User:Risker/Arbcom

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. It’s created by people from all over the world, drawn to the opportunity to share their knowledge, skills and talent, without material benefit. From brilliant writers to wikignomes, with many in between, there is one common thread: we all have hopeful hearts. We see value and potential in freely sharing knowledge with the world, in a single, widely encompassing source.

The same thing that makes Wikipedia special is also its Achilles heel. Bringing together such a large group of people from different cultures, social skills and educational levels means there is plenty of room for normal human disagreements. Disputes are magnified and can quickly escalate as a result of the imperfection of written communication combined with strong feelings and divergent interpretations of policy, English usage, and intention. When behaviour violates our policies, we employ dispute resolution. These processes seem to have more good intention than good effect, because they often fail to change the behaviours or resolve the dispute.

Arbitration is intended to address editorial behavioural issues with the goal of removing roadblocks to the continued improvement of the encyclopedia, yet it tends to do this in a remarkably superficial way. Instead of drilling down to identify the root cause(s) of the problems, it is largely dependent on the commentary of interested parties and context-free “diffs” that give only snapshots of often complex situations. Transparency is not a priority. Well-considered commentary is drowned out by acrimonious hyperbole and self-serving rhetoric. Arbitrators frequently fail to identify the heart of the problem, and their decisions give the appearance of taking the path of least resistance rather than the path to resolution. All who are involved come away disillusioned and disheartened, regardless of the final decision. The process itself exacerbates the harm it seeks to halt.

My contribution, should I be appointed to the Arbitration Committee, will be to ask questions and expect—and give—straightforward responses; to prevent arbitration pages from becoming just another battleground; and to encourage editors uninvolved in the conflict to develop evidence that dispassionately illustrates the core issues instead of the peripheral distractions. We need to re-establish the Arbitration Committee as a place to resolve disputes in a collaborative and positive way without inflicting further harm on ourselves, our hopeful hearts. Because, at the end of the day, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia.

Signpost responses

Questions from Ral315:

1. What positions do you hold (adminship, mediation, etc.), on this or other wikis?

   I am an administrator on the English Wikipedia.

2. Have you been involved in any arbitration cases? In what capacity?

   I have made statements and provided evidence (particularly in the Tango case), commented on workshop and proposed decision pages for a range of cases before the Arbitration Committee. I have never been a party, and have never filed a Request for Arbitration.

3. Why are you running for the Arbitration Committee?

   Several of our colleagues, including many whom I hold in high regard, have encouraged me to put my name forward over the last several months. I think it's important for the membership of the Arbitration Committee to be reflective of the broad diversity of the project. My candidacy brings an additional dimension to complement the many other excellent candidates.

4. How do you feel the Arbitration Committee has handled cases and other situations over the last year? Can you provide an examples of situations where you feel the Committee handled a situation exceptionally well, and why? Any you feel they handled poorly, and why?

   The advance posting of the shortlist of CheckUser and Oversight candidates was a good first step in the right direction, and hope that this "experiment" will continue to evolve so that in the future more community input is sought before appointments are made. I believe that the Mantanmoreland decision turned out to be the right one, despite the uproar that it caused at the time the case was closed; the community was still very divided on the seriousness of any sockpuppetry at that time. When definitive evidence was developed to show that sockpuppetry had recurred well after the decision was released, the community was readily agreeable to banning of the Mantanmoreland accounts. I agree with the general dissatisfaction with the length of time it took to resolve the C68-FM-SV case. The handling of the OrangeMarlin matter was a serious misstep. These two cases in particular have had a serious effect on community confidence in the committee. The development of the closed motions process is a positive way to resolve certain narrow disputes in a timely way.

5. What is your opinion on confidentiality? If evidence is submitted privately to the Committee, would you share it with other parties in the case? Would you make a decision based on confidential information without making it public?

   I understand that there is some information the Arbitration Committee receives that should be kept confidential to protect the privacy of an editor or to ensure the well-being of an editor or even the encyclopedia. On the other hand, I believe that the Committee has permitted the definition of "confidential" evidence to be stretched beyond a reasonable point, allowing editors to submit evidence that does not contain any private information under the cloak of secrecy, preventing the community and any editors named from assessing the significance of this evidence, and responding to it. I'd like to see a middle path, where only genuinely private or harmful information is kept confidential, and editors are required to submit any other evidence on-wiki. It is impossible, however, for those of us not already privy to the Arbcom mailing list to determine how much private evidence has been involved in prior cases; thus, I am not in a position to propose an appropriately crafted protocol at this time.

6. Why do you think users should vote for you?

   I bring a different voice to the table. I continue to believe in the core philosophy of the project, and try to exemplify it in my editing and administrative actions. My own wiki-history features collaborative work on a wide range of content, as well as involvement in most administrative areas; in other words, I have worked successfully with a broad range of contributors throughout the project. I have a strong interest in, and awareness of, privacy and personal security issues related to editing Wikipedia, as can be seen in this essay, which I largely authored. I recognise that there are many ways in which one can contribute to the development and improvement of the encyclopedia, and that helps me to better understand and address the conflicts between those who primarily focus on specific functions of encyclopedia-building.