to how we apply the MOS to content. We must therefore not enact sanctions that ban a user from voicing a particular opinion. But, if their conduct in discussions about this topic is deficient, we can ban them from discussing the topic altogether, irrespective of the opinions they put forward"

There is no evidence that my conduct in discussions about the MOS or article titles is deficient. I am a frequent contributor to all RM discussions, and appropriately suggest improvements to the MOS when I see deficiencies, although that is done only very rarely, as my interests lie in other areas than in the MOS guidelines. Apteva (talk) 18:42, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

None of the links provided are evidence of any current behavior that needs to be checked, as all of them are from January. In the last three months, I have made over 2,000 edits, hundreds of them RM discussions, and if this was an issue my talk page would be riddled with complaints by now. This request is completely out of the woodworks and is totally unsupported by even one diff that exhibits a problem that needs to be addressed.

On February 15 I was canvassed to participate in a MOS discussion titled WP:NCCAPS → "shorter than five letters" rule, which I had contributed to in December, and I declined, stating that "we use wp:article titles policy, not MOS to choose titles". Is that a problem? (that was on my talk page) NCCAPS is a naming convention, part of article title policy, and not a part of the MOS guidelines.

Wikipedia does not have a (choose your favorite villian) Party that dictates what everyone has to think and anyone who disagrees must be censored from saying otherwise. This ban is completely ridiculous. I have not been "discussing whether MOS should be applied to titles", and should not be sanctioned for doing so. Where are the diffs that I have made one such edit in the last month? Or two months, or even three? Is this really an ongoing problem, or is it simply in someone's imagination that my thinking the obvious is actually a problem, just because they have a fringe view of how Wikipedia works, and want to stifle all other views? Apteva (talk) 18:14, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

And if I can not discuss whether MOS should be applied, I would be free to unequivocally state that it was, and was not, but could not discuss whether is was or was not? This is getting even more silly. I can not quote MOS anywhere in Wikipedia??? How am I supposed to edit anything? Apteva (talk) 18:19, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

As to the April edit, that was the revert of an. If anyone has a campaign, it is not me. As there is absolutely nothing unique to band names, as apposed to any other article capitalization, there is no need for a band name capitalization section at all, and it was appropriately removed. Apteva (talk) 19:57, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Check the history. There was nothing on the talk page about adding to the capitalization section at the time that addition was made. The proposal on the table was to delete the section., which was added because the page looked like this. The appropriate step would have been to say, no, and I think it should be expanded, because punk rockers can't get band names right, and we don't like the capitalization they use, and want to use our own, or whatever reason, and this is different from say, book titles, and need to have the information repeated here (so that someone can make different rules here and create a content fork from NCCAPS)... It is like changing the name of an article while there is an AFD – pointless. Unless disrupting Wikipedia to make a point is the objective. Apteva (talk) 16:21, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Gatoclass
I will try to keep this brief as I don't want to waste any more time on this than I already have. I had a number of reasons for modifying the original sanction to include the phrase and against the MOS being applicable to article titles. Firstly, that wording was included in the originally proposed topic ban, which received strong consensus at AN/I, here. I don't know why Seraphimblade chose to omit the phrase when imposing the actual sanction and was unable to query him on it since he is not currently active; however, in coming to the decision I did, I was influenced by Seraphimblade's comment later in the AN/I discussion when he described a proposal by Apetva to remove references to MOS in WP:TITLE as clearly related to Apteva's activity in the area of dashes/hyphens, and ... a violation of the ban. While Seraphimblade went on to state that he felt no extension of the ban would be necessary before imposing a sanction for such edits, I am of the opinion that it is generally better to remove ambiguities in the scope of a topic ban in order to avoid any possible chance of misunderstanding and thus potential future wikidrama.

I was further influenced in my decision by a couple of recent edits by Apteva, one of which removed reference to MOS in the WP:Naming conventions (music) guideline, which might be interpreted as a renewal of the same campaign, and also by some comments at Talk:Suicide of Kelly Yeomans, where the user made what I considered to be some ill-informed comments regarding policy, particularly that WP:BLP applies to articles about the deceased. Apteva is also in the habit of making absolutist statements on talk pages which indicates possible ongoing difficulties with collaboration. It was for these reasons I initially considered a broader MOS- or TITLE-related ban for Apteva, but after they assured me on my talk page that they no longer belabour a point I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and merely modify the original ban to reflect the originally proposed wording.

Apteva states that they have made "hundreds of edits in RM discussions" in the past few months without complaint, if that is the case I suppose the above handful of edits might be considered unrepresentative; nonetheless the extension of the ban I made would not impinge on their ability to continue contributing to such debates; the extension only prohibits them from advocating a particular view related to a meta-issue on which they have been deemed disruptive in the past. Given Seraphimblade's comments, I am still inclined to view this modified wording as more of a clarification than an extension; however, I don't feel strongly about this issue, and if the consensus among reviewing admins is that Apteva's recent conduct is not sufficiently problematic to warrant the rewording, or that the rewording is unnecessary, I won't argue the point. Gatoclass (talk) 13:54, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Dicklyon
The evidence of the problem, and of the community's support for this ban as a partial solution, is plentiful, starting with the section under my name above, and including, going back in time:, , , , among other places. Dicklyon (talk) 03:49, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

The most recent anti-MOS-in-titles disruption that he says there's no evidence of is this section blanking in naming conventions. (remarkably, he now claims above that his section blanking was a revert of an undiscussed bold edit, which it most clearly was not; it was neither a revert nor was the prior change undiscussed; my edit before his blanking was in fact a clarification prompted by his own initiated discussion, in which he pointed out a potential problem that I fixed, at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (music). par for the course.)

As for ErikHaugen's suggestion, I don't mind it being more neutral, but the trouble with replacing "advocating" with "discussing" is that it doesn't prohibit steps like the one I just linked above, in which the anti-MOS advocacy was in the form of section blanking, not discussion. Dicklyon (talk) 19:00, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Ohconfucius
oh boy, the circus is back in town again just as the Big Top was being dismantled. Do you think it's wise? You have lots of seats to fill, and few of us want to see the show again after the clown disgraced himself and the tiger pissed all over the audience. ;-) --  Ohc  ¡digame!¿que pasa? 04:12, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved A Quest for Knowledge
....the inability to let things go is the cause of most topic bans. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:05, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved ErikHaugen
I want to address a couple of points that Apteva raised.
 * it sets a bad precedent to automatically give out sanctions to the complaintant in addition to or instead of the complaintee — This precedent is already quite well established. This happens all the time. See wp:BOOMERANG. Regardless of the merits of the rest of this appeal, this should not be considered to be an issue.
 * apposed by a non-involved admin as being non-content neutral — I was a bit surprised to see this, too. I think it would be a reasonable outcome of this appeal that and from advocating against the MOS being applicable to article titles be replaced with something like and from discussing whether the MOS is applicable to article titles . ErikHaugen (talk &#124; contribs) 16:34, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Per Dicklyon, this should probably be something that would prohibit any edits related to the issue, if it's changed. ErikHaugen (talk &#124; contribs) 16:44, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved SmokeyJoe
It is appropriate that there is a chilling effect on bringing a complaint. Weak complainants deserve a bucket of cold water. If you are going to complain about another editor and seek a formal sanction, you ought to be at least several shades better in standing. WP:BOOMERANG. Bringing a formal complaint is an aggressive act. An alternative is to ask another for help.

I admit to not understanding the ban in question. "the MOS" reads as a contradiction, because there is no single MOS. The multiple MOSs are guidelines, WP:AT is policy, guidelines are usually considered to defer to policy pages where there is there is discrepancy, which sounds a tad legalistic and should be read instead as "where there is discrepancy, fix the guideline to remove the discrepancy". It is very unclear as to what it is that Apteva would like to do that the sanction prevents.

Apteva appears to have been found guilty of filing a weak request at Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement. WP:BOOMERANG requires a response. I think that WP:TROUT would have been better, that the longer-lasting insult of a sanction was a little bit strong. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 14:07, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved editor Dirtlawyer1
This comment is directed to Gatoclass. WP:BLP does, in fact, explicitly apply to the recently deceased. In pertinent part, the introductory paragraph of WP:BLP states:


 * "We must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high-quality sources.  All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be explicitly attributed to a reliable, published source, which is usually done with an inline citation. Contentious material about living persons (or in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced – whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable – should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion."

The added emphasis is mine. Whether this is relevant in a talk page discussion about someone who died in 1997 I leave to the sound discretion of the reader. I take no position on the merits of this appeal. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 14:10, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved editor Tony1
Ani—for the attention of admins. Tony  (talk)  09:39, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by The Devil's Advocate
Admins here should consider the nature of Apteva's unblock request where he states: "Very cute. My behavior is not a problem. Wikipedia must not tolerate incivility. I have absolutely nothing against the editor in question, only their actions, which absolutely must stop. A better proposal would be, for example, to fix the problem. Blocking me and not sanctioning the editor simply encourages the incivility. What I will, do though, to make everyone happy, is promise to avoid Dicklyon for the balance of the block period, ending on June 23, 2013, and not bring up their incivility in any forum, on or off wiki, during that period. It will be up to others to do that, should it continue. Blocks are preventative, not punitive, so that agreement will be more beneficial to Wikipedia."

The comment seems to signal that the editor does not understand why these types of requests keep getting rejected and intends to continue them against Dicklyon and possibly other editors with which Apteva has had disputes in spite of repeated objections. Given that the sanction Apteva is appealing was issued when Apteva filed a similarly frivolous request against Dicklyon and that Apteva has a history of these types of frivolous requests as I noted in that case, I think there should be consideration towards barring Apteva from filing any reports at conduct noticeboards regarding any discussions about article titles, capitalization, and the MOS. I think a time-limited restriction would be appropriate, but it should at least be six months in duration.-- The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 20:34, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Result of the appeal by Apteva

 * This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
 * I've reviewed the information provided, and the evidence from both Apteva and Gatoclass, and my inclination at this time is to decline the appeal, however, I will leave this open in case other administrators wish to comment on it. SirFozzie (talk) 05:06, 22 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Based on what's given here, I don't see any reason to lift the ban on Apteva regarding MOS and article titles that was placed by Gatoclass. In the opening of this appeal, Apteva states that it is 'a fringe theory that the MOS applies to article titles.' When I open up the MOS and read it, I see it has a section at WP:MOS which states:
 * "The guidance contained elsewhere in the MoS, particularly in the section below on punctuation, applies to all parts of an article, including the title. (The policy page Wikipedia:Article titles does not contain detailed rules about punctuation.)"
 * Why would he call it a fringe theory if it's actually in the MOS? I don't pretend to understand why this should be such a big deal, but evidently 28-or-so people in the RFC/U wanted language about MOS and article titles to be placed in Apteva's ban. In the text of his appeal here, Apteva doesn't give us much reason to think that his existing bans are unnecessary. All his statements seem to offer a resolute defence of his position and suggest that everyone else is mistaken. EdJohnston (talk) 12:44, 23 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Note that I have blocked Apteva for a month for a further spurious complaint against Dicklyon at ANI . Spartaz Humbug! 17:19, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Good call, I guess. And at this point it seems safe to close this appeal as rejected. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:57, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Arbitration enforcement action appeal by IranitGreenberg
''Procedural notes: The rules governing arbitration enforcement appeals are found here. According to the procedures, a "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved editors" is required to overturn an arbitration enforcement action. To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).''


 * Appealing user : – IranitGreenberg (talk) 15:03, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring
 * Sanction being appealed : Topic ban from the subject of Palestinian-Israeli conflict, imposed at


 * Administrator imposing the sanction :


 * Notification of that administrator :

Statement by IranitGreenberg
After Pluto2012 warned me against 1RR violation in an article, I saw he broke the rule himself so I reported him, but somehow I ended topic-banned because of my edits in this article. I already promised not to make controversial editions in that article and to look for consensus before introducing material that could be considered POV-pushing. I'm sorry for what I've done, I won't do it again. I want to have another chance to make valuable contributions to this encyclopedia with patience and dialogue.--IranitGreenberg (talk) 15:03, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by EdJohnston
My rationale was already given in the AN3 complaint. The present AE appeal was filed right after my closure of the report at
 * WP:AN3

In the complaint, six people besides myself commented on IranitGreenberg's editing of I/P articles. For more background, you could also check the discussion at User talk:IranitGreenberg. EdJohnston (talk) 18:19, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
 * @Sandstein: Since May 1 IranitGreenberg has been [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log/block&page=User%3AIranitGreenberg blocked twice] for 1RR violations on I/P articles. The rapid pace of these violations from a relatively new account (April 6) and the tone-deaf attitude they exhibited in the AN3 discussion about POV matters encouraged me to believe that some kind of topic ban was necessary. I won't be upset if others feel that the parameters of the topic ban need to be adjusted, or if anyone perceives a genuine opportunity for negotiation. It is striking that IG has toured through so many hot-button I/P articles in a short time, including Zionism, Israel and the apartheid analogy, Palestinian people and Arab-Israeli conflict. From the beginning IG appeared to be familiar with Wikipedia, using stock phrases such as [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Foreign_relations_of_Israel&diff=prev&oldid=549063909 unexplained removal of content]. On [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:IranitGreenberg&oldid=549060805 her first edit] she did the usual thing that socks do to avoid a red link for her user page. She reverted other editors 16 times in her first four days on Wikipedia. To her credit she has done a couple of self-reverts when others pointed out that she could be sanctioned. EdJohnston (talk) 02:35, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Pluto2012
IranitGreenberg should learn wikipedia principles out of a topic that seems to touch him too much. In this section, after I informed him of the 4th pillar and the fact that it was a problem he considered openly there were too many pov-pushers on the topic of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he succeeded in accusing directly 6 contributors namely of pov-pushing. He is much more agressive than any of the standards that are accepted on wikipedia and he focuses on the very polemic arena of the I-P conflict. He should try to prove he can collaborate on easier topics before coming back on this one. Pluto2012 (talk) 16:57, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I deeply regret my accusations. From now one, I'll discuss everything on the talk page before making an edit.--IranitGreenberg (talk) 17:11, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by 1ST7
I think it would be harsh and unfair to ban IranitGreenberg from the topic, as he/she has promised to be more careful and to make the effort to improve. He/she is relatively new to Wikipedia and is still working to improve his/her own editing abilities.

It should be noted that most of the other editors who complained against this user are hardly neutral parties in this issue, one of which ranted about their own political views on IG's talk page for no apparent reason.

If anything, let IranitGreenberg be on probation for a few weeks, but give him/her the chance the go through with the promises he/she made and continue to improve. --1ST7 (talk) 21:57, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
 * 1) The edit you link to is hardly "a rant"
 * 2) In any case, that editor has not been involved in this complaint
 * 3) Having commented several times in the discussion under consideration here, stating "I agree with IranitGreenberg", you really shouldn't describe yourself as an "uninvolved editor". RolandR (talk) 22:27, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
 * 1) It still seems rather rude to write a long and somewhat offensive post about one's own political opinions on someone else's talk page for no apparent reason.
 * 2) That user complained about IranitGreenberg in the Administrators noticeboard and participated in the discussion that ultimately resulted in this ban.
 * 3) I wasn't involved with the discussion that originally led to this ban. --1ST7 (talk) 22:45, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Just wanted to clarify that I'm not trying to get anyone in trouble by pointing out the issue with the talk page; the purpose of that was only to point out that it's unlikely that everyone who participated in the original discussion was an unbiased commentator. --1ST7 (talk) 00:42, 20 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Someone who has been involved in articles related to the topic of the ban, as you have at Children in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, even referring to IranitGreenberg by name on the talk page there, you are not an "uninvolved editor". I'm not questioning your right to comment here, but you should move your comment to before the "uninvolved editors" subheading. Zerotalk 03:07, 20 May 2013 (UTC)
 * No problem. Should I move this entire conversation there or just my original statement? --1ST7 (talk) 03:47, 20 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Keeping it all together is best. I did it. Zerotalk 05:03, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Bbb23
Just a brief statement for the moment to partly address Sandstein's request to Ed. Wikipedia believes in escalating sanctions, e.g., a 24-hour block for one's first edit war, a 72-hour block for one's second battle, etc. In Iranit's case, the topic ban represents an escalating sanction as previous sanctions have failed to stop the disruption. Iranit has been blocked by two different admins in this month. Both were arbtiration enforcement blocks for edit warring in the area of the topic ban, I-P articles. His last block expired on May 12. Since that time, here are some examples of his edits (please bear in mind I know very little about the subject matter):
 * revert by Dlv999 regarding with an edit summary "Gross POV pushing"
 * same material after Iranit supposedly tried to tone down the POV-pushing, now removed entirely by Sean.Hoyland
 * revert by Pluto2012 of Iranit's recharacterization of a caption with Pluto's edit summary "pov pushing" - no editor has agreed with Iranit since the reversion of May 12
 * reversion of Iranit's addition by GreyShark09 - note Iranit's edit summary, "Syria is an Arab enemy of Israel"

I have to stop now. I've only gotten as far as May 12, and there are lots more edits, but I have to go eat dinner. Perhaps someone else can add more diffs to assist Sandstein.--Bbb23 (talk) 01:17, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Tritomex
The problem with Neutral way of editing in relation with Israeli/Palestinian conflict is that always the same pattern happens. Same editors are collectively supporting the same edits, acting as a group while individual editors are simply unable to do anything and are being blocked. This is the unfortunate truth. Iranit was not less Neutral than others, he was alone and was presumed to be on "other side" I do not think that EdJohnston acted in bad faith. He has a great experience and he is known for objective and balanced adminship. The problem is that no one has the courage to say that collective editing of articles related to Israeli-Arab conflict destroyed any illusions of objectivity. If same editors are involved in all editing, edit conflicts, ANI and other noticeboard discussions always with same positions, always together that does not represent consensus, certainly not neutral way of editing .--Tritomex (talk) 07:10, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Keithbob
While I see value in IG's admission of wrong doing and apology I do not think that it is grounds for a reversal of an AN discussion where there was a clear, strong consensus for a topic ban. IG would do well to collaborate constructively in other areas and then make her appeal after some months. -- — Keithbob • Talk  • 18:52, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved Glrx
A topic ban is appropriate. I was a bit concerned that EdJohnson suggested a 3-month ban and Bbb23 suggested 6-months, but the resulting ban was indefinite with 6 months between reviews. There may be good cause for the extension. After Bbb23's comments, IG suggested that strong PoV editors are needed to counter other strong PoV editors; WP wants neither extreme. In addition, IG promised to not add controversial material, but Dlv999 points out a subsequent-to-the-promise edit that needlessly injects "Israelite kingdom" in an article on Palestinian people. That edit colors the apology and whether IG can be more careful with edits; maybe IG doesn't recognize controversial edits; maybe IG wants to be close to the line. In the above statement, IG is mystified about the boomerang, but I would expect IG to understand why. I welcome the apology, but it doesn't explain why it happened or why it will change. Glrx (talk) 19:52, 20 May 2013 (UTC)
 * @EdJohnston: No qualms about parameters now. Glrx (talk) 03:44, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved A Quest for Knowledge
I don't see a reason to lift the ban. Further, I'd be curious to know what other account(s) they've edited under. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 16:21, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

Result of the appeal by IranitGreenberg

 * This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.

EdJohnston, it appears that you topic-banned IranitGreenberg for non-neutral editing. That is a valid reason for a topic ban, but it's not easy for me to find the evidence on the basis of which you imposed the ban. In the AN3 discussion, I find this edit of 17 May 2013, which does appear non-neutral, in that the personal history of the presiding officer has no apparent relation to the topic. Is there other recent evidence that you took into consideration?  Sandstein  19:02, 20 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the reply. While can't speak to the plausibility of the sockpuppetry concerns (that would need a WP:SPI), an examination of the general pattern of editing by IranitGreenberg reveals that they are a single-purpose account entirely dedicated to making changes in favor of the position of one particular side in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Such a pattern of editing violates WP:NPOV. On that basis, the topic ban is appropriate (or at least defensible enough that interfering with the exercise of a collegue's discretion is not warranted), and I would decline the appeal.  Sandstein   15:04, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I have to agree with Sandstein, that the topic ban is appropriate in this case of Non-Neutral Point of View Editing, and recommend that this appeal be closed as such. SirFozzie (talk) 05:08, 22 May 2013 (UTC)
 * So done.  Sandstein   04:31, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

Doncram
''This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below. Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.''

Request concerning Doncram

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement : Orlady (talk) 20:50, 23 May 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :


 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced: Arbitration/Requests/Case/Doncram


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :


 * 1) This edit is an instance of a type of behavior that was at issue in the Arbcom case. Specifically, Doncram is personalizing a content discussion and is turning it into a low-grade personal attack by publicly disparaging another party to the Arbcom case (i.e., User:Nyttend) by telling another user about his perceptions of Nyttend's faults and past misdemeanors. Consistent with the "General editor probation" remedy, I believe that Doncram should be warned about this personal-attack behavior and that he should be required to edit his comments to remove the personal attacks.

Due to my past history with Doncram, I am unable to communicate with him about this sort of matter.
 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :

Notification of user
 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :

Discussion concerning Doncram
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Statement by Doncram
Orlady in this diff a short while ago followed me to the wt:NRHP talk page, with sarcasm that I and other NRHP editors are “slavish” and implied stupid. I was pretty much decided not to reply there, as I suspected it was pot-stirring. I suspected that Orlady had followed my edits and found that disagreeable exchange with/about Nyttend and I suspected that Orlady was trying to bait me to respond by butting in at wt:NRHP. Orlady bringing this enforcement action now tends to support my suspicion. -- do ncr  am  21:48, 23 May 2013 (UTC) And, Orlady has previously contrived to find excuse to post at my Talk page, which Orlady has just now done with statement of "regret". In the arbitration others offered to take care of any necessary postings at my Talk page, if something was so imperative. I don't see how it helps develop wikipedia for this to continue. -- do ncr  am  21:52, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by The Devil's Advocate
I see no evidence of misconduct here whatsoever. Disclosing to an editor who apparently asked for Doncram's comment that he has had past interactions with Nyttend seems more than reasonable and I don't see any misrepresentation of those past interactions. Statements that Nyttend should be more polite and that both parties should disengage also appear reasonable.-- The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 21:24, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Sorry, dudeman, but the fact is that Orlady has an admitted history of following Doncram's edits and it seems to be continuing even after most Arbs insisted that she back away, based off their interactions since the case closed. Several Arbs went so far during the case as to support an interaction ban between her and Doncram in part because of her conduct towards him. That didn't pass, but even those who didn't support such a restriction said it would be better for Orlady to step away. I think having someone thumped for combative responses to a noticeboard filing is one of the lowest forms of administrative action, especially under these sorts of circumstances. Unfortunately, it was a major oversight that the case did not provide any real procedure for dealing with this kind of conduct from Orlady continuing. What can happen is for this case to simply be declined.-- The Devil's Advocate tlk.  cntrb. 22:51, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Orlady, Nyttend speedy-deleted content created by Doncram, out-of-process as I recall, and those deletions were overturned at DRV. This much was noted with evidence during the arbitration case where Nyttend was indeed named as a party. How is disclosing all this a "gratuitous personal attack" on Nyttend? Doncram's criticism of Nyttend's tone is also not uncivil. Much of what Doncram said after all that did focus explicitly on the topic under discussion as well. This filing is frivolous.-- The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 00:29, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * There was an inherently good reason. He was asked to get involved and he stated that he had history with the other party. As far as me bringing it up, it is the substance of your complaint and you explicitly called that comment a "gratuitous personal attack" so there most definitely is good reason to bring it up here. I should also note that Doncram criticizing Nyttend's tone on a matter where he is not involved is no different than you criticizing Doncram's tone here on a matter you are not involved. The only difference being that Doncram was explicitly asked to view and comment in that discussion.-- The Devil's Advocate tlk.  cntrb. 02:59, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

@Gato, all Doncram did in this case was comment on Nyttend's conduct towards another editor and disclose facts about their previous interactions, essentially declaring that he was not uninvolved regarding Nyttend. This seems completely acceptable.-- The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 18:09, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Dudemanfellabra
I agree with TDA that the comment in question does not require arbitration enforcement. However, the comment Doncram made above may as well be the poster child of not assuming good faith, and it misrepresents Orlady's comment at WT:NRHP. Doncram took a comment about an article and immediately personalized it, apparently feeling like Orlady was calling him stupid for reasons beyond me. Nowhere in Orlady's comment is there anything even remotely directed at any other editors. Orlady has frequently edited at WT:NRHP and more than likely still has the page on her watchlist; that does not mean at all that she followed Doncram there. If Doncram is to be punished for anything, punish him for the comment here, not at EHC's talk.--Dudemanfellabra (talk) 22:22, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Nyttend
During the arbitration case, I asked that the Doncram not be banned or blocked indefinitely, but that he be placed on an indefinite shoestring restriction so that just one uncivil comment would be grounds for blocking. I hoped that Arbcom would spare Doncram from an indefinite block in a way that would demonstrate basically that he'd had his last chance. If Doncram's refusal here (and elsewhere since the case) to comment on content instead of contributors be insufficient grounds for a substantial block, then perhaps we need a second arbitration case to replace the first one's remedies with ones that will unambiguously place him on a one-more-strike-and-you're-blocked restriction. AE admins who defend Doncram should consider how their comments will aid the case's desired purpose of preventing him from commenting on content and not on contributors. Nyttend (talk) 23:20, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Orlady
edited [In response to Doncram and TDA:] /edited For the record, my personal world and my Wikipedia activity do not revolve around Doncram -- and they never have -- and I am most certainly not following him. Regarding my edits today, note that I am a member of the NRHP WikiProject and I've had that project talk page watchlisted since some time in 2006 or 2007. When "National Register of Historic Places listings in Manassas Park, Virginia" showed up as a new talk page heading, I didn't bother to look at it because I assumed that it was a simple question that another regular would have resolved before I made to the page. When this seemingly minor topic got several comments per hour, I looked to see what the hullabaloo was all about. I read the comments, recalled my earlier involvement with creating Category:National Register of Historic Places in Virginia by city, reviewed the pages in question, and added a comment stating my suggestion of a good way to resolve the contention. There was no call for Doncram (mor anyone else) to receive my comments as a personal insult. Additionally, I have Nyttend's talk page watchlisted. Seeing frequent edits to that page by the user who had opened that Manassas Park discussion, I looked to see what they were discussing. I found an active conversation between two users who disagreed (I wasn't entirely sure what they were talking about), but were exchanging views in a civil fashion and seemed to be coming around to some degree of understanding. Interspersed in the middle of the conversation was a post by Doncram (who apparently had been invited there) in which Doncram indicated which position he agreed with, then launched into a series of statements about Nyttend, saying he was "abrupt and arbitrary-seeming and non-explaining, too much so for good practice dealing with a new-to-this-topic-area contributor," that Nyttend's tone "seems unfriendly, frankly, and I don't like that", that Nyttend "seems to be coming down hard, imposing upon this Talk page rather than discussing in the wt:NRHP discussion that EHC opened helpfully", then adding "Disclosure: Nyttend and I have had numerous disagreements, including a recent arbitration in which we were both named parties. And interactions where Nyttend used administrator tools in actions that were eventually overturned upon appeal." That was a gratuitous personal attack. Because I had seen this same pattern from Doncram repeatedly, often targeted at me, in the years before the Arbcom case and because I believe this kind of behavior is something that Doncram's editor probation was supposed to ameliorate, I am asking that Doncram be admonished. --Orlady (talk) 23:50, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

@TDA: There was no good reason for Doncram to rehash his personal bill of particulars against Nyttend on that other user's talk page (and there's certainly no good reason for you to rehash it here). If in the future Doncram is asked to mediate a dispute involving a user (such as Nyttend or me) against whom he holds a grudge that he can't keep himself from rehashing, his best response is something like "Sorry, but it's best if I don't get involved." --Orlady (talk) 02:12, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

@Quest for Knowledge: Doncram's long-standing patterns of (1) misperceiving (and then complaining about) comments about content as personal attacks on him and (2) introducing responses to talk-page comments by certain users with announcements about everything he perceives to be wrong with the user were major issues/concerns in the Doncram Arbcom case. His comments about Nyttend are an example of the second of these patterns, and his statements here about me are an example of the first pattern. As one of the other parties to the Arbcom case (and someone who was on the receiving end of these behaviors for going on 6 years now), I supported remedies that would not block Doncram from contributing to Wikipedia, but would lead to changes in the behaviors that led to the Arbcom case. This hope for behavior modification is why I would like him to be warned/admonished now. --Orlady (talk) 22:17, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Keithbob
I presented evidence in the Doncram ArbCom as an uninvolved and un-named party. My evidence presentation and comments were clearly critical of Doncram's past behavior. However, I find this filing to be premature and don't see a single edit with only a flavor of criticism to be grounds for action, at this time. If Doncram reverts back to even a smaller version of his/her prior style of behavior (and I hope he/she does not) then it will be easy for concerned parties to present here with multiple diffs instead of the rather moderate and singular diff presented at this time. -- — Keithbob • Talk  • 02:24, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
 * @ Gatoclass. Good point, I would also support a reminder to Doncram and a strong action later on should he/she be back here with multiple legitimate diffs of mis-behavior being presented against them.-- — Keithbob • Talk  • 20:09, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved A Quest for Knowledge
I don't see how the diff presented by Orlady against Doncram is actionable. I could be wrong, but it doesn't come across to me as a gratuitous swipe at/example of trolling an old opponent. The specific ArbCom remedy referenced in this RfE refers to: "Doncram repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any normal editorial process or any expected standards of behavior and decorum." Only one diff is presented in the RfE so it doesn't appear to be repeated. I'm not even sure if it qualifies as a minor failure, let alone a serious failure. I'm not even sure that this qualifies for a warning. Perhaps a reminder to those involved that Wikipedia - despite all its flaws (or perhaps because of them) - is a collaborative, iterative environment that requires all editors to assume good faith and concentrate on content, and not editors. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:01, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I'll add that I'm not impressed with Doncram's diff against Orlady where Doncram claims that "slavishly" means "stupid". It could also mean "wrong".  Perhaps reminders/warnings to both Doncram  and Orlady are in order.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:22, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

.

Statement by Mathsci
As someone who helped gather diffs in the Doncram case, I am in agreement with Orlady, Nyttend, Keithbob and Gatoclass. Rehashing issues dismissed by arbitrators during the arbcom case is not the way to go. In particular there were no findings in the final decision concerning either Nyttend or Orlady. As others have suggested, Doncram should probably be reminded not to personalise discussions. Mathsci (talk) 19:26, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Result concerning Doncram
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''

The people involved here don't like each other, I get it. But the best thing you all should do is disengage from one another. The reported diff is not actionably disruptive, even if it is not particularly constructive, as is this request and several of the statements here. But AE can't do much to help you tolerate each other.  Sandstein  04:08, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Agree with Sandstein. As personal attacks go, these are not very impressive. Doncram presents as evidence [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3AWikiProject_National_Register_of_Historic_Places&diff=556475898&oldid=556453547 this comment by Orlady]: "..a bunch of formatted lists that are slavishly tied to jurisdictional boundaries,.." Orlady was criticizing a certain method for formatting lists. Any personalization of this comment is surely in the eye of the beholder. EdJohnston (talk) 23:22, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

Though I haven't seen the conversation that preceded the discussion on Emmette's talk page, doncram's post looks to me like a gratuitous swipe at/example of trolling an old opponent, and I really can't see any excuse for this sort of commentary particularly when he was specifically warned by Sandstein to avoid commenting on contributor quite recently. While minor breaches of WP:CIV can be overlooked, I think at least some sort of corrective action is appropriate for chronic offenders, such as week-long blocks. We can probably overlook this particular breach as an isolated example, but doncram should understand that he risks sanctions for ongoing conduct of this nature, in which case I would suggest he receive at least a reminder or warning on this occasion. Gatoclass (talk) 12:10, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
 * No objection.  Sandstein   10:22, 26 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay, I will close this with a reminder. Gatoclass (talk) 10:19, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Request concerning Tenmei/Ansei

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement : — Ryulong ( 琉竜 ) 15:00, 23 May 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :


 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced: Arbitration/Requests/Case/Senkaku Islands


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :


 * 1) Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Japan/Archive/March 2013 Discussion concerning Ryukyu Islands
 * 2) Articles for deletion/Ryūkyū Province AFD on similar topic
 * 3) Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Japan#Ryūkyū province and domain Second discussion on topic

was indefinitely banned from editing any Senkaku Islands or related page in 2011. In 2012, after a year long site ban was lifted, he retired under "Tenmei" and began editing as "Ansei", a fact he admits here, 7 months after the initial act. The Ryukyu Islands, the topic area in which he has been disrupting lately, are the region of Japan in which the Senkaku Islands are located, and it is this reason that I believe he is in violation of his original indefinite topic ban, as it is stated to be "widely construed". His lack of transparency in his changed username until recently is also highly problematic, even though he had not operated as Ansei during his year long ban. I have also emailed the arbitration committee on this issue, but I was not aware of this page at the time.— Ryulong ( 琉竜 ) 15:00, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :
 * @EdJohnston: The ban was to be widely interpretted, so yes. The entirety of the Ryukyu Island chain, of which the Senkaku Islands are a part, should very likely be considered part of the ban, particularly because he has been disrupting the articles and has not been forward with his previous identity until recently.— Ryulong ( 琉竜 ) 15:33, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Ed, I do not believe that Ansei is aware of what is going on here. He will continue to debate the article until he is blue in the face. This seems to be symptomatic of his behavior.— Ryulong ( 琉竜 ) 01:56, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, as I am discovering, he may still be under these restrictions, as well. And looking into these past cases more shows that Tenmei/Ansei has not changed any behavior of his that were problematic in the other cases. For example, this edit shows the same problematic behavior noted in the Senkaku case.— Ryulong ( 琉竜 ) 16:12, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
 * @Ansei: This discussion is not and should not be a continuation of your debate on the now deleted "Ryūkyū Province" article. It is an investigation into whether or not you violated your "widely construed" topic ban from the Senkaku Islands arbitration case and how the arbitration committee and administrators should deal with this possible transgression. We have also mentioned your continued deleterious behavior, such as your unnecessary linking to actual encyclopedia articles as a means of expressing your opinion.— Ryulong ( 琉竜 ) 17:14, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Again, Ansei, stop debating the province shit. This is about whether or not editing subjects on the entirety of the Ryukyu Islands is involved in your topic ban.— Ryulong ( 琉竜 ) 01:52, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Can someone advise Ansei to stop debating the AFD and cut down his arguments because he has most definitely broken the 500 word limit?— Ryulong ( 琉竜 ) 15:07, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Notified, 15:02, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :

Discussion concerning Ansei
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Statement by Ansei
My participation in our project need to be encouraged. This sends a different message.

Please notice the measured words and tone of my diffs. My sentences invite collaborative work -- for example, The closed AfD did not validate a sharpened focus on what is published in reliable sources. It highlighted a chorus of loaded language which is over-reaching in this new thread. In general, for the good of our project, these kinds of destructive tactics and strategies need to be discouraged, mitigated.
 * 1) Let's try to agree that this discussion thread is not about my opinion or your opinion. Can we start by agreeing that WP:V is fundamental in the on-going work of our project? --Ansei (talk) 15:01, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * 2) Is this the wrong venue? Perhaps we will be better able to establish common ground in the context of a wider discussion at WP:AfD? --Ansei (talk) 15:18, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * 3) Unless this AfD thread shows me how to reason through this problem differently, I can't know why or how this cite-based reasoning process is flawed. --Ansei (talk) 18:47, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * 4) I'm sorry to learn that you think the article is misleading. Please edit any sentence which is written in a misleading way. I hope to learn how to write better as I think carefully about any changes you make. If there is no specific problem with any specific sentence, then I'm a uncertain about the point you're trying to make. --Ansei (talk) 17:10, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * 5) Taken together, verifiability and notability are good reasons for this article to exist. No one disputes that the content of the article may be edited in ways that reflect the opinions expressed by participants in this discussion; however, this AfD is only about whether our article about Ryūkyū Province will continue to exist, isn't it? --Ansei (talk) 14:43, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

I understand that ArbCom tries to avoid getting involved in subjects, but it is unavoidable here because of what others have written. Please notice that online US diplomatic archives at the University of Wisconsin allow us to read what the US Minister to Japan has to say about the 1899 US-Japan treaty and about the validity of a Ryukyu Province as a subject for a cite-supported Wikipedia article:
 * [No. 326 "... I have the honor to inclose herewith copies of editorial comments upon the notification which appear this morning in the Japan Mail and the Japan Times. The Times is published by Japanese and is one of the leading papers of Tokyo; while the Mail is the leading paper published by foreigners in this country. Its editor and proprietor is an Englishman. I am informed that the Japanese papers generally are publishing the notice with very gratifying comments. The Government officials appear to be much pleased with my publication in reciprocation of the rescript of the Emperor ...."]
 * [No. 329 Tokyo, Japan, July 15, 1899. Sir: I have the honor to inform you that by rescript of the Emperor the following-named ports of Japan are to be opened to foreign commerce on the new treaties coming into operation. The translation of the rescript is as follows: IMPERIAL ORDINANCE NO. 342, JULY 12, 1899. ARTICLE 1. Besides the open ports hitherto designated the following are to be also open ports ... Nawa, Ryukyu province'.] (bold emphasis added)

In summary, the cite shows that in 1899 Alfred Eliab Buck reported that Japanese newspapers and government officials were pleased with the publishing of the English translation of the Imperial rescript which includes Ryukyu Province. This is not controversial.

My diffs were not about the Senkaku Islands, not about "POV pushing", not about "academic dishonesty", not about a "political agenda" or anything else improper.

I reject the "wiki-felon" theory which underlies this thread; and ArbCom needs to explicitly reject it as well. I haven't yet worked out how to respond to inflammatory or provocative diffs, but focusing on what reliable sources have to say about any subject is a good start. Consistent with Dispute resolution, the result of this thread needs to underscore a constructive approach to prickly issues. What is to be learned from this? --Ansei (talk) 16:47, 24 May 2013 (UTC)


 * @ EdJohnston + FuturePerfect -- WorldCat's abstract of George Kerr's 1953 book Ryukyu Kingdom and Province before 1945 explains that the book is about "the history of the Ryukyu Islands before 1945: Pre-history, the period of the Ryukyu Kingdom, the Satsuma Invasion, the transition from Kingdom to Province, assimilation and WWII" (bold emphasis added). This book was cited in the AfD; and it supports my understanding that the subject is not within the scope of whatever ArbCom had in mind in 2011.  Ward Goodenough wrote in The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science that Kerr's "work is the product of the program of Scientific Investigtrions of the Ryukyu Islands (SIRI), inaugurated by the Pacific Science Board of the National Research Council under authorization by the Department of the Army.  Kerr's original report in 1953, entitled Ryukyu:Kingdom and Province before 1945, was translated into Japanese as Ryukyu Rekishi (Ryukuyan History) in 1956."  See 琉球の歴史 here.  This background information seems necessary because of some of the comments here. --Ansei (talk) 20:47, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

@ Sandstein -- What "problemic conduct" is on-point in this AE thread? Something simple is made complicated, but this is not my doing. It is not easy to understand. In this specific context, the first paragraph of WP:V needs to be repeated as if it were somehow fresh, novel or unnoticed:
 * "In Wikipedia, verifiability means that people reading and editing the encyclopedia can check that the information comes from a reliable source. Wikipedia does not publish original research. Its content is determined by previously published information rather than the beliefs or experiences of its editors.  Even if you're sure something is true, it must be verifiable before you can add it. When reliable sources disagree, present what the various sources say, give each side its due weight, and maintain a neutral point of view." (bold and underline added for emphasis)

In the AfD thread -- just as in Senkaku Islands and in Senkaku Islands dispute and in every other article I have ever tried to improve -- a review will show my work is consistent with the fundamental POV that "the threshold for inclusion is verifiability, not truth". My diffs have no point of view except what is to be found in published sources. This is a good thing -- but it becomes messy when a discussion is complicated by loaded language and straw man arguments like the ones in the AfD and in this AE thread. In the AfD, the process of focusing on "verifiability, not truth" was cut short by Bueller 007's personal attack diffs. The function of his diffs was to delegitimise the cited reliable sources by re-focusing on other things. In this AE thread, Bueller 007 marries a broad personal attack with a defense of my perceived intentions. It is an unexpected pairing. Please give some thought the implications of just one bullet criticism:
 * "His method of "research" is anti-scientific, in that he knows what he wants to affirm, then seeks out evidence to affirm it. Here, he wants to show that Ryukyu is a province, so ... he Googles "Ryukyu province" and presents all the results he can find ..."

Is this not what anyone should be doing in an AfD? When a place name is explicitly mentioned in an 1894 United States treaty, the subject is an example of WP:Inherent notability. Also, this AfD discussion adduced support in the National Archives of Japan (NAJ) here. In the AfD thread, Cckerberos explained: "The term 琉球国 does appear in some Meiji period government documents post-dating the establishment of Okinawa Prefecture" and "when a 1894 law uses 琉球国那覇港, it's not referring to the no longer existent independent country, it's referring to a place in what had already become Okinawa prefecture". It is over-reaching to construe this as having to do with the Senkaku Islands dispute Across a span of years, I have done everything I can to jump through ArbCom hoops. This record of cooperation and compliance is a strong counter-balance to easy complaints like the ones posted here.

Please notice that excerpts showing my cooperation-building strategy in the AfD are numbered above. Please notice that in both the AfD and in this AE thread, these numbered bullets are not acknowledged. In the AfD thread, only Cckerberos responded to my invitation to work together. It is harmful to our project when shifting the focus to me is substituted for discussion based on WP:V and WP:RS. The AfD discussion was marked by inflammatory and provocative diffs which are continued here. It is harmful to our project when destructive tactics and strategies are validated.

There is no cause for the ArbCom actions suggested by Ryulong and Bueller 007. However, I need for this thread to make clear that the purpose of the ArbCom process is (a) not to punish and (b) not to delegitimise the constructive contributions of anyone including me. --Ansei (talk) 16:09, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by (previously uninvolved) 5.12.68.204
After reading that AfD, I think that if somehow the topic at hand here is not found covered by the topic ban, this issue should go to WP:AN for a community ban. The claim that a Ryūkyū Province (kuni) existed between 1609-1872 instead of a vassal kingdom is a clear case of persistent and frankly ridiculous POV pushing based on misreadings if not downright misinterpretation of a handful of sources. An example of source misrepresentation I found myself is omitting the "however" part from a source. Except Tenmei/Ansei no editor or source supported his view. Sources to the contrary abound, e.g. there's Ph.D. thesis titled The Government of the Kingdom of Ryukyu, 1609–1872 cited in the article on the Kingdom. What we have here is an editor who was sanctioned in two ArbCom cases who continues the same pattern of behavior, and which is clearly detrimental to our readers. 5.12.68.204 (talk) 21:12, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

I think that Bueller 007's points #3 and #4 are evidence of Tenmei/Ansei pushing his own point of view instead of aiming for a NPOV article. Maybe I'm not sufficiently familiar with the term "POV pushing"... Or perhaps Bueller meant to say that Tenmei/Ansei's editing is not motivated by some nationalistic POV? I don't care to speculate what might motivate Tenmei/Ansei, but a highly idiosyncratic POV is equally problematic. One Japanese editor remarked in the AfD that Tenmei/Ansei's position in this matter goes beyond what is espoused even by ultra-nationalists ... 5.12.68.204 (talk) 00:00, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Bueller 007
First, some positive comments. Contrary to what others may say about Ansei/Tenmei, I do not think that he is a POV pusher, insomuch as I don't think he has a particular axe to grind regarding Senkaku, Ryukyu, etc. In addition, though still lacking in concision, his style of communication has improved dramatically since his edit ban. (This is a rather low bar, however, as his writing was previously the most verbose and obfuscatory that I have ever encountered.) Rather, in my occasional experience with Ansei/Tenmei over the last six? years or so, I think his remaining problems are:
 * 1) He dives headlong into subjects about which he knows very little. In this particular case, he somehow got it in his head that Ryukyu was a province, and in addition to maintaining the "Ryukyu Province" article, he also made edits to insert this misinformation into a large number of related Wikipedia pages. His inability to read Japanese is particularly problematic considering that Japanese history is his preferred topic. I would suggest that Tenmei/Ansei consider consulting with more knowledgeable people before he goes gangbusters on any given topic, particularly when it is based on evidence that a sensible, knowledgeable person would consider "not particularly convincing".  Because he is such a prolific editor (and one who is not infrequently incorrect), cleaning up after him can be a long and disheartening process.
 * 2) He will not admit when he is wrong, even when he is very clearly wrong.  As in this case.
 * 3) His method of "research" is anti-scientific, in that he knows what he wants to affirm, then seeks out evidence to affirm it.  Here, he wants to show that Ryukyu is a province, so instead of consulting any of the bazillion history books that would tell him that it was in fact a vassal state, he Googles "Ryukyu province" and presents all the results he can find (including those that are obviously errors to anyone with general knowledge on the subject). This method of "research", besides being academically dishonest, also gives extremely biased results, because he is--in the words of Carl Sagan--"counting the hits and ignoring the misses".
 * 4) He misreads, misinterprets, or misrepresents his sources (as in the example presented by 5.12.68.204 above).  And of course, always in a way that makes his point of view the "right" one.

He must address these issues before he engages in any "controversial" edits, but ultimately I'm not sure that arbitration enforcement is the way to go about it. Because I don't think that he's an intentional POV pusher (he merely cannot admit when he's wrong), I'm not sure that this is necessarily related to his Senkaku Islands ban. Bueller 007 (talk) 23:37, 23 May 2013 (UTC)


 * To address the second point of 5.12.68.204 above, what I mean when I say that I don't think he's a "POV pusher" is that I don't think he is trying to push an ideological bias. His motivations are relevant here, because that's how the current Ryukyu Province case is being linked to the Senkaku Islands case.  For that reason, I agree that if any action is to be taken, that community action may be more appropriate than arbitration enforcement.  Bueller 007 (talk) 00:40, 24 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Again, even at this stage Ansei cannot admit that he is wrong. @Ansei: if Ryukyu were a province, there would be official Japanese government documents ruling that it had become one.  Those documents do not exist.  As has been pointed out above, not even Japanese ultranationalists think that Ryukyu was a province of Japan.  Your reliance on obscure ENGLISH sources is inadequate, and is original research at best.  (If you were to show that Ryukyu had actually been a province, then school textbooks throughout Japan would have to be rewritten.)  Consider that 琉球国 had to be translated from Japanese into English and that it is very easy to imagine that someone could have misinterpreted 国 as meaning "province" in this case.  There is absolutely no evidence that Ryukyu was ever an official province of Japan.  It was an independent kingdom prior to 1609, a vassal state of the Satsuma until 1872 (but nevertheless remained an independent kingdom that also paid tribute to China...this arrangement was actually in the interests of Japan so that they could conduct trade with China under haijin and sakoku; they did not WANT it to become a province, otherwise trade would stop because China only traded with their tributaries), a domain until 1879, and a prefecture thereafter.  Please stop with this silliness. Bueller 007 (talk) 17:02, 24 May 2013 (UTC)


 * To administrators enforcing this arbitration: I agree that Ansei needs to be admonished somehow, however, if you yourselves are unable to decide what "Senkaku broadly construed" means, then how was Ansei expected to know where to draw the line? Should he have thought that "broadly construed" meant Chinese-Japanese territorial disputes?  Anything regarding the Ryukyu Islands?  Or perhaps all of Japan or East Asia?  I don't think this can be enforced fairly because the original wording was so vague. Perhaps the Ryukyu Islands should be explicitly added to his topic ban, as he clearly still has not given up on this 'province' nonsense. Bueller 007 (talk) 17:12, 24 May 2013 (UTC)


 * @EdJohnston: I agree with your solution. Bueller 007 (talk) 23:49, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment by Lothar von Richthofen
Last fall, I filed a clarification request as to whether or not the Ryukyus fall under WP:SENKAKU (see here). NYB stated: I believe the intent of the remedies in the Senkaku Islands case is broad enough to allow an administrator to impose discretionary sanctions concerning Ryukyu Islands and Ryukyu Arc. Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 22:20, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Result concerning Ansei
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''
 * Ryulong, your position is that Ansei should not edit anything regarding the Ryukyu Islands because the Senkaku Islands are considered to be part of that chain? You would be asking for a clarification of the scope of Ansei's ban. I guess you are saying that the Senkakus are part of Okinawa Prefecture and are therefore included in the Ryukyus. EdJohnston (talk) 15:22, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I looked over the evidence section of Arbitration/Requests/Case/Senkaku Islands and it suggests that Tenmei/Ansei has an exasperating style in discussions. Arbcom took note of this in their Finding of Fact]. They observe that the same problem from Tenmei was seen in the Tang Dynasty case. It is easy to see this discussion style also in operation in the dispute abut Ryukyu Domain versus Ryukyu Province. My recommendation is to interpret Tenmei/Ansei's topic ban as covering the Ryukyus, under the phrase 'broadly construed.' Tenmei's behavior has been found troublesome by Arbcom twice and now the same problem seems to be occurring here. It would not be adventurous or a bold extrapolation to extend the ban to the Ryukyus but if there is any doubt at all a request for clarification might be considered. EdJohnston (talk) 14:19, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * @Bueller 007: Yes, my argument is that Ansei may not have been aware that his ban keeps him away from all Ryukyu topics. So this case should be closed to warn him not to edit anything about the Ryukyu Islands in the future. No blocks would be issued for any behavior on the Ryukyus up to this point. EdJohnston (talk) 20:43, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I would be inclined to be not too strict about this, if Tenmei/Ansei's edits were concerned with some purely geographical content unrelated to the international disputes that he was meant to be kept away from. However, several remarks by himself and others in the discussions linked to above seem to suggest that there is some kind of POV angle, in the sense that the historical status of Ryukyu as a "province" of Japan (which appears to be the immediate topic under dispute) might be seen as relevant in the context of some argument about the present-day international sovereignty dispute between Japan and China, and that Tenmei/Ansei's edits in this area were thus at least partly motivated by his political agenda with respect to Senkaku. If that is the case, I'd say it's a clear case of a ban violation. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:35, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I agree that, in view of Ansei's problematic conduct, it appears appropriate to clarify that the arbitral topic ban about the Senkaku Islands also covers the topic of the Ryuku Islands as a whole (but not necessarily other islands in the Ryuku Islands). Other sanctions for, e.g., using multiple accounts to evade scrutiny, should be contemplated at the community level.  Sandstein   10:38, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Closing. Tenmei/Ansei is warned that his topic ban includes anything pertaining to the Ryukyu Islands as a whole, including the past or present political status of those islands. He can make no edits regarding the Ryukyu Domain, the Ryukyu Kingdom or the Ryukyu Province. EdJohnston (talk) 19:59, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Request concerning IranitGreenberg

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement :  Sean.hoyland  - talk 14:25, 27 May 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :

The editor is currently "banned from the topic of the Israeli-Arab conflict for three months".
 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced:
 * User_talk:IranitGreenberg
 * Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :

see below


 * Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required) :


 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :

Could someone explain the scope of the topic ban to IranitGreenberg please ? I'm not sure it's clear to them. Looking at their post-ban edits (see Special:Contributions/IranitGreenberg from 2013-05-25T21:18:14), some of them may be topic ban violations. For example I'm not suggesting any sanction, only clarification.  Sean.hoyland  - talk 14:25, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Does the scope include subjects like the Israel–Iran proxy conflict or Iran–Israel relations ?
 * Is this edit a violation because it mentions "the creation of a Palestinian state" ?
 * Is this edit a violation because it was a Lebanese rocket attack on Israel ?

The editor is continuing to violate their topic ban despite the information they have received here. They may not be capable of stopping by themselves. If anyone considers a temporary block to get their attention or an indef ban, perhaps the editor should be asked to explicitly agree to not use sockpuppetry under any circumstances or in any form. A previous topic ban/block of an editor like IranitGreenberg in many ways (i.e. AndresHerutJaim) resulted in the editor becoming a prolific sockpuppeteer which has caused disruption and wasted resources (and this edit is probably by their latest sock).  Sean.hoyland  - talk 05:44, 30 May 2013 (UTC) 
 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :

Discussion concerning IranitGreenberg
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Statement by IranitGreenberg
I thought that Israel conflict with Iran wasn't part of the Arab/Palestinian-Israeli conflict, but if I'm wrong, I'll stop editing there. Regarding Naftali Bennett, I thought I could edit because he's an Israeli politician (not related per se to such conflict), but since I edited something related to Palestine, perhaps I made a mistake (it wasn't on purpose). It won't happen again.--IranitGreenberg (talk) 14:52, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

I want to make clear I also edited Israel Defense Forces. But only related to foreign suppliers, not the conflict, Arabs or Palestinians.--IranitGreenberg (talk) 20:24, 27 May 2013 (UTC)


 * @EdJohnston: I realized editing Naftali Bennett was a bad idea. It falls under topic-ban and I'm sorry. However, I don't see the connection with Iran (it's not an Arab country nor part of this conflict). Anyway, if an administrator tells me Iran articles are related to I/P, I'll stop editing there too.--IranitGreenberg (talk) 20:18, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Result concerning IranitGreenberg
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''
 * Agree with this complaint. In the past, we have sometimes encouraged editors who are working under an I/P topic ban to edit Israeli topics that have nothing to do with the conflict. Naftali Bennett is connected to Israeli settlements on the West Bank and he opposes the creation of a Palestinian state so he's not a good choice. Also, there was a previous case at AE where someone was editing about Iran-Israel relations. Iran's government refers to Israel as 'the Zionist entity'. I would interpret an I/P topic ban as excluding *all* of the edits and topics listed by Sean.hoyland in this complaint. EdJohnston (talk) 19:09, 27 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Agree with Ed. This is clearly a ban violation. I'd be ok with a final warning here, unless there is mor evidence of "line-stepping"-- Cailil  talk 22:22, 27 May 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree with that these violated the topic ban but that a final warning is adequate. IranitGreenberg, the point of a topic ban is that you take a full and complete break from the topic area, and develop editing skills while working on very different subjects. Do you have some other interests? How about sports, birds, bugs, plants, cars?  Go and edit on those subjects and leave anything that could even potentially have links to the I/P conflict behind you. Editing on the fringes of the topic ban will only lead to problems for you, I can absolutely guarantee it.Slp1 (talk) 16:59, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Closing. IranitGreenberg is warned to be more careful in observing her I/P topic ban, which includes everything listed above by Sean.hoyland. EdJohnston (talk) 02:47, 31 May 2013 (UTC)

Soosim
''This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below. Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.''

Request concerning Soosim

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement : Nomoskedasticity (talk) 04:18, 28 May 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :


 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced: ARBPIA and ARBPIA, specifically a topic ban minimally applying to NGO Monitor, Gerald M. Steinberg, any other edit that involves or mentions that organisation or Steinberg as its director, and any organisation that NGO Monitor "monitors", e.g. B'Tselem, New Israel Fund, Human Rights Watch.


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :

As per discussion at this COIN section (and especially the subsection), Soosim is now known to have been violating WP:COI in a blatant way in the I/P topic area: he is a paid staff member of NGO Monitor, as per his on-wiki self-identification, and his primary activities on Wikipedia involve editing NGO Monitor and adding that organisation's criticism of other parties to the articles on those parties. Examples:


 * Editing NGO Monitor:, ; it's worth seeing the history of NGO Monitor to see the extent of his involvement there, and at Gerald M. Steinberg (history), its director.
 * Adding critical NGO-Monitor material to articles about other organisations:, ,


 * Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required):
 * 1) Warned on 13 December 2011 by


 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :
 * The examples given just above really are just examples -- one can find many hundreds of edits like them in Soosim's list of contributions.
 * Since Soosim now wants to give the impression that everything he has done has been "responsible and within wiki rules", I'll make explicit what is surely obvious to most. NGO Monitor has a media strategy and Soosim/Draiman is a paid staff member responsible for implementing it.  That strategy has a few basic components: 1) issue a press release with sound-bites from Steinberg; 2) newspaper swallows some of it whole; 3) Soosim/Draiman adds the sound-bite to a corresponding Wikipedia article.  Editing Wikipedia in that mode -- particularly without disclosing the COI -- is an abuse of Wikipedia, end of story.  Soosim/Draiman might deny that this is what he does, but if so then he doesn't deserve his salary.  As for "Nomo is abusive": I have indeed been calling Soosim a "pov pusher" for several months now -- only I didn't realize quite how right I was.  Nomoskedasticity (talk) 06:59, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * On "PLO supporter": here is a diff showing Soosim restoring that passage after someone else had deleted it. Soosim didn't remove it (as he claims below) -- on the contrary, he put it back, and there is no diff in which he is seen removing it.  There are a few claims of that sort below where diffs are lacking -- and it's not hard to see why.  Nomoskedasticity (talk) 07:10, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * My attention has been drawn to a description of a talk that Draiman gave last year -- recruiting "pro-Israel" editors for the "wiki wars". I suppose we all knew that the CAMERA incident would be repeated.  Nomoskedasticity (talk) 14:30, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Question : In view of Slp1's proposed restriction re new accounts: would it make sense to do a CU check for any other matching accounts that might already have been created? If the CU check already performed was intended only to look for a match between Soosim and Scarletfire, perhaps it should be extended to look for "sleepers".  I'll admit to not really understanding how all of this works, so perhaps it's not necessary -- just a suggestion.  Nomoskedasticity (talk) 05:34, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Since lack of transparency is a core issue here, it is more than a little ridiculous that Soosim wants to clear things up via off-wiki contact. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 13:13, 30 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :

Discussion concerning Soosim
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Statement by Soosim
I have been following all the comments here, at the coi board, and the sockpuppet board. if I may:

a) I have never been involved with anything relating to any sock puppet or meat puppet. I was very happy to see scarletfire join in, but it is the same as for bus stop, ghcoold, plot spoiler, gilabrand, etc and I'm a pretty sure it is not my wife or kids. so, if someone can give me more details, I will try to sort it out. but no, I don't do that, and wouldn't do that.

b) all edits were my own. always have been, and always will be. I never discussed or approved any edit with anyone beforehand. all edits were RS and always agreed upon - maybe after fighting with various editors but never vandalism or disruptive. it is clear to me that it is very much pov and not coi.

c) nomo has always been abusive to me. I have mentioned that many times to him and to others. I think his intentions are not pure. also, malik, dlv, sean, etc have always been watching me. they have said so. sean has been watching for 3+ years. Nothing was ever snuck in - all done above board, with edit summaries, with discussion when needed, etc. (nomo has already started to look for edits to remove even though the edits are RS and non-controversial: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Medical_Aid_for_Palestinians&oldid=557289438&diff=prev  and http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ir_Amim&oldid=557288742&diff=prev and http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=New_Israel_Fund&curid=2343447&diff=557291079&oldid=550308939 and http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=B%27Tselem&curid=38573522&diff=557290974&oldid=554997435 and more

d) I will also say that many editors have jumped to conclusions which are not correct, or even remotely correct. and I think many statements on this page and the coi page have been made which are not based on fact - mostly innuendo, association, over-emotional responses, etc. (one example here is 'edits made during work hours' - I happen to work from home, am a consultant, travel around quite a bit doing my consulting, etc.)

e) and as I said earlier - all edits were responsible, within wiki rules, discussed, etc. many edits were removed, reverted edited by others. no problem. I have cooperated with any editor on any talk page who engaged in a discussion. a most recent example was the nomo/rastiniak/goldblum outrage that incorrectly assumed I wanted to label goldblum as a plo supporter, based on an available RS. within minutes of someone saying that, I removed it. just one example of many many many over the years.

f) and, if I may, perhaps to make it more clear: the I/P conflict area is not one where you can get away with self-promotion, peacock, advertising, etc. and, not to be too repetitive, but wiki is indeed an online encyclopedia, and that npov prevails. that is what I strive for. showing both sides of any discussion, conflict, etc. (again, just look at the many edits nomo is making now, removing any chance for npov. compare and contrast, please....) thanks.

Statement by (username)
I may be mussing something, but who does he identify himself as? , found it.Slatersteven (talk) 14:41, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Peter cohen
Quoting our article on Soosim's employer it is an organization "whose stated aim is to generate and distribute critical analysis and reports on the output of the international NGO community for the benefit of government policy makers, journalists, philanthropic organizations, and the general public." Soosim's role is described by his employer as one of "Online Communications". His contributions are spread through the week (apart from Saturday daytimes) but a substantial number of edits take place during normal office hours. There is no reason to doubt that much of his editing of Wikipedia was done as a paid contributor pushing the propaganda line of his employers.--Peter cohen (talk) 19:44, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

I find the following in the link that Nomo has just inserted particularly interesting "Arnie spoke about the battle for objectivity on Wikipedia. He spends about an hour a day making sure that facts are checked and verified on the online encyclopedia and that anti-Israel bias is not allowed to stand. He encourages all pro-Israel advocates to join the “wiki war.”" Anyone who is really interested in building an unbiased encyclopaedia should not be inviting pro-anything advocates to join a "war" on the encyclopaedia. His role is quite clearly that of a propagandist and the reference to objectivity is just the usual partisan attitude of campaigners who always believe that the media are biased against them and nothing is objective unless it agrees with them. Note he commented on the blog post and thanked the author for the shout out without any indication that he considered anything said other than an accurate representation of what he said in the reported meeting. --Peter cohen (talk) 15:10, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by רסטיניאק
NGO Monitor is Gerald Steinberg and Steinberg is NGO Monitor. There is no LTD there. Steinberg initiated his monitor and calls himself its "president". No action in NGO Monitor can be performed without his order, involvement or agreement. That includes all the edits of Soosim. Therefore, in addition to discussing Soosim there is a need to deal with a whole range of wikipedia activities of NGO Monitor directed by Gerald Steinberg that should be examined, mostly executed by Soosim during the last years since he began editing on wikipedia. They may have had someone else before Soosim to promote their activities and to defame liberal, human rights and Peace NGOs. I would go further than Peter cohen in characterizing the activities of NGO Monitor based on their own words. The main activities of NGO Monitor are geared to harm those organization by aiming at their contributors and supporters, and pushing for legal actions in Israel to block funding from European countries and the EU to Israeli human rights NGOs. There is more on WP:COIN part 8.רסטיניאק (talk) 22:41, 28 May 2013 (UTC)רסטיניאק
 * Just stick to the facts please and not wild speculation to promote your own agenda. Plot Spoiler (talk) 03:43, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks Plot Spoiler, but this is not my agenda. This is of general interest to WP. It should have been yours as well. I have just pointed out that Soosim is not operating as an "independent" agent, but is directed by his boss Steinberg who is NGO Monitor. Is that what you call wild speculation ? All of Soosim's editings  prove that. I am quite surprised to read Soosim's statement here as well as what he wrote on WP:COIN just 3 days ago :  about three years ago, i came across an article that steinberg wrote, i liked it and follow him and his work closely. Interesting way to avoid writing "I work for him and promote him, his ideas, his political fights, and his organization".רסטיניאק (talk) 07:29, 29 May 2013 (UTC)רסטיניאק

Statement by Zero0000
(Disclosure: As someone once lied about in print by Gerald Steinberg, I'm somewhat ill-disposed towards his organization.) Regardless of what Soosim's job description is, for someone to devote themselves so consistently to promoting the viewpoint of a particular rather extreme activist organization is a violation of the core policy WP:NPOV and should not be allowed. Zerotalk 10:56, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Zero0000—the Israeli–Palestinian conflict tends to generate supporters with passions on opposing sides. Unless reliably sourced, no piece information is allowed to stay in an article on any topic relating to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. It is unlikely that User:Soosim promotes anyone else's ideas. Bus stop (talk) 11:05, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * POV-pushing is against the rules, no question. WP:NPOV is an obligation on every editor. It is not a defence to note that other editors push other opinions.  Material has to be selected in a neutral manner, not merely be sourcable.  Zerotalk 11:11, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by The Devil's Advocate
I should note that Arbitrator User:Newyorkbrad made a recent addition to BLP covering this sort of conduct. While Soosim's position at NGO Monitor certainly impacts his editing on various people criticized by that group in connection with the Arab-Israeli conflict such as Goldblum, it also seems to extend to areas where the ARBPIA connection is not so explicit as with this edit targeting Sarah Leah Whitson, another target of NGO Monitor. Granted, there is an Israeli connection to the criticism of Whitson, but it is not explicit in the Libya edit. Administrators here should consider invoking WP:BLPSE while they are reviewing this case or construing the topic ban in such a way that there can't be any indirect pro-Israeli POV-pushing.-- The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 17:16, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Bus stop
I hardly consider posts such as this and this to represent proper use of Talk page space. I think the editor making those posts, User:רסטיניאק, should remove them. The sentiments expressed in those posts should be disregarded unless expressed in a proper forum, such as this thread that we are in here. Bus stop (talk) 18:07, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Biased editing is not unheard of concerning the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. I think User:Soosim approximately represents their own perception of events not unlike most editors involved in this area of editing. That they were associated with an organization representing their own vews is hardly surprising. No one is going to associate with an organization representing views diametrically opposed to their own. There is a dearth of evidence of edits made without the support of proper sourcing. I don't think the charges of "POV pushing" and failure to uphold WP:NPOV are as substantial as they sound. There are many eyes on the articles falling under the heading of "Israeli–Palestinian conflict". Judging by the grievances expressed on this page one would get the impression User:Soosim did identifiable damage to the project. If that were the case, would there not be edits that have to be undone? There are many eyes on the articles under discussion. More importantly the "Israeli–Palestinian conflict" is an area of unusually high contention. Sources are the mainstay of the project. I am assuming User:Soosim operated within that which was supported by sources because no one is bringing evidence of improper edits. Do we find damaging edits that now have to be undone? Bus stop (talk) 04:08, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Neby
Soosim edited rarely and sporadically until May 2010 when he began to focus on Human Rights Watch and other subjects of NGO Monitor's concerns. In August - September 2010 he was added to the staff page of NGO Monitor's website. This does suggest that he took up a post at NGO Monitor in May 2010 and was added to the staff page after completing a term of probation, and that his editing of articles relating to NGO Monitor's concerns was the product of his position at NGO Monitor and not a mere coincidence of interests. NebY (talk) 11:00, 30 May 2013 (UTC)


 * There is nothing surprising about gravitating to an organization that holds the same understanding that one has of world events. I think this was an innocent coincidence of two pursuits: the individual took up a position at an organization of likeminded individuals. At the same time the individual edited Wikipedia. Barely any attempt was made to conceal that. We all edit in our area of competence and/or interest. All that I see transpiring here is the squashing of one individual's passion for editing in the highly contentious area of the "Israeli–Palestinian conflict." My recommendation is that a warning should be given concerning our important policy of WP:NPOV. I think it should be clear by now that WP:Conflict of interest is a policy that is applicable here but that of course should be be reiterated. Beyond that I see no reason for the indefinite I/P (Israeli/Palestinian) topic ban being suggested by administrators below. Obviously increased scrutiny of User:Soosim's future edits will follow this episode. But beyond that I think the individual's voice is as valid and competent as anyone else's and consequently should be allowed to flourish at this project. Material added by User:Soosim was accompanied by supporting sources. WP:NPOV is achieved by the presentation of balancing material. It is wrongheaded to eliminate from the equation an individual who happens to have interests outside of Wikipedia that coincide with their interests on Wikipedia. It has not been shown that activities on Wikipedia were for personal material gain. The area of the "Israeli–Palestinian conflict" is merely an area of passionate personal interest not unlike the passions and interests brought to this area of editing by many other editors. Bus stop (talk) 11:51, 30 May 2013 (UTC)


 * It seems that Bus stop did not realize the problem that was raised by NebY so here is a clarification: Soosim started editing on WP in March 2008 and has not edited articles related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict until more than two years later, in May 2010, when he started working for NGO Monitor. Even then, he did not develop a special taste for subjects and issues, but followed very tightly the line of Steinberg and NGO Monitor, simply promoting both of them and attacking their NGO rivals. There is an enormous wide range of possibilities to edit articles in the I/P "area" but Soosim became "His Masters Voice" on each and every subject he edited. Therefore, the argument of Bus_Stop is not valid ("the individual took up a position at an organization of likeminded individuals").  During his initial two+ years on WP,  Soosim has shown his ability to edit on other issues, which is probably what should be demanded of him now. I have my doubts about the innocence of some of those edits, as some are clearly for self promotion . The other argument of Bus_Stop, that Soosim used "supporting sources" speaks for itself. Bus-Stop does not suggest that those were RS, or that Soosim's sources were not extremely distorting, because if he had suggested that, this would open a Pandora box of evidence against Soosim.  BTW, family promotion by Soosim is prominent in recent edits and so it is quite clear that Soosim could and should direct his efforts in subjects out of I/P. רסטיניאק (talk) 20:25, 30 May 2013 (UTC)רסטיניאק


 * (ec...mv comment, modified at 13:05, 30 May 2013 (UTC)) Evidence indicates suggests that it is not a mere coincidence of interests. For a specific example of the a sequence of events that resemble an organized NGO Monitor advocacy workflow see Dlv999's data at Talk:NGO_Monitor regarding Joel Peters. I've copied the relevant part below from Dlv999's comment.
 * On March 17 2013 I added some description of NGO Monitor's activities from a published work by the scholar Joel Peters to this article
 * The very next day, March 18, an open letter by Gerald Steinburg, to Joel Peters appears on the NGO-Monitor website challenging Joel Peters, and referencing this Wikipedia page's citation of Peter's work. ("We note that your false allegations in this book have been copied onto the NGO Monitor wikipedia entry, thus further falsifying the record.")
 * Subsequently, the Steinburg response to Joel Peters and Wikipedia citation of the same is dutifully uploaded to our article
 *  Sean.hoyland  - talk 12:02, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Result concerning Soosim
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''
 * Administrators processing this request should take into account Sockpuppet investigations/Soosim. T. Canens (talk) 04:22, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I assume that T. Canens may not be free to tell us more, but it looks like there is enough here to justify an indefinite I/P topic ban for User:Soosim. This is for POV-pushing combined with the coyness about his connection to NGO Monitor, and his abuse of multiple accounts. EdJohnston (talk) 03:00, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Agree with Ed. Enuff already. Killer Chihuahua 11:49, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I'd agree also to an indefinite IP topic ban. I'd add anything related to NGO Monitor, Gerald Steiberg etc whether or not it is I/P related. Soosim's explanation above does not address the key point here: that aggresively pushing a POV with an undisclosed COI is beyond the pale.  To say nothing of hypocricy saying this at  his COIN complaint re Goldblum: "I had asked [Goldblum to please first discuss any edit (except for obvious vandalism, etc as per wiki coi) on the talk page"] while doing precisely the opposite himself.
 * In view of the deception and the abuse of multiple accounts I also suggest restricting him to the Soosim account officially. I haven't seen it done before at AE before, but discretionary sanctions say that we can impose "any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project." Given the high rates of sockpuppetry on IP pages in particular, it might be best to start being upfront and clear about the fact that simply starting up another account isn't an option.Slp1 (talk) 23:58, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I concur with and impose the topic ban, for abusing multiple accounts to edit in the topic area, and promoting their own organization (e.g., ) in violation of WP:COI. There's also likely persistent one-sided editing (making changes only or predominantly in favor of the position of one side of the conflict), in violation of WP:NPOV. Because the topic ban applies to the person and all their accounts, a one-account restriction does not appear to add anything of substance to me, but others are free to impose it. I am also, as a normal administrator action, indefinitely blocking Soosim for the abuse of multiple accounts. So closed,   Sandstein   20:52, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Request concerning Proudbolsahye/Ninetoyadome/Yerevanci

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement : NovaSkola (talk) 18:32, 1 June 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :

This users have been ignoring wikipedia's policies and didn't even want to take participation in talk page and have been section blanking, while removing my relavant and well sourced information in Guba mass grave article, as well as user added very extremist material, which included photo of beheaded man in Ibad Huseynov article.
 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced: ARBAA2


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :


 * 1) Date I am discovering, he may still be under these restrictions, as well. And looking into these past cases more shows thatProudbolsahye/Ninetoyadome/Yerevanci has not changed any behavior of his that were problematic in the other cases. For example,  shows the same problematic behavior.
 * 2) Section blanking by users Proudbolsahye, Ninetoyadome, Yerevanci, without reading the talk guide, despite being warned about it.
 * 3) Furthermore, appearance of all this users has been under suspicion as sudddenly during their activity sockpuppet IPs as seen in this edit has been appeared and involved personal attack on me, which is also against Wikipedia's sockpuppeting policy and WP:No Direct Attack policy.
 * 4) User Yerevanci, added photo of beheaded man from random russian site called radikal.ru in article about Ibad Huseynov as seen in here edit as a reference and from unknown made blog, then involved in personal attack and reverting them and accusing me of wrong doing, by breaking Wikipedia's no direct attack policy.


 * Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required) :


 * 1) Warned on by


 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :


 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :

Discussion concerning Proudbolsahye/Ninetoyadome/Yerevanci
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Statement by Ninetoyadome
NovaSkola has a tendency to remove information, even if it is cited, he does not like. In the article about Ibad Huseynov he kept removing my addition where i stated how this individual, who azerbaijani's claim killed Armenian freedom fighter Monte Melkonian, is a lie and posted information from Azerbaijani sources which back up my statement. he removed it stating it is a lie, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibad_Huseynov. In the Guba Mass grave article i posted information regarding the Armenian side of events, while not removing anything regarding the Azerbaijani side of events, and NovaSkola kept removing it claiming it should not be in the lead. User Yerevanci added it to another section and NovaSkola kept removing it. The user kept adding "sources" which have no mention to Armenia, Azerbaijan or Guba and claims it is evidence. The individual posted Ka Hon Chu, Sandra, and Anne-Marie de Brouwer. "the MEN who KILLED me" as evidence for rape that took place in Guba. The book is about the Rwandan Genocide. The individual posted http://www.icty.org/x/cases/krstic/trans/en/000719it.htm and http://www.icty.org/x/cases/popovic/trans/en/061107ED.htm as evidence to claim Amnesty International stated 3000 people were killed by Armenians, even thought the links are about Yugoslavia and has no single mention of Armenia, Azerbaijan or Guba. The user has no problem with the Azerbaijani side of the Sumgait Pogrom or the Armenian Genocide Denial but when it comes to the other side of events regarding Azerbaijani's he doesnt like it and will remove it. Ninetoyadome (talk) 20:45, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by The Devil's Advocate
Not sure about the rest of the case, but this edit by Ninetoyadome, the last paragraph especially, is just beyond the pale. At the very least a stern warning about POV-pushing is needed for that editor.-- The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 02:54, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

Result concerning Proudbolsahye/Ninetoyadome/Yerevanci
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''

We lack the required diffs of warnings per WP:AC/DS and of notifications of this request for each named user. Also, it is not clear which part of the request relates to which of the three named users, and whether the complainant means to allege that they are sock- or meatpuppets of each other. I will close this rather confusing request without action if all required information is not supplied within one hour of the complainant's next edit, or after 12 hours, whichever is earlier.  Sandstein  20:57, 1 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Right, here's my assessment based on an admittedly cursory review of the ill-presented evidence: The edit warring at merits WP:ARBAA2 warnings for all involved who haven't already got one (i.e., Proudbolsahye and Ninetoyadome), as does the edit by Ninetoyadome identified by The Devil's Advocate. Because of the lack of prior warnings (and notification diffs), no further action can be taken with respect to these two at this point. There are no diffs by Yerevanci in evidence that appear to warrant further action at this point. As to NovaSkola's conduct, they have previously been warned for topic-related edit-warring (31 December 2012), and they have now again engaged in edit-warring (,, , , all on 1 June 2013). On that basis, I'm imposing a six-month topic ban. The complaints by Ninetoyadome about NovaSkola's editing are not specific enough (notably, they are not supported by relevant diffs) to warrant further action. So closed,   Sandstein   05:56, 2 June 2013 (UTC)
 * A correction: I'm omitting the warning for Proudbolsahye because they were not edit-warring at Guba mass grave and there's no evidence that has been submitted that would merit a warning.  Sandstein   06:12, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

Request concerning YourHumanRights

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement : NW ( Talk ) 02:25, 4 June 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :


 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced: Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abortion


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :
 * Talk:Abortion, generally
 * , post-warning


 * Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required) :
 * Warned on 17:16, 3 June 2013 (UTC) by

This keeps coming up on my watchlist, and I have seen plenty of editors whom I respect waste time trying to deal with this editor. I could link to more specific diffs, but honestly you are best served reading the whole discussion yourself. The bottom line is this: YourHumanRights has continuously posted long screeds of medically inaccurate information. This information is politically charged, referenced to insufficiently reputable sources, and continuously ignores reasonable points made by other editors in response to his or her comments. These points are wasting valuable editors' time. The behavior fits WP:TE quite well and should be treated as such. <b style="color:navy;">NW</b> ( Talk ) 02:25, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :
 * YourHumanRights has left a response to this filing on his or her talk page. <b style="color:navy;">NW</b> ( Talk ) 21:53, 4 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :
 * Notification

Discussion concerning YourHumanRights
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Statement by Arkon
The guy has less than 50 edits in 4 years. Awfully Bitey, maybe you should try to help him. The four hours between notification and his last edit to that page don't look great either. Arkon (talk) 02:41, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Beyond My Ken
No one who has been here since 2009 can be considered to be a "newbie", so accusing Nuclear Warfare of WP:BITE is just lame. Anyone looking at this editor's comments can clearly see the problem here. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:27, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by MastCell
Per the ArbCom abortion case: "Article talk pages should not be used by editors as platforms for their personal views on a subject... Although more general discussion may be permissible in some circumstances, it will not be tolerated when it becomes tendentious, overwhelms the page, impedes productive work, or is otherwise disruptive."

meets all of these criteria; his posts to Talk:Abortion are tendentious, overwhelm the page, and impede productive work, as evidenced in this talkpage thread. His typical level of rhetoric:
 * "I am well aware that the likelihood is that those who wish to keep women in the dark about this due to their affinity for abortion on demand will ultimately make this entire thread vanish... In the event that those near the top of the wikipedia pyramid of editors want to use their delete buttons, there will be a detailed record of how this went down that I will be happy to share in the blogosphere."
 * Routinely uses inflammatory, charged rhetoric: talks about "the philosophical backflips that must be done in order to defend the violence of dismemberment in uetro." Goes on to describe abortion as "a violent and bloody [procedure] that always results in at least one dead body to dispose of." Proceeds to fulminate about evil "abortionists", the Nazi doctors, and a medical/academic conspiracy to cover up the purported harms of abortion.

This is clearly the sort of talk-page abuse that ArbCom called out as inappropriate. Speaking from experience, it is impossible to have a serious discussion about how to cover a controversial topic when a strident, ideologically motivated agenda account monopolizes the talkpage with inflammatory rhetoric. I understand that in practice, editors are permitted virtually limitless scope to abuse talkpages, so I'm not anticipating much here. But I do think that if we take the talk-page guidelines seriously, then editors like this should be topic-banned.

To address Arkon's point, while this editor has made only about 50 edits, virtually every one of those 50 demonstrates that he's totally unsuited to a serious, productive discussion on the coverage of a politically and emotionally charged topic. Do we wait till he hits 100 inappropriate edits? 200? What's the cut-off before we can enjoy a serious, productive discussion? MastCell Talk 18:19, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved A Quest for Knowledge
I've reviewed most of the edits made by YourHumanRights. YourHumanRights is a near WP:SPA. Virtually every single edit they make promotes a particular POV regarding this topic, and needs to be reverted or fixed by other editors. In fact, I had trouble finding a single good edit. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:08, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by mostly uninvolved Roscelese
(Note: I haven't interacted with YHR on Talk:Abortion, the page under question, though I have edited that page and talkpage in the past and interacted with the user elsewhere.) I basically second what other people have said: the user's an obvious single-purpose account trying to use Wikipedia to promote a political agenda, and the fact that s/he has decided to make AE another soapbox rather than responding to the behavioral concerns is indicative of what we're dealing with here. –Roscelese (talk &sdot; contribs) 02:06, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by YourHumanRights
Throughout this page and the actual abortion talk page itself, numerous editors just keep reposting that the sources and studies I have referenced are flawed and unreliable - yet not a single one has yet offered up a single study themselves to refute any of it. Does anyone here know what a meta-analysis is? Does anyone know what the purpose of a SYSTEMATIC REVIEW of peer reviewed, published scientific studies is? For the sake of those coming across this page in particular, here are a few more examples of the folks whose conclusions must be entirely invalid and irrelevant to all those attacking us for daring to repeat them.

"Expert opinion has openly acknowledged that the evidence demonstrates the association of abortion with preterm birth. Dr. Jay Iams, maternal fetal medicine specialist, world renowned authority on prematurity and IOM Preterm Birth Committee member, stated in 2010:

'Contrary to common belief, populationbased studies have found that elective pregnancy terminations in the first and second trimesters are associated with a very small but apparently real increase in the risk of subsequent spontaneous preterm birth.17'

Dr. Phil Steer, Editor of the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, commenting on the 2009 Shah study editorialized:

'A key finding is that compared to women with no history of termination, even allowing for the expected higher incidence of socio-economic disadvantage, women with just one TOP (termination of pregnancy) had an increased odds of subsequent preterm birth. We have known for a long time that repeated terminations predispose to early delivery in a subsequent pregnancy. However the finding that even one termination can increase the risk of preterm birth means that we should continue to search for ways of making termination less traumatic.18'"

http://www.ncfpc.org/FNC/1305-FNC-Spring13-Abortion%27sImpactOnPrematurity2.pdf

YourHumanRights (talk) 22:26, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by BullRangifer
Nothing but personal attacks, failures to assume good faith, trying to save the world, and treating Wikipedia as a battlefield to further a personal agenda.

The battlefield for this editor has enlarged from abortion to Declaration of Geneva and Preterm birth. Talk pages are seriously abused, so talk pages should also be off-limits. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:57, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

Result concerning YourHumanRights
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''
 * The editor's voluminous postings at Talk:Abortion make the case for us to review here. My suggestion is an indefinite ban from the topic of abortion, broadly construed, on all pages of Wikipedia. His strongly held adherence to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS will make it difficult for this editor to make any neutral contributions to this subject. We often tolerate people with unusual views if they are willing to negotiate patiently from a base of reliable sources and will recognize when the evidence is against them. The chance of this editor listening to anyone else here seems minimal. EdJohnston (talk) 19:41, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Seconded. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:05, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Concur with the above. --Lord Roem ~ (talk) 20:43, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
 * I was initially reluctant to concur with the above assessments, because imposing a topic ban can create the incorrect impression that we are sanctioning people merely for the opinions they express on talk pages (in this case, strongly opposed to abortion, as far as I can tell). I am not qualified to comment on the merits of the arguments related to medical science advanced by YourHumanRights, nor do I think I ought to. However, on further review, I agree that the talk page conduct of YourHumanRights (quite independently of their views on the merits) is unconstructive, in that it consists of very long and difficult-to-understand texts, and that moreover it appears to be tendentious editing (in that it stridently advocates changing articles in favor of a particular, and possibly not exactly mainstream, point of view). Also there are recent edits such as and, where YourHumanRights denigrates others as "Nazis" and "Holocaust deniers", in connection with the dispute about abortion. That, in and of itself, justifies the topic ban. That ban is therefore imposed, with the clarifying proviso that it also encompasses the page Declaration of Geneva and other pages similarly related to the topic of abortion.   Sandstein   14:49, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

TheShadowCrow
''This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below. Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.''

Request concerning TheShadowCrow

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement : Grand  master  20:41, 6 June 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :


 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced: ARBAA2


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :


 * Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required) :


 * 1) Topic banned indefinitely on October 28, 2012 by
 * 2) Topic banned for 3 months on April 11, 2013 by

Something is clearly wrong here. TheShadowCrow has a long history of disruptive editing in AA area, for which he was indef topic banned in October 2012. As is clear from this thread at WP:ANI, he ignored his topic ban and continued editing the AA area in the same manner as before, for which he was again banned, this time for 3 months. Apparently, the admins at ANI were not aware of TheShadowCrow's previous ban, which was logged here:. In my understanding, violation of a topic ban should result in a block. Also note that TheShadowCrow was blocked in December 2012 for ban evasion: I presume that TheShadowCrow's posting in an ongoing discussion at WP:ANI may also violate his topic ban:   Grand  master  20:41, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :

Also, TheShadowCrow twice appealed his more recent ban, never mentioning his indef ban: Administrators' noticeboard/Archive248 / Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive249. The ban was appealed once more by another user on TheShadowCrow's behalf: Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive249. As I understand, this user was not aware of the TheShadowCrow's indef ban. Grand master  22:20, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

@CT Cooper. Thanks for clarifying the situation. I was under the impression that a ban from AA topics would mean a ban from anything related to Armenia and Azerbaijan. Grand master  20:22, 7 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :

Discussion concerning TheShadowCrow
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Statement by CT Cooper
I have stayed out of recent discussions related to TheShadowCrow both out of personal choice and the belief that other admins were handling the issue well enough. I didn't give much thought to the new ban, but I now see that there is the potential for confusion. As far as I'm aware, the ban I imposed under WP:AA2 is narrower than the community ban implemented by the King of Hearts. The AA2 ban only covers content covering Armenia-Azerbaijan and related ethnic disputes, while the community ban covers all content related to Armenia regardless of its nature and is also separately banned from editing all biographies of living persons. I remember informing TheShadowCrow that under the AA2 ban it was okay to continue editing articles on Armenian sportsmen and woman, as long as the content being edited wasn't related to ethnic disputes. I did consider banning the TheShadowCrow from all BLPs with WP:BLPSE given some highly problematic editing which clearly, in the end, lead to this community ban instead.

At present, I don't see any reason to lift the AA2 ban nor any community consensus to do so, so for the moment it will concurrently with the community ban and it will continue to apply after the three months have elapsed. CT Cooper · &#32;talk 16:22, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

Result concerning TheShadowCrow
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''

Arbitration enforcement appeal by NovaSkola

 * Appealing user : – NovaSkola (talk) 00:13, 4 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Sanction being appealed : 6 month topic ban from the subject of Azerbaijan-Armenia relations, imposed at few days ago


 * Administrator imposing the sanction :


 * Notification of that administrator : The appealing editor is asked to notify the administrator who made the enforcement action of this appeal, and then to replace this text with a diff of that notification. The appeal may not be processed otherwise. If a block is appealed, the editor moving the appeal to this board should make the notification.

Statement by NovaSkola
Hello, I've been user in Wikipedia long time ago, made over 20,000 contributions and never been given topic ban until few days ago, someone violated my IP and wrote some nonsense and as a result I've been topic banned for editing Azerbaijan-Armenia related articles, even though it wasn't completely my fault. Furthermore, looks like nobody given my account three-revert rule blocks

I've demand to unblock me on charges of that 99% of my edits been trouble free, I've understand that in future I've take responsibility from my account as well as I will follow Wikipedia's guideline to make better community. Furthermore, 6 month ban for this looks extremely harsh. Especially basing on fact that I wasn't rude to admin or anybody--NovaSkola (talk) 00:13, 4 June 2013 (UTC) - Statement updated per user's talk page. EdJohnston (talk) 13:10, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Furthermore, I never vandalised any sport articles, my ban should be lifted from editing Azerbaijani related sport articles. In fact, before me that articles looked very poor, I've contributed a lot to that articles and want to develop further. You can check all article's history like Sumgayit FK, Ravan Baku FK and etc. I'm also worried that articles will get vandalised by unknown IP's which happens a lot.--NovaSkola (talk) 04:11, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Moreover, now user:Yerevanci and user:Ninetoyadome cooperating to ban me in here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#Personal_attacks

I also would like to ask admins take a look to this:
 * user:Ninetoyadome asked to help user:Yerevanci to punish me in here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Yerevanci#NovaSkola by creating lobbyist group to ban me. Why 2 users work together to work against me? Admin user:Sandstein already warned Yerevanci here who have more warning than me and trying to accuse me as seen in here such as User:Yerevanci/Artagaght that if he keeps continuing violating laws, he will get topic banned. As seen here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Yerevanci#Topic_ban_warning

Admin User:Future Perfect at Sunrise also warned Yerevanci in here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Yerevanci#Copy-and-paste_moves so he stops damaging articles about Turkish Diplomats.

So looks like user Yerevanci have far worth reputation than me in here, and now by cooperating with NineToyadome accusing me of wrong doing --NovaSkola (talk) 05:06, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
 * I asked him if he could help me as you were just reverting my edits for no reason. He declined and so it ended there. The next thing i know is you reported me. If you look at the Ibad Huseynov page now Grandmaster removed a section but stated why. I am currently talking with him trying to figure out which source will work. I said nothing wrong when i stated Azerbaijani's call Ibad Huseynov a hero. http://www.azerbaijans.com/content_420_en.html states that he is a national hero of Azerbaijan. Ninetoyadome (talk) 05:33, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
 * As I've noticed you've been also warned about cooperation. That doesn't mean you have to add photo of beheaded person and you've been in Wikipedia long enough to know this delicate procedures. Two wrongs don't make a right--NovaSkola (talk) 05:44, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Sandstein
Contrary to NovaSkola's statement of appeal, they were not blocked for any edits made as an IP, but for edit-warring while logged in as NovaSkola, as discussed in the AE thread that led to the sanction. If by "violated my IP" NovaSkola means to say that control of their account was hijacked by third parties, then the account should be blocked indefinitely as compromised. Consequently, I see no grounds for granting the appeal, and recommend declining it. I have also been seized by an appeal per e-mail in which NovaSkola asks to exclude sports topics from the topic ban. I leave the decision about this to the administrators reviewing this appeal; in principle this exemption could be granted, but considering this appeal I am not sure that NovaSkola is capable of understanding the reason for (and boundaries of) their ban, which would be an argument against granting the exemption.  Sandstein  12:05, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Sandstein, please look at this edit by Ninetoyadome in Ibad Huseynov article which includes this reference (Azerbaijani's praise Ibad as a national hero for beheading an Armenian http://s019.radikal.ru/i625/1209/1a/22ed7caf3771.jpg) this completely extremist material, which includes beheading photo and user Ninetoyadome by knowing it deliberately added and I've removed it cuz nobody want to see photo of beheaded random guy from random blog site as a reference. --NovaSkola (talk) 03:57, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
 * The only reason i added the picture was because you kept deleting my quote where the Azerbaijani general said Huseynov did not kill Monte. You kept removing it and re-adding the part where it claimed he killed Monte. Here is contact.az, an Azerbaijani website 1.) showing the picture, 2.) saying Huseynov did not kill Monte and 3.)in the article they talk about the picture and how its not Monte. You can keep claiming whatever you want but the evidence is against you. The only reason you kept deleting my posts and the pictures, which i have no problem with them being removed, is because you don't want to hear the other side of events and this is proven again in the Guba Mass Grave article. If i were to remove the conspiracy theories section in the Sumgait Pogroms article i know for a fact you would revert it and call it vandalism and then report me. Ninetoyadome (talk) 05:56, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
 * You've been long enough in Wikipedia to know what is right, what's wrong. So I guess in your logic, it is great when I will get punished for my deeds but you never talk about that extremist material that you've added which could harm and bring trauma to children's mind.--NovaSkola (talk) 06:11, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Proudbolsahye
Your topic ban is solely due to your edit-warring. Your disruption and as to what you were exactly edit-warring over was not even considered in the WP:AE process. This would mean that you received a six month topic ban in the least and escaped with anything more than that.

P.S. You could've warned us earlier about your IP address problems (if that were the actual case that is). Besides, your contributions and edits seem to be consistent and similar for the past month in the least. Proudbolsahye (talk) 02:20, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Please don't use personal no attacks. I wasn't aware someone used my IP account and no need to harass me with direct attacks. --NovaSkola (talk) 04:03, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by NovaSkola
Evidence: Also, this is not the first time NovaSkola has edited at Guba mass grave.10 June 2011;4 November 2011‎;6 November 2011‎ Judging from the evidence, I highly doubt anyone "hijacked"/"violated" NovaSkola's IP. The edits on June 1 mirror his edit history. --Kansas Bear (talk) 05:24, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * NovaSkola's statement, "someone violated my IP and wrote some nonsense", appears to be a bit far-fetched. IF his IP was violated from 01:17, 1 June 2013 till 22:06, 1 June 2013, then this supposed "other" person knew quite a bit about Wikipedia and its inner workings.
 * 1. 16:59, 1 June 2013:Created a new Category for Azerbaijani football(an area which NovaSkola edits heavily)
 * 2. From 17:00, 1 June 2013 - 17:05, 1 June 2013:More edits to Azerbaijani football
 * 3. 17:37, 1 June 2013:Files a Sockpuppet investigation on Yerevanci and Proudbolsahye.
 * 4. 17:41, 1 June 2013:Requests page protection for Guba mass grave
 * 5. 17:49, 1 June 2013:Files at Administrator intervention against vandalism against Yerevanci
 * 6. 17:53, 1 June 2013:Posts on Grandmaster's talk page.
 * 7. 18:07, 1 June 2013:Files another vandalism complaint against an IP
 * 8. 18:10, 1 June 2013:Files for Page protection for Guba mass grave
 * 9. 18:32, 1 June 2013:Files for Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement against Proudbolsahye/Ninetoyadome/Yerevanci
 * 10. 20:03, 1 June 2013:Edited an Azerbaijani footballer, Elhad Naziri.


 * Is NovaSkola banned from editing everything Azerbaijan related, or he can edit articles related to sports and other topics, not related to AA conflict? His recent block was for editing a sport related article. Grand  master  20:22, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

Result of the appeal by NovaSkola

 * This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.


 * I would decline this appeal. NovaSkola's edit warring at Guba mass grave looks to be enough to justify the six-month topic ban that Sandstein issued. Warring to delete the Armenian government's own statement about the mass grave is hard to understand or justify, when it is claimed that the massacre was done by Armenians. If Sandstein wants to allow NovaSkola to do editing on Azerbaijani football topics I have no objection. EdJohnston (talk) 13:28, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Indeed, the edit warring is sufficient for a topic ban. I do not object to allowing a sport exemption. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 12:14, 5 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Would also decline the appeal, per Heimstern. --Lord Roem ~ (talk) 20:48, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Closing. NovaSkola should ask Sandstein regarding an exemption for edits about Azerbaijani sportsmen. EdJohnston (talk) 15:34, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Request concerning GHcool

 * User who is submitting this request for enforcement : RolandR (talk) 20:10, 9 June 2013 (UTC)


 * User against whom enforcement is requested :


 * Sanction or remedy to be enforced: ARBPIA


 * Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it :


 * 1) 07:37, 9 June 2013 Reversion of this edit
 * 2) 19:11, 9 June 2013‎ Reversion of this edit


 * Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required) :


 * 1) Notified on 10 January 2011] by
 * 2) Warned on 17:16, 3 June 2013‎ by
 * 3) Warned on 19:25, 9 June 2013‎ by

Editor has previously been blocked twice for breach of 1RR, as well as several further blocks for edit warring. They have explicitly refused a request to self-revert; the argument that these edits were not in breach of the ARBPIA sanctions, since the reversions were to different sections, is hard to accept, given this editor's long history of editing in this field, and their previous blocks for breach of 1RR.
 * Additional comments by editor filing complaint :
 * And see also my earlier request to this editor to self-revert, after s/he repeatedly added the same contentious material to the article. On that occasion, GHcool self-reverted, with a snarky edit summary. This editor has been given plenty of warnings, good faith, leeway and explanations. RolandR (talk) 01:20, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Sandstein asks below for the original source that GHcool allegedly misrepresented. In addition to the example discussed by Sepsis II, Dlv999 gives a diff with no discussion. The diff is this one, where GHcool adds a ref to the statement "Several prominent individuals, organizations, and scholars writing on the subject of antisemitism categorize the BDS movement as antisemitic". The ref he adds is Jeremy Ben-Ami, in "A New Voice for Israel: Fighting for the Survival of the Jewish Nation." However, following the link given by GHcool, it can be seen that what Ben-Ami actually writes is "Those rallying around BDS tactics hold a variety of specific views and positions. Some involved in the BDS movement are vehemently anti-Israel and deny its right to exist. Some of the rhetoric used by BDS activists is taken by the Jewish community as anti-Semitic. But many of the activists are simply protesting Israeli policies related to the Palestinians, and would certainly support lsrael’s right to exist in peace and security alongside a Palestinian state. The Israeli government and many of the lsrael-right-or-wrong activists in the United States, however, refuse to make any distinctions among these different positions." Thus, Ben-Ami explicitly does not categorise BDS as antisemitic, and it is misleading to add his name in an attempt to lend his reputation to the allegation. The diff was reverted a couple of hours later by Malik Shabazz, with the edit summary "please read what Ben-Ami wrote more carefully". This is not an isolated example, but part of an apparent pattern of misleading citations, suggesting that GHcool needs to use much greater care in presenting sources which purportedly support his point of view. RolandR (talk) 16:15, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Here
 * Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested :

Discussion concerning GHcool
''Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.''

Statement by GHcool
I self reverted. --GHcool (talk) 03:49, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Regarding this edit, I can see how some editors might think that I was attempting to put words into Ben-Ami's mouth. I was not, but I should have been more careful with my edits.  My intent was to cite a source who is critical of Israel's policies (Ben-Ami) on the fact that there are those in the Jewish community who believe the rhetoric of BDS is anti-Semitic.  I did not mean to imply that Ben-Ami considers BDS anti-Semitic.  I apologize for the misunderstanding and have not edit-warred on the Ben-Ami issue.  --GHcool (talk) 18:47, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by User:Bus stop
It is beyond reasonable that Dlv999 and RolandR are repeatedly removing the opinions of reliable sources such as the Anti-Defamation League on the presence or absence of antisemitism. The argument they are making is that the "Anti-Defamation League" is an "advocacy source". Whether or not this is so, need not be addressed in this discussion. Under consideration in this discussion is whether or not the pointing out antisemitism constitutes advocacy. It does not. There is nothing being advocated for. It is a statement of opinion, and it can be countered by other opinions. Therefore I think the burden is on Dlv999 and RolandR to find those counterbalancing opinions in reliable sources. I think we are trying to achieve WP:NPOV but that is not necessarily accomplished by removing sources in the absence of serious flaws in those sources. Bus stop (talk) 21:13, 9 June 2013 (UTC)
 * We are not discussing content here, but user behaviour. GHcool has (not for the first time) breached 1RR; it is no excuse to say"but he was right", particularly as the material he was attempting to afdd appears to have been removed, in whole or in part, by at least five other editors in the past week. RolandR (talk) 22:42, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Dlv999
Over the last week I have been actively editing the article, the editor's approach to the page is basically this: add material from self published advocacy sources (e.g. NGO Monitor, AJC, Simon Wisenthal centre, ADL, Bat Yo'er) from one perspective (pro-Israel). Delete reliably sourced material from academic sources from the opposite perspective. Ignores the 1rr restrictions for articles in the IP topic area. Here is a selection of edits from the last week:


 * Adding self published advocacy material making claims about third parties:
 * Misrepresenting sources:
 * Deleting material cited to academic sources:
 * WP:OR (adding material from sources unrelated to the article topic):
 * Violating 1rr prior to the diffs presented by RRoland:
 * 1)
 * 2) ,

I would also like to say that the article was largely written by the now banned WP:ADVOCATE user:Soosim. Last week user:Sean.hoyland stated that: "I should add that I don't think it will be possible to make the article comply with policy and I don't think it will be possible to resolve content disputes through discussion. It's one of the articles I think Wikipedia shouldn't try to host at the moment because of the poor state of editing in the ARBPIA topic area. I think the article should just be left to those who feel compelled to exploit Wikipedia for advocacy and eventually perhaps it could be moved to a new title like Criticism of BDS. If people want information about BDS itself, it's better for them to go elsewhere. If they want to know about criticism of BDS they can come to Wikipedia." I find his assessment quite correct, but saying that we are just going to give up and leave the article to WP:ADVOCATE editors is not acceptable to me. Admins need to consider the nature of editor's contributions, not only the rate at which editors have reverted material. Dlv999 (talk) 07:43, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Preliminary comment by uninvolved A Quest for Knowledge
I haven't had a chance to take a thorough look through the page history, but there appears to be a group edit war on this article. For example, the sentence beginning with "NGO Monitor states that by singling out Israel explicitly..." has been removed, added, removed, added and removed today. Just as 3RR is not an entitlement, neither is 1RR. During this time, there doesn't seem to be any discussion on the article talk page about this dispute. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:41, 9 June 2013 (UTC)
 * The issue has been discussed extensively, at Is bds antisemitic?, Rfc: Antisemitic boycotts category and Bat Ye'or as academic source. RolandR (talk) 01:08, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Cla68
RolandR has also edit-warred in the article. I would suggest that the responding admins here check the page history and topic ban everyone who has reverted a non-vandalism edit made by anyone else within the last month that didn't have talk page consensus for the revert. Cla68 (talk) 01:49, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Those two edits are nearly a week apart. It's really scraping the barrel to offer them as evidence of "edit-warring"! RolandR (talk) 07:37, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
 * And as it happens, there WAS talk page consensus for this reversion, with the editor who I reverted himself conceding that I was right. RolandR (talk) 09:22, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
 * You reverted him before he admitted you were right. If you had talked about it on the talk page and he had then admitted you were right, and then you removed it, then it wouldn't have been edit warring and there wouldn't be a problem. Cla68 (talk) 10:16, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
 * This seems to be a fairly odd line of argument that you are taking and I am not aware that this is common practice or written in any Wikipedia policies. If someone adds unsourced POV material to the encyclopaedia (as Ghcool did) then it can (and should) be removed immediately without discussion (as RRoland did in the first diff you cite). It is then up to the editor who wants to include the new material to gain consensus - this never materialised. Dlv999 (talk) 15:44, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
 * His reverts were to "See also" links. See also links do not require citations.  So yes, they were revert warring.  To be fair, he wasn't the only one revert warring.  The article history shows several people revert warring with each other.  I recommend that all of them be given long topic bans. Cla68 (talk) 00:35, 11 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Removing a link six days after first removing it, following discussion on the talk page, hardly constitutes edit-warring. And when the editor reverted subsequently accepts that I was correct to do so, this surely cannot be considered worthy of any sanction. RolandR (talk) 08:14, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

Continued unacceptable behaviour
GHcool is also engaging in misrepresenting sources. In this edit GHcool cuts down the statement by Fischer from "'It is certainly true that anti-Semitism fuels the BDS movement. But most of the fuel — and the greatest problem for Western defenders of Israel — is the occupation, its settlements and the ugliness it often brings. That is why, for example, one of the powerful voices at the Berkeley BDS meeting for the proposal was that of an Israeli graduate student who had fought with the IDF in Lebanon. The hard-core may stop up their ears, shut their eyes and yell “anti-Semite” as loud as they can...'"

to simply "It is certainly true that anti-Semitism fuels the BDS movement." When confronted he adds this, notable cutting out Fischer's disagreement with those who "yell anti-semite" and refering in wikipedia's voice to the half quote as a "truth".

He is also using his user page as a soapbox for highly offensive propaganda. Sepsis II (talk) 18:38, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Tippy Goomba
EdJohnston states below that
 * Recently he made an edit there ... he now seems to be listening to others on the talk page

In fact, the edit given is a fine example of the edit warring and ignoring consensus we're discussing. We discussed this issue of the second half of that particular edit here and did not come to an agreement regarding the relevance of his Foxman inclusion, when GHcool failed to respond to the issue of lack of secondary sources. TippyGoomba (talk) 01:24, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Result concerning GHcool
''This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.''

In his edits at Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, GHcool can easily be viewed as a warrior for one side of the dispute. Recently he made an edit there which seem to repair obviously-slanted prose which he had previously added. Since he now seems to be listening to others on the talk page I would not propose taking action just now. EdJohnston (talk) 18:37, 14 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes, the editing climate is problematic, but I don't see an obvious and easy solution, except perhaps by rolling back to a more or less stable version and imposing full protection for a time, thereby requiring all edits to have consensus. Dlv999 alleges that GHcool has been misrepresenting sources, but I don't see how exactly. Dlv999, could you please explain? What is the text of the original source that is allegedly misrepresented?  Sandstein   15:13, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
 * The above comment by User:RolandR at 16:15, 16 June 2013 persuades me that User:GHcool has indeed misrepresented the contents of at least one source. When I add that to his warrior-like and one-sided editing on this article I believe there is enough of a problem to justify a six-month I/P topic ban. EdJohnston (talk) 16:39, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Thanks for providing the text, for some reason Google didn't allow me to preview the book.  Sandstein   18:49, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Closing. User:GHcool is banned for six months from the topic of the I/P conflict on all pages of Wikipedia including talk. EdJohnston (talk) 17:48, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Arbitration enforcement action appeal by Mooretwin
''Procedural notes: The rules governing arbitration enforcement appeals are found here. According to the procedures, a "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved editors" is required to overturn an arbitration enforcement action. To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).''


 * Appealing user : – Mooretwin (talk) 10:24, 12 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Sanction being appealed : Indefinite topic ban on articles, discussions, and other content related to The Troubles, the Ulster banner and British baronets, imposed at 1. The decision allowed for an appeal after six months and six-monthly thereafter. The decision was imposed on 10 February 2012, therefore six months passed on 10 August 2012, twelve months passed on 10 February 2013 and the ban has now been in place and complied with for sixteen months.


 * Administrator imposing the sanction :


 * Notification of that administrator : [Here]''

Statement by Mooretwin
I have abided by the topic ban for sixteen months, and I would like it to be lifted. I have demonstrated restraint in this period and I have learned my lesson about making frivolous and retaliatory complaints against other editors. The incident that led to the ban was "in the heat of the moment" and will not be repeated. Prior to the incident in question, I had successfully managed to avoid confrontation, edit wars, etc., for a period of two years. I've continued to edit constructively during the sixteen months, creating articles and adding content to the encyclopaedia. It is not possible for me to demonstrate collaboration, however, as I am banned from the articles about which I have sufficient knowledge to contribute and which attract a sufficient number of other editors to allow for collaboration.
 * Re the comments about a lack of collegial editing, please see above: "It is not possible for me to demonstrate collaboration, however, as I am banned from the articles about which I have sufficient knowledge to contribute and which attract a sufficient number of other editors to allow for collaboration." Mooretwin (talk) 23:20, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
 * @Cailil - could you show me where the topic ban expressly says that its purpose is to allow a banned user to learn how to edit collegially outside the circumscribed area? Also, you queried the notion that my reporting of Domer48 was in the heat of the moment - what I meant was that it was done under extreme provocation and frustration by an editor who had a long history of bullying me, backed up by a number of like-minded colleagues. That editor and his colleagues have gone now, so the prospect of further provocation is gone and hence the prospect of me being drawn into further disputes is radically reduced. Mooretwin (talk) 09:54, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
 * @Cailil - OK, how about keeping the topic ban in place in respect of editing articles, but allowing me to participate in Talk page discussions. That should allow me to demonstrate constructive and productive participation with no danger of edit warring or the like. Mooretwin (talk) 11:39, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
 * It seems there's a determination to be punitive here. Very unhelpful and disappointing. What is the risk to the encyclopaedia in allowing me to participate in discussions? Mooretwin (talk) 22:41, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by T. Canens
Unfortunately I won't be able to comment substantively on this appeal, so I'll defer to my fellow admins to decide whether the topic ban should be lifted. T. Canens (talk) 22:19, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Flexdream
I was involved in the original case when Mooretwin was suspended so I think I can comment here. I am puzzled why any admin would not want to let Mooretwin extend his contributions to Troubles articles. In my opinion the trouble with the Troubles editing was not with Mooretwin. Mooretwin was faced with a group of implacably hostile editors with a history of readily resorting to AE disputes to oppose other editors. Since that group has been inactive I am not aware of any problems or AE disputes in relation to Troubles articles - absolutely none whatsoever to the best of my knowledge. Cailil wanted to block me also, but was overruled. I have continued to edit but now without any contention or antagonism. I never was an agressive or partisan editor and I've not changed. Have a look at my edit history if you want to see. But previously most edits I made on Troubles articles were quickly blocked by one of the hostile group, and I can give examples of their unreasonable behaviour if that would help. In fact the only reverts I have had have been on non Troubles topics. Why not give Mooretwin another chance? Extending his topic ban is merely punitive without merit. Does anyone seriously expect him to misbehave? --Flexdream (talk) 20:45, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
 * @EdJohnston - You say Mooretwin "has a long history of blocks" and helpfully provide a link. The link shows the last block as being a 2 week block in 2012-02-09, some 16 months ago, and the previous block being for 1 week in 2010-02-09, some 3 years and 4 months ago. Am I missing something? Doesn't the block log demonstrate an improvement in behaviour, and a long period without being blocked? Isn't it cause for some leniency and wisdom to be applied now? Why wait another 6 months to continue the topic ban on Mooretwin. Why not accept them at face value and give them a trial? What's the benefit to Wikipedia in continuing their topic ban. Is it to make a point? --Flexdream (talk) 21:58, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Result of the appeal by Mooretwin

 * This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.

Because the request does not allege that the ban was imposed in error, the decision about whether or not to lift it should be left to the administrator who imposed it, because he is likely most familiar with the case history. As the resounding silence in response to this appeal indicates, it is likely that few other volunteers are willing to spend the time to examine the original case and the appellant's subsequent editing history in detail.  Sandstein  12:38, 15 June 2013 (UTC)


 * I largely agree with Sandstein that it's up to T Canens, but some factual description of how Mooretwin actually came to be sanctioned is necessary. The boomeranged AE thread he links to was the third instance of misbehaviour in a short period of time (the second being a 'marginal breach' of 1RR and the first being a misuse of AE in Feb 2012 - see block log below). I personally find it incredible for Mooretwin to describe his action of filing a retaliatory AE thread (something he threatened to do 12 hours previously) as "heat of the moment". This was a straight forward case of WP:BATTLE, and if we look at the block-log this account has a string of blocks and bans from WP:TROUBLES going back to 2008 - his best period of editing has been the last 16 months, if that shows anything it's that this user and this site are doing well with the ban in place. That said Mooretwin has not had any trouble for 16 months - if there was evidence of collegial editing especially with people he disagreed with I'd be more inclined to suggest/support lifing the ban, at least on a probationary basis-- Cailil  talk 15:11, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
 * For claity the reason I'm asking for "evidence of collegial editing" (i.e productive discussion ending in consensus) is becuase I can't find any in the last 16 months. The bulk of Mooretin's talk page contribs are "Mooretwin moved page" and the 2 instances of actual discussion (back and forth comments between Mooretwinand others) that I've found, at Talk:Newport County A.F.C. and Talk:Rangers F.C., are not especially convincing of a change in attitude, but perhaps I've missed something-- Cailil  talk 16:19, 15 June 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree with Cailil's assessment. If T. Canens had an opinion to offer we should certainly be listening, but since he is now an arbitrator he may have other demands on his time. Per Cailil the evidence of any collegial discussion is very thin, and I would decline to lift Mooretwin's ban this time around. Would be willing to reconsider in six months. Somebody like Mooretwin who has a long history of blocks should anticipate that it takes strong evidence of better behavior for him to get the ban lifted. EdJohnston (talk) 02:45, 16 June 2013 (UTC)


 * @MooreTwin - the express purpose of a topic ban is to allow a banned user to learn how to edit collegially outside the circumscribed area. An indefinite ban cannot be waited out - it is not a time based ban. It will be lifted as soon as you demonstrate that it is no longer necessary, and you will do so by editing productively and collegially in other topic areas, of which there are literally millions. And as a point of information, any interactions will need to be better than those at Talk:Newport County A.F.C. in order for this restriction to be lifted. If there are no further comments from uninvolved sysops I'll close this as declined around in 48 hours time-- Cailil  talk 01:49, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
 * A good elucidation of how topic bans may be reviewed and lifted is here but WP:BAN and WP:RESTRICT are good reading for the imposition side-- Cailil  talk 11:32, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
 * This isn't a negotiation. Again there are literally millions of articles you CAN edit and thus demonstrate that this ban is no longer necessary. Do that and appeal in 6 months time. That is my final comment on this-- Cailil  talk 12:48, 17 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Closing as declined-- Cailil  talk 22:06, 18 June 2013 (UTC)