Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Climate change dispute 2/Evidence

Anyone, whether directly involved or not, may add evidence to this page. Please make a header for your evidence and sign your comments with your name.

When placing evidence here, please be considerate of the arbitrators and be concise. Long, rambling, or stream-of-conciousness rants are not helpful.

As such, it is extremely important that you use the prescribed format. Submitted evidence should include a link to the actual page diff; links to the page itself are not sufficient. For example, to cite the edit by Mennonot to the article Anomalous phenomenon adding a link to Hundredth Monkey use this form:.

This page is not for general discussion - for that, see talk page.

Please make a section for your evidence and add evidence only in your own section. Please limit your evidence to a maximum 1000 words and 100 diffs, a much shorter, concise presentation is more likely to be effective. Please focus on the issues raised in the complaint and answer and on diffs which illustrate behavior which relates to the issues.

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Evidence presented by William M. Connolley
This re-opening has two features: SEWs behaviour, and my parole.

SEWs behaviour
SEWs behaviour has been RFC'd Requests_for_comment/SEWilco: he has had plenty of time to respond there but hasn't; the consensus there is that his behaviour is wrong; nonetheless it continues. SEW has been spamming 3RR with stale reports (details at the RFC). He has persisted in this quite unreasonably, despite numerous warnings to stop, until finally being blocked for it. Even now, despite all, he doesn't seem to get it.

All this was linked to SEWs desire to insert his pet reference format into articles where others (especially me, but not just me) didn't want it. SEW was using his "3RR campaign" to try to get me banned so he could force through his changes. SEWs attachment to his pet format is unreasonably strong: he refuses to consider anyone elses preferences and all his "talk" on it goes nowhere.

Further, although SEW has been insistent to the point of mania on "enforcing the will of the arbcomm", the will of the arbcomm is far from clear: we discussed this at RFA talk but came to no consensus: more importantly, the arbcomm chose not to speak: which I interpreted to mean that my "I discuss on the talk pages where this is useful, and use edit summaries where that suffices. Anything more would be unreasonably burdensome." was considered reasonable.

My Parole
My arbcomm parole was, I believe:


 * Due to a long history of reverting, often without giving adequate explanation for the reverts, William M. Connolley is hereby prohibited for six months from reverting any article relating to climate change more than once per 24 hour period (vandalism excepted). Each such revert must be backed up by a talk page comment where a reputable source is cited or asked for as appropriate (see #Relative value of references). ... Determining ... what is a 'reputable source' is left up to the discretion of the blocking administrator (who should follow the guidance at #Relative value of references).

I note the must be backed up by a talk page comment where a reputable source is cited or asked for as appropriate. This clearly refers to providing scientific references. It cannot apply, e.g., to deciding the format of references on a page. Nor can it apply to removing quasi-vandalism: I was blocked for this ; I don't quite see how references can be provided for that. So I think the arbcomm need to clarify their judgement.

More, I would like the arbcomm to reconsider their decision. IMHO it was a long case, they got bored and wanted to finish it off. The arbcomm found as fact:


 * William M. Connolley often reverts edits which he considers poorly referenced or which in his opinion use a heavily-biased or otherwise inadequate reference (such as citing what a popular writer said about a global warming-related topic instead of a panel of scientists in the relevant field).
 * William M. Connolley is widely viewed in Wikipedia as being highly knowledgeable in the field he is writing about.

I have no complaints about that, of course. What I do complain about was my parole, which came from apparently nowhere. I attempted to ask about that but got nowhere. I'm prepared to accept that the edit war over greenhouse effect was long and sterile, but the arbcomm specifically found in my favour over that page: so I don't see that I should be sanctioned for that.

Evidence presented by Stephan Schulz
I noticed the following part of the original decision: "William M. Connolley may apply to the Arbitration Committee in one month for the removal of this prohibition.". Did that ever happen? It might have saved us at least part of the current rucus. At least for me, this does point out that User:SEWilco's antics are even more absurd - he is trying to get User:William M. Connolley banned for
 * months old edits
 * most of which were uncontroversial
 * most of which have a sufficient edit summary
 * for a parole that likely would have been lifted for months anyways if it ever had come up.

I suspect you have all seen SEWilco's reports on Administrators' noticeboard/3RR and elsewhere. If not, see below.

27 November

 * 
 * Version of noticeboard with 12 of SEWilco's reports

Summary (partial)

 * 1) I am participating under protest, as this case is improper.
 * 2) This case is arbitrary and poorly defined.
 * 3) Arbitration Policy has not been not followed in this case.
 * 4) This is a poorly defined case which improperly included me and made my presentation of evidence overly difficult.
 * 5) Arbitration rulings and policies should be applied equally to all users.  Enforcing rulings unevenly is not fair.  Undermining Wikipedia policies and Arbitration precedents creates an unstable environment for all users.
 * 6) Arbitration rulings are to be taken seriously.
 * 7) SEWilco and other users supported arbitration rulings.
 * 8) William M. Connolley did not abide by arbitration rulings, except when trying to force them on others.
 * 9) The Arbitration Committee did not equally and fully implement the rulings in the previous case.
 * 10) Administrators did not take violations seriously and should support them.
 * 11) Verifiability is an important policy.  Details on source material are important to Wikipedia.
 * 12) Consensus can not be used to support bad article content.
 * 13) I did insert additional citation content in articles Kyoto Protocol and Global cooling.
 * 14) I did follow the consensus style of numbered links to sources.

My Evidence is not yet complete. This is a complex case. (SEWilco 21:26, 8 December 2005 (UTC))

Table of reversions
These are the most obvious discovered parole violations by WMC which are labeled as reversions for which no Talk edit was apparent. A few items are listed for relevant context. A Note "No Talk" indicates no associated Talk page edit was apparent: "Each such revert must be backed up by a talk page comment where a reputable source is cited or asked for as appropriate (see #Relative value of references)." (SEWilco 05:27, 2 December 2005 (UTC))

23 october revert in the lomborg article
--MichaelSirks 21:31, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
 * 23 october
 * It was a argument between me and Ozetto, which was also discussed on the talk pages. WMC didn't participate in this discusion, yet he reverted the text whitout explaination in the comment or on the talkpage. In his own words WMC can't be bothered with his parole. If you let WMC get away with this wikipedia will degenerate into a reverting encyclopedia. Where the one who can shout the longest wins.

16 December modification of Sea level rise

 * 16 December
 * SEWilco is currently applying his bot to convert inline links to his notes system without any discussion or comment. He is well aware that this is a climate change related article and also aware that the editors of climate change articles are opposed to his notes system. I see this as a clear provocation, especially as this case is pending and the RFC is still open. I believe he is mocking the discussion here. Vsmith 17:07, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
 * 19 Dec.
 * SEWilco continues his contemptuous reverting against consensus and in blatant defiance of the current proceedings . Vsmith 05:00, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

14 Dec. article in Nature

 * The science journal Nature published a comparison of Wikipedia science articles with Encyclopedia Britannica: Internet encyclopaedias go head to head. In an online javascript sidenote: Challenges of being a Wikipedian which discusses the work of William M. Connolley in the climate articles and specifically the Climate change dispute arbitration of last spring. In that sidenote Jimmy Wales is quoted: "It takes a long time to deal with troublemakers," admits Jimmy Wales, the encyclopaedia's co-founder. "Connolley has done such amazing work and has had to deal with a fair amount of nonsense." . It would seem that this has direct bearing on the current case and WMC's parole. Vsmith 05:20, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

SEWilco has tried to build consensus; others have hindered that
Whilst SEWilco has not always fully followed all consensus building mechanisms available to him, there have been several attempts by him to build consensus on footnotes, mostly on a wikipedia wide scale. Others involved in this dispute have not supported those consensus building attempts and in some cases have hindered them.


 * Prior to any RFC/RFAs SEWilco runs a discussion on the village pump about direct links. That discussion is later deleted from the talk page archive hiding the evidence of an attempt at compromise..
 * During this RFA, SEWilco initiates a poll on Citations. Attempts are made to disrupt this poll  (N.B. compound edit) based on the person behind it, not the contents.   This is then moved from the page with no edit comment a link of much lower prominence, finally being renamed as if it was a poll on SEWilco rather than on comments..
 * Mozzerati 18:09, 17 December 2005 (UTC)