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 may edit, for voting.

Motions and requests by the parties

Request for academic evidence

1) As user:Piotrus in his remedies section once again talking about my unreliable source and “its supporters”, namely book “Armija Krajova Lietuvoje ISBN 9986-577-02-0”. I once again asking (I asked this several times before) that Piotrus should present an academic and specific publications and academic evidences which specifically denounced the facts presented in this book. And let Piotrus possible presentation have formal structure, namely – present specific book’s Armija Krajova Lietuvoje claim and present specific academic sources (page numbers, authors etc.), which denounced the books claim; after one claim go to other another claim and present academic sources to it, etc. And after it we will see if Piotrus has academic support for his claims. It should be done because contributor not only using this book "unreliable" label as my ill behavior evidence but also continues to label other scholars as “unreliable” [1] too.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:42, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Since this is a new question for the ArbCom, let me repeat my old arguments: 1) no English reviews of this book could have been found, you failed to present any Lithuanian ones, I have found three reviews in Polish press, all calling it extremist/unreliable ([2], [3], [4]) 2) many of book claims, particulary about alleged AK attrocities, are not verifiable by any other source 3) the book publisher, lt:Lietuvos politinių kalinių ir tremtinių sąjunga, is a political party - not known for its reliability and are specifically warned as likely unreliable source in Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Examples 4) the book co-author for t.1 and principal author is the controversial Kazimieras Garšva ([5]). Therefore the book fails WP:RS, particulary the Exceptional claims require exceptional sources section and is simply not a reliable source, your arguments otherwise are simply supporting my statements below.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:46, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for providing online sources; I especially intrigued by your review sources. As I initially asked, post there these sources (or any) specific claims, which concrete facts of the book they dispute (as you noted your sources call it unreliable) ? Which contra arguments they present instead of them? You see I could not locate much, as your one of the review sources’ [6] title reads (if I not mistaken) as the last official visit of the president A. Kwaśniewski to Lithuania, somehow not very academic review source. So it would be great if you post here the specific failings of these sources linked to the book. M.K. 08:27, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that Committee should be informed how credible Piotrus’ presented “reviews” findings. First it should be noted that I did not receive any concrete translation of these “reviews” ; only user:Lysy provided general impressions [7] instead of specific translations, motivating that his English skills are not good enough (but much more superior then my) or he is too lazy or both; so I am sorry if there is inaccuracies as my Polish skills are not superior. Let’s look how these “reviews” challenge the presented facts by book. This “review” provided by Piotrus, is as a strange compilation of russophobic rants published in form of newspaper article.

As all conspiracy theorist do, authors of this so called " review " do not provide any proofs or verifiable arguments, just play on emotional nationalistic overtones about anti-Polish hysteria sown by Moscow ("Wiele wskazuje na to, że owocna współpraca służb specjalnych wschodniego sąsiada z litewskimi skrajnymi nacjonalistami z okresu międzywojennego (wówczas za sianie antypolskiej histerii na Litwie byli sowicie wynagradzani z Moskwy) nie całkiem wygasła również dzisiaj"), about presents of Lithuanian ultra nationalist to Moscow on occasion of 60-th anniversary of defeat of fascism ("Słowem, próba powrotu ni stąd, ni zowąd do ponawiania kłamstw o Wileńskiej AK przez litewskich skrajnych nacjonalistów tuż przed moskiewskimi obchodami 60-lecia pokonania faszyzmu - to ewidentny prezent Moskwie"). This peace of Piotrus' "review" ends with conclusion that "In hard moments Moscow can rely on its allies" (W trudnych chwilach Moskwa doprawdy zawsze może liczyć na swych sojuszników). In such extreme Polish nationalistic rhetoric I hardly can find any signs of academic claims which denounce my presented books facts.

Author of another “review", which Piotrus presented, with very informative title “Catch the thief” goes even further. Not to mention that this piece is not even written by a journalist (it's readers letter to newspaper), not to mention that this article is calling Lithuanian government "infantile", not to mention others chauvinistic rhetoric of this "review", what is really worth mentioning that on author list of "extremists", who need to be "re-educated" or condemned because of "their harmful activities" besides academic Mr. Garšva and few other Lithuanians we found and….and Eufemia Teichmann - former Poland's ambassador to Lithuania ("Potrzebne jest jeszcze dokształcenie w zakresie historii zarówno p. p. Garšvy, Jankusa, Leki, jak i p. Teichmann oraz im podobnych lub zdecydowane potępienie ich szkodliwej działalności").

Of course in such “reviews” full of extreme Polish nationalism rhetoric words as “unreliable” should not be any surprise. I hope that Piotrus will acknowledge that such “reviews” completely not suits not even to determining the source credibility but as well as to ArbCom case itself. M.K. 09:43, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

While the rhetoric of the above publications is indeed popular press, this is just to be expected from popular press. The publications are however reliable: Tygodnik Wileńszczyzny is the largest newspaper of Polish minority in Lithuania, Nasza Gazeta is a joint publication of Polish minorities from all three Baltic states and Świat Poloni is a publication sponsored by Polish government (Senate) and dedicated for Polonia. All three articles are very critical of the book, a sentiment shared by all editors (but you) involved in discussion who read parts of it. We are still waiting for you to present positive reviews of it, as it is, the book fails WP:RS#Exceptional_claims_require_exceptional_sources (particulary considering that one of its prime authors is KG, a leader of 'extremist' organization). No suprise, all things considered, that a book related to 'extremist' organization has attracted little attention from most of academic (or even popular) press - another good argument that we should not see this as a serious publication.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:35, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

So, maybe you now will translate theses "reviews" findings? Which facts of presented book these "reviews" arguing and which contra arguments they presenting, apart of course such "evidences" that Polish ambassador should be "re-educated"? M.K. 21:07, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Currently there is no activity surrounding this issue, despite that I asked to provide specific claims and translations which denounce presented ones in specific book, at least using Piotrus online so called “review” sources. I received none. So, I assume that parties made and presented their final arguments. So I will present my summary denouncing Piotrus claims, regarding book in question.

1) Book presents different chapters written by different scholars (this means that for one or another chapter there is a specific scholar responsible for writing it), second part of book provides primary sources.

2) Every chapter of this book has a name of scholar, which written it.

3) Every chapter of this book includes footnotes and bibliographies used in chapter, as noted in RS examples. For instance chapter written by Rimantas Zizas “Armijos krajovos veikla Lietuvoje 1942-1944 metais” (Activities of Armia Krajowa in Lithuania in 1942-1944) (around 20 pages) use 84 in-line citations with proper attribution to primary and secondary sources; Stanislovas Buchensevas “Rytų Lietuvos mokyklos ir Armija Krajova 1941-1944” (Schools in Eastern Lithuania and Armia Krajowa in 1941-1944) (around 14 p.) uses 59 etc.

4) Authors of these scholarly publications are experts in the field – Ph. D. Arūnas Bubnys one of key areas of his work is Polish underground in Lithuania during WWII (the area of our current interest); Ph. D. Rimantas Zizas specializes in WWII as well. Buchaveckas, Stanislovas another historian specializing in WWII matters and schools situation during the war, etc.

5) book’s presented findings are quoted in different academic publications including studies of Lithuanian Institute of History of WW period [8].

6) book publisher as Piotrus calls it “known for its reliability” is well know for support books publishing, philanthropy, actually its one of the main goals - to support books publishing as well as museums.

7) Piotrus claim that many of book claims are not verifiable by any other source - is completely wrong. If we going to ignore all sources which are presented in book itself (makes a nice list), there is many more which concurs statements of this book such as “Lithuanian Historical Studies, Vol. 9, 2004 ISSN 1392-2343”; Vilniškės AK bendradarbiavimo su vokiečiais pirmtakas ; [9];[10]; “Panorama Nr. 9, 2007 ISSN1822-2986” etc.

8) I already demonstrated [11], which types of “arguments” Piotrus uses to support his POV.

9) so that’s lefts? A, Habilitated Doctor of Humanities Garšva, whom Piotrus openly mocked. It should be noted that Mr. Garšva input is limited by only by one essay in different languages at the end of book, besides there was no need to me quote his essay, so I didn’t in any article.

So my conclusion is – Piotrus failed to present any trusty academic findings which supported his view regarding “unreliable source”, instead providing them, he choose to list reader’s type letter full of ultra nationalistic Polish rhetoric, which openly advocates for territorial claims; mocking Poland’s neighbors. And that’s saddens me that Piotrus did not distance himself from those “reviews”, but contrary, trying to persuade that his ultra Polish nationalistic internet web pages publications are trustworthy. Ignoring simple RS guidelines, which instructs that such type web pages should be used with care, that authors of publications should have expertise in area (contrary to Piotrus presented readers letter) etc. And remark that those “reviews” are supported by polish Senate makes them reliable would not help, as it is widely know, that different publications supported by this Senate there were penalized by autonomous publishers watchdog for promoting ethnic hatred and mocking from ethnicity. All these presented facts demonstrate on which ground are built Piotrus’ claims regarding my “disruptive editing” by “using unreliable sources”. I rest my case. M.K. 10:56, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

In general, I repeatedly asked M.K. to provide sources, on this and other matters, and he never responded. DGG 21:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Can you provide a diffs in which you specifically asked me, as you note, “repeatedly” to provide sources of this matter? Let me remind you that in this section we are talking about publication “Armija Krajova Lietuvoje ISBN 9986-577-02-0”, because the only time you suggested to me something personally - was this [12]. M.K. 08:30, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have read the summary of the book written by its editor, Kazimieras Garšva. The summary used hate language, typical for extremal nationalists. Garšva himself is not a historian. I would never use such source as a citation for any other subject than "Nationalism". --Lysy^talk 18:46, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It is very good that you made a comment, more people familiar with this issue will state their view, more chances that we will do everything right here. So, besides your own impressions maybe you have some specific scholars opinion too? Could I ask a favor? Could you translate some findings of Piotrus presented review sources,as with my Polish skills will take much time? If it is too big you can translate it in my user talk. M.K. 14:49, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Careful selection of sources

2) Controversial statements on the difficult history of the region should be supported with carefully selected reliable sources. Reviewed academic publications should be preferred. News magazine commentaries do not qualify as reliable sources in this context. The articles on controversial events should best focus on facts, and individual opinions should be best avoided or clearly attributed. The sources supporting contradicting or controversial points of view should be carefully balanced and ideally accepted by consensus.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Probably would need some rewording, but my message is that obscure or extremist sources are one of the plagues of the articles in this domain. Agreeing on good sources is often difficult as most of them are not in English and require good faith of all the involved parties, of often contradicting strong POVs. --Lysy^talk 15:37, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Agree in general, but there are few points I'd debate: 1) To News magazine commentaries do not qualify as reliable source in this context I'd add unless they are the only sources available and/or judged non-controversial by all involved editors; keep in mind that academic publications always override newspapers and that it is always recommended to state in text that a given fact is a claim of a particular newspaper. Two cases to consider: should we disqualify all writings of Ryszard Kapuściński? And if a newspaper publishes a claim that is plausible and not contradicted by any academic research, why should we discard it (case of Przyszowice massacre).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 15:52, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is quite tough in my opinion. I don't believe that encyclopedic articles should be written based on magazines or newspapers. I've seen too many complete bullshit in many respectable papers, including some of my favourites. So I don't really know, personally I'd be against using such sources at all, but this is out of the scope of this case and belongs to WP:RS. For our purpose, I'd admit magazine sources if they are accepted by all the involved editors, which is rather unlikely for really controversial issues. Maybe we should just make sure that statements from the media are clearly attributed as such in the body of the article (like: "according to BBC commentary of ... etc.) ? --Lysy^talk 19:12, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Why is this principle discussed under "Motions and requests by parties"? It should be moved down the page. Generally, I'm inclined to agree with this principle, although it has no bearing to my grievances with P.P.'s behaviour. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:48, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I thought that it would fit to "requests by parties". Also, I wanted to keep it distant from all the finger pointing and bickering prevalent in other sections of the workshop. I did not have any specific case in mind when I formulated the proposal, it's just a general request based on a number of my past experiences. --Lysy^talk 19:03, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is one of the key issues of this case, the acceptability of sources and the habit of attacking the sources not to one's liking. Using newspapers as sources for historic info is a typical problem. The statement "reliable mainstream newspaper" has to be taken within the context of what actually newspapers are and what are our expectations of them. The main product produced my newspapers are current news and their analysis and when we speak about paper's reliability we imply the reputation they built in doing what we expect them to do: presenting news and their analysis. Writing about remote history is not the newspaper's job and if a newspaper is the only source of some historic theory, it means not that the newspaper suddenly becomes an acceptable source but that the theory is a fringe one not covered in the historic literature.

The author of the particular article make make a difference. An otherwise established historian who chooses to write for a newsmagazine is OK ("established" means verifiable professional credentials, publications in peer-reviewed sources and academic books published by respectable media.) A work by a not-so-established author is also OK if published in a scholarly source. Scholarly sources include peer-reviewed journals, books published by academic publishers or by the university presses. If the author who is otherwise established in academia publishes the article in a normally non-academic source, web-site a newspaper, this may also be acceptable. What is non-acceptable are non-academic publications authored by people with no confirmed credentials. --Irpen 19:11, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Template

3)

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed temporary injunctions

Ethical conduct

1) To preserve the integrity and fair-handedness all parties cease and desist from contacting arbitrators privately or semi-privately (that is outside of the case pages) in relation to this case. Giving evidence that has to be private due to its sensitive nature or leaving a note at the talk page pointing to a new case development is exempted. --Irpen 06:11, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed by Irpen. I think contacting arbitrators off the case pages is unethical as it gives one side of the story an undue weight since all sides of the case are unlikely to watchlist pages of all arbitrators to present their side of the story to counter the arguments presented by the initial contact. This applies even more to the off-wiki communication. The Arbitration pages exist specifically to present the evidence and make statements. Unless there is some info that is private by its nature (like checkuser results) I think very strongly that it has to be presented in the conspicuous place accessible to everyone. In RL parties of the case are not allowed to go in and out the judge's chambers and juror's deliberation rooms to kibitz about the case in private. Of course it is permissible to post a note like "Please see [workshop_page here] for the new development of the stalled case."

This seems rather vague. Could you present an example (hypothetical, if needed) of an 'unethical contact with arbitrators'?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 15:36, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

How is this "vague"? I explained above the circumstances that makes such contact non-objectionable. For everything else, use the case pages and if you think some Arbitrator may have missed your post, prod him/her at the talk page with the link to the proper section. --Irpen 19:14, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

This seems somewhat double edged. Arbitrators should be recusing, if they're receiving such information and using it to deliberate (i.e. they're supposed to be deciding on Wikipedia arbitration based on things on Wikipedia), so it should be a trivial matter for this to be agreed. It's lamentable that such a request or proposal needs to be made, but I suppose it is a sign of the times. Geogre 19:25, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Template

2)

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Template

3)

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Template

4)

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Questions to the parties

Proposed final decision

Civility

4) Per Wikipedia:Civility and Wikipedia:No personal attacks, Wikipedia users are expected to behave reasonably and calmly in their dealings with other users. Insulting and intimidating other users harms the community by creating a hostile environment. Personal attacks are not acceptable. Discuss content, not other editors.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed by --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 01:05, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Disruptive editing

5) Per Wikipedia:Blocking policy and Wikipedia:Banning policy, users who engage in disruptive editing may be blocked from the site or put on probation. Users who show no signs of improvement over long period, after multiple warnings and blocks, may be banned.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed by --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 01:05, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Holy cow! Banning?! Banning? Wow. Don't we block first? Don't we see how a user responds to a block? Don't we save banning for people who demonstrate, beyond reasonable doubt, that they simply cannot edit cooperatively? This is staggering. There are long time users involved here, and I hope none of them are banned. Geogre 02:30, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ops. I am not the first not the last editor to use 'ban' when we ment 'block'. Good catch. No, I am too quite opposed to long bans. Short blocks should be enough to give all but the most die-hard trolls the time to learn from their mistakes and behave better when they come back.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 11:47, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Reliable sources

6) Per Wikipedia:Reliable sources, Wikipedia does NOT discriminate against published sources based on the language they are written in. Polish-language sources are not inherently superior or more reliable than those written in Lithuanian or Russian, and vice versa.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Adapted from Miskin's case. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:49, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Support, since neither I nor any other Polish editor, to my knowledge, ever argued otherwise. However I'd strongly suggest including an additional sentence along the following lines: Sources from regimes known for unreliability, such as from the former Eastern Block, are less reliable then modern Western academic research.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:17, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ex Occidente Lux? Why should I refrain from using Soviet works by Alexander Kazhdan to reference articles on Byzantium-related subjects? And who is better authority on Scythian art than Boris Piotrovsky? Are you prepared to stop quoting Polish sources published between 1945 and 1991? I can tell you that "Modern Western academic research" prefers not to enlarge on certain topics and contains large chunks of pure propaganda. Apart from very few clear-cut and obvious cases, we have no method of assessing what is propaganda and what is not, especially when historic documents are cited. Nobody is free of bias. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:35, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, I am not saying they are all unreliable, but "less reliable" in certain areas, particular such as history and relations of countries under the Eastern Block. There is no perfect method, indeed, but there is enough research into historiography (including Russian) to be able to see which areas are less and which are more reliable (see Marc Ferro's The Use and Abuse of History, or such articles as [13], [14], [15], [16] or [17] for a brief selection). Bottom line is that while Soviet (or People's Republic of Poland) research is probably quite reliable when it coms to Byzantium, it is much less so when it comes to Polish-Russian history or relations, and we have academic sources (per links in my previous sentences) which state exactly that. Of course that doesn't mean all such sources should be discarded, but extra care needs to be taken with regards to WP:RS#Exceptional_claims_require_exceptional_sources and WP:NPOV#Undue_weight.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:14, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The point is the following: If you have an article dealing with, say Polish-Russian (or Soviet) relations, either you accept sources from both points of view, or you only accept only neutral and peer-reviewed stuff. But trying to source an article with Polish newspapers and papers of an institute of dubious reliability while telling Soviet sources are all flawed is called double standard. Either everyone has biaises, or no one has. -- Grafikm ^(AutoGRAF) 17:43, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

This is one of the areas where Wikipedia is at its most vulnerable. There is no inherent superiority in any language, or even in print. After all, I have a 1946 Collier Children's Encyclopedia that points out that Korean children are backward and uneducated. Wikipedia itself has been draped in unadulterated bigotry from 1911 Britanica ports. The difficulty here is that all nations have their books that are out of date, all have their period of bad positivism, all have their fringe presses, all have their weaknesses, and without utmost goodwill and neutrality by native speakers, the speakers of other languages are either faced with outright clash of "unimpeachable" sources or with no sources at all. Without calling out for real world experts and real world skeptics, the battles here are going to be indeterminate, and so we will have to apply other standards than merely "is it published" to determine what is a preferrable source. Geogre 02:37, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I can happily illustrate weakness and bias of Polish sources in many areas (Polish historiography) is on my 'to do' list (for example, I'd never consider using works of Stanisław Grabski with regard to history and politics, and I'd be careful when using Joachim Lelewel or Edward Prus as their works have significant biases). Alas, I have yet to see my opponents admit Lithuanian or Russian/Soviet historiography may be at least a little biased. This is further compacted by the fact that certain (particularly totalitarian, and that includes People's Republic of Poland, too) nations tended to produce works much more skewed then others (per my diffs to academic works on that subject above), and also - as you pointed out - that the older a source, the less reliable it can be. Alas, I can name many discussions where 19th century or highly criticized modern nationalist-extremists are presented at face value, and criticism of them interpreted as bad faith and an attempt to censor some nation. Such inability to look critically at one's historiography and national sources is a problem, showing wide-ranging problems with regards to reliability and neutrality, and should not be ignored.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 12:03, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Laundry lists of grievances

7) Compiling laundry lists of grievances and black books on other users is a violation of WP:Civil and WP:NPA

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed, based on Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Tobias Conradi Alex Bakharev 13:42, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If it's a sin diary for someone, it's vindictive. ArbCom has had rulings before on people who kept long "hitlists" and the like. If it's a list of evidence of policy violations, together with attempts at mediation that took place, then it's reasonable. It's not one of those things that can be listed in advance, and the finding of fact begs the question. If someone is just keeping a "list of dirty words by user:Bobo," then it's bad. If it's "Bobo did the following policy violation, and we went to AN/I, and the consensus there was Y," then it's probably a form of attempted mediation itself. The arbitrators will have to decide which a given thing is, just as we, as users, have to ask ourselves that same question before we ever venture into that territory. Geogre 02:48, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Use of foreign language to discuss opponents

8) No matter to whom one addresses a comment, it is preferred to use English on English Wikipedia talk pages. Using another language is acceptable only as an exception: when communicating with a user with a very poor command of English, it a strictly social communications, when discussing a foreign source, etc. Whatever is the reason of using another language proper translation should be quickly provided if requested.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Adopted from Talk_page_guidelines#Good_practice Alex Bakharev 13:57, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Accusing editors in having xenophobic views

7) Xenophobia, racism, national hatred are frown upon in the civilized society. Accusations of other editors in such views are rarely justifiable. Except few obviously exceptional cases, such accusations constitute a grave personal attack.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. I realize that "rarely" and "Except few obviously exceptional cases" may lead to some ambiguity but there is nothing wrong in applying this terms to the user accounts who come here mainly to spread hatred. However, having seen such accusations leveled by some of this case participants, I feel this principle is necessary to state in some form. Please reformulate if necessary. --Irpen 23:36, 15 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Template

7) {text of proposed principle}

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed findings of fact

Biographies of living persons violations

1) Piotrus (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) violated the Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons policy.

Full picture of evidences here, specifically – mocking from living person, by accusing him faking documentations; misusing sources and presenting poorly sourced material - presenting as embassy information while in reality it was a some sort of tourist portal [18] etc, misleadingly suggested that WP:LIVING is not applied in different articles dealing with living persons biographies [19], preventing cite check and misleadingly suggested that attribution of Polish sources and citations are verified [20] (violation of WP:VERIFY as well as dubious sources there in Polish) (after some time personally started to found flaws [21]), Piotrus did not comply policy, which instructs for immediate removal without discussion dubious and low quality sources [22] , continually supports usage of dubious sources [23] .

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 11:22, 23 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Diffs or link to evidence section, please. Picaroon (Talk) 01:30, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Done M.K. 13:53, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

I see nothing to support BLP in the diffs: one actually reads ":The proper solution is to quote relevant text on talk, and/or also try to link to the stable page verion in the Internet Archive" -- To my mind, that's the correct way to document. DGG 21:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Could you be more specific; for start could you point which part of the policy suggest that is is allowed to mock from living person? And that about usage sources, which do not concur statements which they should reference? Would be great if you quote the policy, which you think allows to do so. M.K. 08:15, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Revert wars

2) Piotrus fueled systematical revert wars.

Full picture of evidence here and here. During this arbitration time frame Piotrus in one alone article managed to revert up to ten times, newest revert campaigns on single article - [24] [25] [26].

2.1) After Ghirlandajo's departure from the project, Piotrus has continued to revert war with other wikipedians.[27] [28] [29] Despite his "gentlemen's agreement" with Irpen not to report each other for 3RR issues,[30] [31] Piotrus asked (in Polish) User:Mathiasrex to report Irpen for a 3RR which did not take place.[32]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 11:22, 23 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Diffs or link to evidence section, please. Picaroon (Talk) 01:30, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Done. M.K. 13:56, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is a misleading suggestion. It usually takes two or more to revert-war. Blaming one party only is simply not fair. I've checked the diffs provided, and usually it was not Piotrus who started warring. --Lysy^talk 19:54, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No it is not misleading suggestion at all, frankly saying I do not understand which sources you "checked", probably wrong ones - I suggest you to start from these etc. M.K. 08:22, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed 2.1) --Ghirla^-трёп- 11:41, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A perfect example of misrepresented if not completly faulty evidence. User:Mathiasrex asked me (in Polish) if I can do something if a 3RR rule is broken; since I did not want to step in due to possible involvement and bias, I simply told Mathiasrex in my reply about existence of 3RR report board. The way Ghirla phrases this innocent incident is similar to how a lot of other evidence is phrased and a significant reason for our previous DRs.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:21, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I said all there is to it at the the talk page of this workshop. Another important issue is whether in some of these wars Piotrus have used the off-wiki coordination to recruit supporters once 3-RR which he sees as "rv-quota" was used up. The evidence of anything that took place off-wiki can only be circumstantial. It is up to arbitrators to decide from several FoF's below whether this can indeed be established for a fact. --Irpen 06:43, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Since I reverted Irpen's version there too and added some material Piotrus contributed to talk page, let me just point out that 1) first diff is Irpen reverting Piotrus, not the other way around 2) Piotrus reverts ([33], [34]) are well explained on talk, particulary noteworthy is that the other party is relying on unreliable source that Western academic journal has described as "close to Stalinist and neoimperial concepts" 3) several other editors have supported Piotrus version and questioned Irpen's, ex. myself, Lysy [35], Balcer [36] and [37]. 4) Alex who reverted Piotrus twice ([38], [39]) has not explained any of his views on talk even after Piotrus asked him on his talk page and in edit summaries. 5) Finally, per Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle, nobody is really guilty of revert warring, as the article is being steadily improved. Nobody has broken 3RR, most parties (w/out Alex...) are discussing issues at talk, and although there are some uncivil comments at talk, they don't come from Piotrus. Similar situation can be seen in all 'revert wars' alleged by MK - Piotrus (and Lysy, Balcer, and others) are always keeping their cool, being civil, adding reliable sources and willing to discuss issues at talk. This, unfortunately, cannot be always said about the other side... - Darwinek 20:52, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You can start you investigation from here. Worth to note that source which you say talks about "close to Stalinist and neoimperial concepts" was added on 30, while last revert, which is here presented conducted in 29. So if I not mistaken you saying that Piotrus new about this source one day before, then it appeared, to justify his reverts? Interesting story, but somehow implausible. M.K. 08:35, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You are mistaken, the unreliable source was added on 28 ([40]); note that 2 reverts were done by a user who refused to discuss the issue at talk.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:14, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No. Darwinek who presenting now theory about unreliable source, basing on source ([41]) which should justify your reverts was added on talk on 30 while last presented diff shows your reverts of 29 d. M.K. 11:01, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Concerns about Melt's reliability and neutrality were raised earlier on talk page by that time, and similar discussions took place earlier on other pages. I was also aware of the critical academic reviews at the time of my reverts, but it was late at night and I didn't have enough strengh to compose a post reflecting those new findings, which I did on the following day. Again, the user who reverted me twice has never commented on that article's talk page.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:24, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Very interesting explanation - you knew about review, which now some contributors notes as critical to the discussion, but you was too tired to present it back then, but you wasn't too tired to start revert campaign. Regarding why contributor did not responded to you, I don't know, maybe his edit summary explains restored sourced info, btw, Piotrus, removal of sourced information is one of the key pattern of your edits. M.K. 09:59, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Just for the record, my edits were merging Piotrus's and Irpen's versions of the article (basically Piotrus's version with Meltyukhov's info from Irpen's version), the second edit was restoration of the sourced Meltyukhov' info (I have spent some time merging two versions and thought that my work deserved little bit more than just blind revert by Piotrus). Both edits were done before Piotrus's comment on my talk page. II am not an expert on Meltyukhov but I saw no reason to discard an academic book written on the topic Alex Bakharev 06:55, 21 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I appreciate your effort, but check the talk page next time. Metl's book is quite unreliable, see also discussion on his talk page and the very article itself for more details.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 09:01, 21 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Selective approach to source's reliability based not on the general criteria but on whether one likes what they say is a separate issue discussed at this very page separately. --Irpen 06:43, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Disruptive editing by Dr. Dan

3) Dr. Dan (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has a history of disruptive editing that includes block for incivility, attempts to turn Wikipedia into a battleground along national lines by insulting Polish editors and challenging their good faith ([42], [43], [44]) and engaging in personal attacks ([45], [46], [47]). See evidence subsection for more evidence, including many previous warnings.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed by --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 01:05, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Misleading suggestion. First of all administrator, who blocked contributor acknowledged that block was controversial. I suggest you better label your "evidences". M.K. 09:49, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Misleading criticism. Controversial block does not mean 'wrong block'; as can be seen from archived thread the block was not overturned. Also, note Dr. Dan's reply to the block: "As to whether I violated WP:Civil or not, I probably did" and "Maybe something good will come out of this RFI, because I will definitely work on becoming more civil". Unfortunatly, as my presented diffs, endorsed by several other users, show, his work didn't last long enough (or went far enough). That, however, his allies defend him claiming he was never incivil where he himself admitted otherwise, is quite telling.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:21, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"Criticism", "wrong block" could you elaborate on these? M.K. 11:03, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As this ArbCom degenerates almost daily with some of the most absurd statements and amazing comments from you, P.P., I wish to briefly say that due to an illness of a close friend, and his death, and the complications of the funeral and the deep sadness and mourning resulting from that event, I have been unable to log on to WP as frequently as I would have liked to in the past few days. It's also caused me to look at this ArbCom only very sporadically. Rest assured, I intend to present evidence at this ArbCom very soon. As to the above thread, I think Durova's own perspective and commentary on the block you asked her to perform would be more telling than your own. I had some private correspondence with her regarding the block, which is not something that I care to present here. If she wishes to share it, in expressing her thoughts on the block, I do not have an objection to her doing so. With or without that private correspondence, maybe she can shed some light on why it was, or wasn't, "controversial". As to your continual attempts to deflect the reasons that this proceeding was accepted by the Committee, I suggest that you concentrate your efforts on answering those charges rather that concentrating on "how bad Dr. Dan is." Or is the reason that you were brought before this ArbCom is because I'm so bad, so incivil, and so biased against Poland that you lost control of your better judgement, but that now by eliminating me, or succeeding in censoring me, everything will be like it used to be in the "old days" when you could engage in your efforts on the project, unchallenged and unimpeded?.Dr. Dan 18:39, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Sadly, in my experience the vast majority of contributions by Dr. Dan are spiteful commentaries designed to generate hostility and rancor, sometimes loaded with irony to the point of incomprehensibility, and often containing thinly veiled (or blatant) personal attacks. Out of all problematic editors I have come across, he is probably the worst, as outside of his harmful comments on talk pages he almost never creates any new content. Here is the most recent example , in which he accuses Piotrus of supporting mass murder.Balcer 20:38, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

One more example which Dr. Dan sarcastically suggested be added to the Arbcom proceedings. I will oblige him. In it he makes another completely unjustified, ugly allegation against Piotrus. Balcer 01:26, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Could not agree more --Beaumont (@) 12:20, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Couldn't have said it better myself. //Halibu tt 20:01, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Disruptive editing by M.K

4) M.K (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) displayed bad faith, engaged in personal attacks and harrassing of other editors involved with Poland-related articles in various discussion spaces ([48], [49], [50], [51], [52], [53], [54]). As for content edits, he showed questionable judgement in relation to neutrality and reliability on Poland-related articles (ex. WP:NPOV#Undue_weight issues with edits like additions of minor facts distorting general articles [55], [56], [57], [58], [59], removal of important facts ([60], [61], [62], [63], ~~[64]~~) and for reliability, using unreliable sources related to Vilnija extremist organization and its supporters (like Kazimieras Garšva) - ex. [65], [66], [67], [68]).

Comment by Arbitrators:

I believe a finding regarding this editor may be appropriate. Fred Bauder 18:03, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Evidence I have found: failure to assume good faith Fred Bauder 18:03, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by parties:

Proposed by --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 01:05, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Contributor presenting evidences of my alleged “harassment” presented article and contributors talk pages and calls them as “Poland related”, how such articles can be called Poland related but not Lithuania – related And how such [69] even can be called “Poland related” harassing at all? I presented findings of inaccurate Piotrus’ info , which discussed in detail here , while other misused info covered and here. Presented “evidence” of incivility and harassment is not evident is such scale as his own [70] [71][72] Repaying for Undue weight it was challenged here with clear signs of misinformation and OR. Claims of “removal of important facts” falls apart then remembering that these articles there adjusted with accordance with WP:LIVING policy which stresses that “Unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material — whether negative, positive, or just highly questionable — about living persons should be removed immediately and without discussion from Wikipedia articles, talk pages, user pages, and project space.” It is worth to note that Piotrus himself is scrutinized here and due to disobeying the same LIVING policy. I found even more confused that this edit is called “removal of important facts”. Regarding “unreliable sources” usage, till present day nobody provided academic evidences which supported Piotrus “unreliable” theory. M.K. 11:47, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Adding some more contra arguments. Regarding Piotrus part “additions of minor facts distorting general articles”, others contributors agreed that these are necessary [73] [74][75][76]. Regarding accusations of “using unreliable sources” there were denounced here and and here. M.K. 12:45, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Piotrus displayed intimidation and threatening pattern

5) Piotrus displayed intimidation and threatening pattern over different contributors.

false accusation of vandalism, threatening of block, accusing of harassment , another threat of block urge to stop intimidation by different contributor etc.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

In a series of somewhat impolite discussions, Piotrus was usually the calmest, and the diffs cited by MK will show it plainly upon impartial reading. DGG 21:43, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Mocking by Piotrus

6) Piotrus mocked contributors.

accuses contributors who do not support his view being naïve souls mocking from state tragedy and me accusation of Holocaust revisionism, more here

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

I'm sorry, but I'd have to comment on those links as I'm directly involved - and they do not hold the water. The second diff ("mocking from state tragedy and me") is especially telling: in one of my posts I suggested that the Republic of Lithuania did not become independent and in control over the city of Vilna until 1991. That's a plain fact - and that's what the article on Lithuania says. But then M.K. took that diff elsewhere and suggested that I was mocking some tragedy, which I wasn't (besides, I don't find the Lithuanian independence a tragedy, to the contrary).

From my past experience with M.K. I can tell that this is his normal modus operandi: I say something, then M.K. takes my words to some unrelated discussion, suggests I said some things I didn't, and then accuses me of it. And now the shocking part: M.K. twisted my words and accused me of things I never said. And now he accuses Piotrus of not responding to his provocation... //Halibu tt 20:58, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Lets see. Current author who is know through the history for his main space disruption , author who is known for mocking Lithuanian language, who likes present his WP:POINT [77], who thinks that bad conduct way is refreshing ; specifically targets one ethnic group of contributors (Lithuanians) [78] with others, picks up random contributors and labeling them trolls (if I not mistaken with user:Iulius he never spoke before this message at all) and who accusing other contributor making death threats, a crime act; who reapers on talk page and using an annexation rhetoric [79] and only now explains “that the Republic of Lithuania did not become independent and in control over the city of Vilna until 1991.” Somehow becoming and independent (btw that about interwar?) and conducting annexation is two completely different things, plain fact indeed. Who was immediately asked for clarification , but there was no answer at all.Modus operandi? M.K. 10:52, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Even here by calling the city of Vilna by that name demonstrates your provocative style of editing regarding Lithuanian related matters. And that has been a major point of contention of M.K. and others. As a simple example, Halibutt, when you created the Antoni Bohdziewicz article, you told us he was born in "Wilno". When I agreed with your earlier insistence that Vilna was more historically "correct", for the sake of consistency I changed it to Vilna. The object of this ArbCom, the Prokonsul Piotrus, changed it back from Vilna to Wilno, repeatedly (see history of Bohdziewicz article). When in the interest of attempting to remove the confusion and strife and childish game playing, I changed it to the current accepted name of the city in English, Vilnius, I got results. You then all of the sudden found "Vilna" to work better. I find it strange indeed that anything, anything but Vilnius will do as far as the both of you are concerned. Dr. Dan 01:22, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Our disputes over the proper naming of Vilnius have been endless. They mostly revolve around deciding when it is appropriate to use the current name, Vilnius, which entered mainstream English usage rather late (for example, it was first used in a Time magazine article only in 1972). There is a legitimate case to be made that for articles involving the history of the city, other names might be more appropriate. At any rate, the argument over the name in the Antoni Bohdziewicz article is a legitimate content dispute, nothing more. Balcer 02:05, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Balcer please! Give everyone a break. The Russians who once upon a time called Vilnius, Vilna, and the Germans who called it, Wilna, in the past too, call it Vilnius today. Only our little Polish club on Wikipedia has a problem with that "diplomatic" courtesy. Wrapped up in a "nationalistic" enigma, this group continues to want to call it "Wilno" whenever they can get away with it. P.P. and Halibutt have repeatedly flamed this issue. What's even more hilarious is how this little club (including your own efforts, Balcer) tells us that the correct English description for Cracow has become Kraków (complete with the little diacritic ó) and we will simply have to learn to live with it. (please see WP:NCGN talk : Cracow/Cracow again. It's much more than a content dispute and you know it. Hopefully the Committee will take a look at it at WP:NCGN talk:Cracow. Dr. Dan 03:02, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Baiting by Piotrus

7) Piotrus baited different contributors

baiting new comers labeling them as fans or organization others others etc.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Stalking by Piotrus

8) Piotrus stalked different contributors.

[80] [81] [82] [83] etc.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Disruptive editing by Piotrus

9) Piotrus displayed continues disruptive editing. Suing to ArbCom precedent, which ruled out that “It is disruptive to remove statements that are sourced reliably”, Piotrus made continued removal statements supported by academic sources, see more evidence of removal of information; strengthen with tendentious editing and intimidation of his opponents (see above)

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Misleading information in evidence section presented by Piotrus

10) Piotrus presented misleading information in Evidence section. See here and here and here

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Rude Evidence presentation by Piotrus

11) Piotrus displayed rude conduct over Evidence presentation. Evidences here

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This seems irrelevant and misguided. If you didn't want Piotrus to suggest you and the other people who sided with you in the initial statements have a common point of view, which is different from the common point of view of him and his defenders, then you shouldn't have filed the case. I think you might want to read through some previous arbitration cases to get a feel of how the process works and what it tries to accomplish; other cases which deal with multiple editors of different nationalities conflicting over subjects related to their nationalities include Armenia-Azerbaijan, India-Pakistan, Hkelkar, etc.. Picaroon (Talk) 15:08, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You are indeed right about that I have little skills in ArbCom, my last participation was in Darwinek's case. But I somehow think that you a little bit wrongly understood my words, as I do not say that it is due to different view of developments but how these views were presented here. As you are professional in this area, feel free to move or remove this part from this page. And if there is something more wrongly done let me know. M.K. 14:59, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Violation of WP:VERIFY by Piotrus

12) Piotrus displayed bad pattern of conduct by refusing to provide necessary information then dealing with sources others then English per WP:VERIFY.

Piotrus is known for his misleadingly attributed sources and information (concern of this also presented in [84] ), and then asked to provide exact citations of sources [85] [86] he not comply [87]. In this particular case I was even accused of denial

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Wheel-warring

13) Piotrus used to indulge in wheel-warring but seems to have been reformed in this respect.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. As long as it's not clearly defined which facet and period of Piotr's activity in the project are examined in the current arbitration, this seems to be a pertinent observation. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:40, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The diff provided is from November 2005 !!! --Lysy^talk 20:00, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'd just like to direct clerk's attention to this talk question about timeframe.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 21:06, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

We should really see the core of the problem. Piotrus was trying to unblock (or have unblocked) other editors blocked for disruption when the editors were pushing for the "right" POV. While Piotrus does not unblock them himself anymore, he continued arguing for their unblocks as for the blocks of his content opponents, sometimes blocking them himself. Wheel-warring itself is only secondary. --Irpen 06:47, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Use of foreign language to discuss opponents

14) Despite multiple protests, Piotrus has the habit of discussing his non-Polish opponents on talk pages of English Wikipedia in a language they don't understand.[88], [89], [90], [91], [92], [93], [94] Such communications are known to have been occasionally incivil: "If we speak about Ruskies [an ethnic slur], there are a couple of nationalists here, and we unfortunately can't bury the hatchet, so we have the constant Cold War with them".[95]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. I have urged Piotrus many times not to call me Gyrandol or other offensive terms and not to discuss my actions in English wikipedia in other languages than English. I want to know what is being said about me. With an increasing degree of mutual understanding, much mistrust will disappear. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:48, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is no rule forbidding use of non-English on private talk pages; I tend to reply in Polish if users post to me in Polish (please note all of the above diffs are either my replies to notes in Polish (sometimes on other talkpage), posts by others users to me (for which I can hardly be blamed), or Ghirla's comments (even more so...). I have supported use of English on public forums, asking others to post in English (ex. here, here and in many other places). As for the use of nicknames and perceived if unintended ethnic slurs, I have done so only few times in the past and apologized to him in our unfinished mediation (see points 1 and 2). I don't use Polish on en Wiki - maybe once every few weeks - and I don't recall I had used any nicknames or slurs since our mediation (even if it was broken and my concenrns unaddressed by Ghirla's wikiholidays).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:19, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I hope that we have settled the issue once and for all. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:22, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It is clear this issue has been settled long ago, as Ghirlandajo himself admits (admittedly making his whole statement self-contradictory). Dragging out old misunderstandings here is inappropriate. Balcer 21:08, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The diffs provided by me refer to the period when I was active in English wikipedia. Since my part-time return in May, I have deliberately avoided disputing with Piotrus or editing the articles edited by him. The timeframe of the current dispute is nowhere apparent. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:05, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

I disagree with Piotrus about what should be the policy here, as I think we should have a rule requiring the use of En in discussions at the enWP--otherwise it shuts out most of the community. But a considerable number of other people do it as well, so I don't think he's out of line with current practice.DGG 22:50, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would not oppose such a rule, were it introduced, but I am afraid its implementation would be difficult. Would we have to remove all posts by new editors who are not aware of it? Remember many en-wiki editors see it as international, are not native English speakers and sometimes find using their native language to communicate with others easier. It would certainly be an ideal world where all users would understand English perfectly, but as it is I know and have to deal with several Polish users whose English is poor, and who occasionally leave me messages in Polish on my talk page. Telling them to try to use English on Poland-related noticeboard is one thing (which I support), telling them to use English in semi-private messages on my talk would be going a bit too far, I think - why should they use English if it takes more time for them and the message is of little interest to others (ex. here)?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 04:45, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think any problems would arise if you communicate in Polish with newbies, although I have yet to see a useful mainspace contribution to this project by folks who don't speak English. The problem is when you discuss your opponents with seasoned Polish wikipedians such as Darwinek. This is not so harmless as it may appear. For instance, this Polish-language edit in which you incite User:Mathiasrex to report Irpen for 3RR issues on Taras Triasylo. --Ghirla^-трёп- 06:25, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I explained above, your Mathiasrex example is completly wrong. For valuable contributions of users who have a poor grasp of English and tend to leave me msg in Polish, see contribs of User:LUCPOL, User:Tymek or User:Radomil.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:25, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Per Talk_page_guidelines: "Use English: No matter to whom you address a comment, it is preferred that you use English on English Wikipedia talk pages. This is so that comments may be comprehensible to the community at large. If the use of another language is unavoidable, try to also provide a translation of the comments". When asked to translate user talk comments, Piotrus stated "I don't have time for that; there is nothing offensive in those posts and besides 1) they are private messages from Darwinek to me" (User_talk:Irpen#Translation). Novickas 18:11, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Nobody has ever informed me that I am supposed to write messages in the English language only. Obviously, it is a must for the articles, but messages? Anyway, from now on I will stick to English, and contrary to what Piotrus thinks, my grasp of this language is not so poor. When you have two little boys sitting on your knees, it is difficult not to make mistakes either in grammar or in spelling. Tymek 00:45, 21 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There are valid reasons of using foreign languages on talk pages: communicating with contributors with poor command of English, social communicating with users in their native language as a sign of respect to their culture, discussion of the finer details of foreign language sources then the point can be missed by translation. What is important is what foreign languages should not become a "secret" communication device to slander editors behind their backs or canvass their POV among right people. I guess Piotrus as a Pole living in the USA would avoid discussing personal habits of his non-Polish-speaking co-worker in his presence using Polish language. Wikipedia is no different. Talk_page_guidelines explicitly tells so. I think it is worth to reinforce the guidelines by the Arbcom decision. Alex Bakharev 05:05, 21 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Accusations of vandalism

15) Piotrus regularly accuses long-standing contributors of vandalism or calls them vandals ([96], [97], [98], [99], [100]).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:51, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

All edits from March'06. Again, this has been addressed by our unfinished mediation. I am certainly not overusing the v-word anymore; but please note that some of the comments I made above are still quite valid (some articles needed attention ([101], [102]), some users needed to be warned [103]).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:29, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus, I am glad to hear that you desisted from calling your opponents "vandals". You know that I haven't been around for a while (contrary to your assertion, it was a wikiexile rather than wikivacation, and I'm still active part time in Russian Wikipedia), so I can't really assess your progress in this respect. It'd be great to hear Irpen's opinion, for a change. Unfortunately, I am told privately that most of your traditional opponents decided to give you some slack in this arbitration, since you seem to have been on close terms with the only person capable of paralyzing ArbCom decision-making process.[104]. More's the pity. I believe we should speak out once and for all, so that A/C could focus on more urgent disputes. There is no need to come right back to the same issue again and again. --Ghirla^-трёп- 21:09, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I noted in my presentation indeed, Piotrus somehow enjoys placing vandalism warnings, despite that they are completely false. M.K. 09:05, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Canvassing

16) Piotrus resorts to canvassing in order to push pro-Polish POV into the articles about the history of Eastern and Central Europe ([105], [106], [107], [108], [109], [110]).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. This has become regular in other national segments of Wikipedia, unfortunately. But I think the example was set by the Polish notice-board. Tireless canvassing escalates trivial conflicts into large-scale wars that last for months and years. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:00, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This - canvassing - is actually a claim I hear often whenever two or more Polish editors happen to be seen together. Again, the language of my old (March'06 again...) notices might have been a bit to ironical - it has changed since then as I (hope) I've learned to be more neutral - but please note I never suggested editors how they should vote. I believe X-related board is for annoucement of X-related discussions. It is my belief that the more editors are aware of a discussion, the more neutral it will be as the always vocal but tiny minority of different strong POVs will be shown as just that - a tiny minority. I have increasingly post at non-Polish noticeboard to ensure diversity of views (as indeed just posting to X noticeboard on X-Y problem is suboptimal), ex. Russian, Russian, Russian..., German, German, MILHIST and others. See also my evidence section for examples of my common posts to RfC and other completly neutral forums, requesting opinions.Therefore I believe that I never violated Wikipedia:Canvassing, as my posts never suggest how to vote (I can cite several examples where after my posts Polish users were divided in their opinions), and are certainly not "provocative attempts to stack an ongoing poll" or "aggressive propaganda campaigns". As accusations of canvassing are creating bad atmosphere on noticeboards every few weeks (ex. here, here, here, here, here, here...). I would indeed appreciate ArbCom ruling on whether I (and other users of Polish noticeboard) had or hadn't violated WP:CANVASS to put an end to this issue. PS. Once, Ghirla himself has been criticized for canvassing at Polish noticeboard... (although I think his post, for the record, was perfectly acceptable).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 18:03, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I consider notices on national noticeboards harmful, because they tend to escalate edit conflicts rather than defusing them. In such cases, an editor of your standing does not even need to express his opinion, as it is sufficiently known to everyone regularly checking the noticeboard. Everyone knows in advance how a Polish or Russian wikipedian will most likely behave if the conflict concerns a Russo-Polish war. This is a generalization, as there is a handful of people on both sides who would be unfazed by nationalist considerations, but it is nevertheless true. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:47, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I completly disagree with your generalization as in my opinion it is majority, not minority, of editors, who will be "unfazed by nationalism". Advertising potential disputes as widely as possible is the best guarantee that a minority of nationalists/extremists/etc. will lose whatever hold they had on a discussion.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 23:13, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have not been aware that posting an inflammatory call to arms on a noticeboard frequented by citizens of one's own country qualifies as a sort of dispute resolution. If you had "advertised" potential disputes on the notice-boards of some countries other than Poland, I would have agreed with you. However, the least controversial way to ask for a neutral third opinion on a content dispute is to use WP:RFC, which is visited in equal measure by editors of all nationalities. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:26, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I pointed out above, I am now commonly posting to other noticeboards (including Wikipedia:Eastern European Wikipedians' notice board, unfortunatly that board never got popular enough, but I supported the idea of such forum to facilitate communciations), RfCs and such precisely to avoid any bias from 'one country' stance only. Are you?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 19:51, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I currently monitor neither my Watchlist nor any particular noticeboard. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:08, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

I must ask: what's wrong with informing fellow interested editors that a discussion is ongoing? No suggestion which way to vote, no threats, no insults - just information. The fact is, none of us is aware of what is going on in all of Wikipedia all the time. I see no problem with asking people to have a look at a discussion, particularly on a regional notice board, designed for discussing just such issues. I myself did some informing during this discussion, and Irpen promptly accused me of running a "high scale canvassing campaign" ... "his campaigning on-wiki has been hectic and wide-scale". Undeterred, I did the same during what could have been a heated discussion, but Hungarian editors also ran an information campaign and guess what? Everyone came out pretty happy. Of course, indiscriminate messaging turns into spam, and should certainly be avoided, but within decent parameters - parameters that, as far as I can see, Piotrus has respected, I don't see any problem with making people aware of current debates. Biruitorul 03:41, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Canvassing is not acceptable for two simple reasons: 1) because it tends to magnify local conflicts of little consequence into large-scale edit wars; 2) because its prime aim is to avoid 3RR by involving more reverters. If you really need a comment on some issue, we have WP:RFC. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:47, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ghirla, I wonder how would you comment this announcement in Portal:Russia/New article announcements (sic!) or this one ? --Lysy^talk 08:36, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have never denied that, for a limited period of time, I followed Piotr's lead and practised the same sort of announcements as a means of self-defense against this. After Piotrus declared at the top of the Polish Wikipedians' notice board that "probably anything visited by Ghirlandajo" qualifies as vandalism or needs attention, does it seem surprizing to you? Unlike him, I discovered that this practice is not a valid method of dispute resolution. Now I regret it and find this practice objectionable, despite Piotr's continuing support of it. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:26, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for this comment, I agree on this one with you, and for this reason I'm not a frequent poster to PL noticeboard myself. However, I don't think that Piotrus practices recruiting in the notice boards in the way you're presenting it. All the diffs you've provided are all well over one ear old. --Lysy^talk 19:36, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ghirla, standards of honest debate demand that if you accuse another editor of canvassing and you have been engaging in exactly the same practice yourself, you should come out right away and admit it, to avoid a justified charge of hypocrisy. That "I have never been hiding" statement, forced out of you when presented with undeniable evidence of your own conduct by another editor, is too little, too late. At any rate, I am amazed that you consider canvassing by Piotrus as wrong, but you justify your doing it as "justified self-defense". What self defense? Were you personally threatened in any way? Truly an amazing example of double standards. And your statement that you were only following Piotrus' lead is an excuse a five year old child would not get away with. Balcer 20:00, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Balcer, I am tired of your insinuations of intellectual dishonesty. As everyone knows, I don't follow discussions where four or five editors from PL noticeboard attempt to discredit me or to talk my ear off by repeating the same stuff over and over again. I have wasted hours and days on this manner of "conversation" which actually leads us nowhere. Soon Molobo's block will expire and you will have a nice company here, gentlemen. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:31, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The box in question was was ill-thought, in the end I and other involved editors have removed it and apologized for any ill-feelings about a year ago. We have also settled this in our mediation. Why are you bringing this year-old issue back?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 19:51, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As a matter of fact it was me who removed it. But who counts? Alex Bakharev 03:36, 21 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

To avoid confusion in this discussion, let me state clearly that it was me that removed the box altogether. diff.Balcer 13:01, 21 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Second Piotrus, this is water that has long passed under the bridge. Still, as the editor who removed the box, I am glad it is gone, as it certainly was not accomplishing much good. We all learn from experience. Balcer 20:09, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I strongly agree with Piotrus and Biru. Simply notifying other editors of an ongoing discussion is entirely acceptable and is not canvassing. The only way it turns into canvassing is when somebody posts a notice instructing people HOW to vote. Now, in my experience, the standard reply has been "but when you post notices on national noticeboards, you're deliberately notifying people who you know will agree with you." That, I must say, is slightly ridiculous. Ever seen what happens when you put two Hungarians/Romanians/Russians/Poles/Czechs/[insert nationality here] in a room together and give them something political to talk about? Instant chaos. Nationality alone hardly determines opinions, and is NO guarantor of agreement! ;-) K. Lásztocska 22:53, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yep. Further, please note that those noticeboards are not 'for X-nationality only', they are 'for X-issue interested editors', created for and maintained for the very purpose of notifying watching editors of interesting issues; majority of posts to them are not controversial at all. Polish noticeboard (for example) often gets posts from - and is certainly watched by - editors of other nationalities (just as I, myself, post to and watch various noticeboards/project discussions/etc.). As I wrote above, the very fact that once Ghirla himself has been criticized for canvassing at Polish noticeboard should be telling.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 23:13, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus, you know that a year ago the noticeboard in question was known as the Polish Wikipedians' notice board. I was explicitly asked to refrain from posting on it by User:Molobo, if I recall correctly. Furthermore, the present arbitration was launched no examine your actions rather than mine. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:26, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And I was one of the people who strongly campaigned for the name change to avoid the confusion. Plus the arbitration was launched to examine ations of all involved editors - something you should pause and think about.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 19:32, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I find it more alarming, actually, that Piotrus engages in unethical off-wiki canvassing. Two examples: he seems to have been behind the scandalous off-wiki campaign aimed at derailing another user's RfA. He refused to either admit or deny his involvement, so we have only a circumstantial evidence but the evidence seems pretty strong. The second example, is his campaigning at one notorious IRC channel where he fed a certain David Gerard with I do not know what to bring this user who I never met before to his ArbCom with remarks that were widely criticized by the community. Even more abrogating is that Piotrus does not recognize such steps being unethical even when this was pointed out to him in an explicit form. --Irpen 23:31, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

But where is the evidence that there ever even was a massive off-wiki canvassing campaign? The only evidence presented in that long discussion on the Polish noticeboard seemed to be that a lot of Poles voted. (m:Poles are evil again?) I am really disturbed by these constant assumptions of the existence of some sort of Polish cabal. Often times in this ongoing Eastern European war I notice comments that can really only be described as paranoid Polonophobia, as if all Polish Wikipedians are engaged in some sort of massive conspiracy to discredit Russia (or whatever) and fill the Wiki with slanderous propaganda. Sheesh, even the Hungarians never get such outrageous accusations leveled against us. K. Lásztocska 23:44, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Irpen here makes outrageous charges with no solid evidence whatsoever. I would not be suprised if Piotrus did not deign to answer them. Absence of a yes or no answer in this case in no way indicates wrongdoing. And Irpen has no authority to conduct any investigations of other Wikipedians anyway. Balcer 20:16, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know which nationality you represent in the project, but I certainly don't find your accusations of "paranoid Polonophobia" either reasonable or helpful. It is obvious a priori that "off-wiki canvassing campaigns" are not supposed to leave lasting traces. In most cases, we can only guess what's been going on. As for David Gerard, I feel there is some evidence that he has been contacted with the purpose of having him involved into the arbitration. Once an arbitrator, always an arbitrator, as the proverb goes. Honestly, how can we expect a fair resolution of the dispute if the owner of the mailing list declares that one party "has been gunning for Piotrus for some time - his edit pattern needs thorough review"? --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:26, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm Hungarian. (You might remember me from Piotrus's earlier RfC where you accused me--baselessly--of Russophobia, not that that is relevant here.) I don't know David Gerard so I can't comment much further on this, but I call things like I see them. It's obvious to anyone that Irpen has been gunning for Piotrus for a long time and often assuming the worst of faith: a most recent example is here--Piotrus suggested to another editor that he might want to put Babel boxes on his userpage, and Irpen immediately reverted it (twice) with no explanation, and later accused Piotrus of "pressuring" the other editor into revealing "personal information." An overreaction to say the least, in my humble opinion. K. Lásztocska 20:26, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Side-comment. I indeed consider Irpen's (repeated) removal of my messages to another editor very uncivil, the editor in question also specifically told me he felt they were ok and was not pressured by them ([111]). Whether the above behaviour falls under wikistalking, coupled with a series of unfriendly and even harassing messages to my talk page (here, here, here, here, here to just name 5 cases from the previous two months) is wikistalking and should be commented upon by ArbCom, is something that may deserve a further thought.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 20:44, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A side-comment to a side-comment. I never ever wikistalked Piotrus. I am an adamant opponent of stalking and, additionally, I find working on the topics where Piotrus is engaged highly stressful, so I prefer to avoid articles were this editor is involved rather than engage in them. That I often still cross my paths with the said editor is merely due to some articles' being concerned of more than just Poland, eg. topics re Ukraine and (to a lesser extent) Russia which are of my primary interest. This is the reason why such articles are at my watchlist. Also, I am concerned when a nationalist POV is attempted to be pushed into a Main page through DYK entries or through tendentious editing of Featured articles. Where I see a provocation at DYK's suggestions page (which I monitor regardless of Piotrus' posts), I try to correct the problem. I hope others actually click on the 5 links posted by Piotrus above and read the appropriate discussions. All relevant pages have been on my watchlist from the past editing or were linked to a DYK/FA's. In one of these discussions I, exasperated by his past accusations of stalking him, made a special effort to provide a detailed explanation what brought me to the particular article and that was anything but clicking on his contributions page. To make it clear, I only check contributions of my friends or new editors in my field of interest. In case of new editors, I even make sure to explain to them that my sole intention of looking at their contributions is to help in their first steps at Wikipedia since they are likely to make some easily correctable newbie mistakes. Under no circumstances would I have ever even looked at Piotrus' contributions per se because doing so would only raise further the level of stress from what I would see. This is in addition to my general adverse attitude towards checking other's contributions in general. Finally, in one of the links in the Piotrus' post above Piotrus reveals that he got to a certain page by following someone else's contributions. Anyway, please do click at the links Piotrus posted above. Unlike off-wiki discussions, those links are available for everyone to read. --Irpen 20:54, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The links are given and the evidence certainly goes beyond the fact that "lot of Poles voted". I assume no Polish cabal. I see unethical behavior of one user. Let arbitrators read the diffs above and decide for themselves. This can be easily ended if Piotrus says (he refused so far) what was his role in all this. --Irpen 23:57, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Regardless of the merit, all these links are over a year old now. --Lysy^talk 19:38, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see how Irpen had any authority to conduct all by himself an investigation of Piotrus, complete with questions designed to incriminate him. To me it had all the appearance of harassment. Balcer 20:20, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What authority are you talking about? I saw a suspicious chain of events that ended with David Gerard who no one ever saw in Eastern European topics (nor in any content editing for a long time) coming to this ArbCom "gunning" for me. His entry raised many eyebrows and we are still yet to see DG's explanation to the questions asked about his weird entry. My opinion about IRC is well-known. Using a medium where I cannot see what is said about me and respond was inappropriate and did not add any positive momentum to this ArbCom, particularly by engaging a person known to be formerly close to an ArbCom and who still maintains the ArbCom email list. I don't overestimate how much influence DG exerts over the current ArbCom, especially in view of his certain notoriety that was only increased lately, but still Piotrus could have raised any issues he has about myself in the wikispace rather than at the channel known to be a source of so many problems that plagued this encyclopedia. --Irpen 05:43, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I can't agree with you, Irpen. It has been an open secret that former arbitrators control the mailing list and are capable of bombing any discussion. This has already been deplored in the Giano case. I hope that one day ArbCom will be able to speak up for themselves and determine who should be on the mailing list. This will be the first step in reviving our trust in the institution which has been so sorely shaken after the Essjay controversy. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:31, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I did not ask David to comment on your behaviour. That he did was his own choice, yet that you keep assuming we conspired against you and keep accusing us of this all over wiki, with no proof but your own bad faith assumptions, is a big part of what this ArbCom is about. There is no cabal, people are questioning your behaviour because it violates our policies and common civility; one does not have to know much about EE history to see that much.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 06:55, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have no idea what you have asked David Gerard. All I know that immediately after your ArbCom was started you asked for the access to the channel we used to criticized together. Immediately after that David Gerard, who is always there, who could not have possibly been aware of any EE topics (or any content issues of WP) comes in with a link someone conveniently provided to him (btw, have anyone clicked on that link?) All I am asking is that you not talk behind my back about the content (or any other) disputes you are having with me or others. There are no issues in these conflict that require secrecy, no checkuser, privacy, immediate dangers were involved. This is unethical and have got to stop. --Irpen 08:39, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The problem with canvassing former arbitrators is delicate and complicated. Can an "arbitrator emeritus" recuse from the case? I'm not aware of any precedents. I'd like this point to be elucidated if any arbitrator follows this page at all. Anyway, we'll never know how many other former arbitrators have been contacted by Piotrus in connection with this case. That's the nature of IRC for you. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:31, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

For the record, I still strongly support the notion that IRC channels, including admin one, should be publicly logged and available online, to avoid such 'what I think you said there' discussions. As I explained to you on my talk page, I asked on IRC for procedural advice about ArbCom proceedings (when to post stuff, where to post stuff, etc.), David was one of the users that replied at some point. I see nothing wrong in asking for advice through channels that allow me to get a reply in few seconds or minutes, considering that traditional wiki questions can be unanswered for over a month (sic!), and even questions on this very arbitration talk can be ignored for days.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:34, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

To Ghirla's question, I don't think that the fact that DG has power to control outsider's post to the ArbCom list gives him much influence. Emails of arbitrators are publicly available to any editor who wishes to post private evidence. As for Piotrus engaging to communicating with Arbitrators personally during the case, while I think it is improper, it is up to arbitrators what they think of such communication. I am on the record proposing that all parties discuss all the arbitration related matters with arbitrators only at the arbitration pages seen by all. A narrow exception is for evidence that cannot be publicized and Arbitrator's talking to each other. To make a real life analogy, internal communication of the judge's panel, is kept in confidence. However, none of the sides can go in and out to the judge's chambers save exceptional circumstances approved by the judge. That said, I don't think Piotrus' personal off-record communication with Arbitrators while his case is being heard would have much impact no matter what I think of the propriety of his taking such steps. --Irpen 20:54, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Just a small observation. It has been suggested that P.P.'s past canvassing is all over a year old and is therefore no longer an issue. During the recent, and unresolved dispute as to whether or not Kraków is the correct English usage toponym for Cracow at WP:NCGN:talk (which by the way was brought up by me as a matter of using English on English Wikipedia, not as a matter of disputing "national pride"), P.P. immediately brought my efforts to the attention of the Polish bulletin board. Personally I do not have a problem when he asks for advice or help from this forum, but please don't try to suggest that he doesn't do so, and frequently do so. Dr. Dan 04:21, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know who would suggest that I don't use that forum often: I certainly do. After all I edit a lot of Poland-related articles, and this is the board where Poland-interested editors gather to discuss and learn. Bottom line is that Poland-related issues should be noted at Poland-related noticeboards (or wikiprojects, for the record Poland-related noticeboards doubles as Poland-related WikiProject), Russian at Russian-related one, historical and history-related one, and so on. This is what they are there for; trying to suggest that using an X-related noticeboard for X-related discussions is some sort of WP:CABAL is simply illogical.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 04:55, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please do not invoke the cabal strawman here. Most of the above has nothing to do with cabal allegations. --Irpen 04:59, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In a new development, I wonder if this is canvassing?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:56, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Forum shopping

17) Piotr's favorite method of content dispute resolution is to post a civility or disruption complaint on some public noticeboard (WP:ANI, WP:PAIN) and have his opponent blocked from editing. Just one prominent example.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. What makes discussing content with Piotrus so difficult, is that you may expect any minute that you will be blocked on account of a complaint that he posted on some notice-board. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:08, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No diffs from 2007 again? Anyway, I will reply to this shortly: I believe anybody has a right to ask for advice on public forums. As an admin involved in a dispute, I cannot excercise my powers in such cases - so I can either shut up and give up, or ask other admins to review the situation. I see nothing wrong with asking for advice or review. Certainly this has nothing in common with "forum shopping", as defined at WP:CANVASS. PS. Ghirla, would you like to post diffs/history logs to examples when due to my 'forum shopping', somebody was blocked and then there was a consensus the block was unfair and resulted due to my 'machinations'?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 18:09, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

WP:CANVASS defines the term "forum shopping" as "repeatedly asking for outside opinions until you get an opinion you like". This is actually what have been done to have me blocked by Friday. I have accepted that block as reasonable, but I can't accept your attempt to have me blocked last December (see the diffs above) when you applied to WP:PAIN, were snubbed by a responsible admin, started to question him on his talk page, then moved the thread to WP:ANI, from whence it was removed by another admin as "forum shopping", yet you instantly restored that thread and started to question the second admin on his talk page, etc, etc. That's what is called "repeatedly asking for outside opinions until you get an opinion you like". --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:44, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The community consensus was that we should take the matter to DR, which is why we ended up in ArbCom and Mediation last winter, and why we are here. I did hope that the issue would be simpler - alas, apparently it is not. That's all there is to it. Asking for advice is not forum shopping.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 19:43, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Nevertheless, when I was not active in Wikipedia, JzG exhorted you: "You have a tendency, when you get frustrated with someone, to post the dispute to every board on the 'pedia looking for support. Are there any other admins working on the same articles you are? It looks like this is a core part of the problems you are experiencing."[112] It would have been great if you applied to a neutral person we both trust rather than asking compatriots of questionable reputation to do "the dirty work" and engage in forum shopping for you.[113] --Ghirla^-трёп- 11:16, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Other than the fact that JzG misunderstood the issue and showed some subperfect jidgement threatening to block users involved in ongoing discussion (including me and Irpen, see full threat in Ghirla's diff), this is not saying much. Boards exist for a reason: to be posted upon, and if a party wants to keep a discussion secret they should never start it on a public site such as Wikipedia. And I see you are again attaching the discredited diff to Mathias question...--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:32, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Ghirlandajo repeatedly violated WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA despite many warnings and previous blocks

18) In addition to large body of pre-2007 evidence showing a stable pattern (ArbCom warning from Jan'06, blocks for incivility, evidence presented in my statement in ArbCom Dec'06), his edits from this year confirm this unfortunate pattern holds: [114], [115], [116], [117].

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed by Piotrus.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 19:09, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please don't try to deflect the discussion of your behaviour. I don't think many people buy into Ghirlandajo's fabled incivility these days, even despite these formidable diffs. This is an old trick. Couldn't you provide anything better than a stale log with two blocks for one of which I received apologies and another resulted in desysopping? --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:30, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Removal of references

19) Piotrus has been deleting sourced statements which he does not like personally.[118] [119] [120] [121] [122] [123] [124] [125] [126] [127] [128] [129] [130] [131] [132] For Russian-language sources, the usual motivation is that they contain "Czarist/Imperialist propaganda" (for pre-1917 sources), "Soviet/Communist/Stalinist propaganda" (for 1917-1991 sources), or "Putinist/Totalitarian propaganda" (for post-1991 sources).[133] [134] [135] [136] [137] [138] In this way, every Russian-language reference may be deemed inappropriate and eliminated.

Comment by Arbitrators:

It is the responsibility of all editors to critically evaluate sources, nationalistic propaganda is not a reliable source. Fred Bauder 13:39, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This edit and the reason for it is problematic. In first the views of Mikhail_Meltyukhov are NOT described as 'Stalinist and neoimperial concepts', but as similar to them. 'second his book in question referred to as containing "shocking falsehoods".' does not contain the quoted language. The url must be wrong. Fred Bauder 16:15, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Fred, I am not sure if I can reply in this section; please move my comment if I cannot. In the first article, Melt.'s views, based on the work in question, are called close to Stalinist and neoimperial concepts. I really think that there is little difference between this and directly stating they are 'St. and neoimp.' - both criticism, in academia, are very serious and the difference between is rather tiny. The second url is indeed wrong - for some reason I put in the same link for both, the correct one is this one (make sure to read footnotes).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:28, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by parties:

Proposed. I don't like to see Sergey Solovyov and Vasily Klyuchevsky labelled as "Czarist propagandists" and scholarly quotes from Russian-language monographs or compilations of documents routinely replaced with links to Polish blog entries and newspapers. Once a historian says something unfavourable about Poland, he is labelled as "nationalist" or "Soviet puppet", even when his nationality or allegience is difficult to determine.[139] [140] [141] [142] I don't think attempts to impeach or discredit sources that don't suit one's POV will lead us anywhere. If you don't like your opponent's source, provide a source that claims the contrary, rather than removing the reference as "invalid" or questioning its integrity. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:01, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

First, please note that I have replied to this argument as presented by MK in the first point of my evidence (on the basis of WP:NPOV#Undue_weight or WP:RS#Exceptional_claims_require_exceptional_sources). Second, I'd like to see diffs were reliable refs are "routinely replaced with links to Polish blog entries and newspapers". Third, please note that some of the above diffs don't involve me, but other editors (ex. [143], [144], [145], nicely showing that many others also dispute those refs), some involve simply moving a referenced piece to another section) and some others are completly not related to any reference removal (ex. [146]). Specifics of each presented case vary, but usually detailed reasons for why a given source was challenged are to be found on relevant article's talk (where we "routinely" provide academic references to argue the case); in most of those cases arguments of myself and other involved editors have prevailed, as can be seen from the fact that stable (in some cases, even Featured) versions of those articles (in Ghirla's diffs) don't use those sources (or use them in a consensus way). One very current diff as presented by Ghirla ([147]) is a good example of a common pattern of such disputes: as summarized on Talk:Mikhail_Meltyukhov#Criticism, the author in question, a modern Russian historian, has been discussed in English-language academic publications twice, with his views described as 'Stalinist and neoimperial concepts' in first and in second [link corrected on June 9] his book in question reffered to as containing "shocking falsehoods". We have requested removal of his references from controversial sections until positive academic reviews of his work are presented; what we got so far are arguments that he is reliable because he was interviewed by Russian radio stations and his book was reviewed by... Institute for Historical Review, a Holocaust denial outfit. Challenging and removing such references is not beneficial for the project is perfectly inline with our policies (WP:RS, WP:NPOV, WP:V).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:00, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

With all due respect to Sergey Solovyov (1820-1879) and Vasily Klyuchevsky (1841-1911), their works obviously do not reflect current historical research, and what is more, do reflect the outlook and biases prevalent in their time. Surely better historical sources should be used in Wikipedia than these. Balcer 20:17, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I see others too have problems with Piotrus removal of referenced information. Maybe some remedy will work out of this? M.K. 20:30, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I will narrowly comment on just one aspect of Piotrus' entry above that contains a number of gross misrepresentations. This is actually connected to what is said under the #Reliable sources proposed principle above and Piotrus habit to attack any source or historian that does not fit Piotrus' POV and pushing google links and newspaper articles as reliable when they support his POV. His "first" and "second" links point out, actually, to one and the same url, an obscure page of what seems a defunct publication. The citations of Meltyukhov by western sources and a positive review in a respected peer-reviewed journal are given at the talk page and the Holocaust Denial nonsense Piotrus brings up is not even worth to be commented on. Please care to click on the Talk:Mikhail Meltyukhov and talk:Stalin's Missed Chance (an article about the book) to get a complete picture. This will give a better clue than reading Piotrus' claims about radio, Holocaust denial and other whatnots. See also Evidence by Tarasievich for another example of a very similar line of behavior that bemused the editor who never ever seen Piotrus before. --Irpen 07:44, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Irpen is not presenting a complete picture here. For that, see Talk:Mikhail Meltyukhov, and evidence presented there. Here is a situation in a nutshell. Meltyukhov is a somewhat obscure Russian historian in that his works have never been translated into English. One book of his, "Stalin's Missed Chance", a work of counterfactual history, attempts to prove that Stalin had plans to attack Germany in 1941, a theory not accepted by most Western scholars of the subject, but similar in some respects to the views of Victor Suvorov. That book has received one favourable review in a Western journal. This review may be used to establish the validity of that book and the reliability of Meltyukhov as far as the analysis of the Soviet-German military situation in 1941 is concerned.

However, Meltyukhov has written another book, Soviet-Polish Wars, and this is the one which the controversy is all about. A number of controversial claims have been backed up by citations solely from that book. Usually these are claims of various atrocities by the Polish side in the Polish-Soviet War of 1919-1921. That book has received not a single positive review in any reputable academic journal (or at least none have been presented so far). Instead, we have two reviews of that book which condemn it as being extremely biased and subscribing to a Stalinist view of history. Until positive reviews of Soviet-Polish Wars are presented to counter the crushing negative reviews, there is a solid case to be made that the book is too biased to be used as reference in Wikipedia, especially when it comes to controversial claims.

As for the Holocaust Denial thread here, that was indeed a small mess. Some editors were confused about the significance of an article in a Holocaust Denial journal which praised the book Stalin's Missed Chance (even Irpen momentarily misjudged it and cited it as a reliable review diff). He later corrected himself diff). This has been cleared up now, and that favourable review judged non-prejudicial to Meltyukhov. Balcer 14:37, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

We are not here to discuss content. I suggest you retract your lengthy off-topic statement above. --Ghirla^-трёп- 11:19, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Piotrus

20) The editing and other actions of Piotrus fall within an acceptable range.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed Fred Bauder 13:33, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Most diffs provided lead to dead ends or attempts to deal with poor editing by other users. Fred Bauder 13:33, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by parties:

I see that the mailing list works the way it was expected to do. If wheel warring or repeatedly calling me a "chandelier" or "vandal", despite my loud admonitions to desist, falls within "an acceptable range", then what does not? --Ghirla^-трёп- 15:58, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Point me to specific evidence. Fred Bauder 16:58, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

[148] [149][150] As Piotrus has correctly pointed out, the timeframe of this arbitration is nowhere apparent. I agree that his June edits fall within an acceptable range, but it has not always been so. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:28, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If we going to once again present evidences, so lets continue "vandalism" theme - look to this accusation of vandalism and threat to penalize (original edit by contributor which Piotrus considers vandalism and which "deserves" threat). So my question to you, Fred Bauder, this is too "fall within an acceptable range"? M.K. 11:04, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Based on the diffs above, so would appear that my March, April, May and July diffs fall within acceptable range :) Or would you have any specific complains about anything newer then, let's say, half a year? PS. And all of your three links point to my RfC in which out of 40 editors who commented, only several agreed with your accusations...--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 22:22, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Setting aside the fact that this proposal is obviously beneficial to me, I'd like to remark that it is this type of proposal - clearly stating whether editors involved in this ArbCom have beheaved well or not - that is needed to end this case. General amnesty without any specifics will only result in continuation of all the behavior that led to this arbcom in the first place.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:29, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Karma

21) Due to aggression against Poland and its people by its German and Russian neighbors, accurate descriptions of many events of Polish history necessarily seem biased.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Fred Bauder 13:37, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Modifications proposed by parties:

20.1) Due to centuries of aggression against Lithuania and its people by its German, Polish and Soviet neighbors, accurate descriptions of many events of Lithuanian history necessarily seem biased. - proposed by Ghirla.

20.2) Due to centuries of aggression against Russia/Soviet Union and its people by its Polish and German neighbors (Polish-Soviet War, Soviet-German War), accurate descriptions of many events of Russian/Soviet history necessarily seem biased.- proposed by Ghirla.

20.3) Due to centuries of aggression of Poland against its neighbours Lithuania (Polish-Lithuanian War), Czechoslovakia (Polish-Czechoslovak border conflicts), and Soviet Russia (Polish invasion of Russia), accurate descriptions of many events of Polish history necessarily seem biased.- proposed by Ghirla.

20.4) In the 20th century, no neighbour of Poland, except Germany, escaped invasion by Polish forces. Consequently, accurate descriptions of many events of Eastern European history necessarily seem biased.- proposed by Ghirla.

20.5) Due to the very nature of the subject, accurate descriptions of many events of any country history necessarily seem biased. Proposed by --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:41, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by parties:

Or "biased descriptions of many events of Polish history seem accurate"? Seriously, Fred, you can't arbitrate content. Sure, this "finding of fact" will hush up the dispute, but it will only encourage Piotr's aggressiveness in the long term. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:06, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed 8.1, 8.2, 8.3, 8.4. In my opinion, we should keep in mind that the primary sides to the dispute are Poles and Lithuanians. Saying that the Polish point of view is inherently correct, and the Lithuanian point of view is inherently flawed... I would not call that arbitration. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:11, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The other arbitrators are unlikely to endorse this proposal. However it is part of the background. The relations between Poland and Lithuanian are much more tangled. I don't such a sweeping generalization would be supportable.Fred Bauder 16:54, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Fred said no such thing. Balcer 16:30, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. As a minor point, I'd dispute the inclusion of several ilinks: ex. Polish-Soviet War - it was not started by Poles, and I'd agree with Davies it was not started by Soviets neither, it was an accident. Polish-Lithuanian War is similary murky; so are the Polish-Czechoslovak border conflicts (we could as well add Silesian Uprisings and talk about agression against Germany) and Polish invasion of Russia talks about PSW and 17th and 11th century events. But as a larger point, I think it would be more correct to state that "Due to the very nature of the subject, accurate descriptions of many events of any country history necessarily seem biased". There is no need to single out Poland (which, I would agree with Ghirla, is not a saint), nor even the Central/Eastern European region. History - most of social sciences, really - are much more POVed then hard science. It's difficult to argue about a mathematical equation, it's easy to argue about a war. That said, I believe Ghirla's propositions, particulary 8.4, show well his strong POV and unwillingess to reach consensus with the other side (and btw, he is incorrect: Poland never had any conflicts with Romania).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:41, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would not go into content disputes here. Suffice it to say that the Polish-Soviet War is described by modern historians as "an act of naked aggression" on the part of Poland and that Poland was one of Hitler's jackals during the Munich agreement. And I fail to see how occupation of Lithuania's capital is anything other than aggression. Perhaps we should mention that no country has been victimized by post-WWII Western scholarship more than Poland. The underpinnings of this attitude are easy to understand and sympathize with; but its corollary is neglect of Poland's own aggressive actions against Russia, Lithuania, and Czechoslovakia. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:50, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, "an act of naked aggression" sums it up well. Fred Bauder 18:58, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would just note that PSWar, a FA-class article that has been through several reviews including a relativly recent FARC, does not reflect Ghirla's POV. Whether it is because the article was taken by Polish cabal or because such POV cannot be justified using reliable sources, I will leave it for others to decide by themselves...--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:07, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Probably because I've never read this article. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:13, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You made 7 edits to that article, ex. [151], [152], [153] or [154]. You did them w/out reading the article...?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:26, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I have pointed out on WP:FAC more than once, I lack patience to read a featured article (or any article of that length) in full. I've certainly read the sections that I edited, but not the entire article. I'm not superhuman. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:34, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Due to centuries of aggression against Lithuania - well, I thought I knew history of Poland, but as it seems, a Russian gentleman knows it better. Please enlighten me and present me examples of centuries of aggression against Lithuania. In the 20th century, no neighbour of Poland, except Germany, escaped invasion by Polish forces. How about Romania? How about Latvia? How about Slovakia since 1938? How about Hungary since early 1939? Poland has never been a perfect country, but believe me - we have two big neigbors compared to whom Poland is a dove Tymek 04:37, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed 8.5.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:41, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If Committee is going to judge this type of historical developments it is absolutely necessary to note and Poland's aggression. M.K. 11:06, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

I need to take issue with point 8.4 above, which states: "In the 20th century, no neighbour of Poland, except Germany, escaped invasion by Polish forces." This statement is factually incorrect: Poland shared a common border with Romania throughout the Interwar period, see Poland#Reconstitution of Poland; at no time during those 20 years (or, indeed, through the rest of the 20th century) did Poland invade Romania. Turgidson 01:56, 17 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but P.P. already took issue with it on June 8th (please see his above objection). Dr. Dan 02:27, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Suppression of Russian nationalist source

22) In this edit Balcer argues for suppression of the Russian historian Mikhail Meltyukhov as a source:

At any rate, the whole idea of justifying the murder of 20,000 Poles in 1940 as an understandable payback for the murder of "60,000" Russians in 1920-1921 is simply repellent and utterly immoral. By making his argument, Meltyukhov has put himself beyond the pale. He cannot be considered a serious, unbiased historian worthy of being cited in Wikipedia. For me personally as a Pole, his comments simply turn my stomach.

In the light of this damming evidence, I believe references to his works must be removed from Wikipedia. We must do this just like we would remove the works of any historian who would attempt to justify any mass murder as justifiable payback for a perceived past historical wrong. Basic standards of human civilisations and morality demand this. A person propagating such sick views has no place in civilised discourse.

Piotrus concurs

Comment by Arbitrators:

Proposed Fred Bauder 16:48, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Russian nationalism is a part of our world. NPOV does not differentiate between "civilized" and "uncivilized" viewpoints. Fred Bauder 19:06, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by parties:

Please note that Balcer's and my arguments for removal are backed primarily not by our personal POVs but by two academic reviews highly critical of this work ([155], [156]); no positive academic reviews have been presented in support of it. Therefore I believe removal of this reference and its claims is concurrent with our policies (WP:V, WP:RS). This is discussed in more details at #Removal of references.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:04, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know who this Meltykhov is and whether his ideas are notable per WP:FRINGE (these are content issues), but I'd be interested in consulting a Wikipedia article about "the murder of 60,000 Russians". Is it a reference to the Polish concentration camps of the 1920s? It's a shame that wikipedians interested in the 20th century failed to expand on this vital subject, preferring to bicker endlessly on relatively minor points. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:09, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ghirlandajo is linking to Detention Camp Bereza Kartuska, which operated from 1934-1939. A shameful chapter of Polish history to be sure, but only 20 inmates died and the dates are wrong so clearly this cannot be the institution Meltyukhov is referring to. The article you are looking for is Camps for Russian prisoners and internees in Poland (1919-1924), which succintly explains the problems in Meltyukhov's claims. Balcer 17:15, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(Edit conflict with Balcer) I believe it is a reference to the Camps for Russian prisoners and internees in Poland (1919-1924). Melt's numbers are also outdated, in light of this section.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:16, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Have the Kaczynski administration or its predecessors apologized to the families of Russian internees? Are they still in denial of the whole issue? --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:39, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comments like this one are neither relevant or helpful. Balcer 17:53, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This can be redirected too. M.K. 12:52, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It has been suggested that the Polish concentration camps and the Katyn executions are connected in some way, that is, that the latter was viewed by its perpetrators as a retribution for the former. As I understand, the Russian government issued apologies for Katyn (although it took place in a different country, run by two Georgians). It is instructive whether the Polish government admitted its guilt for the concentration camps or they still continue to represent their country as an eternal victim of foreign aggression. --Ghirla^-трёп- 06:05, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think the readers should be informed at this point that the expression "Polish concentration camps" that Ghirla insists on using is POV in the extreme and entirely unhelpful here. Still, it is a good example of the style of argument Ghirla routinely employs, and illustrates the difficulty of having a calm, rational discussion with him. Balcer 11:15, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In this context, such remarks are useful for establishing the emotional tone involved. Fred Bauder 18:50, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In that case I feel obliged to point out that my comments you are quoting in (8) were originally made on User talk:Irpen as my private appeal directed solely at that user, with whom I had many dealings with in the past and who was the principal supporter of using references by this author (and who subsequently moved my comment to Talk:Mikhail Meltyukhov). I would have not used such emotional language had I written this up for Arbcom. Anyway, my own emotional state should not be an issue in this particular case. As Piotrus said, we have two scholarly reviews of Meltyukhov's work which clearly indicate his strong bias, and no positive reviews whatsoever to validate it as a reference. For me the case is clear: it should not be used. There is no rule that we have to accept as a valid reference any work by anybody who considers himself a historian, no matter what other historians think of him. Balcer 19:30, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is another problem. One of the sources you cite [157] is itself an excellent example of propaganda, Polish nationalist propaganda, despite being on the site of Warsaw University. Fred Bauder 14:28, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The author, Andrzej Nowak, is a profesor of history at Jagiellonian University (the most prestigious in Poland). Do you have any grounds to dismiss his views as "Polish nationalist propaganda"? At any rate, at issue is the credibility of Meltyukhov, not Nowak. Let positive, affirming reviews of Meltyukhov's book Soviet-Polish Wars be provided as requested, if we want to confirm he is reliable as a source.Balcer 14:43, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Balcer, someone's being a professor in the Polish university and being a Polish nationalist is not mutually exclusive, you know. One does not need to be an expert to be able to tell the propaganda when one sees it. The elementary act of reading comprehension does not constitute the original research. Fred made a reasonable conclusion from what he saw in that "review". But if you need more, I suggest you take a good look, at, say this article by this professor Nowak entitled "Polska pchła" ("The Polish flea") and tell us all that this writing does not impress you with rabid Polish nationalism. (You may need to pay the subscription fee to read this masterpiece or you may try googling a free mirror.) But even this is secondary. The question is whether googling one or two obscure "reviews" is sufficient to impeach the author whose authority is easily confirmed by his work being frequently cited by other academics. This is a cheap trick. Pitorus tried the same with Mitrofan Dovnar-Zapol'skiy, the leading authority of the Belarusian history. Read talk:Polonization for details. --Irpen 06:22, 4 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That you don't like what Nowak's writes does not make him a nationalist. Can you present reviews of his work described as such? No? Moving on. Metl is "frequently cited"? Please provide diffs; all we have seen so far are a few cites to uncontroversial military facts. Zapol'skiy is completely another story, but a good example of how you insist that Russian Empire / early Soviet (Stalin) era scholarship cannot be considered obsolete or biased. Your favorite sources are heavily biased and unreliable, as shown again and again in our various discussions, and this ArbCom is not going to change that.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 11:06, 4 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

More generally, I am becoming confused as to where the burden of proof lies in this matter. If a new source is introduced into Wikipedia to back a controversial claim, is it the task of those who introduced it to provide proof that it is a valid source, or is it the task of those who question it to provide proof that it is invalid. Thus, if tomorrow some Polish buddy of mine writes a book called Polish-Soviet Wars, publishes it online on his website and I start using it as a source in Wikipedia for proving the existence of Russian atrocities, is it your job to find evidence that his work is unreliable? Or my job to prove that the work is reliable (by presenting its positive reviews by academics, for example). Clarification on this point would be appreciated. Balcer 14:51, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The person advancing the information has the burden. How great that burden is depends on the nature of the information. Fred Bauder 19:09, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Right Said Fred! :) --Irpen 06:50, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Piotrus blocked his opponent in a content dispute

23) Piotrus blocked his opponent in a content dispute, ~~driving a well-meaning newbie from Wikipedia forever.~~[158]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:31, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That anon was primarily a disruptive user: [159], most of his edits were continuation of ongoing revert wars indicating he was a well experienced editor with primary account(s) blocked long time ago, and his reply to my warning left little hope for any civilized conversation ([160]). I was hardly engaged in any content dispute: I spotted a reverting, POV pushing, trolling IP and blocked him - this is nothing more or less then normal troll policing.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 18:52, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The first edit consists in addition of the epithet "propagandist" to describe a journalist with propagandist output. The second edit is his rather mild reaction to your "stern warning". Our ideas of disruption obviously differ. I would rather classify as disruption every edit made by Space Cadet. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:29, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Adding adjectives like "propagandist" w/out reference is not a good editing practice. When asked for references, accusing other editor of harassment is not a "mild reaction". Joining revert wars in the first days of one's editing is not a "good faith noobie editor" average practice.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 21:06, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It saddens me to find out that sysop misused his tools once again. Blocking policy strictly characterize that if sysop is in argument with other contributor he should not block his content opponent. To me situation surrounding this block indeed looks like block to content opponent. Blocking policy suggests:

“Everyone was new once, and most of us made mistakes when new. That's why we welcome newcomers and are patient with them, and assume that most people who work on the project are trying to help it, not hurt it. We also ask that newcomers make an effort to learn about our policies and guidelines so that they can learn how to avoid making mistakes.”

Piotrus left message on anon’s talk page [161], in it, I can not find any attempt to inform user about specific policies on his talk, Piotrus also did not inform him which specific contributions are considered as “false information, untruths and POV-pushing” . So how person not knowing about this crucial information, could adjust his conducts? If I understand correctly anon even added refs to his claims [162][163], even before Piotrus “message”. He even added more his/her thoughts on his talk page [164] right after P.P.’s “message”. So in my view anon can con be classified as obvious vandal of project. But Piotrus decided to block him later [165] without any presentation of specific diffs which would show why such block was used, Piotrus also did not inform anon that he/she could contest and ask for another sysop intervention. And the block for 1 month only with 1 warning (issued by the same Piotrus) to me looks like too long, especially then contributor can not be classified as obvious vandal. In other words these evidence shows Piotrus’ neglect and violation of WP:BP. Sadly, Piotrus falsely accuses new comers like in this different case as well. Should be noted that Piotrus misused his administrator tools and in the past, like preventing from move such pages as Jogaila (Władysław II) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (with much telling rationale); Międzymorze (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) and unblocking his Polish friends. Seems that 2005-2006 problems continues and in 2007. M.K. 13:38, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Again, much of the argument is moot because this user was not a newbie. He is a problematic user with a fluctuating IP who has been revert warring on Poland/Germany related topics for the past year. Here are his contributions from November 6 to November 23, 2006, for example (IP: 70.133.71.77). here from 13 October 2006 to 5 November, 2006 (IP:71.137.200.151), and here from 23 August to 28 August, 2006 (IP: 71.137.206.246). His IP fluctuates wildly so it is difficult to track his edits (part of his modus operandi, I guess). I hope the above convincingly demonstrates Piotrus was not dealing with a newbie here. Since I had quite a bit of dealings with this anon in the past, if more evidence is requested by Arbcom (specific diffs to demonstrate the same edit pattern), I will be happy to provide it. Still, given that the IP Piotrus blocked (70.133.71.150) is almost the same as one of those above (70.133.71.77), and close to the other ones, I don't think there is much need as the evidence is overwhelming. So, please stop using the "poor newbie" argument, it just does not fly. Balcer 15:49, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I do not know if this is the same or not the same contributor, your statements currently are speculative, at best. As these IPs can be from local network etc. And there are no indications in Piotrus ban message that he links these IP’s as one person. In other words there is a room for doubt. And if the consult blocking policy there is clearly stated: “A rule of thumb is when in doubt', do not block; instead, consult other administrators for advice. After placing a block that may be controversial, it is a good idea to make a note of the block at the administrators' noticeboard for sanity checking.” Currently I am unaware that Piotrus did these procedures, as policy notes.M.K. 10:28, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

For me it is beyond reasonable doubt here that in all the edits by IPs given above the same person was involved. What exactly are the chances of finding two different people on the same network who just happened to be fascinated by the medieval status of Danzig? Look, if you want to stick to your faith that this may all be an amazing coincidence, you are welcome to it. But I think Arbcom members with their long experience on Wikipedia will conclude otherwise, and then reflect on your ability to correctly assess evidence staring you in the face. Balcer 17:43, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I said I do not know, which relationship links theses different IPs. As I editing quite many articles relating with history, many contributors presenting the same sources, same arguments, but this makes to me no room that they are same persons only having such evidences. Your emotional explanation regarding Danzig ends just looking at Gdansk Vote, where you will be amazed how many contributors “fascinated” by this city. If you have nothing constructive to add, which could draw light on this matter – so don’t add.M.K. 14:07, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Driving away? Not for very long. Barely two days later, that editor came back under a different IP here. Now he is using another IP [166]. Calling this problematic user well-meaning newbie is flat wrong. He has been around for a long time and should know better. Balcer 17:59, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Either you provide solid evidence of alleged disruption or you stop calling an opponent in good standing "problematic". Perhaps he is a problem for you and Piotrus, but the community in general may find his edits helpful and to the point. I don't know the blocked IP well enough to say whether it's him or it's someone else who's editing under IPs you provided. If I were him, I would file a request for deadminship following that one-month block by his opponent in a content dispute. This is simply inacceptable. We can't treat newbies like this. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:04, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It is him all right. There is only one IP in the 70s range persistently edit warring in areas related to territories now in Poland and formerly in Germany. The style is quite distinct. Anyway, just look at the dates. Piotrus blocks him on Feb 23, another edit is made in the same area under new IP on Feb 25. Coincidence? I don't think so. Balcer 18:09, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Even if your identification is correct, it's fortunate that the guy managed to find another IP and to continue his involvement with Wikipedia. One may admire his commitment to the project in the face of abuse. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:15, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, if your internet provider assigns dynamic IPs (as many do in North America), the IP numbers change automatically once in a while (I am not sure exactly how frequently), so getting a new IP takes no effort whatsoever. Let's not make a hero out of this guy, for crying out loud. Persistence by itself is not an admirable quality. The facts are these: the guy was asked numerous times to get a login, and he has steadfastly refused. Let this be the evidence of the seriousness of his commitment to Wikipedia. Balcer 18:26, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Blocking one's opponent in content dispute is inappropriate, no matter whether he logged in or he did not. It's not for nothing that Wikipedia accepts contributions from anonymous accounts. Some IPs are known to have made in excess of 20,000 good-faith edits. Facile blocks in such cases are not to be taken lightly. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:29, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The opponent was effectively not blocked, he was editing again 2 days later, and is still editing today. Apparently he thinks nothing of Wikipedia rules. If one is blocked, it is not all right to just get another IP and edit again 2 days later. In light of this, your attempt to paint this user as a paragon of virtue is misfiring. Balcer 20:36, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You have the burden of proving that it's the same editor. I see no compelling evidence for that. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:38, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Looking at edit histories seems to make the case pretty unassailable. With anonymous dynamic IPs proving with complete certainty that two of them are used by the same person is essentially impossible, so demanding such proof is not very reasonable. Balcer 22:31, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus and personal attacks

24) Despite his mind-boggling history of revert-warring and personal attacks,[167] User:Space Cadet is not known to have been rebuked by Piotrus, who frequently works with him in tandem (check Piotr's messages on Cadet's talk page for details).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:32, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Admins are not police. I am not a policeman. I don't interact with Space Cadet often, and I don't follow his edits to see if he needs to be blocked, warned, or whatnot. If I see him or anybody doing something disruptive, I warn them: and indeed I have warned him at least once in the past (ex.[168]), so your statement that I have never rebuked him is false.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 21:13, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Firstly, this is not a warning but a mild request. Secondly, you never asked Kosmak to stop abusing fraudulent edit summaries, which are his specialty. Thirdly, the nature of your "collaboration" with Space Cadet may be assessed by going through your Polish-language massages on his talk page. Fourthly, admins are janitors whose mission is to eradicate filth from the project. --Ghirla^-трёп- 21:19, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

For the record, since you objected so much to "Żyrandol" nickname, why are you giving nicknames like "Kosmak" to other editors? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 21:23, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It is as much a nickname for Space Cadet as "Ghirla" is for "Ghirlandajo" or "P.P." for "Piotrus". According to Space Cadet, that's how his friends refer to him. I don't consider myself his enemy. --Ghirla^-трёп- 21:38, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus, I investigated the nature of your only "warning" to Space Cadet. It appears that Space Cadet concluded that a friendly person had betrayed him by joining his detractors ([169]). You clarified that it was just for his "own good", so that nobody could block him ([170]) I take it that you were referring to his favourite fraudulent edit summary: "removed nonsensical chauvinistic claims" ([171]). Space Cadet, of course, did not heed your advice and continued abusing this edit summary ([172], [173], [174] etc.). For instance, just two weeks ago ([175]), on an article that you have been active on. You did not block him for a month, like you did a harmless IP. You did not block him at all. You did not warn him at all. You did not criticize him again. For Space Cadet's own good, as far as I can see. --Ghirla^-трёп- 19:48, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

User:Space Cadet has not been blocked since 11 April 2006. If he is a such problematic user, one cannot tell by any sanctions imposed on him by the community, in the past year at least. Anyway, Wikipedia must have thousands of problematic users. Accusing Piotrus of not rebuking any one of them is just bizarre. What else has Piotrus not done that we must punish him for? I bet the list is very long. Balcer 18:04, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Like Molobo, Space Cadet was explained that he would not be able to circumvent 3RR in the future. Both stopped making more than three reverts but continued revert warring within the bounds of three reverts. Molobo was eventually blocked for a year, while Cadet is allowed to continue his activities to this day, for some reason that escapes me. --Ghirla^-трёп- 19:40, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I suggest you look at the full list of Kosmak's contributions to get a clearer picture of his activity in the project. As Dmcdevit once pointed out, it's difficult to spot an edit that is not a revert. Piotrus likes to pontificate how intolerant he is to incivility and trolling... as long as incivility and trolling don't buttress pro-Polish POV. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:10, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You know, by twisting Space Cadet's name you are not really helping to make your case more credible. Anyway, Space Cadet's edits and their worthiness are not part of this Arbcom. Balcer 18:14, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What makes you think so? He is a major disruptive factor in Eastern Europe-related articles. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:16, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Even if true, why would it be Piotrus' responsibility to rebuke him? Balcer 18:27, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Since he is the only Polish admin active in the project, I suppose it's within his purview to root out incivility and revert-warring on Poland-related articles. If you maintain two revert-warriors on the scale of Molobo or SC, you may never worry about 3RR. Having a couple of tools to ram through your POV makes your life in Wikipedia so much easier. There's one disclaimer, though. When you pontificate about your intolerance to personal attacks, you'd better take a good look around and start eradicating incivility of those with whom you collaborate on a daily basis. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:37, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

For the record, I am far from only Polish admin active in the project. There are several others. And I am ceratinaly unable to watch even a fraction of all Poland-related articles and "root out" disruptive behaviour there - my apologies if spending several hours on Wikipedia daily is not enough for you to be satisfied with my actions.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 21:13, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps there are some other Polish admins who I have never come across, but only you and Darwinek (prior to his desysopping) seem to have monitored Poland-related articles on a regular basis. --Ghirla^-трёп- 21:23, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus compiled a pile of "incriminating diffs" against his opponents

25) For several months preceding the current RfAr, Piotrus had been following the edits of his traditional opponents Irpen and Ghirla, compiling "incriminating diffs" against them and stacking them in Polish Wikipedia.[176] [177] After his umpteenth clash with Piotrus on 6 June, Irpen ceased editing Wikipedia.[178]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed following the recent discussion on Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Petri Krohn/Evidence, where such pages as this one were deemed inappropriate per WP:AGF and related policies. Illustrative of who's gunning for whom. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:54, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Presenting an evidence section is a requirement of many DR proceedings, including but not limited to this ArbCom. Since as other users obeserved, you were "gunning" for me, it is only reasonable I would start preparing a defence - and note it was not me who initatied the DR, so that page was purely defensive. Where I compile and keep my drafts should not be your business, in fact you following my edits on other projects seems very much like WP:STALKing. PS. And your assumption that I somehow caused Irpen to take a break is a perfect illustration of 'bad faith' accussations that I hope ArbCom will put an end to. PS2. I can't help but notice that at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Petri Krohn/Evidence you are actually supportive of creation of such pages; for the record I don't care and don't mind if you have a similar page on ru wiki (and I certainly am not going to go spy on you).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 18:44, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus, please take a cup of tea. Your accusations of "spying" and "stalking" are without merit. When trying to find this arbitration, I googled for "Piotrus" and "evidence"; you may see the result. And here's what I've got when googling for "Piotrus" and "Ghirla". I hope there is nothing wrong with googling. I don't know what sort of defence against me you were preparing back in March and February when I hardly edited English Wikipedia at all, and certainly did not touch any Eastern Europe-related subject. Frankly, I'm not comfortable when my edits on completely unrelated subjects are meticulously traced and recorded in order to be presented against myself one sunny day. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:47, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I explained in my evidence, you were active back then, made incivil remarks and refused to apologize for them and/or resume our mediation. The evidence was gathered for discussion if the mediation would be resumed, and then you joined this arbitration. I find it interesting that instead of discussing the evidence you are trying to question other users right to gather and present it.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 20:59, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The debacle over IRC-induced block of Irpen has nothing to do with that, Piotrus, although you finally blanked it five minutes ago. Furthermore, it's up to you to present evidence that there are Russian editors who "can edit Poland-related articles in English Wikipedia without facing some sort of harrassment". Since you have failed to provide it, this is sad truth rather than "incivilities" as you strive to present them. If you are searching for real rather than imaginary incivilities, please take a look at the edits of Space Cadet. --Ghirla^-трёп- 21:10, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piaskownica2 was created in Dec'06 and honestly I don't recall what was its purpose (PAIN draft, maybe?). I apprently forgot to blank it after I used it, so I did it now. And your argument that I have to present evidence that Polish editors are not doing what they are not doing is as logical as your claim above that I am guilty of not policing all Poland-related articles and single-handedly dealing with all disruptions on Wikipedia. Finally, for the record, several Russian or Russia-interested editors have voiced their support of me in this ArbCom (ex. [179], [180], [181]). Unlike you, I have no problem with ethnic editor groups, and I cound many Russian editors as my editor friends.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 21:18, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No person you claim to be Russian is actually Russian or lives in Russia. One has Belarusian roots and does not speak Russian; another is a Ukrainian from Kyiv who is notorious for his anti-Russian POV. It may be argued from your edit that every Ukrainian or Belarusian does appear to be Russian to you, but I would not press that thought further. Contrary to your assertions, I don't expect you to "single-handedly deal with all disruptions on Wikipedia". I expect you to stop accusing your opponents of incivility, while giving a carte blanche to your Polish friends. As for your statement about my "problems with ethnic editor groups", I consider it quite incivil and would not stoop to responding. --Ghirla^-трёп- 21:35, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The diffs I presented above, like this, speak for themselves. I think it is "a gang of Polish editors and their allies from neighbouring countries" who should and are offended by your continuing remarks.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 21:46, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I was indeed ousted from this project to Russian Wikipedia by "a gang of Polish editors and their allies from neighbouring countries". This is a stern fact. I still would not edit a large swath of articles, because it's too depressing. I don't know why you take my remark personally. Did I mention your name? Let's move on. It is well-known that you prefer to deflect criticism of your actions by referring to Ghirla's fabled incivility and disruption, but don't expect me to play these games here. --Ghirla^-трёп- 22:09, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I feel deep frustration that Piotrus makes "incriminating" list of his content opponents and even this list is placed in pl.wiki. Such activities considerably effects and makes almost imposable transparency and mutual trust among editors. And Piotrus response to raised concerns only concurs user:Mikkalai's, the most active editor ever in wp, words, who suggested that Piotrus is incapacity to understand basic rules M.K. 14:06, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Whether the information Piotrus keeps on his Polish Wikipedia personal pages is acceptable or not is a matter for Polish Wikipedia and its policies. I do not think it has relevance here. These are separate projects, after all. As for Irpen, unless you have some evidence of why he took a 2 week Wikibreak (so far), please don't make completely unfounded accusations. Balcer 18:34, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I fail to see why a page full of dirty laundry should be branded as an "attack page" in English Wikipedia and should be acceptable once imported to a fellow wikipedia project. It's all the same to me. As for Irpen, I made no assertions as to the reasons for his departure, although I may reasonably doubt that the statement about his "gunning for Piotrus" and need to investigate his activity was scored to encourage his contributions to Wikipedia, especially coming from the person who orchestrates discussions on the Arbcom's mailing list and controls #wikipedia-en-admins. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:55, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Balcer above asks for evidence that what he tongue-in-cheekily calls "Irpen's Wikibreak" has anything to do with Piotrus' repugnant and meticulous attempt to prepare an attack on his opponents. To satisfy your curiosity, Balcer, I am here to confirm that I found myself unable to edit Wikipedia specifically because of being overcome by an overwhelming feeling of disgust when I discovered (by accident and not through stalking, I will post details at talk) that Piotrus has been collecting diffs on myself and on others for months, doing so secretly and outside the en-wiki space. The deviousness of this beats anything I have seen so far from other editors active in this segment of Wikipedia. Having taken everything I have taken from Piotrus in the past, I was still taken aback by this new demonstration of his vigor and dedication aimed at destruction of his content opponents. Most recently, he added user:Grafikm_fr [182] to his hit list as well (see this for the full collection of his chosen targets).

Here one may find Piotrus' prepared in advance "response to the evidence presented by Irpen" that he drafted in anticipation of whatever he thought I would post. In this statement-to-be Piotrus appears to be making ready for accusations he guessed others would make and how? By following me (and several others) for months and collecting seemingly "incriminating" diffs to use at some point should he need to call for blocks, prove general disruptiveness or merely deflect the discussion. This started way before the onset of this ArbCom.

His secretly prepared "response" aimed at casting myself a problem editor is worthy of attention. He starts his "response" with an astonishing and revealing twist: '"I am tempted to limit my reply to Irpen's evidence with this single diff..." but this carefully prepared as "spontaneous" overture gets expanded into 6 lengthy passages where he goes as far as characterizing myself as a "royal pain in the butt" and calls for some unheard of remedies. Did he know in advance what he would be accused of while drafting a response to my statement which was never written? Did he try to build a one-size-fits-all demagogic argument? Or was he just thinking that dumping shit on me would help deflect the discussion from whatever he thought I would say to the topics that we would rather have discussed hoping, as usually, to rid from the subject (or the opponent) this way or the other?

I invite the ArbCom members and the general public to actually read the Piotrus' statement against myself that, I suppose, includes the complete compilation of all the dirt he thinks he dug out over this lengthy surveillance operation. I only humbly ask to actually click on those supposedly "incriminating" diffs that he managed to collect and if you have questions check their context. See for yourself the merit of his accusations and give to this pile of dirt all the serious consideration it deserves. --Irpen 03:43, 18 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

My full reply is here. After Irpen declared he is writing evidence against me, I wrote my own draft. If you want to fault me for doing it in semi-public place, while you presumably did so offline, go ahead. Please note that the evidence has not been presented here so far - Irpen, I find no pleasure in 'throwing mudballs', and I prepared mine only because you said you are already working on yours :( --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 11:04, 18 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is more to this in the discussion I had with Balcer at my talk for those who are interested in details. But to summarize it, Piotrus is trying to put an argument on its head. No one doubts his right to draft a statement in his private space. However, Piotrus started the secret page specifically to collect mud well before this case was started. I would not mind him drafting a statement. But here we are talking about shadowing other editors and meticulously collecting diffs for months waiting for the opportune moment to throw them in. This is the most repugnant activity I have seen in the entire Eastern European wiki-corner. --Irpen 07:17, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please tell me how can I collect evidence (diffs), required for DR proceedings, without actually "collecting diffs", and I will be more then happy to adopt such an enlightened method of evidence collection (without collection...) in the future. Btw, I am aware that you prefer to post various statements and comments without any diffs - but I am afraid for most DR our rules are clear in demanding diffs to back up one's claims. Oh, and I found it very interesting that although several editors presented diffs in these proceedings, you find only my "collection" unethical. Once again I'd ask you to show us evidence that the diffs presented by those other editors were collected in a much less "repugnant" manner. I am sure you would not be singling me out for condemnation because I dared to gather evidence against your person, would you?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 15:43, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by others:

The only thing that is clear in all of this is the right of the accused to face his accuser. If there is no accusation, then there should not be evidence. A wiki is "easy," by definition. It's easy to collect information, if one is motivated. After all, our constant friend Daniel Brandt believes that we're all exposed this way. Therefore, collecting in advance, when there has been neither a complaint nor an attempt at mediation, seems to be sandbagging. If you have enough "evidence" to start collecting the diffs, you really should be trying to work things out. If you don't, then you shouldn't be collecting the diffs. What is shown, at heart, is a vindictive attitude -- as if one were saying, "I know we got peace now, but I'm going to have to get you at some point later." The entire attitude necessary is a sort of J'Accuse. I have known people keep such lists in the past, when a user was really, really out of line, and that was kept merely to see if the user went off the rails (this was Eternal Equinox). We had reason to believe that we were looking at multiple block evasions. Each by itself was insufficient to seek a ban (not block, but ban), and so there was a need to document all the block evasions. In other words, each was a policy violation and none was concluded amicably. In this case, it appears that it is a highlight reel of slights and disagreements. That's pretty icky. It will be up to the arbitrators, I think, to determine whether these collections were with an eye toward dispute resolution (which we should all seek) or clearing the field of one's opponents in editorial concerns (which none of us should seek). If it's the former, then it's still a bit wretched (see my first point about this being a wiki). If it's the latter, and it looks more like that to me than otherwise, then it's very much out of bounds. (I understand that any editor in any of these fields must be vigilant against organized nationalists and the like, but that can only be valid if an external, if people from a wholly other point of view, are with you the entire time ensuring that you do not fall prey to your own nation's preconceptions.) Geogre 19:34, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus has urged Polish editors to discuss article content outside Wikipedia

26) Piotrus has repeatedly urged Polish editors to use an instant messaging agent to coordinate discussion of Poland-related articles.[183] [184] [185] [186] [187] [188]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. I don't have much problem with off-wiki discussions of article content, as long as they are not used for canvassing FAC votes (a fresh example). --Ghirla^-трёп- 11:04, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Bad faith assumption. Tymek has joined the discussion before I posted that note on his talk page. Following my actions and conversations with other editors, and accusing me of canvassing and other bad deeds in public fora (as you recently brought up my name in ANI), is on the other hand something that I hope ArbCom will address.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 11:23, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I will never understand why people should want to use an off-wiki messager to discuss article content. Why be so secretive about it? --Ghirla^-трёп- 11:30, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Despite your bad faith assumptions, it's not about secrecy, but about speed. On the other hand, you are no stranger to using off-wiki forms of communications yourself.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 11:38, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The e-mail was discussed by me on the evidence page at the outset of this arbitration. I may forward it to you if you wish. It's about good advice rather than about canvassing or discussing article content. Wikipedia software has the e-mail function for a good reason. On the other hand, instant messaging clients are ideal for engineering astroturfing in discussions and votes. --Ghirla^-трёп- 11:48, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, but I am not interested in yours - or any other editor's - private correspondence; I have better things to do on this project then to trace imaginary cabals and conspirations. As I wrote many times before, I certainly don't deny - and I would admit if asked as I did in the past - that I use various off-wiki forms of communications (up to 'face to face') to discuss wiki. I however strongly resist any implication that I use them for 'canvassing' or any other inappropriate action. Of course, you can keep claiming that it is not true, but you should be aware that unless you can present some evidence to back you up, your presumption of guilt is a violation of WP:AGF and related policies. Considering that in your current 'case' (Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Soviet invasion of Poland (1939)), only two Polish editors other then myself have voted so far - and the one whom I have asked for IM info before his comment is currently opposing, not supporting, my nomination - anybody can judge the merit of your claims that I am canvassing with my 'yes-men'. And for the record, I certainly hope that the ArbCom WILL address this issue, I am pretty tired of this accusation coming up anywhere when somebody dares to agree with me and to disagree with you.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 12:44, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A major characteristic of off-wiki instant messaging is that it leaves no lasting traces, so it's pathetic to demand "irrefutable proof" in such cases. If they left some irrefutable proof of canvassing, off-wiki discussions would have lost their meaning. The proposed finding asserts that you have urged Polish editors (Halibutt, Balcer, Logologist, Appleseed, among others) to discuss article content outside Wikipedia. This is based on your own statements, sometimes made in foreign languages, for a reason that escapes me. You are aware that some people regard you as the leader of the Polish Cabal, so I fail to see the point of fostering their suspicions with explicit endorsement of off-wiki messaging in Polish. As for your note that only several Polish editors have voted, you should wait when the nomination is closed. The last time when your article was nominated, it appears that the entire Polish community of Wikipedia rushed to support, often without any rationale: Beaumont, Logologist, Halibutt, Darwinek, Lysy, Balcer, Visor, Julo, Ouro, Jacek Kendysz... --Ghirla^-трёп- 13:27, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it took you long enough to bring up the Polish cabal argument. You know, I will just say what another editor has wisely said to you, instead of wasting hours on pointless discussions: I have nothing to prove to you. Good day, indeed. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 14:01, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't believe in Polish Cabal, I did not take part in the relevant mediation, and I don't accuse you of being its leader. Please don't impute these statements to me. What I don't understand is why you should implore fellow Polish wikipedians to use off-wiki instant messaging, given the current atmosphere of tension and mistrust around the entire issue. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:45, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I already told you - and I is no secret - the answer is speed.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 20:38, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Are you in a hurry to discuss "article content"? Ok, this probably explains why, once I dispute a point with you, Balcer and Lysy would chime in within minutes. An extra revert is never a problem, under these circumstances. --Ghirla^-трёп- 21:14, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Comment by Dc76:

You can find my comments at Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/Soviet invasion of Poland (1939). For the record, I just put them here as well:

In response to: As has become routine with Piotrus nominations, this page has been compromised by canvassing. [...] Piotrus to spur other Polish editors "to action" and for canvasssing FAC votes for as long as I know him. [...] I wonder how all of your traditional yes-men learn about the nomination... I suppose it's some sort of extrasensory perception. [...] It's not my responsibility to write the article for you. [...] No offense intended, but I see you [addressed to others, not to me-Dc76] in Wikipedia only when you appear on some talk page to vote in league with Piotrus and other GG clients. It's up to you to prove that you have independent opinions. --Ghirla-трёп- 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Dear Ghirla, why can't you assume good faith from your fellow co-editors? Most come to discuss out of share curriousity for the subject, and only on days when they find 20-30 spare minutes to do so. Have you also heard of people agreeing on one item of discussion and totally disagreing on another? It is so irritating when you and 1-2 others make it all about the editors and not about the issues. It is very offensive from your part to ask everyone to justify themselves in front of you! ("It's up to you to prove that you have independent opinions.") Only Vyshinsky used to talk like that. Are you in your mind, why do you see everyone as your enemy? :Dc76 12:32, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

In response to: Ghirla, you say that it's not your responsibility to help write the article; but that would certainly have been one way to solve the problem. The best thing that could have happened would have been for excellent editors like yourself and Irpen to have long ago added the material that you believe has been deliberately left out. Clearly the books in your countries present a different account than the one presented by western historians, but only you and others who have access to those sources can provide the material that you feel is lacking.qp10qp 14:27, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but that would require working on content and issue, not flaring personal accusations left and right, which is very easy. What if he fails to find sourses supporting his POV or supporting it only to a small extent? He could not then shout accusations as now. IMHO, it is a psichological and inter-relational problem that some users have to a number of subjects, nothing to do with the content.:Dc76 17:21, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I would like to ask ArbCom to force all editors to discuss the issues and contents of the articles, and to abstain from personal acusations which create a tense atmosphere and subsequently generates hostility in 20 other articles for another month or two, until things calm in the absence of content of dispute. I am not Polish and noone's "yes-man", and I don't have any interest in 99% of Piotrus' articles. The same are other users. Why do we have to bear so much bullying and stigmatization? :Dc76 17:41, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I don't think we have met before, and I'd like to assume your good faith even in the face of canvassing and block shopping that I see among your recentmost edits on my watchlist. This is exactly Piotr's line of behaviour, as it was he who courteously invited you to comment, apparently aiming to derail the discussion with the rambling diatribes above. Let me assure you that Piotrus does not need a self-appointed advocate. Now back to the issue at hand. If you endorse his view that people of the same nationality should discuss some of the hottest topics on Wikipedia in instant messaging services, you'll perhaps agree that we should throw a bunch of our guidelines out of the window. I fail to see how the use of a Polish instant messager for discussing Wikipedia content may be instrumental in bringing the editors of different nationalities together. Piotr's facile approach to off-wiki discussions is inherently divisive, because it leads to formation of warring nationalist cliques. That's the last thing we need here. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:45, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Most of the diffs you provided are over year old, some are almost two years old. I don't see why are you bringing these here. I remember I've tried to negotiate with you in the past and we have exchanged a couple of emails. Is this something condemnable ? --Lysy^talk 20:16, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
My gripe is not with e-mails. The timeframe of the case is nowhere apparent. If you want fresh evidence, look here. --Ghirla^-трёп- 21:14, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(I am assuming, Lysy, you talk to Ghirla, b/c I don't know you. "Hi. How do you do.":Dc76 20:50, 12 July 2007 (UTC))[reply]

In relation to Ghirla's accusations just above Lysy's message:

Here you can find my full response about the accusation of "canvassing". I said hello to a newly met user, listing him the articles that we might have common interest in, and Ghirla profiles me because I posted a message on ArbCom, and accuses me of "canvassing". Very "nice" of Ghirla.
the second acusation is of "block shopping". Please, explain this in layman terms, I do not understand this term. That edit was about the following: a disruptive editor managed to erase "Romanian 1946 elections were riged" from the article Romanian Communist Party without others noticing it for 3 days. When someone observed this and returned it, the disruptive editor started rv, and counted till 4, then left a message on 3RR. The admin who read that saw the diffs and blocked the legitimate user for 24 hours. The disruptive user was not erasing the phrase from the article any longer, b/c the other 5-6 eidtors of that article by that time noticed it, so he can no longer push POV. But he managed to distroy the reputation of the legitimate user, b/c the 24 hour block remains on record. So, I wrote a message to the admin who did the block and asked her to look into the issue again. (you can see more details here) Ghirla now accuses me of "block shopping". Again - nothing about any issue in any article, just accusation of talking to third parties without "the permission of Ghirla". The inquisition was asking people to prove their inocence, but Ghirla want more - wants me to have a certificate from him that I am allowed to leave a message on another person's talk page. See where it arrived?! See any discussion about content of articles?
I am not a specialist on WP polices, and I persoanlly don't use any outside WP way to communicate and coordinate with editors. But I do not know if this is "prefrable" or "preferable not to be done". I can only say about me: personally I do not do it, because WP for me is a relaxation in free time, not my bread, and I am not interested discussing WP with people around me. Lysy above says it's ok to email. Look, guys, do whatever you do, I am not interestred in setting rules for what you do between yourselves. Can we stop discussing people and discuss content of article, please. Or there lies the problem: Ghirla can not discuss the content of the article.
I give a damn about what Piotrus does. Yesterday I saw his name for 3rd or 4th time, and sincerely until yesterday I thought this was one of those people who edits one day per month. But the problem here is Ghirla accusing Piotrus of contributing to articles about Poland and talking with other Poles in order to avoid dissussing with him issues about content of the article. And Piotrus "courteously invited you to comment" (i.e. telling about this ArbCom case) was something that in my oppinion he was oblidged to tell to everyone on the page disscussing that article's quality. If he wouldn't and I find out later that he knew about the ArbCom case and did not tall, I would have told Piotrus: why didn't you tell when this article is disscussed in ArbCom, are you hiding something? :Dc76 20:47, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have never talked to Piotrus about any Wiki articles, we only exchanged greetings using Gadu Gadu. He has never asked me to support him, I doubt if he ever will. Ghirla - you should go to a doctor, are you paranoid or what? As I see, the Soviet part of your mind prevails Tymek 19:44, 20 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"Encouragement of vandalism"

27) Piotrus has accused Ghirla of "encouraging vandalism" after Ghirla had questioned Piotr's block of a newbie with whom Piotrus was involved in a content dispute. The subsequent discussion on WP:AN determined that Piotr's accusations have no merit.[189]

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. The finding illustrates Piotr's attitude to newbies that don't share his POV. Neither do I appreciate fraudulent allegations of vandalism (see above) or encouraging vandalism. --Ghirla^-трёп- 12:18, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Portraying the linked ongoing AN discussion, where no consensus was reached, as one that has 'already determined my accusations have no merit', is just one of many examples of evidence misrepresentation seen in this proceeding. I would nonetheless welcome any ArbCom comments on both the particular subcase in question, and on the portrayal of the issue as seen above. PS. Considering that this discussion in no way involved you, until you appeared on the talk page of the user I warned to challenge my competences, I would like to hear from ArbCom if this falls within WP:STALK.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 14:54, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus' accusation of everyone stalking him is not new. It is addressed in detail at the talk page of this workshop. --Irpen 08:08, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

I am pretty sure Ghirlandajo would react just as strongly if some anonymous IP attempted to insert, say, a "Racism in Russia" section into our Russia article. Quite simply, actions of this kind are gross POV pushing and completely unacceptable. Our articles about countries must be held to a high standard. Piotrus had a strong case to identify this as vandalism and take appropriate action. Balcer 14:47, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Balcer, while I appreciate your opinion, I assure you that Piotrus does not need your advocacy. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:50, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

But we can still address the Balcer's statement. We are not discussing whether Ghirla would have reverted pasting the content of Racism in Russia into the Russia article verbatim. I am sure he would. I also objected and removed the irrelevant stuff (or undue weight material) from wide-topic articles. The issue here is a narrower one. Would we have accused a newbie user who have done so in vandalism. Is this right to resort to block threats?[190] Or speaking even more narrowly, does [[191] this entry] posted by Ghirla merits the accusation of Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive95#Vandal encouragement.

Also, Balcer, Piotrus himself has a widely known habit of posting irrelevant or loosely relevant material to wide-topic articles such as Russo-Japanese War, Catherine the Great, etc. I don't even remember to how many articles he posted the material about the Zaluski Library episode. Not only it was added to, say, Russian National Library but even to the article as broad as the Russian Enlightenment. Piotrus' revert warring to distort that fine article by giving an undue weight to an episode so remotely related to the events in question (to be fair, others eagerly joined the rv-war from all sides) caused one of the most bitter discussions where he accused me even of xenophobic views in the heat of the moment (NPA experts here?)

So, take a look at the original diff posted by Ghirla.[192] Does it merit the accusation that Ghirla encourages the vadals that Piotrus has leveled here? And, also notably, this exemplifies one more time the Piotrus' habit that is brought up here more than once: resorting to various boards at every opportune moment and trying to use them to get help in content disputes by having his opponents sanctioned or reprimanded. But this belongs to a different FoF. --Irpen 08:08, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Using boards is good. I think we should all agree with that. After all, that's an attempt at resolution. The question is whether diffs are presented fairly and whether the use is really for dispute resolution, instead of some other, less salubrious motive. The arbitrators will, I hope, take all this on board and weigh it fairly. Geogre 04:08, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Encouragement of trolling

28) Piotrus has expressed a patronizing attitude to disruptive trolls that share his POV and, despite negative feedback from fellow sysops (Wiglaf, Dmcdevit, Kelly Martin, Dbachmann), encouraged their activity in the project.[193] [194] [195]. His characteristic opinions on the subject:

"Until they can't control their fringe POV pushers, then somebody has to keep them in check - and I thank Molobo for taking this burdensome task of my hands".
"I'd like for Molobo's 3RR ban to be uplifted";
"I am really disappointed to see so much vehemence and ill will directed towards Molobo".
"I am tempted to unblock Digwuren per my reasoning" (July 17).
See the above section about Piotr's interactions with User:Space Cadet, when he declared that he is not a policeman to curb his friend's personal attacks and revert-warring.

This is coupled with never-ending attempts to place myself on the same footing with his pet trolls:

"I certainly don't see that Molobo is a 'general disruption' any more than Girlandajo is"
"personally I think Ghirla is even more disruptive in this reverts then Molobo"
"You and Jaakko should try a mediation, you both seem to be provoking each other" - in response to my complaint on WP:PAIN that a now-permabanned vandal (Jaakko), when reverted, labelled me a "hating racist".
"Talking to certain editors is pointless. Talking about them is little better. Don't imitate their flaming style" - a generic message spammed on July 17 to talk pages of several nationalist accounts that had been involved in a witch-hunt against myself.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. I consider this behaviour extremely provocative. This qualifies as deliberate baiting. Its aim is to foster revert-warring Ghirlaphobes that would ram through Piotr's POV into our articles. Since I never make advances to offensive and/or nationalist trolls, I find this attitude highly objectionable. --Ghirla^-трёп- 12:54, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

User:Molobo was banned on June 24, 2006 for a year and has not returned to mainspace since. Given that he was a favourite stick with which Ghirlandajo likes to bash Piotrus, I can imagine his crushing disappointment about this. Regardless of its merit, much of the evidence presented above is quite simply old stuff, and some of the diffs quoted are from November, 2005!Balcer 13:42, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Speak of the devil - Molobo (talk · contribs)[196]. -- Matthead ^discuß! O 01:17, 18 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I was not expecting that he would ever come back. Still, he has served out his one year ban, and has every right to return. Let's hope he has learned something. If he returns to his past disruptive behavior, I expect he will be immediately banned without much discussion, permanently this time. I will definitely support such a ban in that case. Balcer 02:58, 18 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There appears to be a pattern of patronizing attitudes to folks who may distract my attention from mainspace and bring about my frustration. Piotr's latest edits show that nothing has changed since Molobo's ban. User:Digwuren (currently blocked for a week) is the latest reincarnation of Molobo and Bonaparte, and Piotrus is busily defending him from reprisals. You may check Digwuren's "contributions" in the history of my talk page to get some idea how annoying he is. --Ghirla^-трёп- 13:53, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The only encouragement of trolling I have seen recently is discussed in a section above, and it is not me who is doing the encouragement.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 14:55, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This entry just above is a fine example of what is discussed in a preceding section indeed. --Irpen 08:09, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

WP:NPOV is replaced by WP:CIV

29) Piotrus tends to trivialize irreconcilable content disputes by representing them as civility issues.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. This is so obvious that it does not need elaboration. Plenty of evidence throughout the page. This or this or this is typically dismissed as "comments insulting Ghirla's opponents and creating a bad atmosphere". See also claims about M.K.'s supposed incivility below (e.g, this edit is ranked among "incivil comments and accusations”). On the Evidence page Piotrus admits that "incivility has been shown by all sides in this conflict, occasionally even by myself", probably a reference to the infamous "Ruskies" remark.[197] Elsewhere, he refers to Irpen as a "royal pain in the butt".[198] In short, WP:CIVIL is interpreted so as either to have a free pass at POV-pushing or to have a stick for beating his long-standing opponents with and to go block shopping when appropriate. This sidelines the content disputes and obfuscates the real problems. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:33, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Civility should be understood as a character issue rather than a particular speech act. Nothing I say can be uncivil. It can be rude, but it can't be uncivil. On the other hand, by dissolving the bonds of civil discourse, I can be uncivil in general. Per what I wrote above, under the finding on NPA, I believe it is very important to distinguish between the general good citizenship of politeness and the actually necessary quality of "not disrupting our ongoing project of writing well and fairly." It would be nice if all were nice, but it is nicer still that we not silence each other in the name of Emily Post. We must continue to discuss, continue to, yes, battle, with ideas, to keep the The Cathedral and the Bazaar ideal of Wikipedia functioning. An overly nice use of "civility" and "NPA" is the death of open source information. Geogre 04:13, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

On existence of a Polish (and allies) cabal

30) As discussed here and here, there have been common accusations of Polish editors and their "allies" using on- and off-wiki forms of communications to form a cabal and influence various discussions, votes, policies and content damaging Wikipedia project, in the process chasing other editors off this project and conducting various other offenses. Mentions of such a cabal includes accusations on widely read project pages (ex. AfD, FAC nomination talk or article's talk pages).

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. The ArbCom should also rule on whether such a cabal exists or not, and take appropriate action against either editors involved in this cabal (if it exists) or accusing others of being involved in it (if it doesn't).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:23, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

The whole accusation and discussion on the talk page for the Occupation of Poland article, as instigated by Ghirlandajo [199] and including additional accusations by Vlad Fedorov[200], is a sorry display of

attacking anyone who takes a dim view of official Soviet historiography;
attacking anyone who agrees that a dim view of official Soviet historiography as being part of an organized "plot" to discredit aforesaid official Soviet historiography;
meanwhile producing not a shred of reputable references to support their own position/the position as defined in official Soviet historiography.

These sorts of campaigns of content dispute by character assassination need to come to a stop. They add nothing of value and, frankly, to me appear to be designed to waste people's time and/or simply drive them away from Wikipedia. — Pēters J. Vecrumba 04:56, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus has just mentioned Gleiwitz incident, an article which is now protected after User:Molobo, Piotrus, User:Balcer and also User:Richardshusr took on User:Jadger. For example, Piotrus recently reverted three times in less than two hours. By chance, less than an hour later, Balcer reverted twice. Dèja vu, non-existing cabal, they just happened to be there at the same time. Result was a 3RR report [201] by Piotrus and Balcer, and a 24h 3RR block for Jadger who had explained his sources in summaries and on talk, against what seem to be four Polish editors. -- Matthead ^discuß! O 12:32, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Right, of course Jadger should be immune from 3RR, seeing as he had to take on the Polish cabal and had to defend his unreferenced OR against 5 editors on talk. How could we have missed that...--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 13:31, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I can see, Jagder simply does not have a Gadu-Gadu to issue calls for extra reverts to his compatriots. The problem of Wikipedia is that it does not offer any remedy for dealing with revert-warring ethnic cliques other than tolerating and emulating the more wikiskilled and the more hypocritical warrior with the biggest smile on his face. I'm talking about the need for content arbitration here. --Ghirla^-трёп- 13:08, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think this motion is ill-conceived. I am convinced that there is a "Polish cabal" to the extent that there is a group of Polish editors who might think similarly on a number of issues related to Poland. Big deal. There is also a Jewish cabal, a Catholic cabal, a Greek/Eastern Orthodox cabal, a global warming cabal and any number of other cabals. For the record, I am NOT a member of the Polish cabal. I'm not even Polish. (At least unless my mother knows something that she hasn't told me.)

I don't understand what is being charged here. Should a "cabal" of 5 editors be limited to 3RR so that an individual editor can contend against the cabal on an equal footing? This is nonsense. Edit warring that passes 3RR should be dealt with by page protection and an attempt to seek consensus. Violation of consensus should be met by blocking. 3RR is per editor, not per "side" or per "cabal". It's an imperfect rule but it's the best anyone has come up with so far.

The mandate to seek consensus does not evaporate just because one side of an issue has multiple proponents who can be described as a "cabal". If you are in a dispute where there you are the only one on one side and there are four or five people on the other side, that should be a message to you that maybe you need to seek a compromise. It is not the time to be throwing out allegations of a "cabal" and using that to justify violations of Wikipedia policy.

I would hope that ARBCOM would endorse my analysis in whatever manner seems appropriate.

--Richard 15:37, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Asking for input is not canvassing or forum shopping

31) Advertising a discussion on forums dedicated to such issues, such as regional notice boards, is not canvassing, provided that the message is neutral and nonpartisan (per WP:CANVASS). Preferably a message with similar content should be copied to all relevant noticeboards, to ensure no party is excluded from notifications (like here, here and here). Asking for input regarding other editors actions (ex. [202]) is not forum shopping (per Wikipedia:Forum_shopping#Forum_shopping); editors have the right to ask on a neutral forum for others to review and comment on edits that they deem troublesome (just as posting to WP:ANI/3RR is not "block shopping").

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Canvassing accusations like this are getting too common. It would be nice for ArbCom to review this recent example, already mentioned above, particularly as the article in question has recently gained Featured status - certainly, if I and other Polish editors have managed to "canvass" it into this status, we need to be stopped, and Featured Candidates rules revised to stop evil conspiracies from disruption.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 18:12, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus, when you are "asking for input" on your own nation's noticeboard, claiming that "every article visited by Ghirlandajo is in effect vandalized" or "needs attention", you know very well what sort of response to expect.[203] I qualify such edits as calls to arms and attempts to escalate minor edit conflicts into full-scale wars involving several ethnic cliques. This behaviour has never resulted in anything positive. If you need to request a third opinion, please use WP:RFC and other mechanisms that may attract neutral, rather than biased comments.

The same applies to WP:ANI when it is abused for diatribes against a person you've been persecuting for years. No arbitrators' noticeboard is part of WP:DR. You have not been known to inform your opponents that they are being denounced and discussed on WP:ANI, although WP:ANI makes it clear that this is not the Wikipedia complaints department and that you should inform other users if they are mentioned in a posting. --Ghirla^-трёп- 13:37, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

We have discussed those issues at our mediation last December. I have changed my style of postings towards more neutral (hence your diffs date to the last year and your comment above that [Piotrus] "June edits fall within an acceptable range"). On the other hand after your short break early this year you have returned to the uncivil and offensive commentary we have discussed back then - as shown by mine and other diffs of your edits as recent as the last few days. So perhaps instead of complaining about my year old behavior, you should address concerns raised about your days old behavior?--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 13:45, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is wider than your own behaviour. By the way, you started a WP:AN thread accusing me of "encouragement of vandalism" several days ago.[204] Let me remind you that "ill-considered accusations of impropriety of one kind or another (such as WP:ICA)" are explicitly condemned as incivil by WP:CIVIL. --Ghirla^-трёп- 13:53, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Let me remind you that telling a newcomer he can ignore experienced administrator's warnings and continue with his personal attacks ("You are a homophobe", etc.) is far from constructive encouragement of new editors.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 14:04, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Let me remind that you found it prudent to block a newbie editor you were in content dispute with, after issuing one Polish-language threat to him. I'm afraid that's not the way newbies are expected to be treated in the project. We normally don't block anonymous vandals until the fourth warning, you know. This guy was not a vandal. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:11, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As a result of this attitude, there are accounts that specialize in making provocative edits to their opponent's talk page, waiting for the comments to be removed per WP:TALK, and then starting endless complaining on WP:ANI, repeating the same accusations over and over, one after another, so as to make the thread as long and beefy as possible, to cast their opponent as a troublemaker, and to divert him from mainspace activity. This is a handy way to make the appearance of a huge problem where there is none. If the thread dies away or ends up by being archived, you may started it all over again tomorrow. That's how ethnic clique wars are waged in Wikipedia these days. --Ghirla^-трёп- 13:49, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Interestingly, I have addressed this very issue with my recent comment at Proposed talk (update section). The bottom line is that you claim that you do nothing wrong and are attacked by others for innocent comments. Others, myself included, claim that it is you who provoke the discussions (with inflammatory posts like [205]) and then complain when you are accused of starting them. Which side is right, unfortunately, is not something this ArbCom has been able to even comment upon so far :( --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 14:02, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Since you seem to be unable to distinguish between a complaint on WP:AN and a regular notice on the relevant talk page, I see no point in following this line of discussion. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:11, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

2) Incivility and harassment are bannable offenses per our policies; M.K is warned that continuing to assuming bad faith, slandering other editors and wikistalking them on various pages will lead to a ban.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed by Piotrus.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 01:05, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

At least to me, your presented findings of facts of my alleged misbehavior are not proving your remedy. And regarding AGF, remembering your resent encounter with your content opponent you accused him of "gross violation" good faith and acknowledge beeing “suspicions”. Let me look at Wikipedia:Tendentious editing which states “Warning others to assume good faith is something which should be done with great care, if at all—to accuse them of failing to do so may be regarded as uncivil, and if you are perceived as failing to assume good faith yourself, then it could be seen as being a dick.” and let me remind Wikipedia:Assume the assumption of good faith which states "the more a given user invokes Assume good faith as a defense, the lower the probability that said user was acting in good faith."; this probably is also worth to note "When involved in a discussion, it is best never to cite WP:AGF". While I see particular person all over posting all the same WP:AGF to his content opponents. M.K. 11:56, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Support. Seems good to me. I expressed serious concerns about M.K.'s incivility when this whole ArbCom case started. I am still concerned about it and I approve this proposal. - Darwinek 20:42, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Could you explain how did you draw such conclusions? If I remembering correctly the biggest interaction with you was, then you did this under note "format"; while last time I had issues concerning you, was your ArbCom case, there you have been desysoped and placed on civility parole, for obvious reasons. M.K. 08:55, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You know very well your sins (including incivility). Other editors provided evidence of your behaviour. That's how I draw such conlusion. Look to your mind and say honestly "I have been incivil, I admit.". I have done that (regarding my ArbCom case) and feel much better now. - Darwinek 19:50, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The difference is that i did not ever called my content opponents using F word or similar. M.K. 09:26, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The difference is that Darwinek has admited he was wrong (IIRC "under influence") and apologized to all offended.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 17:02, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please do not equal me with Darwinek in the future, who once again was blocked due to incivility and edit-warring as it looks; [208]. M.K. 20:23, 4 June 2007 (UTC), however after apology he was unlocked [209].[reply]

Don't worry, I certainly see a difference between Darwinek, the 24-most active contributor to this project, and you. Darwinek is able to admit he made mistakes and apologize for them, improving his behaviour in the future and thus remaining a productive member of this project (as clearly shown by his unblock). I don't recall seeing you apologize for your offences or try to work out a compromise in our discussions - which is a big part of what brought this ArbCom about.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 03:49, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I completely agree that the last defense tactics is to bring in an edit counts. M.K. 09:33, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Support - This entire Arbcom process as launched by M.K., mean spirited as it is, with multiple assumptions of bad faith, stretching of facts, and accusations bordering on outright slander, makes some action of this kind absolutely necessary. Quite frankly, if Arbcom does not take a strong stand on this, whatever faith I have in Wikipedia being a project worthy of contributing to will probably evaporate. Balcer 21:10, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Someone should indeed learn to behave at least in ArbCom, why did you post such message in the first place? M.K. 08:55, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, that message may not have been constructive. I thought better of posting it, and removed it less than an hour later, something M.K. neglected to mention (no surprise there). Another example of M.K. modus operandi: pick a diff that puts a user in the worst possible light, without other diffs that may provide a complete picture. Balcer 14:44, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It is sad that my message was misinterpreted. I did not made a general statment with diff which somehow should prove, as you say, "a user in the worst possible light". I just asked the question why did you post such message in the first place? Why nonconstructive messages is used here? M.K. 09:26, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

M.K is requested to seek mentorship

3) Majority of M.K contributions are valuable additions to Lithuanian history and architecture. As Polish-Lithuanian history is in some periods closely related, any content probation would be counterproductive to Wikipedia goal. Therefore M.K is requested to seek Wikipedia:Editor assistance and input of neutral editors before he adds any controversial information to Poland-related articles or talk; by definition anything related to unreliable sources is controversial.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed by --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 01:05, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I find this remedy once more lacking concrete support from Piotrus evidence and findings of facts presentation. That most troubles me, is “Poland related” articles (almost all articles of Lithuania can be listed in so called “Poland related” category). But the most troubling is “by definition anything related to unreliable sources is controversial.” Who will judge that is unreliable, you? As you did with professional scholar Ph. D. Arūnas Bubnys sources? M.K. 12:00, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

MK has a point--he should also seek mentorship with respect to Lithuanian articles. DGG 21:34, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. I support the idea, although I'm not sure how practical this solution would be. --Lysy^talk 07:38, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Oppose. This proposal singles out MK, while Piotrus has been involved in many serious content and conduct disputes with editors representing all of Poland's neighbors; their comments in this case, and elsewhere, are extensive. Poland-related articles also include Russian-Polish, Ukrainian-Polish, and German-Polish history and relations; to be fair, all such articles, as well as Lithuanian-Polish articles, should be put under probation. Probation, as I understand it, means increased involvement by neutral parties, which we should all welcome. Novickas 14:27, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Piotrus is placed on revert limitation

4) Piotrus placed on revert parole, limiting to one revert per article per week, excluding simple vandalism, for a period of one year.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. As contributor in question conducts revert wars all over the place, was ~~banned~~ blocked due to 3RR violation and reported many more times, till present day continues his same revert pattern, there is no away way only to limit his ability to do reverts. M.K. 14:33, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Piotrus' block log is clean except for this one block for a 3RR violation over a year ago, which resulted in a 3hr block (which M.K. incorrectly calls a ban). For an editor such as Piotrus with such a stupendous amount of edits, this one slip is perfectly excusable (we are all human after all). As for the fact that he was reported many times, as M.K. claims, how interesting that none of those many reports resulted in further blocks. This proposal illustrates well the modus operandi of M.K., who vastly exaggerates the supposed offences of Piotrus to make his case for requesting drastic punishment. Balcer 20:52, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Not resulted in other cases as only after report he conducted self revert. M.K. 08:25, 31 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The measure is predicated upon our assessment of Piotr's activities discussed in the "revert wars" section above. I feel that M.K. presented convincing evidence that revert-warring increased after my departure from the project, although the arbitrators may disagree on this point. --Ghirla^-трёп- 11:48, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Piotrus is warned about violation of Biographies of living persons policy.

5) Piotrus is warned about violation of Biographies of living persons policy.

For mocking form living person, failing to follow proper attribution of sources, misleadingly rejecting that policy is not applied to different articles, which involves person biography. And the burden of evidence for any edit on Wikipedia, but especially for edits about living persons, rests firmly on the shoulders of the person who adds or restores the material.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. This remedy is necessary as contributor in question is administrator, who is disobeying the policy. As well this warning will be good precedent for the identification wrong editing pattern for further conducts relating particular policy with different contributors. M.K. 14:33, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Piotrus is warned about violation of Biographies of living persons policy and should be instructed to familiarize with the policy.

6) Piotrus is warned about violation of Biographies of living persons policy and should be instructed to familiarize with the policy.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Quite the same as above remedy but reinforced with instruction to familiarize with the policy as I noted from contributor’s edits in article as well as presentation in Evidence and finding the facts during ArbCom that he is completely unfamiliar with this policy. M.K. 14:33, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Piotrus is placed on civility parole.

7) Piotrus is placed on civility parole for continues mocking form contributors, stalking, biting them etc.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 14:33, 29 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Piotrus is warned and instructed to stop issuing false block threats.

8) Piotrus is warned and instructed to stop issuing false block threats. False blocking threats results discouragement, maks non-constructive environment and less opportunity to resolve the arising conflicts.

11) Here's an idea. How about everybody takes a deep breath, steps back for a minute, and admits that everyone involved in these perpetual disputes, being human, has done wrong at some point or another. Acknowledge that to some extent, national biases in historical matters are inevitable, and the important point is to discuss matters like intelligent adults and try to come to some sort of agreement/compromise. Everybody stops accusing each other ad nauseam of tendentious editing, canvassing, conspiracy, forum shopping, cabalism, nationalist extremism, etc. etc. etc. Agree to assume good faith as a general habit. Don't be dicks. Don't bait your adversaries (that includes not launching another one of these ridiculous RfCs or RfAs every two bloody months.) Live in peace like intelligent 21st-century Europeans: if you can't bring yourself to actually like each other, at least try to keep up some sort of cool but civil relationship. No paranoia. Quit wasting all your energy on these endless trials and back-and-forth sniping--you realize you've made the headlines in the Signpost over this?--forgive each other past offenses, resolve to do better in the future. PLEASE?!

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed by K. Lásztocska 19:31, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's a nice idea, but this was tried and proved a failure before. We tried formal and informal mediations, RfCs, and many other forms of DRs. I personally tried many times to settle our differences in discussion and suggest reaching an understanding through cooperation on non-controversial topics. Alas, we are here, and I am afraid all sides (for there are more than two...) have shown they cannot settle their differences without an outside help. Too many people on both sides believe they have been wronged and/or that they are 'right'. There is too much 'bad blood' for all concerned to just go back, as much as we can wish for it. We need, for better or worse, ArbCom to tell us who has been right and who has been wrong, otherwise we will keep pointing fingers and creating a mess.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 20:03, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Good point. When can we expect a ruling? K. Lásztocska 20:15, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't know but See here for clerk's comment on this. The sooner the better, I think.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 20:47, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Like Piotrus, I believe outside intervention is essential. These conflicts have been going on for about 2 years now, and if there is one thing we know for sure, it's that they will not go away on their own in the near future. Balcer 21:15, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I fully endorse K. Lásztocska's impassioned plea. Well said! Even if it's not completely practical (and I don't quite see why not—maybe because I don't really know all the history of these epic conflicts), the sentiment is admirable. Turgidson 00:06, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have grown up but the horses appear to be undead. I did revise my behaviour but others seem too happy to proceed along the familiar lines. So many nasty things happened in my absence that their examination may prove beneficial to everyone, if we don't want to see them repeated again and again. --Ghirla^-трёп- 11:24, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

"Don't be dicks", indeed. Know the story about the beam and the eye? -- Grafikm ^(AutoGRAF) 15:40, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Dr. Dan explains his credentials

12) Dr. Dan is encouraged to make clear what kind of degree/school/diploma makes him a historian (a verifiable claim, preferably) or to explicitly claim no more than amateur level.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Comment by others:

Proposed. It is desirable that an author that very actively participates in history discussions often making them unnecessarily heated by advancing his POV, makes clear what "this user is a Historian" box means on his user page. Maintaining such a box smells like... you know. --Beaumont (@) 20:54, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Smells like... you know. How delightful, Beaumont! Very nice. Would this be an example of what Durova would block you for 24 hours, or for what you might be awarded a barnstar (or at least get a high five) from your friends.Dr. Dan 03:47, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What block?? There is also nothing about Durova and blocking Beaumont on B.'s talk page or archives, for the record. As for the smell... I smell this - if much weaker, of course.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:49, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You don't need credentials to consider yourself a historian. The box is harmless, unlike divisive hateboxes with such statements as "this user supports the dismemberment of Russia" or "this user supports a fight for independence of Chechnya" (which is actually the same). Once upon a time Kelly Martin deleted them on my request, Halibutt attempted to restore the hateboxes on several occasions, they were again deleted, but now I see them revivified, e.g., on the userpage of User:Mathiasrex. The sole purpose of such userboxes is to inflame wikipedians of different natiionalities and engender hatred. Dan's box is quite harmless in comparison. --Ghirla^-трёп- 10:51, 6 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Completely unrelated suggestion presented by Beaumont. How this proposed remedy will solve any problems? And no, I do not know like how smells it. Care to explain,Beaumont? M.K. 09:51, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There's really nothing to explain here, but Beaumont doesn't seem to mind the title of "Prokonsul". Somehow I don't think it was conferred by the Roman Senate. Dr. Dan 15:26, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Origin of my nickname is explained on my userpage, and is poetic, not functional - your common comments on it (ex. [210]) are just one of many things that I hope will stop after this ArbCom. Personally I don't need to see your creditentials as a historian, or medical doctor or anything - but you (nor anybody else who prefers anonymity) should not expect that you will be seen as anything but well-meaning amateurs (and if anybody sees me as a Roman Proconsul, well, they have a problem... :>).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 18:09, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Really, try to have a small sense of humor. As your own link above says, I do not consider you a Proconsul, either Roman or Polish. But it's nice that you do add a "touch of the poetic" to the project afterall. You chided me just the other day with the remark that Wikipedia is an Encyclopedia, not a poem. As I mentioned in my evidence, my remarks are typically in response to your insulting or threatening comments to me (please re-read the preceeding non-highlighted comments made by you, and myself, in your own link above). And try to remember your own recent admission of being guilty of incivility. I say again, the difference is that I haven't asked anyone to block you. I gather that on top of the very missplaced arrogance with your remark concerning "well-meaning amateurs", that you consider your work "superior" to most others without the creditentials (sic) that you must possess. Frankly, I don't know where you get a lot of the information you put into the project, but I completely understand why you are here at this ArbCom, and a great deal of Wikipedians are tired of your attitude and antics. I mostly resent your perpetual attempt to censor people, myself included. You truly need to add some maturity to your thought processes. Rather than censor you, I still look forward to collaborating with you in the future. When you see this "light" at the end of the tunnel, the members of the Committee will not need to make any decisions concerning this matter. And if you do as a result of this entire procedure, then it will not have been in vain. Dr. Dan 23:52, 16 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Prohibition to remove sourced information

13) Piotrus is prohibited to remove or blank out sourced information, without clear consensus on specific article’s talk page.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Evidence presented here, here and here. Different contributors made clear that Piotrus removal of referenced information is a problem. Probably combining this remedy with revert limitation, we could have effective tools to deal with part of Piotrus’ misconducts.M.K. 09:48, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Let me suggest a rephrasing: M.K. and others involved in discussions with Piotrus are no longer bound by WP:V, WP:RS and WP:NPOV (Editors adding or restoring material that has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, or quotations, must provide a reliable published source, or the material may be removed.), and Piotrus is prevented from acting on those policies (specifically, he is forbidden to challenge or remove material that is unreliable or non-neutral). I guess ArbCom is a good place to consider this and I do understand where M.K. is coming from; after all those policies have seriously handicapped M.K. in our previous edits and discussions, if he is allowed to ignore them, I am sure he would be much happier :) PS. I explain the reasons why in some cases removal of even referenced info is justified in this part of my evidence.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:43, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Do you familiar with WP:POINT? Regarding that you call your conduct explanations of removal sourced information other contributor made legitimate note regarding these issues "I feel unhappy about user:Piotrus and several other editors 'assuming the right to judge sources and sources' authors' and one more “Also, there's a definite tendency to discard anything not known to Piotrus (and those other editors), or to bracket it with the wording corrupting its meaning.” [211]. M.K. 21:07, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

An archetypal example of WP:KETTLE: "I do understand where M.K. is coming from; after all those policies have seriously handicapped M.K. in our previous edits and discussions, if he is allowed to ignore them, I am sure he would be much happier..." Huh! Piotrus, I maintain that the style of your comments is getting ever more self-righteous and aggressive, and that disturbs me a lot. --Ghirla^-трёп- 16:39, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually such Piotrus aggressive comments only concurs that presented remedy could be effective way to deal with his continuous misconducts. M.K. 10:41, 9 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Piotrus is cautioned

9) Piotrus is cautioned to avoid encouraging disruptive trolls, campaigning for their unblocking, and accusing his long-standing opponents of "vandalism" or "encouraging vandalism".

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Based on this and this. I second Dmcdevit's opinion to the effect that "I can't imagine any reason why anyone who would use their admin powers with such disregard would deserve our confidence".[212] --Ghirla^-трёп- 13:08, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Parties reminded, reworded

15) All parties are reminded of the need to edit courteously and cooperatively in the future. Failure to do so will be looked upon harshly by the Committee, and may result in the summary imposition of additional sanctions against those editors who act inappropriately.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. Removed "continue to", which suggested that all editors mentioned as parties in the case have acted inappropriately in the past. This was not confirmed in the "Findings of fact" section. --Lysy^talk 15:24, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Second. This is a crucial difference.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 15:26, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Laundry lists of grievances and black books

16) Maintaining laundry lists of grievances, black books and other form of attack pages is forbidden on English wiki, other public servers of Wikimedia foundation and in the public areas of internet. The obvious exceptions are personal WP:RfC (that should be certified within 48 hours) and accepted requests for arbitrations. Attack pages created on English wiki maybe deleted by any administrator per G10 criterion for speedy deletion, attack pages created off-wiki should be removed by request. Failure to remove an attack page may lead to bans.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. More verbose variant of Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Tobias_Conradi#Laundry_lists_of_grievances Alex Bakharev 14:10, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have been involved in ongoing DRs on the theme similar to this ArbCom since late last year (Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Piotrus (Dec'06-Jan'07); Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Piotrus-Ghirla and related mediation (Dec'06-Feb'07); RFI against Dr. Dan (Jan'07), this ArbCom (since April'07), not to mention some other mediations, RfCs and so on. As can be seen from edit history of the "pile if incriminating diffs", 99% of those preceding this ArbCom were about Dr. Dan - I was simply gathering evidence for an RfC to show that his behavior has not change despite his promises last December, but due to opening of this ArbCom this evidence was presented here.

I am unaware of any rule that requires evidence to be gathered 48h before the launch of a DR. Such a rule would be ill concived, since there is no way to verify that users have prepared their diffs in under 48h of posting them in DR and that they have not been collecting such diffs offline for a longer time (for example, based on Irpen's comments cited below, it is clear he has been gathering evidence about me offline since at least May but he has not published them yet). Such rule, were it to exist, would only penalize those who try to be at least somewhat transparent to the community, like myself. I simply gathered evidence when I had time and unlike others I did it in a place that allows time verification. Later I have used that page to gather evidence about other users involved in this ArbCom, and to prepare various drafts of my statements - I find editing directly in Wiki easier then preparing posts intended for Wiki in an offline document. Notably my diffs and drafts of a statements, were prepared after other users have posted theirs here or made it clear they will do so (for example, my diffs and statements related to Irpen (May 30, 07:21) were compiled after his messages that "This fresh example of using double standards in POV-pushing will be added to your arbcom" (May 28) and "I am right now busy writing up an evidence for your ArbCom" (May 30, 06:23).

The bottom line is that my edits where not a compilation of any 'black attack book/page of grudges' intended with any bad faith but simply a preparation for normal Wiki DR proceedings that require evidence (and indeed almost all material from that page has been presented here). That I didn't sometimes have time to refine it quickly and instead worked on a draft for more then 48h before posting it here should not be of any concern to anybody. I find it puzzling that some users try to discuss how, when and why I gathered the evidence (something which, again, everybody involved in such proceedings do), instead of addressing the evidence itself. Particularly if we are to believe that Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, I urge the editors here to concentrate on the main issues at hand, not the technicalities of how one chose to gather their evidence (for the record, I don't care how long editors involved here have been gathering evidence, in what format have they kept it and so on; but if we are going to condemn editors who gather evidence for more then 48h (and wouldn't this be a discrimination of people occasionally busy in RL?), I would like to see a way that we can verify all other statements and evidence presented here by others was prepared in such a short period).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:10, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Using foreign languages as means of secret communications

17) No matter to whom one addresses a comment, it is preferred to use English on English Wikipedia talk pages. Using another language is acceptable only as an exception: when communicating with a user with a very poor command of English, it a strictly social communications, when discussing a foreign source, etc. Whatever is the reason of using another language proper translation should be quickly provided if requested. If foreign language appears to be used to hide a personal attack or to canvass votes of a specific national group then it is considered as an aggravating circumstances over violations of WP:CIVIL, WP:NPA or WP:CANVASS

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed Alex Bakharev 14:19, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Misuse of ongoing ArbCom case to intimidate or slander opponents

18) Use of ongoing ArbCom in attempts to intimidate opponents, or to create an impression that their arguments in various discussions need not to be taken seriously as their involvement in the ArbCom equals presumption of guilt, is unhelpful and is a violation of WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA, bordering on character assassination.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed, to address comments such as "we don't want to get you in trouble and sent to ArbCom again", "This fresh example of using double standards in POV-pushing will be added to your arbcom", "forcing your opponents into lengthy discussion with no substance in order to filibuster the change you object is not new on your part, and raised at your ongoing ArbCom", "Your arbcom is in great deal devoted to those issue", "And Piotrus arbitration case on canvassing is also accidental.". --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 15:28, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This finding (misplaced under "proposed remedies") may bristle with strong and loaded terms, but it has some merit. Piotr's appeals to my opponents to add evidence against myself are not really appropriate, as is the harrassing aimed against Piotrus himself. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:03, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Enforcement of WP:CIVIL and related policies

19) Editors who are commonly warned by neutral parties that their edits are incivil and violate WP:CIVIL, WP:NPA, WP:AGF and related policies and commonly ignore such warnings should be put under civility parole and warned that future violations of those policies will not be tolerated.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

It's a shame WP:PAIN is no more, but it quite obviously suites certain editors who brandish many civility related warnings on their pages, knowing that few admins have will consider blocking them and that they can safely throw insults and unfounded accusations left and right. Imposing a civility parole after several warnings (perhaps in some period of time) is the only way we can show that those are not just empty words and preventing Wikipedia from turning into a flaming hell that Usenet has became. Alternatively, we can simply delete those policies, if we are not going to enforce them - they represent just a form of instruction creep and confuse editors, who wonder why they are not enforced.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 16:41, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by others:

Template

20) {text of proposed remedy}

Place here items of evidence (with diffs) and detailed analysis

Removal of important facts

1) I would like to ask that another to party examined if this diff placed on finding of facts by user:Piotrus as "evidence" labeled as "removal of important facts", is credible as there is no removal of any info in presented diff.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

Proposed. M.K. 12:23, 30 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This diff is indeed not relevant, I don't know how it got here - it is not in my evidence; I probably messed up something when I was copying diffs for workshop, please accept my apologies. All 20+ other diffs in that section are however quite relevant; I crossed that one off.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk} 20:59, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Piotrus/Workshop

Motions and requests by the parties

Request for academic evidence

Careful selection of sources

Template

Proposed temporary injunctions

Ethical conduct

Template

Template

Template

Questions to the parties

Proposed final decision

Proposed principles

Neutral point of view and consensus

Assume good faith

Harassment

Civility

Disruptive editing

Reliable sources

Laundry lists of grievances

Use of foreign language to discuss opponents

Accusing editors in having xenophobic views

Template

Proposed findings of fact

Biographies of living persons violations

Revert wars

Disruptive editing by Dr. Dan

Disruptive editing by M.K

Piotrus displayed intimidation and threatening pattern

Mocking by Piotrus

Baiting by Piotrus

Stalking by Piotrus

Disruptive editing by Piotrus

Misleading information in evidence section presented by Piotrus

Rude Evidence presentation by Piotrus

Violation of WP:VERIFY by Piotrus

Wheel-warring

Use of foreign language to discuss opponents

Accusations of vandalism

Canvassing

Forum shopping

Ghirlandajo repeatedly violated WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA despite many warnings and previous blocks

Removal of references

Piotrus

Karma

Suppression of Russian nationalist source

Piotrus blocked his opponent in a content dispute

Piotrus and personal attacks

Piotrus compiled a pile of "incriminating diffs" against his opponents

Piotrus has urged Polish editors to discuss article content outside Wikipedia

"Encouragement of vandalism"

Encouragement of trolling

WP:NPOV is replaced by WP:CIV

On existence of a Polish (and allies) cabal

Asking for input is not canvassing or forum shopping

Template

Proposed remedies

Dr. Dan is placed on probation from Poland-related articles and discussions and placed on civility parole

M.K is warned about incivility and harassment and placed on civility parole

M.K is requested to seek mentorship

Piotrus is placed on revert limitation

Piotrus is warned about violation of Biographies of living persons policy.

Piotrus is warned about violation of Biographies of living persons policy and should be instructed to familiarize with the policy.

Piotrus is placed on civility parole.

Piotrus is warned and instructed to stop issuing false block threats.

Piotrus is warned and instructed to stop issuing false block threats.

Piotrus admonished

Ghirlandajo is warned about incivility and personal attacks, and placed on civility parole

Everybody grows up and stops beating these dead horses

Dr. Dan explains his credentials

Prohibition to remove sourced information

Piotrus is cautioned

Parties reminded, reworded

Laundry lists of grievances and black books

Using foreign languages as means of secret communications

Misuse of ongoing ArbCom case to intimidate or slander opponents

Enforcement of WP:CIVIL and related policies

Template

Proposed enforcement

Template