Another arbitrator resigns; Norton case closes

On Thursday, arbitrator Coren resigned, following closely on the heels of arbitrator Hersfold's resignation on Wednesday. There are two open cases. A final decision has been given in the Norton case.

Arbitrator Coren resigned, effective immediately, charging that the committee has become politicized. The matter is covered in this week's "News and notes."

This case, brought by Fram, involved allegations of an ongoing pattern of copyright violations in uploaded files, and in links to copyright-violating off-wiki pages. To address the issue of a portion of the evidence having been deleted and only viewable by administrators, a select number of deleted files were restored, with the contents visible via a template, for the duration of the case.

The committee passed the following findings of fact: that Norton had made more than 100,000 edits since 2004, that he had a history of adding text and images that were in violation of copyright, that he had done little to resolve copyright concerns, that he had violated a topic ban on article creation, and that he was willing to accept restrictions on his editing to prevent further incidents.

The committee passed the following remedies: that Norton is “strongly admonished" for copyright violations, that his topic ban on article creation remain in place, that he is restricted from uploading images for use on English Wikipedia, and that any links to external sites he has contributed to are to be vetted on the talk page before being added to article space by another editor.

This case, brought by Mark Arsten, was opened over a dispute over transgenderism topics that began off-wiki. The evidence phase was scheduled to close March 7, 2013, with a proposed decision due to be posted by March 21.

This case was brought to the Committee by KillerChihuahua, who alleges the discussion over this American political group has degenerated into incivility. The evidence phase of the case was due to close by March 20, 2013, and a decision is scheduled for April 3, 2013.

• Unblock request: Fæ: The committee accepted the appeal of Fæ, after he declared his past accounts, on the condition that Fæ is topic banned from images and BLPs "relating to sexuality, broadly construed".
• Statement: Malleus Fatuorum and George Ponderevo: The committee responded to an assertion that Malleus Fatuorum had been using the account of George Ponderevo as an alternate account by passing a motion to mark the accounts with a shared IP tag.
• Position changes at Audit Subcommittee (AUSC): The arbitration committee extended the terms of three of the members of the Audit Subcommittee (AUSC) whose terms originally ended on February 28, 2013 to April 30, 2013. An arbitrator was named to fill the position of an arbitrator who resigned. A call was issued for applications for three vacancies for non-arbitrator members to the subcommittee, to be submitted before April 1, 2013
• Clarification Request: Arbitration Enforcement: A request for clarification has been brought by Gatoclass regarding whether an administrator can “act in a request" involving 1RR restrictions, whether an administrator can act when an editor has not received a formal warning, whether an administrator can adjudicate in an appeal if they adjudicated in the decision that lead to the appeal, and whether an administrator can issue a warning before consensus on a request has been reached.
• Amendment Request: Monty Hall problem: A request has been made to the committee for amendment of the remedies, including removal of discretionary sanctions.
• Clarification request: Climate change: A clarification request of the climate change case was filed by NewsAndEventsGuy, who requests clarification of who can post arbitration enforcement notices to talk pages and add to the notifications, blocks, bans, and sanctions log.
• Clarification request: Discretionary sanctions appeals procedure: A request to clarify the appeal process for discretionary sanctions warnings was filed by Sandstein.

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18 March 2013 (all comments)

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Based on what I read in this Signpost (and earlier ones) my opinion is that the Arbitration Committee is in a severe crisis. Under these circumstances, does the ArbCom still has the confidence of the community? Two Arbitrators gone, one acting extremely strange. Not good, not good. The Banner talk 11:00, 22 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• I suggest that the AUSC section be modified to include that the WMF have stepped in to prevent non-admins being appointed, despite a non-admin having previously been appointed to AUSC and despite the declared preference of several arbitrators to include non-admins on AUSC if a qualified candidate is available. EdChem (talk) 11:17, 22 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I doubt whether all the participants in that discussion, which at this point is still ongoing, would agree with that characterization, but anyone who wants minute-by-minute updates can always check the noticeboard talk page. —Neotarf (talk) 06:33, 23 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Amendment Request: Monty Hall problem: I think the clarification request regarding editing the "log of blocks, bans, and sanctions" page is unrelated to the Monty Hall amendment. Was something inadvertently pasted under the wrong bullet?
  • I have amended the description. The request is somewhat puzzling however, as it lists "Remedy 3" as the clause "to which an amendment is requested". Remedy 3 provides for a named editor to be "restricted to 1RR (one revert per day, unless reverting vandalism) on the Monty Hall article for a period of one year". Since the restriction was passed on March 25, 2011, it seems this restriction has long expired. However, the only remedy under discussion seems to be the discretionary sanctions. —Neotarf (talk) 05:47, 23 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thanks. I had noticed the inconsistency in the request as well. I assume it was a simple clerical error, and that the requester meant to cite Remedy 5. ~ Ningauble (talk) 14:25, 23 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• I am puzzled why certain people who seem to object to virtually every established process and authority level from the WMF on down remain with the project. It seems that either they must be deeply, passionately committed to the project while despising virtually the entire community, or else they are just addicted to stirring up trouble and can't abide not being noticed. Powers ^T 14:10, 24 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • There are members of this project who have no desire to help produce, improve, and curate our content, and are only here for the perpetual and relentless drama. For them, process, decisions, and political power within Wikipedia are the primary purpose for the existence of Wikipedia. The fact that two Arbitrators have resigned within a week over the pandering that ArbCom has to do to this group means that a real change in Wikipedia administration must be made. Wer900 • talk 19:20, 24 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oddly enough, the people I described and the people you described seem to overlap significantly. Powers ^T 14:38, 4 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]