Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate change/Proposed decision/Archive 4

A plea
A wise person once said: don't moon the jury. Some of the expressions of frustration made on this page are quite understandable. Nobody so far has expressed wholehearted support for all of the proposals that seem most likely to pass, and those who have toiled honestly over evidence and workshop proposals, then waited patiently for weeks while the drafting arbitrators produced their initial proposals, understandably want their hard work to go towards the final decision.

There are other statements that simply should not be made in the circumstances. Attacking the arbitrators is, if nothing else, counter-productive, especially if your stated grounds imply a strong element of partisanship. In most cases that come here, the battleground mentality is entrenched, and the arbitrators know this and recognise the signs.

Surely at this point, instead of antagonizing the very people elected to solve the problem where we have failed, we should strive to set aside partisanship and cooperate. Tasty monster (=TS ) 06:04, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * What we need to do is question the arbitrators about why they're voting the way they are. We need to question them in a very serious, very polite way. And we need to politely press them for answers. Bring it up here, and name Arbitrators, asking them to respond. And if they don't, go to their talk page and link to the questions here and ask them again to respond. Ask them politely to do their job, one part of which is explaining just what they're doing. There are several admins we should be asking and we should do it before the case closes. Cooperation was never supposed to be mindless. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 13:44, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * In a very polite way I suggest that we all allow the arbs to vote without any harassment. Polargeo (talk) 15:47, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree totally with what Tasty monster and Polargeo say. Please let the arbitrators have some space to do the hard work that is needed in this case.  -- Crohnie Gal  Talk  11:34, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Asking for clarification, pointing out things that have been missed, and suggesting changes are all legitimate things to do, as long as they are done politely and non disruptively, so I think your comment misses the mark. ++Lar: t/c 11:57, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * They're even more than legitimate things to do -- they're the purpose of this page. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 16:27, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree, but they should be done on this page, long as it is, and not on the individual arbitrator pages, so that everyone can see what is being asked and said. ScottyBerg (talk) 19:29, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

"to come into effect if and when this user returns to editing"
OK, what's with the addition to the ChrisO remedies "to come into effect if and when this user returns to editing"? Surely if the purpose of the ban is really to be preventative, it doesn't matter whether the user sits it out while editing or not. I'm sure it serves plenty of purposes that relate to leaving something hanging over this editor's head to discourage him from returning, but I was not under the impression that was supposed to be the purpose of topic bans. ArbCom sanctions shouldn't be affected by a user's decision to vanish, neither positively nor negatively. Above, we've had many arguing that ChrisO's vanishment shouldn't cause arbs to choose not to sanction him. That's absolutely correct, but nor should it cause the sanctions to be any harsher, which this amendment would effectively do (instead of X time, it becomes X time + however long ChrisO does not edit). Heimstern Läufer (talk) 13:23, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree with HL. That clause does look punitive and should be changed. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 13:49, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, I was going to raise the same question, but I got distracted by Kirill's findings. Retirement time should be "time served", so if he were to return in a year, the ban would have expired by then. ATren (talk) 13:51, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Good points, HL, I agree.-- SPhilbrick  T  14:01, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I was set to give a long list of analogy with sentencing, but I realized that the entire line of questions is moot. ChrisO left for good, so what does it effectively change when the remedies kick in?  &mdash; Coren (talk) 14:06, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Kinda have to agree with Coren, if we're getting to the point that we're routinely assuming people are going to come back after asserting RTV, then we really need to plug the holes in RTV (not that we probably don't already!) SirFozzie (talk) 14:08, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * (ec, @Coren) If he really did leave for good, then there's no need for sanctions at all. The only reason to enact sanctions at all is that there is a possibility he will return, which we all know does indeed exist. If he stays away forever, yes, this is moot. But we all know that the right to vanish can be revoked at any time, and if that does happen, the questions are no longer moot. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 14:14, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There's no hole to plug here, Fozzie. No one is getting out of any sanctions by exercising the right to vanish. As long as the purpose of the ban is to prevent disruption, it is of no consequence whether the user sits it out while editing or while not editing. Saying that it has to be served while editing is effectively saying "Yeah, go off into that corner you picked over there, bad boy. You can come back when you want, but when you do, no cake for a week." That's just plain punitive. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 14:21, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I tend to disagree with you, but in general, when the committee topic bans a user for a set amount of time, what we (in general, noting I'm recused here) are looking for is the ability to work constructively with others in areas that are not so heated. Let's take a completely hypothetical example here. The Committee topic bans User:JoeShlobodnick from a certain topic area for six months due to edit-warring and problematic source use. Instead of showing that he can work in other areas without a problem, the day after this passes, he ceases editing for six months. The day after his topic ban expires, he's back editing in that area. You can probably understand the increased scrutiny that this would bring.


 * I don't doubt that Chris, should he desire to return at some point in the future, will probably want to have absolutely nothing to do with the topic area (Even with my status in this case, I think I'll break out in hives if someone says "Climate Change" in real life... so I can certainly commiserate!).. I still think that the question is moot, and personally, I support the remedies that he is to contact the committee if he returns to editing to work out terms of his return to allow the community and the Committee the necessary security that there wouldn't be any problems re-integrating him with the editing community. SirFozzie (talk) 14:31, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * (ec) Punitive? No.  Dissuasive?  Yes, definitely.  Let's not bury our heads in sand here; there have been very many invocations of RTV which were made as a way to duck out of the way of a sanction and never intended to be for a permanent departure.  (And my own position is that this is, in fact, almost always the case).  In some cases, hoping that sanctions will not be applied at all in the first place, in other cases hoping that the matter has been delayed long enough that a reevaluation weeks or months later will lead to lesser sanctions.  If ChrisO left for good (as I presume he has), then the remedies are not affecting him.  &mdash; Coren (talk) 14:35, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I read this as the clock starts when the case closes. If it runs out before ChrisO returns, done. But if he returns before the clock runs out, then the sanctions are in effect for that remaining period. Not to pick at old wounds but there have been users in the past who asserted RTV and then came back under a different name, and complained when they were tied back to the old name. So this package of remedies ought to be passed... if he comes back, it has to be with linkage or at the very least notice to ArbCom, and if he comes back within the time limits of the sanctions, they are in effect until the clock runs out. If ArbCom actually meant they start as of the moment he returns and run a year/6months/whatever from THERE, then I join the chorus here saying that's probably not a good idea. ++Lar: t/c 14:26, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, that's my intent anyways. I think the wording is clear enough (the remedies don't start if he returns, they apply if he does); but rereading some of the questions above make it seem as though some think otherwise.  Wording woes?  &mdash; Coren (talk) 14:39, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That is completely not at all how I read this remedy. Though it does explain a lot about why I thought we were talking past each other previously! But if the purpose of Roger Davies's change was not that the remedies would begin whenever ChrisO returns, which is how I read this, why add it in the first place? Isn't it automatically true that the remedy begins at the closure of the case, and are de facto effective only if and when he returns during that six-month period? Also, while that may be how Coren read this, is that how Roger Davies and Shell Kinney have? If the current wording does mean the sanctions expire six months after close date, regardless of if and when ChrisO returns, consider my objection withdrawn, though I would suggest better wording.
 * P.S.: No statement on my part as to whether the sanctions are warranted in and of themselves, as I haven't read the evidence, and I think going through this case at any length cause me to vomit my breakfast and several vital organs. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 04:38, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I think Coren has acknowledged that it wasn't what he intended either, and if rewriting to improve clarity is needed, I expect the arbs are open to it. Do you have a suggested reword? I thought for a bit and I didn't come up with something crisp. But I tend to be wordy. Maybe you'd have better luck? ++Lar: t/c 12:18, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm still not understanding why an addition to the original wording was needed. "ChrisO is banned from Climate Change articles and their talk pages, broadly construed, for six months" means that from the day this case closes, ChrisO may not edit CC articles for six months, doesn't it? Which I think is exactly what Coren and you mean, or am I wrong? Is there something I'm missing either in your meaning or the meaning of the phrase Roger Davies added? Heimstern Läufer (talk) 12:31, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Also, this comment makes me think Shell Kinney is reading this very differently from Coren. Her wording strongly suggests she does mean the remedy to start as soon as ChrisO returns. Which, if I'm reading the situation correctly, means they've voted the same way for a remedy that they are interpreting in different ways. Assuming I'm right, I think further discussion is going to be needed by the arbs. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 13:58, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The more I re-read this point in the PD the more I agree with you that some sort of careful editing to make crystal clear when things start is needed... I thought it was clear, and I gave my interpretation, and Coren said that's what he thought too. But elsewhere he and others talk about whether sanctions that don't start on return are as effective as those that do. Plus Shell's commentary. So clearly more clarity is needed. ++Lar: t/c 19:17, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, please. Let's start by figuring out what exactly these sanctions mean; then I'll figure out if/how much I want to gripe. :-) Heimstern Läufer (talk) 23:23, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I do agree with Heimstern Laufer on this point; the RTV should not be a significant factor in our decisions about ChrisO, and we shouldn't be approving sanctions that are fundamentally unfair and imply that failure of editors to continue participating in the project will be be held against them. If ChrisO had simply stopped editing, there would be absolutely no consideration of extending a sanction beyond its natural termination, and I see no justification in treating an editor who has publicly left the project any differently from one who quietly leaves without any comment. Risker (talk) 15:34, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

I mean ChrisO no disrespect when I say he's unlikely to stay away from Wikipedia for long. In that light I think his invocation of the Right to Vanish" was a tactical error, probably committed in haste and anger. But in the meantime I respect his right. And I could be wrong.

I think that rather than making a special case of this we should probably change Right to vanish to reflect the harsh reality that an editor who invokes this privilege and then changes his mind has gone back on his word. In such a case, the editor should contact the Committee prior to returning to returning, and if he doesn't then his status will be reviewed by the Committee when his identity is discovered. This would provide an opportunity to review his interactions prior to leaving, identify any possible issues that might arise going forward, and in some cases where the vanishing was to avoid harassment, to safeguard the identity of the returned editor. --TS 17:52, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Offish topic, and because I admire CO for putting his personal principles before the status of flag holding over issues they are passionate about, it is a pity to comment that I thought that RTV was for editors in good standing; I am not considering the allegations, PD findings and (perhaps) remedies, but the FoF which detailed the admonishments, sanctions, restrictions and desysoppings, following cases brought brought previously before ArbCom regarding ChrisO. The decision is made, however, that RTV has been allowed, but perhaps next time another editor requests RTV during a case where they are a party and a troublesome past that they be permitted to retire with a courtesy blanking-redirect as appropriate. It also means the distinction is not deprecated by those with a potential to abuse it. Sorry. Sermon over. LessHeard vanU (talk) 20:44, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree with TS and LHvU on the FoF regarding RTV for CO. (Enough acronyms?) Perhaps WP:ADMIN is relevant here, since it defines "in good standing" as "not in controversial circumstances," whatever that means. With the caveat of course that ChrisO is not an admin. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 20:52, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * We're going to have to add another finding about you violating WP:WOTTA. Jehochman Talk 00:12, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * @Coren - You stated: '...there have been very many invocations of RTV which were made as a way to duck out of the way of a sanction and never intended to be for a permanent departure.(And my own position is that this is, in fact, almost always the case)...If ChrisO left for good (as I presume he has)...'

--K10wnsta (talk) 00:39, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Given your position on the majority of such right-to-vanish cases, on what are you basing your presumption that ChrisO has left for good?
 * AGF. He wouldn't be the first person to actually leave for good, even if it's not the general case.  &mdash; Coren (talk) 04:13, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

ChrisO's commendable work on BLPs
Allegations have been brought against ChrisO but in the circumstances don't seem to have been carefully analysed in a balanced way. I've not gone through them in detail, but would note that in the cases I discussed under the heading above [fixed link] the editor doing most to discuss in a collegiate way and reduce or remove BLP violations was ChrisO. My comments were focussed on those apparently trying to contravene proposed principle # 3.1.8 Biographies of living people by giving undue weight to negative or controversial aspects of the subject's life and work, but ChrisO should be given credit for working to get agreement on reducing that problem. Have been short of time to work on this lately, will come back on this with diffs when time permits. . . dave souza, talk 22:40, 6 September 2010 (UTC) Diffs for a start:    and  various discussions, for now... dave souza, talk 23:05, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Assuming for the sake of argument that your diffs actually show what they purport to, which is not exactly a slam dunk, good work does not give a free pass for bad. ++Lar: t/c 12:18, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Editor reconciliations
Marknutley indicated he would agree now to accept a 6 month withdraw. Can the Arbs accept this? Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 15:43, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Arbs are considering it, apparently. Guettarda (talk) 16:00, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * The more important point is that while banning individual editors may quiet things down for a while, the situation will deteriorate again in the absence of systemic remedies. There's no shortage of people to take the place of Marknutley or TGL (or ChrisO for that matter). Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:23, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I very much agree, Boris, and it also worries me. I have tried to encourage the expression of some more systemic thoughts above under . No takers yet, unfortunately. --Nigelj (talk) 17:48, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Out of curiosity when should i start the six month ban? mark nutley (talk) 19:03, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Whenever you want. Any user is free to self-ban at any time. You don't need anyone's approval. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 19:05, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * True, take what you want; however should be noted here. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 19:58, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * SBHB, this may be because the true disruption is beyond them. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 19:58, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I have begun to unwatch various CC articles and shall withdraw fully tonight. I suspect it shall make no difference though to the obvious outcome of this mark nutley (talk) 21:26, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

and shall withdraw fully tonight - it looks like this promise was worth nothing. This seems to fit into the previous pattern - every time you've been unblocked with a promise not to contribute to the Cl Ch area, you've broken it William M. Connolley (talk) 09:30, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Query regarding policy change / suspension
WP:ADMIN says Involvement is generally construed very broadly by the community, to include current or past conflicts with an editor (or editors) and disputes on topics, regardless of the nature, age, or outcome of the dispute. But the PD says (at enforcement item E2) an administrator will be considered "uninvolved" if he or she has not previously participated in any content disputes on articles in the area of conflict. Is the committee's omission of the "conflicts with an editor (or editors)" part of the definition intended to be a broadly applicable policy change, or is that part of the policy being suspended only for the present case? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 20:05, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * And on another policy change: WP:BLP says Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion but the PD says unsourced negative or controversial information is unacceptable.  Does this mean that unsourced positive information is OK?  In the past some have argued that it is, so it would be helpful to get clarification. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 14:06, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I would suggest that positive unsourced information may be kept in while an editor searches for a reference, but is removed if that search is fruitless; unsourced postive information should not be retained on the basis that a reference might be found. Negative unsourced information is removed immediately, and then a search conducted and the content only re-instated when a RS is found. IMO, of course. LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:45, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

And now a message from our sponsor
Have you ever been faced with tendentious editors pushing an idiosyncratic point of view? Haven't we all? Next time this happens, reach for Advocacy, the quicker, less costly way to explain that Wikipedia is not for promoting causes. Jehochman Talk 00:17, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I've already tried that. It doesn't work.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:22, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Have you tried the extra strength, institutional size package? Jehochman Talk 00:22, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I have no idea what that means. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It is humor, a means of releasing stress during tense situations, such as the one that has existed on this page. Jehochman Talk 00:30, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It helps to explain the joke to the literal-minded. AQFK, Jehochman was humorously engaging in advocacy while promoting his advocacy essay, using the persuasive tactics of advertising cliches and marketing strategies such as "extra strength, institutional size". Viriditas (talk) 01:55, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Ah, I didn't realize that this was Jehochman's essay. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:01, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * It's not mine. Feel free to edit Advocacy.  Perhaps this is a place where the disputants could find common ground. Jehochman Talk 03:46, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Remedies section is a train wreck
While it is not a fait accompli, since a number of the arbitrators have not voted, the remedies section is shaping up to be a train wreck of epic proportions. Neither of the proposals (R1 or R1.1) for applying standard sanctions are passing, but R2 is passing, so the climate change sanctions noticeboard is going to be suspended, replaced by ...? &lt;cue crickets&gt; None of the remedies against WMC, Polargeo, TGL, or MN are currently passing. R10-R14 read more like principles than remedies, especially R10-R12; maybe they should be moved to principles? (Those five are all currently passing unanimously, which seems to support my contention that they are principles, since all of the arbs who have voted are in agreement.) The only other remedies which are passing are R18.1 (instructing Stephan Schulz not to characterize himself as uninvolved) and R21.1 (regarding a user who has left, invoking his Right to Vanish). Some of the measures currently not passing are likely to move to the pass side as more arbitrators weigh in, but right now, it's not looking very pretty in the whole remedies area. Hopefully, the whole situation with R1 and R2 will be resolved before the case closes.  Horologium  (talk) 00:40, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Just close your eyes and don't look. Eventually some sort of coherent decision will be posted. Jehochman Talk 00:49, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * But the discretionary sanctions will obviously pass and that is the most poweful tool for Admins to control the CC area. Forget about the currently named editors, they are not important. Just visit any science forum on the internet and check out threads discussion climate science and you'll see what I mean. Count Iblis (talk) 00:58, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm very optimistic about things going forward. The discretionary sanctions could pass now in some form if Risker's procedural concerns were resolved to mutual satisfaction, because it only needs her vote to pass.


 * I disagree with Horologium's description of the remedy section as "a train wreck", too. I've seen many arbitration cases in trouble, and this isn't one of them.  The most important remedies have enough votes to pass, some of the minor quibbly ones such as Lar, 2over0 and Jehochman are dead, and the only major decisions to be made there are on the final dispositions of William Connolley, The Good Locust, and Mark Nutley, each of which need two or three supporting votes to pass.


 * The really sticky area of this arbitration case, it seems to me, is the enforcement section. The crucial "Uninvolved administrators" motion is just dangling there like an odd sock in a laundry basket. Three abstentions, no other active votes. --TS 02:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Count Iblis and TS have the correct perspective. There's never been a shortage of combative editors on the climate articles, so whether or not sanctions are placed on specific individuals doesn't matter much in the long run. It's the systemic changes that are important, and those are a mixed bag at the moment. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 02:34, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * My concern is not whether sanctions are applied to specific editors (although I think that several of those need to be done too), but the fact that it seems that the arbs are focusing on the individual points without looking at the big picture. The fact that the only specific sanctions are directed towards Stephan Schulz and Departed User 3 seems to be odd, to say the least. The problem over Discretionary Sanctions is even worse, with everyone in agreement that the current regime doesn't work, but no clear support for a replacement. We have two "active" arbs who have not voted (one ow whom has not participated in any of the threads on any of the many pages of discussion), and 17 principles, 6 FOF, 10 remedies (5 of which are more like principles), and 0 enforcement mechanisms which are passing. (Out of 20 principles, 22 FOF, 27 remedies, and 3 enforcement mechanisms.) I recognize that when the arbs finish voting, we will have a clearer picture, but some of the most sorely needed FOFs and remedies appear to be hopelessly deadlocked.  Horologium  (talk) 18:05, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

The way things are going, I think this case is destined to be known as "Climate Change 1". :-/ ATren (talk) 02:42, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I fear you are correct, but the case isn't over yet. Let's give the arbs a chance to come up with something. If they find an innovative solution to this problem I will personally lobby for them to be given a pay rise. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 02:45, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't think I'd put money down against ATren's proposition, but from what I can tell the discretionary sanctions regime has been extraordinarily successful on many formerly intractable topics including September 11, 2001 attacks, pseudoscience, the Arab/Israeli and Eastern Europe kerfuffles and whatnot. I'm pretty sure there will be a lot of cautious editors playing nicely with one another once the meaning of that sanctions regime sinks in. --TS 02:50, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * See Arbitration_Committee/Discretionary sanctions. --TS 02:57, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * You may be right. I may be overestimating the appearance of chaos right now. But even if they do everything right, CC2 might still be unavoidable. I still think SirFozzie's scorched earth was the best approach I've seen. ATren (talk) 02:59, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * It would certainly quiet things down for a while, but is not a realistic long-term solution. The problems would erupt again whenever the next batch of dogged contrarians showed up and encountered "true believers" (or perhaps someone who was familiar with the scientific literature, but there are fewer of those). Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 03:15, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Extending the metaphor farther than its reference to a military strategy, we should remember that in fire ecology, a "scorched earth" can both inhibit and stimulate the germination of certain types of plants. It may or may not be a coincidence that the long term disruption by Scibaby has been a topic of concern for many accounts created after the user first appeared.  I maintain that Scibaby's purpose is for distraction, while the real problem goes untreated, as is illustrated in this case. Viriditas (talk) 03:17, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Oh I've said that very thing myself on multiple occasions, but I imagine we disagree on what the effects of Scibaby have been. To be sure the "real problem" has gone untreated since there are good excuses like Scibaby around to cast the "real problem" in a good light. TheGoodLocust (talk) 03:24, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * TGL, I always appreciate your POV, even if we are in disagreement most of the time. Yes, we are talking about two different things.  When I talk about Scibaby's distraction, I mean that the user is keeping "us" busy looking this way, while there are things going on "over there". Viriditas (talk) 08:44, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * The fundamental problem with "scorched earth", and any kind of WP:Kindergarten justice is that the good guys edit under their real names, while the bad guys use pseudonyms. Do you really think, that William M. Connolley would return to Wikipedia or CC under some sock pseudonym? How about someone named G major or Bozo the Clown or Johny Walker or Catharsis or LOX or AK-47 or A-Team or Debit or Big mama or Delirium (no pun intended)? -- Petri Krohn (talk) 22:51, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * P.S. - By the way, is there any administrator left, who is using his real name and is notable enough to have his own article? -- Petri Krohn (talk) 22:51, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I only know of one administrator who is notable enough to have their own article which is this one. I can't think of any others but there probably are more. HTH, -- Crohnie Gal  Talk  11:11, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * User:Arthur Rubin although I don't think this should convey any sort of respect with regard to editing CC articles. Polargeo (talk) 11:19, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There is another who isn't primarily notable for Wikipedia-related activities--User:David Eppstein. There are two whose notability derives from Wikipedia: User:Jimbo Wales, and User:Michael Snow. There are others whose names are prominently linked to their usernames, as well: User:Anthere is an easy example.  Horologium  (talk) 12:11, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

ScienceApologist redirect of new CC article
This is so disheartening. marknutley created this article yesterday and obviously put a great deal of work into it. There are 71 references, 54Kb of data, well-placed images, etc. ScienceApologist redirected that article, losing every bit of content, to Climate change alarmism -- without any discussion on the talk page, without any comment to mark, without even any kind of reason given in his edit summary. This appears to be a total nasty, malicious, in-your-face POV pushing, taunting-of-a-soon-to-be-banned-user redirect. What's even more distasteful about this is that at approximately the same time SA was disrupting the Wiki and escalating tension in the CC topic area, I was over on Watts Up With That? extendeding SA a giant dose of collaborative good will on a very long, hotly-contested issue .. for which ScienceApologist expressed his gratitude.

Not much has been said by or about ScienceApologist in this case, but this needs to be looked at because this is exactly the kind of action that is taken against non-mainstream-consensus science content and editors all the time. This kind of thing belies the repeated arguments that the poor scientists are picked on and frazzled from dealing with attacks and assaults from the "fringe."

I reverted the redirect and actually redirected it to its proper name per MOS, and left SA a notice on his talk page. I will notify him of this new section mentioning him here as well.

(Addit -- After being reverted again and then self reverted by the admin, discussion had stabilized and a merge discussion had started. William M. Connolley then came in an redirected it again without discussion on talk page and without explanation in edit summary Minor4th  07:21, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * UPDATE – The article has been deleted / moved to user space as a recreation of deleted content, see Articles for deletion/Climate change exaggeration. I do not see any point in continuing this discussion. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 13:47, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * And now it's been redirected again -- losing all the content from what must have been weeks of work -- and the page is protected .  Great. Please do something about this.   Minor4th  07:34, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Might this be an opportunity to work closer with your colleagues under the provisions of WP:BRD, and can we make an effort to assume good faith without attributing malice to one side or the other? Civility is important here. Viriditas (talk) 07:43, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * SA should know that the proper and non-confrontational way to approach this would be to place a "proposed merge" tag on the "exaggeration" and "alarmisn" articles and then start a discussion on one of the talk pages. Cla68 (talk) 07:47, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It's probably best for everyone involved in this dispute to refrain from speculating about motives and to work towards resolution in a harmonious manner. This often involves taking a step back and looking at the big picture. Viriditas (talk) 08:40, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Have you looked at the article beyond the pretty pictures and the irrelevant references? It's a pure case of WP:SYN, inventing a term not supported by significant sources and then listing alleged examples. While it no doubt represents a lot of work, that in itself does not make it valuable - I can shovel sand from one mound to another and back again all day, without having done something useful (except, arguably, for my stamina). And no, nothing is "lost" - it's all in the version history. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:47, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * The pictures are pretty though. I think the article is now tagged for merging, and there is a discussion there where all of this would be more appreopriate. Weakopedia (talk) 07:52, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * A discussion has been started on a proposed merge, so please chime in there instead of here. Cla68 (talk) 07:54, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Besides being virtually empty of content, the article is a POV fork by a single-purpose editor who doubtlessly knows the other article exists. We can keep it up for a few days to see if there's anything worth keeping. (Of course, the merge request could have been made straight from the author's sandbox.) — kwami (talk) 07:59, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

@Cla - the merge discussion should take place there, but this kind of action needs to come to the Arbs attention. If there was not an Arb case going on and a light being shined on this type of action, it likely would not have been reversed and that would have been the end of that. This kind of thing is exactly what the Arbs need to see because you see people right here trying to justify it, arguing for summary deletion because it's "not useful" and "empty of content" because they don't like the article. Have y'all seen some of the crap that is around Wiki? This article may need work and maybe the alarmism article can be merged into the new article but we dont go around deleting articles we don't like by calling them POV forks and redirecting the content away to the article history. <b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 08:05, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There is a good reason that assuming good faith is considered a "fundamental principle". We want Wikipedia to be a place where people from all backgrounds can work together towards the common goal of creating and improving encyclopedic articles.  It is possible to have disagreements with other editors without accusing them of "nasty, malicious, in-your-face POV pushing".  Per 3.1.6 of the PD, "It is unacceptable for an editor to routinely accuse others of misbehavior without reasonable cause in an attempt to besmirch their reputations. Concerns, if they cannot be resolved directly with the other users involved, should be brought up in the appropriate forums with evidence, if at all." Viriditas (talk) 08:38, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I've redirected the thing yet again, as a POV fork. MN is being disruptive by creating this thing. And M4th is being disruptive by accusing SA of malice (I've removed the PA from the header ) (oh - and for those with better memories than me - wasn't something similar deleted a while ago?) William M. Connolley (talk) 09:16, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, that takes the cake as far as AGF goes. An admin already protected the article, unprotected it, undid the redirect and started a merger discussion. Which you have just overridden. Great display. Weakopedia (talk) 09:24, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * More fun-n-games at User_talk:Kwamikagami William M. Connolley (talk) 09:28, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Also, notice that MN has already broken his promise for fully withdraw from the Cl Ch area less than 24h after making it William M. Connolley (talk) 09:32, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * In this case I fully support ScienceApologist's action, this is the kind of situation WP:BOLD is for. The Climate change exaggeration "article" is a prime case of WP:POVFORK. It is a WP:POVish essay full of WP:SYNthesis. Nothing here is lost however; if the sourced content is usable, it should be merged to Climate change alarmism. Marknutley was fully aware of the POVFORK nature of his work, he has therefore no right to assume that it would survive deletion. Maybe that was not even his point; what if he just wanted to make his position known without outside interference. What I would suggest to Mark is that he publishes his article somewhere outside WIkipedia, Google Knol is a perfect place for this kind of personal insight. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 10:25, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, WMC, I do NOT see that MN broke his promise. You didn't cite a diff, so I reviewed MN's edit history. I do not see an edit to a CC article after 6 Sep. Surely, you aren't claiming that edits here are a violation?(addendum, I see you've said this twice, and the earlier time, you did include a diff. To a talk page, defending against the claim that MN only posts about CC. Are you saying it is a violation to assert that you post about other things? He didn't mention Climate Change, and the sole point was that he does edit on other subjects. Isn't this carrying a personal grudge a bit too far?)-- SPhilbrick  T  13:10, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * P.S. – I have now gone back to the "exaggeration" article and tried to read it a second time. I still did not understand a word of it. This is about the worst piece of writing I have seen on Wikipedia. The article does not provide a definition; it does not even seem to contain a single statement of fact. All it contains is a large collection of cherry-picked quotes. It may not really even be a WP:SYNthesis: it tries to avoid synthesizing its claims from the quotes – as if this was some kind of miracle path to a neutral point-of-view. User:*Kat* below me seems to be saying about the same thing. I really do not think any part of this is usable in the Climate change alarmism article, not at least without a thorough rewrite. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 10:53, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Making articles composed entirely of quotes is a common MN pattern. See for example Echoes of Life: What Fossil Molecules Reveal about Earth History William M. Connolley (talk) 10:58, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Lets AGF for now, please? We're talking about the article, its fate, and how this is a good example of the problems within the CC editing community.  Or at least that is what most of us are talking about.--*Kat* (talk) 11:11, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * (ec)I've got to agree with William and ScienceApologist on this one as well. I've read Mark's article.   Its not very good on a number of levels.  For one thing it reads like something out of the 1901 Encyclopedia Britannica because it is literally a collection of statements and accusations made by various people and organizations on the subject of climate change and the (possible) release of exaggerated or erroneous data.  That is why it cites so many sources. Its not an article.  Its a list dressed up as an article.--*Kat* (talk) 10:35, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, I have no opinion on Mark's article since I haven't read it, but this statement struck me a bit since it reminds me so much of the List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming article, which is a clear POV fork and it keeps the list of scientists intentionally very small to make it look like it is a "fringe" position. They even include misleading graphs to try and debunk each type of skeptical position and have an introductory primer to make sure people know how incorrect these people are and how the IPCC is 100% correct. To be sure it is probably more polished and well-written, lipstick on a pig if you will, but it is purely an advocacy article as it is currently written (like several other articles). TheGoodLocust (talk) 16:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * What is needed is an unambiguous list containing the relevant scientific results of the sceptics without any rebuttals and introductions that have a pro-AGW bias. We should let the outstanding scientific results of the sceptics speak for themselves. Would something like "List of publications in the journal Nature contradicting the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming", do? Count Iblis (talk) 18:30, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Didn't Nature have to retract 7 papers by that fraud Jan Hendrik Schön? If you want to keep it, then keep it simple - making such oddly specific articles is gaming in the same way that partisan polling places tend to get the numbers they want by asking the "right" questions.


 * A good way to improve the article is to stop posting graphs based on a paper or two from Real Climate/Climategate scientists (you know, WMC's associates) and then explicitly declaring those misleading graphs to be the "consensus" version (source?) in an article that has nothing to do with those graphs. The article clearly tries to discredit everyone on it in the most dishonest of ways, but that's what you get when people edit with a clear COI. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:06, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Off-topic discussion of author and content
I simply wish to emphasise the nature of Marknutley's edit summary. It's like throwing a grenade and running for cover. Wikispan (talk) 11:43, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Well worth quoting here in bold: may as well move this to mainspace and let them fight it out among themselves - is that an act of good faith? William M. Connolley (talk) 12:00, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes it is an act of good faith, as i am withdrawing from CC articles then any CC related articles in my user space had to be moved or deleted. It was painfully obvious that people would fight over this article, hence the edit summary mark nutley (talk) 12:04, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * If you knew that it would start a fight why did you create it in the first place?--*Kat* (talk) 12:10, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * (ec) Mark has given a perfectly good reason for his action, no reason to accuse him of it. Likewise ScienceApologist took the only possible next step. The only thing to consider now is what possible part of Mark's "citation collection" could go into the main article. Anyway, I apologize for my hard criticism of the article content, I now understand it was nowhere finished. Unless there is still someone here who wants to accuse SA for something, I think this discussion can end. If you like, continue at the merge discussions. I do think that Minor4th should strike out his original comment. If not, someone should archive this discussion as irrelevant. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 12:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I wasn't making accusations. I was just asking a question. --*Kat* (talk) 12:35, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Because CC Exaggeration happens all the time, it is notable. All articles related to CC cause arguments, i knew this would be no exception to that. Personally i would prefer peace and quite and people working on improving it, not just try and remove all content which does not agree with their POV mark nutley (talk) 12:15, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Apart from the fact that this is a violation of MN's restriction not to add content without approval (approval he has sought as failed to get;, User_talk:Marknutley/Archive_7, No_original_research/Noticeboard/Archive_13), it's also a CSD G4 (see Articles for deletion/Climate change exaggeration). And that's aside from the whole issue of it being a POV fork of climate change alarmism. Guettarda (talk) 12:17, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Comment: Hatting this section is inappropriate. The real problem here is MN's actions. SA's decision to simply redirect the article was both appropriate and very restrained. Minor4th's behaviour, on the other hand, is far less than optimal. Guettarda (talk) 12:57, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * What about section headers? Those do help with navigation and this section has gotten pretty long.--*Kat* (talk) 13:02, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

So is the current version similar to the one deleted via AfD? If there's an admin around that can take a quick peek and compare, a G4 deletion could save a lot of bickering. Tarc (talk) 13:03, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * It's not identical to the deleted version or I would have tagged it already, but I believe that it's close enough that the deletion decision applies. See a copy of original article here. Guettarda (talk) 13:06, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think that it is the same - the old version i believe is this one: User:Joepnl/Vault/Climate change exaggeration. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 13:11, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It's too different from the deleted version for G4 I think. But equally a second AFD or merge debate seems a waste of time and drama. I've userfied to User:Marknutley/Climate change exaggeration, from whence any that wants can merge anything to climate change alarmism. Rd232 talk 13:13, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not seeing the edit summary at the link provided by Wikispan above. His creating this article was disruptive, even more so during the arbcom decision. ScottyBerg (talk) 21:24, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Redirect war involving several editors and admins
Timeline of events:


 * creates Climate change exaggeration, well sourced, 71 references, 54 Kb, pictures, etc.


 * redirects to Climate change alarmism less than two hours after article creaion -- a small, poorly sourced article with barely any content.  No talk page discussion, no edit summary.


 * restores article with edit summary: ''ScienceApologist, why would you do this redirect and lose all of the content of the new article? That is very mean spirited and contrary to policy. PROD it or tag for AfD) and left note on SA's talk page asking for explanation. Started discussion here.


 * redirects again citing "POV fork" -- even though the new article is much longer and much more thorough than the article that it was redirected into. Different content too.


 * protects the page to his preferred version after redirect citing POV


 * After discussion Kwamikagami unprotects, reverts his own redirect and starts merger discussion


 * redirects it back to the alarmism article without talk page discussion and without meaningful edit summary. Before Connolley redirect warred, things had calmed down and the merger discussion had begun and was accepted as the proper method for proceeding.


 * reverted Connolley and restored the article with edit summary: this is not a game while the CC arb case is under way. Let normal processes be followed. Sheesh!


 * userfied the article to mark nutley's userspace without discussion, without speedy tag, with edit summary: Userfy clear fork of Climate change alarmism; see talk page -- merge tags are still on the page, and the merge discussion had only barely started


 * Redirects the resulting main space article name to Climate change alarmism with edit summary reasonable alternate term I suppose - so redirect to Climate change alarmism


 * Tags the resulting empty page for speedy deletion citing  recreation of deleted content: see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Climate change exaggeration (it is not a restoration of a deleted article, not even close)

Do I even need to go through the analysis of everything that is wrong with this series of actions? Arbs please do something about this. <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 14:10, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Not only do you not need to go through it, but you didn't need to list it, especially with the omission of key data points. The page is now at User:Marknutley/Climate change exaggeration if anyone wants to merge stuff from there. Whilst not a recreation of the deleted article, the March 2010 AFD Articles for deletion/Climate change exaggeration seems to establish "alarmism" as the preferred term, and this article was created in June 2010, and comfortably survived an AFD in July. Global warming alarmism, by the by, has existed as a redirect since 2004. Rd232 talk 14:17, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Just curious if you happened to see the redirect war going on when you deleted the page from mainspace and redirected the resulting blank page? Did you happen to notice the merge tag linking to the merge discussion?  Under what  criteria did you unilaterally speedy delete the article without tagging it?  <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 14:20, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * In answer to your question, the creator's edit summary "may as well move this to mainspace and let them fight it out among themselves" was the decisive factor. It sounds WP:POINTy, and it achieved disruption. Sending it back where it came from aborted that disruption. Besides which it is a blatant POV fork of an existing article, under a name which had previously been deleted, with only one plausible merge target. What exactly is there to discuss? There's nothing to see here, move along. PS the speedy deletion question threw me but I think you don't know that admins have the ability to move pages without creating a redirect to the destination, to avoid creating something only to have to delete it. Since cross-namespace redirects to userspace are not allowed, I unticked the "leave a redirect" option. Rd232 talk 14:32, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Minor4th, please have these discussions in an appropriate place; the Proposed Decision talk page is not it. You also may want to consider that your current behavior is not reflecting well on your participation in this topic area. Shell   babelfish 14:33, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks, could you be more specific? I don't doubt that I am a bit wound up right now and my behavior likely reflects it, and for that I apologize and will be more aware of it and modify it where it is pointed out to me.  That notwithstanding, I think this event is a very good illustration of the difficulties and contentiousness in this topic area and to the extent the Arbs have time or inclination, it could be informative. I do wish you would be specific about the behavior of mine you find troubling so that I may correct it.  <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b>


 * Minor4th, I apologize for my harsh comments earlier. I do however think that your argumentation is not at all helping you or your case. I have been following this CC circus for half a day, and it is already driving me crazy. I am starting to feel great sympathy for the editors on the "scientific" side of this debate. I do wonder what is keeping all of you in this battleground for so long. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 14:41, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I wonder as well.  And I accept your apology. Again, to the Wiki in general, I apologize for getting wound up, but this is very frustrating -- I know we obviously see it differently if you're feeling sorry for the "scientific" editors (not sure what that means but I catch your drift) because what I see is actions being taken that just wouldnt be tolerated on the rest of Wiki.   I'll just leave it at that and acknowledge that there is clearly more than one view.   <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 14:56, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I agree that I think this event is a very good illustration - but not in the way that M4th thinks. A more honest assessment would be: William M. Connolley (talk) 15:16, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * MN receates a previously deleted page Articles for deletion/Climate change exaggeration with a deliberately inflammatory (though accurate) edit summary.
 * The page is properly redirected, as before.
 * A few of the "usual suspects" (M4th, Collect) show up and stir up trouble by re-recreating the deleted article.
 * M4th makes an attack on an uninvolved admin who has dared to touch "his" article.
 * M4th deliberately adds in PAs whilst discussing the matter here and revert wars to keep the PA in  and still insists that the PA is justified.
 * "The usual suspects"? All I did was say that normal processes should be followed. That is all.  If that is enough to become a "suspect" than I surely pity anyone who actually disagrees with you on something!  I "re-created" nothing, by the way.  I do not have that power to begin with!   Now might you calm down and recognize that I am just an outsider who has consistently spoken for following rules and procedures? Thanks! Collect (talk) 18:07, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Of course you re-created it: as in, you reverted the redirect, thus unhelpfully prolonging the problem William M. Connolley (talk) 18:48, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Dear me -- I note that you made not any try at a real edit summary - all I did was undo your unhelpful redirect as there was an already-started merger discussion. Is that sufficiently clear?  Where a merger discussion exists, is there a deadline you must meet to act without an edit summary of some consequence at all?  Is there a reason to short-circuit established WP policies and procedures? Collect (talk) 19:00, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Guys, the crisis is over. Why turn it into a drama after the event? The only point I would have people take away is a useful reminder of the value of edit summaries which are (a) informative and (b) neutral and AGF. Hasty and and large-volume editing makes it easy to forget at times, so let's just take the opportunity to remind ourselves of what we should aim for. Rd232 talk 20:25, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Let's not oversimplify things. I saw Minor make his first post here, and I checked all the talk pages of the peoples involved to see what was what. At that point SA had made the redirect and the article was protected. By the way SA didn't give his reasons for the redirect anywhere, just did it. So that is mistake one and two - Minor posting here without stopping to discuss, and SA redirecting without discussion.
 * I tried to diffuse the whole thing by making a discussion out of it - but then you jumped in and again redirected the thing, despite it just having been edit warred over and left that way by an admin.
 * That wasn't really a good faith move.
 * Actually there are a few people making less than good faith moves, and they seem to part of the cadre that always make less than good faith moves. This is a good illustration in that if you blocked all the particpants you would solve half the problems in one fell swoop. Weakopedia (talk) 15:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * This is a good illustration in that if you blocked all the particpants - no. This is an illustration that if you blocked the original source of the problem - viz, MN and his ilk - you'd solve *all* of the problems. even now reality has intervened - the article is deleted, the redirect restored - you're still unable to accept it. In your odd world, the people causing the disruption are good, and those attempting to fix it lack "good faith" William M. Connolley (talk) 17:57, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, seeing as how you have managed to worm your way into yet another edit war, your nth since this case started, I suppose you would say that, wouldn't you. Which, I suppose, is why your name is in lights, and mine isn't. Thanks tho. Weakopedia (talk) 21:03, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I was just wondering if a saving grace for nutley was that he was unaware of the existence of the climate change alarmism article (having not edited it or its talk page or the AFD). But No_original_research/Noticeboard/Archive_13 shows substantial discussion of his userspace draft in July, including comments about being a fork. Rd232 talk 15:26, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't know about that, but surely he knew that he was re-creating a deleted page, which (if substantially identical) could have been speedily deleted under CSD G4. ScottyBerg (talk) 21:20, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * People don't always know when they're re-creating a deleted page; this was (I think) completely written by nutley, so G4 didn't apply. But the NORN discussion shows nutley was aware of the context. Rd232 talk 21:24, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually when you create an article with the identical title of a deleted article, a little msg. pops up saying that it was deleted. This he would have seen at the point of actually putting the article into mainspace. Even if he didn't, which I doubt, it seemed to be deliberately provocative, given the timing. ScottyBerg (talk) 21:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Good point, I forgot about that warning. Rd232 talk 22:38, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Yeah, it's a big pink thingie. See Greenville business magazine, as an example. 23:16, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That's what she said. --TS 23:20, 7 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I believe MN created the article as Climate Change Exaggeration (note upper case "CCE") which had not previously been deleted. Minor4th then renamed it to "Cce" . So MN didn't see the deleted indicator. ATren (talk) 02:00, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * But, digging deeper, he did vote to keep the original, so he did know about it. ATren (talk) 02:05, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Even if he had forgotten about that, he'd still have gotten the big pink notice when he created the article. It's not case sensitive. See Greenville Business Magazine ("Greenville business magazine" had been deleted). ScottyBerg (talk) 12:45, 8 September 2010 (UTC) Sorry, poor example. In all likelihood Mark did not see the pink notice. ScottyBerg (talk) 13:01, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It does appear to be case sensitive (I don't think ScottyBerg's link shows what he thinks it shows) but as ATren points out MN clearly was involved enough to know what he was doing. Polargeo (talk) 12:51, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * What I was trying to show was this:Greenville business magazine was deleted, but you still get the big pink deletion notice if you try to create Greenville Business Magazine. If you try to re-create either article you'll get the same notice. Go ahead, give it a try. I'm familiar with this article as I posted the original CSD notice, and my contrib history still shows the lower-case version being deleted. ScottyBerg (talk) 12:57, 8 September 2010 (UTC) Oh no! I goofed. Both were separately deleted. Sorry. ScottyBerg (talk) 12:59, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Rlevse's votes
It looks like Rlevse's votes are indented and not being counted. If this is intentional and he had removed his votes, can a clerk strike them so it is clear? If this is a glitch, can a clerk please fix? 128.151.71.18 (talk) 18:51, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Ask at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Clerks, but from memory I think it's the normal method of handling struck votes. --TS 19:05, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * He has gone inactive on all ArbCom related materials. The normal procedure for an arbitrator going inactive during a case is to indent the votes (to show that they do not currently count, due to Rlevse going inactive), but not to strike them. SirFozzie (talk) 19:07, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

2 comments

 * 1) If remedy 4 (William M. Connolley topic-banned (BLP)) passes, will WMC be allowed to make talk page edits on these BLPs?
 * 2) As Risker has pointed out, remedy 20 (ChrisO is banned from all BLPs and their talk pages for one year, to come into effect if and when this user returns to editing.) does not have an associated finding of fact. That is not fair to ChrisO; there should be some diffs given to justify such a sweeping remedy (all BLPs, and their talk pages, project-wide). -- JN  466  15:28, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree. It's a sweeping remedy. The fact that no arbitrator has attempted to justify it is not fair to ChrisO at all. Doubly so because he edited under a long-used alias and is retiring from the project anyway. Cool Hand Luke 19:28, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

FellGleaming
A user has just returned to CC. This user ducked out before this case began. User:FellGleaming is now edit warring at Watts Up With That?, trying to reintroduce edits of the IP 99.144.248.213. It is difficult to know what to do in the current limbo but there have been past CC sanctions against this user here and shortly after there was a case here which closed as wrong venue as stands without prejudice on some or all issues being raised elsewhere or here. The reason these issues were then not raised at the time is because FellGleaming withdrew from the topic area of climate change Wikipedia talk:General sanctions/Climate change probation/Requests for enforcement/Archive 3. However as FellGleaming is now back we have an issue. Polargeo (talk) 15:44, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I request page protection for Watts Up With That?. I know this is unusual to request it here but thanks in advance. Polargeo (talk) 15:49, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It's at Requests_for_page_protection. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 15:54, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * thanks AQFK but please just protect it and think later. Polargeo (talk) 15:58, 8 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Polargeo is an involved editor at this article, actively reverting my changes. . He is also an editor who has conflicted with me on other articles. The material he refers to has been deleted and reinserted by many other editors besides myself, including Squiddy, A Quest For Knowledge, ScienceApologist,  William M. Connolley, SlaterSteven, Minor4th, and at least two different IP editors.  See history here: .  Some of these editors have been far more active in reverting here than myself.  It's illuminating that Polargeo considers none of them as "edit warring", but immediately threatens me with action.  Is this the act of a disinterested bystander?  I put forth that his past history of conflict with me is driving him here, and as further evidence list his choice of language as accusing me of "ducking out".   I was a bit light in editing over the summer, but I've been actively editing again for the past month.  Fell Gleaming talk 16:08, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't deny I have gotten involved in this article with my recent edit and I don't deny that I am involved with regards to FellGleaming, that is why I did not protect the page myself. If she wishes to throw that up as a smokescreen to protect her actions then that is hopefully not going to gain traction. Polargeo (talk) 16:11, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Polargeo is there as an editor, not as an administrator. There is nothing wrong with that. Admins can get involved in content disputes, just like everyone else. they just can't use the tools. The Wordsmith Communicate 16:22, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Firstly, please get my sex right please Polargeo; I've said many times I'm male. Secondly, the action in this case is a small group of editors who wish to remove a NYT-published recommendation of the article subject, as part of a lengthy campaign to scrub the article of any positive references.  Their initial justification was that the review wasn't notable, because the journalist who wrote it wasn't a scientist.  When that argument failed to gain traction, a posting on a personal blog purporting to be an email from the journalist was then notable enough to preface the recommendation with the statement she had retracted her opinion.  When it was revealed that not only was the source non-reliable, but the interpretation of the remarks was flawed (she actually stated she regretted that her recommendation was interpreted as idealogical), her NYT article suddenly became "not notable" again.  Another group of editors, myself included, are arguing against such a tendentious interpretation.  Further, these same editors who believe the NYT recommendation isn't notable, believe very strongly that a negative review from another journalist is notable, despite the journalist issuing a formal retraction that he "got it wrong" when he accused the article subject (a web site) of having inaccurate figures.  See Polargeo's reversion above for an example of this.
 * However, if the charge is "edit warring", the real issue is that Polargeo has seen fit to ignore several other editors who have been far more active in this article's disputes than I have been, instead visiting mine and other talk pages with threats to me of "topic bans" and other similar remarks. Fell Gleaming talk 16:26, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry I was going on the recent ANI you were involved in on a politcal BLP for your gender. As to the edit warring I asked for page protection against everyone. I saw two recent reverts by yourself re-adding information added by the IP. This was more significant recent edit warring than from any other individual (except maybe the IP). Polargeo (talk) 16:35, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Over the past week, SlaterSteven and ScienceApologist have engaged in far more reverts than I. Yet the only person you slapped with an edit war warning and a threat of a topic ban was myself.  Further, one of those two edits of mine you refer to (the one you yourself reverted in fact), was not even itself a revert.   And even now, you're visiting my talk page with unfounded accusations of sock puppetry.  Is this proper behaviour for an admin?  Fell Gleaming talk 16:59, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You are incorrect your two reverts in the last two days on the same thing were here and here. They have nothing to do with your other edit which I undid/reverted here. Polargeo (talk) 17:06, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The second edit was over a day before the first, meaning I haven't even breached 1RR here. A glance at the article history shows several editors with 2 or 3 reverts of the same material on a given day.  Did you warn any of them? Did you threaten any of them with a topic ban?   Did you accuse any of them of sock puppetry?  Please answer.   Fell Gleaming talk 17:14, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I said you previously narrowly avoided a topic ban by leaving the CC topic area as I outlined at the beginning of this thread, I did not "threaten you with a topic ban". as to edit warring I am simply looking at your recent actions. If you wish to justify these by highlighting what other editors have previously done then you are unlikely to find much sympathy. Polargeo (talk) 17:22, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Here are diffs of other editors reverting the same paragraph, just in the past 3 days alone ( I think I missed a few but this should suffice to make the point):
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * .

To clarify, Polargeo, how many of these other editors did you warn for edit warring? Fell Gleaming talk 17:31, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you two could continue this discussion on one of your talk pages? This is an ArbCom case page. This has been a useful demonstration of some of the patterns of interaction in the topic area, but it's probably run its course in terms of relevance to the case. MastCell Talk 17:58, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Poleargeo, who is an admin, gave me an edit war warning, and notified me he had opened my case for discussion here. If an admin doesn't know proper policy, how are we mere mortals expected to understand?  Fell Gleaming talk 18:09, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * We were asked by arbs to inform them of any edit wars on CC articles during this case. Edit wars during the case are being logged on the proposed decision page and this is the talkpage. The WP:GS/CC/RE Jehochman is suggesting I post at has no credibility in my opinion, never has had and thankfully looks certain to be superceded by this arbcase ruling. Polargeo (talk) 11:49, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't like that board much, but it's the best we have for now. Soon we'll have WP:AE.  Your original post here was not a neutral report of an edit war that had required protection.  I believe this is the wrong venue.  If there is disruptive editing, or protection needed, file a request in the proper venue.  If you feel the need, you can add a link here to inform the arbitrators of ongoing acting.  Bringing the dispute here just lengthens this bloated page, and delays resolution of the problem. Jehochman Talk 14:27, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Guettarda
I'm not sure if the Committee is considering a finding against Guettarda, who is one of the parties to this case, but it might want to look at that edit. Cla68 (talk) 05:24, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Just noting that I don't particularly hold it against Guettarda for venting on my talkpage. I don't believe that it has crossed the line into disruption, so i'm fine with that comment. The Wordsmith Communicate 07:28, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what's supposed to be wrong with that comment. The conduct Guettarda refers to, however, is worrying. --TS 09:28, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Recent additions to "Findings of fact" against various editors
There's stronger evidence against KimDPetersen and Scjessey than the evidence just added against ATren, Cla68 and the rest. It's on the evidence and workshop pages and this talk page. I also think there's better evidence (that I've already provided on this page) against Polargeo and KimDPetersen, as well as Hipocrite (see my evidence about incivility and battleground behavior on the evidence page and discussion on the Workshop page). -- JohnWBarber (talk) 20:28, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Please see this comment from Shell at 0610 this morning. --TS 20:34, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * (ec with above)Note the difference between Coren's comment explaining his abstaining at Finding 11 (on Polargeo) and Coren's recent support of findings of disruption against these new editors. I think this is jarringly inconsistent (emphasis added):
 * I see what I would term clear personal attacks, and incivility, but I cannot support this finding as titled (as Brad mentions above, "disruption" is a term of art on Wikipedia that applies only to much more severe continued misbehavior). — Coren (talk) 00:34, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Personally, I think Polargeo's behavior on the GSCCRE page was more disruptive than what I've seen in the diffs for the other editors. I'd like to know more about this "term of art" about "disruptive". Perhaps we should refine the language at WP:DISRUPT to reflect it, or maybe I'm just missing something. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 20:39, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I think everybody interested in the arbitration is now fully aware of your opinions about Polargeo. --TS 20:41, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Yet again, Tony, you miss the point. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 20:46, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * JohnWBarber: I am working on a FoF regarding Scjessey on my talk page. Please let me know if you have any diffs that should bad added (or removed) and any other suggestions that you might have.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:06, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Other than what's on this page, I have nothing new to add. I just saw it. Looks good to me. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 21:12, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * JohnWBarber: Can you please cross-reference your evidence with mine to see if I've missed anything? To be honest, I didn't really pay much attention to the discussion on this page with Scjessey.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:17, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Simply put "disruption" is a pattern of interfering with the normal editorial process. Being habitually rude or combative with another editor is a serious problem, but not the same as systematically ignoring NPOV, or original research, or otherwise preventing consensus from being reached "normally" by vexatious litigation, misuse of process, filibustering, and so on.  &mdash; Coren (talk) 23:03, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I'll think about that. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 23:36, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

←I object to this witch hunt in the strongest possible terms. There's no legitimate case that can be made if the diffs are read in their proper context, rather than cloaked in falsehood as they are presented in the section above. Genuine efforts to get fellow editors to calm down have been recast as personal attacks, as have some of my emotional responses to serious baiting and abuse on this very talk page. I have twice begged administrators and arbitrators to impose an interaction ban upon JohnWBarber and me to prevent this editor from continuing his years-long campaign against me, but it has fallen on deaf ears. Of 15,000 edits, this individual has managed to find roughly 15 edits that, when taken out of context and dressed-up with falsehood, seem less than civil. Faced with a statistic like that, it is obvious that JWB has made this a personal matter that has nothing whatsoever to do with this topic or Wikipedia as a whole. This is about getting rid of enemies, not improving Wikipedia. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:25, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It is worth repeating that JWB has not opened an RfC/U about my alleged incivility, or pursued any other form of resolution. It is also worth reminding everyone that I still haven't edited in the climate change topic since pledging to do so, so I'm at a loss to explain why my username should keep popping up on this talk page. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:43, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Nevertheless, the parties are advised to chill. Look, I like and respect all of you as editors, and it's really pointless to get into this kind of dust-up, particularly in the waning days of a long arbitration case that appears unlikely to vindicate anyone (but may end up sanctioning some).  Cheers, y'all. - Wikidemon (talk) 00:32, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Motion for NW to recuse.
Per my comments here I would argue that a motion to ask NW to recuse as a clerk from this case would be in order. --209.204.65.148 (talk) 02:30, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That thread you linked has three other clerks telling you that you're off-base. MastCell Talk 03:13, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Actually you have two, and a third refusing to comment on the matter since it was brought up by an ip address. Regardless, and despite that NW seems to have a peculiar affection for one 'side' of this debate, I don't see him voting on the decision so who cares what he does really. Weakopedia (talk) 08:08, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Just as acting as an administrator in a topic area doesn't make you "involved" it doesn't merit a recusal either. You'd also get a lot further if you provided actual diffs or anything other than vague handwaving in the direction of "some people" think NW is involved in "some side"... Shell   babelfish 08:44, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Are you talking to me? If so, I don't need to provide diffs for nuthin since I was 'voting' to let NW play clerk, same as you, and you got no diffs. If you meant the IP they did provide diffs and you might want to think about your use of indentation. Weakopedia (talk) 09:49, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * It isn't so much that these proceedings may aspire to the level of drama, but that it is often such poor fare... LessHeard vanU (talk) 11:20, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh come now, you must admit that provided an amusing farce William M. Connolley (talk) 13:53, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It was only when I realised that the title bar at the bottom of the page was limited to a certain number of characters and had thus omitted "...#An_episode_of_group_hysteria.2C_now_resolved" from the link description that I was able to return to my usual orbit, and recognise that you had not had some sort of revelation. It was a disturbing few seconds, in truth. LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:40, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Tony Sidaway's hatting of discussions
Minor4th's post this morning about the hatting of discussions struck a nerve with me. For the past year, I've watched Tony Sidaway repeatedly - and I mean repeatedly hat discussions in an apparent attempt to stop editors from discussing issues and retain his preferred version of an article. This is unfortunate as the one thing that we should be doing more is discussing things and trying to reach compromises. His constant hatting of discussions that he doesn't like has a chilling effect because it prevents us from resolving the issues and moving forward. It also encourages edit-warring in the article space since we're not allowed to discuss our issues on the talk page. He's done it dozens of times, especially in the Climategate article. I'd like there to be a finding that Tony Sidaway has abused the hatting of discussion and a remedy that Tony Sidaway is no longer allowed to hat discussions in the CC topic space. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 13:43, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Could you please provide some diffs that show the problem? Thanks. Shell   babelfish 13:51, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I disagree with AQFK. All to often discussion here meander off into the weeds and the page clogs up. Hatting is a good solution to that; TS, as uninvolved, is to be commended for helping. But doing it to push your own POV, as M4th did, and edit warring to keep it in (whilst making PA's in the same edit), isn't acceptable William M. Connolley (talk) 14:00, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure that TS is "uninvolved". ++Lar: t/c 14:24, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You *are* involved, and refuse to admit it. Your judgement on involved or not is not worth having William M. Connolley (talk) 14:39, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * "I'm not uninvolved." -TS. Now, did you want to argue that the author of a statement knows less about the statement than you do? Or that ArbCom finding me uninvolved (if not without some culpability for where we are now) are wrong, should that be how it comes out? Your judgment is not worth having. Full stop. ++Lar: t/c 14:52, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Looks like you've degenerated into point-scoring against me, which pretty well proves my point. If TS says he is involved, thats fine - it demonstrates that he is rather more honest than you are. And I didn't say he was uninvolved. What I said, and maintain, is that your judgement on the matter is worthless William M. Connolley (talk) 15:11, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You've been point scoring against others for a very long time, but no matter. My point stands, you are willing to go against ArbCom, and your judgment is worthless. As are your assurances, should any be dragged out of you. You are the very embodiment of the problem here, although the problem is vast, because you're such a poster child for bad behavior. ++Lar: t/c 15:19, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Let's be careful with this one. More discussion is often better, but we've all seen situations where the discussion stops being productive, and can drag on uselessly, especially if there are more than one involved who like to get the last word. Hatting such a discussion isn't an absolute bar to a continuation of discussion, it sends a message that if you want to continue, you need to start a new section, and perhaps it isn't worth it. I've seen many a hatting stop a worthless exchange of heat in its tracks. That said, it can be abused, and if it is done by "one side" when they think they are losing an argument, it can be detrimental. Yes, TS can be hat happy. However unless several of those examples are accompanied by contemporaneous complaints, I'd prefer that ArbCom simply note (perhaps even informally with a post here) that hatting can be abused, and care should be taken not to stop a productive discussion, even if long.--  SPhilbrick  T  14:03, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Sphilbrick: My proposed FoF is only about TS. If a discussion truly needs to be closed, then let someone else do it.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 14:07, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I've known Tony onwiki a very long time. I have a great deal of respect for his intellect and enthusiasm, as well as his ability to come up with erudite comments and witty turns of phrase. But a request to him, much less a general finding, will have zero effect on Tony unless he wants it to. Often in the past only a directly worded statement from someone in a position of authority that explicitly mentions him has had any effect. Now, this is a "failing" that perhaps many of us fall prey to ("Yes, X is bad but they're not talking about ME!"), present company certainly not excepted, but it's something to keep in mind. If Tony's hatting and clerking is excessive, a general admonishment most likely won't do. Even requests to him on his talk page from other editors had no effect. ++Lar: t/c 14:23, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm not uninvolved. The hatting seems to work quite well, and I consider it to be an essential element of good page management. Another technique I've used is to break out long discussions to a subpage. Claims that complaints on my talk page have no effect are very wide of the mark, and of course there's nothing to stop any editor who objects simply undoing the edit. If there is evidence of abuse, I think it should be compiled. I note that up to now nobody has raised this problem, if it is one, to the level of RFC, which wouldn't have been difficult to do if the evidence was abundant. Nor, I seem to recall, is any aspect of my talk page conduct mentioned on the evidence page (not that this should limit the Committee if a problem exists).

Overall, I think competent hatting and archiving is far too rare, and I would like to see it encouraged in situations where repetitive and unproductive discussions are common. Tedious and hostile slabs of text on talk pages contribute greatly to the battleground atmosphere. --TS 14:44, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I would definitely like to see this explored because Shell made a finding that I was disruptive and cited my hatting of one off topic section of a discussion.  The only reason it occurred to me to hat the discussion was because I had seen Tony do it numerous times on this page.  I thought that was an accepted practice, and I was doing what I thought was approved protocol in this topic area.   I do not think that should be counted as disruptive behavior for me when I was just doing what I've seen other editors do -- if it's ok for Tony, it should be ok for me.  If it's disruptive of me, then it's disruptive of Tony.  Either way, I don't think that should count against me because I am new to the topic area and was only following the example of a more experienced editor.   <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 14:50, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * @TS: Thanks for acknowledging you are not uninvolved. As for reverting hatting, that doesn't always work well. Sometimes it does, but as Minor4th points out, it's been cited as problematic in this very case. I think it would be better if you voluntarily stepped away from clerking and left it to the clerks. ++Lar: t/c 14:54, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, unproductive hatting and unproductive unhatting can be problematic. The question is always whether the edit was appropriate.  We're not talking about clerking, here, but talk page management which is and has always been carried out by the editors themselves. --TS 14:56, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Hatting on these pages is often done by clerks. It may be best if it always is, or at least if there is any question about a particular hat, undo it, and leave it to the clerks. I do agree with you that competent hatting is a good thing, and that unproductive hatting/unhatting isn't. I just do not think that all of your hats have been productive. Some have been premature or have hid part but not all of a discussion, leaving a false impression. You're not the only one, in fact one of the clerks in this case did that too.. but at least with clerks there's a more formal mechanism to protest. ++Lar: t/c 15:01, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

I think we're talking to cross purposes. The hatting A Quest For Knowledge complains about is that on talk pages of articles in the topic area. As you may be aware, I responded to suggestions by the arbitrators that editors perform page management on this page, but stopped editing this talk page when it became evident that any such editing by someone other than a clerk or an arbitrator was likely to be controversial. --TS 15:20, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You know what? We are. Full marks for taking that suggestion, and my apologies for confusion or raising side issues. ++Lar: t/c 16:13, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Shell: Diffs are available on my talk page. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:32, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't think that unhatting is going to improve the atmostphere among editors on Wikipedia. Realistically, only the first editor following the hatting has the option without thorny issues with subsequent comments. Maybe the solution is to move the contested hatting into a new section? Slowjoe17 (talk) 21:49, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually all any editor has to do is remove the template that does the hatting/archiving instead of trying to do an undo or rollback. Shell  babelfish 15:30, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

Looking at this again I think Minor 4th has a complaint that an arbitrator said he had "hatted a section you didn't like on a case page for goodness sake." The hatting off accompanied edit warring over the title, which was obviously pretty serious, but I don't think the above characterization was necessarily helpful. As Minor 4th says, he saw me doing similar hatting and copied it thinking to help improve this page (which at the time was obscenely large). Now it turned out that such hatting was controversial, but Minor 4th probably didn't realise that because he is unlikely to have seen the messages that were put on my talk page. --TS 13:06, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Obama emigration
Something above on this page reminded me of something I investigated but didn't follow up late last year. In mid-2009 some people were sanctioned for disruptive editing in the Barack Obama topic area, and it seems that some of them migrated from that area where they couldn't continue their hostilities to climate change where they took up the cudgels again. It might be useful to include a finding on this, because it shows how the behavior of the people in question might apply across several topics and perhaps need broader sanctions. I'm sorry I didn't contribute to the evidence or workshop processes else I might have raised this earlier and in the appropriate place. I don't know whether it's significant that William M. Connolley was active in that other probation as an administrator. --TS 16:58, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * For information, users sanctioned under the Obama probation according to the sanctions log and active in the climate change topic area include the following:
 * (who I believe also edits as User:JohnWBarber)
 * (now under 1 year ban by arbcom)
 * (now indefinitely banned by the community)
 * This list is just the result of eyeballing the log. There could be others. --TS 17:12, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you'd be so kind as to provide a link for the above. I can't remember just how long ago it was. Here, let me help you with the ArbCom case. I think there was only one person associated with this case that was sanctioned in that case in August 2009, for edit warring and, more to the point, for personal attacks: Scjessey. So far, the only two people who have thought my 2008 behavior was relevant now have been Jehochman and Scjessey. But of course ArbCom members are always welcome to look into my present and past behavior. By the way, Tony, would you say your behavior has changed much in two years? Just askin' ... -- JohnWBarber (talk) 17:25, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * My list above is not from the arbitration case, but from the probation. My intent is to document a migration of sanctioned editors from one topic to another. It is painfully evident that some personal grievances and vendettas from that topic have been carried over to this one. --TS 17:30, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Vendettas? Funny, I can only find one. Scjessey's against me. But you put it in the plural. Have you found others? Do you mean Tarc's vendetta against me? But he only briefly commented on this page, so I wouldn't call that a vendetta. Something between Wikidemon and me?   (If you look into the sanctions matter, that was the editor I was having a problem with at the time.) Nope ... no vendetta there. Between Lar and me? Between LHvU and me? No and no. There must've been some other vendetta you're talking about, Tony. C'mon, fork it over. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 18:10, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * JohnWBarber, your commentary on this page is starting to become incivil and unproductive. Take a break. Shell   babelfish 16:20, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Migration? If I'd wanted to bother editing the Barack Obama article then I would, but it was made perfectly clear to me that some things weren't allowed in the article. I'd hoped such activism was limited to political articles, but I was clearly too optimistic. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:41, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Weren't you topic-banned from Obama articles? Guettarda (talk) 18:45, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * According to the sanctions log, TGL was blocked for 96 hours, 1 week, 2 weeks, and 1 month before being topic banned, and the reasons given for the blocks are similar to issues raised regarding CC editing. I think TS is correct that this is relevant background information for a Finding of Fact in the present case.  EdChem (talk) 18:54, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes I was, I've said it before here, but I decided not to go back after my topic ban expired since it was clear how much trouble there was going against the House POV. That's the real problem with wikipedia as a whole; some admins can't help themselves and subtly or overtly push their POV. Only a "denialist" would assert otherwise. TheGoodLocust (talk) 18:57, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh, I see. Guettarda (talk) 19:20, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes I was, I've said it before here, but I decided not to go back after my topic ban expired since it was clear how much trouble there was going against the House POV. That's the real problem with wikipedia as a whole; some admins can't help themselves and subtly or overtly push their POV. Only a "denialist" would assert otherwise. TheGoodLocust (talk) 18:57, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh, I see. Guettarda (talk) 19:20, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Thank you, this clears up a lot of my confusion about what is going on with some of the past history comments. -- Crohnie Gal Talk  14:22, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

Interim enforcement?
Please see the probation request for enforcement talk page where AQFK has detailed 2 edit wars on the Phil Jones article: .William M. Connolley has 5 4 reverts in 24 hours.

Just above that section is another discussion of an RfE against WMC that went nowhere. The edit wars are breaking out all over the place. Within the last week WMC brought to the 3RR noticeboard for yet another violation, but the closing admin took no action. The probation enforcement board is now essentially obsolete because of this case. And WMC continues the 3RR violations unhindered. making multiple reverts across multiple articles. How do we enforce this now? CC article space is getting worse, not better. No one will enforce against Connolley, and he knows this. There appears to be a pervasive reluctance to impose sanctions on WMC, and it's unclear where requests for enforcement should be made. Is now the time to bring it to AE or is an injunction appropriate or where should we go to get enforcement? <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 15:21, 12 September 2010 (UTC)


 * It might be useful, for starters, to represent situations accurately and to use less emotive language. You have done neither here. Guettarda (talk) 15:42, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Could you point out the innacuracies and "emotive language"? That notwithstanding, dont you agree we need some clarification on how enforcement is supposed to take place until this case concludes? Im sure you dont wish to see continued violations and edit wars with no enforcement mechanism.  <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 16:31, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * They may be referring to the fact that the vast majority of the "edit warring" was reverting edits by sockpuppets and the over the top comments about a single editor without checking into the details first. Shell  babelfish 16:59, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not following you at all. Can you explain where my comment was over the top please?  <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 17:07, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

M4th has made two errors. The first is to fail to realise that contiguous edits count as one for revert-counting, so I have only 3 reverts in 24h at most. The second is to fail to realise that reverting socks doesn't count, which disposes of another. So, there is no 3RR violation - I look forward to M4th retraction of his baseless claim William M. Connolley (talk) 17:11, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

Oh, and since forum shopping am all de rage, I'll point out that User:Peterlewis is already under sanction log for making undiscussed reverts, and has made another on that article today. NW has reminded him of this but PL still refuses to discuss his revert. Perhaps some finding might be in order William M. Connolley (talk) 17:15, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

Aaaaaand another thing: there is a quite surreal conversation going on at the PJ talk page. We're clearly all talking at cross purposes to each other but can't work out how, so if anyone fancies their abilities at understanding and explaining different points of view, do please have a look William M. Connolley (talk) 17:18, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

@Shell. I think what part of the issue is that when WMC has 4 reverts in a 24 hour period, past the so-called bright line of 3RR, without any socks and/or vandalism (as in Cla's referral), an admin closed it with "no action." At the same time, other editors in the same time period and same article have been sanctioned following 1 (or at most 2, counting generously) reverts. In the case mentioned above, WMC went back and looked himself after the 3RR noticeboard action was completed, noted that he had 4 reverts, and voluntarily agreed not to edit that one article for 48 hrs (and that was admirable, but a block would have prevented him from editing during that time at all). I won't address the numerous alleged socks that have been blocked following reverts by WMC, most without CU or little to no evidence presented, just an allegation of socking (note that I'm not saying that these are not socks, just that there is no evidence presented, or none that I could find). There is a disparity here that should be addressed. GregJackP  Boomer!   17:21, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I was under the impression that you were sanctioned for misrepresenting a source, not for edit warring. Shell  babelfish 17:27, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The sanction posted by NW stated "continue to edit war" and "blatant disruption". It said nothing about misrepresenting a source.  The misrepresentation allegation was first brought up on the PD talk and ANI pages.   GregJackP   Boomer!   18:01, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Here is the full rationale for why I banned Greg: When the author of a source says that you are wrong, you should step back and listen, not continue to edit war because you read the paper differently. Doing so otherwise is blatant disruption. <b style="color:navy;">NW</b> ( Talk ) 18:25, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Even so, taking Greg out of the picture -- findings in this case were made against me and a couple of others based on, in some cases, one revert. Some clarification is in order to rectify why it's over the top to bring diffs of Connolley's multiple reverts but single reverts from me, Cla, ATren and Hippocrite warrant a Arb finding. Maybe there is an explanation that I am just missing -- that is what I am looking for. <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 18:31, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

Phil Jones article
 * 1st revert: ,
 * 2nd revert: ,
 * 3rd revert: ,
 * 4th revert:

Apparently this last revert was a sock, although it appears the sock was blocked after only 2 edits, both reverting WMC. I havent looked at the SPI, but I assume there is a checkuser confirming this as a sock? If so, ignore that one. Three reverts -- Shell mentioned above that one revert can be edit warring, so I fail to see how this is anything other than edit warring. I also fail to see how Shell can characterize my comment as "over the top." Maybe WMC should let someone else revert socks when he already has 3RR's within 24 hours. I will analyze the other diffs that I posted so we can clear this up. I will retract anything that I have gotten wrong. <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 17:23, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * So much for stopping. You've made your point, let it go. Shell  babelfish 17:27, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You haven't taken the point though. Enforcement is uneven. So are your proposed sanctions. You seem to have voted against sanctions with teeth for the most problematic editor here and you haven't spoken out except to chastise those pointing out his problems. Perhaps the playing field is doomed to be unlevel forever. Perhaps the dominant bloc should be allowed to continue doing the excellent job of enforcing the house POV, and consequences (to the rest of the project) be damned. ++Lar: t/c 10:01, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You are aware that your #1 and #2 are counted as 1. revert (contiguous edits) - right? So even without acknowledging socks WMC is at max at 3R. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 17:29, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You are aware that your #1 and #2 are counted as 1. revert (contiguous edits) - right? - presumably not, because I've already said it. Though perhaps if someone *else* says it M4th will be able to read it. Then he can come back and apologise for making unfounded allegations and wasting everyones time William M. Connolley (talk) 17:33, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The first revert you removed:
 * "== BBC interview ==Professor Jones was interviewed by BBC's environment analyst Roger Harrabin in February 2010. Dr. Jones states that the global warming has not been large enough between 1995 and 2009 to be statistically significant at the 95% significance level. In answer to the question 'Do you agree that from 1995 to the present there has been no statistically-significant global warming', Dr. Jones answered: 'Yes, but only just. I also calculated the trend for the period 1995 to 2009. This trend (0.12C per decade) is positive, but not significant at the 95% significance level. The positive trend is quite close to the significance level. Achieving statistical significance in scientific terms is much more likely for longer periods, and much less likely for shorter periods.' In answer to the question 'Do you agree that from January 2002 to the present there has been statistically significant global cooling?', Dr. Jones admitted that temperatures have dropped in this period: '[...] The trend this time is negative (-0.12C per decade), but this trend is not statistically significant.'"
 * The second revert you removed this:

"George Monbiot initially called for Jones to resign after the release of the emails, stating that the emails contained 'evidence... of attempts to prevent scientific data from being released, and even to destroy material that was subject to a freedom of information request.' . Later, Monbiot reiterated the criticism but retracted the call for resignation."
 * There was an intervening edit as well with WMC adding something. If those are contiguous edits, then ok.  I still think it's quite disruptive, even if there is no technical violation of 3RR.   I just want to know what is expected in this area because on the one hand I see justifications for several reverts because there is no technical violation of any rule, and on the other hand I have been told that a single revert can be edit warring. Now it seems like different standards are being applied to different editors, and if that is what the policy is going to be, I'd appreciate if that could just be stated clearly so that everyone knows what to expect from here on out. <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 18:10, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

Climate change alarmism
 * 1st revert: Sept 7, 4:08
 * 2nd revert: Sept 7, 9:06
 * 3rd revert: Sept 8, 9:17
 * 4th revert: Sept 8, 15:22
 * 5th revert: Sept 8, 16:43
 * 6th revert: Sept 9, 2:38  (WMC claims he was reverting socks, but he was reverting Tillman)

There is no question the last 4 reverts were within 24 hours, but even without the 3RR bright line rule, there should be no question that this editing behavior is disruptive and promotes a batteground atmosphere. I can see no reason whatsoever that I was found to be disruptive when I reverted once a couple of times -- and the same arb who made a finding that my conduct is disruptive and batteground-ish says that it is over the top for me to ask how to enforce against an editor who has 6 reverts on an article, 4 within 24 hours -- 4 reverts on Phil Jones within 24 hours (3 if the last was a sock). This is not isolated to these two articles, I can give many more examples of 2 and 3 reverts if not more. I am asking Shell to please clarify her comment above in light of these diffs and also considering that she stated to me that one revert is disruptive if it happens frequently. Please explain why there should be no PD finding about this disruptive conduct in light of the findings you made about me, Gla, ATren, GregJackP and Hippocrite.

Now I see also that Shell has said "so much for stopping" as if my bringing diffs to an Arb page is further evidence of my disruptive behavior. Please clarify that comment. Yesterday you asked that we make proposed findings and provide diffs -- today, I ask a legitimate question and respond with diffs to your comment that my question was over the top, and I'm disruptive. I am honestly asking you to explain to me what I am doing wrong because this doesn't make sense to me even a little bit. What is it that you want me to stop?? What is disruptive? What is over the top? <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 17:57, 12 September 2010 (UTC)


 * NuclearWarefare: Your argument is based on a logical fallacy known as argument from authority. Just because WMC is co-author doesn't make him automatically right.  I'll further note the irony that your sanction against GregJackP caused more disruption than the original content dispute.  It spilled out onto ANI and 5-10 editor's talk pages, resulted into claims of bias and has led to the call for your recusement as clerk.  If your goal was to end/reduce disruption, then your action was less than successful. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:03, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * @ AQFK, your own logical fallacy is in supposing that WMC was wrong or unsupported by reasoned examination of the source by other editors. GregJackP was wrongly claiming that the source defined actions as "alarmism", apparently substituting his own original research rather than reading the source. WMC's informed opinion and the opinion of other independent editors should have been taken seriously by GregJackP. . . dave souza, talk 20:03, 12 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Minor4th, this is disruptive. Please stop this, now. If the request has been turned down at AN3 then that should be the end of it. This is not the page for raising 3RR reports and I think the arbs already have enough evidence about who is doing what to whom. Spartaz Humbug! 19:51, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Um...this is the Arb CC proposed decisions talk page.  I think this is precisely the place to raise the question of where enforcement is to take place.   I mentioned two other instances of edit warring, besides the 3RR report, in my OP.  We cannot expect the Arbs to be monitoring every edit on every CC article, and their initial findings illustrated this point very clearly.  They have asked us to provide diffs and to propose findings. That is not what I'm doing here, however.   I was asking about how enforcement should proceed while Arb wades through this case.  I do not see this case winding up any time soon.  Meanwhile the GS/CC board appears to have been rendered obsolete.   Part of the reason enforcement measures have not been implemented is because this case is proceeding.   I have seen that reason cited a number of times by admins at the 3RR board and on ANI.  So the question remains -- should we just expect no enforcement in this topic area unless an admin is willing to jump in and unilaterally impose sanctions (as NW did against Greg)?   If that's the answer, that's the answer, but it's not disruptive to raise the question. <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 22:46, 12 September 2010 (UTC)


 * As Lar pointed out in his evidence, showing a critical opinion raised by one journalist in his newsblog and not backed by other sources showing its significance gives undue weight to that issue in the BLP. In the Phil Jones (climatologist) article, a journalist's critical newsblog opinion together with unsourced and inaccurate material was introduced into the article by and, when properly removed and questioned, was reverted back into the article by ATren without explanation. On the same day,  added a section quoting parts of an interview with Jones, again giving weight to something without any secondary source indicating the significance of the information to the subject. Both of these contentious sections have been removed from the article while discussions proceed on the talk page, despite M.w.denotter,  and a Scibaby sock trying to reintroduce problematic material. The proposed decision principle 3.1.8 Biographies of living people clearly applies to this situation, and it is extraordinary that Minor4th seems to think that proper actions by WMC in these circumstances should be attacked as edit warring. "Poorly sourced or unsourced controversial material should be removed immediately, and should not be reinserted without appropriate sourcing." . . dave souza, talk 19:55, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry -- how exactly is it a BLP violation to quote the man directly from his interview published in the BBC? C'mon dave, seriously? And if you're suggesting that Monbiot's opinions of BLP's are BLP violations unless there's another secondary source, I'm with you on that if we can apply that principle across all BLP articles. <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 23:42, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The selection from the interview has been subjected to quote mining, which is why we require a good secondary source for any interpretation or assessment of the significance of a selected statement. At the article talk page such sources have been proposed, discussing media misreporting based largely on a lie about Jones's statement. Whether the issue is significant enough to take up a large part of the BLP is open to discussion. As for the Monbiot blog comment, see above and note the parallel with the Dellingpole bio where I fully agree with Lar that undue weight was being given to one journalist's opinion which had not been more widely reported in reputable sources. We can, and do, discuss the principle in all BLP articles. . . dave souza, talk 09:30, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the link to the blog entry in the Economist. It helps puts the lie to the claim that the Jones claim isn't notable. I'm a big fan of the Economist, so I was momentarily chagrined to see that one of their writers was so clueless, but I see it is a blog contributor, so my opinion of the Economist hasn't been diminished due to this lapse. I'm a bit surprised you didn't challenge it; surely you are aware that, among scientists, a statement that there is no trend isn't equivalent to a statement that the central estimate of the slope is zero, it means that the observed slope isn't statistically different than zero. Which is what Jones said. The Mail article deserves criticism, unless they explained in their article that "no global warming" really means "no statistically significant warming".-- SPhilbrick  T  13:45, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Out of sequence discussion, suggest hat for dead horse
Suggest that the clerks hat or archive this, and possibly the two comments above that raised the issue. . . dave souza, talk 09:30, 13 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Dave souza: You are incorrect.  Friday's fiasco seems to be nothing more than a knee-jerk reaction based on faulty logic.  I read through WMC's paper twice and identified 11 different passages that talk about CC alarmism.  It seems to be a wonderful resource for that article.  It's a shame that we're not using because there's some great information in WMC's paper.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:21, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * A Quest For Knowledge, you are incorrect about the BLP issues raised by the edits on 11 September, which was on Saturday, if that's what you're responding to. As for WMC's paper, I've read it carefully and it makes just one reference to CC "alarmism" used of global warming, and none to "alarmism" referring to "global cooling" as GregJackP was claiming. You seem, like him, to be injecting your own original research or opinions. Not good practice. . . dave souza, talk 20:37, 12 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Dave souza: No, I'm referring to Friday's fiasco.  Your claim that you read WMC's paper carefully is contradicted by your simplistic claim that the word "alarmism" only appears once.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:30, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Ah, so you're derailing the thread by putting your comment of 20:21, 12 September 2010 out of sequence with my comment that you're responding to. Any objection to me moving this thread into the appropriate place? Since "WMC's paper" is presumably a reference to Peterson, Connolley and Fleck (2008), the only reference there to "alarmism" is p. 1332, Imhofe quoted as saying "that the global-warming alarmists are concerned about global warming". Or by "simplistic" do you mean that you find instances which sorta look to you a bit like alarmism but don't use the term? Looks like original research. . . dave souza, talk 22:13, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think identifying the word "alarmist" with alarmism is original research, nor do I think identifying warnings of an impending Ice Age with alarmism is original research. Would a reference for an addition article be OK if it used the word "plus" instead of "addition"? I don't know what to say about the consensus that says otherwise, that isn't likely to get me blocked with the others. Art LaPella (talk) 22:25, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Or "denier" in place of "skeptic"?  GregJackP   Boomer!   22:34, 12 September 2010 (UTC)


 * dave souza: No, I was not the first editor who brought up Friday's fiasco. If the best argument against GregJackP is based on faulty logic and simplistic text searches for the word "alarmism", that is extremely troubling.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:48, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Souza is correct. You are hijacking this thread and repeating claims which have already been addressed. Greg misused the source and cannot explain how it supports his edits.  Neither can you, apparently. The pattern and tenor of this discussion is obvious.  Vexatious harassment of WMC and advocacy of climate change denial, a fringe, anti-science POV. Viriditas (talk) 22:55, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The paper was not misused as a source to show alarmism has been related to the global cooling scare of the 1970s. The paper appears to have been removed as a source from the article, but based on this discussion, I suspect that someday soon the Peterson/WMC paper will be readded to the article as a source.  If that happens, the findings by the arbitrators in this case that the source was misused will look very foolish and shows why the Committee members need to be extremely sure when they stray into findings that directly relate to content decisions. Cla68 (talk) 23:08, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I prefer the current version, "... which usually means global warming", to GregJackP's edit. But he didn't misrepresent the source, whether AGW is true or not. Or more broadly, a misleading defense of science, is science in name only. Art LaPella (talk) 23:23, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with the current version's wording. I also agree that the paper was not misused. GregJackP  Boomer!   03:56, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Using the Wikipedia sourcing policies and guidelines, please show how the source was appropriately used. This question has been asked many, many times, and no answer has ever been given.  With all due respect to Art LaPella, he admittedly doesn't write articles, so he might not be familiar with how we use sources. Viriditas (talk) 04:15, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
 * This particular dispute, about Peterson/Connolley/Fleck, should not be re-(re-re-re-)argued here. One of the major underlying themes in this whole dispute is the absolute inability of many involved parties to drop the stick and back away from the horse carcass. Let's be part of the solution, instead of repeatedly demonstrating the problem. MastCell Talk 05:15, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
 * OK. Whatever you two can agree on about the horse carcass is OK with me. Art LaPella (talk) 05:21, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It's already been subject to community discussion, and I have no quarrel with the outcome. Suggest a hat on the dead horse. . . dave souza, talk 09:30, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Editors of interest
As we continue to work through individual findings, we've noted that a number of editors have been mentioned in discussion here as having problematic battleground behavior. We would welcome suggestions for proposed findings using the model seen in the most recent additions here. Though by no means exhaustive, in alphabetical order for no particular reason and for everyone's reference some of those mentioned have been:

Shell  babelfish 11:15, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't edit in the area. My only actions are that of a bouncer trying to break up a brawl.  I think it would be best to separate the involved from the uninvolved for the sake of clarity. I believe the only sysop action I have taken was to issue a topic ban to WMC.  This was lifted after some discussion, and then WMC wisely volunteered to cease editing in the area pending ArbCom posting a decision.  Otherwise, I organized a voluntary recusal by about 15 editors.  Not sure what I've done that could be construed as battling; a referee usually doesn't get called for a penalty (though often people on both sides will dispute some of the referee's actions, quite passionately.)  Jehochman Talk 12:53, 13 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I would add :
 * for edit warring, battleground:, , ,,,,,
 * for edit warring, battleground :
 * for incivility
 * I will add more diffs later. <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 13:30, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * What is that single Rd232 diff supposed to show? Whatever it is, I'm not seeing it. MastCell Talk 21:21, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It wasn't really supposed to show anything -- it was the beginning of what ultimately was a collection of diffs.  See the section above with the proposed finding.  There you will find the diffs for this user.  <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 01:19, 12 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I suggest adding
 * for completeness
 * whose sole purpose in being here seems to be to run down Cla at every opportunity.
 * who is a long term participant
 * who has been involved in GS/CC/RE requests
 * whose administrative actions have not been without controversy.
 * who is a long term participant
 * who has had recent accusations of bias and involvement levied
 * who has been cautioned for disruption, and who was running a string of socks at one point
 * who is recent but seems to be quite partisan
 * who is a long term participant
 * who is a long term participant
 * who is mentioned below for excessive clerking/hatting, and who has contributed to the battleground atmosphere.
 * who is a long term participant
 * to your list ++Lar: t/c 15:03, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Also add
 * See prior discussion on this page:  <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 14:38, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

This is shaping up to be a list of everyone who edits in the area. There's a reason for that. The editing environment is so toxic, one cannot edit in the area for more than a handful of edits unless one is aggressive. A closer look will reveal that some are aggressively trying to enforce policy while others are aggressively violating it. <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 14:38, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm not going to waste my time and ask you to remove some of the "skeptics" from the list, but I don't think Count Iblis should be on there. Perhaps the evidence shows otherwise, but he seems reasonable to me. The others make some very good suggestions, but I think it is diluted somewhat with the inclusion of editors with less behavioral issues - I don't blame them though because the minimal threshold for such behavior seems quite low in some cases. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:31, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I think you should remove Jehochman as well. He has certainly said and done things that I disagree with, and I have no love for the man, but I don't think his behavior needs to be addressed. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:34, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I would of course agree that I am reasonable :) . However, what we can also do is look at the contributions of a large fraction of all the editors who have been heavily involved in the CC field to get a better understanding of the sources of the problems, what provokes bad behavior, what kind of restrictions would work best etc. etc. For this you also need to look at editors who have been heavily involved in the CC area and have behaved in a good way. I would suggest adding the following editors:




 * and the old-timers:




 * I.m.o., it is very important for ArbCom to look at these old-timers. This puts the present conflicts into a better perspective. Looking at this shows i.m.o. that the source of the problem is the entrenched position of sceptics that climate science is fundamentally flawed, which clashes with the opinion of other editors who treat climate science as any other scientific topic.


 * You'll also see that Andrewjlockley had been pushing views suggesting that the consequences of climate change may be far more serious than the consensus view suggests. His edits were based on bad science and poor understanding of what sources say. This led to the "pro-science faction" (most of whom are active today) giving Andrewjlockley warnings see here and also in later sections on his talk page. Count Iblis (talk) 18:00, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * We also had one chap earlier this year on Talk:Global warming saying the article was flawed because it didn't have anything about the Amazon rainforests bursting into flames, which he seemed to have read on some website or other. He got really upset when we said we weren't going to include such unsourced nonsense. I was never quite sure he was serious. --TS 18:09, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * He might have been referring to another one of the IPCC's errors about the Amazon being massively more vulnerable to forest fires/drought from global warming (some insane figure from greenpeace I think). TheGoodLocust (talk) 18:19, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It was WWF, based on peer reviewed research. The nonsense came from a Sunday Times journalist who grossly misrepresented the facts and sought to blame the IPCC. The newspaper also misrepresented the words of a scientist they sought out for comment. According to the Press Complaints Commission, whose decisions carry regulatory weight in the UK, the newspaper has acknowledged this and published a correction and apology.. --TS 18:31, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * "Based" on peer-review research isn't the same as actually being peer-review research. I haven't looked into details about that particular case, but I've looked at their other incredibly stupid errors based on pamphlets from various advocacy groups and if that history is any indicator then their claims were quite ridiculous. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:02, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * This is getting off topic. The Sunday Times has publicly acknowledged that WWF's claim that "up to 40% of the Amazon rainforest could be sensitive to future changes in rainfall." is in fact supported by the scientific research. --TS 19:09, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * If it is getting off-topic then hat the conversation - beginning with your comment. In any case I'll link WUWT's article on the retraction. It is clearly a ridiculous claim anyway, challenged by scientific research (in the article) - if someone thinks global warming is going to screw over 40% of the Amazon then they should demand a refund for the time and money spent educating them. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:13, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I have cited the Press Complaints Commission, you have cited a blog.  It seems appropriate to leave it there. --TS 19:19, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Oh Tony, I linked the article so you could read it and judge its merits rather than evoking an argument from authority. We aren't writing an article here so it is okay to read the blog. But hey, since you didn't read it then name the peer-reviewed paper that the 40% claim was based on. You say it is peer-reviewed so name the paper, the author(s) and the journal. Maybe I'm wrong, I'll admit if I am, and you now have an easy way of doing it. TheGoodLocust (talk) 21:30, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Without comment on anything else in this thread, is currently indefinitely banned. I do not think that we should discuss sanctions without offering the right of reply. If they appeal the community ban and return to problematic editing, WP:AE should be able to handle it even without explicit mention in this case. - 2/0 (cont.) 20:28, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Absolutely. Thanks for the information.  Roger Davies  talk 20:15, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That said, the subject of this comment appears to have been editing very similarly to GoRight and was clearly causing the same level of frustration to other contributors due to tendentious editing and wikilawyering (see also the other comments that the subject made on that version of the page). I'm a bit surprised at the limited evidence that was presented on this editor - evidently, the evidence does exist even in diffs like that, and editors were frustrated by the behavior (eg; on that version of that page, see where someone else says "But that's the end of my patience; one more accusation from you and I will have a LOI due to unpleasantness of working with you"). Ncmvocalist (talk) 10:27, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

"The editing environment is so toxic, one cannot edit in the area for more than a handful of edits unless one is aggressive." This is the culture, but it isn't necessary. The alternative is to be bureaucratic: strictly adhere to policy, try to gain consensus, and if others seriously violate policy then take it through the proper channels. Especially don't criticize others except as required to make very specific requests about what you are certain needs to happen. It's isn't impossible to be professional, it's just very difficult and not immediately rewarding. However, it becomes easier the more ArbCom does to clean things up. Mackan79 (talk) 22:14, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Keeping on topic
In response to the desire expressed here to broaden the scope of the findings, Shell posted a request for draft FoFs. She and I are happy to review them and include them in the proposed decision if appropriate. However, little of the response has been usable. Instead, we've seen (i) endless meta discussion about areas that ArbCom is unlikely to touch and (ii) lists of potential FoF candidates that we simply do not have the time or resources to research from scratch. So, if there is someone is clearly missing, and a FoF would be appropriate, please post a draft, supported by good unambiguous diffs. The FoF should focus on obvious examples of battleground editing: incivility, blatant POV-pushing, dubious reverting, edit-warring etc. There's zero point in dwelling on content. Roger Davies talk 20:12, 13 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Roger Davies: It's been a lot of work, but I've created FoF for Stephan Schultz and KimDabelsteinPetersen as requested. I've also created one of my own regarding Tony Sidaway.  I've begun working on some more FoFs but they're mostly stubs.  I'm getting a little burnt out so I might leave it to other editors to work on, not sure.  They are available here: User:A_Quest_For_Knowledge/Climate_change_Proposed_decision.  A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:31, 13 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Pardon me for stepping out of the peanut gallery, but in light of There's zero point in dwelling on content, could you expand a bit on sourcing? There's been a great deal of discussion lately on "inappropriate use of sources" which has even made it into two of the proposed FoFs.  From what I've been reading on the talk page here, it seems like the sourcing disputes are content related.  Or, at least it seems nigh impossible to prove anyone is deliberately misusing a source.  If those items remain in any FoFs, could ArbCom expand on Principle 11: Sourcing, or add an additional principle to explain 'inappropriate use' of a non-content nature?  --InkSplotch (talk) 21:56, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
 * In a sense, it's all about content: few of us are here for purely social reasons, the purpose of getting involved is to build the content of an encyclopedia. Roger Davies' list above includes 'blatant POV-pushing' and 'dubious reverting', but there are many people here who will say, "I wasn't POV pushing, they were" and "My revert wasn't dubious, but theirs was". The only way to decide on these points is to look at the sources for, and the notability of, the content in question. I don't see how this can be settled without some view (implicit or explicit) on the content. --Nigelj (talk) 22:22, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Arb Votes Analysis
So far it looks like TGL and MN are being judged to have a greater degree of egregious behavior than WMC. Does a comparative analysis of the evidence really support this outcome? Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 01:42, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * No, not even close.   I am so disappointed in ArbCom (so far, I suppose there's a chance for redemption but my confidence in the committee is shaken).  In fact I'm disappointed in the whole Wiki.   The bullies who have made this topic area a hellish place to edit are getting rewarded for making it unbearable for the rest of us.   Good luck getting new editors in here and good luck getting any new uninvolved admins -- great message being sent -- take a stand against blatant and persistent Wiki policy violations and get topic banned or asked to refrain from taking admin actions.  What a complete and total waste of time this has all been.  <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 02:55, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It's not over yet; however, the current votes seem to be carelessly imbalanced in fair standards application. If this continues, many disputes may be put back to the admins and newbie admins ... to be bitten by the bullies. The arbitration process just delayed things. I don't believe it will be a waste of time. Folks have matured in this process, no matter how it turns out.  For myself, my own voluntary climate change restriction (since I applied before the General Sanctions, which i did not trust to protect my content contributions) has taken away from content development.  I look forward to the ArbCom close, so I may focus time on articles.  Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 03:59, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps arbcomm are indeed taking some account of substance after all William M. Connolley (talk) 07:38, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * No doubt they have. However, whose accounting the bodies left behind in the wake of climate change progress? Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 08:34, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Happily for my biases, I was wrong William M. Connolley (talk) 17:47, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Wrong about what? WMC, will you agree to a voluntary remedy now to withdraw? Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 20:01, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Wrong about Kirill, of course William M. Connolley (talk) 22:47, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for reconsidering your decisions Kirill. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 15:29, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

In a different analysis, I don't mean this to suck up, but I think that Carcharoth's vote statements at P 4.1 (Collective behavior of blocs of editors (alternate)) and at P 10 (Undue weight) are absolutely beautiful articulations of what should be learned from this process. Well-said! --Tryptofish (talk) 17:53, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Possible Sock investigation
Hi, I have found two IP's that appear to be the same person participating at Anthony Watts (blogger). Since they may be socks of one of the parties to this case, I am reporting them here, as suggested by the SPI submission system. If this is the wrong place, please move this request.

Users:
 * 96.45.189.230
 * 72.20.28.54

talk page diffs:
 * 
 * 

Nearly identical contrib history. Post nearly identical unsigned comment to talk page then perform the same edit to article. The edit itself is not necessarily problematic, but the socking certainly is, as it evaded the 1RR rule on the page. Sailsbystars (talk) 15:54, 14 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Hmm, geolocate to very differnt areas (different countries - Fullerton, CA vs Ontario, Canada), different ISP's. Proxies maybe?  <b style="color:darkred;">Ravensfire</b> ( talk ) 17:23, 14 September 2010 (UTC)


 * The Canadian one is for blackberries I believe. Anonymous IP vandals aren't a huge problem though - obvious socks screwing around on ArbCom pages are. Of course, Ratel was an obvious sock, but if any of us had reported him then we'd likely have been blocked for "disruption" or something. Oh well, at least we have the high road. TheGoodLocust (talk) 02:02, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Ratel was an obvious sock - how so? I certainly had no idea (or even a suspicion, and from what i've seen of the case, not even a chance to notice/suspect). But to preempt: If people sock (against rules) - then good riddance - and Goodbye! --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 03:26, 15 September 2010 (UTC)


 * He is an extremely shrill and ideological wikilawyer who thinks he is saving the world. Rules don't apply to people like that. WP:BEANS for the rest (not that it matters).TheGoodLocust (talk) 03:35, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * TGL, remind me again, which Wikipedia articles are you currently working on or have been working on, in let's say, the last six months? Any at all? Viriditas (talk) 04:14, 15 September 2010 (UTC)


 * So is this the 8th or 10th time you've asked me that Viriditas? I've already asked you to quit harassing me so I won't bother to repeat myself. I'd ask an admin to ban you but you share and tirelessly promote the House POV so that'd be a pointless gesture too. So I guess I'll wait for the next exciting installment of baiting "civil" POV pushers and cowardly admins. TheGoodLocust (talk) 04:41, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Ratel was fairly open about being an agenda-driven editor , yet was blocked not for that, but for operating a sock puppet.  I think some editors feel that if his POV was the same as Scibaby's rather than WMC's bloc, he would have been blocked much sooner.  Is this an incorrect assumption? Cla68 (talk) 04:54, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't know the answer to your question as far as other editors go, and I don't know who Ratel is, but I think your faction names are pretty catchy: "Scibaby bloc" and "WMC bloc".  Until this case, I did not realize there was a favored House POV.  Now I know I'm on the losing side.  <b class="nounderlines" style="border:1px solid #999;background:#fff"><span style="font-family:papyrus,serif"><b style="color:#000;font-size:110%">Minor</b><b style="color:#f00;font-size:80%">4th</b> </b> 06:04, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There is no house POV and there is no losing side. The fact is, one POV cannot exist without the other.  You can't know white without black, love without hate, peace without war.  The  point is not to separate or highlight one over the other, but to honestly investigate their relationship and interconnection. Viriditas (talk) 09:40, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The "house POV" of any serious, respectable reference work is going to be that human activity contributes to climate change. (That's the "house POV" of Britannica, for example). Just as the "house POV" is that HIV causes AIDS, that tobacco smoke causes cancer, that vaccines do not cause autism, and that the attacks of 9/11 were staged by Al-Qaeda rather than the U.S. or Israeli governments. I use scare quotes around "house POV", because this isn't really an editorial POV. Any honest effort to represent the current state of human knowledge will end up "favoring" these perspectives, because they are heavily favored in reputable sources. In each case, there are significant dissenting points of view which deserve mention, but serious, respectable reference works are generally expected to prioritize mainstream thought and knowledge, rather than to provide an uncritical echo chamber for minoritarian talking points. To people who are personally invested in a particular minoritarian viewpoint, that can look like a "house POV", I suppose. But it's actually part and parcel of creating a serious reference work, as opposed to a search engine. MastCell Talk 16:25, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That wasn't the House POV I was referring to - just as aspect of it. Some of the people in this thread have mimicked the phrase that "reality has a liberal bias" - that is the real House POV and it is a very subversive prejudice since those who have it are incapable of recognizing it in themselves. As for the rest of your post, you continue trying to equate global warming skepticism with various silly points of view - that isn't an argument; that's sophistry. There has been no honest effort to write these articles; there has simply been long-term agenda-driven editing and soapboxing designed to promote a very specific point of view of it - and repetitive one-sided rhetoric over a long period of time is indeed effective (just look at North Korea).TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:30, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

Well put, MastCell. I have tried to make a similar point here before, and you have expressed it very well. --Nigelj (talk) 19:31, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Remember MastCell, that very few of the editors here complaining about WMC's bloc's behavior are trying to promote a minority POV. It sometimes might seem that way because many of our edits (but not all) seem to be only for one side, but the reason is that WMC's bloc only edits for one agenda and refuses to allow other views, no matter how reliably sourced.  Also, you cannot say that all criticisms of AGW science are minority, there is a wide variety of acceptance, including within the science community, of different aspects of the AGW debate.  WMC's bloc, however, accepts no alternate viewpoints of any of it.  Remember also, that most of the editors who are here complaining about WMC's bloc's behavior, including me, were drawn to the topic because we noticed repeated violations of WP's policies, such as BLP, NPA, and NPOV that were going unaddressed.  In fact, when I was looking at talk page histories, MastCell, I noticed some personal attacks being made in content discussions in which you were involved, but you failed to take any action to tell the perpetrator not to do that.  That's at the heart of this.  It seems that editors who promote WMC's POV (like Ratel) get a free ride with WP's policies (other than socking), while others do not.  WMC's POV is not the "mainstream" view of AGW science.  WMC promotes RealClimate's agenda, whose opinion on climate science is at one extreme of the AGW debate, as the content of and the reaction to the Climategate emails shows.  In sum, the matter here is behavior, not science. Cla68 (talk) 23:00, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Long time observer of the climate change articles. Gota disagree with you on WMC's POV....from my perspective and training(POV?) WMC's view on climate science is within the mainstream, and he likely deserves several barnstars....What for? for his consistant and determined willingness to keep sticking his neck out in defense of the scientific mainstream. Course only WMC knows what motivates him but I its something as simplistic as a realcimate agenda, whatever that is. --Snowman frosty (talk) 23:17, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You would not believe how tired I am of hearing about William and RealClimate, so please excuse me for not continuing a conversation which once again threatens to be consumed by those two topics. Nor do I really feel like defending myself for all of the times I could have lectured someone, but failed to do so. I disagree with you about the "extreme" nature of RealClimate's viewpoint (for that matter, so does Nature), but it's not really worth discussing, particularly not here. MastCell Talk 00:22, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * MastCell: Do you think that not speaking out when you see problems (from those on your side, and you definitely do have a side here) "models desirable admin behavior"? ++Lar: t/c 11:38, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Here we go with the "sides" again. --TS 11:42, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Lar, I think that limiting off-topic discussion and ignoring provocation are desirable behaviors worthy of modeling. So let's leave it there. MastCell Talk 21:59, 16 September 2010 (UTC)


 * An anonymous editorial from 6 years ago Mastcell? Written the same month that Real climate was launched? I'd hardly recall it a resounding endorsement - more of a "good luck." In fact, that editorial was rather prophetic in some ways; here are some choice quotes:


 * "Few would argue with the need to tackle attempts to distort science, but is a blog the best way to do it? The approach certainly has its dangers. For example, many issues in climate science, such as the course of temperatures over previous millennia, are hotly debated by researchers. Some would argue that a rapid-rebuttal service, run with minimal peer review, can never hope to combat industry propaganda and properly represent this diversity of views."


 * "The researchers involved will, for example, have to work to ensure that they do not oversell their own opinions when commenting on research issues that divide scientists. "


 * "The site needs to balance speed with objectivity, readability and accuracy. That's no mean feat. Fail, and the blog will be dismissed as no more trustworthy than the myriad lobbying groups already writing on climate."


 * As I said - the editorial was rather prophetic. TheGoodLocust (talk) 03:18, 16 September 2010 (UTC)


 * MastCell, I don't know if RealClimate's advocacy regarding certain aspects of the AGW debate is right or wrong. What I do know is that we shouldn't have editors here trying to support that blog's agenda in Wikipedia.  We know who they are, because the evidence page and this PD talk page contains evidence of these editors trying to use RealClimate as a source, including trying to use it to add pejorative information in BLPs.  That's why this case is not about science.  It's about advocacy and the behavior that accompanies it, behavior that violates numerous WP policies and prevents the CC articles from being a place where all interested editors can cooperate, collaborate, and compromise in building some articles. Cla68 (talk) 01:52, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Cla, by that same account, most people here are Nature, Science and GRL advocates! Exhibiting/editing within the same view as some blog or journal that just happens to be reasonably within the mainstream, is not advocacy. [do i agree with everything presented on RC? Hmmm - possibly... but that doesn't come from reading RC (which i actually do significantly less than WuWT or CA] --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 03:01, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Indeed. Cla, if you do not understand that RealClimate is squat in the middle of the scientific mainstream, you either have not read RC, or you really have no basis for editing this topic for content. We do not rely on RealClimate for information, although it usually is a reliable source. Our content agrees with RealClimate because both happen to follow the mainstream opinion on climate change. Have you ever read RC? Have you checked the credentials and publication record of the contributors, guest or otherwise? If you think RC "is at one extreme of the AGW debate", where would you put voices predicting runaway greenhouse effect turning Earth into a second Venus, Hurricanes razing the Southern US, a complete collapse of oceanic ecosystems followed by a PT style mass extinction, or (human-scale) rapid collapse of the Antarctic ice sheets? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 04:48, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Stephan and Kim, is paleoclimatology, which RealClimate's staff disproportionally represent, a major part of climate science? From what I've read, the attention given to it by the IPCC and the media is way out of proportion to its actual influence on the main body of climate research. Cla68 (talk) 05:10, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * RC does not have "Staff", it has (voluntary) contributors. Paleoclimate is one of 11 chapters (10 technical ones) of the IPCC AR4 - I think that is a fair representation. Of course, paleoclimate also informs many other parts of climatology - climate involves long-term changes, so you necessarily need to look into the past. But I don't understand how your question is relevant - do you suggest that paeloclimatologists are in conflict with other climatologists? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 05:35, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I think everyone in this particular discussion has made the points they want to make. Cla68 (talk) 07:22, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh, I guess I should answer your question, even though it risks taking this thread off topic. From what I've read, although a few climate scientists have criticized the temperature proxy research in which the RealClimate and CRU scientists are often engaged, the main criticism has been from statisticians .  Again, however, I think all of us here have made it clear how we feel on this particular issue. Cla68 (talk) 07:42, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * So it is your contention that the articles mimic the Real Climate narrative not because that content has been pushed in to the exclusion of other content by a Real Climate co-founder, but because the Real Climate narrative is so mainstream? Interesting. I don't know about Cla, but I've read quite a bit of Real Climate and a fair amount about its various members, even watched a few in debates. I wouldn't say they are as extreme as some organizations who promote the things you've mentioned, but perhaps it is only because that sort of rhetoric is so outrageously wrong that they'd lose credibility in their target audience. Outside of their narrow group of friends though, but still within their field, I'd say their reputation is quite strained. TheGoodLocust (talk) 05:13, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

I suggest that trying to sideline mainstream scientists such as those who contribute to RealClimate is not a productive use of time and effort in this arbitration. It is likely to fuel a finding that those individuals doing so, at the same time that they misrepresent Andrew Montfort and the like as significant representatives of mainstream scientific views, are harming the editing environment either through their ignorance or their advocacy of fringe scientific positions. --TS 09:57, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I suggest that you're right. It's not a good practice and folk are not likely to get away with it. I further suggest that "trying to sideline" anyone, regardless of viewpoint, (by, for example, stuffing their BLP full of negative tidbits) is not a good practice. However the same caution about not doing it apparently does not apply if the BLP doesn't hold the house POV. The problem here is not the POV, which happens to be correct. It's the actions taken to defend it by a large and powerful bloc. ArbCom apparently casts a mostly blind eye, rejecting evidence or characterizing it as inconsequential (while throwing the book at the other side of the same edit wars, for example) so it's becoming clear that nothing much will change after this case concludes, except that perhaps the playing field will be even less level than it is now. ++Lar: t/c 11:45, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Comment: on BLPs, this is really a matter of WP:BLP policy, since it's hardly specific to climate change. I did propose (Wikipedia_talk:BLP) an initial thought on how to change policy to force discussion more quickly on contentious BLP issues, and I invite anyone who really cares (BLP concerns have a tendency to be transient and occur only when it affects subjects editors support) to pitch in with thinking out loud on what can be done. Rd232 talk 12:28, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There we go with the "level playing field" comments again. At least I do agree with the kernel of your argument on BLP, Lar. What I don't agree with is your characterization of the activities of the scientifically literate editors whom I have sometimes called "Team Science" and of the drafting arbitrators.


 * I've encountered, for instance, undue reliance on the Monbiot/Plimer food fight on Plimer's article and had little problem voicing my disagreement with the prominence given to Monbiot's self-serving account of the affair. And I'm sure that had an effect in bringing the article to its present fairer state. While there is sometimes imbalance, I simply don't encounter the kind of entrenched, determined anti-skeptic BLP-stuffing that you seem to see everywhere. On the other hand the disgraceful nonsense that was stuffed into, for instance, the Pachauri article and kept there for a long period, is worrying.  The terrible calumnies about prominent climate scientists such as Jones, Mann, Trenberth and so on were very worrying and I eventually just gave up watching those articles, such was the feeding frenzy. Likewise the determined efforts to remove from Wikipedia articles all mention of death threats against climate scientists, which were well sourced and investigated by several police forces worldwide and the FBI.


 * To get back to the subject matter, the issue here is the attempts to abuse Wikipedia to promote fringe views, and I'm pleased that we're in agreement on that. --TS 12:42, 16 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I doubt that any editors participating in this discussion favor promotion of fringe views, because their views are never fringe, their actions are always nonpartisan, while others are partisan, the playing field is tilted, etc. As you point out, TS, one editor's BLP-stuffing would not be apparent to another editor. If this was a clear-cut situation, it would not be taking arbcom so long to wrap this up. The problem here is more subtle, and requires a substantial amount of time in the weeds, preferably by seeing the various battles fought out in realtime, for any outsider to get a clear sense of the dynamics. ScottyBerg (talk) 13:54, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh, I don't think it's that subtle: There is a mainstream view, and there are people who want to emphasise controversy. --Nigelj (talk) 16:02, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That's right, but it's not always immediately evident. ScottyBerg (talk) 16:14, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Out of order
This case is an utter mess. New arbs keep coming in and proposing new dramatic sanctions which ignore the fact that other arbs such as the drafting arbs have spent considerable time on this already. the case is becoming a comedy of errors. Lists of out of context diffs rule the day along with sheep voting. This solves nothing, just topic ban the 2 or 3 worst culprits, set up AE instead of CCRFE and make it work on a day to day basis in practice, enough of this posturing. Polargeo (talk) 13:08, 29 September 2010 (UTC)
 * How many months has this case been going on for? Seems like arbs are now just reacting to the case talkpages and not any real problems with CC articles. Oh well speaking ones mind on case talkpages should obviously result in a topic ban. Polargeo (talk) 14:31, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Ha, you should complain. If you look at the BLP-busting diffs against me, most of them are form more than two years ago, and one removes the word scientist from Tim Ball even though the current stable state of the article is happy with that. Because, he isn't a scientist. So, making A BLP more accurate is now an offense against BLP. Many of the diffs in this case are junk - Rlvese threw them together to tar people with very little care and attention. R is gone, but the poison lingers on William M. Connolley (talk) 16:48, 29 September 2010 (UTC)


 * After being topic banned from the Fred Singer article you went to your talk page, implied he was committing tax fraud, posted a link to a document containing his telephone number and address and then linked to your blog where you said he was insane. You then resisted attempts by multiple people on your side to delete that nonsense.


 * If anyone else had thrown a temper tantrum like that then they would've and should've been blocked - doubly so as you managed to mangle your facts so much since you were so eager to accuse Singer of something. You should be thanking your lucky stars that the Arbs didn't post that recent crap on the PD page. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:35, 29 September 2010 (UTC)


 * You're wrong, but your continuing attempts to spread poison are presumably noted by the arbs, so keep it up William M. Connolley (talk) 17:38, 29 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Lucky for me I'd already submitted this as evidence so I didn't have to look far. Here is the first part of the conversation, someone can walk the diffs if they want to see the rest of the conversation. You do bring up an interesting point though - can truth be poison? I think for some people. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:49, 29 September 2010 (UTC)
 * -- JN 466  18:59, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Note on BLP
The Committee may want to follow our BLP test case here. The issue at hand is whether someone can be notable solely because of publicity surrounding their contrarian views on climate change. Several of the Committee have said that BLPs should give a balanced overall picture of the subject without undue weight on their climate change views. But if the subject's notability rests solely on such views, with near-zero impact otherwise, how do we do this? The Committee should allow for this in their Principles and Remedies. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 14:42, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Seconded. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:54, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * This is an imortant point. Many CC BLPs of marginally notable people are used as venues for the views of those individuals. Once a BLP has passed basic notability so it is not deleted (as in this case with a couple of newspaper mentions) the strict BLP guidelines then allow only self published material from the individual and these BLPs inevitably become outlets for the views of the individual and their own publications. Criticism usually exists but often only in similarly self published venues therefore imbalance is automatically created. This is a major problem and extremely difficult for editors to deal with when treading around BLP restrictions. I would suggest that self published material and opinions should not find their way onto wikipedia unless there can be a balanced treatment of this material. Polargeo (talk) 16:26, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The more basic problem is the criteria at WP:PROF. I plan to make a WP:BOLD revision of those criteria, but perhaps this should wait until the final decision of the arbitration case lest still more drama be stirred up. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 16:31, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * So can one of the three of you that voted within the span of 2 hours to delete the Tim Ball explain to me how this isn't a clear example of WP:MEAT meant to prove a WP:POINT? I'm especially curious for Guettarda's answer since he has never edited the Tim Ball article before and yet he not only managed to be the first delete vote (sans the OP), but he also has a pattern of showing up to quickly vote for adminship for your group. This is especially troubling since WMC is going around linking to blogs and implying that Tim Ball's resume is either inaccurate or dishonest - reminds me of his implication that Fred Singer was committing tax fraud. Too bad all the admins willing to confront him on the issue have been harped into inactivity. TheGoodLocust (talk) 16:57, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Those who are tempted to respond to the above comment should keep in mind the arbitrators' oft-expressed concerns about discussions on this page veering off topic. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:02, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Oh I think its quite relevant. It shows WMC's pattern of using talk pages to slander BLP subjects - something you guys don't call him out on. In my opinion the AfD demonstrates more clear-cut meatpuppetry, your abstention/pleading the 5th with the excuse that it is off-topic confirms it in my mind. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:15, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * @TGL: Why did I join that discussion when I did? Well, there's this. I realise this page can be a long, unreadable mess, but I don't think it's my fault if people don't follow the discussions here. (I try to read more than I write.) Incidentally, AFD is not a vote (which is why we renamed VFD), and I did not vote - I carefully considered the notability guidelines, read all the links in the article, and then expressed my opinion. If you read my comment, you'll see that I actually took all of the criteria on WP:PROF into account. I should also point you to Proposed Principle #6, which, with 7 supports and no opposes, should probably be treated as if it had passed. Guettarda (talk) 17:42, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * And, incidentally, I've had the article watchlisted for many months, maybe years, after watching some debate at the Great Global Warming Swindle article. I've got 8600 pages on my watchlist. Many of them I've never edited. Guettarda (talk) 17:47, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Bullshit. You people always say that you have articles on your watchlist you show up together - even when you've never participated in the articles. I wonder if the Arbs can look at your watchlist and see if it shows WHEN such an entry was added. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:53, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * So in other words, you've never participated in that article, at all, but when SBHB and WMC declare their intention to make a WP:POINT you rush on over and give them your unconditional support for an AFD? Is this similar to all the times where you rushed over to vote adminship for so many of the participants in this case? Thanks for proving my point about this bloc behavior. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:50, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree with Boris that this is a problem. We have dozens, if not hundreds, of biographies of people notable only for their promotion of a minoritarian viewpoint. Such biographies take only 2 possible forms: they can end up a platform for the individual's minoritarian view, or a platform to debunk the individual's minoritarian view. In practice, I haven't seen any successful and encyclopedic middle-ground biographies in this setting. I guess I'm hopeful that Articles for deletion/Timothy Ball will mark a sea change, where we recognize and address this dilemma, but it's hard to be anything but cynical about the AfD process in general. I realize that ArbCom can't solve this problem any more than I can, but ideally its complexity will at least be appreciated. Simple answers like "just AfD the article; I'd vote to delete it" are impractical. Sanctioning the people who take the "debunking" approach to these bios, rather than the "uncritical echo chamber" approach, is perhaps necessary - after all, we all need to take BLP seriously - but it's not a systemic solution, and it's doomed to failure in the long term unless the underlying issues are addressed. MastCell Talk 17:21, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * So have you guys ever voted to delete biographies of people on your side who are noted AGW supporters (no coy responses please)? Or do you mostly vote to delete the articles of skeptics and skeptical topics (I think we all know the answer to this)? Also, I note that WMC's biography lists him in the "climatologist" category even though he has no education in the field (any citation for that? I know you guys fill the skeptic's bios with CN tags), while Tim Ball's bio does not put him in that category despite him being refereed to as a climatologist and having an education in geography (GN search of WMC and Ball). Perhaps if these articles were written by people not antagonistic to them then they wouldn't have such glaring inconsistencies in the writing? TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:50, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I disagree with MastCell's viewpoint. From what I know the personal viewpoints of biographical subjects does not factor in to whether a biography is notable, although I don't have any experience editing biographies. I don't think this is based in policy or guidelines. I don't mind being proven wrong. I also disagree that they serve a significant platform for airing their views. The main climate change articles are where people go to for information on climate change.-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  17:58, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

I won't comment at the deletion discussion because I don't know enough about this person. Here I will comment that I think the Committee could if it wishes affect the focus of the BLP deletion debate by making appropriate findings of fact in this or another case.

It is generally accepted that we have many articles about people who probably don't merit such an article, and these articles tend to proliferate unchecked where they are sometimes used to promote or attack partisan views.

The Committee could certainly make a difference by stating that this is intolerable and drawing up appropriate remedies to be applied on battleground BLPs. It should not be impossible to reverse the normal presumption, which requires consensus to delete, to require consensus to keep where the article relates substantially to a living person known solely for his opinion or actions in a battleground topic.

Climate change could be declared such a topic without risk of the declaration facing credible dissent. Tasty monster (=TS ) 18:02, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * They won't do that though, as BLPs are determined by policies and guidelines and community voting. ArbCom don't make content decisions and definitely won't overrule content policies. What they will do is topic ban or otherwise restrict people who engage in battleground or other disruptive conduct on BLP articles.-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  18:05, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Default-to-delete for BLPs would be ideal, but will never happen on its own without a strong push to get things moving. Perhaps the arbitrators could make an appeal to a Higher Power to give such a push. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 19:31, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I would love to see default to delete for BLP's.However, as the pending changes trials shows, it is nigh-impossible to get "consensus" (meaning enough support to prevent people vehemently opposed to whatever idea it is from making enough of a hubub to prevent it) on any major changes these days. Got any ideas on how to get past that? SirFozzie (talk) 19:35, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm not convinced this is really off-topic, aside from perhaps the comments by, but whatever. MastCell Talk 18:12, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I've revised the area hatted. Alexandr Dmitri (talk) 18:23, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

I would agree that previous Committees have sometimes expressed reluctance on content matters, but nevertheless they have seldom shirked their responsibilities for interpreting and clarifying the policy applying to biographies of living persons. The modest steps I suggest above are in line with the spirit of the landmark Badlydrawnjeff case. They would, I suggest, bring substantial calm to the topic by making it easy to remove poor quality articles that serve no purpose except to provide a venue for warfare. Tasty monster (=TS ) 19:16, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * To be honest TS, to remove the venue for warfare would require deleting every or almost every article connected to climate change.-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  19:19, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I disagree. Many articles within the topic area are untouched by the fuss. Even the main article, global warming, is seldom a problem area. --TS 19:58, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There is a steady stream of talk page drama though on the main global warming article. A further problem is if articles which generate battleground problems are default deleted, that would encourage more battleground behaviour among rival factions to get articles they do not like deleted, thus more drama not less drama will be the result. I still believe that ArbCom will not enact your ideas. The way to deal with the problem is to topic ban the people causing disruption, not to delete articles where people causing drama congregate to do battle.-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  20:05, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Your "analysis" here is simplistic and indeed incorrect to the point of silliness. Indeed, global warming and its recent history disproves your point all by itself. Please, take the time to actually check what you're saying before you say it William M. Connolley (talk) 22:58, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The "steady stream" comment I made was referring to the newbie and ip editors who use the talk page as a soap box, hence why I said "talk page drama"; the article content is quite stable. The article talk page now has over 60 archives. I was not saying that it was a battleground by established wikipedians.-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  23:33, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

I perform routine page management on the global warming talk page. If it were prone to "talk page drama" I would have noticed, believe me. It's often a focus for people who have read something on a blog and wonder why it isn't in the article. That really isn't a matter for concern. --TS 20:43, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * See my above comment, I clarified what I meant. Yes that was what I was referring to, newbies using the talk page as a soap box. I think we have drifted off-topic but I had to clarify what I meant.-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  23:37, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I think I realised what you were classing as "drama". With the current archiver period of 21 days we've got two or three on the go on the talk page at any one time. It's an absolute non-issue. The article is one of the most popular on Wikipedia according to the statistics I've seen, and actually a few of them are regulars who keep coming back every few months. This isn't the kind of thing that needs arbitration. It's kinda fun trying to work out which blog site they got the latest idea from. --TS 03:26, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Tony's proposal
My suggestion is far more modest than default to delete for BLPs. I am essentially providing a new form of remedy to situations where, in the view of the Committee, there is substantial evidence that articles of little or no intrinsic value are being used as a means of spreading a content dispute. That's an illegitimate means of editing and merits extraordinary action. The proposal has two parts:
 * (1) a remedy that sets a presumption that any BLP in the topic area is being used for such warfare, and requiring consensus to be reached that it is not being used for warfare or that it has substantial merits that would make it a potentially valuable article (because the subject is highly visible, for instance).
 * a. If there is no consensus that the article has merit, it is deleted.
 * b. If there is consensus that the article is a battleground but has merit, it is stubbed down, protected and rebuilt by admins, and then unprotected within a reasonable period.
 * c. if there is consensus that the article has merit and there are no battleground issues, the article is kept and no further action is needed.
 * d. Due consideration should be given by the closing admin to the merits of merging or redirecting to an article on a topic with which the subject is closely associated.
 * e. Legitimate work in stubbing down and rebuilding ordered in step b counts as administrative action and does not amount to topic involvement for the purposes of subsequent administrative action.
 * f. Admin action taken to thwart this remedy may lead to sanctions and, in egregious cases, the loss of adminship.
 * (2) a finding by the Committee that a topic is a battleground topic where BLPs have been used as a means of warfare. This would trigger the remedy described in (1).

I hope that provides enough clarity. This is just a draft and could undoubtedly do with some polishing. --TS 19:56, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Ok. Michael Mann article gets deleted because no concensus can be achieved among the opposing camps. Fred Singer article gets deleted due to lack of consensus of merit. William M Connelly article gets deleted (that would be funny to watch) due to lack of consensus of merit. Eventually all climate BLPs are deleted due to opposing camps failing to reach consensus. Lots of topic bans for failing to reach consensus,, ugh more drama. I understand that you have made this [complicated] proposal in good faith but feel that you are unduely focusing on the benefits and not considering the risks of [significantly] increased drama. Your proposal is also very prone to gaming and POV pushing etc.-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  20:12, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * My solution, while not novel, is that ArbCom, topic ban or otherwise restrict those involved in significant disruption to the topic area. This appears to be the direction ArbCom are going in and it is a direction based on years of experience dealing with drama.-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  20:18, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Neither the Michael Mann nor the Fred Singer article is in danger of deletion under the remedy I suggest. The William Connolley article might be deleted, and I don't think anybody would miss it. --TS 20:46, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Ah, I am an idiot, I apologise, I skipped over your introduction paragraph and missed this bit "there is substantial evidence that articles of little or no intrinsic value".-- Literature geek |  T@1k?  20:52, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry, but I see this almost orthogonal to this case. I grant that creation of marginal BLPs is a problem. I can imagine someone creating a marginal BLP in the CC area to make a point, or using one to carry water, so to speak, inappropriately. However, this same problem can occur with Israel/Palestine, race/intelligence, ID, Holocaust issues, or any number of contentious areas. What is special about CC that we should have unique rules governing the creation of BLPs? And why on earth would ArbCom be uniquely qualified to establish such rules? If we do have a problem, it is WP wide, and ought to be addressed by the community at large as part of the BLP policy committees, not as a specific ruling from Arbcom, simply because it came up as a tangential issue in a CC case.-- SPhilbrick  T  20:50, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

I agree that it is somewhat orthogonal to the case. This is why I say this proposal could be applied in either this or another case. The relevant community processes broke down long ago (See SirFozzie's summary) so it's within the Committee's remit. It can be applied as a remedy in cases where the Committee finds that substantial damage is unavoidable unless special measures are taken. --TS 20:57, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There's no harm in putting it into black and white, and a few of us 'trying it on for size' here, though. I have two thoughts: (1) I'm worried that the opening para puts too much executive power over to the Committee, who are not necessarily familiar with the topic, and the relevant details. (2) While the outcome sounds good, I don't see anything much here that could not be done under existing rules - anyone can raise an AFD (even members of the committee once this case is over, admins, the rest of us) and most of the rest [of the steps a-f] can follow. If these BLPs are causing significant hassle (I stay away from them personally), then sure, let's start thinning them out, as soon as this case is over. --Nigelj (talk) 21:10, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The proposal is predicated on my observation that such BLPs are incredibly difficult to delete. The AfD process just isn't set up to handle abusive editing. Arbcom is, that's its job, and this proposal of mine is a first draft showing how Arbcom might address it.  Arbcom really, really is devised to handle problems like this, those that the community badly drops the ball on but nevertheless are damaging the encyclopedia. --TS 21:26, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

I agree that the proposal as it stands would be susceptible to gaming in normal circumstances. I see it being applied in topics that already have substantial remedies to prevent battleground activity, so that the deletion discussion would fall under something akin to the discretionary sanctions already proposed in this case. In such circumstances the problems could be controlled. --TS 21:40, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I think that this proposal has considerable merit. Though radical, it is an example of creative thinking and I hope the arbs give it serious consideration. ScottyBerg (talk) 22:07, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree, it's an example of good thinking. I think it is a blueprint for one of the things we can get on with after this case is closed, sanctions and enforcement are in place and (hopefully) we have a good supply of new neutral admins looking over everyone's shoulders to prevent gaming and 'abusive editing' (as Tony mentions above). Then, AfDs should work nicely and the ground can be cleared of quite a few useless articles (BLPs and others), with any useful content merged into a much more thought-out coverage of the grand topic. --Nigelj (talk) 22:13, 30 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I think the proposal should be tendered to the BLP discussion pages, since it covers many a battlefield area where BLP's are used as attack pieces or coatracks depending on the stance associated with the subject. I stay clear of that area, but would note my support of such a general proposal. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:54, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Anybody should feel free to tender it to the BLP policy discussion page, but frankly I don't think it could ever be accepted as policy. I think it's more realistic to propose it as a remedy within the context of arbitration. Maybe a few years down the line, if it works as a remedy, it might be seen as a viable solution to battleground BLPs within existing policy, but for that to happen we'd need a change in culture at AFD and DRV. --TS 23:07, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * This won't fly as a remedy: it's purely about content and ArbCom don't do those.  Roger Davies  talk 05:34, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * That just ain't so. While some members of the community operate under this misconception (and others will pay it lip service for the sake of not rocking the boat), the fact is that the ArbCom is quite willing to make content decisions whenever it's possible to shelter those decisions behind some sort of user-conduct figleaf.  The ArbCom regularly makes decisions about whether or not users have correctly applied Wikipedia content policies &mdash; which is tantamount to enforcing content decisions.  Even decisions which are genuinely primarily focused on conduct will indirectly affect article content by excluding editors who have a particular point of view.
 * For example, the last case ArbCom closed was Arbitration/Requests/Case/Race and intelligence. Finding of fact 6, David.Kane: "...this editor has placed undue weight on selected research by A. R. Jensen to promote a point of view.".  In other words, the ArbCom has determined that David.Kane's edits violated the WP:WEIGHT provisions of WP:NPOV: a content decision.  (Roger Davies should be aware of this finding of fact, as it appears that he drafted it.)
 * Similar findings are sprinkled throughout Arbitration history. I don't think that this is a bad thing by any means &mdash; it just demonstrates that the 'ArbCom doesn't do content' trope has always been rather thin and tattered. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:11, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Suit yourself. I carefully framed it to be about abusive editing and left all content-related decisions up to community processes, but if you don't agree it's back to the drawing board. But before you write it off, check the Badlydrawnjeff decision. Tasty monster (=TS ) 11:02, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks
I want to thank Hypocrite for bring attention to my indiscretions. I must apologies to the Wikipedia community for my ignorance and egregious behavior. War is simply against my principles. Accepting the fate of a martyr, seem to be in them. As well, it's surprising to see so many Battlefield conduct findings proposed for Topic Ban remedies, the effect seems to have chilled down the topic. Sincerely, Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 12:54, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Perhpas
We should leave the idea about how to deal with any future abuse (and indead any pages that in some edds eyes are 'naughty') andtick to just the qeustion of users santions. It seems to me that we have now a very large discusionwith nothing that looks like agrement, and does look like aontinuation of the conflicts. We come back to the issue of pages and content when, and if, it turns out sanctions have not workd. We will be able to judge the real scpe and nature of any porbloms and thus will be in a better position to judge hat actions are needed.Slatersteven (talk) 11:45, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Par for the course, the Climate Change issue have disrupted every dispute forum Wikipedia has to offer. There must be a better way to address the disputes. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 15:46, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

A new? suggestion
Coould we use a process similar to pedning revision to create a peer review process (by by the wiki concept) on CC realted artciels. The Peer review privalige only going to edds who can demonstrate expert knowledge in the field.Slatersteven (talk) 15:20, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
 * No. Terrible idea. This is not Citizendium-- SPhilbrick  T  15:39, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Despite having commented, and thus arguably part of the problem, I don't see this is as a commentary on the PD, so I hope a clerk will hat it.-- SPhilbrick  T  15:42, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
 * No, I don't see the problem with a suggestion like this, as it appears to be a suggestion for an addition to the PD. However, I don't think it is workable for a number of reasons. ScottyBerg (talk) 17:18, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * This is a variation on the suggestion a few sections above about fully protecting the articles and only allowing certain edits through after they have been reviewed. While its heart is in the right place it clashes with a few policies, shuffles some issues to different venues without solving them and opens up new cans of worms which would have to be dealt with.


 * Specifically,


 * How do you reconcile this process with WP:OWN?


 * Who chooses who gets 'Peer Review Privalige' and what constitues 'demonstrat[ing] expert knowledge in the field'?


 * What happens if people believe this process could be used elsewhere? (slippery slope, basically)


 * What processess should be in place to prevent abuse of the new system?


 * I believe these concerns (and more) would need to be addressed before such a system could be implemented. 198.161.174.222 (talk) 15:53, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
 * As you will ote I say that this effectivly removes the idea that wikipedia is a wiki. I agree wiht all of the concearns. I just don't see any other way of resolving this short of genocide.Slatersteven (talk) 16:05, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

I think what is possible is for Jimbo to appoint anonymous Referees who will volunteer to write Referee reports when articles are nominated as GA or FA candidates. Articles will get the GA or FA standard if, in the judgement of the editors involved in the FA or GA process, the issues raised in the Referee report are dealt with adequately. So, the end decision remains with the editors as it is now. Count Iblis (talk) 16:35, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * But this will not deal with the edit warring and general lack of tolerance and civility that seems to have infested these pages. This I would argue is the esential problom, whatever the PD thyat is acepted it will have to address the geberaly poor behavure of many of the parties (from both sides). The PD should not be a victory by other means.Slatersteven (talk) 16:41, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, the problem on the climate change pages was caused precisely because the sceptics couldn't get their way with the experts editing here. What is needed is to insert the feedback from experts in a different way. POV motivated edit warring exists in the first place because Wikipedia articles are quite prominent on the internet. GA and FA status are important.


 * Suppose that for the FA status of the main global warming article to be prolonged, it would have to be refereed first. Then the Referee report may well say that the section on solar variation is too large, giving far too much weight on fringe ideas. So, that section would then be shortened, and sceptics who don't like this would have to swallow this. No complaints like "WMC dictating his version against Wiki-policies" can arise in such a process.


 * If this is done for all the CC articles then editors will anticipate that POV motivated edits will have to be removed later anyway, so they won't bother edit warring to get such edits in articles. Count Iblis (talk) 17:02, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree with some of this, but not with your statement that "GA and FA status are important." I haven't seen any evidence at all that the average reader knows or cares whether an article is GA or FA. The only meaningful distinction is that FA is eligible for being featured on the main page. The topic will continue to be fought over because of the strong views that people hold about it in the real world, regardless of whether Global warming is FA . Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:24, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * If the pending revisions return, maybe putting all of the articles that are now a battle to edit, would be useful at least to stop or curb the socking that is obviously causing some of the problems.  The thing is though, editors have to make sure that new editors who saying something is in the references, then they have to make sure before accepting that the editor isn't a sock of somebody the proper way.  Another way which was done by a bunch of us with a couple of administrators to help out was to check new editors locations and ISP if possible.  The administrators, some were involved in the articles and some were uninvolved which helped slow down the sock puppet we were having problems with.  The sock puppet was community banned and has a lot of IP's they have used along with a few named accounts.  That editor is easy for those who know her to stop her in her tracks at least breifly which is why the administrators are helpful here. She has now moved on to other articles but always seems to come back to some of her older articles.  I guess it's habit.  When an editor was proven to be her by either behavior, duck test, and/or SPI, the editor was blocked and someone would go through and revert all the edits per WP:DENY.  Maybe something like this could work also within the CC articles?  Just throwing out some ideas that have worked in other areas.  HTH, -- Crohnie Gal  Talk  23:21, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, I agree that GA and FA are not always the focus of the contrarians. I remember that in 2007 the sceptics even argued against renewing the FA status of the global warming article. But there has been a GA drive recently for some articles on books that are sceptical on climate science. Perhaps one has to think about doing a deal with Google. Articles that on peer review are found to be lacking and are not improved after a reasonable time, will be awarded a BA status. The Google-bot will pick up that signal, leading to a significant drop in the page ranking. Count Iblis (talk) 00:53, 2 October 2010 (UTC)