Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee 3

Summary

This RfC is to discuss current and, potentially, past incidents involving the Arbitration Committee, where actions were taken against users, usually blocks, that involved a lack of information and transparency and often oblique, extremely generalized statements to both the accused and to other community members.

The specific incident that this RfC is in response to is the recent block of User:ScottyBerg as a sockpuppet of User:Mantanmoreland.

A number of users were and are concerned about the block, as ScottyBerg has been a positive contibutor to the community and the encyclopedia. Concerns were raised on the talk page about a number of inconsistencies in regards to the block, the perceived reason for it, and the response from Arbitration Committee members.

With User:Reyk's permission, following is a numbered summary made by Reyk of some of those concerns:

• 1. Secret trials based on secret evidence are abhorrent to nearly everyone.
  2. ArbCom are sure enough of guilt that we should unquestioningly accept their assertion that it was a slam-dunk decision, but not sure enough to actually allow the accused access to the evidence against them. This is not fair play.
  3. ArbCom have now made it clear there is a way back for the accused if they're guilty but no possibility of return if they're innocent. Also not fair play.
  4. Ditching due process to go after the "bad guy" seems unnecessary since nobody has claimed ScottyBerg was disrupting anything.
  5. We feel we have not got satisfactory answers to our questions.
  6. In the event that we are accused of something, we feel we're less likely to get a fair hearing than we did before this whole ScottyBerg mess.
  7. This business of hanging on to CU info for a long time doesn't sit well with a lot of people.

In addition to these points, another point raised by User:Ken Arromdee was that the block seemed to have precipitated from the comments of a blocked sockpuppetteer on Wikipedia Review, a discussion that ScottyBerg's blocking admin, User:Alison, was involved in.

These concerns, and possibly more, have serverely marred a number of users' views on how the Arbitration Committee conducts itself and has raised fears that this process of "secret trials" could be conducted on any user without the possibility of rebuttal. This RfC is meant to raise, discuss, and express these concerns with the Arbitration Committee and to bring about some sort of change in how these processes are done.

Users certifying the basis for this RfC

1. Silverseren^C 23:33, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
2. Reyk _YO! 00:15, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
3. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 03:22, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
4. Jack Sebastian (talk) 07:21, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Statements

Statement by Silver seren

I am an individual who was heavily involved in the discussions on ScottyBerg's talk page. I was also in email contact with him throughout, in an attempt to help rectify the situation. Unfortunately, he has been extremely disillusioned with Wikipedia over this incident and has stated he will never be involved in Wikipedia again, even if proven to be innocent. Furthermore, he gave me his side of the emails he sent to ArbCom. Actually, he gave me all sides, but considering there was only ever one response from Arbcom, the one initially sent to him saying that they were looking at his case, it's really just one side.

He sent around ten further emails after that initial response, with info and questions, but received no further replies whatsoever.

As stated above in the summary, what very likely started this mess was those comments on Wikipedia Review. It has also been stated that Scotty's edits on Gary Weiss are one factor, but as thoroughly explained by him and others on his talk page and in emails to Arbcom, all of those were routine Huggle edits or the reversion of undue weight material to the article.

Furthermore, it was originally unclear where the CU information came from. The last Mantanmoreland sock blocked was a significant time ago, enough for it to have been already stale when Scotty was brought to an SPI back in September, where it was thrown out for plain ridiculousness. Arbitrator AGK then said to me that certain CU infor is kept on the CU Wiki for a temporary period of time, but I don't believe a year and a half fits into anything that could be considered temporary.

Are Arbitrators and Checkuser's essentially keeping CU info indefinitely on their Wiki? There are ethical issues for such a thing and, in my opinion, leaves the possibility for such info to be abused.

But what this all boils down to is that Arbcom is doing the same thing it has been doing before and pledged to stop, being obscure with their information, having a complete lack of transparency, and serving as judge, jury, and executioner without even allowing the defendant to present their case.

Something needs to change. Silverseren^C 23:33, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Comment from the WMF about the Checkuser wiki

The Wikimedia Foundation provides a wiki to users with the checkuser privilege for the express purpose of storing data on long-term abusers (of which Mantanmoreland was certainly one). This raises no ethical or legal questions, contrary to the statement above: this process was approved by the General Counsel, and is covered in the Retention of Private Data policy. The specific sections are:
It is the policy of Wikimedia that personally identifiable data collected in the server logs, or through records in the database via the CheckUser feature, or through other non-publicly-available methods, may be released by Wikimedia volunteers or staff, in any of the following situations:

• Where the user has been vandalizing articles or persistently behaving in a disruptive way, data may be released to a service provider, carrier, or other third-party entity to assist in the targeting of IP blocks, or to assist in the formulation of a complaint to relevant Internet Service Providers,
• Where it is reasonably necessary to protect the rights, property or safety of the Wikimedia Foundation, its users or the public.

So, without prejudice to the rest of this discussion, I did want to be very clear that there are no ethical or legal issues in this one object. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 01:04, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

@Silver seren, you say: I find it hard to believe that there are no legal ramifications for hoarding personal information on people, but I give up the point. There's no need to give up the point. If you think there's a legal issue, why don't you write up what it is (referring specifically to the types of data that are stored on Checkuser wiki) and I'll pass it on to the General Counsel. I think your use of the word "hoarding" is extremely leading here, regardless. If you truly do concede that point, may I recommend that you strike through or otherwise modify your statement to impress upon people that you no longer believe that to be an issue? Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 06:07, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

I removed the legal bit, but added to the sentence my concern regarding the possibility of abuse of it. Silverseren^C 18:27, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

So you're um...saying that you accept what Phillipe says but you don't believe it? --Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:34, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Huh? No, i'm saying that I believe him in regards to there being no legal issue with it (though I find that strange), but I do think there are ethical concerns, along with the possibility of abuse of such indefinitely kept information. Silverseren^C 21:21, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Regarding the hoarding of personal info: I think Silver Seren should be much more afraid of Google, Facebook, Apple, the FBI, the DHS, etc. etc. etc. than of Wikipedia. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 06:31, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Who says i'm not concerned about them too? :) Silverseren^C 06:40, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Statement by SirFozzie

Silver seren has created a tempest in a teapot. He objects to every bit of the recent block of ScottyBerg as a reincarnation of a community banned user.

First: The way to come back from a community ban is not to create a new account in violation of the ban, and then to go on merrily editing, now matter how productive a user you intend on purportedly being.

Second: For some reason he intends to teach long term banned users on how to better evade CheckUser scruitiny, in defiance of the community's saying "no, the person behind this account is not welcome, Tracking behavioral evidence and similarities (as well as IP ranges) between accounts is somehow "secret witch trials".Instead, he demands we hand over evidence on how a user was caught sockpuppetting so they can better avoid being blocked next time.

Third: Alison contacted the Committee to alert us she was on the verge of blocking the user, and carefully and congently explained why she was about to do so. We told her that we had no problem with the initial block, but would carefully consider any appeal from ScottyBerg. When that appeal was made, Nearly a dozen checkusers and arbitrators carefully scruitinized the evidence linking the two accounts. A couple of this number provided background information only, but recused from any formal decision as they were involved in the original case that ended up sanctioning the user that ScottyBerg was linked with. However, every arbitrator and check user who reviewed this case concurred with the finding linking the two accounts.

Fourth: Going back to the second point, Silver complains that we have left a path back for ScottyBerg if he IS the community banned user but not one if he isn't. This point is now moot as the determination has been made (again unanimously) that yes, ScottyBerg IS a reincarnation of a community banned user.

Fifth: Silverseren demands we show evidence that ScottyBerg was disruptive. Again, his opinion is that an editor who the Community has told "You are not welcome here" is allowed to edit, as long as he is superficially not causing issues. This again, is not the case. Editors who are community banned have a way to get back in to editing, this was not the way. Also, ScottyBerg violated an Arbitration Committee violated the remedy from the original Arbitration Committee case that stated he is not to edit articles related to those brought up in that case.

Sixth: Silverseren, brings up, as a side show to this issue, that checkusers keep details on persistently sockpuppeting editor in an effort to better recognize and neutralize further attempts to disrupt Wikipedia in concurrence with their mandate from the rights granted through the Committee (and the WMF). This is not the place to discuss such things. There is already a place to bring complaints about use of advanced permissions, the Audit Subcommittee, and failing that, the WMF itself. However, he knows he will get short shrift from either, because he is again wrong on the facts and the issues. (Note: When I wrote this up, I had not yet seen Phillippe's statement. However, the point still stands, and is confirmed by the office's post. )

In short, Silver seren is either mistaken or deliberately wrong in all major facts of this issue, and this RFC is not a legitimate attempt to solve a dispute, but instead an attempt to cause drama and trouble. This is not the first time that Silver seren has attempted to stir up action against the Committee, In his past attempt (involving a user who was blocked and their administrator tools removed for misues (including suicide threats), he was again proven wrong on all points, but that has not stopped him from charging in, Don Quixote style, tilting at windmills yet again. If he has concerns about the way the Arbitration Committee runs within its mandate and rules, he can always run for a seat on the Committee at the end of the year.

Note for the record: Silver seren violated WP:CANVASS by attempting to "stack the deck" in commenting to all the people who spoke in the decision on ScottyBerg's talk page, but not the purported targets of this RFC. SirFozzie (talk) 01:58, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

@SirFozzie: The personal attacks aren't needed here and you should realize that the list of points and other information was taken from other people, like Reyk, and isn't just me. So your continued use of negative terms (complains, demands, ect.) and my name is both rude and wrong. Anyways, your points in order:

1. A number of us disagree that Scotty is Mantanmoreland. The point we're trying to make is that if Scotty is innocent, you've given him no steps to take to come back. He would have to falsely say he's guilty and use the standard offer, as that's the only option for him, even if he's not Mantanmoreland.
2. I have never once stated that Arbcom should give up specialized behavioral information that influenced their decision. What I have said is that it is entirely possible for a generalized explanation to be made that explains why the block was made, such as "Due to the editing made on such and such articles and through CU data, we have determined that so and so is a sock of so and so". Something like that doesn't give anything away, but explains where the decision came from.
3. The issue that a number of us have is that it appears what instigated Alison to this is a comment by a blocked sockpuppeteer on Wikipedia Review.
4. This, this is exactly the type of mindset that has upset so many people. You absolutely refuse to even acknowledge the possibility of being wrong and, likely because of this, have offered no alternatives for the accused if you are wrong.
5. See #1.
6. I have read Philippe's response. I find it hard to believe that there are no legal ramifications for hoarding personal information on people, but I give up the point. The CU issue is minor compared to other stuff.

And it's funny that all you guys have to bring up is always Rodhullandemu. That's the only thing you ever have and the issue there was the same issue as here, lack of any information given to the community whatsoever. At least in that case you replied to his emails, unlike what you've given to Scotty here.

And I discussed this on Scotty's talk page beforehand and other people were in support of me making this RfC. That's why I did it, your insults aside. Silverseren^C 02:04, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

@Your note: I hadn't even been done in getting it set up yet or added to any RfC places. You can't blame me for not notifying you when I hadn't even officially started the RfC yet. I notified all of those people to have them come certify this if they were interested, then I would have opened it and gone and notified you guys. This RfC is still not even listed anywhere, as I wasn't ready to do that before. Silverseren^C 02:06, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

You had multiple hours between contacting Reyk, Mongo, etcetera so I find your comments less then accurate. Also: You may disagree, but you are not in possession of the IP and behavioral evidence that Checkusers are qualified to handle per the privacy policy. It's not that you disagree with it, it's that you can't see it, and you are acting like a gossip monger, demanding to know things only because you have a burning need to be "in the know". If you want to have access to private info, then put your name forward for advanced permissions, although I would have to state for the record that I, for at least one would not trust you with sensitive, private information, based on your past history.

It seems you are unaware of the history, in fact the issue that started the whole Mantanmoreland issue is that a checkuser requested by someone who ALSO turned out to be a sockpuppet of a banned user. However, what that checkuser found (that Mantanmoreland and Samiharris could not be authoratively linked, because one account (Samiharris) exclusively edited using open proxies. Despite this fact, the only hue and cry to sweep the CU results under the rug were amongst Mantanmoreland's greatest defenders, and as it turns out, they as well were proven wrong.

And to respond to your repeated talking pointthat "You've given ScottyBerg no way back if he is truly innocent.. again, he is not innocent. A dozen arbitrators and check users have signed off on this, that the two accounts are the same. In short, your reply to my response is no more credible then your original statement. SirFozzie (talk) 02:33, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

First off, can you please stop the insults? They're not making your argument stronger or you look better with your argument. In regards to the notifying, I was doing all of that at work. I notified them around three hours ago, in between setting this up, and then got off work and went to have dinner. And, again, this RfC isn't even technically open yet.

Anyways, I don't want to see the evidence, because that's not the issue here. The issue is how Arbcom acted throughout all of this. Scotty being innocent or not isn't important at this point.

The main problem isn't even just about this single case. It's with the fact that you, and presumably Arbcom, refuse to acknowledge the possibility of being wrong. If this is a mindset that all of you use for every case, therein lies the problem, because there's no way for you to be right 100% of the time. You have to allow the possibility of being wrong or you aren't the right person for the responsibilities handed to you. This is why I always felt that having just Arbcom is a problem. In a sense of a court case, since Arbcom is always compared to being a court, when you appeal a decision, you don't appeal it to the same judge and jury that made the decision, because having people review their own decisions is pointless. Who's really going to willingly change their own judgement without outside influence?

Not to mention that your last paragraph is a complete circular argument. "You shouldn't believe we made a mistake because we didn't make a mistake". It doesn't matter how many people in the group you had review it, not allowing the idea of having been mistaken or having overlooked something is a major problem. This is not a mindset that Arbcom should have, because they cannot properly represent the community with it. Silverseren^C 03:06, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

No, the cogent part of the argument is "CheckUsers and Arbitrators are qualified and authorized to handle private data per the authorization of the WMF. As for categorizing my comments refuting your "statement" insults does not make them any less true. The last time you went tilting at windmaills, against the Committee, it was demanding to see the contents of oversighted edits so you could determine for yourself whether the Committee had made the right decision to block the user". Oversighters, and even those who saw the edit before it was oversighted tried to assure you that the edits were indeed oversightable and the reason who got blocked. You refused, and only when the mass of the community told you to stop beating the dead horse and drop it, did you begrudgingly do so.

While we ARE fallible, one of the reasons why so many people reviewed the evidence for ScottyBerg's appeal is to make sure that we WEREN'T making a mistake. To suggest all these people were simultaneously wrong stretches the odds to a point that only "I really have a need to see for myself" can explain it. And considering one of your major points of your creating this RFC was that you thought Scotty had a secret trial and was innocent, to now claim that "Scotty being innocent or not isn't important at this point" proves my point, that you don't really have a case to be answered here in this RFC, you are just upset that you aren't "in the know" and want to force the release of private information to satisfy your own curiosity. SirFozzie (talk) 03:24, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

The private data has little to nothing to do with this. It's about whether there's the possibility that the conclusion this data and those that read it is faulty. No matter how many people you had review the data, there is entirely the possibility that the conclusion it represented was incorrect. And this isn't about this case specifically, but any case. There needs to be a way for those accused to represent themselves and prove their innocence. At the very least, they deserve replies from Arbcom, rather than continual silence.

And, again, I don't want to see the data. What it says is irrelevant to this RfC. The issue is how this and many other blocks/bans are conducted by the Arbitration Committee, and these other blocks/bans are continually pointed out by users to be obtuse in how they are presented to the community. That is the point of this case, to have Arbcom actually follow the pledge of transparency that they made at one point in time. Silverseren^C 03:55, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

OK, now I don't understand. You don't want to see the data, but you think everyone who has seen it is interpreting it wrongly. You don't believe Arbcom has communicated with ScottyBerg, even though it says that it has. I presume you don't want to see those emails, you just don't believe that they exist. So what do you want? What is the outcome you want from this process? Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:54, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Are you implying that there are further replies from Arbcom beyond the one that states "The Arbitration Committee (or its Ban Appeals Subcommittee) will consider your appeal and inform you of our decision by e-mail or on your Wikipedia talk page. In the interim, I (personally) would encourage you to remain professional in any posts to your talk page - if indeed you find it necessary to make any at all."

You did "inform him on his talk page", I suppose, but just to say that it was denied. There were no replies to his other emails to the committee with evidence of his innocence, not even a little "We have received your email and will add the information to our consideration" or something like that. Silverseren^C 19:03, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

And you know there's evidence of his innocence because...? I take your point that it's hard to prove a negative, but other people accused of socking have managed it often enough. Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:19, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

You already know the emails he sent to Arbcom, including what he said in them. And i'm not saying it proves his innocence, i'm saying that he deserved at least some sort of response to his statements and questions. Also, was semi-protection ever applied to his talk page as he asked, because of that disruptive IP? Silverseren^C 21:19, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Alison semiprotected his talkpage for 24hrs on the 15th, and Newyorkbrad then semiprotected it until the 23rd. That's in the public page logs, so you can look that up for yourself. Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:56, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Statement by Jack Sebastian

As I've pointed out elsewhere, I don't actually like ScottyBerg; my few interactions with the user made me less likely to interact with him. So, it was with a bit of schadenfreude that I read about his being blocked. Unfortunately, I began to wonder if the basis of the block was a good one. There are too many crap users who become for all intents and purposes 'block-proof' (or at least extremely block resistant) because others inflated a charge at one point or another which never stuck, and I didn't want to see that happen here. I state this so as to make it clear I am not one of SB's defenders.
I haven't seen the evidence against SB that substantiates the claim that he is Mantanmoreland. There is no public checkuser that connects the two. I am extremely disturbed that the sole reason for failing to present this evidence seems predicated upon WP:BEANS - specifically, that making the proof known would compromise Wikipedia security (this from User: Mongo).
It seems to me that such an excuse is so ripe for abuse that some users have jumped on the bandwagon, sure that just such an abuse has taken place here as well as at previous times. ARBCOM's response to these concerns hasn't done much to calm people's fears, though AGK and another took the time to try and explain the matter, though I think they failed to appreciate the depth of these concerns.
I think that the idea of a secret deliberation about someone's block is anathema to the core ideas of Wikipedia,a nd certainly contrary to where ARBCOM has sought to protray themselves as desiring more transparency.
Clearly, this isn't happening. I understand (at least some of) the difficulties with aiming for complete transparency, and can clearly see the apparent problem here. I am not advocating we tear down ARBCOM and tar and feather the arbs before running them out of town on a rail; that is counter-productive. Also, I am guessing they wouldn't vote to do that to themselves.
That said, I think a little more than lip service needs to be paid to the idea of transparency; they do answer to the community, after all - or am I wrong about this. If so, then the problem is ever so much larger: who watches the watchers? - Jack Sebastian (talk) 07:38, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

To be honest Jack, checking the user's IP address only really confirmed that he was located in the right part of the world. The reluctance to discuss is because all but the best poker players don't realise what their 'tells' are. Hence there is always a general reluctance by the checkusers to openly catalogue 'tells', because they feel it gives them an edge in identifying serial sockers. However, most of the rest of the evidence is on Wikipedia if you want to go ferret it out yourself - you can read all the discussions about Mantanmoreland and his socks, look at the editing patterns of all the socks, run whatever wikistalk/editor compare tools you like, and see if you agree with the dozen and more checkusers and experienced admins who are/were familiar with his editing. Silver seren can do the same. Any editor can do the same. What they don't have a right to, as it goes at the moment, is to have all the evidence laid out in simple sentences, because in this case they aren't the jury. If the community wants to insist that socks cannot be blocked unless there is a community discussion, then that needs to be proposed in the usual way.Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:52, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

I understand what you are saying, Elen, and I am not advocating a dulling of the perceived edge that CU's feel they have. By the same token, it is unreasonable to ask us to trust that checkusers are using the Force or whatever to do their job, and we should just trust that they are doing their job.

Before the aforementioned comment gets taken largely out of context, I will point out that questioning authority is not the same thing as damning it. I have no reason to believe that cu's are abusing their community-entrusted authority. Then again, I have no proof that ScottyBerg is Mantanmoreland, either. There is an issue of trust which ARBCOM isn't engendering by its perceived actions, and it is pretty much the source of the problem here here. I typically don't believe in large-style government cover-ups, but with the details of Echelon and Watergate, there exists good reason to scout for abuse by those in authority.

I don't believe that treating the rest of the users as if you have to "dumb down" the evidence for the community (suggested by the "have all the evidence laid out in simple sentences" statement) is fair. Likewise, suggesting that we can wade through the - if not mountain, than certainly a large-type hill of - evidence or IP search tools is not beneficial to the community's view of ARBCOM's openness. You are effectively asking us to listen for one harmony in the cacophony that is Wikipedia. Bluntly, if you've done the work, share it with us, and save us the time. If MM has been outed, then the privacy issue isn't on point. If ScottyBerg is indeed MM, then - being connected - he also has no expectation of privacy - especially since you are all unanimously convinced that they are connected. There has to be a better middle ground than what currently is in place. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 17:30, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, you should trust that they are doing their job. If you do not trust that this was an appropriate block, there are dispute resolution processes in place: the Audit Subcommittee includes community representation, and the WMF Ombudsman Commission is an arms-length body that has absolutely no connection to English Wikipedia. Every arbitrator is elected by the community, and every checkuser appointed since 2009 has been vetted both by the Arbitration Committee and by community consultation; all of them must meet the WMF requirements for handling of private information. Thousands of blocks a year are made by checkusers using private information and the collective wisdom accumulated with respect to serial abusers of the project. That this one happens to involve a longterm contributor meant that there was lots of review prior to and following the block to reassess the opinion of the blocking checkuser; this has possibly been the most thoroughly vetted checkuser block in the past three years, and there has been no dissent at all about the link. Risker (talk) 17:56, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

See, that comment didn't answer anything contained in Jack Sebastian's post. It's this defensive "you chose us, we all checked, we much be right" mentality that is irking people. Silverseren^C 18:30, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

I have pointed him to the appropriate dispute resolution processes. You can follow them too. Risker (talk) 18:40, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Not helping. :/ Rather condescending, actually. Silverseren^C 18:45, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

• Jack, apologies. I didn't mean 'dumbed down' - I was thinking about the way evidence is laid out for a jury. If the community was being asked to make a decision, then the evidence ought to be laid out in a way that the community can follow. But, there is not currently a mechanism by which the community makes decisions on whether someone is a sock or not, so there is not currently a requirement to lay out the evidence. Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:51, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

No worries, Elen; I am glad that I took your comment the wrong way, and that you took the time to point out the correct interpretation. You also point out the same problem that I do; namely, that there is no mechanism by which to verify that arbs are making the right decisions. I know that might ruffle some arb feathers - 'who says we need anyone to verify our work? We're arbs, after all' - but the bitter pill here is that the community is not meant to trust you implicitly.

We create this culture wherein we call on others to prove that which they wish to add to articles. We insist that matters in discussion pages and community areas be cited with relevant rules and/or guidelines. Proof is part of the wiki 'DNA'. Those who can't or won't get this eventually weed themselves out or get weeded out by others. The assumption of good faith does not extend into matters as serious as this.

So, asking us to simply trust you (and I'm also addressing Risker's comments here) is contrary to what we do as wiki editors and counter-productive as a request. I am saying that if you are wrong about ScottyBerg being Mantanmoreland (and if you are not willing to risk both your adminship and arbiter status to do so, then you cannot say it with certainty), you are giving the community no opportunity to discover that error. And I think that not allowing that is a grave mistake that only further isolates ARBCOM from the community and further hobbles with process.

Risker, you seem like a smart guy, and I've never known you to make a mistake, but then, my Pops would say that makes you ripe for one. If you were aware of the ScottyBerg page - and I find it very hard to believe that no one commenting here wasn't watching that page - you might have suggested "the appropriate dispute resolution process" then, instead of waiting until Silver seren took the time to file this RfC. That seems a little bit less than helpful. I am commenting here so that we can try to address a problem without having to move further up the pipeline. You don't have to take my comments seriously, but I intend them as such. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 06:27, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Jack says:

• "There is no public checkuser that connects the two." - I thought checkuser info was never public.
• "I think that the idea of a secret deliberation about someone's block is anathema to the core ideas of Wikipedia" - well no, if it was really like that, there would be no such thing as checkuser, and no private arbcom deliberations.

Transparent processes have their advantages which is why we use them when we can; they also have limitations, especially in a setting as privacy-protective as Wikipedia. We try to resolve most disputes at the community level that is open to everyone, supposedly with transparency. When that doesn't work, plan B is to swap out some of the trust created by (supposed) transparency, for trust that's been vested in specific users (i.e. arbcom and CU) through community processes such as elections, thus making it possible to use private data and deliberations after open processes have failed. Per KWW, this is an encyclopedia after all, not an experiment in governance or judicial machinery.

In reality the "community" processes of course aren't so transparent either, because of the amount of sockpuppets, undisclosed COI, etc. present among the community participants. While it's not inconceivable that such issues could affect arbcom/CU, the arb/CU members have at least gone through some scrutiny and (in the past) open election discussions. Now we have secret-ballot of elections, which I'd have considered a loss of transparency, Of course lots of good editors supported that (I personally didn't), but it's disturbing when someone associated with socking does it.[1] 67.119.12.141 (talk) 05:57, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Statement by MONGO

I want to bring attention to a few issues here that need to be clarified...

• Checkusers are generally regarded as being highly trusted members of the community. They are expected to ensure that when they are dealing with possible ban evaders that they take certain steps to seek out other highly trusted members of the community (such as the arbitration committee) if they have evidence that may lead to a re-ban of a ban evader. In the case in question, checkuser Alison did this.
• The arbitration committee is generally regarded as being highly trusted members of the community...upon reviewing Alisons data, they apparently reached the same conclusion, namely that ScottyBerg = Mantanmoreland, who was banned from editing Wikipedia.
• Checkusers and members of the arbitration committee are expected to maintain the rights of privacy of all, including ban evaders, yet also provide feedback as to the basics as to why a returning editor has been rebanned...in this case, this has been provided.
• There are certain techniques, pieces of data, ques and other things I may not be aware of that allow for investigations of ban evaders to be possible...in other words, there is a lot more to such matters than just IP correlation. Some of this information must remain somewhat confidential so that the editor who is blocked as a ban evader, or those wishing to evade a ban or vote stack or similar isn't as easily able to dodge his/her ban. In previous comments on this matter, I alluded that reveiling some particulars of what is involved here could "compromise" Wikipedia...to clarify, I should have used the term "compromising"...but even with this adjustment, all I mean is that we don't want to aide and abet anyone using undisclosed sockpuppets...there are numerous reasons for this.
• The arbitration committee generally enforces previous bans but does allow (after some time has elapsed) the opportunity for all but the most egregious of editors the chance to return to normal editing...in this case, the committee has explained what this avenue is and it seems from my perspective to be a fair one for the most part.
• I believe that Alison and the arbitration committee here have acted in the best interests of Wikipedia in that the rules apply to all equally and a ban evader has no entitlement to editing this project unless they have sought out a modification of their ban via the arbitration committee....in such circumstances, the arbitration committee generally also seeks out comments by those who may have been involved in prior actions which led to a ban as well as community comments.
• Those sanctioned under arbitration are expected to follow certain procedural steps to regain the right to openly edit here.

However, I have other points here that should be noted...

• ScottyBerg amassed over 12,000 edits...aside from what a few have labelled as "promotional" to a certain bio, I can see no malice in any of ScottyBerg's contributions. Of course, I haven't reviewed every single edit made by ScottyBerg and may not be nuanced enough to know if he did or did not edit some articles in a completely neutral manner, but I know of almost no Wikipedian that doesn't have some bias...there are numerous editors on this website that edit purely from a biased position...their contributions surely appear far more detrimental to the project than ScottyBergs edits to a certain bio.
• Aside from some edits to a certain bio, ScottyBerg appears to have stayed completely away from editing areas that were edited by Mantanmoreland...
• ScottyBerg and I have had zero email communication that I can remember...he posted a few times to my talkpage and I remember giving him a barnstar for his positive contributions to a 9/11 related article and discussions there. Mantanmoreland and I did have email correspondance long ago...he never provided, nor did I inquire about his real life identity. My knowledge of ScottyBerg is solely based on his contributions to some of the same articles I have worked on. I never had any knowledge of or any reason to suspect that ScottyBerg may be a ban evader.
• The discussion which led to this matter of ScottyBerg being ban evader Mantanmoreland appears to have commenced at the website Wikipedia Review. I have generally held an antagonistic viewpoint of this website, the motives of some of the contributers there as well as their welcoming of not only banned editors (note that I don't believe Mantanmoreland contributed there as he would not be welcome I don't believe...the mods there may be able to check that), but some former editors of Wikipedia that have been involved in real life stalking and real life harassment....and their at least previous active efforts to try and identify the real life identities of some of our contributors. There is concern on my part that an off-wiki website, of a somewhat (from my perspective) dubious standing, may be misused as a coordinating point for on wiki harassment...[2]
• I do not think that the contributions made by ScottyBerg are in any way detrimental to this website...if indeed he is Mantanmoreland, I believe that his contributions as ScottyBerg already demonstrate that he has "reformed".
• I question the zeal that appears to have been shown here...I do not see any evidence that ScottyBerg was a threat to the content of this website. There may have been a better way to deal with this situation.--MONGO 17:58, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

In closing, I want to reemphasize that I believe that checkuser Alison and the arbitration committee have done the right thing here. It saddens me that an editor that has made apparently 12,000 plus contributions, virtually every single one of them positive, has been found to be a ban evader, but I AGF that all involved in this matter have enforced the letter of the law so to speak...for if we don't enforce the rules, all we are left with is anarchy.--MONGO 18:48, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

There are two different components here, and it might be as well to separate them, as otherwise I think it might become confused. The first is the question of whether the ScottyBerg account is operated by the same person who operated the Mantanmoreland account. The second is - if the first is true, should action have been taken. There's probably more discussion to be had about the second component, and as I said above to Jack, an argument that there should be community discussion in some cases might well receive support, because the community might not advocate continuing to block the individual if their sock has operated peaceably for years. Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:45, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

I believe that the evidence that Alison and the arbitration committee examined is conclusive that they are the same editor. I also believe that ScottyBerg has a 99 percent positive contributions history, but I am willing to modify that if provided evidence aside from a few to a certain bio that demonstrate malice or COI.--MONGO 19:06, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

I do think that this, and Quest's statement below, are worth further discussion. Even among the reviewers, while everyone thought he is Mantanmoreland, some people did question whether it was worth blocking him. The question is - what do you do if you decide he can stay? Do you say he's a blocked user but you've decided to keep him on. Do you fudge it - say there's not enough evidence that he is? How do you respond to the argument that it encourages socking? And what do you do when WR keeps up the pressure? --Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:33, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

I'll be blunt here and say that Wikipedia Review can go to hell....so any "pressure" they apply to our website itself should be ignored. Now as far as pressure on ScottyBerg himself, that is a dfifferent matter and perhaps even if he avowed to never touch Mantanmorelands areas, the malicious editors there may have made his editing experiences here (by socking and attacking here) untenable. I don't support the return of an arbcom banned editor unless he/she goes through the proper channels and abides by set conditions...am I incorrect in my assumption that this was initiated at Wikipedia Review...and the checkuser was performed based on evidence or suspicions cast there? Where is the official request for checkuser on ScottyBerg? Was it requested by a neutral third party? Why is User:Vee8Njinn/SB still up?...this is an obvious bad party sock page. I suppose the subsequent edits to the certain bio is the reason that a previously dismissed Rfcu became more in focus. Its these sorts of things that makes a few of those commenting here come across as frustrated.--MONGO 19:53, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Is that really all the behavioral evidence there is? Wikistalk is pretty much useless, as there are a number of people that would have more of a match with Mantanmoreland and not be him. The other evidence is what..."rply" and "--"? The -- is useless, as two edits out of 12,000 doesn't mean anything. I'm sure i've used -- before myself. As for rply, i'm not seeing any comparison to Scotty listed there. Silverseren^C 20:11, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm under the impression that the information posted at the closed RFCu and at User:Vee8Njinn/SB constitutes the bulk of the behavioral evidence...subsequent "promotional" edits to Gary Weiss and closely correlating checkuser (IP) evidence is enough to determine that this is the same editor. I'm in a personal quagmire as to how to fully address this matter...anything that had it's birth at Wikipedia Review leaves a bad impression.--MONGO 20:22, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Second that sentiment. There is (to my mind) no reason why there couldn't be a proper community discussion as to an unblock that could cover off all these points. At least then it has been properly aired. Elen of the Roads (talk) 20:41, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, I'm better at asking the questions than figuring out the solutions. This is a relatively unique situation...a ban evader returns under a new username without arbcom agreement, makes almost universally good contributions, is found to be evading a ban and gets rebanned. The vast bulk of those banned return using short lived socks which are quickly found and blocked...who knows, we probably have other new accounts of previously banned/blocked editors that moved on to new horizons and have remained undetected.--MONGO 20:58, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Just musing here and not really in support of such a thing overall, but I wonder if some sort of statute of limitations might be in order...in that an old arbcom case is best amended (though never nullified) so that an otherwise trustworthy editor can return in peace under set conditions....we know what those conditions would be in this case.--MONGO 21:03, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Interesting thought. As you say, most socks just repeat the previous behaviour, get caught and blocked. I'm sure there are users out there editing under a new name that no-one has picked up - or someone has noticed but kept mum because the new incarnation appears harmless. I don't have answers either, but it's an interesting thought to put into a discussion. Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:13, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

User:Rootology is an interesting case...banned in the MONGO arbcom case, subsequently socked as User:XP and with other accounts...ventured to Wikipedia Commons where he was later made an admin...petitioned arbcom for his ban to be lifted on en.wiki...arbcom asked me and I said grudgingly okay after he promised to avoid me (lol)..and even became an admin here under his original username. The main difference here is that Rootology went through the proper channels for such an amendment...and conditions were established which allowed him to edit again, and as I mentioned, even be given admin tools. Sorry no links as I'm just reciting the events as I recollect them...--MONGO 21:24, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, Rootology followed the prescribed route, which is fairly tortuous. At the other end of the scale, we have Count Iblis below, who seems to be suggesting that socks not be blocked at all while they are editing productively, which I would think it could be argued...rather invalidates the point of blocks. Yes, you're blocked, but we won't block your socks until they are unproductive. Or should we consider that? Some socks do edit productively for a while before running off the rails, which seems to be a strategy of some sockfarmers to cause more confusion and disruption. Elen of the Roads (talk) 01:12, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

There is (or was) in fact something of a tradition that if a banned user returned quietly and edited productively, depending on the circumstances of the ban, other editors who noticed this would often choose to not say anything. This was always a collective IAR on the part of the editors who noticed (and it obviously had to be unanimous), rather than anything that the banned user was entitled to by any stretch of the imagination. For example, the brouhaha over User:Law was (if I remember correctly) because Law became an administrator while other users/admins knew that Law was a new account of a banned user. If Law hadn't run for admin, then the eventual disclosure probably wouldn't have caused noticable blowback towards other people who had kept their knowledge quiet. As it was, it caused multiple resignations of admins and arbcom members. I can think of a few other examples I won't go into. So maybe the arbs/checkusers who discovered SB=MM could have just monitored the situation quietly or contacted SB privately, instead of blocking and announcing. But I'd imagine that the "transparency" aficionados would have been even more bent out of shape if something like that later became known.

Anyway, by another tradition, banned users normally can't get unbanned unless they themselves ask to be unbanned. If ScottyBerg wants an unban, the obvious thing for him to do is contact BASC or ask someone to open an AN thread where the request could be discussed in the usual way. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 02:11, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I've just spent a few minutes looking over ScottyBerg's contribs. His mainspace editing is mostly reasonable, concentrating on New York City-related articles (geography, transit, etc). Of 12182 total edits he's made 4527 Huggle or Twinkle edits, mostly vandal reversions scattered all over mainspace (with some concentrations in specific articles he probably has watchlisted), suggesting he's been doing some RC patrol. Those are of course useful contributions per se, but at least in the old days, doing a lot of vandal reverting plus some uncontroversial mainspace editing was a standard route for returning editors to gain adminship without close scrutiny at RFA. So (forgive my cynicism), that pattern at least lifted my eyebrows about his possible intentions. I also notice some involvement of his in DR related to climate change and other areas inhabited by certain dramaboard/WR regulars, that I don't get a good vibe from. He says he has never heard of Mantanmorland.[3] He participated in several other SPI's, most extensively in WP:Sockpuppet investigations/Nelsondenis248/Archive (where he did good work), showing interest and knowledge in this area. He removed mention of WR from an essay section discussing disgruntled former Wikipedians.[4] Early edit history (bunch of transit-related edits, then shows up on Jimbo's talk page about climate change, etc.) also looks a bit "constructed" through the lens of the known history we're discussing. Plus there are the Gary Weiss edits and a few other issues I'll skip. Overall not much "smoking guns" but my heart is still nonetheless not exactly filled with AGF. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 04:55, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, ScottyBerg doesn't have the kind of contributions such as new pages or major article enhancement, but his edits still appear to be overwhelmingly constructive nevertheless and that is generally all we ask of any editor. We have a history of being overly tolerant of well known POV pushers, SPA's and similar contributors that are, in my opinion, more detrimental than ScottyBerg has ever been while editing under that username.--MONGO 05:17, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

True. I do wonder how many other socks he might be running. One thing that really bugs me is when tendentious editors and sock operators start trying to influence site policies in ways that can weaken the encyclopedia's integrity. That's an area where SB causes me some concern, though I'll agree that it certainly could be a lot worse. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 05:48, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I haven't seen any evidence as of yet that ScottyBerg had any sock accounts, only they he is a sock account of Mantanmoreland...I assume that User:Alison would have uncovered and also blocked any other socks during the checkuser investigation. Alison also protected the Gary Weiss article due to BLP enforcement.--MONGO 05:55, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I presume you mean other sock accounts and you've forgotten Bassettcat,[5] plus the total insanity of the MM arb case itself. I haven't looked into the past WP and WR discussions enough to know how the SB-MM connection was uncovered in the first place. I'd superficially guess that it was not easy to discern. So I don't necessarily expect that other ones (if they exist) were likely to have been discovered. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 06:20, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

No, I didn't "forget" Bassettcat since I posted that same AN/I archived link here earlier[6]...I meant that ScottyBerg isn't a sockmaster account...while we're here chatting about socks, how about you start editing here with your regular username...not to be rude, but why the coverup since you seem otherwise to be contributing without malice and quite neutrally and you're not a newbie.--MONGO 06:56, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't use a username. I think I edit more neutrally without one. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 07:48, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Hmm. Have you edited under a named account before, anon67? - Jack Sebastian (talk) 08:01, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Statement by A Quest for Knowledge

The purpose of Wikipedia is to create a high-quality, free-content encyclopedia. Everything else is secondary. ScottyBerg is a productive editor with 2 year's experience and 12,000 edits, and a clean record. Even if he is Mantanmoreland, whatever conduct issues they might have had in the past have obviously been corrected. Productive editors who aren't causing any problems should not be blocked. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:24, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Statement by Count Iblis

I agree with A Quest for Knowledge. For me, the issue isn't ScottyBerg being Mantanmoreland or not. User:Tisane was also blocked by ArbCom for a similar reason, despite that user being very productive here. Count Iblis (talk) 00:46, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

I'm not sure how relevant that example is. Tisane only edited for five days. Even User:Pickbothmanlol can manage five days before going off at the deep end sometimes.--Elen of the Roads (talk) 01:07, 30 January 2012 (UTC) My bad. For some reason earliest contribs came up for me with 6 August 2010. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 01:47, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I see a lot more editing time than that here. Count Iblis (talk) 01:40, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Tisane may have been "productive", but his editing was biased at best and alarming at worst. Fences&Windows 21:48, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

My best ABF theory towards ScottyBerg's editing pattern is that he was after a sysop bit. Whether that strategy still works and he wanted to do with the bit once he got it, I don't know, but it can't have been good. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 21:41, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Statement by Kww

This is covered by one of the missing pieces of WP:NOT: Wikipedia is not an experiment seeking a perfect online social justice system. It has a rough-and-ready system that is good enough for the task. A lot of people with checkuser privileges looked at the data and came to a conclusion. It may be the right one. If it is, they did the right thing, as socking is intolerable, no matter the productivity of the sock. They may have made a mistake, in which case .0000000000015% of the human race is unjustly blocked from editing a website. That's a problem of no consequence, and not worth any more effort than has already been put into the case.—Kww(talk) 03:20, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

I don't like the absolutism of "X is intolerable no matter what" per WP:NOTBUREAUCRACY among other things, but I agree with the general sentiment about WP dispute resolution and its imperfections. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 06:51, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Statement by The Devil's Advocate

I will just copy-paste the comment I left on the user talk page for Jimmy Wales:

“ User:Cookiehead, who appears to frequent the site of Wikipedia Review where many active and banned editors have been discussing User:ScottyBerg as a sock of Mantan, makes the following edit to the Gary Weiss article: [7]. What is rather telling is that the edit summary has a comical feel to it and the use of quotations around the phrase "weight-loss surgery" as well suggests this was never meant as a serious edit. Sure enough, as soon as Scotty reverts the edit Cookie goes to WR to announce his success: [8]. It appears this was the inciting incident that led to the block, all apparently prompted by the discussion on WR.

However, the most unsettling thing is what happens next. Following several acts of vandalism the article was put under protection. At that point User:Cla68 leaves a post on the WR thread suggesting ways to "smoke out" Mantan socks in the future: [9]. Providing advice about how to use edits to a BLP as a way to provoke someone into an action that will lead to a block is a clear-cut case of disrupting Wikipedia to make a point. Should an editor be making positive contributions to the site and only fail to do so as a consequence of baiting by a group of individuals editing in bad faith, I believe the latter should be the subject of greater concern than the former.

”

Off-wiki coordination to use edits to a BLP article as a means to prove a point about a specific editor is problematic. Given that the admin who issued the block apparently frequents WR it raises serious questions about this case. I don't think disruptive editing should be overlooked even if it is supposedly done with good intentions.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 04:17, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

The Devils Advocate...there has been little doubt in my mind that the suspicion that ScottyBerg is Mantanmoreland was commenced at Wikipedia Review. The chief antagonist of Mantanmoreland is Wordbomb...supposedly, both their real life identities are known and they have real life disagreements that in the past spilled over into Wikipedia. For the record, Wikipedia Review has been more empathetic to WordBomb than to Mantanmoreland, but in terms of disruption of this website, my assessment is that WordBomb was far worse.--MONGO 04:38, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

• Remember, when WordBomb tried to bring it to WP's administration's attention that the person behind the Mantanmoreland account was attempting to use Wikipedia to promote Gary Weiss and Naked Short Selling, he was banned. WordBomb was then forced to publicize what was going on, including the administrative corruption supporting it, on WR, among other places. As you know, Mantanmoreland was eventually community banned, vindicating WordBomb and exposing a rotten core of corruption in Wikipedia's administration, which included the use of mailing lists to coordinate content editing and controlling of WP's administrative processes, such as AfDs and RfAs. Many of WP's newer editors appear to be unaware of the history behind the Mantanmoreland accounts and thus are understandably confused by what has happened recently. Cla68 (talk) 04:56, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

  Much of what you have descibed falls into the realm of conspiracy theories. I was an admin during part of that period and even though I was one of those supposedly misled by Mantanmoreland, I never once got a single email from another admin suggesting I participate in some campaign to control article content at any of Mantanmoreland's haunts...or to participate in a single Rfa or Afd. If anything, this sort of stuff is coordinated at WR, not the opposite.--MONGO 05:04, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

One thing to note is that one of the first instances where these accusations were prominently made on Wikipedia involved User:Verbal IED, who was apparently a sock of User:Editor XXV. The username was an admitted homage to WordBomb. What is particularly off is how Cla68 reacts to blatant harassment by those socks.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 05:35, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

• Please don't assume that the Wikipedia Review thread (or related actions) was the significant factor in this action; it certainly would not have had any effect on the opinions of the majority of those who reviewed the blocking decision. Risker (talk) 05:41, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

From what I can tell, it has only been alleged that WR was the source of the inquiry, not that it played a decisive role in it. However, from what I recall it was said by an admin (possibly the blocking admin) that the CU evidence was an ISP (Internet Service Provider) match with behavioral evidence being the crux of the case. Did the behaviorial evidence examined go well beyond what has been generated by WR?--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 06:17, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

It did. If the sum of the evidence had been correcting vandalism at the Weiss article and living in an area with a substantial population, we wouldn't be here now. Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:31, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm pretty unimpressed with the WR crowd but I don't think the "weight loss" edit The Devil's Advocate takes issue with was especially egregious or disruptive. According to the citation, Weiss is very happy with the surgery and gives talks about how great it was as part of his public speaking career. Weight-loss surgery is (I think) not a formal medical term, but it's the term Weiss himself uses, so putting it in quotes seems like a reasonable attempt at dealing with that tension. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 06:27, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Screw "problematic", DA; if Cla68 did indeed recommend such a disruption, then a block is clearly in order, and a substantial one at that. This is behavior we absolutely need to apply a rolled up newspaper to the snout of. It is not only disruptive and pointy, its an utterly cynical use of Wikipedia to injure another. I find Cla68's behavior completely unacceptable. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 07:43, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

It looks like there was some on-wiki conflict between ScottyBerg and Cla68, so Cla68 played the banned-user card. I've looked at enough diffs by now to see that ScottyBerg's editing was quite good most of the time. Instead of socking, he should have contacted arbcom and asked for an unblock/clean start and agreed to stay away from certain topics where he had problems. He can still do that and I hope he does. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 09:08, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

From what I understand the WR crowd like to mock the whole idea of Gary Weiss having weight-loss surgery and the edit I noted, with the edit summary, definitely has a tinge of mockery underlying it.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 17:09, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

The edit is also something I would revert, for both because it seems completely irrelevant in the context it is presented in and because it is sourced to an, essentially, primary source. And Cookiehead is definitely a WR editor who is not here to improve things. You just have to read his user page to see that. Silverseren^C 20:50, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I had got my diffs confused--it looks like ScottyBerg reverted that edit,[10] but earlier he had made another edit that kept the info in the article, re-wording it and moving it from one section to another,[11] implying he didn't have a problem with it. I didn't examine the surrounding edit history that closely, but I see Drmies later removed the info from the speaking section as self-promotion.[12] I think maybe your real beef is with the WR participants who forced the sock issue onto arbcom (which otherwise could perfectly well have been exercising discretion and deciding not to intervene), so maybe you should be addressing that side of things more. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 02:58, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Wait, it looks like Cookiehead was actually edit warring over that thing (example). Not good. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 03:25, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Which editor do you think may be the sockmaster of Cookiehead? I can give you a clue....[13]--MONGO 03:32, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I had been thinking Cookiehead's editing reminded me of someone. You may be onto something but I don't have a scorecard handy and have lost track of the specifics. I liked this though :). 67.119.12.141 (talk) 03:40, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Cough (edit summary) 67.119.12.141 (talk) 03:48, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Statement by Tora Bora Mora

People need to realise that on Wikipedia they are living in a world where the likes of User:Elen of the Roads will protect and enable users like User:Mo ainm to hide their previous account history in flagrant breach of WP:CLEANSTART, ironically on the say so of the infrequent visitor User:Alison. In a single post that she never bothered to substantiate or defend, Alison 'confirmed' that Mo ainm's past account cannot be revealed due to WP:OUTING concerns. Yet it's a matter of public record that he came up with this OUTING justification well after the event, having clearly misunderstood what CLEANSTART allowed, seizing on the fact he had simply included his very common first name in his original account name. This is not personally identifying information protected by WP:OUTING, yet this deception of the community still stands to this day. If it's true that Scotty has a clean record and is a constructive editor now, then whether he is MM or not, his enforced exile in this manner is morally inexcusable when compared to what the likes of serial gamers like Mo ainm have got away with, with the help of some of the exact same people. Tora Bora Mora (talk) 15:30, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

And whose sock are you.....? --Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:29, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Another sock at User:ScottyBerg'sNextS0ck. I find it highly unlikely that either of these are Scotty, so someone else is trolling him. Probably someone from WR. Silverseren^C 02:04, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Bongwarrior nailed that one's head to a coffee table. The first one I think is more likely one of the editors on the British side blocked over The Troubles.--Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:06, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

One quick comment from HJ

I think most people will agree that I'm far from the biggest fan of the Arbitration Committee. However even I feel compelled to point out that its members are highly respected editors. I very much doubt that blocking an established contributor based on non-public evidence is something they do lightly and I'm certain that they are not conspiring to keep some hidden agenda from the community. If the evidence is private, it's private for a damn good reason—ie because somebody else's privacy is at stake, or because to reveal the evidence would reveal sensitive information on how to evade site security. That the community is not privy to the evidence does not mean that it is invalid or that it does not exist. Folks questioning ArbCom's judgement on matters like these should cast their minds back a few months. I'm sure several of you have read the leaked material regarding Sophie (talk · contribs) and Rodhullandemu (talk · contribs)—and that's just the stuff that's common knowledge. As painful as it may be, sometimes we have to trust ArbCom—after all, what do they gain from any of this? HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:15, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Questions and Discussion

• As an overall comment, i don't think any of us would be opposed to a permanent topic ban on Scotty from the known Mantanmoreland-related articles. Scotty himself even indicated on his talk page his full willingness to be under such a topic ban. Though again, this doesn't matter all that much, since I don't think he's going to come back regardless. Silverseren^C 19:56, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

As I said above, I see no reason why there shouldn't be a community unblock discussion, with those kinds of terms being considered, if it's what folks want. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:17, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

We received many e-mails from ScottyBerg, in all of which he claimed he was not Mantanmoreland. I would give serious consideration to a ban appeal that gave an accurate account of his past accounts, but the community would not allow us to unban MM if he did not admit he was ScottyBerg, so to offer an unblock with topic-ban is a non-starter. We were put in a difficult position by the lack of such an admission, and I do not see what else we could have done (nor, therefore, what this discussion hopes to achieve as it relates to our handling of the specific case at hand). AGK [•] 21:56, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Which does rather make Silver's point that if he isn't Mantanmoreland, he's caught in a catch-22. By maintaining his innocence, he confirms his guilt. I do understand Silver's concern here, and it is an issue in many judicial systems, where prisoners cannot be considered for parole until they address their crime - a reasonable position, but one which leaves the genuine victim of a miscarriage of justice with two equally unpalatable options, stay in jail, or confess to a crime they did not commit. There genuinely isn't an easy way out of this. Everyone who looks at the evidence thinks they are the same person, and one could not countenance an unblock unless a genuine sock 'fessed up, but there is still an uneasiness in straight out saying "confess to being Mantanmore or stay blocked.' Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:43, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Some jurisdictions use a device called an Alford plea in situations like this.  Roger Davies ^talk 23:52, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Interestingly, since we're talking jurisprudence, the majority view in English law is that plea-bargaining is an invidious process, and although there are situations where a convicted criminal may receive a lesser sentence if he pleads guilty, they are always looked on by a section of the interested with great suspicion. However, in the lesser court of Wikipedia, plea bargaining seems to be used quite a lot. Elen of the Roads (talk) 00:00, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

This is probably due to our nature, which overall is benevolent.--MONGO 04:11, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't think that this block was thought through to its logical conclusion. If Scotty really is a sock, then all he has to do is create another account. He knows what got him caught last time, so he can more easily evade detection the next time. IOW, blocking him accomplished absolutely nothing. But if Scotty isn't a sock, then the block only hurts Wikipedia. This block was a complete lose-lose move. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:22, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

The trouble is, if one takes that argument to its logical extreme, one simply hands the keys of the pedia over to Grawp, Bambifan101, Pickbothmanlol and so forth. It's never worth blocking them if one's intention is to stop them coming back the next time. Because they never do.Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:45, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I think what AQFK meant is that blocking them when they've only been positively contributing to Wikipedia is a detriment. If they are doing negative things, then yeah, a block is justified as it would be in any other case. Silverseren^C 22:50, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

That's actually the reason why it is so important to undo everything the sock did, without regard for quality. It's tedious and slow, but if you carefully insure that everything they do is undone, they eventually get the point.—Kww(talk) 22:51, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

But in this case, we're talking about a productive editor. Can anyone point to anything positive that this accomplished? I'm at a loss to think of something. Enforcing rules for the sake of enforcing rules seems a bit WP:LAME to me. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:03, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, it's between a rock and a hard place. If we *failed* to take action, and six months from now someone else figured it out, we'd be condemned for not acting immediately, and having ignored the return of a community-banned user. Risker (talk) 23:13, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, I can certainly understand that. How often does a situation like this one happen? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:49, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Usually a couple of times a year we're blamed for not acting on something or other, or alternately blamed for acting too precipitously or harshly on something or other. As I write this, we're being blamed for both harshness and ignoring things at the same time. Kind of goes with the territory, unfortunately. Risker (talk) 23:56, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I wonder if it would be beneficial to modify policy to handle situations like this, to give you guys an out. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 01:54, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't think this is a policy issue. I think it is a behavioural issue on the part of certain segments within the community. There is this ongoing expectation that arbitrators are supposed to render perfect decisions (for various definitions of perfect), always be available, always respond appropriately and in a timely manner, meet all deadlines without fail, and write a few featured articles in our spare time. The one thing I can say Arbcom does very consistently is fail to meet the expectations of all segments of the community all of the time. :-) Risker (talk) 03:19, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Pretty crappy deal huh? All work and no play....and worse of all, NO PAY. Thank goodness there are a few like yourself willing to stick your necks out...--MONGO 03:25, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

If we're required to do any particular thing in response to a banned user's activities, that means the banned user controls our editing rather than the other way around. That obviously isn't good. Regarding KWW's "revert everything" theory: I don't think an out-of-process deletion or AfD of History of logic (written by socks of a different banned user, see FAC discussion) would go over very well, and undoing ScottyBerg's 4500+ vandalism reversions doesn't seem like a great idea either. As with anything else on WP, clear thinking and good judgment addressing a particular situation (especially an unusual one) is preferable to knee-jerk, "one size fits all" responses. Do what's best for the project, which per our principles involves adaptability. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 00:45, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Something I'd like to see (or at least have a discussion about it) is a change in policy that gives ArbCom the option (as opposed to a requirement) to block an sock in situations like this one. IOW, let ArbCom use their best judgement. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:19, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I would object strongly. Banned is banned. If a banned editor comes in through the front door (i.e., the Ban Appeal Subcommittee), that's one thing. Simply socking until you are caught is another. As for the problem of proclaimed innocence, that's a problem in real life where there are real consequences. Ever heard of anyone being released on parole without showing repentance? That's extremely rare, and for anyone to show repentance they have to admit guilt, even if they are actually innocent. Don't hold a website to a higher standard than every other justice system in the world.—Kww(talk) 23:31, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

The real world doesn't have the same rules as Wikipedia. If it did, you could murder someone and not sent to prison if you promised not to do it again. My concern is of practicality. Can you point to one positive thing that this block accomplished? I asked the question yesterday[14] and no one could come up with anything. Maybe you missed that part of the discussion. Can you please read through it? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:37, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

It prevented a banned editor from contributing through an illicit account. That's a benefit in and of itself. Whether you believe that or not, acknowledge that many of us do. I read that section, and even replied to it. It doesn't matter whether ScottyBerg was constructive. He was sockpuppeting.—Kww(talk) 23:46, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

But if Scott really is MM, then he's just going to create another account. The same situation that existed before the block exists after the block: a banned editor is still contributing through an illicit account. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:49, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

And that account will be blocked, hopefully faster this time. This can go on for a while. See Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets of Brexx, for example. If someone actually manages to go completely undetected, that will come under WP:FRESHSTART, but that's really just an acknowledgment that some never get caught.—Kww(talk) 01:12, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

OK, let's say that you're right. They productively edit Wikipedia using an illicit account and in less than 2 year's time, they are blocked. So, they use another illicit account to productively edit Wikipedia. Rinse, rather, repeat. So what has been accomplished if the situation remains unchanged? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 04:35, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

You are missing the stage where, instead of yelling at arbcom for blocking the sock, people go through the edits and remove them. That's what I do with any sock that I block: go through their entire contribution history and remove everything that doesn't result in restoring vandalism or copyright violations. The only reason I'm not doing it here is that I can foresee several editors crying out "But they were productive edits!" and undoing what would be a lot of hard work. The only way to discourage a sockpuppeteer is to eradicate the results of their work. Do that for a while, and all but the pathologically ill ones go away.—Kww(talk) 12:39, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

And based on Elen's comments, I am becoming ever more doubtful that Scotty is MM. Silverseren^C 00:11, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Desired outcomes

There's usually a section in an RfC/U with what the filing party would like to see as an outcome (listed party uses better sources, less swear words or whatever). While discussing feelings is good, I think it might be helpful to pull out what people would like to see as more definite outcomes eg. should there be a community unblock discussion, should there be a change in policy about long term unproblematic socks, should there be a discussion about checkuser data retention outside of the legal requirements. Elen of the Roads (talk) 00:06, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

The first two, I think, both should be done. The third is really dependent on if other people share my concerns. If members of the community don't, then there wouldn't really be a point in that discussion. Silverseren^C 00:57, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

The question becomes, how does one define an "unproblematic" sock? We must remember how Mantanmoreland operated: he slowly and insidiously altered articles to his preferred POV, he made strong friends amongst Wikipedians, he leveraged those friendships and working relationships to drive off anyone who tried to edit his articles (harming the reputations of other Wikipedians in the process), and to this day editors with expertise in the field avoid working on articles that he worked on. The damage he caused has not been completely repaired even years after the fact. We have similar problems with other longterm, apparently unproblematic socks: their social engineering practices inflict wounds that never really heal, and that is why they're removed from the community permanently. They harm our faith in our ability to provide neutral information, and they harm our faith in treating each other respectfully and without malice. Perhaps you should spend some time reading over the archives of WP:VANISH and WP:CLEANSTART to get some sense of what the community's feelings are on this subject. As to the checkuser data, it's not going away, and the checkuser wiki (where checkusers are encouraged to retain any relevant information) discourages "personal files" kept by individual checkusers, while permitting routine review to remove information that no longer appears germane. As increasing numbers of problematic editors show up on multiple projects, the need to share information in a secure manner has only increased. Every year, thousands upon thousands of socks are blocked by checkusers using this information and these tools; only a handful of these blocks are questioned by the community. It is precisely for that reason that the work of checkusers is monitored carefully, and why there is a process for addressing situations where a checkuser block is likely to be more controversial. Last month, we blocked an administrator who was socking, *and* desysopped him, but the situation was first identified by a checkuser. Risker (talk) 01:27, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Would indefinitely topic-banning him from Mantanmoreland's known issue areas not fix the problem? Then it is on his own head if he violates the topic ban. That would be an obvious way to deal with suspected (or, I suppose you would say confirmed in this case) sockpuppets of old problem users, that have, as far as can be seen, been contributing productively to Wikipedia. Just topic ban them from the problem areas and let them contribute productively elsewhere, as they have been doing with the accounts anyways. Silverseren^C 01:35, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

That might be worthy of discussion in this particular case, but not in all cases. Consider if someone's on-wiki editing was generally good, but they were blocked under something like NLT. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 02:36, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Also, this is a Community site ban and Committee topic ban. I would suggest that if we want to remove the community ban (which I don't recommend, but meh, we can leave it up to the community, where I would have a say, but so would everyone else.. This runs into the problem you see that "what if he's innocent".. If he's not, the topic ban never comes into play really, the person behind Scotty's account is not to edit all without getting the community to release the community ban. But since the identification is made, we'd actually be flouting the community's stated wishes by turning a blind eye and letting him edit. SirFozzie (talk) 03:19, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I got into this through a mention on Jimbo's page and my views on this may not be as extreme as some of those expressed here, but I still think there are things which smell wrong about this.

Jimbo pointed out that he once offered to go on Skype with this person to prove he isn't Mantanmoreland. Someone in the original discussion suggested he could send a copy of his driver's license. That may be too easy to forge, but I'm sure there's something that could be used. I would suggest as a starting point that Arbcom should accept such things as evidence. He refused to provide such evidence to Jimbo, and so he probably won't do so here either in which case, fine, it's over, but all of the rest of us who are wondering "what would I do if this happened to me?" can rest a little easier.

I'd also suggest asking "if it wasn't for Wikipedia Review, we would have initiated this process?" We may be in a situation where someone disrupted Wikipedia and generally did bad things in order to point out a sock. What is the right thing to do in that situation? It's not immediately obvious that the right thing to do is to kick out the sock and thus encourage the troublemaker. Ken Arromdee (talk) 02:09, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I missed the beginning of this, but I'd have thought that if someone wanted to point out a sock without causing disruption, the obvious way is to email checkuser-l. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 02:23, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, email a checkuser directly. The Checkuser-L mailing list does not accept emails from non-subscribers, and all subscribers must be checkusers or stewards. Risker (talk) 02:26, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Now able to refresh my fossilized memory banks on this matter, Mantanmoreland, as SirFozzie noted above, was topic banned by arbcom and then after another sock was identified, was banned indefinitely by the community two months later...here...as I have noted above, ScottyBerg appears to be a reformed editor. I might welcome sectioning off below and asking for wider community discussion on this matter. I'll leave this up to those who know where to post requests for more feedback from the community as they see fit.--MONGO 04:30, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

It should be noted that ScottyBerg has posted at his talkpage that he has no plans on contributing again [15].--MONGO 04:57, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

As we should know well by now, that doesn't necessarily mean he's really gone. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 06:41, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Actually, it means that he is hoping that this uproar will subside so he can get his new account(s) going with a minimum of scrutiny. Cla68 (talk) 04:46, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

A rude and unfounded statement. In a sense, Cla, you're also under scrutiny here. Silverseren^C 05:02, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Definitely under scrutiny. One outcome I'd like to see is Cla68 never, ever pulling the disruptive baiting crap at WR that has been documented. I still think that it deserves a block until the cows come home. Hello pot, meet kettle - Jack Sebastian (talk) 06:59, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

If ScottyBerg is indeed a sock, then he's probably already created a new account and is happily editing some corner of Wikipedia. In fact, if he was smart, he has already created a number of sleeper accounts a long time ago. Nothing was accomplished with this block. Nothing. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 15:27, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I've been watching this debate since the start and only commented once in a small way. But the question I keep coming back to is: If Scotty is a puppet of a prolific sockmaster then why expend so much energy trying to get that sock unblocked? The ScottyBerg account didn't have any special userrights and interactions with it were a mixed blessing - switching to another account would probably have had advantages for the master. I'm also reminded of a case over a decade ago on USENET, we had some (behavioural) evidence that a certain poster who was making significant threats was a particular Californian Businessperson (They also ran for Congress in the 90's). With a bit of work we got I.P's for both the Real person and the Usenet account and could compare them and they also matched. However later when everything came out, it was two different people close enough to share an I.P. - since then I've always been wary about checkuser data and how it's used. In the public it is open to challenge either by the individual or by the community but in private it can be checked by no-one except the arbiters - at WP:SPI we have had several cases where reasonable challenges have been made to checkuser data but here the individual is not aware of that checkuser data to challenge it. I understand the worry that in some cases revealing the evidence could make the person a better sock, but in what court would you exclude the accused from a hearing on the basis that hearing about fingerprint evidence will make them more likely to wear gloves the next time they commit a crime? I also wonder if perhaps you still wish to retain secrecy in cases like this ArbCom should have one of it's members act as a council to the accused; testing the evidence thoroughly, acting as a liason to the accused and counterpointing the editors brining the evidence to ArbCom. Stuart.Jamieson (talk)

Agreed, that kind of thing has happened sometimes. That's what we have the audit subcommittee for. In this case, the IP data doesn't match any previous sock, just demonstrates that the guy lives in the same - large - area and uses the same ISP. It's not the smoking gun - behaviour is the smoking gun. Indeed, from my experience, its when there's no behavioural match only a technical match that mis-identification is moree likely. Which again is what the audit subcommittee is for. They go through technical data, but this was virtually all editing patterns, which are available to any editor if they want to go look. Interesting observation on the protestations - there are some sockmasters who make a huge point of protesting the innocence of their socks, because this takes up everyone's time and increases the drama and disruption. In MM's case though, probably not so much. Elen of the Roads (talk) 17:52, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

In other words, an evaluation of the evidence would not break any privacy rules and since the behavioral evidence is public it would not really be an issue of telling him how to avoid suspicion in the future.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 18:17, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

One of the things that has been bothering me about this is how Arbcom has been inconsistency invoking privacy rules. If the evidence really cannot be shown because it violates Mantanmoreland's privacy, and you really believe that Scotty is Mantanmoreland, then you should be okay with showing the evidence to him. You can't violate his own privacy by giving him information about himself. In practice, the answer has been that you're sure he is Mantanmoreland when that is to his disadvantage, but when being Mantanmoreland would help his case (allow him to see the "private" information) suddenly you're not that sure after all. Ken Arromdee (talk) 18:50, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Bothers me too because in this case, there is no private evidence. All the checkuser did was in ScottyBerg's case is confirmed that the guy is in the right part of the right continent - an exclusion test. All the rest of the evidence, as people have pointed out in various places here, is all over the wiki. What the checkusers and admins who have been around for a while have is a collective memory that identifies editing patterns etc. Me, because I've not been here for so long, and I haven't primarily worked in SPI, there's not so many I can spot. There is a theory that he's Weiss, there is a theory that you can track his interests based on Weiss's blog, the later socks frequently edited articles on such as the NY Subway, some parts of NY, other stuff. Someone has pointed to it above. ScottyBerg did launch a considerable defence - I don't know if he's told people that he hadn't. He argued that he only came to edit the Weiss article by accident, that his other interests were coincidental or arose from picking up articles after recent change patrol. And it is hard to prove a negative. But we wouldn't, for example, block an editor who everyone swore blind was a sock of Mark Nutley, because at that time there just wasn't sufficient evidence. And you should hear the way Mattisse's socks continually petition to be unblocked as mistaken identities, including having the sockmaster contact us and say that this isn't her sock. So it isn't easy. Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:35, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

This has its own problems: it seems like people don't even agree on whether there was any secret evidence. Just imagine how it would feel if this happened to you. You're being kicked off and not only do you not know what the evidence is, you don't even know if the evidence is being described accurately, even in very basic terms, because nobody seems to even know what the evidence is like. It seems to be whatever is convenient at the moment. I suppose I'd have to add to "desired outcomes" "state categorically whether the evidence was secret". Ken Arromdee (talk) 22:57, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

There's no way to get rid of this problem until we get rid of the whole notion that editing an encyclopedia has some kind of privacy implications. —Kww(talk) 23:11, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

If a Mantanmoreland sock is discovered again in the future and blocked, it will be interesting to review this "RfC" in hindsight. Cla68 (talk) 06:30, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't know about that. I'm not asking that he be reinstated. I'm asking that there be a way to get reinstated if he is legitimate. The answer to this should be an offer to do something that a legitimate user can do and a sock cannot. If he's a sock, this would not lead to his reinstatement, so if he is discovered again in the future it would not reflect badly on this idea. Ken Arromdee (talk) 15:59, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

'* Silver serin, in the context of the whole thread beginning with A Quest For Knowledge's comment at 21:22, 30 January 2012 (UTC) ("I don't think that this block was thought through..."), please explain precisely why the objectives of this RFC are valid. AGK [•] 14:24, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

There weren't any objectives originally - just Silver had a sense that something was wrong. That's why we're trying to pick 'em out here. I don't think there's anything wrong with holding this discussion, it's turned up a few things worthy of larger consideration. Elen of the Roads (talk) 14:58, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

What do you mean why they are valid? Why would they not be valid? Silverseren^C 17:50, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)For myself, I think the desired outcome would be fourfold:

• A lessening of - if not complete removal of - these secret 'trials', then a clearly-defined standard for when these sorts of matters are to be handled privately. Secret trials (and despite the informal nature of the back and forth private list, these are indeed essentially trials) are anathema to both an open society and an open wiki. This is not how Wikipedia is supposed to be. Period.
• The accused must be able to see the evidence arrayed against them. Stuart Jamieson's recent and concise post underscores the absurdity of the privacy/secrecy claims of the Checkusers and arbiters trying in effect to prevent a WP:BEANS situation from unfolding.
• Blackstone's formulation is on point here; Stuart Jamieson also makes the excellent suggestion that, since these sorts of deliberations bear a great many earmarks of a trial, that one of the arbs should stand for the accused. As no one outside of ARBCOM has any idea what actually occurred in the discussion, we have no way of kowing if everyone walking into that discussion didn't do so predisposed as to SB's guilt. It would be nice to know that the accused has someone without that presumption.
• A clear addressing of how a user can clear a ban if they are indeed innocent. Currently, the only way for SB to return is to admit he's MM and undergo the arduous process of return. If they are not guilty, they are not as likely to try and return. If they are innocent (check that; if I were in this situation), they would want that avenue clearly highlighted so the could get reinstated without admitting a falsehood (i.e. that they are someone they are not).

Maybe that's too much to ask, especially for arbs who think their time is better spent than on providing niceties for someone they are convinced is a sock. I suggest that it is precisely because of that belief that these outcomes are necessary. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 18:04, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I'd also add that Arbcom should do something to make sure this doesn't send the message "Hey, disruption is fun and works great! Look, we did it and got one of our enemies kicked out of Wikipedia!" And no, I don't know the best way to do this myself. I'm not really familiar with WR anyway. Ken Arromdee (talk) 19:04, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, now that is a concern. Open to suggestions on that one, because once someone has let the genie out of the bottle, it's difficult. You can't pretend that you don't know, but you can't avoid that the source is not one you like. Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:38, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Elen, it certainly would have been fine with me if arbcom had chosen to sit on the info quietly while monitoring ScottyBerg's editing after checking out the initial report. Sooner or later IMHO he would have done something that unquestionably called for a block, and gotten one. I hate the "legal" analogies this page is full of, but it's certainly the case if a member of the public reports suspected criminal activity to law enforcement, LE thanks the person for the tip and then doesn't (at least immediately) give any further info. Until (and unless) actual arrests happen, the tipster never learns whether an investigation was opened, whether it was found to be conclusive in either direction, whether they decided that there really were crimes being committed but were waiting for the case to get juicier before pulling the plug, whether they decided something was up but they had more urgent cases to pursue, etc.

I also by now agree with Devil's Advocate that Cookiehead's experiment was deserving of a block. If nothing else, it pretty much discredited WR as sanctimonious guardians of BLP's, and Mongo mentioned some socking suspicions about Cookiehead. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 02:48, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

ScottyBerg has posted the emails he sent to arbcom over at his talkpage, just for the record. I've been reading through all this on the Rfc (three times now) and at ScottyBerg's page as well have done another examination of ScottyBerg's editing...if he is Mantanmoreland, he did a pretty good job covering it up...one thing that keeps popping up is the IP issue...right place and right ISP I suppose...so a basic match (it's New York City...8 million people...it's not North Platte, Nebraska for instance) Anyway, this section is about what outcome should happen here...and against my usual intolerance for any ban evasion and my general dislike of liars...I am going to say now that I have a doubt. I have a doubt that SB=MM...it's not a strong doubt, but sufficient enough to justify saying that I think ScottyBerg should be unblocked. If this were a murder case or even a shoplifting case...I'd want the pieces to fit together better than this before I convicted or even tried to prosecute this guy for life much less death. Look, this editor wants to edit and his contributions have shown nothing in the way of malice...he's not going around calling people nasty names, he's not using socks to vote stack...he's not POV pushing...he's not a SPA. No, he doesn't have a long list of new pages or good/featured article work under his belt...or major efforts to right wrongs on some policy pages or similar, but he seems a good egg overall...a wikignome primarily. I was the editor that brought forth the extensive sock investigation of User:SevenofDiamonds being banned editor User:NuclearUmph...it was the first arbcom case of that type, so I know how to spot a sock...and unless arbcom has many more pieces to this puzzle than what I can spot, then this is insufficient evidence to convict....I might be wrong and I surely must be I suppose, but I do have a doubt.--MONGO 03:04, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I suppose my above sentiments mirror the same ones I had at arbcom SevenofDiamonds...[16]--MONGO 03:13, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Mongo, if this was a murder or shoplifting case, the court would be weighing whether to order the defendant to be physically killed (in the murder example), or anyway given a criminal record (making him near-unemployable for the rest of his life) in the shoplifting example. Here we're talking about booting an anonymous user from a privately operated web site, which when you get down to it is not much different than throwing someone out of a restaurant. You simply don't get a criminal trial in such a situation. And per Ken Arromdee, if Scotty isn't socking, he can apparently fix things up by talking to Jimbo on Skype (or presumably the phone), but he refuses to do that, preferring martyrdom. So I think you guys are asking a bit much.

And no, if you're playing poker with someone in order to beat them, you don't explain their tell (poker) to them even though it's "public" in the sense that it's in plain sight and could as well be noticed by other observers besides yourself. You use it against them to your best advantage and hope that they never figure it out. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 07:30, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Jimbo's offer was made before this case. As far as I know, Arbcom has not offered him any way to clear himself, not even appearing on Skype. Ken Arromdee (talk) 16:03, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

As far as I know, he could still talk to Jimbo on Skype if it would clear things up. I know Jim has his moments, but if he came to Arbcom and said he had spoke to the guy on the phone and he's a subway engineer, lives in whatever place he edits the article on etc, then that would be serious evidence that he isn't MM and this is mistaken identity. There may be an element of sock fatigue in the responses - with socks of certain editors you just do not want to engage in conversation with them - which might cause an innocent editor to feel they had no way to 'clear their name'. Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:18, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Most people cannot hide their tells even when told, but yes, it's best that they are not aware of them. Most of the sockpuppeteers that I spend my time with have one or two habits that reveal their identity, and it's quite apparent that they don't know what they are.—Kww(talk) 11:24, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I assume Alison and arbcom are correct...I'm not going to nor desire to use this Rfc as a place to pick on these folks...I respect that they have unforgiving "jobs". But take the edits to NY subway articles...if you're a New Yorker, its a part of life for almost all there to spend an hour at least everyday riding or waiting for a train...I'm not surprised this would therefore be in the editing realm of ScottyBerg...just as it was with Mantanmoreland. In the SevenofDiamonds case there were a few "gotchas"...he edited several very obscure articles and templates that had extremely low editing histories...I'm either missing or overlooking the "gotchas" in this case.MONGO 12:28, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Judging from the letters sent to ArbCom that SB posted as to his page, I am seeing less and less of a connection, too. Can an arb confirm that these were in fact the letters sent to ARBCOM? - Jack Sebastian (talk) 15:15, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps ArbCom should give a rough order of magnitude estimate of the probability that ScottyBerg is not Mantanmoreland given the similarities in editing behavior. This will force ArbCom to take into account all sorts of pre-selection effects, and if this probability is still extremely low, then it will make the identification of ScottyBerg as Mantanmoreland more credible. Count Iblis (talk) 16:00, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I've been trying to figure out this "tell" that so convinced arbcom and company that Scotty is the sock master. Editing articles about NY can't be it. They already know the man lives in NY! Having the same ISP as this sock master is a possibly sad coincidence. How many ISP's are there in NY? Putting these two together can't be it in my mind. The only thing that I can figure is that Scotty uses the same pass word in addition to the other two rather weak coincidences. I admit that at first glance that's a pretty damning coincidence. Let's think about it a bit more though, maybe the password is "newyork" or "subway" or "timesquare". Since the ScottyBerg account hasn't been accused of doing anything wrong, is it really fair to ban someone in this situation? Because they use the same ISP and same password as a banned sock master? My opinion doesn't really matter though. It is apparently unanimous for those opinions that matter, it is enough to ban a productive contributor. Bill Huffman (talk) 19:00, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Someone please explain THIS

I hope I’m wrong about this, but I don’t think so. Yesterday Scotty B gave everyone a big “tell” when he posted his “Third e-mail to Arb Com” on his talk page. This e-mail lists a long series of edits performed by the Mantanmoreland IP. I copy/pasted this list…it appears below this statement, so you can see for yourself. This list includes the usual: 114 edits by Mantanmoreland in Naked Short Selling, 27 edits in Patrick M. Byrne, 5 edits in Overstock.com. But then I noticed a number of edits for NYC subway lines, and remembered that Scotty B’s talk page had said “I’m a trolley buff and a New York City subway buff.”

So I looked into the subway articles on this list:

• IRT Third Avenue Line -- 68 edits
• New York City Subway -- 25 edits
• R32 (New York City Subway car) -- 23 edits
• IRT Sixth Avenue Line -- 20 edits
• C (New York City Subway service) -- 16 edits
• IRT Ninth Avenue Line -- 15 edits
• IRT Second Avenue Line -- 14 edits
• 18th Street (IRT Lexington Avenue Line) -- 6 edits
• Battery Place (IRT Ninth Avenue Line) -- 5 edits

None of these articles contained a single Mantanmoreland edit. But ALL of them contain Scotty B edits, with PRECISELY the number of edits listed above. The above nine articles contain 192 Scotty B edits and zero Mantanmoreland edits.

So Scotty B made 192 edits from the Mantanmoreland IP – just counting the nine subway articles. If we look at other articles, we may find hundreds of more edits – in which case Scotty B was editing from the Mantanmoreland IP, just about every day.

192 edits, right out there in broad daylight. Maybe I’m missing something here – but this looks pretty clear, and pretty bad.

Magnificent Amberson (talk) 21:07, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

(Below is Scotty B’s third e-mail to Arb Com, with the list of Mantanmoreland edits)

My third: I cannot find the Wikistalk took, only Soxred's "top edited pages" tool. Here are the results for Mantanmoreland:

• 114 - Naked short selling * 85 - Martin Luther * 73 - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad * 44 - On the Jews and their Lies * 39 - John M. Oesterreicher * 37 - Louis Farrakhan * 28 - World Trade Center (film) * 27 - Patrick M. Byrne * 26 - Gary Weiss * 23 - On the Waterfront * 23 - Paul Burke (actor) * 23 - Henry Ford * 22 - National Crime Syndicate * 20 - Dave Karnes * 19 - John M. Corridan * 17 - Jews for Jesus * 17 - Fordham University * 17 - Cornelius Willemse * 16 - John McLoughlin (9/11 survivor) * 15 - Ernest Borgnine * 14 - Shepherd Mead * 14 - Will Jimeno * 13 - Malcolm Johnson (journalist) * 13 - Pump and dump * 12 - Ethan Bronner * 12 - Thom Calandra * 11 - Joe Queenan * 10 - Eddie Egan * 10 - Burton Turkus * 10 - On the Jews and Their Lies * 10 - Microcap stock fraud * 10 - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Israel * 10 - Richard Price (writer) * 9 - Big Love * 9 - New antisemitism * 9 - Short and distort * 9 - 2004 Madrid train bombings * 9 - Arthur Waskow * 8 - The Quiet Man * 8 - The Friends of Eddie Coyle (novel) * 8 - List of Fordham University people * 8 - Jordan Belfort * 7 - Detour (novel) * 7 - Herb Greenberg * 7 - Church of St. Joseph in Greenwich Village * 7 - Jack Garfein * 7 - CounterPunch * 7 - Mark Cuban * 6 - Grand Concourse (Bronx) * 6 - Charles Lane (actor) * 6 - Dutch Schultz * 6 - Rose Thering * 6 - Carroll Baker * 6 - Louis Buchalter * 6 - Michael V. Gazzo * 6 - Love with the Proper Stranger * 6 - Jason Thomas * 6 - Kossar's Bialys * 6 - James Cagney * 5 - The Wanderers (1979 film) * 5 - David Strathairn * 5 - Hedge fund * 5 - Antonio Demo * 5 - James Dale Davidson * 5 - Yonah Shimmel's Knish Bakery * 5 - The Nation * 5 - Overstock.com * 5 - Pat Reid * 5 - Avery Corman * 5 - Lee Harvey Oswald * 5 - Murder, Inc. * 4 - Harry Connick, Sr. * 4 - Spencer Tracy * 4 - Russ Tamblyn * 4 - Market Wizards * 4 - Meyer Lansky * 4 - Ryan's Daughter * 4 - Barry Foster (actor) * 4 - The Sleeping City * 4 - Roger Lowenstein * 4 - Arthur Levitt * 4 - Boys Town (organization) * 4 - Chop stock * 3 - The Seventh Cross * 3 - Stratton Oakmont * 3 - Joseph A. O'Hare * 3 - Cong, County Mayo * 3 - The River (1951 film) * 3 - Havana Conference * 3 - Mickey Spillane (mobster) * 3 - Donald Henry Gaskins * 3 - Alex Nicol * 3 - Augustin Cardinal Bea * 3 - Richard Conte * 3 - Mission San Xavier del Bac * 3 - The Lost Weekend (novel) * 3 - Jack Ruby * 3 - Fordham, Bronx * 3 - Woody Strode * 3 - Katrina vanden Heuvel Here are the results for me: * 89 - Nelson Antonio Denis * 87 - Doyers Street (Manhattan) * 85 - Steve Brodie (bridge jumper) * 76 - Juano Hernández * 74 - East Harlem * 71 - Raymond Márquez * 70 - Zahi Hawass * 68 - IRT Third Avenue Line * 60 - Chasing Mummies * 57 - Bowery * 53 - Sixth Avenue (Manhattan) * 48 - South Bronx * 46 - Seventh Avenue (Manhattan) * 45 - World Wide Tours bus crash * 43 - Chinatown, Manhattan * 38 - Allen Street (Manhattan) * 36 - Time travel urban legends * 34 - Tenth Avenue (Manhattan) * 32 - TriBeCa * 32 - Occupy Wall Street * 30 - Harlem * 27 - Chinatown bus lines * 25 - New York City Subway * 25 - Spread tow fabric * 24 - Singer Building * 23 - Italian Harlem * 23 - R32 (New York City Subway car) * 22 - ServiceMagic * 22 - Edgar Allan Poe Cottage * 22 - Commissioners' Plan of 1811 * 21 - Herberts Cukurs * 20 - Gary Weiss * 20 - IRT Sixth Avenue Line * 19 - Chuck Yeager * 19 - 2011 Egyptian revolution * 19 - Koreatown, Manhattan * 19 - Bowery (disambiguation) * 19 - Climatic Research Unit email controversy * 18 - List of Puerto Ricans of African descent * 17 - List of Puerto Ricans * 16 - C (New York City Subway service) * 15 - Closings and cancellations following the September... * 15 - Manhattan * 15 - IRT Ninth Avenue Line * 14 - IRT Second Avenue Line * 14 - The Bronx * 13 - Houston Street (Manhattan) * 12 - Harlem Riot of 1964 * 12 - South Street (Manhattan) * 12 - The Circus (film) * 11 - Adam Clayton Powell IV (politician) * 11 - Donald A Wilson Secondary School * 11 - Richard “Skip” Bronson * 11 - Longwood, Bronx * 10 - New York City * 10 - Shakaiba Sanga Amaj * 10 - Angie's List * 10 - Brownsville, Brooklyn * 10 - Stacy Horn * 9 - Steve Brodie (actor) * 9 - Josh Franceschi * 9 - Stonewall riots * 9 - Arthur Avenue * 9 - Rick Sanchez * 9 - Siege of Richmond * 9 - Pleasant Avenue * 9 - La Marqueta (East Harlem) * 8 - Hashomer Hatzair * 8 - Ferdinand Waldo Demara * 8 - Jerome Tiger * 8 - Alvin C. York * 8 - Division Street, Manhattan * 8 - Eddie Chapman * 7 - RMS Titanic Lifeboat No. 6 * 7 - Grand Concourse (Bronx) * 7 - Robert Moses Playground * 7 - Berenice Abbott * 7 - Association of Naval Service Officers * 7 - Radio Row * 7 - St Andrew's College, Cleethorpes * 7 - List of Clark University people * 6 - Orwell High School * 6 - Mottephobia * 6 - List of Puerto Rican boxing world champions * 6 - Irwin Corey * 6 - Longwood Historic District (Bronx) * 6 - 18th Street (IRT Lexington Avenue Line) * 6 - Stormfront (website) * 6 - David M. Gonzales * 6 - Young Man with a Horn (film) * 6 - Vesey Street (Manhattan) * 6 - Gotobus * 5 - David Guetta discography * 5 - You Me at Six * 5 - Space Cats * 5 - Michael Sorrentino * 5 - Malbone Street Wreck * 5 - Zuccotti Park * 5 - Battery Place (IRT Ninth Avenue Line) * 5 - Nolita I'm not seeing any intersections except for Gary Weiss, which I have already discussed. I have shown no interest in any of the major subject areas of that editor, finance and theology.

• I may be missing something here, but you are aware that the above list is actually two lists, right? The first being edits by Mantanmoreland, and the second being edits by ScottyBerg. There's a "here are the results by me" in the middle somewhere. I'm not seeing how you're inferring that the NY edits are actually by Mantanmoreland based on that. Can you please clarify? Reyk _YO! 21:45, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
  • BTW- I see that all your edits consist of this list posted in various places. Whose sock are you? Reyk _YO! 22:09, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

• What exactly are you talking about in regards to the IP? You do realize that the IP that the two accounts have is for a large portion of New York, over 8 million people, right? Silverseren^C 00:08, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I smell a WR rat. This is too transparent for someone of MM's supposed socking skill. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 02:22, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I would expect all three of the accounts mentioned on this page are either a single person from WR or a group of them working together. Do they realize that the more they sock and try to incriminate Scotty, the more it makes it seem like they're the ones that created this whole scenario in the first place (though we already know they did), thus lessening actual support of the Scotty = MM theory? Silverseren^C 02:28, 2 February 2012 (UTC)