Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2007-06-04/Arbitration report

The Arbitration Committee accepted one case this week, and closed one case.

Closed case

 * Zeq-Zero0000: A case involving the actions of and .  Zero alleged that Zeq had engaged in POV-pushing, while Zeq alleged that Zero had misused administrative tools in blocking him, the case in particular involving the question of whether probations, article bans, etc. can be enforced by involved admins.  The arbitrators considered several different versions of a principle covering to what degree involved administrators may enforce probation, but none attained majority support. As a result of the case, Zero0000 was advised not to take further administrative actions against Zeq, including enforcement of probation, and was admonished that editors who are not restricted in their editing of a page or area are entitled to be accorded good faith and be treated with respect and courtesy.

New case

 * Badlydrawnjeff: A highly controversial case involving the actions of Badlydrawnjeff, Doc glasgow, Tony Sidaway and JzG in relation inter alia to the article known as QZ, which underwent an AfD which was closed as delete by Drini, but overturned on DRV by Xoloz. The resulting AfD was then speedily closed by thebainer.  Badlydrawnjeff then filed for a deletion review, which was speedily closed or removed by a number of administrators and others consecutively, including JzG, Doc Glasgow and Tony Sidaway, and the closures often reverted or new DRVs opened.  There is dispute as to whether the actions of all parties were within process, and whether, as some believe, WP:BLP takes priority over DRV.  A peripheral issue to the case is a 60-hour block of Badlydrawnjeff by Zsinj, apparently after discussions on the admin IRC channel, although some have stated that the consensus on the channel did not favour the block.  The block was quickly undone by Gaillimh.  Additionally, some allege that violetriga acted improperly in undeleting some articles deleted under BLP.

Evidence phase

 * PalestineRemembered: A case involving the actions of, referred from the Community sanction noticeboard.


 * Miskin: A case involving the actions of, who was controversially blocked by for one month (later reduced to one week) for revert warring.


 * Abu badali: A case alleging that has disruptively tagged non-free images for deletion, even when a valid fair-use justification exists, and has harassed editors who have complained about this behavior. Abu badali denies the allegations.


 * NYScholar: A case involving the actions of a number of users, including and, in relation to the Lewis Libby article.


 * Piotrus: A case involving administrator and other editors on Central and Eastern Europe-related articles. Multiple parties accuse others of edit warring, incivility, unethical behavior and biased editing. (An earlier arbitration case, Piotrus-Ghirla, was dismissed without prejudice  in part due to inactivity of, who was listed as a party in the new case.)


 * Paranormal: A case involving the actions of various users, especially as regards bias and attribution, on "articles on paranormal and pseudoscientific topics", such as parapsychology and Electronic voice phenomenon.

Voting phase

 * Hkelkar 2: A case involving the actions of, , and , Rama's Arrow alleges that the others acted as meatpuppets of banned user Hkelkar, and blocked them for six months.  They deny the allegations, and allege that Rama's Arrow acted improperly in blocking them, and in posting private e-mails to the incidents noticeboard.  Kirill Lokshin has proposed remedies imposing no sanctions but calling on the parties to enter into mediation, as well as a finding of fact noting the lack of reliable evidence in the case, all of which have the support of six arbitrators, and a remedy prohibiting admin actions between the parties has the support of four.  However, voting on principles regarding the posting of private e-mails is split.


 * TingMing: A case involving the actions of .  alleges that he has engaged in "controversial edits", edit warring, incivility, and possibly sockpuppetry.  TingMing denies the allegations, and alleges incivility on the part of Ideogram.  Kirill Lokshin has proposed a remedy banning TingMing for one year, which has the support of four arbitrators, but is opposed by Blnguyen.


 * E104421-Tajik: A case involving the actions of E104421 and Tajik. The case had been suspended to allow a referral to Community enforceable mediation, but the mediation broke down after Tajik was alleged to have edited through sockpuppets while claiming to be away and unavailable for the mediation. Remedies have been proposed banning Tajik either indefinitely or for one year (which have the support of five arbitrators), and reminding AzaToth that Wikipedia operates by consensus (with the support of two arbitrators).

Motion to close

 * Transnistria: A case involving the actions of and  on Transnistria-related articles.  MariusM alleges that Mauco (who has not made a statement because he is blocked) has engaged in sockpuppetry, edit warring and other misconduct.  If closed,,  and  would be indefinitely banned from any editing related to Transnistria.