Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2011/Candidates/Risker

Risker

In my three years as an arbitrator, I’ve focused on both infrastructure and casework. I contributed to the development of a community-based checkuser and oversighter corps, as well as the development and functioning of the Audit Subcommittee. I led the drive to ensure that checkusers, oversighters and auditors are expected to be available and active, so that community members know the teams can be counted upon. This included moving the oversight request functions to the OTRS system and guiding the team members who developed the oversight manual. I have worked collaboratively with checkusers from other projects, stewards, and the WMF in improving management of the checkuser mailing list (including removing archiving functions and deleting existing archives) and developing the Checkuser wiki for data retention relating to long-term abuse.

During this work and throughout my tenure, I remained active and involved in the majority of on-wiki cases. I’m not usually the first off the mark, nor am I the last person voting (unless it moves very quickly). I do, however, read all of the evidence for every case I vote on, including the entire discussions from which diffs are taken.

If selected to continue my work with the Committee, I plan to collaborate closely with the WMF on behalf of the Committee to sort out issues involving mailing lists and management of archives, as well as finding systems which fit within the WMF structure to help the Arbitration Committee better manage its incoming requests. This continuation of the work I started on behalf of the Committee in April of this year should have a significant positive impact on Committee workflow and communication.

In considering whether to seek a second term on the Arbitration Committee, I went back to read over my previous candidacy statement and responses to (over 140) questions. I found it reassuring that, despite three years of working with Wikipedians sometimes at their worst, I still hold the same beliefs and follow the same principles: our passionate and diverse community is both Wikipedia’s greatest challenge and greatest strength. To best assist community members in working collaboratively and constructively, the Arbitration Committee must be both frank and fair.

Obligatory statements: I have identified to the WMF. Those who want to know my alternate accounts can see the Candidate Guide or “Alternate accounts and interesting stuff” on my userpage.

Candidates are advised to answer each of these questions completely but concisely. Candidates may refuse to answer any questions that they do not wish to, with the understanding, however, that not answering a question may be perceived negatively by the community.

Note that disclosure of your account history, pursuant to the ArbCom selection and appointment policy, must be made in your opening statement, and is not an optional question.

In addition to the responses to questions on this page, I have also made comments related to my candidacy in the following locations:

Risker (talk) 04:37, 24 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

General questions

Skills and experience:
a) What skills and experience, both on Wikipedia and off, do you think you will bring to the committee if elected?
I’ve been an arbitrator for the past three years. During that time, I’ve carried out just about every function a committee member could perform, with the exception of being a lead drafter for a case. I coordinate the AUSC and lead the “advanced permissions” group within the Committee; and I am a list administrator for all of the mailing lists associated with the Committee, as well as Oversight-L and Checkuser-L.

b) What kinds of personal experience have you had with the Wikipedia dispute resolution processes? If applicable, please provide links to Arbitration cases where you have been involved, or offered an uninvolved statement.
As a sitting arbitrator, I have been active in most of the cases throughout my tenure. Prior to that, I provided statements in the IRC and Tango cases. I provided evidence in the Tango case (seen here) and evidence involving private information for the Geogre/WMC case, the latter of which was sent to the committee's mailing list. I commented on workshops in several other cases.
Strict versus lenient decisions: Although every case is different and must be evaluated on its own merits, would you side more with those who tend to believe in second chances and lighter sanctions, or with those who support a greater number of bans and desysoppings? What factors might generally influence you?
I fall somewhere in the middle of that spectrum. The specific facts of the case are what drives my decision. I have actively supported the majority of desysop proposals made by the Committee in the last three years; however, I have privately taken aside administrators whom I feel are on the path to burnout and offered assistance in helping them to refocus and to take time from areas that are stressful. I’ve voted for bans where the final decision of the Committee has been a lesser sanction, and voted for lesser sanctions (or shorter bans) where the decision of the Committee has been an extensive ban. In the’’Ottava Rima’’ case, I formulated a different form of ban sanction in which the Committee requires development of a satisfactory probation plan before the banned user may return to editing. Generally, I will observe the behaviour of the editor(s) through the duration of the case (or amendment/clarification request) and will be looking for indications that the editor(s) is attempting to modify concerning behaviour or alternately continues to exhibit the unhelpful behaviours that have led to their involvement in an Arbcom case.
ArbCom and policies: ArbCom has not historically made or altered Wikipedia policy, and it does not include matters of Wikipedia policy in its scope of responsibilities. Policies, however, often play a role in cases brought before the Committee. Can, and should, the Committee take positions on the appropriateness, effectiveness, or clarity of policies as part of the case resolution process? If so, should ArbCom be allowed to make changes to policy directly, or recommend specific changes to policy as part of the case resolution process? Please give reasons.
I'm not sure of a situation where Arbcom has taken a case that doesn't involve one or more Wikipedia policies. Having said that, many Wikipedia policies overlap and even contradict each other; as well, there are sometimes questions of which policy takes precedence over other policies when more than one policy could be applied to a situation. I think that the internal conflict between policies is a key reason for accepting cases, and expect that the Arbitration Committee should endeavour to try to resolve those conflicts. This is interpretation of policy rather than development of it; the former is one of the reasons for the creation of the Committee, and the latter is beyond its mandate. I do think it is appropriate in some cases to strongly recommend methods by which the community can resolve larger questions of policy without direct intervention of Arbcom, although I do not think it is outside of the scope of the Committee to assist in the design of the method for considering these questions.
ArbCom and article content: ArbCom has historically not made direct content rulings, e.g., how a disputed article should read. To what extent can ArbCom aid in content disputes? Can, and should, the Committee establish procedures by which the community can achieve binding content dispute resolution in the event of long-term content disputes that the community has been unable to resolve? Please give reasons.
There are ways to do so without directly ruling on content. One can reinforce the applicable sections of policy; one can discuss the hierarchy of policies (core policies and those stemming from WMF Board resolutions having priority); one can give examples illustrating the appropriate interpretation of policies. In some cases, such as the BLP motion of 2010, the Committee has essentially directed the community to figure out how best to apply policy to certain segments of the project (in that case, unsourced BLPs). I think to a large extent one of the things that individual arbitrators can do (although I reinforce this is a personal activity and not a Committee one) is to model the editing behaviour that is expected within the project: good use of reference sources, writing BLP material in a conservative way, giving appropriate weight to information, and so on. In other words, arbitrators need to walk the talk.
ArbCom and motions:
a) What is, in your view, the purpose of an ArbCom motion? Under what circumstances, or for what areas or processes, would the use of a motion be your first choice in handling the situation.
Motions have varying purposes. Most frequently, they are appropriate for very straightforward issues that do not require extensive evidence and whose outcome is clear-cut. One of the other uses is to manage procedural issues, and these largely occur on the arbitration wiki.

b) When is it not appropriate to start a motion? If the community has reached consensus on an issue, does ArbCom have the right to overrule that consensus with a motion? If the community is unable to resolve an issue for some time, and there is no active case related to that issue, can ArbCom step in and settle the issue themselves by motion?
I don't think that it is in the project's best interest to use motions to manage a complex issue. There have been situations where a portion of the community has come to a consensus that is in conflict with core policies (e.g., issues on individual articles); however, I cannot recall a particular situation where a motion was used. Rarely, Arbcom has introduced a motion or made a "statement" of some sort that seems to come out of the blue; the July 2010 statement on Checkuser blocks might be an example. In fact, this statement was made because of the observation that several administrators had taken to reversing checkuser blocks, which often are made without publicly discussing some of the underlying reasons. As Checkuser practices are within the scope of the Committee, this was appropriate.

c) There were a number of controversial motions this year. Please identify a few motions from 2011 that you believe were appropriate (if any), and a few you believe were inappropriate (if any). Discuss why you have reached the judgements that you did.
I think one of the series of motions that the community found somewhat confusing was the series of motions related to abstention votes.[1] The impetus for this series of motions was that a motion had been made in relation to accepting a case that was technically infeasible to carry out; however, the motion was passing because several arbitrators had abstained. Several of the abstentions were written in such a way that they "read" like oppose votes. Thus, we had a discussion about how to prevent this situation from recurring. What was unusual was the fact that we had this "discussion" on the project wiki as opposed to the arbitration wiki. I personally didn't find the resolution to be entirely satisfactory, but the process of discussing the situation did reinforce to my colleagues the importance of not abstaining unless one truly has no opinion on the matter or does not mind if the motion/proposal passes. Since that time, fewer arbitrators have abstained in various votes. I remain concerned that any motion or proposal can still hypothetically pass despite having a large number of abstentions, and would be inclined to revisit this process issue in the future.
Private information: In light of the mailing list leak:
a) Do you believe that the Arbitration Committee should keep records that include non-public information, including checkuser data and the real life identities of users, after whatever case or issue that information originally pertained to had been handled by the committee?
Well. There isn't much checkuser data on the Arbcom-L mailing list; what little there is, is there for a very specific reason related to that individual user. The Committee never actively seeks to obtain real life identification of users, and it is rarely relevant; the only time I can think of where we have come close is when user accounts have publicly linked themselves to a real-world identity and we seek verification that this linking is correct. As to old cases, as we speak there is a case that relates to sanctions going back well before my tenure, and I am certainly reviewing that old information now. Earlier this year, we had reason to research some activities going back to 2004-05. The vast majority of posts to the mailing list, most of which did not see the light of day during the leaks, are routine communications: reminders to vote, sorting out who will write which case, who's going to prepare a motion, an arbitrator advising on his or her availability, and similar co-ordinating notes that are just easier to do on email than anywhere else.

b) If the answer to any part of (a) is yes, how long should the information be kept, how should it be kept, and who should have access to it?
My own inclination would be to chop up the archives, keeping only the previous 2-3 years easily accessible and older archives in a separate area that requires more elaborate processes to access. We have several issues with the current archives: the "searchable" format is also easily downloaded, so that is currently locked and not even sitting arbitrators can access them; the non-searchable format is enormous and extremely difficult to work with. We do need to find a middle ground where we have usable archives that aren't easily downloaded, and there are ongoing discussions with the WMF to try and find some resolution to this situation. Given that the archives are now "out in the wild", I think it's important to retain them in their totality; I don't trust whomever gained access to them to (a) not modify them or (b) not give them to someone else who might modify them.

c) Currently, much of ArbCom business is handled over email, and in other non-public forums. Do you believe that all ArbCom discussions that do not directly concern private information should take place publicly? If so, how? Why or why not?
As I have noted above, a very significant portion of the emails coming to the list relate to co-ordination or quick messaging. Most arbitrators are in a position to check their emails much more frequently than they log in. (I can usually respond to an email within an hour or two, but be more than 8 hours away from being able to log in to the project, for example.) As well, this is the list to which the requests for unblock/unban come; by definition, the users who send those requests are not permitted to edit the project. There's also the fact that if one needs to send a message that applies to more than one or two arbitrators, that would mean repeating the same message on up to 18 talk pages. To me, that's a waste of everyone's time, especially as there might well be 18 separate answers that then have to be collated...somewhere...

d) What, if anything, did the Arbitration Committee do wrong before, and in response to, the mailing list leak? What did they do right? What would you have done differently?
I think it should be noted that the Committee was not insensible to the notion that the archives were a concern; we had had some active discussions about trying to find some improvements and solutions to their accessibility and retention around April of this year, and it had been my plan to work on this issue extensively in July. Circumstances, of course, intervened before we could proceed further, and I suspect that the events surrounding the leak actually created more delay in addressing the overall situation. Aside from trying to move a little too quickly to share information that hadn't been completely verified, I don't think much different could have been done.

e) If your real identity is not already widely known, do you intend to publicly identify yourself if elected?
As I noted at the time of my first candidacy, I am willing to share my full name on request and will confirm it if someone asks. I use my "real" name when answering non-oversight OTRS tickets. I use my real name when appearing at public Wikimedia/Wikipedia events, large or small. My photo is on Commons, and I have linked to it on my userpage. However, I have a rather unusual name, and in the past three years several members of my family have been on the receiving end of abuse that was intended for me. I don't think my family members should have to tolerate that, and I believe it would be worsened if I was to post my name publicly. So...if you want to know, you can ask and you'll get an email response.
Division of responsibilities:
a) What do you think should be the division of responsibilities between ArbCom and the WMF? Are there issues currently being handled by one that should really be handled by the other?
The WMF has been increasingly responsive to the need to help manage certain potentially harmful or disruptive behaviours over time, and as their staffing has increased. The "emergency@" email has been in place for threats of harm for a long time (which was a greatly appreciated improvement) but it was only possible because there is now more than one lonely person on the Community Relations department. The WMF has been much more active in assisting projects to deal with very serious vandalism and user harassment, although this is done on a non-public basis so few editors are aware of it. On a more global perspective, the WMF has developed draft terms of use that are intended to assist all WMF projects in managing problem behaviours, and has led the discussion for a draft global ban policy for the overall community to address users whose behaviour is a problem across multiple projects. These latter two initiatives were at least partially motivated by concerns expressed by our project's Arbcom. I believe that things are moving in the right direction here. I suspect that the WMF will continue to rely to some extent on Arbcom to help identify situations where the WMF should be lending a hand, though, and I think that will be one changing role of the Committee: sort of a triage process to identify which issues are serious enough to go to the WMF, and which can be handled within the community.

b) What do you think should be the division of responsibilities between ArbCom and the community as a whole? Are there issues currently being handled by one that should really be handled by the other?
I don't think there is particularly a "division of responsibilities" between Arbcom and the community; the community brings matters to Arbcom when there is reason to believe that a situation requires focused review and binding resolution. Although I believe that the community is capable of developing something similar to discretionary sanctions for specific situations, with increasingly limited numbers of administrators willing to work in this area I can understand that the community generally defers such decisions to Arbcom.
Challenges facing the project: Please share your views on the following subjects. In each case, discuss ArbCom's role, if any.
a) Does the English Wikipedia have a problem with "vested contributors"? Why or why not? If there is a problem, what is to be done about it?
Those who've heard my previous screeds on the inappropriateness of using the term "vested contributor" pejoratively when it is usually considered a positive in the rest of the world may wish to skip this response: they already know that the fact they're vested enough in the project to care about reading Arbcom candidate Q&As, that I consider everyone reading this page to be a vested contributor. Generally speaking, the community is pretty good identifying editors whose negative contributions considerably outweigh their positive contributions. The greater challenge is in addressing problem behaviour in high-volume contributors, particularly those whose contributions include particularly well-regarded work (whether that is in content creation or improvement or in some technical or administrative area) as well as particularly inappropriate behaviour. In the earlier days of the project, extensive work went into trying to get these editors to change their behaviour, although they were rarely removed from the project; this rarely happens anymore, if for no other reason than that people have decided RfC may not be all that effective. What isn't as obvious is that the community has found other ways that tend to be more successful in limiting poor behaviour, in particular noticeboard discussions focusing on a range of possible bans. There are still some editors whose behaviour regularly crosses over the line of acceptable behaviour, and when a well-formulated and straightforward case is brought to Arbcom, the Committee will usually hear such cases and take action if required.

b) Does the English Wikipedia have a problem with factionalism? Why or why not? If there is a problem, what is to be done about it?
There are all kinds of "factions" within the project; I think that particular redirect is pretty inappropriate, though, because it redirects to Wikipedia:Tag team, which I believe is a different concept entirely. Thus, I'll answer this question as if it is meant to discuss tag-teaming rather than factionalism. I do believe that there are problems with (usually small) groups of editors asserting ownership on certain articles, and even entire topic areas; I know I've encountered it myself when editing articles. One of the more serious issues here is that (despite all their contradictions) almost invariably editors involved in such "tag teaming" can logically argue that their actions are supported by one or more of our policies. Unfortunately, these situations generally need to be dealt with on a case-by-case basis by independent editors, and success is very mixed.

c) Does the English Wikipedia have a problem with editor retention? Does Wikipedia have an overall shortage of editors? Do specific parts or tasks have shortages of editors?
I am not sure that we have a shortage of editors, but we do have a problem with a dwindling number of highly active editors. I am not sure that is so much an editor retention problem as it is an editor development problem. As time has gone on, the barrier for entry of new editors has increased significantly, thus adversely affecting the pool of potential new editors. We then do very little to encourage new editors, or helping them to develop the skills needed to become a "regular". There will always be areas that are short of experienced and knowledgeable editors; with over 3 million articles, there will always be the need to revise, improve, expand and update.
Reflection on 2011 cases: Nominate the cases from 2011 you think ArbCom handled more successfully, and those you think it handled less successfully? Please give your reasons.
I don't think it's particularly appropriate for me to identify which cases were successful or not successful; I will leave this on in the hands of the community to decide.
Proposals for change: What changes, if any, in how ArbCom works would you propose as an arbitrator, and how would you work within the Committee towards bringing these changes about?
One of my main objectives in this current candidacy is to improve the handling of Arbcom's workload so that we're in a better position to respond in a timely and (hopefully) more consistent manner. I believe this can be done by improving the software we use for email correspondence, and this is an issue that is already on the table with the WMF. I think there are a few procedural areas where we can improve and become more transparent to the community, as well; in particular, I think we need to revisit whether or not to accept cases when a majority of arbitrators vote to accept, regardless of the "net-four" rule.

Individual questions

Please ask your individual questions here. While there is no limit on the number of questions that may be asked, please try to keep questions relevant. Try to be as clear and concise as possible, and avoid duplicating questions that have already been asked.

Add your questions below the line using the following markup:

#Question: #:A:

Questions from Rschen7754

I use the answers to these questions to write my election guide; thus, not answering specific questions will affect my recommendation. Also, I may be asking about specific things outside the scope of ArbCom; your answers would be appreciated regardless.

The questions are similar to those I asked in 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010; if you've already answered them, feel free to borrow from those. Please note that question 3 has drastically changed from what it was in past years, though.

The first 9 questions are short answer questions. The last question is a bit open-ended.

What is your view on the length of time that it took for the case Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Tree shaping?
A: It took too long. After being on the "inside" for three years, I think the main reason this sometimes happens is that the Committee (contrary to popular belief) genuinely is a collection of individuals rather than a finely tuned team. So, we tend to defer to each other or work on other projects rather than recognize when someone is having difficulty completing a task. I don't think the "second drafter" role has worked out the way it was intended, with the alternate picking up the slack or actively pitching in to write decisions. Oftentimes someone entirely different will wind up writing all or part of a decision, but then something else doesn't get done, or it gets done late. Arbitrators need to be better at saying "I need help here" and also in responding when someone else says it.
Do you believe that WikiProjects can enforce standards (such as article layout) on articles, directly and/or indirectly?
A: Wikiprojects are subprojects where editors with common interests can organise and focus work on a specific topic or range of topics, in order to develop the content of one particular segment of the encyclopedia. I do not believe that they can enforce any standards outside of the communally agreed-upon ones, although they can develop and encourage certain formats or layouts. We have many articles that have been claimed by multiple wikiprojects, and I've seen articles become a mess with templates representing them, not to mention the disputes over which project's template or preferred format should take precedence.
An editor has made many productive edits to articles on Wikipedia, including several featured articles. This user has not broken policies per se, but is hard to deal with, giving "smart aleck" remarks, ignoring consensus, ignoring what administrators / experienced users tell them, etc. What are your views on this situation?
A: This is fairly dependent on the individual user, and the points that are being made. The community has been successful in limiting the involvement of users who fall into this category in the past; in other situations, the community appears to be quite tolerant of editors who behave like this; and in still other situations, those editors have been brought to the Committee to attempt to address their behaviours, with different outcomes (usually sanctions of varying nature) dependent on the individual circumstances and the extent of disruption. In other words, it depends.
An editor fails WP:COMPETENCE. What should be done in this situation?
A: This is very situational. I have seen this tag given to editors who add good reference sources using raw urls instead of using one of the fancy templates; on the other hand, I've also seen editors insist on attempting to use skills they do not have and creating significant disruption in various areas of the project. It is rare to find someone who is completely incompetent in all aspects of the project, although it does happen. As Wikipedia editing becomes increasingly complex, and the community less willing to help new users learn, this will become a more significant issue.
Do the circumstances described in questions #3-4 justify a community ban?
A: It is dependent on the circumstances
Do you believe that "it takes two to tango"? Would you consider mitigating the sanctions on one user given the actions of another? Eliminating them entirely?
A: More often than not, I've thought that when two (or more) editors are personalizing and escalating a dispute, it is unreasonable to sanction one and not the other. There are situations where only one editor should be sanctioned, though, if only one editor is behind the escalation and personalization. Again, this is situation-dependent.
When do you believe cases should be accepted by ArbCom?
A: I think that Arbcom should accept cases that the community has tried to resolve unsuccessfully, and those where there is little prospect of the community resolving without the assistance of the Committee. I think sometimes the community accepts behaviour it shouldn't because nobody wants to get tangled up in a case; we need to find ways to get those cases brought to and accepted by Arbcom. Having said that, the dispute should be serious, even if localized, and it shouldn't be presented as focusing on one issue when the intention of the request is to focus on something else.
When would you vote for the long-term ban of an editor?
A: I have done so when I believed that the editor's behaviour was detrimental to the project.
If elected to ArbCom, do you plan on being active for the majority of your term?
A: This was the toughest question I had to ask myself in considering this candidacy. I do intend to be active throughout the term.
What are the current problems with the Wikipedia community?
A: I think that we have created far too many barriers for new potential editors, and that we are unwelcoming and narrow-minded toward anyone we perceive as outsiders. The project's greatest strength in its first 8 years was its constant replenishment of volunteers. Five years ago, there would have been three candidates for every seat already announced by this point in the election cycle. At any given time, there would be three or four RFAs, twice as many editors participating at FAC, and half again as many "high volume" editors. We need to find our way back there, as the signs of entropy are already surfacing in places.

Thank you. Rs chen 7754 23:59, 11 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Question from Tony1: Professional mediation and indemnification

Restraining aggrieved parties in emotionally charged scenarios is central to the Committee’s role, and arbitrators are in principle exposed to legal action by those parties in a real-world jurisdiction. It matters little whether an action is launched or merely threatened, and whether it is unreasonable: the costs for an individual arb to forestall a default judgment in a foreign court would be considerable (and I believe it’s not hard to transfer an order to the courts in one’s local jurisdiction). The risk is greater because as volunteers we can’t be expected to provide professional mediation as an intermediary between wiki and real-world judicial processes—mediation that might head off litigation in the first place.

Given the WMF's annual income of some $20M, what is your view on whether the Foundation should:

set up a process for engaging and coordinating professional mediation of disputes that have the potential to morph into legal action against arbs (where requested by the Committee and where the Foundation believes the arb has acted in good faith); and
offer legal indemnity to arbs after either a litigious party has rejected an offer of WMF-funded mediation or after that mediation has failed? Tony (talk) 13:06, 17 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Answer:

As has already been reported, Arbcom is in continuing discussions with the WMF about issues related to this. It is a very complex issue, not least because the project works across a huge number of legal jurisdictions, and as such terms like "mediation" and "indemnification" mean different things depending on where one is. In the legal jurisdiction where I live (Ontario, Canada), mediation is often a mandatory step in litigation, but is less common prior to legal action being initiated; in either case, the mediation usually involves cold, hard cash being exchanged. Indemnity is a complex issue as well; in order to be indemnified, normally the indemnified party (in this example, Arbcom) would normally have some direct obligation to the indemnifier (in this example, the WMF). I do not know that it is in the best interests of the project that Arbcom have obligations directly to the WMF; we are a creature of the English Wikipedia and its community, and our obligations should be directed to our specific project. I could foresee situations where this could create significant conflict. Having said that, my preference is that the WMF seriously consider looking at a method for funding the defense of individuals with advanced, designated positions throughout the WMF, such as checkusers, oversighters, stewards, and arbitrators, regardless of the project, provided they were operating within WMF and project guidelines. To the best of my knowledge, none of the members of these groups have ever been personally sued for actions related to their responsibilities. My personal assessment of the risk to anyone within these groups is that it is a tiny bit higher than the risk that every editor undertakes; however, the risk is actually very low; I believe any one of us is much more likely to be sued (or threatened with a lawsuit) for our non-project activities than for whatever role we perform on a WMF project.

Thanks, Risker. Food for thought. Tony (talk) 10:42, 20 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Tony, I hope you don't mind if I ask Risker a followup question in this section?

Risker, I certainly agree with you that a legal protection fund would be a helpful and welcome change. However, as an outsider with no real connection to the WMF, I am struggling to see the feasibility of what you propose. I'm curious if can think of anything that the WMF could do without having a backup fund of several hundreds of thousands of dollars. NW (Talk) 15:14, 20 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think this is one of the things that would be discussed with the WMF. Per the reports previously provided by our Liason Newyorkbrad as well as Coren, we know that they are aware of the significance of this issue to several members of the (larger, WMF-wide) group identified, and are examining different options. Risker (talk) 21:51, 20 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Glad to know it's an issue. Risker, could I ask a supplementary? Your response to the GQ4 about content rulings raises the matter of whether you've had significant experience in writing content on the site. Could you briefly provide details, since many voters probably think this is an important aspect of balance in arb judgements. Thx. Tony (talk) 13:14, 22 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Like hundreds of thousands of other Wiki?edians, I first came to this project to read an article...which led to another, and another and another. In no time at all, I found myself spending entire evenings going from page to page, which was certainly more edifying than the latest version of whatever reality program the rest of my family was watching. But, like thousands of others, I'd spot little errors or typos that annoyed me. Finally, I worked up the courage to try to fix one. I can still remember the sense of adventure the first time I clicked the "edit" button, and the terror the first time I saw all those strange things in the editing window. But I managed to make that first edit, and I was hooked. I kept up my "follow the links" exercises, fixing a typo here, and improving the grammar there. One day I wanted to make a comment on the talk page of an article, so I created an account; I'd figured out about usernames and the like by then, but I kept editing logged-out most of the time until I started to get more serious about the bigger picture.
My natural editing niche is as a wikignome and copy editor, and prior to joining the Arbitration Committee I did collaborative copy-edits on articles during or preparing for featured article candidacy; several of them are listed on my user page. Somewhere along the line, I managed to bring the James Blunt article up to good article status. I also collaborated on bringing Jacques Plante to featured article status with Maxim. SandyGeorgia granted me co-nominator status for taking over the Michael Gomez article when it was at FAC; I was originally the copy editor of the article and was helping the nominator start the FAC process, when he was blocked for an extended period, and sort of stepped in to complete the process. I've also spent time doing new page patrol and, after I became an administrator, reviewing various deletion requests. I figured out that recent changes patrol wasn't really for me fairly quickly, because I tended to read the articles and check the reference links and edits before deciding whether or not to revert; often I'd find someone had reverted acceptable content that needed just a bit of a tweak, and I'd wind up editing the article rather than "patrolling" the page. And, I'll be honest, I'm more a fixer than a starter; though I have a few "new" pages to my name, almost all of my edits are focused on improving existing content. My content editing has dropped significantly since I was appointed to Arbcom, but I still spend a lot of time in article space wikignoming and (especially) reading; when I'm not at my "home" computer, I'll sometimes slip back into the habit of wikignoming anonymously, mostly to encourage myself to take a break from the "drama pages" and pay attention to what we're really here for. I follow content-related noticeboards and participate there when I have time; and I still read over GAN and FAC candidates and add comments when I am certain I will have time to follow up, or sometimes make a few smaller copy edits as I'm reading through. During June to August 2010, I was one of the most active administrators participating in the "pending changes" trial, reviewing edits and selecting articles to become part of the trial. In my arbitrator role, I will often review entire articles and their talk pages edit-by-edit, which has given me a greater appreciation of how layered our articles really are. I've also participated in responding to OTRS tickets related to article content, and when doing so will usually find myself copy editing an entire article instead of just the one sentence that was related to the OTRS request. One of my other ways of keeping involved in our content is to watchlist the user talk pages of a few highly active content editors; they're usually editing interesting articles and discussing fascinating topics, and it is reading those pages that renews my sense of what's really important around here.
Over the last month or so, I realised that my "first" GA was in need of a revamp, and I've started the process of reviewing its content and reference sources off in my userspace. As it turns out, I've had some interactions with newer editors on other language Wikipedias who are looking to improve the same article on their projects, so we've started a bit of an informal reference source exchange to try to build up these articles at the same time. My end of this cross-wiki collaboration effort is affected by my responsibilities with the Arbitration Committee, but I'm carrying my weight, and I'll be doing some focused research off-wiki while I have some real-world downtime in the coming weeks.
I'm sorry that I've written such an extensive response to what should be a pretty simple question — I'm still very passionate about Wikipedia's core mission. It is our community goal of sharing information that keeps me involved in this project, and being part of Arbcom, where I see our key objective as removing the impediments to the continued development of good content. Risker (talk) 05:49, 23 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Questions from Sven Manguard

Looking over ArbCom cases from the past few years, it is clear to me that many times, editors involved in the dispute being heard in a particular case use the Workshop page as a platform to continue their disputes. These Workshop posts tend to take the form of 'finding of facts that the people on the other side of the dispute have committed heinous acts, heavy sanctions for the people on the other side of the dispute, and people on my side of the dispute get off without even a warning' (it's usually less transparent than that, but barely).

Do you agree with my above conclusion, in part or in full, or not at all? Please explain your reasoning.
A - One thing I've noticed with active workshop pages is that if the users involved are arguing there, they aren't usually arguing in article space; from that perspective, I'd rather keep the arguments confined to the smaller, out-of-the-way locale. On the other hand, there is no doubt that things occasionally go too far on one or more case-related pages (sometimes the talk pages can be very poisonous as well).
If you believe that problematic activity occurs in the Workshop pages, (even if you don't agree with my statement), what solutions would you propose?
A - Generally speaking, I have encouraged and/or supported clerks in taking action, although I do expect clerks to respond in a manner that is not disproportionate to the issue at hand. I have taken action myself from time to time, either giving warnings or, rarely, imposing a sanction.

Questions from Hawkeye7

Given the overarching importance of the Wikimedia chapters to the work of the WMF and the Wikipedia in general, could you tell us more about your involvement with your local chapter, what projects you have been involved with in your chapter, and what you believe the major accomplishments of your chapter have been?
First off, I would dispute the "overarching importance of the Wikimedia chapters". The projects themselves can (and do) survive quite well without any support from chapters, but chapters would be quite pointless without projects; thus, I consider the projects to have the overarching importance. Many chapters have produced very valuable contributions to the movement, but I consider the work of chapters to be an adjunct to the work within projects themselves, and the WMF as a whole.
I do not have anything that could even vaguely be considered a "local chapter". There is a (very new) Canadian national chapter, headquartered about 4400 km away from me, and there have been no official local meetings of the chapter. I have attended two local meetups in the past year, one more formal (where Sue Gardner spoke) and the other very informal with a handful of fellow Wikimedians. I've also attended formally organized wiki-meetups or events in New York City twice, and in Washington DC; and had informal meetups with multiple Wikimedians when I was in London earlier this year.
Like many Wikimedians, I have a finite amount of time available for volunteer work. Over the last three years, the majority of that time has been focused on the work of the Arbitration Committee of the English Wikipedia. In the summer of this year, I was one of the referendum monitors for the WMF-wide personal image filter referendum, assisting in its setup, monitoring votes to eliminate duplicates and socking, and assisting in the presentation and analysis of the results. These are good uses of my wiki-skills, and I feel that they have provided value to both the movement as a whole, and our project in specific. I do not have any desire to organize meetups, meetings, or education sessions (although I will participate in local events if I am otherwise available), so I am unlikely to be involved in the creation of a local chapter. I do intend to attend Wikimania this summer, as I believe I will be able to get away at that time. The last two Wikimanias have been at times when I was not able to travel.
Given the purpose of the Wikipedia is the creation of content, I notice that only 29% of your edits have been to the main space, and that the majority of that dates back to 2008 or early, which obviously puts you at something of a disadvantage compared to some other candidates (and editors) who have made more substantial contributions. What articles do you intend to be working on over the next few months?
I don't know how much it puts me at a disadvantage; my article contributions are in the midrange of current candidates, and none of those with higher percentage of mainspace contributions have spent the last three years focusing much of their volunteer time on the Arbitration Committee. Nonetheless, I continue to "keep my hand in" with articles, and do some edits to mainspace every month. As well, I read between 4 and 10 articles a day (occasionally making minor edits while doing so), follow discussions on noticeboards that focus on content issues (e.g., the BLPN, and participating in the discussions about the India Education Project), read over a few GANs and FACs every month (occasionally participating if I have sufficient time to do so), and participate in OTRS responses and new page patrolling as my time allows. I recently reviewed the James Blunt article I had brought to GA status some time ago and think that it needs a revamp, so I have started the process of reviewing its content and reference sources in my userspace, and identifying additional and improved reference sources there as well. I've also communicated with newer Wikipedians who have an interest in improving the same article (and other related articles) in other language projects (in particular the French and German projects), and as a group we have been surveying available reference sources to try to do something of a cross-wiki article improvement drive. I expect that this project will continue for many months; however, I have been able to set aside a block of time later this month for more intensive research. Obviously, the research takes place off-wiki and results aren't immediately apparent.

Questions from Russavia

There is a still open RfC at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification#Request_for_clarification:_Arbcom-unblocked_editors. As evidenced at this request, there are numerous admins and editors who have serious doubts over the Committee's unblocking of what is suspected, with a high level of good faith and WP:DUCK evidence, to be a banned disruptive sockpuppet. Do you think it is appropriate that after nearly a month and a half:

the community is still none the wiser as to what exactly lead this sockpuppet to be unblocked? Your answer to this question is important, as the Committee has not indicated that there were any privacy concerns requiring this unblock to have been dealt with in secret.
of being asked to identify themselves, those responsible for approving the unblock have still yet to do so, let alone follow a Committee members suggestion a month ago that those responsible for the unblock should be commenting?
there is still no clear answer as to why an editor is told by the Committee that future concerns in relation to the editor should be taken to the community, with a heads up to the Committee (I still have the email from 24 September as evidence of this), whilst the clarification request is indicating that the Committee will deal with all future issues in relation to this editor? Despite the email from 24 September saying that the editor in question is not under any "protection" from the Committee, once could reasonably assume that this is the case, or...
the Committee refuses to explicitly acknowledge that it may have erred in this case, and given lack of Committee response turn it back to the Community to deal with?

The last question is especially important as there are numerous uninvolved admins and admins who have previously dealt with the user in question, who are too "afraid" of going over the Committee's head, even in the face of evidence; if one assumes ownership of a problem as the current Committee has, then surely the current Committee must also assume ownership of their actual ownership of the problem possibly being part of said problem. If one looks at the answers thus far given at the request from arbiters closely, one can see that there seems to be a theme amongst arbs to suggest that the Community block the editor for other current issues; all the while the Committee avoids answering Community concerns at the actual clarification request. However, the other issues have only strengthened the opinion of sockpuppetry amongst other members of the Community.

As an arbiter who is seeking re-election, I would also request a response to the following:

did you play a role in the unblocking in this particular case? If so, please explain your role, and whether you involved or not in the unblock, were you in favour of the unblock in subsequent discussions?
depending on the outcome of that clarification request, and of course your re-election bid, if re-elected what will you do as an individual arbiter to prevent such things from occurring in the future? that is, of course, apart from permabanning me or banning me from requesting that the Committee take responsibility for its actions :)
absent the declared issue of privacy concerns, do you think that BASC should publish all of its decisions with a clear rationale on wiki for Community review?
how important do you think it is that editors should willingly admit when an error is made, fix it, and then move on?

I'm going to respond to your comments and questions as a group; I trust you won't mind. I've taken a look at my email logs and don't see any comments on my part with respect to this block/unblock discussion when it was occurring. For much of that time I was largely inactive on Arbcom matters as I was a member of the group monitoring the Personal Image Filter WMF-wide plebiscite, which was occurring at the same timel I spent about 140-150 hours on that in total from July through September. I'm actually not clear exactly why that clarification request is still open, as it appears to have had a large number of comments from various arbitrators, and there's no motion to be made there. It is my understanding that there were sufficient variances in the technical data, as well as the editing comparisions, that those commenting on the request for unblock decided to assume good faith; after all, if the user misbehaves in a significant way, it is a simple matter to block him for his own behaviour. I'm actually having a hard time understanding what the real problem is here. Checkuser isn't pixie dust, and nobody should assume it is such; when technical evidence isn't entirely conclusive (or appears to be contradictory), the default should normally be to unblock, barring some other reason to keep the user blocked. As I've mentioned at the clarification request, should an account that has been unblocked by BASC contravene Wikipedia policies that would normally result in a block on another editor, the BASC unblock is not a reason for an admin to hold back on blocking. Blockable behaviour is blockable behaviour. As to whether or not an error has been made in this situation, I think what we have here is a large number of qualified people who have individually interpreted a block of information in different ways. It's okay for people with a similar level of knowledge and background to come to different conclusions, particularly when the available information is very limited. However, if a clearcut error is made, my own tendency is to own up to it, make the necessary corrections and continue forward. I don't think there is much benefit in publishing each individual BASC decision onwiki; most requests received are declined, and thus there's no status change, and reversals of community-imposed sanctions (as opposed to those imposed by a single admin) are usually published on the noticeboard. Creating a regime where all requests are required to be published would encourage some of our more abusive sockpuppeters to continue petitioning for sanction changes on their socks simply for the lulz value; we already encounter issues like that without publishing the usernames involved.

Questions from Thryduulf (talk)

Are there any topic areas from which you will (almost) always recuse? If so please list them.
A: I would recuse from cases where my own actions (as an editor or administrator) are directly involved or where I have made significant contributions; topic areas where I hold strong personal views (e.g., the Race and Intelligence case); and those that may relate in some way to my real-world activities.
If a party or observer to a case request asks you to recuse on a case before you have opined (beyond "waiting for (more) statements" with no indication of leaning), how will you respond?
A: I would certainly discuss this with the editor requesting recusal; however, I'm not going to give a blanket "I'd recuse if asked" statement. I have certainly seen situations where editors have asked for the recusal of one or more arbitrators not because of any conflict or issue, but because they don't like the overall positions that arbitrator has taken in the past ("you're too soft on xxx" or "you always support xxx sanctions"). I may seek the counsel of other arbitrators in situations for borderline cases, and will generally rely on their opinions.
If a party or observer to a case request asks you to recuse on a case after you have indicated your support, opposition or leanings, how will you respond?
A:Per the arbitration policy, once voting has begun I would refuse such requests unless there are exceptional circumstances.
What are you feelings regarding a sitting arbitrator being a party to a case? Is there a conflict of interest? Does the level of their involvement in the events leading up to the case matter?
A:This will happen occasionally, and usually their direct involvement isn't too much of an issue. There has not been a situation during my term where an arbitrator has refused to recuse in such circumstances. The committee has a secondary mailing list that is used for such cases, and the recused/involved arbitrators do not have access to that mailing list for the duration of the case. While it may not be particularly apparent to others, most of the time arbitrators don't watch over the activities of their colleagues or opine on them, so it is unlikely that most members of the committee would have had prior knowledge of another arbitrator's involvement.
If you find yourself in the above situation, how will you ensure there is no conflict of interest?
A: I have been in situations where I have recused. I remain silent on any committee discussions about the situation; if I feel strongly enough to comment on a specific point, I would invariably do so on-wiki on the applicable case pages, prefacing my comments with the fact that I am recused, and I post in areas where it is clear I am not commenting as an arbitrator.
On rare occasions, as part of the routine task of providing a periodic "to-do" list for the committee, I would include "Case xxx is now xx weeks overdue, those who are active on this case please address" or something similar, without any comment on recommended actions.
Should a sitting arbitrator refrain from getting involved in lower-level dispute resolution during their term? If so, why?
A: I think that arbitrators should do their best to remain involved in most aspects of the project, including both editorial contributions and (where applicable) administrative actions; it's important for arbitrators to remain a part of the community and it is useful to have a hands-on understanding of some of the issues that may underlie cases (e.g., knowing how the community applies certain policies). Having said that, if there's any reason to think that a particular dispute has a significant chance of coming before the committee, it's best not to get involved. I'd avoid matters at RfC, for example, and I don't think arbitrators should be spending a lot of time on the administrative noticeboards.
Should a sitting arbitrator refrain from getting involved in policy discussions during their term? If so, why?
A: No; in fact, arbitrators are often well informed of problem areas within policies, or where policies conflict, and their experience may be helpful to the community in coming to a consensus on modifications to policy. However, I believe arbitrators who comment on policy are doing so as experienced and informed members of the community, and not as an extension of their role on the Committee.
In what circumstances can incivility be excused?
A: Define "incivility". Okay, that sounds a bit facetious, but in reality that is really the biggest problem with trying to respond to a question like this. I find templated warnings that speak in general terms without clearly spelling out what exactly is the problem are very uncivil: they're inactionable and imply wrongdoing without explaining the basis. These templates, however, are heavily used by hundreds of Wikipedians.

Thanks for the questions. Risker (talk) 19:01, 27 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Questions from Joe Gazz84

I would like to apologize for the late questions, I've only just gotten the time to write them. If you see a question that you've already answered or one that is similar, please proceed to answer it, you may think of a new way to explain your idea/answer. Please answer all of these questions, they will weigh in heavily when I vote.

Apologies to you and the other editors who have asked questions here. I am traveling and am also getting used to a new laptop, on top of the site crashes that occurred, so I've lost my responses a couple of times. Let's try it again. Risker (talk) 00:55, 28 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Can you please elaborate on what you answered above as to what needs changing? Why does that need changing? Why would that benefit the community and the committee?
A: I've proposed a few different changes above, could you please be more specific on which change you would like to discuss further? I think I've presented a pretty good case for the ones I've suggested, but if you still have questions I'm happy to try to respond.
Given that the committee doesn't create policy but only enforces policy set-forth by the community, do you believe it would be allowed or acceptable for the committee to set a policy if it sees a need for one?
A: The Committee interprets policy and site practice, which is essentially unwritten policy. (Remember, our policies are descriptive of our usual practices, not prescriptive of them.) It also helps to sort out the hierarchy of policies: WMF board policy as over-arching, then core policies (WP:V, WP:N, etc), then other policies and guidelines. It is my own belief that we have too many policies now, and that many of them conflict with each other in some way, so I don't really see the need for Arbcom to create a new one. There have been times where we have rather sternly told the community that there is a gaping hole in places where policies intersect that needs to be addressed; on the whole, the community has developed processes to address those gaping holes without the Committee having to do so.
An editor, who has been extremely helpful to the wiki and it's surrounding community (many good articles, helps clear backlogs, etc.) one day comes to ArbCom for breaking a rule, do you/would you discount the offense and let the user off with a "warning" not a full ban because they have a good history? Why or why not?
A: Every situation is different, and there are always a lot of factors to be taken into account, for example: what rule was supposedly broken, whether or not it was actually broken, the circumstances under which it was broken, whether this is the first or the 452nd time this user has broken the rule, whether there have been previous warnings/sanctions, how the editor has responded to those warnings/sanctions, whether or not this rule is one that would normally result in a ban. There are very few circumstances under which I would consider anything less than a ban if an editor has been found to be calling someone's employer/friends/family/colleagues, but I'm pretty unlikely to ban someone for breaking 3RR twice in three years.
How do you know what your limits are when dealing with a case? (No, I will not define "limits", please use your interpretation of what I am asking.)
A: I'm not entirely certain I understand what you're trying to get at here, but these are some factors I consider as limiting. If I have a personal involvement in a case, I recuse (which is something of a statutory limit). If I am aware that I will not be in a position to keep up with a case (will have reduced or no availability for personal reasons, or am focusing my wiki-volunteer time on a specific project), I will usually place myself on the inactive list for the case. Generally speaking, if someone brings a case with a relatively minor infraction of a policy which already appears to be on its way to resolution, while a very widely known and more serious infraction of the same rule is blithely ignored, then I am unlikely to accept the case. I am also not fond of "coatrack" cases, where the initial request is almost exclusively focused on one issue while multiple commenters urge acceptance of a very significantly different case. (Of note, though, if the evidence in a case leads the Committee in a different direction than the original question, that's a horse of a different colour.)
If you could sum-up your experience here at Wikipedia, in one word, what would it be and why? (This question has more meaning to it than you think, more about the "Why" part though.)
A: I am not able to sum up my experience with Wikipedia in one word. The sheer breadth of my experiences, both positive and negative, do not fit into one easily categorized term.

Thank you, JoeGazz ♂ 22:06, 26 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Questions from Gimmetoo

How should one identify when an arbitrator speaks as an individual rather than "officially"? How and when is it appropriate for an arbitrator to say what "the arbitration committee thinks"? Is it appropriate for an arbitrator to speak as an individual in a way that affects future arbitration?
A As a rule of thumb, I would say that arbitrators are speaking as arbitrators on pages related to arbitration (unless they have specifically identified that they are not speaking as arbitrators in that circumstance); they are speaking for the Arbitration Committee when they are posting something signed off specificially as "for the Arbitration Committee". The rest of the time, unless they are specifically identifying that they are wearing their arbitrator hat, I believe that they are speaking as individuals. As to the second part of your question, I am not certain what you mean about "affect[ing] future arbitration". Generally speaking, none of us know which cases are going to come before the Committee - several times I've been sure we would see certain issues, which never appeared, while what looked like minor issues turned out to be very serious Arbcom cases. Risker (talk) 01:02, 28 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Question from Martinevans123

If an editor creates multiple accounts to edit articles in different subject areas, not realising that this is in breach of WP:SOCK, how should he or she be dealt with? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:29, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm. I guess my first response would be to ask why and how this was identified, and why one is certain that it really is a single editor; if the accounts are editing in discrete areas without overlap, there should be no obvious connection that would lead to a sockpuppetry investigation. We have to remember that Checkuser is not for fishing, nor is it magic pixie dust.

Provided that only one account is editing in "project space", and all accounts are editing in an otherwise appropriate manner, this would be at best a very borderline violation of WP:SOCK, and I'd hesitate to do much more than send an email to one of the accounts advising that their use of multiple accounts could potentially be misinterpreted. The reason for blocking socks is based on the behaviour of the multiple accounts: good-hand/bad-hand accounts, socks created to breach a block applied on an account (particularly if the behaviour that led to the block is repeated with the new account), and so on. While my preference is that editors use a single account, I do still believe that the focus should always be on the content added rather than the person behind the pseudonym. Good faith, properly sourced, appropriately NPOV edits should not result in SPI investigations unless the account behaves in a way that is harmful to the encyclopedia or editing environment. We've had a bad habit of shooting ourselves in the foot by making (often unfounded) assumptions about the person behind the pseudonym. The only way to prevent socking is to require that every editor use an account linked to their RL identity, and that is directly in opposition to overarching WMF policies.

I'll note that the position I put forward here is not one that is "soft on socking" — I've blocked hundreds of socks since I was an administrator, conducted very extensive SPIs as a checkuser (and occasionally wearing the arbitrator hat), and have requested that other checkusers review the activities of accounts that have appeared to behave in a questionable manner and are likely socks or returning banned/blocked users. I do not think violation of site policies using alternate accounts is acceptable. Risker (talk) 23:25, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Your position seems very fair. Perhaps it would be a lot easier ro require that every editor used an account linked to their RL identity. But in such a case as this one, would you expect "sock puppet investigation activities" to occur before or after all the user accouts had been indefinitely blocked? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:31, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

My question to you is why the accounts are indefinitely blocked. If there's no tangible evidence of abusive sockpuppetry, there is no justification for either checkusering them or blocking them. There always has to be a justification to block an account, and in the hypothetical you've proposed, there isn't one given. Risker (talk) 23:51, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hmmm. Who knows. Perhaps in this purely hypothetical case another editor was suspicious of a single talk page edit and emailed an administrator, who then hastily went on a checkuser fishing trip and decided that more than five accounts was simply too many for any one user to reasonably hold. So instead of asking any questions they rapidly blocked all of them, just to be on the safe side. Or maybe the administrator had a clever tool that automatically flagged up multiple editors using the same ip address within a given time period? Administrators, of course, have access to information that ordinary users do not, don't they? Martinevans123 (talk) 00:03, 10 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators don't have access to IP or user agent information, only checkusers do. I note, however, that this is looking less and less like a hypothetical case. If you have concerns that an inappropriate checkuser was done on you, I suggest you contact the Audit Subcommittee; this subcommittee is tasked with reviewing concerns about appropriate use of privacy-related tools, specifically checkuser and oversight/suppression, and can be reached by email at arbcom-audit-en

lists.wikimedia.org. Risker (talk) 01:28, 10 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That's a very useful link and advice. But if this wasn't a hypothetical case, I guess the editor concerned might just say "it's all a bit late for that now". I suspect that he or she might easily have resigned. Is it always apparent who is an admin, who is a checkuser, and who is both? But perhaps I could post another hypothetical case for your consideration? Martinevans123 (talk)

Well, the information about the AUSC is on the Wikipedia:Checkuser policy page, so it is easily accessible, and unblock instructions include the opportunity to appeal to the Arbitration Committee; the opportunity was (and is) there. However, two of the accounts clearly violated the WP:SOCK policy, so I do not believe the checkuser acted in error. The permissions that each user holds can be determined easily by going to Special:ListUsers and entering the account's username. As to an "additional" hypothetical, it is my experience that usually "hypothetical" questions are ones in which the questioner continues to add additional facts that only they know when they don't like the response they receive on the first effort. So if you're going to add another "hypothetical" question, please provide all of the relevant facts up front and let's not change the scenario partway through, okay? Risker (talk) 20:04, 10 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That's all very useful information, thanks. Information of which, I imagine, 90% of ordinary editors are completely unaware. My sincere apologies for apparently starting with such a general question that became more and more specific. And further apologies if it appeared that I "didn't like" any of your answers. You look like an administrator who likes to be in control. I won't be adding any more hypothetical cases. Okay? Martinevans123 (talk) 20:15, 10 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it doesn't surprise me that most users don't know where every page on the project is; I've been here 6 years and I still discover new things on a regular basis. That's the nature of the project. :-) As to your last point, I'd suggest it is more a willingness to set limits and to respect the use of the time and energy of all of the participants in a discussion, including those who are just readers, that leads me to establish what I think are reasonable mutual expectations. Up to you whether or not you have any further questions. Risker (talk) 21:25, 10 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Voted already, thanks! And I was very impressed by the effort you put in here. Many thanks for your useful, constructive and informative responses. Enjoy your election! Martinevans123 (talk) 21:35, 10 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]