Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/MZMcBride/Workshop

This is a page for working on Arbitration decisions. The Arbitrators, parties to the case, and other editors may draft proposals and post them to this page for review and comments. Proposals may include proposed general principles, findings of fact, remedies, and enforcement provisions—the same format as is used in Arbitration Committee decisions. The bottom of the page may be used for overall analysis of the /Evidence and for general discussion of the case.

Any user may edit this workshop page. Please sign all suggestions and comments. Arbitrators will place proposed items they believe should be part of the final decision on the /Proposed decision page, which only Arbitrators and clerks may edit, for voting, clarification as well as implementation purposes.

Motions and requests by the parties

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Proposed temporary injunctions

Temporary desysop of MZMcBride

1) While this case was ongoing, MZMcBride deleted a large number of IP talk pages[1] and was unresponsive to attempts at dialog.[2] Concerns expressed by several administrators at ANI are that this appears to be use of an unapproved and unsupervised bot script to perform controversial admin actions. The only way to prevent further controversial deletions was for another administrator to block his account.[3] At an ongoing case where related behavior is already under scrutiny, this raises very serious concerns. Proposing temporary desysop until the case closes.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I don't think temporary desysop is needed, but I would favor an injunction against MZMcBride's using automated tools such as bots or scripts to perform deletions, for so long as the case is pending. It bears emphasis that a temporary injunction is an interim step to give us time to evaluate the situation, and does not represent any form of predetermination of the merits of the case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 16:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

To Durova: Unfortunately, in my experience, it has frequently happened that parties or observers have taken a temporary injunction ruling as a signal of how the final decision is going to come out, or as a prejudgment. (This frequently is observed in real-world litigation situations as well.) I want to avoid even the possibility of that happening when we enter such an injunction. Newyorkbrad (talk) 19:03, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I think this suggestion is moot now in light of the temporary injunction. Unless there are new developments, further comments on this proposal are probably not needed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:36, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

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Comment by others:

Proposed. Durova^Charge! 15:54, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Endorse. I strongly endorse what Durova stated above. MZMcBride should be desysoped immediately due to the reasons given above. — Aitias // discussion 16:09, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Endorse. I'm sorry it's come to this. I spent quite a while going back through a sample WP:ANI contributions by MzMcBride and I was struck by how reasonable, civil and constructive his/her comments and actions were on many different issues raised there. Yet the intransigence and arrogance demonstrated with the issue of bots on the one hand and deletions on the other hand contrasts starkly with his/her other behaviour. As Beetstra has pointed out in this proceeding and elsewhere for several weeks, this has been having deleterious effects on our project. I had originally thought this could all be resolved without desysopping MzMcBride, temporarily or permanently. It would have been so simple for him to say at some point, "OK, I'll stop for now while we talk about this"; I don't know why he chose differently. I am now beginning to lose confidence in his/her suitability as an admin, now or in the future. --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 16:31, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I share your sadness at how things have developed. Yet perhaps it's something other than arrogance. Let's assume good faith that he might not be good at adjusting to feedback; we all have our strengths and our weaknesses. Either way, intervention has become necessary. Durova^Charge! 16:34, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Do not endorse, but I would endorse a temporary injunction against running adminbots on his main account whilst this RFAR is ongoing. –xeno (talk) 16:42, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

(ec)I am sorry to now have to endorse this solution. MZMcBride is indeed a very reasonable person, and I do agree with the deletion of most of these talkpages (I did not mention another example I worked out this morning, where all deletions were OK, except for one that put a grin on my face .. deletion of a talkpage with a {{welcomeanon}} .. I thought these were nice). However, the script was deleting way too much, but when pointed to that, the script was adapted. Still, and MZMcBride asked me for examples, when looking at it, there are examples which still give problems with the current set. I would have expected that MZMcBride would have helped, where possible, to undo the actions at first, but that has not happened. The damage will now have to be undone by others. Sad start of my weekend. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 16:46, 6 March 2009 (UTC)(MZMcBride has promised to stop the script until consensus is reached again). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 17:42, 6 March 2009 (UTC) I unblocked on the reason that the script would stop, however, it continued and it deleted more pages. I have re-blocked MZMcBride. Below remark for removing this again still holds, but it really has to stop. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 18:27, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

• FWIW, I've posted to MZMcBride's user talk that I would consider withdrawing this motion if he makes a very prompt and clear statement that nothing like this will happen again.[4] Durova^Charge! 16:52, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
• FWIW 2, I have granted Durova to strike my endorse as well, if MZMcBride will completely stop with user and user talk page deletions until consensus on that has been reached (I might not be around too long anymore, and will probably not be online until Sunday/Monday). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 16:58, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

To Brad: by no means does this proposal attempt to prejudice the case. It comes as a surprise that such an idea needs to be mentioned. Durova^Charge! 17:06, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Here is a diff of MZMcBride's response.[5] Since he does not promise to refrain from controversial use of the tools for the remainder of this case, I leave this proposal as it stands (even though it appears unlikely to be acted upon since the Committee is currently voting on a milder motion). Durova^Charge! 17:39, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

• MZMcBride resumed automated deletions in spite of the promise[6][7][8] and has been reblocked by the unblocking administrator.[9][10] Durova^Charge! 18:44, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Pending an explanation I'm willing to assume good faith here (or at least not assume bad faith). MZM's statement indicated he was busy with other things and perhaps he forgot to turn off the bot, or it inadvetantly restarted itself, or something of the sort. –xeno (talk) 18:48, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

At this point I'd expect him to proactively cooperate with any necessary cleanup. Durova^Charge! 18:54, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

As I suspected, there was no ill intent in the fact that the bot continued running, it appears to be an issue with the bot framework, or the api, or something of the sort. So I am still opposed to any desysopping, temporary or otherwise. –xeno (talk) 19:43, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes. Durova^Charge! 19:44, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Endorse - While MZM's a good editor, his use of these admin tools was excessive. Xclamation point 17:49, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Oppose - what's with this case? He hasn't had a chance to say a word in his defense, but you want to desysop him already? Didn't we learned the problem with that last time, when the Arbcom ended up having to throw out the entire Matthew Hoffman case, because of the circus it became? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 05:58, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Oppose. I'm not sure if this is necessary since the script was causing the problems, and not the non-script based deletions. As long as he stops using scripts/bot(s) everything should be fine. Synergy 00:59, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Refrain from using automated tools

2) MZMcBride is directed to refrain from using automated tools (including bots and scripts) to delete pages or nominate them for deletion while this arbitration case is pending. This is a temporary injunction and does not reflect any predetermination on the outcome of any issue in the case.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Risker (talk) 16:46, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Note: This temporary injunction has now been moved and voting is on the proposed decision page. Risker (talk) 17:18, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

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Comment by others:

If he hasn't received approval to run a bot for this purpose, then the wording appears redundant. Durova^Charge! 16:55, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

As above, I endorse in lieu of proposed injunction #1. –xeno (talk) 17:04, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Since he started the script again after saying he wouldn't this seems sensible. EconomicsGuy (talk) 18:10, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Seems enough. I'm not sure a temporary desysop is required here. That escalates the situation and he has already complied by agreeing to turn off the script. If he re-offends after this direction, then it may be appropriate to look at something more serious. For now, I think that both the proposed injunctions will have the same effect; if they don't, then perhaps it is indicative of a larger problem that needs to be addressed. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 00:33, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

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Questions to the parties

Please note: The Arbitration Committee has developed a series of questions for MZMcBride, requesting his response. As the majority of these questions relate to security or privacy, these questions have been submitted to him via email. The Committee will endeavour to share with the community the general thrust of the information, but may not be able to provide full details. Risker (talk) 16:19, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Confirming that MZMcBride has responded promptly to the questions posed by the Arbitration Committee, and that responses have been received. Risker (talk) 05:02, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

The following is the text of the questions emailed to MZMcBride on behalf of the Arbitration Committee, and his responses. The questions from ArbCom are bolded; there are no redactions. Risker 23:42, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Re page relating to oversight/hidden revisions: Please explain the circumstances under which you became aware that hidden revisions were visible to those with toolserver accounts. What were your actions when you became aware, and did you actively search out information when you became aware that it was available? Who did you advise? Did you attempt to contact any of the users who hold the revision-hiding permission on enwp? What other options did you consider rather than publishing your userpage essay, specifically naming User:Alison, when you identified what you considered inappropriate use of privileges? [/snip]

-- “Please explain the circumstances under which you became aware that hidden revisions were visible to those with toolserver accounts.” I became aware of the Toolserver replication issue on February 9, 2009, according to my IRC logs. Toolserver users have access to a replica of the various (public) wiki databases, but they do not have access to everything. “Views” are used to restrict certain information, for example the password fields and e-mail fields in the user table.

Upon discovering that the information was available to all users with Toolserver access, I contacted Tim Starling (who is pretty much second-in-command below Brion) in private message on IRC. He told me to ask River to fix it. I contacted River in #wikimedia-toolserver and told her of the issue a few minutes following my chat with Tim. River wasn’t around at the time, so I also private messaged her with a sample query for her to use as a test case.

Two days later (February 11, 2009) I asked River if she had received my message. She told me, “i can't fix it. i thought this would be discussed before it went live, but apparently not” and “i will talk to other admins about it.” [Admins here referring to Toolserver admins.]

To my knowledge, when Werdna became a root user [admin] on the Toolserver, he fixed the MySQL views to no longer leak suppressed revisions. This took place a few weeks following my discovery. Without someone pointing out the issue, this could have remained unfixed for months or years.

-- “Who did you advise? Did you attempt to contact any of the users who hold the revision-hiding permission on enwp?” Specific to en.wiki’s ArbCom, I discussed the Toolserver leak with Jayvdb on February 11, 2009 in private message on IRC. And I discussed some of the issues I had with Alison’s use of oversight with Risker on February 12, 2009. I also spoke with Dmcdevit (though he’s not on ArbCom any longer, so I won’t get into specifics). I should also note that at the time Dmcdevit did not have oversight having resigned it months prior.

-- “... did you actively search out information when you became aware that it was available?” I did run queries to see to what extent the data was available.

As of day, the Toolserver still leaks certain data. For example, the suppress log is available to all users on the Toolserver. As these features are relatively new and poorly-documented, it’s difficult to know exactly what the suppress log is, but it appears to be all actions that use the oversight-level RevisionDelete. Example result:

| 20208245 | suppress | revision | 20090206194136 | 111632 | 0 | Hodgkin's_lymphoma | hid content (applied restrictions to administrators) for 1 revision: private medical information | oldid 261517460 | 0 |

-- “What other options did you consider rather than publishing your userpage essay, specifically naming User:Alison, when you identified what you considered inappropriate use of privileges?” I think context might help here. There have been rumors surrounding Alison’s privileged access for a long time (both oversight and checkuser). And there have been rumors surrounding the access of other oversighters / checkusers for a number of years. (The Steve Crossin incident, the Troubles checkusering, etc.)

I considered a number of options when I discovered what I viewed as misuse (or abuse) of oversight (or its equivalent RevisionDelete).

One option was to keep everything private. Send e-mails privately to Alison, ArbCom, et al. However, two factors weighed against this. (1) The entire wiki concept is predicated on openness and transparency. The use of private mailing lists and private wikis, etc. didn’t seem a particularly appropriate thing to do on a site that stresses responsibility and accountability. If I was going to be the one complaining about someone’s actions, it should have my name attached, not be “in an e-mail from an unnamed source.” If you’re going to complain about someone, it’s only fair that you do so without a wall (in my view, at least). (2) From discussions with a number of people, it was clear that private e-mail communication had been tried before. And each time, the concerns had been brushed off or dismissed.

A second option was to make everything very public. I considered starting a thread an the Admin noticeboard. I also considered posting to a talk page or even filing an Arbitration case. This would’ve caused more harm than good in my mind, so I chose not to.

The third option was to make a wiki user subpage. As anybody with a “secret” page knows, most user subpages go entirely unnoticed unless you point them out to people. A user subpage allowed for a public record (timestamp included) of my views under my name, but without the drama that would come with a more public option like a noticeboard thread. My views could be put “on the record” but still be kept discreet.

I should note that the essay was not intended to personalize the issue as much as it originally did. Obviously I was upset and disappointed with the actions of a few particular people. However, I didn’t name the page /Alison or /Lar,_Alison,_Jayjg. I named the page /Data_suppression because that was its focus primarily: my views on the misuse of data suppression. I later de-personalized the essay a bit before ultimately deciding that there were more important issues that needed focus and that it was in the community’s best interest that the pages be deleted quietly rather than through a deletion discussion like MFD.

The answers to the other questions will come in the next few hours / days.

MZMcBride date 7 March 2009 21:32

Re Mediawiki security issues: Please explain your motivation for collating this information and then publishing this summary of potentially harmful actions in userspace. Had you discussed these issues with any of the developers directly and, if so, what was their response? Had you considered filing bug reports or publishing the information on Mediawiki instead? [/snip]

-- “Please explain your motivation for collating this information and then publishing this summary of potentially harmful actions in userspace.” The “Going rogue” page was really intended as a joke (which the top of the page suggested). (I debated for a while to name it “Going rogue” or “Going rouge,” even.) Nearly all of the information on the page would require an admin account, which is a large part of the reason most of the bugs haven’t been fixed (little incentive to fix things if all of the users with access are trusted).

Once again, user subpages are generally not heavily trafficked, so the likelihood of anyone seeing the page was rather low. The likelihood of someone seeing the page and obtaining an admin account surreptitiously was so low as to be considered zero.

The primary motivation was to document known remaining vulnerabilities in the software. Most of these bugs have been known about for years, but nobody had ever bothered compiling a formal list. I chose to because it keeps things more organized and allows the problems to be hopefully addressed. There are bugs filed related to some of these issues.

-- “Had you discussed these issues with any of the developers directly and, if so, what was their response?” When the page was originally created, it was brought up in #wikimedia-tech. Prodego immediately speedily deleted it. I restored the page. Tim Starling’s (Brion’s second-in-command) comments were, “I would have been happy with the page staying” and “nothing on there was particularly dangerous.” Brion’s comment immediately following Tim’s was “*yawn* drama is boring.”

Tim also said, “but if Marybelle [MZMcBride] found something truly dangerous, I'd expect him to disclose it privately rather than put it on a userpage list.” Which is exactly what I did a few days later when I discovered that ‘bigdelete’ (the user right responsible for preventing large pages from being deleted and causing massive database locks) was not recognized by the API. That is, any admin could use the API to delete any page (for example, “Administrators’ noticeboard/Incidents” which has over 490,000 revisions and would likely lock the site for several hours). This bug was reported privately and fixed by Mr.Z-man (see http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:Code/MediaWiki/45944 ).

-- “... publishing the information on Mediawiki instead?” I have a habit of creating pages on en.wiki regardless of where they should actually go. This likely because I have admin rights on Meta and MediaWiki.org, so it’s trivial to import a page elsewhere if necessary (or it’s trivial for me to find an admin who can). I originally created the “Going rogue” page at en.wiki, but later moved it to MediaWiki.org where it currently lives. However, I should note that moving it “off-site” was heavily criticized by FayssalF in particular.

Two down, two to go.

MZMcBride date 7 March 2009 22:03

Quick (insignificant) note regarding part 2. I wrote, “‘Administrators’ noticeboard/Incidents’ which has over 490,000 revisions and would likely lock the site for several hours).” That should read “Administrator_intervention_against_vandalism.” AN/I ‘only’ has over 314,000 revisions.

Now, on to part 3.

Re Sockpuppetry how-to: Please explain your motivation for collating this information and publishing in userspace this summary of methods for reducing the likelihood of sockpuppets being detected. Describe what you considered as the risks and benefits of publishing this information. How does your decision to publish this information fit within the scope of good administrative judgment? [/snip]

-- “Please explain your motivation for collating this information and publishing in userspace this summary of methods for reducing the likelihood of sockpuppets being detected.” This seems a bit like a loaded question. I created the page because I like to document things. (For example, I’ve been writing the history of user rights at Meta recently because nobody ever seems to have taken the time to do so. http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/History_of_user_rights ) I see this page as a sister page to the “Going rogue” essay.

Once again we’re dealing with my user space, which is rarely if ever trafficked. Once again we’re dealing with (mostly) common knowledge simply being compiled in the form of a user space essay.

-- “Describe what you considered as the risks and benefits of publishing this information.” There are plenty of legitimate uses of an alternate or ‘sock’ accounts. And there are plenty of reasons one might want to conceal their identity on the Web, even to CheckUsers (who, while mostly trusted, have had some ‘bad apples’).

Obviously a possible risk is that this ‘how-to’ could be used to evade CheckUsers. However, as the essay explicitly stated (it was deleted by me), working in the same area or double-voting is not something one should use an alternate account for.

-- “How does your decision to publish this information fit within the scope of good administrative judgment?” This seems like a second loaded question. My adminship has no relation to socking. Good administrative judgment, to me, is making decisions that benefit the project and that stay within the spirit of our principles and our policies. Am I administrator on the English Wikipedia? Yes. But there was no information in my essay that related to my (or anyone else’s) adminship. There was no information that any non-admin couldn’t have written. As most of you probably know, I rarely, rarely deal with sockpuppets. The people who do would likely have a number of other (more creative and elusive) ways to skirt CheckUser.

MZMcBride date 8 March 2009 03:34

Re Deletions and use of bots: How do you perform your deletions, technically speaking? Can you provide examples of community discussions before you started deletion runs? Please explain why you have not submitted adminbot requests to BAG. Is it useful for high-speed accounts to have a bot flag (i.e., running off their own account rather than the admin's personal account)? Do you use this page? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:MiszaBot/PSP [/snip]

A little background first. At present, I have about 800,000 deletions. These questions are incredibly vague, so most of the answers I can provide will necessarily be equally vague. Please feel free to clarify if necessary.

-- “How do you perform your deletions, technically speaking?” Which deletions are you referring to and when? Over the years I’ve used JavaScript, Python, and a Firefox extension that allows batch tab opening to do deletions. As well as doing many by hand. Most recently I’ve been using Python for the majority of my deletions.

-- “Can you provide examples of community discussions before you started deletion runs?” Er, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Be_bold ?

I don’t really know what this question means. For things like broken redirects, there’s been agreement that we should delete those for years and years. Orphaned talk pages, the same. Old IP talk pages were discussed at various noticeboards and project-space talk pages (I can provide links if necessary.)

-- “Please explain why you have not submitted adminbot requests to BAG.” Well, adminbots being generally accepted by the community has only come very recently. For years and years, they had to be run as “open secrets.” That is, most administrators and long-term users were well aware of their existence, they just weren’t discussed. I started operating adminbots during this era and old habits die hard, I suppose. I should also note that I’m one of many admins who run bots and scripts under their main account. And most of this is sanctioned and appreciated by the community.

While I think ST47 is a dedicated Wikipedian, I don’t think he sat by his computer for two weeks updating his subpage every fifteen minutes: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:ST47/CUOS_2009&action=history And ArbCom even commended him for his work. As I said, for the most part these bots are sanctioned and appreciated.

One advantage is that I get to keep my logs contained to one account. This makes things drastically simpler from the programming side and the social side. All of my logs are centralized, rather than say, the various SoxBots (I think there are ten now and nobody can ever figure out which is which). [See also: the note below about MiszaBot vs. Misza.]

The bots are (for the most part) non-controversial and they are documented in my user space. The issues surrounding them seem to stem from strict policy interpretations rather than legitimate objections to the tasks they perform. (Nobody seems to be complaining about broken redirects being deleted.)

The last two reasons for not seeking BAG approval are a bit more simple: (1) I worry about excessive drama related to them. While the community has mostly calmed down regarding adminbots, there are still some who try to raise a stir about them. And there are still some who try to raise drama entirely unrelated to adminbots and more related to me. (2) I can’t file any bot requests at the moment. It would create a rather awkward situation if I were to lose my adminship and still have bots with admin rights.

And, as I’m certain you all are aware, there’s now an injunction precluding me from automated deletions. So, for example, the broken redirects were deleted by Chris_G under his admin account last night: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log&offset=20090307105032&limit=20&type=delete&user=Chris+G

-- “Is it useful for high-speed accounts to have a bot flag (i.e., running off their own account rather than the admin's personal account)?” The short and simple answer is: it depends. Bot flags only make a difference in two places: watchlists and RecentChanges. So if it’s truly high-speed, getting a bot flag can reduce noise there (Meta has a flood flag for this that is simply a wrapper for the bot flag). If a bot is only dealing with unwatched (or not very watched) pages, there can actually be a benefit to not having a bot flag.

For example, I got a note on my talk page thanking me for my old IP talk page deletions because it indicated to the admin that they could take those pages off of their watchlist now that they’ve been deleted.

-- Do you use this page? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:MiszaBot/PSP Not really. I remember seeing it months and months ago. And I even went looking for it again in January, but couldn’t find it. (Incidentally I couldn’t find it because it’s updated by a bot and not Misza himself. Those consolidated logs really can be helpful, as I said earlier.)

The page also has issues with false positives and such, so running my own query was faster and more accurate. (I could easily filter out all “secretaries” pages, for example.) And I also used some page text scans to find pages that wouldn’t have “secret” or “hidden” in the page title, which that page doesn’t do.

MZMcBride date 8 March 2009 03:59

No [snip]s here. I just have a general question.

Nearly everything I’ve written in the past four e-mails is not confidential. Most of it is fairly mundane, actually. Unless there is a pressing reason not to, I would like to publish the e-mails on-wiki. This provides much better transparency and also clarifies a number of misconceptions. It also demonstrates accountability on my part to answer questions when asked (something that I’ve been chastised heavily for allegedly not doing on the /Workshop page).

Please let me know your thoughts.

MZMcBride date 8 March 2009 04:02

Questions for MZMcBride

Please note that these questions are in addition to the ones Risker has referred to above. Newyorkbrad (talk) 17:16, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I have a few questions concerning the deletions of "secret pages" or "hidden pages" which led to the filing of this case. In some instances, I can surmise what your answer is likely to be, but I think it would be best to be sure, and am therefore giving you an opportunity to respond directly.

1. What led you to decide that deletion of these pages was warranted or was a priority at the time you undertook this project?
2. Did you consider warning any or all of the affected users before deleting the pages? If you considered it, why did you decide not to?
3. Why did you choose the wording that you used for the deletion summary?
4. Did you consider advising any or all of the affected users, other than through the deletion summary, after deleting the pages? If you considered it, why did you decide not to?
5. Do you have any comment with regard to the number and strength of questions or concerns regarding the deletions as raised on your userpage?
6. Assuming for purposes of this question that the outcome of this arbitration case does not either preclude or encourage your doing so, do you plan to conduct sweeps and delete similar pages in the future?

Thanks for your input on this as well as the other issues. Newyorkbrad (talk) 17:16, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

1. Like most endeavors on this project, the work gets done whenever someone chooses to sit down and do it. After seeing the discussion on AN and remembering that these had been discussed long ago (with a consensus that they shouldn't exist, in my mind), I decided to do a few quick scans for them and then delete them.
2. No, I did not consider warning the editors. I thought that there was sufficient clarity that Wikipedia was not supposed to be used as a gaming service. Obviously others disagreed.
3. The deletion summary was chosen for two reasons: (1) tradition (the wording came from an ancient deletion summary used by someone else long ago); and (2) because I felt it was in-line with the lighthearted nature of the pages.
4. No, I did not. It was my hope that the pages would be deleted in one final sweep and that they wouldn't re-emerge. I also hoped that people would realize there are far more important things to be done rather than searching for secret pages and giving each other barnstars for it.

   Also, there were quite a large number of pages and notifying each user would take far more time than it was worth. (I should remind people again that ultimately our goal here is not to create as many games as possible. There is an entire namespace filled with libel and unsourced nonsense that needs to be addressed.) It would also be intentionally poking the bear, which seems like a pretty unwise thing to do.

5. I've been here long enough to know that with nearly any action, a talk page post explaining why you're a terrible person and why you hate the project is to be expected. People get upset when their pages are deleted. It's one of the reasons I avoid CSD A7 deletions in favor of maintenance-related deletions like broken redirects and orphaned talk pages. People develop an attachment to these pages, so they're understandably upset when they're deleted.
6. I have no intention of similar sweeps and deletion of similar pages. When this case is finished, I do intend to bring the remaining pages to MFD to hopefully rid the project of them forever.

   Feel free to ask for clarification if necessary. --MZMcBride (talk) 19:31, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Questions for MZMcBride 2

MZMcbride: can you explain this set of edits by you: The edit counts per minute this morning are:

• 08:19 (61)
• 08:18 (68)
• 08:17 (7)
• 08:16 (64)
• 08:15 (69)
• 08:14 (77)
  • — Rlevse • Talk • 10:18, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

I was about to sign off for a while when I saw this pop up. I use Firefox, which utilizes tabbed browsing, making it easy to open tabs and delete pages quickly. I believe I explained this at an AN/I thread recently as well. (Minor note: they weren't edits, they were actions.) --MZMcBride (talk) 10:28, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

A few more comments. I'm bemused that someone could look at a set of non-linear deletions and come to the conclusion that they were automated. That is, generally scripts will delete, wait a specified amount of time, and then delete again. Seven deletions in one minute followed by 68 in the next isn't something I know how to script, even if I wanted to achieve that effect. Looking at the deletions, some of them are out of alphabetical order; scripts don't go out of order, but browser tabs usually load out of order. Finally, scripts don't miss. There were three or so pages that errored, causing me to have to go back to the tabs and re-submit (see here).

To Roger and Rlevse: As I recall, both of you were quite hasty in voting to accept this case (voting before the main party had even made a statement, I believe). And now both of you are trying to hastily de-admin me. I'm trying to assume good faith here; I ask that you do the same. --MZMcBride (talk) 10:53, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

I find it to be downright bloody impossible to load enough tabs to do 346 deletions in 6 minutes - noone is that fast - paticuarly 210 deletions in 3 minutes. Viridae^Talk 11:34, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Request for information from User:Rlevse or User:Roger Davies: Which of these edits/actions were deleterious to the encyclopedia? Mahalo. --Ali'i 14:31, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Questions for MZMcBride 3

A few follow-up questions (apologies for the delay in asking these questions):

1. User subpages (sockpuppetry and Mediawiki security issues) - you said "user subpages are generally not heavily trafficked, so the likelihood of anyone seeing the page was rather low". Two points here - it is possible to use the page viewing stats site to check how many views your pages received. Have you considered doing this? Secondly, once people were aware of your subpages, did you consider that the text might be copied to other websites where more people might see it?

Page view statistics are provided by henrik here. Looking specifically at the number of page views per day for the "Socking" subpage, if you remove the initial creation and the deletion debate, it's regularly zero views per day. The "Going rogue" subpage has the same pattern. If you remove the deletion debate period (in January), you see about zero to one views per day.

Is it possible for people to copy and paste the content and put it elsewhere? Sure. But these aren't state secrets, most of this is common knowledge merely collected in one place (as I said in the earlier e-mail exchange).

Thanks for the links. I'm going to list the relevant dates and stats here for reference.

Extended content

The "Going rogue" subpage was created 00:36, 20 January 2009, and MfD'd at 00:45, 20 January 2009. Redirected 02:11, 22 January 2009, unredirected 17:59, 22 January 2009, and re-redirected 08:41, 25 January 2009. Page viewing stats for January, February and March for the en-wiki page are here: Jan, Feb, Mar. Unfortunately, there seems no way to track how many views the mediawiki page is getting, but it is clear that the en-wiki page got a fair amount of traffic. Whether due to the MfD debate or attention drawn to this page from elsewhere, it's not clear. You are incorrect that it is "zero to one views per day" after removing the deletion debate period in January. It got 65 views on 26 February, 27 views on the 27 and 14 on the 28th. There are also double-figure views in March as well (56 times so far). The March ones may be due to the case, but the February one is either probably due to a link from an external site, or an ANI thread (not sure which). Turning to the "Socking" subpage, it was created 04:43, 6 February 2009, nominated at MfD at 19:49, 28 February 2009, and deleted 22:05, 28 February 2009. The Jan, Feb and March page views are here: Feb, Mar. It got a small amount of traffic (17 views) on the day of creation (could that just be you looking at it?) and then 204 views on the day of the MfD debate. So you are correct here that the MfD debate (or maybe another thread that led to the MfD) raised the profile of that page. Since this page, unlike the other one, was deleted, it is also possible to look at the 19 times the page has been viewed in March, and then compare with the number of times an administrator looked at the deleted revisions. We find that the Special:Undelete page (accessible to admins only) was viewed 8 times after deletion on 28 February, and was viewed in March 24 times on the 1st and 20 times on the 6th. How much of that is due to people arriving late at the deletion debate, and how much due to arbs and admins looking at the page when they heard about it, I don't know. A few hits might show up after it has been mentioned here. It is possible the 6th March hits are due to arbs looking at the page, though without knowing where the page was mentioned, I can't really tell.

My conclusions so far are that the initial traffic to those pages was indeed low or zero, and that your point that it was the MfDs or other links that really raised the profile of the pages is correct. However, I think you are downplaying the amount of visibility that was brought to these pages, or that would potentially be brought to these pages (something you couldn't control). Thus I've asked a set of further questions below (should be the last from me on this subtopic). Carcharoth (talk) 11:46, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

(1a) What is the best way to get these issues resolved while minimising any associated drama?

(1b) If you become aware of similar issues in future, would you handle things the same way or differently?

Well, not treating them as "issues" is probably a good first step. However, when you want to quietly discuss someone's user subpages, their talk page is a pretty good option. Or, if they're truly 'zomg secret,' there's always e-mail. Posting to very high-visibility noticeboards and starting high-visibility deletion discussions should be a last resort, not a first step.

As for the future, it's become clear that making user subpages isn't the best option, so I can't specifically say what I'd do.

Sorry, I wasn't clear with the question. For (1a), by "issues" I meant what is the best way for you or others to work to get issues like mediawiki security and knowledge (or not) of socking strategies addressed, not what is the best way for people to address issues they might have with your user subpages. But I think you've answered that by acknowledging that user subpages may not be the best way to document such things (at least not on en-Wikipedia). Presumably you will stick to places like the Mediawiki wiki, Bugzilla, private email, private IRC chats, wiki-tech-l and places like that. I absolutely agree that for the pages in question, people should have approached you privately first, before raising the visibility of the pages, though you should still bear whatever responsibility falls on those who create such user subpages in the first place. Carcharoth (talk) 00:51, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

2. Analysis of deletions - you said "At present, I have about 800,000 deletions. These questions are incredibly vague, so most of the answers I can provide will necessarily be equally vague. Please feel free to clarify if necessary." It is obviously difficult to review 800,000 deletions. Is it possible for you (or someone else) to analyse your deletion log and summarise what proportion of these deletions are of what type (e.g. by examining the deletion log entries)? Is it possible to calculate a "success rate" (e.g. number and percentage of pages that have been undeleted and/or recreated since you deleted them). Should detailed analysis like this be possible, and is it easier to do such analysis on a single account or on multiple bot accounts (one for each task)?

Number of deletions per day

mysql> SELECT -> DATE(CONCAT(YEAR(log_timestamp),"-",MONTH(log_timestamp),"-",DAY(log_timestamp))) AS day, -> COUNT(log_timestamp) AS deletions -> FROM logging -> WHERE log_user=212624 -> AND log_type="delete" -> AND log_action="delete" -> GROUP BY day; +------------+-----------+ | day | deletions | +------------+-----------+ | 2007-05-13 | 212 | | 2007-05-14 | 79 | | 2007-05-17 | 41 | | 2007-05-18 | 12 | | 2007-05-19 | 44 | | 2007-05-20 | 35 | | 2007-05-21 | 41 | | 2007-05-22 | 43 | | 2007-05-23 | 52 | | 2007-05-24 | 49 | | 2007-05-25 | 128 | | 2007-05-26 | 32 | | 2007-05-27 | 58 | | 2007-05-28 | 19 | | 2007-05-29 | 47 | | 2007-05-30 | 62 | | 2007-05-31 | 38 | | 2007-06-01 | 83 | | 2007-06-02 | 36 | | 2007-06-03 | 46 | | 2007-06-04 | 137 | | 2007-06-05 | 71 | | 2007-06-06 | 57 | | 2007-06-07 | 30 | | 2007-06-08 | 57 | | 2007-06-09 | 26 | | 2007-06-10 | 46 | | 2007-06-11 | 56 | | 2007-06-12 | 15 | | 2007-06-13 | 20 | | 2007-06-14 | 72 | | 2007-06-15 | 26 | | 2007-06-27 | 9 | | 2007-06-28 | 84 | | 2007-06-29 | 15 | | 2007-06-30 | 37 | | 2007-07-01 | 14 | | 2007-07-02 | 9 | | 2007-07-31 | 10 | | 2007-08-01 | 17 | | 2007-08-02 | 11 | | 2007-08-03 | 70 | | 2007-08-04 | 221 | | 2007-08-05 | 152 | | 2007-08-06 | 159 | | 2007-08-07 | 235 | | 2007-08-08 | 66 | | 2007-08-09 | 507 | | 2007-08-10 | 12 | | 2007-08-11 | 9 | | 2007-08-12 | 355 | | 2007-08-13 | 42 | | 2007-08-14 | 20 | | 2007-08-15 | 3 | | 2007-08-16 | 8 | | 2007-08-17 | 8 | | 2007-08-18 | 6 | | 2007-08-19 | 110 | | 2007-08-20 | 264 | | 2007-08-21 | 51 | | 2007-08-22 | 29 | | 2007-08-23 | 7 | | 2007-08-24 | 108 | | 2007-08-25 | 20 | | 2007-08-26 | 53 | | 2007-08-27 | 41 | | 2007-08-28 | 47 | | 2007-08-29 | 1162 | | 2007-08-30 | 644 | | 2007-08-31 | 276 | | 2007-09-01 | 315 | | 2007-09-02 | 472 | | 2007-09-03 | 494 | | 2007-09-04 | 52 | | 2007-09-05 | 34 | | 2007-09-06 | 53 | | 2007-09-07 | 122 | | 2007-09-09 | 8 | | 2007-09-10 | 20 | | 2007-09-11 | 9 | | 2007-09-12 | 267 | | 2007-09-13 | 12 | | 2007-09-14 | 24 | | 2007-09-15 | 73 | | 2007-09-16 | 11 | | 2007-09-17 | 49 | | 2007-09-18 | 4 | | 2007-09-19 | 1 | | 2007-09-20 | 44 | | 2007-09-21 | 16 | | 2007-09-22 | 152 | | 2007-09-23 | 81 | | 2007-09-24 | 67 | | 2007-09-25 | 24 | | 2007-09-26 | 103 | | 2007-09-27 | 15 | | 2007-09-28 | 47 | | 2007-09-29 | 98 | | 2007-09-30 | 102 | | 2007-10-01 | 87 | | 2007-10-02 | 3 | | 2007-10-03 | 68 | | 2007-10-04 | 389 | | 2007-10-05 | 144 | | 2007-10-06 | 262 | | 2007-10-07 | 7 | | 2007-10-08 | 19 | | 2007-10-10 | 7 | | 2007-10-11 | 14 | | 2007-10-12 | 6 | | 2007-10-14 | 321 | | 2007-10-15 | 73 | | 2007-10-18 | 64 | | 2007-10-19 | 186 | | 2007-10-21 | 235 | | 2007-10-22 | 34 | | 2007-10-23 | 17 | | 2007-10-24 | 3 | | 2007-10-25 | 21 | | 2007-10-26 | 1 | | 2007-10-27 | 1 | | 2007-10-30 | 1 | | 2007-10-31 | 10 | | 2007-11-01 | 3 | | 2007-11-02 | 623 | | 2007-11-03 | 264 | | 2007-11-04 | 1223 | | 2007-11-05 | 1 | | 2007-11-06 | 869 | | 2007-11-07 | 1 | | 2007-11-08 | 565 | | 2007-11-09 | 27 | | 2007-11-10 | 710 | | 2007-11-15 | 11 | | 2007-11-16 | 211 | | 2007-11-18 | 228 | | 2007-11-19 | 30 | | 2007-11-20 | 98 | | 2007-11-21 | 203 | | 2007-11-22 | 647 | | 2007-11-23 | 1109 | | 2007-11-24 | 1 | | 2007-11-25 | 300 | | 2007-11-26 | 1 | | 2007-11-28 | 470 | | 2007-11-29 | 1 | | 2007-12-01 | 2 | | 2007-12-02 | 1 | | 2007-12-03 | 5 | | 2007-12-05 | 1 | | 2007-12-06 | 547 | | 2007-12-08 | 16 | | 2007-12-09 | 19 | | 2007-12-10 | 1 | | 2007-12-11 | 82 | | 2007-12-12 | 172 | | 2007-12-13 | 267 | | 2007-12-14 | 187 | | 2007-12-17 | 257 | | 2007-12-19 | 128 | | 2007-12-20 | 283 | | 2007-12-21 | 123 | | 2007-12-22 | 443 | | 2007-12-23 | 1208 | | 2007-12-24 | 3583 | | 2007-12-25 | 10 | | 2007-12-29 | 2 | | 2007-12-31 | 190 | | 2008-01-01 | 1 | | 2008-01-02 | 1823 | | 2008-01-03 | 4 | | 2008-01-05 | 564 | | 2008-01-06 | 1641 | | 2008-01-07 | 172 | | 2008-01-08 | 28 | | 2008-01-09 | 1 | | 2008-01-11 | 33 | | 2008-01-13 | 3 | | 2008-01-18 | 3473 | | 2008-01-19 | 1 | | 2008-01-20 | 681 | | 2008-01-21 | 80 | | 2008-01-22 | 290 | | 2008-01-23 | 114 | | 2008-01-24 | 352 | | 2008-01-26 | 2 | | 2008-01-27 | 85 | | 2008-01-28 | 1 | | 2008-01-29 | 3 | | 2008-01-30 | 2 | | 2008-02-01 | 70 | | 2008-02-02 | 316 | | 2008-02-03 | 70 | | 2008-02-04 | 1 | | 2008-02-05 | 30 | | 2008-02-06 | 3 | | 2008-02-07 | 122 | | 2008-02-08 | 540 | | 2008-02-09 | 62 | | 2008-02-10 | 9 | | 2008-02-11 | 864 | | 2008-02-12 | 24 | | 2008-02-13 | 1 | | 2008-02-14 | 2 | | 2008-02-15 | 923 | | 2008-02-16 | 2 | | 2008-02-17 | 22617 | | 2008-02-18 | 6035 | | 2008-02-19 | 302 | | 2008-02-20 | 5 | | 2008-02-21 | 4 | | 2008-02-22 | 1 | | 2008-02-23 | 125 | | 2008-02-24 | 1 | | 2008-02-25 | 1 | | 2008-02-27 | 322 | | 2008-02-28 | 915 | | 2008-02-29 | 9443 | | 2008-03-01 | 1 | | 2008-03-02 | 1 | | 2008-03-03 | 2 | | 2008-03-04 | 170 | | 2008-03-06 | 1 | | 2008-03-07 | 1 | | 2008-03-08 | 650 | | 2008-03-09 | 1 | | 2008-03-11 | 13 | | 2008-03-12 | 9141 | | 2008-03-16 | 1 | | 2008-03-17 | 135 | | 2008-03-18 | 55 | | 2008-03-19 | 57 | | 2008-03-20 | 1 | | 2008-03-21 | 1317 | | 2008-03-22 | 1117 | | 2008-03-23 | 1247 | | 2008-03-24 | 332 | | 2008-03-25 | 159 | | 2008-03-26 | 838 | | 2008-03-27 | 3 | | 2008-03-28 | 282 | | 2008-03-29 | 76 | | 2008-03-30 | 123 | | 2008-03-31 | 47 | | 2008-04-01 | 3 | | 2008-04-03 | 481 | | 2008-04-04 | 1736 | | 2008-04-05 | 429 | | 2008-04-06 | 161 | | 2008-04-07 | 13794 | | 2008-04-08 | 2 | | 2008-04-09 | 77 | | 2008-04-10 | 3426 | | 2008-04-11 | 521 | | 2008-04-12 | 625 | | 2008-04-13 | 1438 | | 2008-04-14 | 622 | | 2008-04-15 | 134 | | 2008-04-16 | 276 | | 2008-04-17 | 8 | | 2008-04-18 | 2479 | | 2008-04-19 | 199 | | 2008-04-20 | 477 | | 2008-04-21 | 371 | | 2008-04-22 | 1 | | 2008-04-23 | 2781 | | 2008-04-24 | 2 | | 2008-04-25 | 218 | | 2008-04-26 | 87 | | 2008-04-27 | 147 | | 2008-04-29 | 26 | | 2008-04-30 | 285 | | 2008-05-01 | 203 | | 2008-05-02 | 356 | | 2008-05-03 | 68 | | 2008-05-04 | 121 | | 2008-05-05 | 176 | | 2008-05-06 | 165 | | 2008-05-07 | 11 | | 2008-05-08 | 167 | | 2008-05-09 | 190 | | 2008-05-10 | 4959 | | 2008-05-11 | 246 | | 2008-05-12 | 362 | | 2008-05-13 | 48 | | 2008-05-14 | 50 | | 2008-05-17 | 231 | | 2008-05-18 | 246 | | 2008-05-19 | 60 | | 2008-05-20 | 160 | | 2008-05-23 | 292 | | 2008-05-25 | 537 | | 2008-05-26 | 2 | | 2008-05-27 | 2 | | 2008-05-28 | 387 | | 2008-05-29 | 42 | | 2008-05-31 | 6475 | | 2008-06-03 | 71 | | 2008-06-04 | 157 | | 2008-06-05 | 37 | | 2008-06-06 | 163 | | 2008-06-07 | 196 | | 2008-06-08 | 214 | | 2008-06-09 | 385 | | 2008-06-10 | 194 | | 2008-06-11 | 290 | | 2008-06-12 | 350 | | 2008-06-13 | 11 | | 2008-06-14 | 2 | | 2008-06-15 | 7 | | 2008-06-16 | 36 | | 2008-06-17 | 389 | | 2008-06-18 | 326 | | 2008-06-20 | 243 | | 2008-06-22 | 108 | | 2008-06-23 | 174 | | 2008-06-25 | 320 | | 2008-06-29 | 1 | | 2008-06-30 | 177 | | 2008-07-01 | 134 | | 2008-07-02 | 86 | | 2008-07-03 | 212 | | 2008-07-04 | 763 | | 2008-07-05 | 564 | | 2008-07-06 | 5551 | | 2008-07-07 | 9842 | | 2008-07-08 | 13409 | | 2008-07-09 | 10715 | | 2008-07-10 | 13234 | | 2008-07-11 | 13487 | | 2008-07-12 | 8462 | | 2008-07-13 | 34 | | 2008-07-14 | 239 | | 2008-07-15 | 320 | | 2008-07-16 | 5 | | 2008-07-17 | 45 | | 2008-07-18 | 36 | | 2008-07-19 | 216 | | 2008-07-20 | 122 | | 2008-07-21 | 128 | | 2008-07-22 | 58 | | 2008-07-23 | 34 | | 2008-07-24 | 541 | | 2008-07-25 | 312 | | 2008-07-26 | 423 | | 2008-07-27 | 39 | | 2008-07-28 | 3 | | 2008-07-29 | 77 | | 2008-07-30 | 143 | | 2008-08-01 | 1680 | | 2008-08-02 | 5849 | | 2008-08-03 | 46 | | 2008-08-04 | 70 | | 2008-08-05 | 18 | | 2008-08-06 | 41 | | 2008-08-07 | 62 | | 2008-08-08 | 42 | | 2008-08-09 | 138 | | 2008-08-10 | 45 | | 2008-08-11 | 60 | | 2008-08-12 | 25 | | 2008-08-13 | 148 | | 2008-08-14 | 339 | | 2008-08-15 | 3218 | | 2008-08-18 | 2 | | 2008-08-19 | 211 | | 2008-08-20 | 21 | | 2008-08-21 | 28 | | 2008-08-23 | 1 | | 2008-08-24 | 1134 | | 2008-08-25 | 5 | | 2008-08-26 | 24 | | 2008-08-29 | 1 | | 2008-08-30 | 93 | | 2008-09-01 | 112 | | 2008-09-02 | 115 | | 2008-09-03 | 57 | | 2008-09-04 | 25 | | 2008-09-06 | 184 | | 2008-09-07 | 9 | | 2008-09-08 | 44 | | 2008-09-09 | 105 | | 2008-09-10 | 51 | | 2008-09-11 | 50 | | 2008-09-12 | 13 | | 2008-09-13 | 114 | | 2008-09-14 | 212 | | 2008-09-15 | 544 | | 2008-09-16 | 1834 | | 2008-09-17 | 219 | | 2008-09-18 | 95 | | 2008-09-19 | 223 | | 2008-09-20 | 31 | | 2008-09-21 | 152 | | 2008-09-22 | 1 | | 2008-09-23 | 55 | | 2008-09-24 | 55 | | 2008-09-25 | 36 | | 2008-09-26 | 10 | | 2008-09-27 | 1 | | 2008-09-28 | 74 | | 2008-09-30 | 59 | | 2008-10-01 | 90 | | 2008-10-02 | 1 | | 2008-10-03 | 39 | | 2008-10-04 | 99 | | 2008-10-05 | 107 | | 2008-10-06 | 42 | | 2008-10-07 | 81 | | 2008-10-09 | 86 | | 2008-10-11 | 26 | | 2008-10-13 | 33 | | 2008-10-15 | 54 | | 2008-10-16 | 6 | | 2008-10-17 | 493 | | 2008-10-18 | 215 | | 2008-10-19 | 29 | | 2008-10-20 | 1 | | 2008-10-21 | 231 | | 2008-10-22 | 101 | | 2008-10-23 | 128 | | 2008-10-24 | 74 | | 2008-10-25 | 1387 | | 2008-10-26 | 61 | | 2008-10-27 | 68 | | 2008-10-28 | 79 | | 2008-10-29 | 33 | | 2008-10-31 | 2 | | 2008-11-01 | 4 | | 2008-11-03 | 21 | | 2008-11-04 | 19 | | 2008-11-05 | 15 | | 2008-11-07 | 49 | | 2008-11-08 | 223 | | 2008-11-09 | 537 | | 2008-11-10 | 100 | | 2008-11-11 | 253 | | 2008-11-13 | 1 | | 2008-11-14 | 27 | | 2008-11-15 | 71 | | 2008-11-16 | 216 | | 2008-11-18 | 264 | | 2008-11-19 | 99 | | 2008-11-20 | 51 | | 2008-11-21 | 279 | | 2008-11-22 | 1246 | | 2008-11-23 | 775 | | 2008-11-24 | 316 | | 2008-11-25 | 131 | | 2008-11-26 | 2 | | 2008-11-27 | 508 | | 2008-11-28 | 68 | | 2008-11-29 | 2 | | 2008-11-30 | 13 | | 2008-12-02 | 19 | | 2008-12-04 | 51 | | 2008-12-05 | 591 | | 2008-12-07 | 1 | | 2008-12-08 | 40 | | 2008-12-09 | 6 | | 2008-12-10 | 832 | | 2008-12-11 | 69 | | 2008-12-13 | 98 | | 2008-12-14 | 21 | | 2008-12-15 | 36 | | 2008-12-16 | 277 | | 2008-12-17 | 776 | | 2008-12-18 | 329 | | 2008-12-19 | 3178 | | 2008-12-20 | 4689 | | 2008-12-21 | 4698 | | 2008-12-22 | 8602 | | 2008-12-23 | 6641 | | 2008-12-24 | 9145 | | 2008-12-25 | 7252 | | 2008-12-26 | 14 | | 2008-12-27 | 135 | | 2008-12-28 | 6469 | | 2008-12-29 | 8362 | | 2008-12-30 | 8725 | | 2008-12-31 | 8801 | | 2009-01-01 | 7301 | | 2009-01-02 | 5264 | | 2009-01-03 | 7761 | | 2009-01-04 | 7936 | | 2009-01-05 | 6547 | | 2009-01-06 | 7894 | | 2009-01-07 | 7657 | | 2009-01-08 | 6104 | | 2009-01-09 | 8240 | | 2009-01-10 | 7617 | | 2009-01-11 | 7838 | | 2009-01-12 | 7764 | | 2009-01-13 | 7750 | | 2009-01-14 | 7822 | | 2009-01-15 | 7351 | | 2009-01-16 | 6512 | | 2009-01-17 | 7986 | | 2009-01-18 | 8061 | | 2009-01-19 | 7649 | | 2009-01-20 | 7463 | | 2009-01-21 | 7813 | | 2009-01-22 | 6996 | | 2009-01-23 | 3964 | | 2009-01-24 | 7727 | | 2009-01-25 | 6941 | | 2009-01-26 | 7673 | | 2009-01-27 | 7015 | | 2009-01-28 | 7611 | | 2009-01-29 | 6304 | | 2009-01-30 | 7938 | | 2009-01-31 | 7954 | | 2009-02-01 | 7680 | | 2009-02-02 | 7341 | | 2009-02-03 | 7881 | | 2009-02-04 | 7890 | | 2009-02-05 | 7715 | | 2009-02-06 | 7326 | | 2009-02-07 | 7567 | | 2009-02-08 | 6797 | | 2009-02-09 | 7850 | | 2009-02-10 | 7215 | | 2009-02-11 | 6868 | | 2009-02-12 | 7179 | | 2009-02-13 | 7196 | | 2009-02-14 | 7099 | | 2009-02-15 | 6160 | | 2009-02-16 | 6999 | | 2009-02-17 | 7210 | | 2009-02-18 | 7746 | | 2009-02-19 | 7451 | | 2009-02-20 | 6750 | | 2009-02-21 | 7738 | | 2009-02-22 | 8041 | | 2009-02-23 | 8236 | | 2009-02-24 | 7663 | | 2009-02-25 | 6685 | | 2009-02-26 | 6330 | | 2009-02-27 | 6074 | | 2009-02-28 | 7338 | | 2009-03-01 | 7925 | | 2009-03-02 | 7703 | | 2009-03-03 | 8107 | | 2009-03-04 | 7265 | | 2009-03-05 | 7081 | | 2009-03-06 | 4830 | | 2009-03-08 | 1 | | 2009-03-11 | 508 | | 2009-03-13 | 44 | | 2009-03-15 | 4 | | 2009-03-16 | 111 | | 2009-03-18 | 1 | | 2009-03-19 | 116 | | 2009-03-21 | 4 | | 2009-03-23 | 355 | | 2009-03-27 | 1 | +------------+-----------+ 556 rows in set (58.53 sec)

Top 25 deletion summaries

mysql> SELECT -> log_comment AS reason, -> COUNT(*) AS uses -> FROM logging -> WHERE log_user=212624 -> AND log_type="delete" -> AND log_action="delete" -> GROUP BY reason -> ORDER BY COUNT(*) DESC -> LIMIT 25; +-------------------------------------------------------------------+--------+ | reason | uses | +-------------------------------------------------------------------+--------+ | [[WP:OLDIP|Old IP talk page]] | 500232 | | csd g7 | 91945 | | [[WP:CSD#G6|CSD G6]] | 47958 | | csd u2 | 37482 | | orphaned talk page redirect | 26681 | | csd g6 | 18137 | | csd g8 | 16399 | | temporary userpage over 1 month old for indefinitely blocked user | 15106 | | csd r1 | 14366 | | csd g2 | 5388 | | [[WP:CSD#G8|CSD G8]] | 3596 | | csd c1 | 2961 | | [[WP:CSD#G2|CSD G2]] | 2828 | | [[WP:CSD#G7|CSD G7]] | 2375 | | unnecessary page | 2256 | | orphaned subpage for indefinitely blocked user | 2052 | | csd t3 | 1948 | | [[WP:CSD#R1|CSD R1]] | 1179 | | csd a5 | 1135 | | csd g1 | 963 | | csd u1 | 931 | | deprecated template without user objections | 760 | | csd a7 | 729 | | [[WP:CSD#U2|CSD U2]] | 471 | | inappropriate use of user page | 261 | +-------------------------------------------------------------------+--------+ 25 rows in set (3.52 sec)

Calculating a "success" rate is nearly impossible. Whether a page currently exists does not indicate whether a previous speedy deletion was appropriate or not. The very nature of speedy deletion means that pages are constantly re-created appropriately following deletions in many, many cases.

I've provided some analysis here. More detailed analysis is possible, though it's best left for those with more inclination than I.

I will note, however, that because I was only dealing with one user ID, aggregating statistics was significantly easier (for my purposes, at least).

Thanks for the stats. I realise that many pages are constantly recreated for legitimate reasons, but how easy would it be to get a crude figure for number and percentage of bluelinks in your deletion log? If that is possible, is it then easy to determine what percentage and number of those are recreations, as opposed to undeletions? Technically, there would likely be cases of deletion-recreation-redeletion cycles and deletion-undeletion-redeletion cycles. The possibilities for analysing such things are a bit endless, really. Sorting the results by the deletion summaries you gave above is another possibility, but as you said, maybe "best left for those with more inclination". The main point of this question was to get a larger picture of the scale and nature of the maintenance deletions you perform, and the stats you have provided have done that. The idea behind counting the blue links in your deletion log was to get an idea of how many 'silent' recreations there are where no-one turns up on your talk page to question the initial deletion. Carcharoth (talk) 01:03, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

The further stats I was after have been provided by Dragons flight here. I don't have any further questions here about the stats. Carcharoth (talk) 01:31, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I ran my own queries and my numbers pretty much agree with those found by Dragons flight. I do want to note however, that when I sampled the data, the first entry I came across was User:Dtrebbien/Sandbox, which I had previously deleted per author request (CSD G7). So, these stats, while interesting, mean very little overall.

3. Technical details of deletions - you said "Over the years I’ve used JavaScript, Python, and a Firefox extension that allows batch tab opening to do deletions. As well as doing many by hand. Most recently I’ve been using Python for the majority of my deletions." As you know, using tabs is what led to the second injunction during this case. Could you expand on what you consider the differences to be between automated and semi-automated tasks, and at what point you would leave a script unsupervised and when you would do a manual review of each page instead. Is "batch tab opening" a form of automation or semi-automation? Please feel free to go into as much detail as needed.

I don't feel this is an appropriate forum to delve into the semantics of automated versus non-automated actions. Generally I've held that something is automated if there is no human intervention. Semi-automated is when there is help from outside tools but human intervention. Batch tab opening is semi-automated, I suppose.

4. Community discussion and being bold - in response to the question “Can you provide examples of community discussions before you started deletion runs?”, you linked to the talk page of WP:BOLD. You also said "I don’t really know what this question means. For things like broken redirects, there’s been agreement that we should delete those for years and years. Orphaned talk pages, the same. Old IP talk pages were discussed at various noticeboards and project-space talk pages (I can provide links if necessary.)" Could you please provide these links you've said you can provide? I also recall some discussions at WT:CSD (criteria for speedy deletion) - would you be able to provide links to any discussions there that changed the way you carried out speedy deletions, or where the criteria were rewritten to follow established practice?

See Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 32#Deletion of old IP talk pages, Wikipedia talk:User page/Archive 5#Old IP talk pages, and Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive180#Deletion of old IP talk pages for the original discussions. OLDIP was added to WP:USER. Subsequent discussions took place on my talk page after which I modified the deletion script to scan page text for certain key words, see: User talk:MZMcBride/Archive 13#Spam-tracking pages, Wikipedia talk:User page#OLDIP and Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 33#U4.

5. Adminbot requests and BAG (Bot Approvals Group) - you said "I started operating adminbots during this era and old habits die hard, I suppose. I should also note that I’m one of many admins who run bots and scripts under their main account. And most of this is sanctioned and appreciated by the community." If the latter refers specifically to the tasks you carry out, could you provides example of community sanction and appreciation for your tasks?

Here, here, here, here, and here. Those were the most recent deletion-related compliments I could find.

6. Other bots and admins - your example of ST47 updating election tally subpages doesn't seem strictly relevant, as there was no need to use admin tools to update the subpage, unless it was protected as it probably was. Also, the task was uncontroversial and easily tracked (not the case for rapid and diverse deletions as part of a log of 800,000 actions). In any case, data updates, as you do for Wikipedia:Database reports, are qualitatively different from deletions, and don't require admin tools unless the page in question is protected. Do you agree with that assessment?

No, your assessment is wrong.

My point was that for all this demonizing of automated actions and unapproved bots, the Arbitration Committee itself has benefited from both substantially. And, no, your point is invalid. ST47's user contributions were "cluttered" with his contributions to his subpage every fifteen minutes.

More broadly, there continue to be a number of adminbots that are run daily, some of which even identify themselves as robots in their log actions.

7. Recognising and repairing mistakes - can you provide examples of a deletion run or task where there were valid objections and where you stopped the run and undeleted the pages you deleted or asked someone to undelete the pages for you?

All of my talk page archives are available here.

And some further questions that have arisen since the last questions were asked:

8. Conduct during the case - do you think there were misunderstandings surrounding the injunctions? If so, how could such misunderstandings have been avoided? Once an injunction is in place, should the onus be on the parties to a case to ask questions about it, or should the parties trust their own interpretation of the injunctions? [Note: no-one has presented evidence related to conduct during the case - if you (or anyone) has links to ANI or other discussions that took place during the case, that would be good.]

The primary issue here is that ArbCom's first injunction simply wasn't written the way it should have been, something only later realized. As Sam puts it here, ArbCom's intention was apparently to stop all deletions, not simply automated or semi-automated deletions.

If the objective was to stop deletions, the injunction should have plainly said so. But it didn't, which was a failing on ArbCom's part.

9. Tension between process (see Wikipedia:Process is important) and WP:IAR and WP:BOLD and bot actions - do you think that WP:BOLD and WP:IAR can be applied to bot actions, or does the volume and speed of such actions make it inappropriate to be bold?

Yes, it's possible to appropriately apply WP:BOLD to bot actions, though it should be done with care.

10. Prior discussion and reaction to objections - do you accept that in some of the previous incidents involving deletions runs, some prior discussion, or more prior discussion, might have avoided or reduced the volume of objections, or would there have been objections regardless, and at what point should a decision be made to go ahead (or continue or restart a run) in the face of objections?

Prior discussion can be helpful, but in many cases it simply provides an opportunity for people with bad intentions to try to make a power-grab and delay action in order to inflate their own sense of "power" and control. That is, many times people don't have objections to the actual tasks being performed (the vast, vast majority of people don't care at all). Instead, people will use discussions to raise irrelevant points in an effort to cloud the discussion and troll.

Legitimate objections should always be listened to and carefully considered. Unfortunately, the majority of objections are generally illegitimate.

11. Previous incidents - three major previous incidents are mentioned on the Workshop page:
    • (a) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Archive141#User:MZMcBride_and_large_numbers_of_deletions
    • (b) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive427#Massive_redirect_deletions
    • (c) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Archive180#Deletion_of_old_IP_talk_pages
    In hindsight, what would you say you learned from those incidents?

I've learned that the community is quick to judge and act and I've learned that sometimes communication can be helpful. I've also learned that noticeboards can be used constructively, but oftentimes are used as a means to create drama, troll, and do nothing else.

12. Previous blocks - looking at your block log, I see several block log entries that mention your bot actions (Block log). The dates are: 23 November 2007, 31 May 2008, 3 June 2008, 5 December 2008, 25 December 2008, 6 March 2009 (twice). Were these blocks justified, in your opinion? If not, why not? If you or anyone else can provide links to discussions of the blocks, that would be good as well.

• 23 November 2007 — inappropriate block quickly overturned by the admin (who is no longer an admin)
• 31 May 2008 — a good-faith effort to stop a bot; not really needed, but whatever
• 3 June 2008 — unjustified and unnecessary; Pilotguy had become seriously disillusioned with the project and had a grudge with me
• 5 December 2008 — inappropriate block quickly overturned by the admin; as I recall, the block and unblock all happened without me noticing; kind of bizarre
• 25 December 2008 — confusion over OLDIP deletions; acceptable block given that I wasn't around
• 6 March 2009 — the first block was rather shitty in my mind, but acceptable; the second was a technical block (a block due to technical issues)

13. Relative urgency of tasks - how urgent do you think WP:CSD#G8 deletions are compared to other tasks (such as the one where you are generating lists of biographical articles that may need Category:Living people added to them)? Do you think maintenance tasks can be done by others if needed?

I see the comparison as apples to oranges. Both are important tasks that need to be done, but trying to compare the "urgency" of them is not possible.

Maintenance tasks can be done by others, but past experience (with statistical backing) have shown that most maintenance tasks are done by a very small percentage of admins.

14. G8 deletions - as it stands, G8 is a broad spectrum of examples (there are at least 10 separate examples listed there), united by the common characteristic that the page being deleted is dependent on a deleted or non-existent page. When carrying out bot actions (where the edit summary can be programmed in an tailored to the specific page), do you think it is useful to provide a more detailed deletion log summary (for example, saying which type of G8 deletion is being done) than just a link to the CSD being used? Some of your deletions in the past seem to have linked to the associated page that was deleted (e.g. ""Zachary Katznelson" ‎ (CSD G8: Zachary Philip Katznelson)"), but your recent deletion summaries did not do that (they only linked to CSD G8) - was there a reason for that inconsistency?

The distinction made more sense when CSD R1 existed. If it's an orphaned talk page, the deletion summary "CSD G8" is used (because it's trivial to find the corresponding subject-space page using the tabs at the top). If it's a broken redirect, "CSD G8: Target page name here" is used because it's quite difficult to know where the redirect was pointing without that information.

Could the logs be made clearer? Possibly, though I like to use the most condensed (while still somewhat accessible) form possible.

15. Examples of possible deletion errors and follow-ups of recreations - could you explain the following deletions User:Mjpresson/secretpage, Talk:Red Dragon FM, Talk:Lodge Street Temple, The sovereign art foundation, Least common denominator. Do you think follow-ups are needed when pages are recreated, or when redirects are created and redirected? If a broken redirect is deleted and then recreated, is that a feature or a bug?

• User:Mjpresson/secretpage — blanked by the author, which I (mistakenly) interpreted as a request to delete the page; as I've said elsewhere, creating a subpage called "secretpage" and then blanking it and expecting to stay around forever is pretty stupid
• Talk:Red Dragon FM — Subject-space page deleted, so I deleted the orphaned talk page; later, a page was moved to its location (see here)
• Talk:Lodge Street Temple — talk page of a subject-space that never existed; should be deleted again
• The sovereign art foundation — target page deleted by another admin; I deleted the broken redirect; redirect later re-created
• Least common denominator — target page deleted by another admin; I deleted the broken redirect; redirect later re-created

Re-creating a previously speedied page is perfectly acceptable in most cases. Deleting broken redirects or orphaned talk pages (when they're broken or orphaned) is absolutely acceptable.

• User:Mjpresson/secretpage - presumably leaving a note to the user would have let them tell you that you were making a mistake here. Where do you think the line should be drawn between warning someone about an impending page deletion, and simply deleting the page and relying on them to ask you if they have a problem about it? If you have a system where standard deletions are highly automated and done by a few people, does that lose the human element of the process?
• Talk:Red Dragon FM - I believe in the past you have argued that backlogs of orphaned talk pages need to be deleted to clear the way for potential moves like this in the future. Is this an example of that sort of thing?
• Talk:Lodge Street Temple - should the editor who posted to that page be told by a human what has happened here and that he is (presumably) posting in the wrong place, or should the page just be deleted the next time the bot sweeps past?
• The sovereign art foundation - nothing further here.
• Least common denominator - the target of this redirect was a disambiguation page. The AfD is at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lowest common denominator (disambiguation). Is there not an argument that the admin who closed that debate and deleted the disambiguation page should have fixed the redirects that subsequently got broken? Going further, is there not an argument that the person best placed to decide on any talk page deletion is the admin who deletes the associated page? Shouldn't that admin be doing the deletion, rather than all the "post-deletion" tidying up deletions being left to a bot? Going back to the specific case of disambiguation pages, is it possible to detect broken redirects that are pointing at deleted disambiguation pages and flag them up for repair instead of deletion? Or is deletion a legitimate way to prompt people to repair things? Carcharoth (talk) 01:26, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

These questions aren't appropriate for this forum.

16. Checking of actions when called into question - by deleting the secret pages (and other incidents), your judgment in deleting pages (and your general judgment) has been called into question (regardless of whether your judgment is correct or not). Thus it is reasonable to check your deletions. However, the sheer volume of your deletions makes this difficult. Do you agree with this summary of this aspect of the case?

I agree that I've deleted a lot of pages and thus the workload to study the deletions is larger.

However, there's an underlying implication of some sort here, in my mind. With any user who performs a lot of actions, it becomes more difficult to review their actions. Look at Special:Contributions/Aitias, for example. While trying to determine whether he was an alternate account of someone, I had to wade through thousands of automated or semi-automated edits using Twinkle, etc. Does that mean that every person who reverts vandalism should set up a separate account? I don't believe that's a reasonable conclusion to draw.

17. IAR and deletions - Wikidemon makes the following point on the Workshop page: "Observation - Arbcomm does not need to rule or even express an opinion about a content matter like this in order to reach the case. As I have mentioned elsewhere, MZMcBride's content position in deleting the pages is defensible, finds considerable agreement, and is seemingly in good faith. At the same time speedy deletion of the user subpages is not strongly mandated by policy, and there was principled, vociferous disagreement at the time by others. What is relevant is that MZMcBride proceeded with mass page deletions despite objections and requests not to do so, not whether he was ultimately right in doing so. The question before the committee, I think, is whether WP:IAR permits the use of administrative tools to enforce one's content position in controversial cases, as opposed to uncontroversial improvements in the encyclopedia. Wikidemon (talk) 16:59, 25 March 2009 (UTC)" - do you agree with this assessment of the case?

To my knowledge, I've never cited WP:IAR or any variant of it, so I would greatly appreciate it if people stopped trying to put words into my mouth.

Overall, this assessment is simplistic and doesn't account for the other issues that make up this case.

Some of the questions are open-ended, some are specific. Please ask if you have any questions. Carcharoth (talk) 09:08, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Finished. If you have further questions, add them to a new section below. Otherwise, they won't be answered. --MZMcBride (talk) 02:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for answering so promptly. You've answered most of the questions I had, and I'm going to drop a note to the other arbitrators letting them know your answers are now available. If I have any more questions, I will ask them promptly (by the end of the weekend). My colleagues may have some questions or follow-ups as well. If any proposed principles, findings of facts, or remedies arise from these questions, I will post them in the main Workshop section for comments during the week. Carcharoth (talk) 02:54, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for the heads-up and preview of the next week. I appreciate it. --MZMcBride (talk) 03:13, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Questions for MZMcBride 4

Clerk note: Moved from the main page. Tiptoety ^talk 19:02, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I would be very grateful if MZMcBride could urgently explain to the committee how he achieved the following speeds in deleting articles (source: deletion log), which appear to be automated and in breach of the injunction.

• 08:19, 23 March 2009 (61)
• 08:18, 23 March 2009 (68)
• 08:17, 23 March 2009 (7)
• 08:16, 23 March 2009 (64)
• 08:15, 23 March 2009 (69)
• 08:14, 23 March 2009 (77)

I mention this because the committee has been asked to consider, without prejudice to the final determination, a motion to temporarily desysop MZMcBride until this case has been decided.  Roger Davies ^talk 10:28, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

To avoid any possible confusion, I'm noting here that I replied to Rlevse in these two diffs: one and two. I'm also curious to know who asked the Committee to consider a motion. And with that, I'm going to sleep; it's been a long day. --MZMcBride (talk) 10:57, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed final decision

Proposals by User:Stifle

Proposed principles

Administrators

1) Wikipedia administrators are trusted members of the community and are expected to follow all of Wikipedia's policies and guidelines to the best of their abilities. Occasional mistakes are entirely compatible with this–administrators are not expected to be perfect–but consistently poor judgement may result in reapplication for adminship via the requests for adminship procedure or suspension or revocation of adminship. If revoked, the user may have a temporary or permanent limitation placed on reapplying.

Comment by Arbitrators:

This is an earlier version of a standard wording that we use. I am sure that some version of this will go into the final decision, taken perhaps from the SemBubenny or Cla68-FM-SV case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:21, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

I believe this is standard. Taken from Wikipedia:Arbitration policy/Past decisions. Stifle (talk) 12:02, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Communication

2) Users, and particularly administrators, are expected to communicate with others when their actions are disputed.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

I don't know if there's a historical principle about this, but it seems appropriate to the case. Stifle (talk) 12:02, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I suggest copying it from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/SemBubenny/Proposed decision#Administrator communications which should have passed by the time this RFAr is done. Regards SoWhy 12:19, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Bots

3) Bots are automated or semi-automated processes which are usually used to operate menial, non-controversial tasks. Bots must be approved before operating.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Prior ArbCom discussion of bots can be found in the two Betacommand decisions and before that in the Marudubshinki case. See also my other comments below regarding adminbots. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:23, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

I don't know if there's a historical principle about this, but it seems reasonable. Stifle (talk) 12:02, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Consensus

4) As put forward in Wikipedia:Dispute resolution, Wikipedia works by building consensus. This is done through the use of polite discussion, in an attempt to develop a consensus regarding proper application of Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines such as Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. There are multiple outlets to assist consensus-building should they be required.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Submitted for consideration. Stifle (talk) 12:02, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Use of userspace

5) Active Wikipedia contributors are afforded latitude in what they keep in their userspace. However, keeping large amounts of material or material which is at odds with the purpose of the encyclopedia, especially in the userspace of new or inactive users, is discouraged. Such pages may be nominated for deletion. See also Wikipedia is not a blog, webspace provider, social networking site, or memorial site.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Agree. Secret ^account 14:23, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Submitted for consideration. Stifle (talk) 12:02, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

This principle appears to be tangential to this case. The case is about how MZMcBride went about taking these actions. This kind of judgement on content is outside the purview of both this case and ArbCom. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:07, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

But it's related to this case, as it was the topic on why MZMcBride deleted those pages in the first place. Secret ^account 14:23, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

By reaffirming that principle here as part of this case, ArbCom could be giving de facto approval to the position that "secret pages" were against policy. That is not within the purview of this case or ArbCom- that is a matter for community consensus. Nutiketaiel (talk) 18:17, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

How so? It doesn't mention secret pages specifically, its a summary of what's basically community norms and established policy with regard to userspace. Mr.Z-man 22:08, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

By implication. Nutiketaiel (talk) 17:54, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

• Agree - Like it or not, this is related to the case at hand. Whatever actions MZMcBride may have taken were taken with the goal in mind of the betterment of the Wikipedia. Removing this cruft is definitely a good thing; the issue here is simply the way this admin may have goine about doing it. Tarc (talk) 13:55, 5 March 2009 (UTC)
• Should reword - Arbcom does not need to take unnecessary content positions by endorsing one view of WP:NOT over another, only to observe that the page deletions were in support of an arguable (but not clearcut, and disputed at the time) interpretation of user page policy.Wikidemon (talk) 16:30, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed findings of fact

MZMcBride operates unauthorized bots

1) MZMcBride has operated unauthorized bots, including some that use his admin rights, on his main account, contrary to the bot policy. 1 2.

Comment by Arbitrators:

There is no dispute that MZMcBride has operated adminbots, given that he has a page in his userspace describing the purpose and programming of the bots. Last fall, we had a request for arbitration raising the question of whether MZMcBride and other admins were violating the bot policy by running bots from their admin accounts without seeking bot approval and without seeking RfA for the bots. The consensus of commenters at that time was that everyone had known for years that there were some unauthorized adminbots being operated, but they were necessary to perform important tasks, and that the appropriate course of action was community discussion to clarify the bot policy rather than an arbitration case to rule on or sanction the admins and their bots. Could someone kindly update us as to whether that discussion has taken place, what is its status, and whether there have been any policy changes or movements toward consensus on the status of adminbots in general and MZMcBride's bots in particular. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:18, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

To Dragons flight, thank you. Any additional information that you or anyone want to refer us to on this issue can be posted here or in evidence, whichever is easier. I will add that for my own part, I am not inclined to sanction MZMcBride (or anyone) substantially, or necessarily at all, for failing to comply with a recently adopted policy or consensus if it was less than completely clear that he was required to comply and that he was notified he was required to comply. Whether to require compliance going forward is a separate question. Newyorkbrad (talk) 21:31, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

It's illegal yes, but tell me what this has to do with the current case, which is MZMcBride and his deletion of the Secret pages? Secret ^account 14:21, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Because some of his bots use his admin rights which are tangential (since we are examining all aspects of his admin actions)to this RFAR as stated by the statement by the Committee at the top of the evidence page. -MBK₀₀₄ 20:15, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Submitted for consideration. Stifle (talk) 12:02, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

@Secret, it makes it very difficult to examine MZM's "IAR" deletions when his log is filled with thousands (literally) of admin-bot log entries interspersed throughout. Several people have asked him to move this task onto a bot account but he has refused. This clearly falls within the scope statement at the top of the evidence page. –xeno (talk) 14:40, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Xeno is right, this case is not about the secret pages (no matter how often this is claimed to be otherwise) but about his admin conduct overall. And it's certainly something that should be noted. SoWhy 14:46, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

User:MZMcBride/Sandbox 4. xeno is aware of this page. --MZMcBride (talk) 18:06, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, but it's a sub-optimal workaround. Having a separate bot account performing the WP:OLDIP deletions would be ideal. There doesn't seem to be any compelling reason to keep it running on your account. –xeno (talk) 18:14, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

@Newyorkbrad. How/where would you like that information? The short answer is that in September, the Bot Policy was modified to include a section on adminbots with support of most of the parties. It establishes that existing administrators may operate adminbots with the approval of WP:BRFA and that an RFA is not necessary for an adminbot. It also set a nominal time frame of two months for existing adminbots to be submitted to BRFA for approval. Many acknowledged adminbot operators have not done so. It is not obvious if all bot operators knew of the change though many (including MZMcBride) participated in the associated discussions, and would not have an excuse of ignorance. The only bots with admin powers at the present time are AntiAbuseBot, CAT:TEMP deletion bot, Cydebot, DYKadminBot, MPUploadBot, and ProcseeBot. Dragons flight (talk) 21:11, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, Dragons flight. Off to read. --Ali'i 21:24, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

@Newyorkbrad: In the discussion of a grace period for existing adminbots, MZMcBride explicitly endorsed [11] the two month grace period for pre-existing adminbots. Though to the best of my knowledge no one has ever seriously threatened him (or any other adminbot operator) with punative actions for not complying. Dragons flight (talk) 22:09, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride fails to communicate

2) MZMcBride has failed to communicate with editors whose pages he deleted. While in the context of his high level of deletion activity, it is not reasonable to expect every deletion to be explained, the deletion of so-called "secret pages" in February 2009 could have been discussed better.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This finding should also make mention of the fact that MZMcBride failed to halt his controversial deletions while discussion of that subject was going on elsewhere, along with the rude and sarcastic edit summaries directed at the users who's "sekrit" pages were being deleted. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:09, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

MFD

3) A Miscellany for deletion discussion in April 2008 failed to achieve consensus for the deletion of secret pages, other than those explicitly marked as fake secret pages.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

I marked it as a case by case basis, which means it can be renominated for MFD anytime. But yea, those pages weren't supposed to be mass deleted. Secret ^account 14:25, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Proposed remedies

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

MZMcBride directed

1) MZMcBride is directed to cease running all bot tasks on his main account forthwith. Should he run any bot tasks on his main account, he may be blocked for the duration listed in the enforcement ruling below. Should he wish to run a bot task, he shall use a bot account, which must be approved by the usual process.

Comment by Arbitrators:

To MZMcBride: Please comment on why you believe it is unnecessary (see my comments elsewhere on this page for some of my thoughts and request for additional information on the current status of adminbots). I do not at all, however, see why it would be unenforceable if it were warranted. Compare Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Marudubshinki for an example of how such a thing could be enforced, if the committee were inclined to go in that direction (I am currently unpersuaded that we need to go that far). Newyorkbrad (talk) 18:31, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I should point out that whether it is possible, with certainty to determine whether an administrator is complying with this policy or not is immaterial to the fact that there are serious technical issues with an admin using a bot with his own account (such as the inability to distinguish positively whether, and which, bot is making edits).

For that matter, MZM is a trusted bot operator and a request, by him, to approve an admin bot would not be onerous or difficult— unless the proposed task is controversial enough that it shouldn't be done at all before further discussion. — Coren ^(talk) 23:15, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Seems unnecessary and unenforceable. --MZMcBride (talk) 17:57, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

To NYB: I don't know how adminbots got dragged into this discussion (frankly, I don't know how they ever do). The deletion of secret pages wasn't automated. If anybody has suggested it was, they're quite simply lying.

My point was / is that there's no easy way to discern manual deletions from automatic deletions (compare this to this). If you can see a difference, you're a better man than I am. :-) I've been running a broken redirect deletion script under my main account daily for ... maybe a year now? And I run a script weekly to delete orphaned talk pages. I don't see any need to restrict functioning, productive processes. --MZMcBride (talk) 19:50, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I suppose there are a number of analogies one could use, both real and fictitious. Congress passing a law outlawing racism, for example. Or, in a more real sense, Prohibition. Sure, you can pass the laws, that's the easy part. It's the enforcement that's the problem. Does that mean I'm saying I'm 'above the law'? No, not at all. But when passing broad statements like this, it's best to (a) apply a standard fairly to everyone (there are quite a few admins who continue to operate bots under their main account); and (b) ensure that it's a practical and reasonable measure (this statement doesn't take into account, for example, testing under a main account which is explicitly encouraged in the current bot policy). This measure is impractical and unneeded.

A. B.: Your evidence is deeply flawed. Though, after consultation with others, I've been advised that's very likely not worth the time to refute it. So I won't. --MZMcBride (talk) 22:43, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Reply to MZMcBride- Why would it be unnecessary to go through the same process for getting a bot approved that everyone else has to use? In what way is in unenforceable, since the provision clearly spells out that you could be blocked for violating the prohibition? Nutiketaiel (talk) 18:21, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

there's no easy way to discern manual deletions from automatic deletions: I think that forms part of the "kindly-get-a-bot-approved argument". –xeno (talk) 20:03, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I think it's pretty easy to spot with your account; see the edit histories and links posted at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/MZMcBride/Evidence#MZMcBride's bot-like deletions aggravate problems. As for enforcement, see one suggestion at Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/MZMcBride/Evidence#Broader deletion concerns. Finally, you're not really saying you're exempt from community-decided policies that apply to the rest of us … are you? --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 22:06, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Unsupported by findings; also comes back to the fact that earlier stages in dispute resolution are needed - particularly in terms of community discussion. Ncmvocalist (talk) 02:22, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Unauthorized adminbots: I keep reading that everybody knows about these (including Arbcom) and tacitly ignores the issue. Furthermore, supposedly there are multiple adminbots. Can someone clue me in on this? Perhaps on the evidence talk page to begin with? What are examples of other unauthorized adminbots out there? What has Arbcom said about these? How does these bots' use square with the explicit requirements of our bot policy? In fairness to MZMcBride (and to the community, which thinks policies are for admins, too), I think this needs to come out. Personally, I think of "Ignore all rules" as a break-glass-in-case-of-emergency rule, not a hunting license for admins. --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 16:57, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I have to agree with A. B.'s point of view here: if the bots are unauthorized, then why would we look the other way? Isn't this case supposed to review MZM's entire conduct as an admin, and if so, shouldn't he be enforcing the rules on others instead of being allowed to get away with using one himself?? And please, if you can prove that other admins are runnng unauthorized bots, they should be subjected to the rule of law also. bahamut0013^words_deeds 17:48, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

There's a world of a difference between running a script every week or so to do trivial cleanup and spamming the deletion log 24/7. I see no reason to require an admin to run every job on a bot account but if someone is going to make this many deletions they should ask for a bot flag. Expanding the scope of this case to every admin who ever ran a script on their main account is overkill. It's not about invoking IAR if the task is uncontroversial, it's about doing so with sense. EconomicsGuy (talk) 17:59, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Without any comment regarding anything else here, as a technical note, a bot flag has no bearing on the deletion log whatsoever. --MZMcBride (talk) 18:06, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, but it segregates thousands of (perhaps not so) non-controversial deletions, preventing them from obscuring the other entries in your deletion log (sandbox4 notwithstanding, not everyone will know to look there). It also grants explicit approval (rather than a "let's just look the other way" tacit approval) to run a script that performs administrative actions. –xeno (talk) 18:11, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

@Bahamut: the 'Rule of Law' on wikipedia is an illusion. There are no Laws, you are not entitled to due process, you have no rights, you have no appointed defender, there is no procecution, and justice is not blind. Arbcom issues findings based on consenses as a theoretical consensus representitive of admins. If the real Admin core is unwilling to enforce Arbcom edicts then they are effectively meaningless. Therefore Arbcom will never issue a remedy which they think might not be enforced (people might realise thay have no real power). This is why they sent the unautherized bots issue back to the community to resolve, because many admins objected to Arbcom ruling against it. Once they judge that the admin community is prepared to enforce a unapproved bot ruling, then they will make it. They won't do it because its right, or because its fair, they will do it because of consensus.198.161.174.194 (talk) 03:50, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps "law" wasn't the perfect wording, but then, the point should have been succinct: the current guideline, agreed upon by consensus, is that non-approved bots are not to be run, for various reasons (mostly regarding reliability, as I have taken it). It really doesn't matter that the script he is running is very helpful and such... he is violating the current consensus. And if there are editors and admins who don't agree with that consensus, then why hasn't the policy been put up for a proposed change? Where are the discussions to alter consensus? Perhaps I missed the announcement?? I doubt very much that the community at large feels one way and the admins feel the opposite way... bahamut0013^words_deeds 18:04, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

In this sense, official consensus and unofficial concensus were at odds. The official consensus was that all bots need to be approved. But the unofficial consensus was that many useful bots were running without approval that caused no issues, and to cease the use of these bots in order to wait for approval would be disruptive. I believe it was also stated that the time and requirements to get approval was unreasonable high. A perversion of the unofficial consensus became 'the real way to get a bot approved is to run it and see if anyone complains. The longer it runs without anyone noticing the more entrenched it becomes until it is defacto approved'. Where this runs aground is enforcement of the official consensus. If the admins are the ones defying the official consensus in favor of the unofficial consensus, then who watches the watchmen? (full discloser: I watched The Watchmen and decided the comic was better ;) ). So since no one was willing to enforce the official consensus (an admin got punished for doing so... due to blocking a nondisruptive unapproved bot being concidered POINTy.) then the unofficial consensus gained steam and one can hardly blame MZM for following what appeared to be Arbcom effectively endorsing the unofficial consensus (though they made no official ruling on the bots themselves). So no one would ever OFFICIALLY say that running a bot without approval is ok... but nudge nudge wink wink...y'know.198.161.174.194 (talk) 18:54, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride admonished

2) MZMcBride is admonished for embarking on a mass deletion without communicating clearly with the users whose pages were being deleted and, as appropriate, the community.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This statement should probably make mention of his rude and sarcastic edit summaries directed at the users who's "sekrit" pages were being deleted. It wasn't just a lack of communication- what communication there was was condescending. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:15, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Disagree Whilst I disagree with the Secret page purge I'm happy to accept that it was done in good faith. So IMHO a better solution would be to clarify that such pages are basically sandbox stuff that can be a sign of a cautious newbie finding their feet before working in Mainspace. ϢereSpielChequers 16:24, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Users admonished

3) The users who created so-called secret pages, and, in many cases, large series of pages to distract users from finding those pages, are admonished for violating WP:NOT#MYSPACE.

Comment by Arbitrators:

We could make a finding that these pages are generally unproductive if we wished (but see my long comments made at the case acceptance stage for counterarguments, and of course we don't make content rulings or their equivalent for userspace). However, the users who created secret pages are not parties to the arbitration case, and going to the trouble of notifying them that they are being added to an arbitration case so that we could admonish them would probably do little more than compound the disruption that this entire situation has already caused. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:26, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Wikidemon's observation below. Carcharoth (talk) 08:37, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Agree there 100%, especially the editors that has little mainspace work. Secret ^account 14:22, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Has to be said. Stifle (talk) 12:14, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

That's a content decision that ArbCom should not make. Also, there is no consensus at all that those pages are violating WP:NOT#MYSPACE. Regards SoWhy 12:17, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. This case is about MZMcBride, not about every user who has a secret page. This is well outside the purview of both this case and ArbCom. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:10, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I completely disagree. This would not be a content decision. A "content decision" would be whether or not to label Hamas or IDF a terrorist organization, or whether to allow information about a game show contestant to be in the encyclopedia. It wouldn't be a content decision, it would be a conduct decision. Content decisions affect the main article space. People conducting themselves in a way that violates policy, however, is well within the scope of the arbitration committee (although perhaps not this "case"). The "content" (in this instance, "secret pages") is a prima facie example of bad "conduct". Mahalo. --Ali'i 15:48, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

On the contrary- it is a matter of concern regarding the content of user pages, and should be decided by community consensus. Nutiketaiel (talk) 18:23, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

There are other ways of getting this message across, such as by urging the community to come to a consensus on the matter. Alternatively, by directing administrators to deal with violations (and that wouldn't require a content definition of what those violations are). Ncmvocalist (talk) 02:28, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

This is really too general to make a useful remedy. It's like saying "Myspacers (you know who you are), knock it off." Many of the Myspacers are not necessarily aware of what they're doing and even those who are are unlikely to take any notice of an admonishment not directed at them individually. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 07:58, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

This is a conduct and not a content issue. As for whether the owners have behaved inappropriately, I think a certain amount of humour helps buld the community and these pages are harmless when done by valuable, regular contributors. Any deletions should be handled at MfD, not CSD, if someone has a concern. --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 13:40, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Agree - This most certainly not an issue of content, it is an issue of reinforcing existing policy. Tarc (talk) 14:02, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Agree There's been too much discussion of "rights" and some people have forgotten that our purpose is to build an encyclopaedia. Building the community comes second to that goal. At the end of the day people don't donate to WMF for the server resources to be squirrelled away on things that other sites (Myspace, Facebook, Bebo etc) do far better. Orderinchaos 13:35, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Disagree Whilst I fully agree that users who are MySpacing and not yet contributing to the Encyclopaedia should be gently encouraged to start contributing, a blanket ban on secret pages would include editors who've gone through that phase and are now productive contributors. The financial cost of these pages is trivial, and if you think of them as sandbox stuff by new editors it ceases to be a problem - sometimes I wish a few more of our new editors would cut their teeth in user space. ϢereSpielChequers 16:10, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Observation - Arbcomm does not need to rule or even express an opinion about a content matter like this in order to reach the case. As I have mentioned elsewhere, MZMcBride's content position in deleting the pages is defensible, finds considerable agreement, and is seemingly in good faith. At the same time speedy deletion of the user subpages is not strongly mandated by policy, and there was principled, vociferous disagreement at the time by others. What is relevant is that MZMcBride proceeded with mass page deletions despite objections and requests not to do so, not whether he was ultimately right in doing so. The question before the committee, I think, is whether WP:IAR permits the use of administrative tools to enforce one's content position in controversial cases, as opposed to uncontroversial improvements in the encyclopedia. Wikidemon (talk) 16:59, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed enforcement

Enforcement by block

1) Should MZMcBride run an unapproved bot task on his main account, he may be blocked for an appropriate duration by any administrator, bearing in mind that blocks should be preventative rather than punitive. Blocks should be logged below in the "Log of blocks and bans". Blocks under this remedy shall not be overturned other than with the consent of the blocking administrator or with a clear consensus on an appropriate forum (such as WP:ANI) that the block, or duration, was inappropriate.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This does nothing to address the issues of his failure to communicate, seek consensus, obey consensus or heed the requests of the community to stop controversial actions and await consensus, nor the rude and sarcastic edit summaries he was targeting at the users who's "sekrit" pages he was deleting. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:13, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Please feel free to propose your own remedies etc. (: Stifle (talk) 20:23, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I think he should be de-sysoped. I also don't feel that it's my place to suggest such a thing, so I won't be writing a proposal to that effect. Nutiketaiel (talk) 20:27, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Isn't this what's happening already, on two occasions as a preventative measure? - Mailer Diablo 21:58, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I like the wording but cannot agree that it is appropriate - we don't even block long term pains in the neck who disrupt article work, and I believe the tasks being done by this admin are necessary, if controversial. Orderinchaos 13:36, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Template

2) {text of proposed enforcement}

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposals by User:Ali'i

Proposed principles

What Wikipedia is

1) Wikpedia is a project to create a high-quality, free-content encyclopedia in a collegial, respectful atmosphere among its contributors.

Comment by Arbitrators:

The current standard wording: "The purpose of Wikipedia is to create a high-quality, free-content encyclopedia in an atmosphere of cameraderie and mutual respect among the contributors." Newyorkbrad (talk) 16:29, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Wikipedia:About, Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not, Wikipedia:Five pillars, User:Jimbo Wales/Statement of principles. --Ali'i 15:51, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Tweked slightly per Brad. (Omitted "cameraderie" [sic], and "purpose"... trying to define what it is rather than its purpose) --Ali'i 16:44, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I've often thought the purpose principle is necessary in nearly every case, however, I don't think much will be achieved by restating it in this case. The same with the above alternative. Ncmvocalist (talk) 02:30, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

No, I think it's important context for MZMcBride's actions. And the actions of everyone who wants to contribute here. What Wikipedia is helps define what Wikipedians can and should do. --Ali'i 14:19, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I've already conceded that it is relevant to everyone and nearly every case, but I (and this is just my view) don't find your other reason compelling as it obfuscates some of the issues in this case. The purpose of Wikipedia is a broader idea; people are expected to work towards achieving the purpose of Wikipedia if they are editing. MZMcBride seems to have always tried to perform his actions in line with that purpose beyond anything else, and arguably, some could say that he succeeded in many ways, but failed in others. That doesn't help define, underline, or address the problems that precipitated this case much at all. Ncmvocalist (talk) 07:50, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed with either form of the wording, in intent. Orderinchaos 13:39, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Improving Wikipedia

2) If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, it should be ignored.

Comment by Arbitrators:

There was some relevant prior discussion on this in the Sarah Palin case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 18:32, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

User:Jimbo Wales/Statement of principles, Wikipedia:Ignore all rules, Wikipedia:What "Ignore all rules" means, Wikipedia:Five pillars. --Ali'i 15:51, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

IAR does not mean break the rules every time they're in the way. It means break the rules if process is in the way. How, exactly, is asking for a bot flag (process) in the way here? What's the urgency with these deletions that continue to render the deletion log totally useless? EconomicsGuy (talk) 16:05, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Not about bot flags... it's more a general statement of principles. --Ali'i 16:08, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Okay, in that case I agree. The principle just doesn't work unless you apply it with sense, which is my point here. EconomicsGuy (talk) 16:15, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, obviously. Mahalo. --Ali'i 16:20, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

IAR is not a free pass to ingore consensus, nor create it when none exists. bahamut0013^words_deeds 17:52, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Agree. This is fundamental to how Wikipedia operates, we are not a bureaucracy. The key, of course, is ensuring that one is in fact "improving and maintaining Wikipedia" and not simply breaking rules for the hell of it and citing IAR. However I believe the actions by the user under consideration fall within "improving and maintaining". Orderinchaos 13:38, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposals by Mailer Diablo

Proposed principles

Admin bots

1) Admins should not run bots on their sysop account that are enabled to perform sysop actions (blocking, deleting, etc) without specific community approval from Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval and/or WP:RFA.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

From RfAr/Betacommand. - Mailer Diablo 22:19, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

It has been said elsewhere that there are several admins (other than MZMcBride) that run bots/scripts like this. Is there any proof of this, or is there anyone willing to identify the others? If there are indeed others, since adminbots are now within the scope of this arbitration, they should be notified that their activities fall within the purview of this case, if they wish to respond. Thanks. --Ali'i 16:56, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

This is a mostly complete list as of last summer. Dragons flight (talk) 21:24, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Bot policy now holds that BRFA is the correct mechanism for adminbot approval and RFA is not. See also my comments higher up this page. Dragons flight (talk) 21:24, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Communication

2) Due to the collaborative nature of Wikipedia, proper communication is extremely important, and all editors are expected to respond to messages intended for them in a timely manner and to constructively discuss controversial issues. This is especially true for administrators in regard to administrative actions. Such expected communication includes: giving appropriate (as guided by Wikipedia's policies and guidelines) warnings prior to, and notification messages following, their actions; using accurate and descriptive edit and administrative action summaries; and responding promptly and fully to all good-faith concerns raised about their administrative actions.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

From RfAr/Betacommand. - Mailer Diablo 22:19, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed remedies

MZMcBride temporarily desysopped

1.) For his failure to communicate and out-of-process bot deletions of pages, in contravention of the bot policy, MZMcBride (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) is desysopped for a period of three months. After three months, his administrator access will be automatically restored.

Upon restoration of access, MZMcBride shall not run any admin-bot tasks on his main account forthwith. Should he wish to run a bot task, he shall use a bot account, which must be approved by the usual process. Should he violate this restriction, the Arbitration Committee may remove his administrator access (either temporarily or permanently).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Compromise of sorts between the two extremes. Taken from SV motion. - Mailer Diablo 16:45, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

No comment on the merits of this, but, I don't think this would be supported given the voting on SemBunney2. Ncmvocalist (talk) 16:58, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride's bot tasks are, for the most part, uncontroversial. The only exception I can think of is the spam pages, but he agreed to search for spam keywords before deleting. While they may be a technical violation of the bot policy, the rejection of the "unapproved adminbots" RFAR would seem to suggest that if its not causing any actual problems, its not something ArbCom is going to issue sanctions over. He's also been working on formulating a guideline/CSD for the IP talk pages, so I would hardly call them "out-of-process." AFAIK, the "secret pages" deletions were all manual. Mr.Z-man 17:10, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

It would seem that the SP deletions weren't automated... after all, I've never met a bot that can speak lolcat. bahamut0013^words_deeds 17:54, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

They most certainly could have been though. NuclearWarfare _(Talk) 04:06, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

The list was obviously generated using a script, but as far as I know, the deletions were all manual, which is likely why your page wasn't deleted. Mr.Z-man 18:34, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Disagree I believe this remedy is excessive - should be reserved for actual disruption rather than a measurement of the scale of drama erupting from less-than-perfect execution of actions. Orderinchaos 13:40, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposals by User:SoWhy

Proposed principles

WP:IAR is not a carte blanche

1) WP:IAR is important for Wikipedia. But it is not a replacement for discussion, nor a trump card to ignore dissenting opinions. If challenged every user needs to explain why the rule should be ignored, not continue to ignore it without discussion.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This is probably going to raise outcries but let me explain my reasoning: At WP:IAR? it says "It is neither a trump card nor a carte blanche". It's not something you use after you have been challenged for it. Because then you know that some people disagree with you and IAR is not a trump carte to avoid discussion and/or finding consensus. And it's nothing you should use if you a.) know that there is an active discussion going on where people explicitly have stated that they disagree with such actions and b.) know that there is opposition to your actions past on previous experience (for example an MFD with a clear "no consensus" close). IAR should be used to ignore rules if they prevent you from improving Wikipedia. But if you break them to ignore dissenting opinions, then it's usually not an improvement. SoWhy 16:22, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I completely agree. This seems to be one of the main points of the issue at hand. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:05, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I prefer the clear and simple wording of WP:IAR personally - with the emphasis on "improving or maintaining". As it stands it does not give carte blanche, the last sentence in this proposition appears to be added bureaucracy. Orderinchaos 13:41, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Wouldn't ArbCom passing a ruling defining rules for IAR kind of defeat the purpose? Mr.Z-man 18:35, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't see a problem stating that. It's not a ruling, it's a stating of principles. Anyone who thinks IAR is a carte blanche to do whatever they like, essentially ignores the spirit of IAR anyway and it cannot hurt to remind people of that. SoWhy 20:16, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Then it should just say that - "IAR is not carte blanche to do whatever you want." None of this "If challenged, then do this..." Mr.Z-man 00:15, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Administrators

2) Administrators are trusted members of the community. They are expected to lead by example and to behave in a respectful, civil manner in their interactions with others. Administrators are expected to follow Wikipedia policies and to perform their duties to the best of their abilities. Occasional mistakes are entirely compatible with adminship, as administrators are not expected to be perfect, but consistently or egregiously poor judgment may result in the removal of administrator status. Administrators are expected to learn from experience and from justified criticisms of their actions.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

From Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/SemBubenny/Proposed decision#Administrators. SoWhy 09:44, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Administrator communications

3) Administrators are expected to provide timely and civil explanations for their actions. All administrator actions are logged and offer a "reason" field to be used for this purpose. While all editors are expected to reply to good-faith queries about their activities placed on their talk page, administrators are particularly expected to respond promptly and civilly to queries about their administrative actions and to justify them when needed.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

From Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/SemBubenny/Proposed decision#Administrator communications. SoWhy 09:44, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Deletion policy

4) Wikipedia:Deletion policy, Wikipedia:Undeletion policy, and Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion together provide policy and procedure for deletion and undeletion of pages. Wikipedia administrators are expected to use the deletion and undeletion abilities granted to them in a fashion consistent with these policies. Administrators who wish to delete pages that are clearly outside the criteria for speedy deletion should list those pages at the appropriate deletion discussion or, in case of articles, Proposed deletion. This does not negate the right of administrators to delete blatantly inappropriate content (i.e. where no valid controversy can be considered possible) even if it falls outside the formal CSD criteria, nor constrain application of our policy on biographies of living persons.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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Comment by others:

From Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/SemBubenny/Proposed decision#ADeletion policy, slightly re-worded. I think it is important to add how "blatantly inappropriate" has to be understood, else is highly subjective. SoWhy 09:44, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed findings of fact

Using an adminbot

1) MZMcBride has been running scripts that automate deletions through his main account, which was raised thrice at the administrator's noticeboards in April 2008, June 2008 and in December 2008.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Ignoring Wikipedia:Bot policy

2) Despite being urged to do so, MZMcBride has declined to get approval for an adminbot to do the automated deletions.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This finding fails to take into account the users who were willing to (reasonably clearly) overlook this "requirement". Ncmvocalist (talk) 12:32, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Is it not ignoring policy just because some people said it's okay to ignore it? SoWhy 12:36, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I think you may be missing my point; one can't divorce an incident from its full context - especially when there were other 'urges', views, comments, and the like. Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:06, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Appears to be singling out one user for a common problem (see other comments on this page and elsewhere). Orderinchaos 13:43, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Ignored criticism

3) Despite being criticized for his deletions and in December 2008 even blocked[12] for running a script without responding, MZMcBride has continued to delete pages even while discussion about whether the deletions are within policy was ongoing.[13] He ignored all appeals to pause the deletions for the time it might take to discuss the issue, presenting the community with a fait accompli instead.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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Comment by others:

What are those links supposed to establish? The secret pages deletions (which AFAIK were all done manually, or manually reviewed) are a totally separate incident from the December block. This makes it sound like it was all one contiguous event. Mr.Z-man 17:14, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

This case is not about the secret pages deletions but about MZM's behavior in general of which the latest controversy is just an example. SoWhy 00:48, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

My point was that the phrasing seems to suggest the December block and the secret pages deletions are directly associated with each other - they aren't. Mr.Z-man 00:54, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't believe this proposition accurately characterises the situation. He did in fact pause at a critical juncture, so the last sentence is false. Orderinchaos 13:44, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Insulting deletion reasons

4) MZMcBride deleted "secret pages" with insulting deletion summaries (example) that violate both Wikipedia:No personal attacks and Wikipedia:Assume good faith.

Comment by Arbitrators:

The wording of the deletion summaries was inappropriate, particularly as the log entries were the only communication explaining why the pages were deleted. I may propose a reworded version of this. Newyorkbrad (talk) 13:32, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

No matter what one might think about these pages, I think it's clearly insulting to tell people they are not doing enough for Wikipedia (people with more than 3000 edits in this example). SoWhy 10:01, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

If people want others to consider their concerns, I think it's only fair to expect that some consideration is given to differing views too. While I agree it may be an issue worth noting, it's in dire need of rewording. Ncmvocalist (talk) 12:37, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

The statements aren't a different view, they're blatantly rude and insulting. This finding is accurate just the way it is. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:09, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

If it was perfectly accurate the way it was, then I wouldn't find issue. :) And to be perfectly blunt, I do find issue. Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:28, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Then what is inaccurate about the above statement? With what do you find issue? Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:33, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I find issue with the wording, as I implied earlier. I'm considering this moot, as I think Nyb will resolve this in due course via a rewording. Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:50, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Would you mind trying to explain why you find issue with the wording? I'm not trying to annoy you, but English is not my mother tongue and as such I am eager to know what to improve if I made a mistake with the wording. Regards SoWhy 13:57, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

But he said "please". Isn't that enough? ;-) I think everyone agrees that he could have used slighty better wording, although I might argue that it doesn't really violate the No Personal Attacks policy (the civility policy... probably). Although I'd probably note that the lolspeak isn't necessarily harmful. For most on the Internet, it's a common enough occurance as to not be totally insulting (especially since the entry wasn't entirely lolspeak, and gave additional information). Your mileage may vary. --Ali'i 14:29, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

The log itself should be edited by someone like BRION VIBBER or Tim Starling. Same for any other insulting log. Anonymous Contributor.

Look, I have problems with some of MZMcBride's actions and the seeming arrogance that accompanied them; I don't think he should have deleted these pages without discussion, but they were sort of an inside joke after all and it's possible that he was attempting to use friendly humour to comment, even if it was subject to misinterpretation. These edit summaries definitely represent poor communications -- edit summaries are insufficient for controversial actions. Also, such humour without more context is very prone to misinterpretation. Nevertheless, I think that of the two possible explanations (a misfired joke vs. an intended insult), AGF requires we assume the first, unless someone can show that MZMcBride has a history of insulting people. A dope slap may be more appropriate here than an official sanction. --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 15:08, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Also, a bit of process wonkery: there should probably be a note of this edit summary issue on the evidence page. Likewise, if someone has evidence to show that these edit summaries might have been intentionally insulting (for instance, a prior history of MZMcBride insulting people), that should also be included there. If these really were intended to be insulting, I believe MZMcBride should be desysoped, but as I note imemdiately above, I have my doubts. --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 15:13, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't think the lolspeak is the insulting part but the implied "you don't do enough for Wikipedia!"-part. At the very least it's uncivil and uncalled for. But I will try to phrase an alternative. SoWhy 15:23, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Well the issue is it's entirely a matter of interpretation (how you look at it). Whether it's during an ArbCom case, or at an administrator noticeboard, when a party can't let an incident go, or when editors start piling on a discussion, many administrators often end up wondering loudly "can we all go back to working on the encyclopedia more NOW?" (aka search for exposed drama less). That isn't intended to mean one isn't doing enough for the encyclopedia, rather, it's intended to say 'the time spent doing this, or defending this, would be better spent building the encyclopedia'. I'm not saying that his choice of words (or actions) were necessarily appropriate or seemly, but if we want people to AGF, then the same needs to be extended the other way, even when interpreting others edit-summaries. Ncmvocalist (talk) 16:33, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

That example is not even remotely insulting or offensive, but rather just sarcastic and blunt. People really need to develop some thicker skin around here if doing a parody of I can has cheezburger is making them feel all offended. Jesus. Tarc (talk) 14:06, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, because sarcasm is really helpful. Nutiketaiel (talk) 12:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

That was perhaps the dumbest essay I've seen on the Wikipedia, and that's saying a lot. The point here was that people are making far too big of a deal over this particular nitpick. Tarc (talk) 13:47, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Whatever your opinion of the essay, sarcasm is completely inappropriate for an Admin's communication with users regarding the deletion of pages. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:55, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, because admins are expected to be emotionless robots as they go about performing their roles here. If I was plowing through dozens upon dozens of that mindless, idiot cruft that this secret myspace stuff is, I'd probably develop quite a sarcastic streak too. This is seriously making a mountains of molehills, so as a wise man one said, "Lighten up, Francis". Tarc (talk) 14:24, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

They are not expected to be emotionless. They ARE expected to be polite. And since he was obviously using to bot to effect the deletions, he was not "plowing through" them, he set an automated task and let it run. Is it really that difficult to set it with a more appropriate message? Nutiketaiel (talk) 15:07, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

unindent It's not unreasonable to expect an admin to not offer something that could potentially be insulting... and it would take a really insensitive person to not see how this could be insulting. I'd also think more than twice about how I worded something if it was going to be repeated over and over and over to many different people (which is why many high-use templates are protected against vandalism). Sarcasm should not be acceptable to anyone except a user you know very well and you are positive will take it with good humor; given the volume here, that can't be the case. bahamut0013^words_deeds 18:21, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Failure to communicate

5) MZMcBride deleted "secret pages" without warning the users they belonged to and did not leave any explanation on their talk pages justifying his reasoning. He deleted them using deletion summaries (example) that violate both Wikipedia:Civility and Wikipedia:Assume good faith. He continued to do it in the same manner, even after users complained to him and users on WP:AN asked him to pause and/or stop.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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Alternative finding of fact to #4 above, reworded. SoWhy 15:29, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Users have often been warned not to violate WP:NOT#MYSPACE and when users don't "get it" we have treated it as a blockable offence in the past (eg GP75 etc). Orderinchaos 13:46, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

There is no consensus that these pages violate WP:NOT#MYSPACE nor would that mean that such manners are okay. SoWhy 20:18, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed remedies

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

MZMcBride desysopped

1.) MZMcBride's administrative privileges are revoked. He may apply to have them reinstated at any time, either through the usual means or by appeal to the Committee.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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Comment by others:

This will probably not be popular with some people defending his actions but I think this is warranted. Again, this is not because I like secret pages or anything. MZMcBride has been previously strongly admonished by this Commitee just a few months ago. Since then, he has repeatedly ignored WP:CSD to delete pages he did not deem valuable for Wikipedia instead of using the correct venues. The most concerning thing about that are not the deletions outside policy but his clear disregard for community discussion and consensus. On the secret pages issue, he ignored that there was a discussion ongoing(!) on how to treat those pages. After he started his deletions in midst of this ongoing discussion, he ignored appeals to pause his actions by multiple admins and users even for the length of a discussion (which noone can say is a good way to apply WP:IAR) to take place. He did the same with the OLDIP deletions, something that was not policy when he started deleting them (and caused for example multiple problems for Wikipedia:WikiProject Spam which used some of those pages to track known spammers). He continues to use an unapproved adminbot after several admins asked him to stop and get it approved. His deletion reasons (see FoF #4) are insulting to all editors involved and completely inappropriate for an admin who is thought to be an example to other users. His unwillingness to communicate with people who disagree with his actions and to reflect on criticism rather than to ignore it and to continue the criticized action make him a bad example to every user. All in all, his behavior is inconsistent with a project that relies and thrives on discussion and collaboration. Ignoring the rules is good as long as it helps the project. Ignoring other users' concerns and opinions is not. Regards SoWhy 10:22, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Just want to go on record saying that MZMcBride does (often thankless) yeoman's work as an administrator, and Wikipedia would be worse off in several ways if he was desysopped. First, and most obvious, we would lose his immense body of administrator work. Second, it would be a signal to the community that the arbitration committee tacitly approves of unencyclopedic pages, and will punish anyone who attempts the bold move of eliminating them (as well as other editors doing anything boldly). It would be a signal to the community that process and wikipolitics are king while product, quality, and ingenuity are unessential. Third, it would be a signal that the arbitration committee "plays favorites" with regards to adminbots (if what has been said is true, that other admins run "unapproved" bots, yet only one gets desysopped, while the others aren't reprimanded). Fourth (MZMcBride can correct me if I'm wrong), if desysopped, MZMcBride may feel as if all of his actions are not valued, become (further) disillusioned from the project, and leave altogether (which would be a terrible loss for Wikipedia). Some of these concerns could be tempered slightly by other remedies/findings of fact, but these and other unwritten tangential issues lead me to believe that desysopping MZMcBride would be deleterious for the encyclopedia (and we should be doing things to help the encyclopedia, not hurt it). If his actions are indeed an issue, we have barely scratched the surface in behavior modification methods (and not in the creepy meaning of those words). Jumping to arbitration was bad enough, desysopping would be the paragon of hastiness. I urge the arbitration committee to not consider this lightly. Mahalo nui loa. --Ali'i 15:41, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

While I won't be as verbose as Ali'i, I also think desysopping is unnecessary. MZM may need to splash some cold water on his face, but desysopping is premature and does not present a net benefit for the encyclopedia. –xeno (talk) 15:44, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I knew that this proposal will probably cause such outcries. Nevertheless, I think it's the correct way. MZM had his cold water splash already at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Sarah Palin protection wheel war#MZMcBride admonished. He was admonished (strongly even) to not ignore on-wiki consensus, yet he has again shown in this case that he does not want to wait for consensus to be determined. Admonishing him again will ridicule ArbCom because then it will look like their decisions can be ignored without consequences.

@Ali'i: As I wrote above, this is not about those secret pages. ArbCom would not take any stand on that issue by such a discussion, no matter what you try to read into it. The reason for this proposal and this case in general is not (I seem to repeat myself) the pages deleted but how it was done. MZM ignored on-wiki discussion and dissenting opinions and was not willing to discuss the matter. I think it does the encyclopedia more harm to have an admin who thinks they are not bound by policy and community discussion than to have undone maintenance tasks. The latter can be fixed much easier than a bad public image. If ArbCom does not show users that admins are not above the rules and that admins have to discuss controversial actions like everyone else, then it will be much harder to convince people to follow the rules. If those who are tasked to enforce the rules do not follow them, how should we expect others to accept them? It's not a single issue here but a long term pattern of picking-and-choosing which rules to follow and which to ignore and of acting controversially rather than trying to reach consensus. SoWhy 16:02, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not claiming that MZMcBride is completely blameless. I am saying that desysopping is too harsh in this instance. The argument over whether you need consensus before you act is one to be held elsewhere, in my opinion. --Ali'i 16:24, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree with everything Ali'i said above. A desysop in this case would be quite clearly elevating process and rules over the project's goals. Mr.Z-man 17:18, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

There seem to be a lot of parallels with this case; contested IAR speedy deletions, lack of communication, incivility. However a key difference is that SemBubenny deleted articles while MZM deleted userpages. SemB was admonished and warned. To desysop MZM would seriously paint the wrong picture: deleting articles = admonishment, deleting userpages = desysop. I know there are other issues, such the prior admonishment, but I still think the best outcome would be one similar to in the SemB case. ~ User:Ameliorate! ^{(with the !) (talk)} 22:18, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

With the difference that SemBubenny has not been warned before (as you said) and that he only was in one dispute. SemBubenny has not run admin scripts to make those deletions, has not ignored ongoing(!) discussions (while continuing to undertake actions he knew are controversial) or used incivil deletion summaries. The main difference is clear: SemB was not previously admonished for ignoring consensus, so it's logical to admonish him (and if you followed the voting on that case, you'd know that ArbCom was near desysopping as well). MZM was told multiple times, both on AN/ANI and by ArbCom, that he should not go on "rampages" invoking IAR that ignore consensus and other users. It's just logical that he should now face the consequences that Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Sarah Palin protection wheel war#MZMcBride admonished warned him will happen. It's not about "deleting userpages = desysop" but about "warned, warned again, strongly admonished + repeated the same same despite that = desysop". It's not about the userpages deleted (again, I repeat myself); it's about the way he did those deletions, outside of policy and ignoring discussions, consensus (policy is consensus as well after all) and concerned users — and doing it after he was again and again told to not do that. ArbCom has to show the community that this cannot be tolerated, no matter what the current reason for the case is. Otherwise the picture will be "deleting outside policy and ignoring discussion = just fine as long as it's only user pages". Regards SoWhy 00:23, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Not a fan of deadmin, but this is the second arbcom case in 6 months or so to deal with MzMcB's work. I fear it is time to start deadmin'ing people who struggle to work with others. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 21:37, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Despite my concerns about his behaviour, I'd really like to see us avoid this way. We really do need folks like him who will do thankless grunt work. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 04:01, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

There could be a middle ground: explicitly leave open the possibility of MZMcbride re-applying for adminship and getting the mop returned if the community feels he can be trusted again. I would hope... nay, I would challenge MZM to be mature enough to admit mistake, take his lumps, and then buckle down and show the same drive he's shown in the past to do good. If he does this, and the community shows sufficient impartiality and fairness, he'll be back to doing good things in no time, while also establishing the precedent of not looking the other way when admins screw up. bahamut0013^words_deeds 18:09, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride is open to recall, seven days after an incident, with the conditions being that if ten administrators feel it is appropriate, he will voluntarily revoke his adminship. This isn't an indication that I agree with that, but more a note that may be relevant here as some form of alternative. Esteffect (talk) 02:20, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Entirely disproportionate to the scale of matters being considered, and especially given other cases where far more controversial and disruptive admins have been allowed to keep their bit. Orderinchaos 13:47, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Rather than desysop MZMcBride why not require him to go through a reconfirmation RFA? —Nn123645 (talk) 23:22, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Isn't that essentially the same thing? Algebraist 15:20, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

I suppose, but going that way would effectively be giving the decision to the community, as MZMcBride would have the option of either resigning or going through the reconfirmation RFA within x amount of time. —Nn123645 (talk) 17:37, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

I believe I am aware of much, if not all of the evidence against MZM, both public and private. IMO, much of it deals with things unrelated to adminship. Further, in examining those things that do deal with adminship, I think de-adminning at this point in time is overkill. Looking at the SemBubenny case, I think a similar warning is in order. Possible some sort of administrative probation "MZM cannot do X for Y months" would be in order. Also, I think a re-confirmation RFA will generate more bad feelings than productive feedback and would not be worth it, citing the prior instances of Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Stevertigo and Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Carnildo 3 as my cases in point. MBisanz ^talk 23:34, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

If you are citing RFAr/SemBubenny as an example, you have to acknowledge that ArbCom was close to desysopping SemBubenny and then switched to admonishment. And that was SemBubenny's first ArbCom case. MZM was already strongly admonished for similar behavior in RFAr/Sarah Palin protection wheel war, so I fail to see how repeating this admonishment will solve anything. SoWhy 07:47, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I saw this rejected RFAR against SemBubenny as similar to the Sarah Palin wheel war, and the several deleted RFCs at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Mikkalai, also distinguish the situation. MBisanz ^talk 08:01, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't think a declined RFAr and several 2 year old RFCs can be compared to an accepted RFAr with a strong admonishment result a few months ago. And I fail to understand why you think an admonishment could work now if it hasn't worked a few months ago, so I'd like to ask you to explain it to me please. Regards SoWhy 11:48, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

It is my view that this incident (deletion of secret pages) is wholly unrelated to the Sarah Palin wheel war case. Nothing in that previous admonishment would have precluded MZMcBride from deleting these pages. In my view it would be like telling a child not to throw rocks, and then trying to hold that scolding against him when he leaves the water running. Two different situations. Mahalo. --Ali'i 13:52, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

But following this argument any admin would be allowed to misuse the tools until they were warned to specifically not misuse it in this way; and then they would be allowed to misuse them another way without fear of the previous warning's consequences. For example, they could randomly delete outside policy, be admonished for it and then go on blocking random users because the previous admonishment was only for deleting outside policy. Surely that can't be right, can it?

And somehow I do not think that distinction is correct. After all, both cases are about ignoring consensus (and deletion policy is written consensus). SoWhy 14:25, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

• Reconfirming my view that this is overkill. Ncmvocalist (talk) 11:23, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Seconding the above notion and adding on that it seems like another case of "OMG ADMINBOTS, WE MUST DESYSOP CAUSE THEY'RE NOT APPROVED!" yeah, ok. Lets desysop Misza13 while we're at it. Secondly, just because he deleted your pet page doesn't mean he's evil. He's acting in good faith here (to me) in what he thinks is best for the project as a whole. Kwsn (Ni!) 21:56, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

But that's exactly the problem. He is doing what he thinks is best for the project, ignoring the community's views on what is best for the project, as reflected by ongoing discussion or established consensus. Admin status is not a license to use the tools unilaterally and ignore the opinions of others. Algebraist 15:20, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposals by User:Ameliorate!

Proposed principles

Administrators

1) Administrators are trusted members of the community. They are expected to lead by example and to behave in a respectful, civil manner in their interactions with others. Administrators are expected to follow Wikipedia policies and to perform their duties to the best of their abilities. Occasional mistakes are entirely compatible with adminship, as administrators are not expected to be perfect, but consistently or egregiously poor judgment may result in the removal of administrator status. Administrators are expected to learn from experience and from justified criticisms of their actions.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Taken from Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/SemBubenny.

Administrator communicationse

2) Administrators are expected to provide timely and civil explanations for their actions. All administrator actions are logged and offer a "reason" field to be used for this purpose. While all editors are expected to reply to good-faith queries about their activities placed on their talk page, administrators are particularly expected to respond promptly and civilly to queries about their administrative actions and to justify them when needed.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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Taken from Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/SemBubenny.

Proposed findings of fact

MZMcBride

1) MZMcBride has edited Wikipedia since May 2005 and has been an administrator since May 2007. Has has made more than 50,000 edits to Wikipedia, has taken over 700,000 administrator actions, and has shown a high level of dedication to the project.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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Adapted from Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/SemBubenny. MZM has taken more admin actions than any other admin (granted a lot of them were automated).

I fail to see the relevance of this, unless you are implying that his high number of actions should render him above Wikipedia policies and consensus. Nutiketaiel (talk) 17:59, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Orderinchaos 13:48, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed remedies

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

MZMcBride admonished and warned

1) MZMcBride is strongly admonished:

(A) To speedy-delete only articles that fall within the criteria for speedy deletion or are otherwise blatantly inappropriate for inclusion in Wikipedia, and to err on the side of caution in cases of doubt, unless the article contains BLP violations or implicates matters of similarly high concern;
(B) To provide clear explanations of his administrator actions and to respond promptly and civilly to questions and comments regarding such actions; and
(C) Not to take unilateral administrator action where there is no consensus to do so.

MZMcBride is warned that any continuation of the problematic behavior in which he previously engaged is likely to lead to the revocation or suspension of his administrator status without further warnings.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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Adapted from Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/SemBubenny.

Jurisdiction retained

2) As in any arbitration case, the Arbitration Committee retains jurisdiction over this matter. In the event that there are further serious problems involving MZMcBride's administrator conduct or communications despite the urgings and warnings contained in this decision, a request to reopen the case may be made at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration. If necessary, this may lead to the suspension or revocation of MZMcBride's administrator privileges.

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Taken from Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/SemBubenny.

Proposals by User:Beetstra

Proposed principles

User and user_talk space pages can be used as evidence or support

1) Pages in userspace and in user_talk space generally are for any use concerning this project. However, posts in these two spaces can be used as evidence or as support for actions taken on a larger scale. E.g. warnings to users about their unwanted external link additions ('spam') can be used to support blacklisting of the involved domains. Deletion of such information a) hides it from users who use this information to support requests, and b) deminishes the transparency of such processes. Such information should only be deleted when it is in violation of core wikipedia policies.

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For consideration. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 17:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Cross-wiki importance aside, such deleted information may often be valuable to non-admins on enwiki; while the rules MZ was working under were designed to minimize this, there would probably be exceptions where an IP, having been formerly warned for vandalism, resumes after a long time. (For instance, a teenager may be absent from a household for months while at boarding school or college.) Also, the information may be useful for users of that IP themselves; e.g. non-warnings left to very inactive users. Mangojuice^talk 14:17, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

These are incredibly unlikely scenarios. I don't know about other countries, but at least in the US, pretty much every residential ISP uses dynamic IP addresses that change as often as once a day; dialup connections may get a new IP with each connection. Unless the vandalism is exactly the same as before, assuming that the warnings given to an IP a year ago were meant for the same person who's using it now is a very bad assumption to make. As for the "infrequent user" scenario, besides the dynamic IP issue, if they make one comment on a discussion page that they sign or is auto-signed, that would create a link to the talk page, so it wouldn't get deleted. Mr.Z-man 18:25, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Nope, that is not the point. The physical user is the same person if he uses another IP, still, he may have been warned, and have seen that warning, while on the other IP. In short, the editor has been warned. That is the problem. Both the new and the old IP may indeed already be in use by another user (though I doubt if the script did check for static IPs!). Example: if Grawp is coming to a new IP, we block immediately. Why? a) Grawp's modus operandi is clear, b) Grawp was warned on the previous IP. How de we know he was warned on a previous IP, because we can see the warning, linked to the edit. Deletion of the previous IP talkpage hides that. And if only all cases were as obvious as Grawp. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 18:30, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Are we hacking into people's webcams like a in movie or something? As I said, unless the edits are the same, there's nothing that can conclusively link a vandal/spammer/etc to a given IP when they aren't using it anymore. I don't think you understood my point. My point was that, unless the behavior is the same, we can't know that the physical person is the same. Mr.Z-man 23:41, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Exactly, if the behavior is the same, the editor is likely the same, even if they is using another IP now. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 23:50, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

You are making a normative judgment about what user space content should and should not be deleted. That's not really appropriate for arbitration. The decisions about what should and should not be deleted is handled via MFD and CSD. For the purposes of arbitration, it makes much more sense to establish whether policy was violated rather than argue about what policy should be. Dragons flight (talk) 18:47, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

That is true. But I feel that part of the problem here was the policy ... even with proper implementation of it. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 19:04, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

But unless there's some indication that the community is unable to come to a consensus on it, ArbCom shouldn't rule on it. The comment about "proper implementation" sounds like a request that ArbCom should override a policy since you don't like it. Mr.Z-man 23:41, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, that was not what I meant. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 23:50, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

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2) {text of Proposed principle}

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Proposed findings of fact

Deletion of evidence or support for actions

1) Deletion of user pages and user talkpage has resulted in hiding material which is, or can be proof or support for other actions taken on wikipedia.

Comment by Arbitrators:

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For consideration. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 20:40, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Template

2) Talkpage messages on IP users often leaves messages not intended for the current user. Where deletion would likely hide information which may be of interest later in the process, alternatives like blanking or archiving should be considered.

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For consideration. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 18:36, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:CSD #U4 did not properly cover possible exceptions

3) The wording of the WP:CSD #U4, as introduced here by User:Locke Cole, and adapted here by User:SmokeyJoe and here by User:MZMcBride, insufficiently covers all cases where talkpages may be, or may become of interest.

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It covers a lot, but there are likely too many exceptions. I want to note here, the users I mentioned only added the (apparent) consensus, they are not parties here in the text of this finding of fact. Added for consideration. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 18:53, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Note: U4 has been removed from CSD and is thus not a valid criterion at the moment. SoWhy 14:27, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

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1) {text of proposed remedy}

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2) {text of proposed remedy}

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Proposals by User:Dragons flight

Proposed remedies

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

Cease using unapproved adminbots

1) MZMcBride is to cease any ongoing use of unsupervised adminbots, such as described by User:MZMcBride/Adminbots, or any similar tools that he uses to perform large numbers of unsupervised admin actions. He may operate such bots in the future if they are approved at WP:BRFA via the normal process and operated on a bot flagged account.

Comment by Arbitrators:

I agree with this, but would need some guarantee that BAG can deal with controversial bots and can take the step that is sometimes needed, to withdraw (sometimes temporarily) a bot's permission. i.e. to deflag bot accounts when there are concerns raised in community discussions. The BAG approval process for Lightbot, and then inaction in the face of concerns, is a case in point, in my opinion. Carcharoth (talk) 23:05, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

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Proposed. Rather than simply having MZMcBride unilaterally deciding what bots and scripts to run, I think it is more than time that the community take responsibility for this. I suspect that at least some of these tools will be approved. Dragons flight (talk) 01:09, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Prior approval of bulk administrative actions

2) Prior to undertaking any manual or supervised action that involves using administrative powers on greater than 10 pages/users, MZMcBride must discuss his intentions with at least one other administrator and get their approval. If more than 50 pages/users are involved, then he must post at WP:AN and obtain a consensus of contributors there. This requirement for prior approval applies regardless of the methods or techniques used to perform the action.

MZMcBride may apply directly to ArbCom to have this sanction lifted no sooner than 6 months after it is enacted.

Comment by Arbitrators:

This is one of the key points, IMO. MZMcBride likes to be bold (see response to questions), but where bot-like actions are involved, even if WP:IAR is being invoked, WP:BOLDness can be a hindrance and can cause drama rather than resolve matters. Even just a little bit of consultation, even if something seems obvious, will go a long way to restoring good faith all round. This could be a timed restriction, set to expire after a set period (as stated here by DF). Carcharoth (talk) 23:07, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

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Proposed. Dragons flight (talk) 01:09, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposals by Newyorkbrad

Proposed principles

Administrators

1) Administrators are trusted members of the community. They are expected to lead by example and to behave in a respectful, civil manner in their interactions with others. Administrators are expected to follow Wikipedia policies and to perform their duties to the best of their abilities. Occasional mistakes are entirely compatible with adminship, as administrators are not expected to be perfect, but consistently or egregiously poor judgment may result in the removal of administrator status. Administrators are expected to learn from experience and from justified criticisms of their actions.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed; taken from several prior cases, most recently Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/SemBubenny. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Administrator communications

2) Administrators are expected to provide timely and civil explanations for their actions. All administrator actions, such as deletions, are logged and offer a "reason" field to be used for this purpose. While all editors are expected to reply to good-faith queries about their activities placed on their talk page, administrators are particularly expected to respond promptly and civilly to queries about their administrative actions and to justify them when needed. Moreover, when an administrator takes an action that he or she should reasonably anticipate will be controversial or requires explanation, the administrator should provide advance notice or a contemporaneous explanation of the action taken, in a location that the affected editors are likely to see, so that they will understand the action that has been taken and why it was taken.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. First three sentences taken from several prior cases, most recently SemBubenny. Last two sentences are new wording for this case, but straightforward. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Wow, 'Contemporaneous Explanation" is straightforward. I have enough trouble trying to fit exsanguinate and defenestrate into normal conversation. You sir, are king. 198.161.174.194 (talk) 21:41, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Deletion policy

3) Wikipedia:Deletion policy, Wikipedia:Undeletion policy, and Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion together provide policy and procedure for deletion and undeletion of pages, including pages in userspace. Wikipedia administrators are expected to use the deletion and undeletion abilities granted to them in a fashion consistent with these policies. Administrators who wish to delete pages that are clearly outside the criteria for speedy deletion should list those pages at the appropriate deletion discussion forum (e.g., Wikipedia:Articles for deletion or Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion) or use Proposed deletion. This does not negate the right of administrators to delete blatantly inappropriate content even if it falls outside the formal CSD criteria, nor constrain application of our policy on biographies of living persons.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Adopted from SemBubenny. I have added the references to userspace and MfD, changed the word "articles" to "pages" where appropriate, and italicized "blatantly" to prevent the exception from swallowing the rule. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Deletion notification

4) Whenever an administrator deletes a page, he or she must specify the reason for doing so. Deletion can easily discourage editors, especially new editors, so they should be able to understand from the deletion summary why their page was deleted. When the deletion is of a page in userspace, editors may be particularly dismayed; even though users do not "own" pages in their userspace, because reasonable leeway is generally allowed in userspace, a clear and civil explanation of why a userspace page has been deleted should always be provided.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. First two sentences from SemBubenny; third sentence is new for this case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Personal expression in userspace

5) Editors are generally permitted to include in their userspace a limited amount of non-inflammatory personal expression not directly related to encyclopedic collaboration. Good judgment concerning the nature of the material should be employed, and editing of subpages in one's userspace (except for encyclopedic pages such as sandbox versions of articles and the like) generally should not be the primary focus of an editor's contributions to the site. Inappropriate userspace page may be deleted by an administrator, either speedily where the inappropriateness of the material is blatant, and otherwise through PROD or MfD. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. First sentence adapted from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Billy Ego-Sandstein; second and third sentences new for this case, but drawn in part from Wikipedia:User page and from Stifle's proposal above. This principle is relevant both to the "hidden" or "secret" pages that MZMcBride deleted, as well as to some of the pages that MZMcBride created in his own userspace. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Bots and scripts

6) Bots are processes that modify Wikipedia content in a fully or partially automated fashion. Scripts are also computer algorithms utilized to automate or semi-automate certain types of editing. These tools are extremely valuable for the purpose of facilitating the making of multiple edits that would be unduly time-consuming or tedious for a human editor to perform manually. Approval from the Bot Approvals Group is generally required before an editor may use a bot for automatic or high-speed edits, although application of this policy to bots maintained by administrators has historically been unsettled.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Taken from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Betacommand 2, except for the last clause (beginning "although..."), which is new for this case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Responsibility of bot operators

7) Like other holders of special access or privileges, bot operators have a heightened responsibility to the community. Bot operators are expected to respond reasonably to questions or concerns about the operation of their bots. An editor who (even in good faith) misuses automated editing tools such as bots and scripts, or fails to respond appropriately to concerns from the community about their use over a period of time, may lose the privilege of using such tools or may have such privilege restricted.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Adapted from Betacommand 2. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Role of the Arbitration Committee

8) The Arbitration Committee does not directly resolve content disputes, whether dealing with the content of articles or of other pages in the project, nor issues of policy, such as whether and under what circumstances administrators may use bots on their administrator accounts, or whether "secret" or "hidden" pages in userspace should be permitted.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Biographies of living persons

9) Substantially improving the level of compliance with our policy on biographies of living persons remains the most urgent ethical issue facing Wikipedia. Efforts to enhance and ensure compliance with the BLP policy are commendable, even though editors may disagree in good faith about the best means of doing so.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. See generally Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Badlydrawnjeff; Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Footnoted quotes; Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Sarah Palin protection wheel war. The relevance of this principle, which may not be clear on first reading, will become apparent from the findings. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Combatting harassment

10) It is unacceptable for any editor to harass another, nor does the community expect editors to tolerate gross harassment, whether by fellow editors or by banned users or trolls. Any editor, including an administrator using administrator powers, may remove or otherwise defeat attempts at harassment of an editor. This includes serious acts of harassment directed at the user himself or herself.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Adapted from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/MONGO. The relevance of this principle, which may at first seem irrelevant to those not familiar with nuances of the case, should become clear from the findings (and I hasten to add that it is not MZMcBride who has harassed anyone). Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

To MZMcBride: The relevance deals with the oversight issue you once raised in your userpage, on which there is a finding below (which may or may not stay in). This is an important principle to me, and I'd like to reaffirm it, but I realize the tie-in may be a little too oblique for this decision and I will consider dropping it. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:49, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I'd drop the troll reference. Unneeded. Harrassment is harrassment no matter who it's by Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:55, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

It's somewhat unclear whether the findings of fact are now finished, however at the moment, to an outsider, this section would appear incredibly awkward and unexplained. Even as the subject of the case, I'm only reasonably sure (read: not 100%) that I fully understand the purpose of this proposed principle. Clarification may be best here. --MZMcBride (talk) 03:43, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

I seem to remember the deprecation of the term "troll" in formal wiki-language as unnecessarily aggressive, see also TFD/Trollblock. MBisanz ^talk 05:01, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Circumstances and sanctions

11) In deciding what sanctions to impose against an administrator or other editor, the Arbitration Committee will consider the editor's overall record of participation, behavioral history, and other relevant circumstances. An editor's positive and valuable contributions in one aspect of his or her participation on Wikipedia do not excuse misbehavior or questionable judgment in another aspect of participation, but may be considered in determining the sanction to be imposed.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Adapted from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/C68-FM-SV. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:31, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes - big-picture important. Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:56, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed findings of fact

MZMcBride

1) MZMcBride has edited Wikipedia since May 2005 and has been an administrator since May 2007. He has made more than 50,000 edits to Wikipedia, has taken more than 700,000 administrator actions, and has shown a high level of dedication to the project.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. This is a standard form of finding for decisions that I draft focused on a particular editor or small group of editors. I am relying on Ameliorate!'s proposal above for the specific data. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Yep. background important. Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:57, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Background is important, but this oversimplifies things. I would want more detail than this before assessing the overall "career" of an admin. Pure numbers don't really cut it here. More relevant would be previous disputes and queries on his talk page and how MZMcBride handled such things. Also relevant would be how many of the deletions were later undeleted, and which ones were on request and which ones were just overturned. There was at least one incident where an undeletion script was run to undo deletions done by MZMcBride. I am referring to this and this. Carcharoth (talk) 09:30, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Going with Carcharoth's line of thinking above, anybody can easily amass tens of thousands of deletions by running scripts to do the work. That does not say anything about the level of dedication and the proposed wording seems misleading here. SoWhy 10:03, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride's contributions

2) MZMcBride's administrator work has, among other aspects, focused on the use of automated tools, such as bots and scripts, to identify categories of pages that he believes require administrator action, such as deletion or unprotection.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Deletion of "secret" or "hidden" pages

3) On February 23 and 24, 2009, MZMcBride deleted a total of more than 250 userspace pages from the userspaces of more than 100 editors. He located the pages by using a script to find userspace pages with names including the word "secret", and then he deleted the pages. MZMcBride's intention was primarily to delete "secret" or "hidden" pages used for what he perceived as frivolous or "social" purposes (such as "find my secret page and win a prize"). However, the deletions inadvertently included some more substantive or encyclopedic pages that simply happened to have the word "secret" in their names.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

To MZMcBride: I thought I recalled there being more than one "false positive," but I will check again in the morning, and modify if I'm wrong. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:53, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

The last sentence is a bit ... meh, but acceptable I suppose. The deletions were all manual (deleting pages with "secretary" or pages like User:Daniel/Hidden would've been quite bad). The one "false positive" I remember had to do with someone who had subsequently blanked a page in their user space; the page was deleted under (and using the summary) CSD G7 (author requests deletion), but admittedly was mixed in with the rest of the deletions. (Why someone would create a subpage called /Secret and then blank it and expect it to stay around forever is simply baffling to me, but this is just a minor quibble.) --MZMcBride (talk) 03:29, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

A reasonable sense of precision is necessary in Fofs, and I praise you, Nyb, for maintaining it in these proposals up to this point. While "more than 250" stays at the reasonable level of precision, merely stating "some" out of 250 is really not good enough, and far too vague. Can you please put a rough number on how many of these deletions included some more substantive or encyclopedic pages that simply happened to have the word "secret" in their names? Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:52, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Lack of communication accompanying the deletions

4) MZMcBride did not notify or warn editors whose userspace pages he was considering deleting before he deleted the pages, so that the users did not have a chance to defend their pages before they were deleted. MZMcBride also did not put a notice on the editors' talkpages when he made the deletions. As a result, many of the editors first learned of the deletions when they noticed that the page had become a redlink, or went to work on the page only to discovered that it was no longer there. Although editors whose pages are deleted (rightly or wrongly), are often disappointed or upset, it was predictable these editors' unhappiness would be increased because they learned of the deletions in this way.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

I think that the last sentence (particularly the second half) is not something that is fit to be in a Fof in this case; I'd argue that it is inaccurate. Was evidence presented to demonstrate the differences in how disappointed or upset people were between deletions made with notification, and deletions made without? If not, the last sentence should be omitted; it'd better serve as a rationale (in a principle) that some people may become more upset if they are not offered the courtesy of being notified. Does that make sense? Ncmvocalist (talk) 14:13, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride's deletion summaries

5) MZMcBride's deletion summary for many of these deletions was "o hai, i haz found ur sekrit page! please contribute to the encyclopedia more and search for hidden pages less." While the intent behind the frivolous wording of summary may be understandable, it offended several of the editors whose pages were deleted. Moreover, the implied assumption that all or most of the users hosting "secret pages" were spending an undue proportion of their wiki-time on non-encyclopedic activities appears not to be accurate, as established at User:Cool Hand Luke/Secret page.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This is well-worded and pretty succinct; I'd have labelled this as perfect if "frivolous wording of summary may be understandable" was explained a little bit more clearly. Ncmvocalist (talk) 14:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Status of secret or hidden pages

6) "Secret" or "hidden" user pages do not fall clearly within any of the criteria for speedy deletion. Despite extensive community discussion from time to time, there is no policy or precedent clearly establishing whether such pages are an acceptable use of userspace. Reasonable arguments can be made on both sides of this question. See User:Bahamut0013/Secret pages for one summary of the competing arguments.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

I'd suggest an addition that MZMcBride knew that there was no such consensus and deleted although he could be reasonably sure that there was no consensus for his actions. At the very least he must have known that WP:CSD is written consensus regarding deletions without discussion and that WP:CSD did not allow it. SoWhy 14:25, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Good faith in the deletions

7) In making and defending these deletions, MZMcBride relied on an MfD discussion in April 2008, whose scope and applicability to the recent deletions is disputed, as well as language drawn from the policy Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not. We accept MZMcBride's explanation of these deletions on the workshop page and that he deleted these pages with the sincere belief that he was benefitting the project. However, even while MZMcBride was still deleting pages, a thread about them was opened on the administrators' noticeboard. In this discussion, many editors objected to the deletions and the way they were being made. At least as of that time, MZMcBride should have stopped deleting these pages until a consensus was reached.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

While I am one of the defenders of WP:AGF for almost everything, I fail to see how anyone could have read a MFD with the outcome "no consensus" (or specifically "case to case"-basis) as "delete all such pages" (without even reviewing them). I think such an assumption stretches the limits of WP:AGF too far. The very least knowing this result should have told him to seek consensus before acting. After all, can a "belief [to be] benefitting the project" override a community decision? To me, that sounds somewhat contradictory to WP:CONS and, while not codified in WP:CSD, I was under the impression that it was widespread consensus that a page that survived a deletion discussion cannot be speedy deleted (except in cases of newly discovered copyright violation) because an admin's judgment should not override a community consensus where there is no need to do so.

Even if one were assuming "good faith" here, shouldn't the last sentence be more clear, e.g. like "Those deletions he performed after learning of the threads on the administrators' noticeboard have to be considered as being done in bad faith"? After all, even if one were to assume good faith, that good faith was lost when he positively knew of the controversy of the deletions and yet continued to make them. Regards SoWhy 14:46, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride's response to complaints about the deletions

8) Several editors whose pages had been deleted posted to MZMcBride's talkpage. Some protested the deletions, while others asked the reasons for them or expressed concern about potential loss of the data on the pages. At first, MZMcBride's responses to some of the queries from the editors who hosted "secret pages" were cursory, although his responses to other editors was more detailed. However, MZMcBride agreed to provide any affected editor with an e-mailed copy of his or her deleted page(s) to avoid data loss. He also agreed to reinstate any of the deleted pages upon request by the affected editor, although he also stated that he would thereupon nominate the page for deletion on MfD.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This, and the previous 2 findings, seem sound. Ncmvocalist (talk) 14:16, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Not sure if this makes a difference here, but I'm not sure if any of the pages undeleted actually were nominated for MFD. I was going to do it myself actually (with individual MFDs for each one) but the RFAR started before I got a chance, and I decided it would cloud the issues more than anything else. Mr.Z-man 23:22, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, MZM only ended up filing one MFD, and the page was swiftly deleted on request of the author, so nothing telling there. –xeno (talk) 23:33, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Status of adminbots

9) The status of bots run by administrators on their primary accounts, particularly bots capable of administrator actions such as deletion or protection/unprotection, was controversial for several years. For a time, formal policy was that such bots were impermissible, although it had become clear that several well-respected administrators were running "adminbots" and that some of these bots were doing important work for the project. In September 2008, the Arbitration Committee declined a request for arbitration on this subject, in which MZMcBride was named as a party. Several arbitrators observed at that time that whether and when to permit adminbots was a policy matter that should be addressed by the bot approvals group (BAG) and the community as a whole. Subsequent community discussion led to the addition of a "Bots with administrative rights" section to the bot policy, which regularized the status of such bots. Administrators running previously unapproved adminbots were requested to submit requests for BAG approval of their bots within two months.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

MZMcBride's adminbots

10) MZMcBride has repeatedly acknowledged that prior to this arbitration case, he regularly ran bots and scripts on his administrator account. He has stated his view that these bots perform important maintenance tasks for the project. A few users have questioned whether some of these tasks are in fact beneficial. MZMcBride has declined to submit his bots to the bot approvals group for approval, in substance suggesting that he believes that any such requirement would be unnecessarily bureaucratic.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. I am not quickly finding the link I had intended to use for the last sentence, so MZMcBride, please correct me if I have mischaracterized or misphrased. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

My comments regarding this issue are lengthy and are available above in the section marked "Re Deletions and use of bots." --MZMcBride (talk) 03:37, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

MZMcBride's userspace

11) MZMcBride has previously maintained several problematic or unnecessarily contentious pages in his userspace, including among others:

(A) a page purporting to illustrate means by which an administrator who chose to "go rogue" could damage Wikipedia or other wikis that use Mediawiki software (he later moved the page off-wiki with a link from the Wikipedia page after the page was MfD'd; we note that MZMcBride has advised that developers were aware of this page and did not object to it, and that he did not include on this page any serious security holes to which he thought attention should not be drawn);

(B) a page explaining how users wishing to violate the sockpuppetry policy could evade detection; and

(C) a page, not clearly intended for any dispute-resolution purpose, which objected to a named oversighter's deletion of certain edits from the oversighter's talkpage, which he maintained in that state on-wiki for more than one week even after being advised that some of the deleted edits were tests of the new revision-deletion functionality, while the others were of a harassing and threatening nature.

However, prior to the commencement of the arbitration case, MZMcBride voluntarily deleted these pages, and he has not created any similar ones.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

MZMcBride's BLP efforts

12) MZMcBride has commendably developed an innovative script intended to identify articles that may contain certain types of BLP problems. Some issues for discussion may remain concerning the best means of listing and addressing the issues raised by the output of the script.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

This will need some modification based on MZMcBride's response below. To SoWhy, this is relevant in that BLP issues are a focal discussion point throughout the community, and administrators have additional tools with which to address BLP problems: blocking users who add inappropriate information, protecting articles affected by repeated BLP violations, determining if CSD or other deletion is required, assessing consensus in deletion debates, ensuring the BLP policy is applied appropriately. That MZMcBride has "commissioned" a colleague to develop a script to assist in identifying existing problems in articles, and has run the scripts, is a reflection of his awareness of this issue as both an editor and an administrator, whether or not he uses his own administrative tools in addressing these issues. It speaks to his judgment, one of several facets of adminship that are relevant. Risker (talk) 20:36, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

I have almost no programming skills. I commissioned bjweeks to write the BLP reviewer. --MZMcBride (talk) 03:23, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

To SoWhy: What do you see the scope of this case as? And how does this finding support or oppose that scope? --MZMcBride (talk) 19:22, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

To SoWhy: I think you'll find (even with only a cursory examination) that this case is about far more than just my use of administrator rights. (Just as an example, it doesn't require admin rights to create user subpages.) --MZMcBride (talk) 19:37, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment by others:

If Bjweeks was a party (which he isn't), I'd have asked the Committee to make a very positive finding with respect to this. ;) Ncmvocalist (talk) 14:19, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

This is quite true, and the community should commend MZMcBride for his efforts. However, I do not see how this is related to the case at hand. NuclearWarfare _(Talk) 18:49, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Agree with NWF here, seems to be covered in NYB's proposed findings #1 and #2 and has no relevance to the case at hand, at least not in this detail. SoWhy 19:16, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

@MZM: Taking from the comments of the Arbitrators at various points, I'd say it's about your judgment, communication and behavior as an administrator (or, as Casliber phrased it, "conduct as an admin in general"). While working on such a script would be a good thing, no question, it is not administrator-related contributing imho and thus I see no reason to mention it specifically more than the other positive contributions, i.e. I see no reason to single it out as a finding of its own. Regards SoWhy 19:34, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

@MZM: Well, I'd have put those subpages in the same scope, i.e. admin behavior. But of course, that is only my view of the scope, so I might be wrong. But I still see, even with a larger scope, no relevance to single out this particular contribution from the others. Regards SoWhy 19:45, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Proposed remedies

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

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1) {text of proposed remedy}

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2) {text of proposed remedy}

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Proposed enforcement

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1) {text of proposed enforcement}

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2) {text of proposed enforcement}

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Proposals by Ncmvocalist

Proposed findings of fact

MZMcBride's deletion summaries 2

5) MZMcBride's deletion summary for many of these deletions was "o hai, i haz found ur sekrit page! please contribute to the encyclopedia more and search for hidden pages less." Based on the circumstances, and "lolspeak" (internet slang) used in the summary, some users appreciated the intended humour. However, some users were understandably upset when they interpreted the summary to make an implied assumption - that they spent an undue proportion of their wiki-time on non-encyclopedic activities. The accuracy of this assumption was a problem: see also User:Cool Hand Luke/Secret page.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Can you provide diffs for "some users appreciated the intended humour" and for "some users were understandably upset"? I know the current proposed findings of fact don't do this either (I think it would be best if diffs were provided), but ideally both versions would have diffs. Secondly, is it possible to pin down how long this summary has been in use for. Based on the old diffs of User:MiszaBot/PSP, this sort of lolcat deletion summary has been in use since at least 24 May 2008 (hover over 'rouge delete' links to see the suggested edit summaries). Checking the redlinks there might indicate much earlier use of lolcat summaries, and hence whether editors were being upset by them (or not) as far back as then. I've found at least one example here of a lolcat deletion summary from May 2008. Quite what this means in the context of this case, I'm not sure yet. Carcharoth (talk) 00:27, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not so sure that the community will agree that lolcat deletion summaries should be considered a standard way for admins to communicate. To quote from the proposed principle 4 in this case:

"Whenever an administrator deletes a page, he or she must specify the reason for doing so. [Editors] should be able to understand from the deletion summary why their page was considered inappropriate for Wikipedia. [...] a clear and civil explanation of why a userspace page has been deleted should always be provided."

In my view, the use of lolcat deletion summaries as a "subculture" (among some admins) is no different to the use of secret pages as a "subculture" (among certain editors). Both subcultures fail to contribute to building of an encyclopedia, so either both need to go, or both need to stay. Arguably, those using secret pages learn more about wiki-markup than those admins using lolcat language in deletion summaries manage to make their point to the editors in question. Carcharoth (talk) 10:27, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Sure, it was meant to be ironic commentary, but is a deletion log the right place to engage in ironic commentary? I think the "upset of users" is missing the point. Will be proposing a finding of fact that incorporates aspects of what we've discussed here. Thanks for the suggestions and pointers. They were very helpful. Carcharoth (talk) 13:46, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Apologies, Ncmvocalist, but it seems unlikely that proposing a new wording of that finding of fact will pass at this late stage. I did have every intention of posting something for voting, but other things have to take priority. I can promise that at the next case where I propose the workshop be used to aid in drafting of rewordings of parts of the proposed decision, I will do so sooner, and take ideas for drafting (and give credit where needed). I've also been following the comments from Wikidemon (here and on the evidence page), and some interesting points have been raised. Thank you both for that - those points should continue to be raised, even after this case has closed. Carcharoth (talk) 20:59, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

This is more neutral; no unnecessary filling of gaps. This is the time to appreciate varying, but reasonable interpretations and perceptions - I see no need to depart from what's written there. Moreover, there was some accuracy - so it would be a falsehood to call it plain inaccurate. Ncmvocalist (talk) 16:52, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

I'll have to look for diffs on that; I'd initially pulled out conclusions from a few of the statements at RFArb, but I acknowledge the preference for evidence to come from other sources (like user talk pages, noticeboards, and so on) - I'll take a look. But on the second issue, you're quite right to bring it up - as this sort of summary was used for a while, then even this proposal will need a revamp, especially if it was considered a standard summary by any number of the community. Ncmvocalist (talk) 05:34, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I don't think it should be considered a standard way. Note my use of "if it was considered a standard..." in my previous comment (as opposed to "given that it was considered a standard...") - I was considering a possible scenario, given that "what ought to be" can often differ from "what actually is happening".

I thought part of the intended humour (irony) was in (i) showing the editor that MZM found the secret page (which was arguably the point of setting up those pages) and (2) engaging in another "subculture" (as you've put it) which seems to emphasise/highlight the non-encyclopedic nature of the page, and thus the same with the non-encyclopedic deletion summary. I think there was a 3rd reason, but it escapes me at the moment. Point is...it should be easier to appreciate the intended humour given that understanding. Though, I note the lack of diffs. Ncmvocalist (talk) 10:57, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Did you mean "upset users"? I'm not sure where "upset of" came in. To answer your question, I think that's the community's decision; the community can make its own decision on whether deletion logs should be strictly professional paperwork at all times - it would be troubling if any group of users to assume authority falls on them to determine that question when the community wasn't given an opportunity to handle that issue of policy-making. Similarly, I also think you've been asking the wrong question in repeatedly referring to principle 4 of a decision that has just been drafted, several weeks/months after those logs were made. The more obvious question would be what community policy/guidelines/norms existed at the time at which the summary was made, and whether these summaries were out of step with the policy/guidelines/norms of the time? Are things always done as they ought to be done? I also note that we look at things on a case-by-case basis, which is why I brought up the irony. All ArbCom can do is suggest a principle for the future and hope that the community will endorse it or modify it (or even reject it if it's inadequate or too narrow or too something) - forcing anything down the community's throat in your, or any other arbitrators personally preferred way will make history repeat itself as far as I'm concerned, in a similar fashion to how the proposal to centralise community ban discussions was treated. Best, Ncmvocalist (talk) 14:59, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

(unindent)The propriety of MZMcBride's edit summaries rests less on what he was thinking at the time, than on how such summaries would likely be received by their likely audience. The point of administrative action is to produce a result, and a large part of the result is the response of the parties affected. It would be useful to see how people actually reacted but an educated guess is useful too because people usually do not actually state what they feel and do in response to jokes, sarcasm, put-downs, bullying, etc., made at their expense by a person in authority. Most youngsters here are intelligent, capable, and serious, yet children are awkward and easily made to feel insecure. Most do not speak in lolcat. If I were a young editor caught playing a frivolous game, and an adult disciplined me in lolcat-speak, I would feel insulted, threatened, mocked, and condescended to. If I were an adult doing the same, I would probably just be confused or feel somebody was being sarcastic. Either way, unduly indecorous verbal theatrics accompanying page deletion seems to undermines whatever administrative goal was to be accomplished. That shows poor judgment. The questions of just what MZMcBride was thinking, and just how bad the damage was, affect how seriously to take the incident - but whether a minor or a major breach of the dignity of the position, it was a breach. Wikidemon (talk) 17:55, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

That's quite funny - I personally considered that you yourself used unduly indecorous verbal theatrics in explaining your position, and grossly exaggerated the extent of "damage" (if any) caused by such a deletion summary for such a page. This view is much like users who consider any use of the word "fuck" (whatsoever) to be a personal attack. Were you trying to compound the intended humour? Or were you being serious? If you were in the latter category, you've failed to explain how you would feel insulted, threatened, mocked, and condescended to; good faith is not optional. Additionally, you've evaded the concern on precisely what was current practice in dealing with such an issue - in doing so, I consider it unjustified to claim that a breach (if any) occurred. This is a wider community concern; unless the aim is to escalate an issue rather than resolve it, it would be unwise to try to point the finger at any one individual for something the community failed to address in policy at the time. The differing community views voiced here already suggest that it would be unreasonable to expect an administrator to assume any one view regarding how it would likely be received by his audience; this was not a matter of poor judgement. The way to remedy the issue is by coming to a community consensus and making that clear, as with other policy provisions - if actions are being taken in opposition to such a provision as of now, then I would not so strongly reject your view. Ncmvocalist (talk) 18:31, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

What exactly is indecorous about my explanation? I assure you that is how I think and write when trying to get to the heart of a matter. Your trying to draw parallel's between MZMcBride's edit summaries and my presentation to ArbCom falls flat. Youthful editors are vulnerable to scolding rebukes; if my tone somehow offends ArbCom they are in the position of power here and I'm sure they can take it. You're wrong about AGF. AGF is a prescription for editors to deal constructively with each other. It is not a sheild given to allow administrators to ruffle other editors on theory that those editors should AGF rather than becoming alarmed. The "current practice" is for an administrator to explain plainly and courteously why they are taking an administrative action against an editor. WP:DELETE is mostly silent on the expectations placed on deleting administrators, WP:BLOCK is quite explicit and detailed on the point, and it is relevant because unlike WP:DELETE it concerns actions taken against individuals. WP:BLOCK#Explanation on blocking says "Administrators must supply a clear and specific block reason which indicates why a user was blocked. Block reasons should avoid the use of jargon as much as possible so that blocked users may better understand them." WP:BLOCK#Education and warnings says "We welcome newcomers, we are patient with them, and assume that most people who work on the project are trying to help it." I don't know of a guideline or essay regarding mocking and taunting, but it is accepted practice, and only good sense, that admins are supposed to calm disruption by lowering the tension and conflict level, not raising it. That means no antagonism, undue scolding, taunting, or victory cry. I need not cite Wikipedia policy to point out that jokes made at somebody's expense are an iffy proposition. You ask how I would feel put upon by an admin talking to me in lolcat. I should think that would be obvious, and you've accused me of over-explaining things already, but if you must know: if I were a member of a minority class widely seen as less capable and less privileged than full members of society, and if a person in the in a position of power and authority over me took an action against me that I could do nothing about, accompanying that action with a stereotypical caricature of my group's style of speech is putting me down based on incorrect assumptions (or worse, prejudice or disdain) regarding who I am. In this case the class is being young and inexperienced. Lolcat did not exist when I was a child but adults had plenty of ways back then of talking down to children. Speaking from experience, I sure resented it when adults scolded me in baby talk or dumb sounding youth lingo, and most people I asked feel the same way. Whether in their hearts they were trying to be clever, dismissive, threatening, or whatever, it all came down to a put-down.

I utterly disagree with the claim that differing community views absolve administrators of a responsibility to consider the effect of their actions. Quite the opposite, particularly in this case. Administrators taking bold actions like unapproved and untested admin-bots, nonstandard methods, acting against community opposition in use of admin tools, or abandoning a discussion in progress in favor of unilateral action, have a special duty to think of the consequences before they act and to accept accountability for the results. Otherwise they have simply gone rogue. The fact that a few supporters take the minority position, defend over-bold actions, or think that the goal justifies the means, does not give them the license to ignore the rules. Wikidemon (talk) 19:55, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

So you were being serious, okay then. I think you really are comparing bread with oranges now. Blocks are very different to deletions; they're not the same, nor are they even remotely treated in the same regard in terms of how personally something can be taken - the only similarity is that they are executed by administrators. And for the record, the evidence on the PD talk page suggests that you are incorrect in sweepingly making any such assumption about current practice. The only mocking or taunting or victory cry found in that edit summary is that of one that's created in the head of the user who so unreasonably interpreting it in potentially the worst way possible - such a user, I expect, would also consider some summaries as a "personal attack" or form of "incivility" when that's a gross exaggeration from the reality (no different here). This can essentially dominate the relevant dispute resolution mechanisms on Wikipedia. Minority class and full members? Editors are the majority class in this project; users with tools are in the minority, but they are more privilleged as a result. Noticeboards also exist for a reason. ("Dumb sounding youth lingo"? Is that how you describe street talk too, just if you weren't accustomed with its nuances? Would that be fair on users who are beyond just accustomed with it?) The fact that you've somehow jumped to the assumption that someone is scolding you is rather interesting; that's certainly not a collaborative outlook - while I respect the fact that you weren't happy as a child with a certain sort of lingo, I also respect the fact that some people on Wikipedia were not happy as a child, even as an adult, with any use of the word "fuck" whatsoever. That doesn't mean that their view will stick as that of the wider community's - it won't. There's nothing scolding, clever, dismissive, or threatening about it, unless you insist on narrowly interpreting it in that way and that way alone.

Far from it; I happen to think administrators always have a responsibility to consider the effect of their actions - but it's unreasonable to expect them to consider or foresee such an extreme view. As for rouge admins, they still exist and will always exist as far as this community is concerned. This isn't about supporting or defending; this is about having a bit of understanding, consideration, clue and common sense. Ncmvocalist (talk) 02:48, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Blocks, page deletions, and other administrative actions have in common that a small number of editors override the will of others via special powers entrusted them by the community. The BLOCK policy, covering their zap button on regular editors' ability to edit, assigns theduty that they explain themselves in a clear, neutral way, without jargon, bias, or conflicted self interest. I see no principled reason why the zap button on users' private content differs from the zap button on their editing rights. If I am wrong about current practice -- if admins are unresponsive, taunting, confrontational, rejoicing, condescending, or insulting when they force their will on nonadminstrative editors -- we have a problem far more pervasive than the one raised here. But I don't think so. In my experience most admins rise to the occasion and take their position seriously; drama comes from a small subset of rogue / maverick admins who treat their tools as a personal prerogative rather than part of a principled whole. As for your repeated attempts to portrey my understanding of language and logic to be weak, and now aspersions about my childhood, that is unbecoming and I would ask that you check those urges here in this forum. In substance, heck yes. A party entrusted with enforcement powers should not be joking, informal, mocking, or anything else beyond straightforward in their official actions. If they want to take their chances with process and decorum, they should be accountable and accept the consequences. Are you deliberately misinterpreting my explanation? The class aggrieved here is a group of 100-odd editors, most apparently exuberant youths, who enjoy playing a silly game that involves creating personal sub-pages. The class is not non-administrative users as a whole. Adults are telling children they may not have fun here on Wikipedia. That is fine, but they should do so respectfully. If an admin threatened me in lolcat-speak with a block on my talk page I would simply think they are out to lunch, a point I have already made. That is its own problem, it renders the threat invalid. But if I were a junior Wikipedian and an admin used the lolcat edit summary that is at issue in this case, in process of deleting my private subpage, you bet I would think something remiss. I would be right. Something 'is' remiss with those edit summaries. This body is about to declare that. I am simply saying, based on my experience and observations, that using stereotypical youth lingo to announce sanctions against young people is disrespectful and likely to be taken as an insult. If you don't agree, fine. But please don't accuse me of nonsense like not having a clue or common sense. It's a fair point and the arbitrators can figure it out for themselves. Wikidemon (talk) 07:12, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

I really need not dignify your response with a reply, but out of courtesy, I will be clear - you seem to be unresponsive to the actual comments raised, and have repeatedly tried to make out that these comments are personally directed at you - in such circumstances, I think you've made my point for me. The very fact that you refer to "threats" from such a lolcat summary says it all. We're done here. Ncmvocalist (talk) 11:04, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Sorry if you feel I have not responded to your points of disagreement. To be clear, I speak in the hypothetical that if an admin violated BLOCK policy by directing an overt threat in lolcat-speak to me as an adult I would correctly perceive the admin to be off base. In the present situation, which falls under DELETION policy, I observe that a young editor being told in lolcat-speak why their page was deleted might interpret that as mocking, taunting, etc. We have both shared our thoughts with the committee. If the committee values yours, mine, or both they may take them into consideration. Wikidemon (talk) 12:58, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

If the discussion was shifting to lolcats in blocks, my response would be very different. The fact is that this isn't a matter of blocks, and to be clear, I fail to see in any way how an editor could assume that a lolcat summary can be perceived as mockery or taunting which is a very serious accusation to make at any time. That was one of the several points that I felt was left unaddressed, and unresponded to. Sorry - you and me both. While I appreciate your concluding sentence, I note that as usual, I didn't raise this issue for ArbCom alone. Ncmvocalist (talk) 14:02, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

DELETION is silent as to the acceptable bounds of language in a deletion summary, so I argue that the letter or spirit of BLOCK should apply. The closest analog to these deletions is a block. They involve use of administrative tools to take away editing privileges of specific individuals by deleting their personal sub-pages and thereby prevent them from playing a game. The messages were addressed to them, and contained a direct request to change their behavior. We can leave the broader question of admin language for another day, but I argue this particular situation should be handled in a more dignified way. I've tried to explain what I think young people might think when someone talks down to them in process of taking away their privileges. That's not an accusation. I see it, you don't. The committee may see it or not. I am here for no other reason than that, to share some observations with the committee. Wikidemon (talk) 14:38, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

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User:A Nobody's evidence by User:Ali'i

The evidence that User:A Nobody posted here is weak. Making "weak 'arguments' in AfDs" from a year ago is hardly an actionable offense. It doesn't explain or give context to any kind of long-term pattern of administrator abuse. Perhaps if he had outright deleted it, it would make sense to include this in this arbitration case. And nominating Template:Rescue for deletion through regular processes over a year after its last deletion discussion is definitely not disruptive. Pages routinely go through multiple deletion discussions. Leaving a year+ between them is not pointed. Mahalo. --Ali'i 18:43, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

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You miss the point that User:A Nobody considers anything disruptive if it is in any way opposed to his inclusionist slant. Stifle (talk) 09:53, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Please, Stifle, don't open up a "there is a bad inclusionist cabal" discussion here... The nomination is pointy because he (and you) argues that it's used "as a weapon to push voters to the deletion discussion"; but that can never(!) be the fault of a template but always the fault of the users who use it that way. The argument for deletion in this case is a highly subjective perception of other people's actions and MZM knows that. SoWhy 10:39, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

The comment by Stifle is true though, totally. A Nobody uses the exact same sort of poor arguments in RFAs. Basically, if you disagreed with him on an AFD, he opposes you. Extremely minor things like that from nearly a year ago have nothing to do with this RFAR and are totally irrelevant. Majorly talk 17:56, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

The bad faith nomination of the rescue template is relevant, however. Sincerely, --A Nobody^{My talk} 18:30, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

How does nominating a page/template for deletion relate to his role as an administrator? He has no special ability from the +sysop compared to a non-admin - if you think the nom is pointless, fine. But it doesn't relate to any supposed abuse of the tools. A pertinent example would be if he had simply deleted the template out-of-process, but that is not the case Fritzpoll (talk) 12:00, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

If the whole crux of this RfAr comes down to deletions by the subject, then I am concerned when I see "speedy delete" with no explanation provided in an AfD or a disruptive third nomination for something kept twice, i.e. more problematic edits with regards to deletion. And these shows in the case of the AfD a lack of explanation and in the case of TfD a lack of going with two clear consensuses, i.e. they help reflect the attitude with regards to deletion that could help explain why he has deleted other items by mentined by others in a seemingly unilateral fashion. Best, --A Nobody^{My talk} 17:33, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

The RFAR is about abusive or improper deletions, not cases where he went through all the proper processes but the community disagreed with him. I haven't looked, but if what Ali'i said about how long ago the last RFD was, it certainly would not be disruptive. Consensus can change, just because it didn't in this case doesn't mean the nom was intentionally done to be disruptive. Mr.Z-man 18:29, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Just as a quick note, if you look at Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/MZMcBride/Evidence#Evidence_presented_by_A_Nobody, I think my evidence is being misinterpreted to some extent. I am saying that in all of our interactions in deletion discussions, I have found only one that I though disruptive and only one that I thought weak. I then go on to point out an example where I thought he made a good argument. I am not calling for desysopping here or anything else; I am saying that I have seen only a couple items that I find questionable, but good work elsewhere and am only encouraging that the good work example be more the norm. I apologize for any confusion. Best, --A Nobody^{My talk} 18:39, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I think the point was that the fact MZMcBride disagreed with you at a couple of AFDs (or made weak arguments, if you prefer) is not considered relevant in any way to the subject of this arbitration case. Stifle (talk) 19:32, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

If people are calling for such measures as desysopping, shouldn't the totality of his edits be considered? And again, I am saying that he has also made at least one good argument in an AfD and that the only negative examples I had were two rather than many. Best, --A Nobody^{My talk} 20:58, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

84.45.219.185's evidence by User:Mr.Z-man

This isn't evidence at all. It starts with an unsupported assertion - deleted talk pages here of IP addresses that have had many blocks - without actually saying which ones, then making a random bad-faith assumption. The rest of it doesn't really make any sense at all. What does mediawiki.org have to do with anything? Mr.Z-man 20:40, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

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