Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Rktect

Case Opened on 21:59, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Case Closed on 14:52, 22 October 2005 (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.

Involved parties
vs.
 * ,, , , (all sockpuppets of same person)

Statement by Egil
After having spent considerable time reviewing the submitted content from Rktect since July 23 2005, esp. connected to historic metrology and geodesy, I have found it, generally speaking, wholly unacceptable. For instance, contrary to accepted knowledge, Rrktect claims that the exact size of the Earth was known at the time the ancient Egyptians and Mesopotamians defined their standards of length (3000 BC or earlier). He also subscribes to the unpublished theories of Livio Stecchini, that all ancient measuring systems are one, defined by each other.

With this basis, essentially all facts get distorted, especially when this is married to a totally uncritical use of historic sources, drawing all sorts of conclusions from them. In addition, the majority of the contributions are irrelevant to the topic at hand, or at best covered elsewhere. Showing disrespect for the mechanisms of Wikipedia, using bizarre markup and a lack of understanding of the level of quality required for an encyclopedia, the contributions of Rktect are unfit for Wikipedia.

There are no cites from reliable sources presented supporting any of rktects claims, although he often provides enormous amounts of irrelevant or marginally relevant text and sources.

This behaviour is not limited to historic metrology; rktect uses the same approach for other areas also (see list of articles affected, below).

Even though it may be the case that there are fractions of rktects contributions that with massive rework could be usable, filtering and reviewing is far too expensive: the amount of work grossly exceeding that of adding new bona fide fresh content. Rktects modus operandi in talk pages only adds to the problem, making discussion in the conventional sense impossible.

Bad faith can be established in a good number of cases.

I thus believe it is the best self interest of Wikipedia that rktect be not allowed to contribute, at the very least for an extended period. I see no other way of creating an environment where the current chaos can be cleaned up.

The complaint is with regards to rktects contributions as a whole. This includes, but is not limited to, his contribution to these articles: In also includes the following articles created by rktect:
 * Everything under Ancient weights and measures
 * Medieval weights and measures
 * Mile
 * Eratosthenes
 * Gabriel Mouton
 * Livio Catullo Stecchini
 * Anti-metric movement
 * Squaring the circle
 * Imperial unit
 * Stadion
 * Foot (unit of length)
 * Comparative metrology
 * Pseudoscience
 * Damascus steel
 * Proto-Indo-Europeans
 * Metrology
 * Unit fraction
 * Conventional Egyptian chronology
 * Cubit
 * English unit
 * Systems of measurement
 * Pace (measurement)
 * Standards of measure in the Copper Age
 * Standards of measure in Medieval Europe
 * Standards of measure in Iron Age Europe
 * Standards of measure in the Jemdet Nasr
 * Standards of measure in the Pre Conquest Americas
 * Standards of measure in the Medieval East
 * Standards of measure in the Modern West
 * Standards of measure in the Near Eastern Bronze Age
 * Mile Standards
 * Atur
 * 100 Royal cubits
 * 21,000 royal cubits
 * River journey
 * Egyptian fields
 * 3ht
 * St3t
 * Khet
 * Pes
 * Mille Passus
 * Mille passus
 * Milliare
 * Pous
 * Eratosthenes stadia
 * Statute mile in the UK
 * Sos
 * Milion
 * Rope stretchers
 * Egyptian minute of march
 * Passus (copyright violation)
 * Aroura
 * Super Ekgdz, later moved to User:Rktect/Super Ekgdz
 * Knotted cords
 * Letter of Nanse
 * Nanše
 * Sirara
 * Ištaran
 * Ningshishzida
 * List of revenues
 * Foot-pound-second system

Statement by Rktect
Please limit your statement to 500 words
 * This began about August 5th with
 * 1. Egil claiming many statements of fact about mensuration were "original research".
 * 2. These charges included cites from references that were actually in their fifth printing.
 * 3. Egil claimed things were "pseudoscience" based on his own speculation and opinion but cited no facts in support of his opinions.
 * 4. He then began submitting pages for vfd by the score
 * 6. This resulted in a mediation attempt which failed
 * 7. The reason for failure was that Egil while restrained by the terms of the mediation from acting himself began contacting others and asking them to take actions on his behalf which they subsequently did.
 * 9. These contacts are documented on my and other users talk pages.
 * 10. This Group (Egil, Gene, Ken, Drini) began voting in concert on every page up for VFD
 * 11. The list of deleted pages shows up on our respective contributions pages.
 * 12 Egil has systematically attacked every contribution I have made for the last month either marking them for deletion, tagging them with disputed tages which he neglects to give reasons for, reverting them, deleting content, references, and Wikification.
 * 13. The same group still acting in concert has joined Egil in reverting, deleting content, Wikification, and references from the pages.
 * 14. These actions are not the actions of individuals acting independently in parallel with no contact between them as some might claim because the contacts and expressions of mutual support are there to be seen on their talk pages going back a month or more.
 * 15. I have asked for protection against this organized attack but have not received it.
 * 16. On one occasion while trying to protect my contributions from multiple reversions I was improperly blocked for two days for making an edit after discussion within this group.
 * 17. "I have never acted in bad faith".
 * 18. I dispute that the consensus of this group with regard to quality is well informed.
 * 19. The policy of Wikipedia is generally inclusive and the articles are not, as is often claimed by Egil all saying the same thing.
 * 20. Some were discussing fields and crop rotation.
 * 21. Some were discussing the Greek orders of architecture.
 * 22. Some were discussing the attempts of various geometers to establish standards of measure in different times and places around the world.
 * 23. Some talked about different standards of measure used by Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece and Rome. * 24. Egil and the rest of the group maintain that there is no connection between these standards of measure
 * 25. Egil and the group at the same time make the conflicting claim that they are all the same thing. Rktect 12:45, August 29, 2005 (UTC)


 * Egil speculates  and opines  but has yet to cite any good reasons for those opinions.
 * [standards]
 * Egil allows his own personal POV, speculations, and opinions to prejudice his approach to the study of measures.
 * If this arbitration were to hinge on a debate of facts I would be happy to oblige with a thorough list of cites and references.
 * Egil repeats another false charge. It is not a copyright violation to properly quote a source.
 * This is just Egils basic lack of knowledgebase. If he thinks that these topics are adequately covered elsewhere let him say where and let me respond with what is lacking.
 * Egil lacks the knowledgebase to properly make this judgement and so do his cronies.
 * Egil should be restrained from removing properly cited and referenced content from Wikipedia or at a very minimum restrained from putting pages up for vfd with no discussion of why, on the talk page of the article, no cites, no references to support his speculations and opinions and basically just a huge lack of doing his homework. I would also ask that any group voting as a group on multiple vfd's be counted as a single vote
 * This is an admission that he is attacking on a personal level not a content based level.
 * Egil provides a list of the articles he is attacking which is essentially any article I may have made a contribution to.
 * Egil makes unsubstantiated false charges of original research, pseudoscientific content and "essentially the same content" which are not based on the article but rather the author.
 * Egil has for a month encouraged his cronies to vote as a group.
 * This is easily verified by looking at the articles deleted and the names of the people voting.
 * There would be considerably less votes for deletion if the cluster (Egil, Gene, Ken, Drini) were counted as a single vote and it were taken into account that by voting as a block they give a false impression of consensus which may be misleading to others.
 * The facts and the math were eroneous and required substantial work to clean up. Mouton is an important person to discuss on Wikipedia, but it is not useful to have a POV article about him with many unreferenced and eristic comments.
 * After suffering a constant stream of reverts by drini on every contribution I made without regard to content, often deleting wikification and references as well as content, and with no attempt by him to communicate on the discussion page I looked at his contributions page and saw there was nothing on it but reverts and concluded he was a vandal and pest.
 * As a new user I did not realize that was set in my preferences or important until someone remarked on it. Generally I attempt to respond to all constructive criticism with a modification of my behavior.

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (6/0/0/0)

 * Accept, but you are both going to have to show better evidence. Fred Bauder 20:50, August 29, 2005 (UTC)
 * Accept. James F. (talk) 23:55, 29 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Accept Theresa Knott (a tenth stroke) 15:05, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Accept. &rarr;Raul654 23:58, 13 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Accept &#10149;the Epopt 03:29, 14 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Accept. Jayjg (talk) 19:06, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

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

No personal attacks
1) Personal attacks are expressly prohibited because they make Wikipedia a hostile enviroment for editors, and thereby damage Wikipedia both as an encylopedia (by losing valued contributors) and as a wiki community (by discouraging reasoned discussion and encouraging a bunker mentality).


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

No original research
2) Wikipedia is not the venue for publishing of otherwise unpublished original research; see What Wikipedia is not, expounded in No original research.


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Bad faith editing
3) Users should not disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point; that is, users should not act in bad faith. Editing in a manner so as to intentionally provoke other editors is a form of trolling and goes aganist established Wikipedia policies, as well as the spirit of Wikipedia.


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Compromise
4) The MediaWiki software and Wikipedia policy anticipates that disputes may arise regarding the wording and content of Wikipedia articles. Should disputes arise, editors are expected to engage in research and discussion with other users, and to make reasonable compromises regarding the wording and content of Wikipedia articles.


 * Passed 6 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Obsessional point of view
5) In certain cases a Wikipedia editor will tendentiously focus their attention in an obsessive way. Such users may be banned from editing in the affected area. See Neutral point of view. Efforts to establish a particular point of view sometimes result in violations of Verifiability as efforts are made to support an eccentric POV.


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Relevance of references
6) Cited references must relate to particular assertions, merely citing a book within which a person after exhaustive searching might find a source for information is not sufficient. Citations need to to be a specific passage on a specific page of an identified edition.


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Edit summaries
7) Editors are generally expected to provide appropriate edit summaries for their edits; providing misleading edit summaries, as well as misuse of the minor edit flag, is considered uncivil and bad wikiquette.


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Detailed unsourced information inserted by Rktect
1) has created a large number of articles which contain a great deal of detailed, but unsourced, information regarding ancient weights and measures, see Requests_for_arbitration/Rktect/Evidence. Many of these have been deleted.


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Sweeping assertions inserted by Rktect
2) has sometimes inserted unsourced anachronistic material such as this assertion that the mile "Miles and stadia have been intended to be unit divisions of a degree of the Earth's great circle circumference since they were first defined as standards of measure by the rope stretchers of Mesopotamia and Egypt" . These assertions seem related to the theories of Livio Catullo Stecchini.


 * Passed 6 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Use of references by Rktect
3) often cites a laundry list of general references which have no specific relationship with any particular item of information; see  and a user's comment.


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Disruptive edits by Rktect
4) has reverted reversions of vandalism by editors he was in a dispute with, , and has admitted that this was in order to prove a point.


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

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

Rktect banned from weights and measures
1) is banned indefinitely from all articles which relate to weights and measures (metrology).


 * Passed 7 to 0 at 14:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Log of blocks and bans

 * 24 October 2005, Carnildo blocked Rktect with an expiry time of 48 hours ‎(Violation of ArbCom decision Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Rktect on multiple articles)
 * 3 July 2007, JzG blocked Rktect with an expiry time of 48 hours (Giving people a break)
 * 8 August 2007, Garzo blocked Rktect with an expiry time of 72 hours (Inserting misinformation: has been warned repeatedly about original research)
 * 27 September 2007, Neil blocked Rktect with an expiry time of 1 week ‎(Multiple violations of ArbCom decision Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Rktect)