Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Shiloh/Proposed decision

Wikipedia has had an article on the "Shiloh Shepherd Dog" since the summer of 2003. The article's very early page history appears to be inaccessible due to an imperfect redirect shortly after it was originally created. The page's original author has been identified, by both sides in ths dispute, as Dr. Jeffrey Bragg, a sled dog breeder and a reasonably prominent writer on subjects related to dogs and dog breeding.

The article was relatively stable and uncontroversial for nearly two years. However, in the spring of 2005, the article was altered on several occasions by anonymous editors who repeatedly attempted to remove references in the article to Tina M. Barber and to organizations she was involved in. These changes were consistently reverted by experienced Wikipedia editors not otherwise involved in on- or off-Wikipedia disputes related to Shiloh Shepherd dogs.

Tina Barber is the original breeder of Shiloh Shepherd dogs, generally recognized as the "breed founder" or "breed warden." She operates the Shiloh Shepherd Dog Club of America (SSDCA) and the International Shiloh Shepherd Registry (ISSR). Barber's claim to a state/common law trademark to the term "Shiloh Shepherd" has been recognized after civil litigation, and has never been successfully challenged. Barber attempted to federally register the trademark, but "abandoned" (a term of art) the registration effort before any final determination was made.

Barber's club and registry are the predominant organizations in their field. The SSDCA webring has more than one hundred members, for example, while its largest rival's webring has no more than thirty-five. Google reports roughly twice as many sites connected to the SSDCA as to its largest rival, the ISSDC.

Shiloh dog breeders have been a fractious community for most of the "breed's" existence; disputes extend even to whether the class of dogs is properly identified as a "breed," and what that term denotes. While Barber's organization have been maintained with relative continuity since the early 1990s, rival/splinter groups have come and gone in that time. Today, the SSDCA's principal rival is the International Shiloh Shepherd Dog Club (ISSDC), established in June 2004. Disputes between the two groups (or their members) have occurred regularly since that time.

Dave Herz is a professional dog breeder/trainer affiliated with the ISSDC, who operates that organization's Canadian chapter. He operates a private message board for that chapter; many of the anti-Barber editors involved in the current dispute are affiliated with that board/site. Herz is a prominent/recognized figure in the Shiloh Shepherd dog community (SSd), and was involved in conflicts with Barber and the SSDCA well before this Wikipedia dispute began.

In November 2005, Herz began editing on Wikipedia, first as an IP-identified editor, then as "Shiloh lover." Herz edited only the Shiloh Shepherd Dog article, and his edits were focused on promoting the organizations he was affiliated with and denigrating rival groups and Tina Barber. Herz's editing practices were incompatible with Wikipedia policies and guidelines regarding writing about oneself and one's own activities, such as WP:AUTO and WP:VAIN; and his attempts to deprecate information about Barber and about her organizations' positions on disputed matters were overt violations of WP:NPOV.

Following Herz's edits, User:Trillhill added a link to the External Links section of the article, to a page presenting the ISSR's position on various aspects of the controversy. Herz responded by creating a user page for User:Trillhill, and posting personally directed comments regarding Trillhill which clearly violated Wikipedia policies/guidelines regarding civility and personal attacks and demonstrated Herz's unwillingness to comply with Wikipedia policies regarding ownership of articles and NPOV. Herz did not sign his post. He also reverted the article, removing Trillhill's changes, without an appropriate edit summary.

On December 2, Herz disclosed personal information regarding User:Trillhill, identifying her as Karen Ursel on the article's talk page, reporting the name of the kennel she operates and her affiliation with the ISSR. Herz was the first editor in this dispute to disclose personal information regarding other editors. His comments also at least bordered on WP:NPA violations, and characterized Trillhill as a vandal.

After Herz added more of his own commentary to the article, clearly incompatible with WP:NOR and in some cases WP:NPOV, a sterile edit war with an IP editor followed. Herz posted a series of clearly uncivil comments to the article's talk page, characterizing changes to his text as "vandalism."

On December 6, Tina Barber began editing the article, as a new Wikipedia user. Her initial factual comments did not violate any Wikipedia policies, although it is fair to say that she presented only information supporting her position in the external dispute. Barber also posted comments to the article's talk page which criticized rival registries, but did not make personal attacks on other editors or violate WP:CIVIL.

On December 8, Herz again made uncivil comments regarding editors whose views differed from his. He also posted an uncivil request for mediation, bordering on a personal attack on those editors, calling their edits "Political/self-serving positions, slander, and derogratory" while describing his own as "unbiased, non-slanderous, and informative using verifiable sources."

(in progress 3/21/06)