Kiefer.Wolfowitz and Ironholds case opens; July 22 deadline for checkuser and oversight applications: The case Kiefer.Wolfowitz and Ironholds was opened. Voting on the Tea Party movement case continued, after a failed attempt at moderated discussion. A group tasked with deciding the content of the lead section of the Jerusalem article has reported back to the committee. Applications for checkuser and oversight permissions close on 22 July.
The case Kiefer.Wolfowitz and Ironholds was opened. Voting on the Tea Party movement case continued, after a failed attempt at moderated discussion. A group tasked with deciding the content of the lead section of the Jerusalem article has reported back to the committee. Applications for checkuser and oversight permissions close on 22 July.
This case, brought by Mark Arsten, involves a dispute between Kiefer Wolfowitz and Ironholds, the original account of Wikimedia Foundation employee Oliver Keyes, that began on-wiki and escalated in off-wiki forums, ending with statements that could be interpreted as threats of violence.
The evidence phase of the case closes 26 July, the workshop closes 2 August, and a proposed decision is scheduled to be posted 9 August 2013.
This case involving an American political group, brought by KillerChihuahua, is now unsuspended, after a moderated discussion failed to agree on the ground rules for such a discussion.
Two additional findings of fact currently have enough votes to pass: that there was no misconduct on the part of KillerChihuahua, and that the current sanctions, which prohibit “more than one (1) revert on the same content per twenty-four (24) hour period" are inadequate.
Clarification and amendment request: Syrian civil war articles: A request was made by Greyshark09 for a 1RR restriction to prevent edit warring. The sanctions for WP:ARBPIA (Arab-Israeli conflict) are currently being applied to the topic area.
Applications for checkuser and oversight to close 22 July: The committee is looking for applications for checkuser and oversight permissions, with special encouragement for those who already have one permission to apply for the other. Users who frequent IRC channels are also particularly encouraged to apply. Applicants must be over 18, willing to identify to the foundation, and already be administrators on the English Wikipedia. For more information see the appointments page.
Mandated dispute resolution for Jerusalem: A group tasked with deciding the content of the lead section of the Jerusalem article has reported back to the committee. A January 2013 motion by the committee appointed three uninvolved, experienced editors, along with a moderator, to assist the community in holding a discussion over the content, with the decision to be binding for three years. The paragraph selected is "Jerusalem, located on a plateau in the Judean Mountains between the Mediterranean and Dead Seas, is one of the oldest cities in the world. It is considered holy to the three major Abrahamic religions—Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Israelis and Palestinians both claim Jerusalem as their capital, as Israel maintains its primary governmental institutions there and the State of Palestine ultimately foresees it as its seat of power; however, neither claim is widely recognized internationally."
The Race and politics case, brought by UseTheCommandLine and dealing with sourcing methods in articles pertaining to race politics, has been suspended for a two-month period beginning 26 May 2013, to see if an editor central to the case will return to editing.
Discuss this story
I would invite Wnt to read the arbitration report again, more carefully. The report has accused no one of anything by name, it merely says statements were made that could be (and in fact have been) interpreted in a certain way. If you look at the case, you will see there are in fact two editors that statement could apply to.
I see no point in quoting any of the original statements directly, especially since one of the comments was made on-wiki and has now been scrubbed. There is much nuance in this case, and it needs to be read in its entirety to be fully appreciated. It would not be fair to either editor to quote anything here out of context. My goal here is not to represent every ping-pong of every argument, but to indicate in broad terms what a dispute is about, and provide a link for those who want to read further.
Likewise I see no point in redacting the name of the case just because one of the named parties is a WMF employee. The Signpost has long used case names in its headings, see for example this report from April of 2012. The original name of Kiefer.Wolfowitz and Ironholds was "Offsite comments and personal attacks". It was the arbitration committee, not the Signpost, that changed the name of the title to reflect the parties named in the dispute.
That said, I would have to say that I feel very strongly about the way accusations about individual editors are represented in the Arbitration Report, whether they are WMF employees or ordinary garden-variety users. This is something I have made clear in private communications with other Signpost volunteers. My write-ups usually name only the party bringing the request, not any named parties, and I have taken care not to repeat unproven, and possibly untrue accusations. I do however report findings that have been voted on by the committee, but even then it is impossible to say whether something is empirically true or not, only that the committee has reached a conclusion.
What is notable about the Kiefer.Wolfowitz and Ironholds case is first, the interplay between on-wiki and off-wiki interactions, second, the fact that some comments were interpreted as being threatening, and third, the relationship between one of the named parties and the WMF. These are not just peripheral issues, they have been identified by the participants as being central to the case. For the Arbitration Report to not to report on this would indeed be a dereliction of duty.
—Neotarf (talk) 04:34, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]