Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2008-02-04/Arbitration report

The Arbitration Committee opened one new case this week, and closed one case, leaving six currently open.

Closed case

 * Bluemarine: A case involving alleged civility and COI violations by User:Bluemarine on Matt Sanchez, the article on himself, which has also been edited tendentiously (from a hostile point of view) by a number of other editors, many of whom have been blocked. As a result of the case, Bluemarine was banned for one year and the article placed on article probation.

New case

 * Ehud Lesar: A case involving a dispute involving Ehud Lesar, with alleged sockpuppetry on his part and alleged harrasment by Fedayee, Eupator and others.

Evidence phase

 * Episodes and characters 2: A case involving alleged continuing disruption of articles concerning television series episodes and characters, following on from a prior case.

Voting phase

 * Waterboarding: A case involving a dispute between a large number of editors on Waterboarding, relating to the question as to whether the technique should be described as torture. Remedies placing the article on article probation and imposing a "general restriction" have the support of two arbitrators.


 * Highways 2: A case involving editing by NE2 on articles relating to WikiProject U.S. Roads, allegedly against consensus of other editors involved with that wikiproject. A remedy has been proposed counselling editors to consider contributing outside of disputed articles.

Motion to close/dismiss

 * IRC: A case involving an alleged personal attack by Tony Sidaway on Bishonen on #wikipedia-en-admins, which led to an edit war on WP:WEA, involving page protection and unprotection by David Gerard, Geogre and others, and a block of Giano II, which was quickly undone. Voting on remedies relating to Giano is split (although an editing restriction remedy is at 3-1), but a remedy subjecting Tony Sidaway to an editing restriction for one year has the support of three arbitrators, and a proposal stating that the committee will determine "Policy and procedure changes regarding Wikipedia IRC channels" separately to the case. If closed, all parties would be "strongly cautioned to pursue disputes in a civil manner designed to contribute to resolution and to cause minimal disruption".


 * Matthew Hoffman: A case involving controversial blocks of MatthewHoffman by a vanished user. If closed, he would be "provisionally" desysopped for six months, and Matthew Hoffman's block log annotated to reflect the arbitrators' view that the blocks were unjustified.  However, Newyorkbrad has opposed the motion to close.