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A request for arbitration is the last step of dispute resolution. Before requesting arbitration, please review other avenues you should take. If you do not follow any of these routes, it is highly likely that your request will be rejected. If all other steps have failed, and you see no reasonable chance that the matter can be resolved in another manner, you may request that it be decided by the Arbitration Committee (ArbCom).

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Currently, there are no requests for arbitration.

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The Arbitration Committee considers requests to open new cases and (exceptionally) to summarily review new evidence and update the findings and decisions of a previous case. Review is likely to be appropriate if later events indicate the original ruling on scope or enforcement was too limited and does not adequately address the situation, or if new evidence suggests the findings of fact were significantly in error.

The procedure for accepting requests is described in the Arbitration policy. If you are going to make a request here, you must be brief and cite supporting diffs. If your case is accepted for arbitration, the arbitrator or clerk will create an evidence page that you can use to provide more detail. New requests to the top, please. You are required to place a notice on the user talk page of each person against whom you lodge a complaint.

0/0/0/0 corresponds to Arbitrators' votes to accept/reject/recuse/other. Cases are usually opened at least 24 hours after four accept votes are cast. When a case is opened, a notice that includes a link to a newly created evidence page will be posted to each participant's talk page. See the Requests section of the arbitration policy page for details.

This is not a page for discussion, and Arbitrators or clerks may summarily remove or refactor discussion without comment. Please do not open cases; only an Arbitrator or clerk may do so.

See also

• Arbitration policy
• Misplaced Pages:Arbitration policy/Past decisions
• Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/How to present a case - Recommended reading: An (unofficial) guide to presenting effective Arbitration cases.
• Arbitration enforcement - Any user can request help here if it involves the violation of an ArbCom decision
• Administrator enforcement requested (shortcut WP:RFAr/AER)
• Developer help needed
• Arbitration template

How to list cases

Under the Current requests section below:

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Current requests

Marudubshinki

Initiated by Snottygobble and I@n at 11:28, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Involved parties

• Snottygobble (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• I@n (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• SCZenz (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Marudubshinki (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• Snottygobble, I@n and SCZenz have made statements below, so no further confirmation is needed.
• Marudubshinki: ,

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Other steps in dispute resolution were tried during earlier stages of the dispute. The situation has now escalated to the point where a number of editors feel that removal of Marudubshinki's sysop flag is an appropriate remedy. As only the ArbCom has the power to direct such a remedy, other steps are no longer relevant.

The ArbCom is invited to consider whether Marudubshinki should be desysopped for running an unauthorised admin-bot through his own account; unblocking himself in order to re-start the bot; and evading a block through the use of a sockpuppet.

Statement by User:Snottygobble

Marudubshinki was promoted to admin in October 2005. On 10 May 2006 he began running an unauthorised, unsupervised bot at Bot-maru (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). This was blocked on 22 May, and a WP:B/RFA request denied. He then began running the bot on his own account. In addition to these violations, the bot ran way too fast, and made mistakes. Marudubshinki was asked many time to stop violating WP:BOT policy. His responses can be summaried by this exchange between Marudubshinki and SCZenz:

Hi Marudubshinki. Can you please stop running unauthorized bots in any form? There's a reason for the authorization process, which is that if more people think about what the bot is doing and then it has a trial period, mistakes are less likely to be made. It is against policy to run unauthorized bots; see Misplaced Pages:Bots, please. -- SCZenz 08:09, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

That is true, but I find running a bot to be extremely useful. Finding all these bugs are simply handy side-effects. --maru 11:26, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

On 28 July, following discussions at User talk:Marudubshinki and WP:AN/I (now at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive124#User:Marudubshinki running unauthorized robots), I@n blocked Marudubshinki indefinitely with edit summary "(blocked per misuse of bot - see note on users talk page)". During the AN/I discussion it came to public notice that

1. Marudubshinki had previously unblocked himself despite being explicitly told not to by the admin that blocked him. In that previous case the block was for running an unapproved bot; Marudubshinki unblocked with edit summary "(bot's shut down)", then restarted his bot the next day.
2. Marudubshinki had lent his bot his sysop flag, allowing the bot to make deletions.

Essjay described this as

...greatly concerning, as the use of bots with admin privs is opposed very strongly on en.wiki... and by the Foundation.... Given that he's been warned numerous times not to run a bot under his admin account, has refused to comply, has added features which utilize his admin status without approval, and has unblocked himself in order to re-start the bot, I'm inclined to request a desysopping.

A number of editors expressed similar opinions re: desysopping, but nothing was done to instigate that remedy. Marudubshinki was told that he must not unblock himself, and that he would not be unblocked until he agreed to abide by the WP:BOT policy. He was also told that he was extremely close to losing his sysop flag.

On 18 August, Marudubshinki placed the {{unblock}} template on his talk page, with reason

The editors concerned wanted a promise from me to go and sin no more against the bot policy. They have it. --maru 00:03, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

I@n then unblocked, and posted a message to that effect at WP:AN/I#User:Marudubshinki. One of Marudubshinki's first edits after unblocking was to add to his user page a disclosure that he sometimes uses the alternative account Rhwawn (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). An examination of Rhwawn's contributions revealed that Marudubshinki had created the account three days after he was blocked, had used the alternative account to evade his block, and had made over 500 unauthorised bot edits through the account. Snottygobble then restored the indefinite block with edit summary "evasion of previous block - see AN/I discussion", leaving on Marudubshinki's talk page the message:

I have blocked both your accounts indefinitely while we thrash out the implications of you running unauthorised bot edits through an alternative account created to avoid an indefinite block applied for running unauthorised bot edits. --Snottygobble 01:57, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Following further discussion at WP:AN/I#User:Marudubshinki, User:ZScout370 unblocked Marudubshinki with edit summary "reducing to time served; but user is reminded to not run any automated edits until a new account is set up and approved)".

The AN/I discussion showed some support for Marudubshinki to be deprived of his sysop flag; and also some support for Marudubshinki to be given one last chance. The ArbCom is now asked to consider this question.

Snottygobble 00:47, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by User:I@n

I concur with Snottygobble's summation above. A timeline of applicable actions of Marudubshinki and others can be read here.

I first encountered Marudubshinki (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) on July 27 when I noticed a page on my watchlist was updated with an edit summary of "(robot: Reporting unavailable external link)". The bot had incorrectly identified an external link as being unavailable because the link had a pipe "|" character immediately following a url address. This was a perfectly normal occurrence when the url was inside a template such as {{cite}}. I had a dialog with Maru on his talk page concerning these edits and suggested that he should fix the bot. I found Maru to be strangely dismissive of what seemed to me to be a reasonable request. I noticed many similar incidents in his talk page.

In this edit on August 18, Maru said "Henceforth I promise not to run fully automatic bots without a bot flag; I shall go and sin no more. Is that sufficient?"

I feel that Maru's violation of WP:BOT policy and deliberate evasion by use of a sockpuppet to be behaviour unbecoming of an administrator. He cannot plea ignorance as he has been blocked 5 times over several months (once on User:Bot-maru, three on his main account and once on sockpuppet account User:Rhwawn). He has been requested to modify his behaviour on numerous occasions and promised to do so, presumably to get his block removed. I see no reason why he won't continue to violate policies in the future. He has unblocked himself in violation of WP:BLOCK ("...Sysops are technically able to unblock themselves ... but should absolutely not do so") policy.

Maru is a valuable editor. Arbcom needs to consider whether his sysop rights should be removed or retained.

Statement by SCZenz

I am involved party, as I was involved in encouraging Maru to reform his bot use from a relatively early time. His bot scripts had a tendency to break things or upset people (i.e. by changing talk page comments to fix typos), and he was at times rather insensitive to requests to change them (for example, he argued at some length that changing talk page comments was ok, despite many requests. They also ran too fast for unauthorized bots. I blocked a preliminary bot account he had after it persisted in unwanted behavior despite requests, and told him it could be unblocked if it behaved properly for an unapproved bot. He never dealt with this, but instead started intermittently making the same edits from his main account, resulting in this colorful blocking history. In short, it took an extraordinary amount of time and drama to convince Maru to follow bot policy, even though he was fully aware of it.

Then of course there are the issues of self-unblocking, running bots with admin powers, and evading blocks through sockpuppetry as described above.

In short, Maru has shown extraordinarily poor judgement and set a very bad example for other users when as an admin he should have been doing the opposite. All this must be balanced against the fact that he is a solid contributor aside from these issues—in particular the question of whether we might lose his contributions entirely if ArbCom reacts strongly to misbehaviors that may now have ceased.

Statement by Marudubshinki

(Please limit your statement to 500 words. Overlong statements may be removed without warning by clerks or arbitrators and replaced by much shorter summaries. Remember to sign and date your statement.)

Clerk notes

(This area is used for notes by non-recused clerks.)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (2/0/0/0)

• Accept. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 17:59, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
• Accept. Sam Korn 09:02, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Rainbow Gathering

Initiated by Oceankat at 17:36, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Involved parties

• Oceankat (talk · contribs)
• Lookingheart (talk · contribs)
• Bstone (talk · contribs)
• Twofeathers (talk · contribs)
• Hawker@xxxxxxxx.org Not a registered user but took part in informal mediation.
• Dante420 (talk · contribs)

• I will post on the user's talk pages as well as the Rainbow Gathering discussion page.

• Misplaced Pages:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2006-07-01 national rainbow gatherings

• http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Requests_for_mediation/rainbow_gathering

• There is an unresolved disagreement and edit war occuring over the additions of several gatherings by to the list of National/Annual Rainbow Gatherings.

Statement by oceankat

• Several gatherings have been added to the list of National/Annual Rainbow Gatherings by Lookingheart (talk · contribs). Lookingheart (talk · contribs) has stated in discussion that next year he intends to add more. Most of my attempts at discussion before informal mediation were ignored by lookingheart as well as most of my posts during informal mediation. Lookingheart refused formal mediation. Without arbitration I see no way to end this edit war. These gatherings are not National but small local gatherings. The National Gatherings have 10,000 to 25,000 people in attendance, Lookiingheart's additions have maybe 200. There have been several hundred similar and larger local, regional, or alternative gatherings over the last 34 years. These rainbow gatherings, which have been called "a gathering of the tribes" or AGOTT or among the newest and the smallest of the expansions or alternatives. I could easily list over a hundred on the east coast that have been in existance far longer than AGOTT and have the same or much greater attendance. I'm sure those on the west coast could list twice that. If lookingheart's gatherings are listed then any equavalent gathering can be listed and eventually would be. Every little local gathering of 25 people as well as gatherings that have never happened before with no reasonable expectation that it even will occur. Often on rainbow calanders people would list gatherings that were only a wish and a dream but the energy never manifested to pull it off. The article would be flooded with trivia as well as non-factual information, ie. gatherings listed that will not occur. I have seen no independant verification of these gatherings. No newspaper articles. No discussion on rainbow websites with reports from the gathering. While its rumored maybe 200 people were at the Mossouri AGOTT, I have no rumors at all about the WV AGOTT lookingheart listed and all requests for information before and during informal mediation were ignored. I can't with any assurance state that the gathering even occured or that anyone besides the few focalizers showed up. The WV AGOTT was clearly in violation of[REDACTED] guidelines concerning the posting of future events. In my opinion, no alternative gatherings should be listed, not even the florida annual which has had annual gatherings for over 20 years. None are sufficiently notable and the difficulty of manufacturing a standard to include some and exclude others is nearly impossible. Yet if we were to craft a standard any standard for inclusion would have to exclude AGOTT as it is the among the smallest and newest of the expansions and any standard that included it would include all gatherings that have ever occured or will occur. Oceankat 18:48, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by Bstone

I hope some thoughts from me might be helpful. I fully admit I have been in a constant edit war with Lookingheart regarding the listing of National/Annual Rainbow Gatherings. I attempted to work out these issued by participating in informal mediation located at Talk:Rainbow Gathering. One will see there that various Administrators attempted to work through the process. While I admit I was not the most open minded, I was willing to compromise on some issues. Lookingheart, however, was entirely unagreeable to any form of compromise. As a result, information mediation failed.

After informal mediation failed, a request for formal mediation was put in. This request failed due to Lookingheart's utter refusal to participate in the mediation attempt. This can be found at Misplaced Pages:Requests for mediation/rainbow gathering.

As a result of this I put in a request to have the page fully protected, even from myself, until this arbitration process could proceed.

It should be noted that Lookingheart has made some striking and entirely basless accusations against myself. On the request for mediation page he likened my response to "Nazi tactics" and "detract from your earning concerning your personal Paypal account for what you call a CALM Unit", referring to the free, volunteer medical team which sets up shop at the Rainbow Gathering and alleging I embezzle donated funds for my own purpose. This is undeinabley false for a variety of reasons which I shall not get into there. This does, however, paint the picture of Lookingheart as someone who is incredibly difficult to work with, unwilling to accept impartial mediation and alleging actual legal crimes without any sort of proof.

I do hope that this arbitration process can proceed and investigate all the various infractions and settle this issue, once and for all. Bstone 12:41, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved User:JzG

I have looked into this and find that Lookingheart's contributions in mainspace are restricted almost exclusively to this subject (the single exception being to create an article on Cottman Transmission, which contradicted some of the information in AAMCO, and to link a single local franchise of Cottman in both the aforementioned articles. Make of that what you will).

So, to all intents and purposes, Lookingheart is a single-purpose account, and the sole proponent of adding these minor local gatherings to the Rainbow Gathering article. At this point I guess we could go one of two ways: Lookingheart could be banned from the Rainbow Gathering article, in the hope that he begins to contriute content in other areas, or he could be politely shown the door as having demonstrated obstinate refusal to accept the way Misplaced Pages works. Just zis Guy you know? 13:14, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by party 2

(Please limit your statement to 500 words. Overlong statements may be removed without warning by clerks or arbitrators and replaced by much shorter summaries. Remember to sign and date your statement.)

Clerk notes

(This area is used for notes by non-recused clerks.)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/0/0/0)

Rootology, MONGO

Initiated by rootology (T) at 21:57, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Involved parties

• Rootology (talk · contribs)
• MONGO (talk · contribs)
• Hipocrite (talk · contribs)
• Badlydrawnjeff (talk · contribs)
• Karwynn (talk · contribs)
• Hardvice (talk · contribs) (indef. blocked along with abusive sockpuppets)
• SchmuckyTheCat (talk · contribs)
• Zoe (talk · contribs)
• Tony Sidaway (talk · contribs)
• Weevlos (talk · contribs) (indef blocked by MONGO)
• Nandesuka (talk · contribs)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• I left a notification here for MONGO. rootology (T) 21:58, 21 August 2006 (UTC)
• Users who had not posted directly here yet but had been named as involved parties, have been notified. , , , rootology (T) 00:16, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Please see the below sections, especially the Timeline of Wikistalking Accusations, where I have asked him for clarification (largely unsuccessfully).

My apologies for filing an overlong initial request (trimmed at Tony's request on my talk page). A summary of the unsuccesfull efforts to get clarification on this are in chronilogical order here.

My goal in filing this arbitration is for MONGO's actions and constant accusations toward me to be reviewed, especially wikistalking accusations.

(originally drafted here, if it's relevant or helpful)

Statement by Rootology

MONGO (talk · contribs), ever since an extremely bitter AfD in July 2006 (and it's fallout/appeals) has been at times civil toward me, and at other times not, but has over the past month (August 2006) begun to accuse me of Wikistalking himself and "other admins". This is distressing to me as I've been trying hard to make positive contributions toward the growth of the project and the encyclopedia. When asked to define the wikistalking, he would generally refuse to clarify or not reply at all, and I have been nervous about my editing in general due to this for fear of upsetting him, resulting in some sort of unappealable ban, and it has made my experience on Misplaced Pages since that AfD very stressful. I've tried to be nice to him--I've asked him for help and input twice on his talk page, for example--but he still persists with vague accusations of a bannable offense under WP:STALK.

I have been almost tempted to simply walk away and start over under a new name after a few months, simply so that MONGO would not know it was me, and so that I would not have to have his shadow looming over me like this. I actually DID close down my user page because of this, but decided to try again after a weekend--and his accusations and hostile tone began again. I believe this is all due to my being one of the more vocal voices that "stood up" to his stance in that AfD, and because of the fact that I don't think I'm intimidated by him--I respect admins, but I shouldn't feel intimidated. I opposed his viewpoint very firmly and stridently, under at the time what I read as policy, and in turn was attacked repeatedly during the process. I moved ahead, got on with things, and have since then worked to build Wikpedia--almost 2000+ edits in the past month alone, trying to do some positive work. But, he keeps hounding me with vague accusations, threats, and a needless attempt to have an intimidating tone.

I do not feel I should avoid any articles because he might have/been working on them, if our paths cross, simply because my presence appears to completely displease him. He's one of the more prolific editors. I have no way of knowing what is or isn't on his watchlist. I just want him to leave me completely alone at this point, not be free to try to use intimidation on me, not accuse of me any of these vague policy violations, and to let me work on Misplaced Pages in peace. As MONGO has in the past banned people simply for being things like "ED trolls", "sleeper trolls", or any other number of vague reasons, and also seems to have a habit of locking talk pages so people cannot appeal, I really would rather not have that specter hanging over me, making me think twice or thrice about every edit for the rest of my time here, worrying about displeasing him. I don't think my job should be to please an admin, but to build an encyclopedia. He's making it hard, unenjoyable and stressful to do that at this point.

Outside views: Making note that Tom's statement, based on evidence, is basically fiction. For Zoe's, I had no contact with MONGO until nearly nine months after I joined.

Statement by MONGO

Just continued efforts on the part of this editor and others to attempt to attack me since the Encyclopedia Dramatica article was deleted. My perception is that rootology, et al, have wikistalked myself and a few other admins such as Tony Sidaway since the Encyclopedia Dramatica article was nominated for deletion. There was a failed attempt to restore the article and an Rfc was filed against me which was deleted. Rootology has repeatedly fought against my attempts to protect myself from harassment, argued above that User:Weevlos should not have been blocked, when that editor was using his userspace to post the same information that was spammed to hundreds of admins via email and talkpages, and no evidence can show that Weevlos ever recieved the spam himself via wiki...my guess is that Weevlos is partly responsible for the spamming. Rootology has "shown up" whenever it is time to attack an admin, especially those that have attack articles (against their wishes I'm sure) about them at the Encyclopedia Dramatica website. Though it is difficult or impossible to prove that rootology edits Encyclopedia Dramatica, (and even if he did, that in itself is not evidence or reason for a banning unless it was proven he was attacking editors off site), his long fought battle to save the Encyclopedia Dramatica article from deletion, his concerted efforts to fight to have it restored, his active participation in the deleted Rfc against me (since I am supposedly a big part of the reason the Encyclopedia Dramatica article was deleted), his prior attempts to identify and collect information about my real IP address, his arguments with Tony Sidaway, and his active role in the most recent Kelly Martin Rfc, lead me to belive that rootology is indeed wikistalking myself and other admins that interest him. Should arbcom take this, I'll be glad to post diffs ad nauseum in the evidence section.--MONGO 22:47, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by Hipocrite

I urge ArbComm to accept this case to review the conduct of Rootology, Badlydrawnjeff and the other listed Encyclopedia Dramatica partisans. Hipocrite - «Talk» 23:42, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by User:Badlydrawnjeff

Much further evidence can be found at the deleted talk pages at Encyclopædia Dramatica, the deleted history of Encyclopedia Dramatica, and at the Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/MONGO (second RfC), a deleted RfC that was put out concerning MONGO's behavior. I encourage arbitrators to review the deleted history of the articles in question prior to making any decisions on the matter. I also strongly request arbtirators take into account false statements made during this process. There are, and will continue to be, many. --badlydrawnjeff talk 23:26, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by David D.

This comment from MONGO in the Kelly Martin RfC did appear out of the blue. I participated on that talk page and it did seem unwarranted at the time. I have had no interaction with rootology, although I did support the deletion of the Encyclopedia Dramatica and from this perspective I would say I am neutral. I did noticed rootology was very keen to keep it alive and from memory, I would say it bordered on pestering. Nevertheless MONGO's accusations may well need to be tempered. David D. (Talk) 22:24, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by Cyde Weys

Rootology and Badlydrawnjeff are members of Encyclopedia Dramatica first, members of Misplaced Pages second. It is thus understandable where all of the wikidramatica around here is coming from. --Cyde Weys 00:52, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by TheronJ

I'm not sure if this is a good test case or not, but any additional guidance ArbCom can offer on what constitutes "wikistalking" will probably be helpful. TheronJ 22:31, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved party Anomo

Encyclopedia Dramatica is basically a site where most people there are a hivemind. To me it is a cult. They all appear to act alike and think alike over there.

Wikistalking I believe is only against the rules if done for harassment and wikistalking is very common on[REDACTED] where about everyone does this. Anomo 23:12, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by Nandesuka

I was the admin who closed the Encyclopedia Dramatica AfD. This whole — dare I say it — drama has been marked by a number of parties refusing to accept community consensus. It seems to me in some sense to be a content dispute that simply won't go away. From that perspective, I'd think that it is not something that Arbcom should take on. That being said, the accusations launched both ways are serious, and I would not object to Arbcom taking this case to evaluate the behavior of all parties involved, if only for reasons of finality. Nandesuka 00:37, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by Zoe

I have to agree that rootology and badlydrawnjeff have decided to try to turn Misplaced Pages into another version of Encyclopedia Dramatica, and don't have the feel for collegiality and community that is needed for useful members of Misplaced Pages. They have harrassed MONGO since they came here, and should be sanctioned accordingly. User:Zoe|(talk) 01:59, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved party Grafikm_fr

I'm a complete outsider to this thing, but saw a lot of it on WP:AN (or was it WP:ANI?). I stronly urge our dear arbitrators to accept the case, because increased stalking and tendentious editing from some editors that come here to wage edit wars and not writing an encyclopedia deserve a reponse from the ArbCom. -- Grafikm 12:51, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by SchmuckyTheCat

I'm named as a party and don't know what my expected role is. I know arbcom wants to see diffs, but I'm not currently in a position to provide them (I got hit by a car, broke some bones, and am recovering. Thanks for caring. Wasting time on Misplaced Pages personality disputes isn't a good use of my lucid hours.)

This isn't about content and it isn't really anything to do with policies (other than basic civility). It's a personailty clash dick-waving, and those with admin powers here obviously win. The whole thing smacks of elitism and treating admins like vested special contributors - violations of principle that go to the very founding of Misplaced Pages.

Here are some basics as I see it:

1. Rootology has nothing to do with ED.

   I can say that as someone who does behind the scenes work for ED. Associating WP editors with ED membership and saying it as though it's slanderous seems to have taken on a life of it's own.

2. Nobody with a longstanding account here on WP was involved with the Mongo article at ED. NOBODY.

   It's a wiki. Nobody here who is also on ED is responsible for those off-WP attacks anymore so than any editor here at WP is responsible for the Siegenthaler prank.

3. Rootology saw the ED AfD, thought there was a little too much personal vengeance involved and asked folks to be objective. Ever since then he's been branded a troll and ED sycophant by Mongo, et al.
4. Misplaced Pages doesn't have loyalty oaths.

   This feels like a Joseph Heller novel. Having an account at ED should not brand people on WP as traitors. There are people who are admins on both wikis (omg! find them out and execute them.).

5. Mongo has been uncivil in his dealings about this issue because of his personal stake. He'd have no problem getting other admins to do any administrative work necessary if he brought it to them. Several other admins have asked him to chill out and let other people handle it. He hasn't dis-involved himself and in the heat of it has said accusatory and inflammatory things at many long-established WP editors.
6. Mongo has a few "cronies".

   No big deal, we all do. Except their role seems to have been to inflame this personality dispute rather than get people to cool off. (Just view the statements here by Cyde, Hipocrite and Zoe and the wide brush they tar anyone who opposes them with.)

7. Is Rootology wiki-stalking Mongo? Don't know, don't care, and rather doubt it.
8. Is Mongo being threatening and uncivil to Rootology (and others)? Absolutely.
9. Is Mongo rogue? Not really.

   - but no admin should turn around and claim harassment for someone daring to question their actions. As a principle any admin action should be transparent and the admin should be able to justify it. 90% of Mongo's admin actions are probably fine, great, good job. But the other 10% are questionable, and the community should be able to ask questions about them without being accused of harassment.

   Specifically User:Weevlos: Nobody has shown any involvement with anything except a single user-subpage copied from ED. I don't see what is so offensive about a page an some other server that mostly consists of WP diffs, but whatever. The user doesn't deserve to be permanently banned with their userpages protected to prevent them from making an appeal of the ban based on the whim ("my guess") of a single admin.

Misplaced Pages is one of the largest and most visible websites on the planet. It may be the largest site that encourages user involvement. There has been major press critical of Misplaced Pages as a whole but I don't think it will take too long before some media looks deeper and takes notice of WP day-to-day administrative action. This massive personality flameout started because some anonymous wiki editor at a minor site like ED called Mongo schoolyard names. Is this really the appropriate reaction to a minor site? If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. Admins that edit controversial subjects and take controversial actions against opponents should be able to handle off-site criticism of their actions without getting their panties in a knot. It won't be long before a major news site does a piece about the "inner workings" of WP - what experience do we want them to have?

SchmuckyTheCat 00:18, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by Tom Harrison

It seems implausible that Rootology's interest in national parks and 9/11 conspiracy theories is independent of Mongo's work in those areas, and Rootology's interest in ED. This request for arbitration looks like another exercise in time-wasting drama. Tom Harrison 22:11, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Clerk notes

Recusing because someone has added me as an involved party. --Tony Sidaway 00:29, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (1/0/0/0)

• Accept, to consider all parties. There are definitely some concerns about civility, consensus, and possibly stalking here. Dmcdevit·t 01:21, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Appeal by David

Initiated by David | Talk at 20:32, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Involved parties

Dbiv (talk · contribs)

This is an appeal against the ban on editing Peter Tatchell which the committee purported to impose today. For the avoidance of doubt, no other part of the judgment is being appealed.

Statement by David

The grounds of appeal are eleven in number:

1. My contributions to the article Peter Tatchell have been overwhelmingly positive and have raised the article from near-stub status to a fairly comprehensive one which is sourced and neutral.
2. No evidence has been presented that I have failed to work together with editors other than Irishpunktom on this article.
3. I resigned as sysop on 20th August and there is therefore no longer any reason to believe that I will misuse rollback, as I no longer have access to it.
4. The decision is founded on a factual error (that I used rollback on editors other than Irishpunktom who made good faith contributions). This is untrue.
5. The decision failed to take into account a private agreement between myself and Irishpunktom which prevents disruption. (Text available on request)
6. No evidence has been presented that I have engaged in disruptive editing generally.
7. No temporary injunction was imposed in the case, indicating that the ArbCom knew I was editing the article properly for the period of the case.
8. Factual errors in other parts of the case produced a biased judgment. Among these errors was the claim that I was blocked for a 3RR on 15th February, when the truth is that there was no 3RR.
9. The arbitrators have been unable to justify, when asked, the proposed decision.
10. The proposed decision does not have community support. I am unaware of a single non-arbitrator who has indicated their agreement.
11. The excessive time taken by a relatively small case (a record, so far as I can tell) has produced a faulty finding.

Statement by Irishpunktom\

David and I have come to an agreement in relation to this article. As David has no history of edit warring with anyone except me, and only in respect of this article, then his Article Ban is surely unwarranted? According to WP:ARBCOM "The Arbitration Committee exists to impose binding solutions to Misplaced Pages disputes" - But, there is no longer a dispute, so this ruling not needed. Please note, I am not questioning the comittees decisions in respect of me, My additions to the article have been rather minor, wheras most of the article was created and then maintained by David.--Irishpunktom\ 15:53, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Comment by User:Calton

Am I the only one troubled by the phrasing ...the committee purported to impose... ? Does Dbiv doubt they did this? --Calton | Talk 04:07, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Update: I have received a rather disturbing bit of wikilawyering from User:Dbiv/David in answer to my question. --Calton | Talk 14:40, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Clerk notes

(This area is used for notes by non-recused clerks.)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/3/0/0)

• I've written a long-ish answer, but it is not an invitation to threaded discussion.
  • 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, and 11 are untrue (In order: You did revert others, you just choose to call them sockpuppets, and it is not founded upon that, but that you edit warred there, edit warring with Irishpunktom being very much a reason for it; that was taken into account, and as I indicated before, it was deemed insufficient, and non-binding; that is not what the absence of a temporary injunction indicates: that is what the absence of a 9-0 ruling would have indicated; semantics– you were blocked for 3RR, whether you agree it was 3RR or not; I have responded to your queries before– what you mean to say is that none have responded to your satsfaction; there is nothing abnormal about the length of time of your case, search harder).
  • 2, 3, 6, and 10 are red herrings (it is indeed your massive edit wars with Irishpunktom that were the main reason for the ban; misuse of rollback was a factor in the desysopping, edit warring, not rollback, was the reason behind the ban; indeed, you were only banned from one article; I strongly doubt that we don't have support in our ruling, but nobody else was asked, so how you can honestly conclude that is beyond me)
  • And we are left with your first point, the only one that gave me pause while making the ruling. You have made very positive additions to the article, but in light of the amount of edit warring, it is my opinion that it is in the best interest of the article and the encyclopedia for you to add your proposed changes to the talk page, and not the article, for others to evaluate and add without fear of edit warring from either you or Irishpunktom; your editing is not severely hampered. I would add that appealing a decision a day after the case was closed, and hours after violating that very ruling is not likely to lead to the desired result. Reject. Dmcdevit·t 23:47, 21 August 2006 (UTC)
• Reject, per Dmcdevit. The link Fred brought up in the first motion to close is also telling. Sam Korn 12:33, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
• Reject. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 18:03, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

MyWikiBiz

Initiated by Cyde Weys at 14:29, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Involved parties and confirmations

MyWikiBiz

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

ArbCom is the only kind of dispute resolution that is liable to work in this instance.

MyWikiBiz (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has been writing and influencing articles on Misplaced Pages on a contract basis for pay.

Statement by Cyde Weys

MyWikiBiz is admittedly writing articles on a for-pay basis. This was noticed and he was briefly blocked and then unblocked by Jimbo after he promised that he wasn't going to do anything bad. Well, it appears that he has. Here we see him voting delete in an AFD, saying the subject of the article should have employed him if they wanted an article that should be kept. This reeks of a protection racket. He's also nominated a few other articles about businesses for deletion; one wonders if he did so because he offered to improve their articles for pay and they refused? I believe this case needs to be accepted to establish some sort of precedent about whether such an egregious conflict of interest with the core goals of the project should be tolerated. --Cyde Weys 14:29, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

More stuff to look at: Look at the deleted edits on Gregory Kohs and Gregory J. Kohs. I'm not quite sure what's going on here but User:Thekohser is self-admittedly an alternate account of "MyWikiBiz", and appears also to have been doing some suspicious business-related edits. --Cyde Weys 16:20, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement by MyWikiBiz

OFFICIAL STATEMENT: I hope that the Arbitration Committee will review the entire legacy of Conflicts, of PaidEditing, of the threads at WikiEN-l and of Options (which took quite some time and effort on my part, to create a fair discussion forum), and weigh the effort and thoughtfulness of those discussions against the three-word reply of "Absolutely unacceptable, sorry" by Jimbo Wales, regarding Conflicts. In light of that, I hope that (a) my most recent juvenile attempts at WP:POINT will be understood as a one-off spurt of activity (where I actually identified some pretty awful non-notable or spam-linked articles, but did so in the wrong way), and that (b) the ArbCom will elect to view this "case" not so much as a means to punish MyWikiBiz, but to address the larger issue of "paid editing" on Misplaced Pages. The herd of horses is already out of the barn, as evidenced by the Reward Board and by PRSA article. Are Misplaced Pages admins resolved in attempting to remedy the situation one AfD, one block, and one IP ban at a time? If so, then Misplaced Pages admins will have a ton of arduous work before them, and the prejudice against MyWikiBiz is going to be insurmountable, anyway, and this "statement" will have been just more wasted time. -- MyWikiBiz 15:40, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

(posted on behalf of MyWikiBiz --Deathphoenix ʕ 15:47, 22 August 2006 (UTC))

• Misplaced Pages dispute resolution