Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests

Crosstalk

I thought there was not to be discussions between commenters, and that we were to address our comments to the arbcom. Probably personal asides should go on individual talk pages. -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 10:58, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

the israel palestine request involves highly contentious material and the longer it asks for comments the more it will degenerate from a structured ask into random turf wars between factions Bluethricecreamman (talk) 02:58, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

active vs. inactive

I don't have great enthusiasm for the WPO case, as I wrote there, but regarding the procedural close Hammersoft brought up, we also have WP:AC, which seems to say that arbs should be considered inactive if they haven't participated in arbitration in the past week. One of the arbs has only a talk page message in arbspace in the past week; the other has no edits in arbspace (unless we count AE actions as "arbitration"). It seems to me that in the future it would be simpler to just say "an arb that hasn't made any attempt to participate in a particular case request is considered inactive for that part of the process" or something. Meh. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 21:54, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

Private activity also counts so if one of those Arbs (which I also thought about and checked on) was active on list we'd have no way of knowing. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 21:57, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

Good point. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 22:10, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

There are two arbs (Z1720 and HJ Mitchell) who are inactive by that definition, and another (Sdrqaz) about to be so. I find it slightly bothersome that two of those are active on the project, just not on arbitration. You're voted to ArbCom to do an important job. It's the only job that you're expected to do work in on a regular basis (outside of inactivity for admins, which is a far larger period). To be active on the project but not on ArbCom seems like setting aside work for which they were placed to do. --Hammersoft (talk) 22:00, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

Z1720 already declined, and I wasn't referring to HJ (who also updated his comment a few minutes ago) because he had been active on that page. I was referring to the two arbs listed as active but who haven't commented at all: Sdrqaz (whose only arbing edit in the past week was the "talk page message in arbspace" I mentioned) and ToBeFree (whose last edit to arbspace was October 23 -- the "unless we count AE actions" above, which I would presume not, but maybe I'm wrong). Anyway, not something I want to argue about, but it would be a shame for it to end in a procedural can-kicking due to active-but-inactive arbs rather than at least a formal decline/accept. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 22:10, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

And in this case if one of those two is inactive then suddenly it opens as a case because 4 would be a majority (9 active arbs - 2 recused arbs = 7 arbs). Which, truthfully, also seems like a weird way to see this case move forward but I suppose no more or less weird than a case with 50% of active arbs voting to open going away. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:14, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

As a post script Sdrqaz has now commented in Arbspace in response to FF's announcement of stepping down and since I've conversed about Arb business with them in the last week have every belief they are active just behind the scenes. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:17, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

@Rhododendrites and Hammersoft: As Barkeep states, I have been active in Committee business behind the scenes – I have sent seventeen emails to the Committee mailing lists in the last week and have voted in our private votes. However, the point about my inactivity in on-wiki Committee business is taken on board and I am sorry for that: it is obvious that I haven't allocated my Wikipedia time appropriately and will rectify that. Yours, Sdrqaz (talk) 02:43, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

@Hammersoft: and others: I am monitoring the page, reading through comments when I get the chance. I haven't felt the need to comment on anything as others are making arguments much better than I could. If someone has something specific they feel like I need to respond to, feel free to ping me as I may have missed it. Z1720 (talk) 03:15, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

@Sdrqaz I am curious whether you think the WPO case should be accepted or not. Those thinking the case should be accepted think Lightburst's existing ban was insufficient, those thinking the opposite think Lightburst's existing ban solved the matter at hand. If you are neutral, or do not wish to weigh in, that is effectively a decline in this case. I myself have no opinion on the matter. Sir Kenneth Kho (talk) 19:28, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

I was aware of, and occasionally looking at, the case request without being sure whether and what to say about it. Saying too much quickly results in calls for recusal independently of whether one is actually needed, saying nothing results in a discussion about inactivity; accepting results in "you wanted this, now find a solution for it" thoughts, declining results in "the others want it and I'm blocking it" thoughts, and I was really in two minds about whether having a case would be beneficial. For me personally, this correctly defaults to a silent decline rather than an abstention, but I guess that's a question of philosophy/policy.
I wasn't aware of this discussion here until today and am always happy about pings. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:18, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

FWIW it would make sense to me, for the future, to document somewhere that (a) if an arb is listed as active on a case, they should find the time to either say one thing about the case in the case request or change their status to inactive; or (b) arbs have X days to weigh in, unless they ask for more, and at the end anyone who isn't down with a formal position of accept/decline/recuse/abstain/neutral/whatever else, is considered inactive. This could take the form of the "active in arbitration" part of WP:AC applying to each specific case (i.e. if it's been a week and someone hasn't said anything, they're assumed inactive on that case until they say something). I mean that just makes sense, right? Or are there more complicated behind-the-scenes reasons why an arb might be considered active on a case but decline to weigh in? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 22:25, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

Arb inactivity is judged as not touching anything arb related for a week, or saying you're inactive. The committee as a whole just does a fantastically terrible job of self-regulating their members who are on The List as active but in reality haven't been seen for a while. There were a few arbs when I was on the committee who made sure to send reminder emails if something was dying in public. Clearly this committee has had a bad time of keeping anyone active, with regular counts of even publicly active-member-days below previous years, on which Barkeep has the stats lying around somewhere. Izno (talk) 18:10, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

• Related to the above discussion, but I'm confused about Special:Diff/1255905950 declining the WPO case. The latest vote totals were <4/3/2> (Accept/decline/recuse). I'm sure I'm just not up to speed on AC process, but how does that become a decline? I'm not complaining, just trying to understand the process better. RoySmith (talk) 16:13, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

  @RoySmith because clerk procedures say if something hasn't been accepted after 10 days it is declined. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:26, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

  Roy, that's why I opened this section -- Hammersoft pointed out the 10-day rule on the case page, and it struck me as kind of shocking to take all the time and energy all these people have put into the case request and flush away everything but the ill will on procedural grounds. Arbs aren't paid and shouldn't be expected to participate in everything, but we do need some clear instructions to avoid such a situation. A possibility for the future: Maybe it's about the definition about "active". The thing that matters most at the request phase is that the arb read it and vote (even if that vote isn't accept or decline), right? So maybe the line is "this is the list of people expected to vote on whether to accept", with the understanding they'd be considered inactive if they don't say anything (after all, "active" for the sake of a given request doesn't mean much if they're only active elsewhere). YMMV. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 13:13, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

  This is as much problematically "procedural" as the automated removal of unactioned reports at WP:AIV, the automated archival of sections at WP:ANI and WP:ANEW and treating a deletion discussion noone participated in as a successfully proposed deletion. We can call it procedural but I disagree with the implication of this procedure being a problem, or the procedural removal being less valuable than an explicit majority decline. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:37, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

  In those cases, everyone can participate (or, in some cases, anyone from a large group of people [admins] can jump in if they can see consensus). Here, consensus doesn't matter and no amount of participation or argumentation can overcome the discussion-closing impact of an absent arb. I'm sure there are downsides of another system, and have sympathy for your points above, but I don't see it as similar to those other venues. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 17:50, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

  Okay, yes, that's true. And thinking about it again, I think I could agree with defaulting to abstention rather than decline in case of no participation at a case request at all. It might require me to change my way of approaching these cases, but the change would probably be an improvement. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:06, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

  I mean, we're talking about an iteration of the committee that really seems apathetic. There's a proposed decision that as we speak has been posted for seventeen days, just as long as the WPO case request remained open without being accepted or declined, and an ARCA thread that has been open for eighty four days, with motions to move it forward languishing for a month and half, longer than most ARCA requests are even open. The committee often moves slower than is optimal, but this past year it has been exceptionally slow to act. Tighter standards regarding how an arb is determined to be inactive could possibly help, this is by no means a new issue but it seems particualrly acute right now. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 21:04, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

Historical precedent

Huldra, re. your curiosity: Can I draw your attention to the Law of 22 Prairial, as codified by the Committee of Public Safety in 1794. The law made denunciation of one's neighbors the only permissible form of evidence, denied the right of the accused to defend themselves or call witnesses, turned the public court into an in camera committee, and, unsurprisingly allowed for only one sentence ... presumably an Indef Site Ban... ;) SerialNumber54129 17:57, 10 November 2024 (UTC)

Serial Number 54129 Hmm, somehow quoting a law from the Reign of Terror doesn't really calm me. And no email from arb.com, as yet, Huldra (talk) 20:15, 10 November 2024 (UTC)

Motion 2b

Can an administrator use this to grant more words or remove the word limit from certain discussions? I'm trying to avoid making this another whole thing, so if there's general agreement on it I'd prefer not to open another ARCA. Pinging @Chess and Selfstudier: who's discussion made me think of this. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 19:25, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

HJM seems to think so. Selfstudier (talk) 19:31, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

@ScottishFinnishRadish I think yes. ArbCom routinely grants wordlimit extensions on its own pages, so it makes total sense for admins to do so here. I think the idea to remove the word limit from discussions is fine, but that admins will have to be conscientious about doing so. We're not trying to make this too onerous or counterproductive, we're trying to give admins the tools to tamp down problems. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 20:01, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

Does the word limit apply to discussions that started before the motion took effect?

There are many discussions that began before the word limit motion passed. Does the word limit only apply to new discussions, or does it apply to older ones as well? Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 19:39, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

@Chess Imo, per the principle of ex post facto, no it doesn't apply to older ones still ongoing, such discussions would be grandfathered in. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 20:02, 17 November 2024 (UTC)