Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Deltabeignet

Case Opened on 13:19, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Case Closed on 06:19, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Please do not edit this page directly unless you wish to become a participant in this request. (All participants are subject to Arbitration Committee decisions, and the ArbCom will consider each participant's role in the dispute.) Comments are very welcome on the Talk page, and will be read, in full. Evidence, no matter who can provide it, is very welcome at /Evidence. Evidence is more useful than comments.

Arbitrators will be working on evidence and suggesting proposed decisions at /Workshop and voting on proposed decisions at /Proposed decision.

You may add to the as needed, but closed cases should not be edited otherwise. Please raise any questions at Requests for arbitration.

Involved parties

 * (admitted sockpuppet)
 * (admitted sockpuppet)

Statement by SebastianHelm
I am only a witness, I don't have any stake in this other than I only want to initiate this quickly before I might get blocked. Please take a look at [] and User talk:Deltabeignet and take it from there. &mdash; Sebastian 23:57, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
 * 1) the desire to trust administrators and
 * 2) a minor disagreement about some deletions he did in a couple of articles, which is why I became aware of this. However, this request is not about a content dispute; I didn't write that part of the articles, and even if I did I would be able to solve this in a civil discussion.
 * Corrected link. 67.117.130.181 13:06, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

I regard this as a case of fraud, which is a crime in the real world. In any functioning society, it would be persecuted in the interest of the community.

We should hold our administrators to the same standard. I think it should go without saying that an administrator who commits fraud and diruption of Wikipedia for months should be blocked immediately and be stripped of his admin status, and a community effort should be initiated to mitigate the harm he did. Moreover, if we find this is indeed a case of fraud (I'm not a lawyer), then those of us who live in the same country as the defendant have a moral obligation to considere if this person should be tried for fraud by the laws of his country.

Furthermore, I think we should conduct a serious intraspection why our community failed to act appropriately: It seems to me that we are not prepared to deal with the criminal energy of some of our users. If that was the WP:POINT of Deltabeignet's "experiment" then we should do our best to learn from it.
 * 1) This could go on for three months without being noticed. (Maybe his actions weren't beyond the threshold of normal vandalism initially, but we don't know. Someone should take a look at his and his sockpuppet's history to find out.)
 * 2) No administrator reacted when this case was brought up on WP:ANI. (At least not until I raised it here, more than 24 hours later.) Instead, people were fiercely discussing cases such as a user who had a medieval quote on his user page.
 * 3) Even after I listed it here, there was nobody who know how to react, other than one person who asked me on my talk page. That feels to me as if I went to the police to report that I witnessed a crime, and the officers would just stare at me and ask: So what should we do about it?

Minor note: Despite my statement that I am only a witness, someone listed me as an involved party. I strongly object to this; I don't know any legal system that would, as a rule, equate a witness with a suspect. This would only further discourage people who already take a big burden on themselves - people who have no personal gain from reporting crimes, but subject themselves to possible retaliation and expend much of their time for no other reason than that they feel it is their moral duty. There can be no doubt that I am reporting this for the sake of the community; as I explained, I have no stake in this matter. I therefore removed this entry.

It is already long past my bedtime; I already invested far more time than I had though I needed to. I have no desire to invest more time in this; I will observe the case sporadically; but if the honorable ArbComm feels I can be of service I will do my best to help. Please alert me on my talk page as I am taking this page off my watchlist for now. I apologize if this is not the correct way to bring this up, and if I said something I wouldn't have said if I had been more awake. &mdash; Sebastian 09:28, 11 December 2006 (UTC) &mdash; 10:09, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Update: There is an ongoing discussion about this case on User_talk:Deltabeignet. &mdash; Sebastian 05:51, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Statement by Deltabeignet
The ArbCom is for the solving of disputes. This matter is clear-cut and does not require any of the Committee's time. I have fooled the community. I have abused my powers for tenuous reasons. I have already voluntarily admitted guilt and I apologise again. I thank Sebastian for his help in the matter, and politely request that he not make legal threats.

This was not a campaign of disruption; it was a loosely associated string of edits. (Begun, incidentally, when I forgot to log in one day.) Most of my actions were breaches of either WP:POINT or WP:DICK. None of the anonymous edits were themselves in bad faith. Rather, my chief mistake was the use of my admin powers (namely, rollback) for personal reasons.

If the community wills it, I will ask to be desysopped.

Naturally, I would prefer that I not be blocked. I have no further intent to disrupt.

I have been scaling down my Wikipedia usage for a while now, and, due to some new commitments, will not be monitoring these events closely. (I'm not officially leaving, especially not when I'd be remembered for a stupid experiment rather than for making Layla a featured article.) Still, send any questions to my talk page, and I'll try to answer them in a timely matter. Deltabeignet 22:53, 11 December 2006 (UTC)


 * (Note: Subsequent statement by Deltabeignet moved to the /Evidence page)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (4/0/0/3)

 * Accept to look into applicability of WP:POINT. We have over 1000 admins; we don't give out permissions to be disruptive to any of them. Charles Matthews 20:26, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Accept. Dmcdevit·t 21:29, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Accept. - SimonP 18:35, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Accept Fred Bauder 13:18, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Voting. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 08:28, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Voting to close this case without remedies for now. (now an active arbitrator on this case). FloNight 11:20, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Voting. Kirill Lokshin 13:47, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Temporary injunction (none)
=Final decision= All numbering based on /Proposed decision (vote counts and comments are there as well)

Case dismissed
1) As a show of good will, Deltabeignet's IP (static and unshared) which was used for the anonymous edits has been soft-blocked so that he can only edit with his account. Deltabeignet has already admitted it and has promised not to repeat the behavior. The case is dismissed and can be reopened if the problem resurfaces again.


 * Passed by a 6-0 motion to close at 06:19, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Log of blocks and bans
Log any block, ban or extension under any remedy in this decision here. Minimum information includes name of administrator, date and time, what was done and the basis for doing it.