Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Naming Conventions/Workshop

Please sign all your proposals by noting "proposed" and your signature ~ either under "comment from parties" or "comment from others", depending on your role here. Thatcher131 12:13, 12 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Another couple of comments. When you are running out of templates in a section, can you make a few more blanks before using the last one.  Also, citing one or two example diffs for findings of fact, or providing a bookmark link to a particular section of the evidence page, is often helpful. Thatcher131 02:53, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
 * ahh, sorry. I think both of those problems where my fault. With the facts, i'd assumed the facts where supposed to be just statements. All the proposed 'facts' correspound with sections on the evidence page, i'll go link them if no one else has already done so. -- `/aksha 11:02, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Linking to the evidence page or a couple of diffs makes it easier for the arbitrators and other parties to evaluate any proposals. Thatcher131 12:22, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Procedure question
Should the parties be replying to, or commenting on, every proposed principle or proposed finding of fact? I'm unclear on the procedure here. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:57, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
 * The workshop process is one method that the arbitrators use to get a sense of where the case is coming from and where it might be going. Sometimes the arbitrators read and comment on proposals and even adopt party's proposals into the final decision, and sometimes they write a proposed final decision without using the workshop page at all.  You should comment if you have something to say, although this is not a vote, so simply stating "support" or "oppose" is less useful than giving a reason for agreeing or disagreeing.  It may be useful to look at other arbitration cases' workshop pages to see how they have been used. Thatcher131 05:11, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Proposed remedies
Is the "proposed remedies" section intended to be edited by anyone, or is it just for the arbitration committee? --Milo H Minderbinder 20:11, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Proposed anything on this page can be edited by anyone as far as I know. The Requests for arbitration/Naming Conventions/Proposed decision page can only be edited by the ArbCom as well as Requests for arbitration/Naming Conventions.  That's my understanding anyway.  —Wknight94 (talk) 20:22, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
 * There does seem to be some odd stuff showing up there. --Elonka 21:38, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Such as? —Wknight94 (talk) 21:45, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Wknight94 is correct about anyone being able to edit the workshop page. It is not uncommon for editors who are unfamiliar with arbitration cases to make some wildly implausible suggestions there.  Crazy-seeming ideas or remedies that look like overkill generally do no harm (as long as editors do not become uncivil over them). Thatcher131 01:49, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Extended discussion of proposal from Leflyman
Copied from "Pre-disambiguation is unnecessary, and contrary to established guidelines and consensus" proposal:
 * You say tomato, I say content issue. We may be talking about a naming convention guideline, but the content of that guideline is not really at issue. That's contrasted with issues of user conduct, which is what ArbCom is likely to be looking at.
 * Regardless, this issue is being hotly debated in several other areas of Wikipedia right now and if ArbCom really wants to take a side, this one issue probably deserves an ArbCom case of its own, open to many different editors to make their case and provide evidence. Deciding such a major issue as an afterthought to a tangentially related case is not the way to settle the debate. –  Anþony  talk  03:37, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry, Anthony, but I'm still not really sure as to what you're saying here. It's clear that the Committee is not exclusively looking at user conduct-- although that's obviously a factor here. Rather, the issues of disambiguation and consensus have been at the heart of this conflict from the git-go. The very first statement made by Yaksha, who brought this case to Arbcom is, "This dispute is regarding whether articles for TV episodes which do not need to be disambiguated should have disambiguation." Further, all the involved parties refer to the need to establish just what the consensus to disambiguate is. To wit:
 * Yaksha: "Claims of Wikiprojects who have ‘consensus’ to not follow the naming convention have so far all been proven false."
 * Wknight94: "A clear-cut case of supermajority consensus has become a nasty all-out war with a very vocal minority....[A] few members of the minority, mostly Elonka and occasionally MatthewFenton, have declared that there was no consensus and that the dispute is still open."
 * Josiah_Rowe: "The only aspect of the debate which I feel needs more emphasis is Elonka's apparent misunderstanding of the nature of consensus... More importantly, the discussion which followed the poll (currently archived here, here and here) showed a strong consensus in support of the principle "disambiguate only when necessary", and no consensus for explicitly including exceptions for particular television programs."
 * Elonka: "[T]he main issue is the guideline at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (television) specifically about when episode articles can and can't use a suffix such as "( episode)"
 * Ned_Scott: "I did attempt to change WP:NC-TV to not include the misleading Star Trek example. Having looked further into the matter, I found that there was no discussion involved for including the example, as I had originally assumed. There was no "consensus"..."
 * All of which is precisely what my proposal deals with. Or were you referring to something else? Thanks,-- LeflymanTalk 04:31, 22 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Arbcom could still state where consensus was shown, which wouldn't be them making the decision themselves. -- Ned Scott 04:41, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm not saying your proposal definitely is outside of ArbCom's scope, as obviously only ArbCom can make that decision. It seems like a content issue to me, so I've expressed my opinion in that regard in my comments.

We're all aware of why this debate started and the statements clearly reflect that. However, if you check out Requests for arbitration/Naming Conventions/Evidence, no one's really making a case for why consistent suffixes are a good or bad idea. It's the history of how the debate itself was handled by those involved. As Ned pointed out, ArbCom will probably decide where consensus lies without taking a stance directly. The actual issues we were debating won't matter much from what I understand.

To get to the proposal itself, it's clear that this one issue has wide ramifications across many areas of Wikipedia. If ArbCom really were going to decide it once and for all, I'm sure there are plenty of editors who would want to chime in and explain not only the history of this debate, but the history of WP:NC:CITY and other cases. If ArbCom cares to decide the issue, this isn't the way to do it. Thankfully, I don't think they care to. –  Anþony  talk  07:16, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

This dispute IS about TV episode disambiguation. But at this point, that's not so important. More like, this issue BEGUN as being about TV episode disambiguation, and has now proceeded to being about consensus and user behaviour. I was trying to give some background into the dispute when i wrote my statement. I did conclude with saying i was hoping this ArbCom case would show consensus was reached and the page moves (which is to do with user conduct) where made with consensus. I wasn't hoping (and didn't express that i did) for the ARbCom case to decide whether TV episode articles should be disambiguated or not.

I'm sorry if my statement made it seem like i was wanting the ArbCom to decide on how the guideline should be. Now that you've pointed it out, i feel like going back and changing my statement. But i feel since the case has already proceeded so far, that'd be sort of...bad. Besides, the opening statement is really to help the ArbCom decide whether or not to accept the case. And they did, and stated they "Accept to consider user conduct during this dispute" - so i guess it wasn't such a big deal. -- `/aksha 07:35, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I just want this thing to be over. If the ArbCom manages to put a lid on this dispute by saying "yes, there was consensus", then great. If they do it by looking at user conduct and banning some editors from being involved with a certain group of articles, then that works too. -- `/aksha 06:58, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
 * While I understand that a lot of feathers have been ruffled by the actions of various editors, my concern is that this is becoming an exercise in fingerpointing and antagonism, rather than an attempt to straighten out the original source of the dispute. Although I may not agree with Elonka's methods or opinions on certain matters (and have stated as such on her talk page and elsewhere), I think turning this ArbCom into a witchhunt is detrimental to everyone. As you point out, the core issue is "consensus" -- which I do think needs to be distinguished here as the ultimate goal of ArbCom's finding-- the Ratio decidendi of legal terminology-- one which should settle the matter for all disputants. Once that is decided, then all other issues of incivility/tendentiousness would fall away. The incredible time and energy that this controversy has sucked up can never be recovered, only ameliorated if something positive comes of it.-- LeflymanTalk 19:30, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Indications are that this proceeding will be more geared towards "user conduct" than naming conventions . And, for the record, Elonka posted evidence first and immediately launched into an attack on my actions  so the tone of this proceeding was set very early on.  —Wknight94 (talk) 19:46, 22 December 2006 (UTC)


 * They didn't set a naming policy in the highways case and they won't here. In the Protecting children's privacy case, they recognized that consensus did not exist, and encouraged the parties to continue working on it.  However, in that case the two sides were more evenly matched.  Here, I'm afraid it looks like a very vocal minority has had a disproportionate effect on the situation.  I won't predict the outcome, though. Thatcher131 01:54, 24 December 2006 (UTC)