Fram blocked by User:WMFOffice for 1 year

[10920]

Just caught this statement at WP:FRAMBAN that makes too much sense to be allowed.

As I've stated elsewhere, there needs to be a separation between the site's quasi judicial decision making and the protagonists involved in disputes. At the moment, particularly at ANI, the site's insistence on solving by 'consensus' means that editors with the most friends tend to fare best, which isn't a very fair system.

It's what happens when WP:NOTLAW/WP:NOTBURO are taken to be absolute commandments rather than warnings not to go too far.

Paley is both an expert in his field and a bloody good egg. One of the best.


I see poor Petulant Clerk (T-C-L) remains indeffed for daring to remove the Signpost article.

they really should lift the block given that even Oshwah acknowledged he was in the right.

[Vigilant]

Saving this for Brenda Wahler's inevitable RfA

You know, Fram, what I am not seeing anywhere is you taking responsibility for how you have gone over the top in your attacks on other people, whatever their mistakes may have been. All I see is you engaging in sarcasm, concern trolling, and disingenuous "solutions" such as (and I am paraphrasing for brevity) "let's ignore copyvio". A person can exercise quality control without being a jerk, and you seem to have not understood this message. I guess this raises an open question: Do you think you are completely in the right? Or do you, sincerely and without sarcasm or excuse, acknowledge that there are legitimate grounds for people to be concerned about your behavior (even if you disagree with the action taken)? Montanabw (talk) 19:27, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Hey there pot calling the kettle black. How many editors have you and your crew driven away from horse related topics? I can count at least a couple. Mr Ernie (talk) 20:18, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Those who understand the feelings of frustration that arise over problematic editors and editing are actually in an excellent place to discuss where the line needs to be drawn, Ernie. This is about Fram's behavior and no one else's. He was the one who allegedly was reported to the WMF by multiple parties. And he is the one who still is not acknowledging that he did anything wrong. Montanabw (talk) 21:14, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

[Vigilant]

Spicy!

Accept It's been said ArbCom hasn't handled issues of harassment well in the past. Here's a chance to change that. RickinBaltimore (talk) 23:52, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Maybe Ekman can go back to being a failed businessman in Russia after this...

[Moral Hazard]

Rob Fernandez is a disingenuous shit

Statement by Gamaliel

As Fram himself pointed out several years ago in an ArbCom case:

you are aware that BLP has an exception for discussions of admin conduct, right?

And there's no question that this is a story about an administrator behaving badly.

Leaving aside questions of the role of journalism in the community, which it clearly does not have the maturity to properly address, you do realize the utter futility of endorsing the deletion of something anyone can read on the Internet Archive? And you do realize the utter foolishness of demanding this story be deleted when it has dominated community discussion for almost a month? In that discussion, editors openly speculated about the alleged misdeeds and identities of accusers and WMF staffers, and you did nothing. The admin who deleted the Signpost article was one of the most active participants in that discussion, making this an obvious WP:INVOLVED violation, and you do nothing. Fram himself is openly attacking his accusers on Meta, with editors linking to it here on this very page, and you do nothing. But when the victims use the Signpost to speak out, ArbCom is once again asked to sanction and silence the victims. I hope that it will finally break with its long tradition of doing so. Gamaliel (talk) 23:20, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Your fake outrage is so gross, dude.

Let's relight the discussion of UV lamps and so avoid mentioning the personal characteristics of librarians, who do not like daylight.

[Capeo]

As Fram himself pointed out several years ago in an ArbCom case:

you are aware that BLP has an exception for discussions of admin conduct, right?

And there's no question that this is a story about an administrator behaving badly.

Leaving aside questions of the role of journalism in the community, which it clearly does not have the maturity to properly address, you do realize the utter futility of endorsing the deletion of something anyone can read on the Internet Archive? And you do realize the utter foolishness of demanding this story be deleted when it has dominated community discussion for almost a month? In that discussion, editors openly speculated about the alleged misdeeds and identities of accusers and WMF staffers, and you did nothing. The admin who deleted the Signpost article was one of the most active participants in that discussion, making this an obvious WP:INVOLVED violation, and you do nothing. Fram himself is openly attacking his accusers on Meta, with editors linking to it here on this very page, and you do nothing. But when the victims use the Signpost to speak out, ArbCom is once again asked to sanction and silence the victims. I hope that it will finally break with its long tradition of doing so. Gamaliel (talk) 23:20, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, just pinged Gamaliel on that disingenuous bullshit on the case page. The “attacking” bullshit really irked me. Pointing out the chains of events as you know them isn’t “attacking.” This is basic stuff. Gamaliel positing himself as a “victim” is ridiculously galling. Because who else could he be talking about in regards to the Signpost article? There’s nobody more obvious that him. His only victimhood was that he face slapped for making a partisan political joke and he has been stunned ever since that ArbCom and the community didn’t have his back.

The funny thing is, my and Gamaliel’s politics are pretty much aligned. I’m just not stupid enough to expect the world is suddenly going to bend to my wishes.

[Midsize Jake]

Well, the real problem here is that one of these things is not like the others.

• "Editors openly speculated about the alleged misdeeds and identities of accusers and WMF staffers"
• "The admin who deleted the Signpost article was one of the most active participants in that discussion, making this an obvious WP:INVOLVED violation"
• "Fram himself is openly attacking his accusers on Meta, with editors linking to it here on this very page"

I mean, Fram may be a jerk, but he was just defending himself. That's actually the basis of this whole fiasco; it's not like some unpopular ArbCom ruling. As the most basic level, these people are worried that they can be banned from their favorite hobby without being allowed to defend themselves against whoever wants to ban them.

And as for the first thing, they actually didn't "openly speculate" as much as they could have, under the circumstances. A big part of their problem in this case, from the beginning really, is that in order to avoid personal finger-pointing on Wikipedia itself (no doubt in order to have their virtue-signalling cake and eat it too), they had to frame the entire discussion as a matter of "principle" and "abuse of process" and a "power-grab by the WMF." In other words, blow it up way out of proportion. If they'd been able to treat it from the beginning as a simple PvP dispute between Fram and Dr. Hale (and yes, I'm going to start referring to her as "Dr. Hale"), it would have been over in less than a week, there would have been an interaction ban followed by some grumbling, and that would probably have been the end of it (until someone completely different came along and decided to try and "do something" about her sloppy editing practices). But they couldn't do any of that, so here we are, three weeks into it and barely into the "stop the bleeding" stage. It would be funny if it weren't so pathetic.

[Moral Hazard]

My god this thread exploded over the weekend while I wasn't looking. I see Rob deleted his pages? Has he finally decided to fuck off? Or is he still playing this "I'm retired but I'm going to whine like a bitch" game?

Video of the Robs in the throes of their everlasting retirements

[10920]

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =904410586

Someone having a bit of fun with the current situation.

[Ansh666]

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =904410586

Someone having a bit of fun with the current situation.

What an idiot, they can't even spell Fuerdai (T-H-L) right.

[Auggie]

I mean, Fram may be a jerk, but he was just defending himself. That's actually the basis of this whole fiasco; it's not like some unpopular ArbCom ruling. As the most basic level, these people are worried that they can be banned from their favorite hobby without being allowed to defend themselves against whoever wants to ban them.

Fram started in 2005. That's 14 years of his life sunk into this hobby. He must be sad. They have to be some real coldhearted jerks to ban him in this manner.

[Capeo]

• • It was incredibly reckless and arrogant for Fram to give me that info. My reading of it is: here is a list of people who I harassed - I'm proud of harassing them. And something much more serious.

Wow. Yeah... that’s how a “journalist” talks... totally makes them sound impartial... and concerned with confidentiality... and not at all having an ulterior motive to win a fight.

I think this tees up an ancillary issue: Is Signpost news or opinion reporting, and does enwiki policy differ for either of the two?

This case (as far as I can see it’s been accepted based on active Arbs) is going to be juicy. It’s timing is particularly disruptive given that the WMF board may be releasing a statement, while it’s going on, that Jimbo thinks most editors will be happy with. The most obvious thing being that the WMF will leave Fram’s fate to ArbCom...

I think this is going to be a straight motion proceeding that just says BLP applies to the Signpost. I think one of the other statements says that ArbCom has decided as much in the past.

Fram might be better served to just post his emails with Smallbones on his meta TP now. Either there’s “something much more serious” or there isn’t. I think not because while Fram is a dick he’s not so stupid as to tell Smallbones, of all people, some deep, dark secret.

That would be ballsy af.

Really, in this situation, what does he have to lose? There’s no coming back from this shitshow as a regular editor, let alone an admin. He’s now the WMF’s chosen user that’s emblematic of everything their initiatives want to eradicate, no matter now messy this gets. Might as well display the point-scorer’s hypocrisy on the way out.

[The Garbage Scow]

So how many ArbCom cases are we at now?

[Randy from Boise]

• • It was incredibly reckless and arrogant for Fram to give me that info. My reading of it is: here is a list of people who I harassed - I'm proud of harassing them. And something much more serious.

Wow. Yeah... that’s how a “journalist” talks... totally makes them sound impartial... and concerned with confidentiality... and not at all having an ulterior motive to win a fight.

I think this tees up an ancillary issue: Is Signpost news or opinion reporting, and does enwiki policy differ for either of the two?

This case (as far as I can see it’s been accepted based on active Arbs) is going to be juicy. It’s timing is particularly disruptive given that the WMF board may be releasing a statement, while it’s going on, that Jimbo thinks most editors will be happy with. The most obvious thing being that the WMF will leave Fram’s fate to ArbCom...

I think this is going to be a straight motion proceeding that just says BLP applies to the Signpost. I think one of the other statements says that ArbCom has decided as much in the past.

Fram might be better served to just post his emails with Smallbones on his meta TP now. Either there’s “something much more serious” or there isn’t. I think not because while Fram is a dick he’s not so stupid as to tell Smallbones, of all people, some deep, dark secret.

That would be ballsy af.

Really, in this situation, what does he have to lose? There’s no coming back from this shitshow as a regular editor, let alone an admin. He’s now the WMF’s chosen user that’s emblematic of everything their initiatives want to eradicate, no matter now messy this gets. Might as well display the point-scorer’s hypocrisy on the way out.

He should borrow a page from Brave Brave Sir Robert and utilize the right to vanish. Come back as WholesomeCooperator (T-C-L) or some such... Bonus points if he makes his first edit coming back to templates...

RfB

[eagle]

I mean, Fram may be a jerk, but he was just defending himself. That's actually the basis of this whole fiasco; it's not like some unpopular ArbCom ruling. As the most basic level, these people are worried that they can be banned from their favorite hobby without being allowed to defend themselves against whoever wants to ban them.

Fram started in 2005. That's 14 years of his life sunk into this hobby. He must be sad. They have to be some real coldhearted jerks to ban him in this manner.

There is no empathy or sense of proportion or justice. This reads like Blue Bloods or some other police procedural drama: An honest young man spends the best part of his working life (14 years) doing his best to enforce the law fairly, without regard for the race, religion, gender or nationality of the people he has been asked to police. He is called before internal affairs a few times, but is cleared by them. He wakes up one day and goes to work and starts giving speeding tickets, including one to the wife of the U.S. Attorney. She protests and says, "You can't give me a speeding ticket, because 1) I am a woman and 2) I am the wife of the U.S. Attorney." He says, "Madam, when you drive your car, my radar gun can't see your gender, and the law is applied fairly to everyone. Please stop speeding. Also, I am a city cop, and your speeding ticket is in municipal court, not in federal court." Her car license plate reads "GNDR GAP", but he does not ascribe it any meaning as he writes the ticket. Everyday for a month, the cop stands at the same school cross-walk writing speeding tickets, and every day the wife of the U.S. Attorney gets a ticket. After a few days, she cries "Harassment." and he calmly says "It is your duty to learn to drive within the speed limit." His supervisors tell him, "Good for you, do your job."

Suddenly, he is suspended without pay and subject to a civil rights investigation conducted by a special FBI task force reporting directly to the U.S. Attorney. The cop says, "You have no jurisdiction over speeding tickets." And the FBI agents say, "This is a special case governed by secret rules that were changed behind you back -- in other words leave the wife of the U.S. Attorney alone."

When Buzzfeed does a story about the cop, the U.S. Attorney denies any knowledge of the investigation, claims she never would interfere in the investigation of her spouse, and makes an analogy to Gamergate. The Deputy U.S. Attorney tweets that the Buzzfeed story is "shitty." [end with dramatic music].

---

I can understand that the wife was frustrated by all of the speeding tickets, but she did not have to speed all the time. The U.S. Attorney and FBi trying to assert federal jurisdiction over local traffic laws is very hard to justify.

I don't think that the Wikipedia Community will be happy with the current state of affairs, and I hope that the WMF Board will undo this.

However, there are other audiences -- the donor base and grant-making institutions. I cannot foresee that they will look past the improper conflict of interest between the Board Chair, the significant other, and how this case has played out. If it is not already prohibited, people will expect better ethic rules to cover such conflicts.

[Randy from Boise]

I mean, Fram may be a jerk, but he was just defending himself. That's actually the basis of this whole fiasco; it's not like some unpopular ArbCom ruling. As the most basic level, these people are worried that they can be banned from their favorite hobby without being allowed to defend themselves against whoever wants to ban them.

Fram started in 2005. That's 14 years of his life sunk into this hobby. He must be sad. They have to be some real coldhearted jerks to ban him in this manner.

There is no empathy or sense of proportion or justice. This reads like Blue Bloods or some other police procedural drama: An honest young man spends the best part of his working life (14 years) doing his best to enforce the law fairly, without regard for the race, religion, gender or nationality of the people he has been asked to police. He is called before internal affairs a few times, but is cleared by them. He wakes up one day and goes to work and starts giving speeding tickets, including one to the wife of the U.S. Attorney. She protests and says, "You can't give me a speeding ticket, because 1) I am a woman and 2) I am the wife of the U.S. Attorney." He says, "Madam, when you drive your car, my radar gun can't see your gender, and the law is applied fairly to everyone. Please stop speeding. Also, I am a city cop, and your speeding ticket is in municipal court, not in federal court." Her car license plate reads "GNDR GAP", but he does not ascribe it any meaning as he writes the ticket. Everyday for a month, the cop stands at the same school cross-walk writing speeding tickets, and every day the wife of the U.S. Attorney gets a ticket. After a few days, she cries "Harassment." and he calmly says "It is your duty to learn to drive within the speed limit." His supervisors tell him, "Good for you, do your job."

Suddenly, he is suspended without pay and subject to a civil rights investigation conducted by a special FBI task force reporting directly to the U.S. Attorney. The cop says, "You have no jurisdiction over speeding tickets." And the FBI agents say, "This is a special case governed by secret rules that were changed behind you back -- in other words leave the wife of the U.S. Attorney alone."

When Buzzfeed does a story about the cop, the U.S. Attorney denies any knowledge of the investigation, claims she never would interfere in the investigation of her spouse, and makes an analogy to Gamergate. The Deputy U.S. Attorney tweets that the Buzzfeed story is "shitty." [end with dramatic music].

---

I can understand that the wife was frustrated by all of the speeding tickets, but she did not have to speed all the time. The U.S. Attorney and FBi trying to assert federal jurisdiction over local traffic laws is very hard to justify.

I don't think that the Wikipedia Community will be happy with the current state of affairs, and I hope that the WMF Board will undo this.

However, there are other audiences -- the donor base and grant-making institutions. I cannot foresee that they will look past the improper conflict of interest between the Board Chair, the significant other, and how this case has played out. If it is not already prohibited, people will expect better ethic rules to cover such conflicts.

Don't romanticize Fram. He is a tone deaf, rule-obsessed, pushy prick, not entirely unlike Eissfeldt. And yeah, you hear me slamming their mutually Vogon attitude towards rule enforcement because that is a big part of the problem with both of these two knuckleheads — neither have traits like empathy or courtesy. They're both bureaucratic pricks in their own way.

Fram has the saving grace of being willing and able to call out the mortally incompetent dunderheads of WMF Engineering on their shitty products...

Eissfeldt has no saving graces.

I personally couldn't care less if Fram gets indeffed to the moon................ by Arbcom, after a proper case in which he has the ability to challenge his accusers, present exculpatory evidence, and appeal whatever punishment that results through normal channels at the appropriate time.

RfB

[eagle]

Don't romanticize Fram. He is a tone deaf, rule-obsessed, pushy prick, not entirely unlike Eissfeldt. And yeah, you hear me slamming their mutually Vogon attitude towards rule enforcement because that is a big part of the problem with both of these two knuckleheads — neither have traits like empathy or courtesy. They're both bureaucratic pricks in their own way.

Fram has the saving grace of being willing and able to call out the mortally incompetent dunderheads of WMF Engineering on their shitty products...

Eissfeldt has no saving graces.

I personally couldn't care less if Fram gets indeffed to the moon................ by Arbcom, after a proper case in which he has the ability to challenge his accusers, present exculpatory evidence, and appeal whatever punishment that results through normal channels at the appropriate time.

RfB

Ok. I understand how you feel about Eissfeldt and Fram. Can you see that a "GNDR GAP" license plate on your car should not exempt you from enforcement of all the Wikirules? What about a strong WMF Code of Ethics to protect both the staff and the community from conflicts of interest arising from the significant other getting special treatment from the WMF Staff (whether it is special funding or travel or a pass on rules enforcement)? Everyone in Boise can grasp the problems with that.

[Randy from Boise]

Don't romanticize Fram. He is a tone deaf, rule-obsessed, pushy prick, not entirely unlike Eissfeldt. And yeah, you hear me slamming their mutually Vogon attitude towards rule enforcement because that is a big part of the problem with both of these two knuckleheads — neither have traits like empathy or courtesy. They're both bureaucratic pricks in their own way.

Fram has the saving grace of being willing and able to call out the mortally incompetent dunderheads of WMF Engineering on their shitty products...

Eissfeldt has no saving graces.

I personally couldn't care less if Fram gets indeffed to the moon................ by Arbcom, after a proper case in which he has the ability to challenge his accusers, present exculpatory evidence, and appeal whatever punishment that results through normal channels at the appropriate time.

RfB

Ok. I understand how you feel about Eissfeldt and Fram. Can you see that a "GNDR GAP" license plate on your car should not exempt you from enforcement of all the Wikirules? What about a strong WMF Code of Ethics to protect both the staff and the community from conflicts of interest arising from the significant other getting special treatment from the WMF Staff (whether it is special funding or travel or a pass on rules enforcement)? Everyone in Boise can grasp the problems with that.

The primary reason that I don't want WMF to steamroll the community is because they would instantly make it into a Friendly Spacer kill zone, in which every bureaucratic excess was excused in the name of advancing their agenda — which when stripped of all the PC rhetoric and utopian "anyone can edit" nonsense distills down to the matter of money from the trough for the Extremely Special Right Thinkers. ArbCom, warts and all, at least has a democratic control mechanism.

RfB

[CoffeeCrumbs]

• • It was incredibly reckless and arrogant for Fram to give me that info. My reading of it is: here is a list of people who I harassed - I'm proud of harassing them. And something much more serious.

Wow. Yeah... that’s how a “journalist” talks... totally makes them sound impartial... and concerned with confidentiality... and not at all having an ulterior motive to win a fight.

This case (as far as I can see it’s been accepted based on active Arbs) is going to be juicy. It’s timing is particularly disruptive given that the WMF board may be releasing a statement, while it’s going on, that Jimbo thinks most editors will be happy with. The most obvious thing being that the WMF will leave Fram’s fate to ArbCom...

Fram might be better served to just post his emails with Smallbones on his meta TP now. Either there’s “something much more serious” or there isn’t. I think not because while Fram is a dick he’s not so stupid as to tell Smallbones, of all people, some deep, dark secret.

I agree with you, I suspect Smallbones is almost certainly exaggerating by a huge amount any information Fram gave him, and if Fram was indeed harassing people I'd find it rather odd he'd confess anything, seeing as from what I've noticed people who do that tend to cowardly deny it when asked.

And if Fram were in the mood to confess to someone, I doubt it would be Smallbones, who on many occasions so desperately wants to cosplay as Lavrentiy Beria.

[No Ledge]

Wikipedia talk pages are all just an [b]ephemeral medium[/b]. Heck, maybe the 'pedia itself is just an ephemeral medium. Why should the volunteers invest so many years of their lives into building an ephemeral medium? The absolute powers in control of our work could all just fold up this ephemeral medium any day, for any reason. How do we know that they won't treat this as a throw-away encyclopedia. We don't. We can't know that.

[eagle]

Don't romanticize Fram. He is a tone deaf, rule-obsessed, pushy prick, not entirely unlike Eissfeldt. And yeah, you hear me slamming their mutually Vogon attitude towards rule enforcement because that is a big part of the problem with both of these two knuckleheads — neither have traits like empathy or courtesy. They're both bureaucratic pricks in their own way.

Fram has the saving grace of being willing and able to call out the mortally incompetent dunderheads of WMF Engineering on their shitty products...

Eissfeldt has no saving graces.

I personally couldn't care less if Fram gets indeffed to the moon................ by Arbcom, after a proper case in which he has the ability to challenge his accusers, present exculpatory evidence, and appeal whatever punishment that results through normal channels at the appropriate time.

RfB

Ok. I understand how you feel about Eissfeldt and Fram. Can you see that a "GNDR GAP" license plate on your car should not exempt you from enforcement of all the Wikirules? What about a strong WMF Code of Ethics to protect both the staff and the community from conflicts of interest arising from the significant other getting special treatment from the WMF Staff (whether it is special funding or travel or a pass on rules enforcement)? Everyone in Boise can grasp the problems with that.

The primary reason that I don't want WMF to steamroll the community is because they would instantly make it into a Friendly Spacer kill zone, in which every bureaucratic excess was excused in the name of advancing their agenda — which when stripped of all the PC rhetoric and utopian "anyone can edit" nonsense distills down to the matter of money from the trough for the Extremely Special Right Thinkers. ArbCom, warts and all, at least has a democratic control mechanism.

RfB

Absolutely. And I am confident that the Boise State Broncos can execute. The last time they faced Laura Hale's NIU Huskies in the Poinsettia Bowl, they won 55-7. Common sense will prevail again.

[Alex Shih]

My mistake. Tarantino is correct. The user talk page edits are (presumably) still all there. That is normal practice, to delete cut-and-paste archives, but keep the page history where the edits were originally made. What you have to watch out for is where archiving is done by page moves, and then the page deleted (I don't think that happened here). Not sure where to raise the issues of a former arbitrator vanishing. It will be blindingly obvious from the page histories of arbitration cases who that vanished user is, such as here. Seems remarkably pointless.

Precisely, rather inappropriate as someone mentioned earlier, and pointless. Unfortunately he just played his cards wrong this time, and there is no saving grace.

[Randy from Boise]

Wikipedia talk pages are all just an [b]ephemeral medium[/b]. Heck, maybe the 'pedia itself is just an ephemeral medium. Why should the volunteers invest so many years of their lives into building an ephemeral medium? The absolute powers in control of our work could all just fold up this ephemeral medium any day, for any reason. How do we know that they won't treat this as a throw-away encyclopedia. We don't. We can't know that.

Wikipedia fulfills a function in the modern world as a primary information database underlying the internets and a dozen tech toys.

All information in every format is ephemeral so there is no sense obsessing about whether WP will last forever; it most certainly will not because nothing does. As John Kenneth Galbraith famously noted, "In the long run, we're all dead."

RfB

[mendaliv]

Partial statement from Smallbones is up:

Sorry if it seems like I'm delaying here. I had a very stressful last week and this morning woke up to a ton of nonsense being said against me. My time this week is very much taken up, but I'll try to get the response going now. I'm not caught up with everything that's been said, but probably up to about 3 hours ago. I'll just put in bullet points so I can stop at a moments notice and continue later. I may reorder them later.

• Ultimately, I think this has to be handled via private evidence. I would like to make sure that I get a chance to give my basic view (without confidential info included) and that a published finding be made signed by the voting arbs.
• There are several reasons to keep this confidential. I won't say all of them here but will email an arb to give to the committee.
• I went incredibly easy on Fram in the article. There's evidence that Fram provided, in which he later asked that names and other identifying info be removed. I agreed and later decided (on my own) I would only use it in the most abbreviated form with nothing like identifying info.
  • We had earlier agreed that I could use that evidence on Signpost, with the only condition that I would not provide his text to any other person or organization, e.g. the WMF, T&S, ArbCom, but Signpost was ok - just the text itself off-Signpost was off limits, not my summary or comments or anything else.
  • That's right, the original agreement was that I could have printed the whole thing in the Signpost, and the current agreement is that I can summarize it, comment on it, etc. anywhere as long as I don't use identifying information (other than that it was from Fram).
  • back in a second

Hoping there's something substantive re: the WP:BLP claims when he completes this.

Part 2:

• • It was incredibly reckless and arrogant for Fram to give me that info. My reading of it is: here is a list of people who I harassed - I'm proud of harassing them. And something much more serious.
  • I couldn't have released that info in any case without hurting at least a dozen specific innocent individuals and the Wikipedia movement as a whole.
  • While I will be very careful in using this information, it certainly did convince me that there was something real about the harassment allegations made about Fram.
  • The only way to deal with this info in Wikipedia is to have both Fram and I state that ArbCom can see the text and view it in private.
• Let's go back to the basic questions IMHO.
  • Did Fram harass editors on-Wiki?
  • Is there harassment on-Wiki and how do we deal with it?
  • Is there any system on enWiki where a person can report harassment without exposing themselves to public ridicule and further harassment?
  • Possible places? Talk pages? no. ANI? no. Other noticeboards? no ArbCom? not according to a recently departed Arb.
• back in a second

Strikes me that all of this should be stricken as dealing primarily with a matter ArbCom has already declined to investigate (Jehochman's failed RFAR). Smallbones has said absolutely nothing about the crux of this issue: The applicability of BLP to Signpost.

Part 3:

• • Is there harassment on-Wiki and how do we deal with it?
  • Is there any system on enWiki where a person can report harassment without exposing themselves to public ridicule and further harassment?
    • Possible places to report it? Talk pages? no. ANI? no. Other noticeboards? no ArbCom? not according to a recently departed Arb.
  • Did Fram harass editors on-Wiki?
• Given the recent uproar about Fram being blocked for harassment, it is the most natural thing in the world for a newspaper to investigate and publish a report on this, especially since Fram invited inquiries on his Commons talk page where he would provide information on the block.
  • Was the article high quality? Damn right! Harassment is a notoriously difficult topic to get information on. Confidential sources are almost always used in stories on the topic - otherwise it would be impossible to have any story on a very important topic. I went to great lengths to get people to go on the record and was pretty successful 2 from previous published onWiki discussions and 2 more new sources (a recent arb and MontanaBW). I reported both people who told me that they weren't harassed and didn't see harassment. And I quoted 2 anonymous sources. This isn't a lightly sourced article.
• I'd like the Arbs to do everything in their power, including asking other bureaucrats etc., to stop Fram from currently trying to out an editor on another website. No I'm not going to mention the website name - but lots of people here seem to be following it and I'm sure at least 1 Arb must know the site.
  • Also I'd like arbs to do everything in their power to stop Fram from quoting my emails (to him) on that site. They are copyrighted by me and I've never given him permission to use them. You might say "Isn't turn about fair play? You've quoted his emails, why shouldn't he quote your emails. Answer: he is using my emails to help in an attempted outing. He has explicitly given me permission to quote his emails (CC BY-SA. Frankly, this could only happen on Wikipedia that somebody would give a journalist a CC license for this!) The exception is the email discussed above.
• back in an hour.

Still nothing about WP:BLP that I can tell. The bit about "don't let him publish my e-mails" is weird, especially the claim that letting him publish them means outing a source. Does that mean Smallbones outed a source to Fram? Or gave him more information than he should have? The whole copyright thing is ridiculous as well, but if Smallbones is serious he should send a DMCA takedown to WMF over it and they'd get rid of it right quick.

Smallbones is definitely past the wordcount: I think he's at 804 words. I'm actually surprised that I'm only at 339. I think I'll point out the verbiage.

[lonza leggiera]

Wikipedia talk pages are all just an [b]ephemeral medium[/b]. Heck, maybe the 'pedia itself is just an ephemeral medium. Why should the volunteers invest so many years of their lives into building an ephemeral medium? The absolute powers in control of our work could all just fold up this ephemeral medium any day, for any reason. How do we know that they won't treat this as a throw-away encyclopedia. We don't. We can't know that.

Wikipedia fulfills a function in the modern world as a primary information database underlying the internets and a dozen tech toys.

All information in every format is ephemeral so there is no sense obsessing about whether WP will last forever; it most certainly will not because nothing does. As John Kenneth Galbraith famously noted, "In the long run, we're all dead."

RfB

I believe it was John Maynard Keynes who famously noted it. Whether Galbraith ever said the same thing, I've no idea.

[Ryuichi]

Part 3:

• • Is there harassment on-Wiki and how do we deal with it?
  • Is there any system on enWiki where a person can report harassment without exposing themselves to public ridicule and further harassment?
    • Possible places to report it? Talk pages? no. ANI? no. Other noticeboards? no ArbCom? not according to a recently departed Arb.
  • Did Fram harass editors on-Wiki?
• Given the recent uproar about Fram being blocked for harassment, it is the most natural thing in the world for a newspaper to investigate and publish a report on this, especially since Fram invited inquiries on his Commons talk page where he would provide information on the block.
  • Was the article high quality? Damn right! Harassment is a notoriously difficult topic to get information on. Confidential sources are almost always used in stories on the topic - otherwise it would be impossible to have any story on a very important topic. I went to great lengths to get people to go on the record and was pretty successful 2 from previous published onWiki discussions and 2 more new sources (a recent arb and MontanaBW). I reported both people who told me that they weren't harassed and didn't see harassment. And I quoted 2 anonymous sources. This isn't a lightly sourced article.
• I'd like the Arbs to do everything in their power, including asking other bureaucrats etc., to stop Fram from currently trying to out an editor on another website. No I'm not going to mention the website name - but lots of people here seem to be following it and I'm sure at least 1 Arb must know the site.
  • Also I'd like arbs to do everything in their power to stop Fram from quoting my emails (to him) on that site. They are copyrighted by me and I've never given him permission to use them. You might say "Isn't turn about fair play? You've quoted his emails, why shouldn't he quote your emails. Answer: he is using my emails to help in an attempted outing. He has explicitly given me permission to quote his emails (CC BY-SA. Frankly, this could only happen on Wikipedia that somebody would give a journalist a CC license for this!) The exception is the email discussed above.
• back in an hour.

Still nothing about WP:BLP that I can tell. The bit about "don't let him publish my e-mails" is weird, especially the claim that letting him publish them means outing a source. Does that mean Smallbones outed a source to Fram? Or gave him more information than he should have? The whole copyright thing is ridiculous as well, but if Smallbones is serious he should send a DMCA takedown to WMF over it and they'd get rid of it right quick.

Panic (T-H-L) is a sudden sensation of fear, which is so strong as to dominate or prevent reason and logical thinking, replacing it with overwhelming feelings of anxiety and frantic agitation consistent with an animalistic fight-or-flight reaction.

There'll likely be a studied avoidance of engaging with the BLP question. It's a losing proposition for him. From Fram's statements on meta, it would appear that Smallbones confirmed Fram's suspicions as to the identity of the "anonymous source". Quality journalisming, that.

And who's the "recent Arb" then?

[10920]

I read Smallbones' statement and all of it stinks.

The last parts especially:

I'd like the Arbs to do everything in their power, including asking other bureaucrats etc., to stop Fram from currently trying to out an editor on another website. No I'm not going to mention the website name - but lots of people here seem to be following it and I'm sure at least 1 Arb must know the site.
Also I'd like arbs to do everything in their power to stop Fram from quoting my emails (to him) on that site. They are copyrighted by me and I've never given him permission to use them.

Everything about his statement screams "I'm a lying POS!"

[Ryuichi]

• I'd like the Arbs to do everything in their power, including asking other bureaucrats etc., to stop Fram from currently trying to out an editor on another website. No I'm not going to mention the website name - but lots of people here seem to be following it and I'm sure at least 1 Arb must know the site.

If bureaucrats have some power or influence then I can only assume "meta".

[mendaliv]

There'll likely be a studied avoidance of engaging with the BLP question. It's a losing proposition for him.

Indeed, I think that's pretty likely. I can't see any argument that Signpost doesn't lose here other than "Fram bad".

I mean, I don't disagree with that proposition, but it still doesn't overcome WP:BLP.

From Fram's statements on meta, it would appear that Smallbones confirmed Fram's suspicions as to the identity of the "anonymous source". Quality journalisming, that.

Yeah, which makes Smallbones' pleas to keep the e-mails off meta at least as self-serving as they are source-protecting.

And who's the "recent Arb" then?

I reckon it's Rob, who appears to have done a RTV today and why people seem reluctant to mention his name on-wiki.

[Midsize Jake]

• I'd like the Arbs to do everything in their power, including asking other bureaucrats etc., to stop Fram from currently trying to out an editor on another website. No I'm not going to mention the website name - but lots of people here seem to be following it and I'm sure at least 1 Arb must know the site.

If bureaucrats have some power or influence then I can only assume "meta".

I'm not so sure - are we aware of any Arbs who know about meta.wikimedia.org? I guess there might be one, even two, but that's really straining the ol' credulity in my opinion.

Naah, much more likely he's just lying his ass off. It's what he does.

[lonza leggiera]

• I'd like the Arbs to do everything in their power, including asking other bureaucrats etc., to stop Fram from currently trying to out an editor on another website. No I'm not going to mention the website name - but lots of people here seem to be following it and I'm sure at least 1 Arb must know the site.

If bureaucrats have some power or influence then I can only assume "meta".

Yes. I think someone already posted a link above, but it's probably several pages back by now.

[Randy from Boise]

Wikipedia talk pages are all just an [b]ephemeral medium[/b]. Heck, maybe the 'pedia itself is just an ephemeral medium. Why should the volunteers invest so many years of their lives into building an ephemeral medium? The absolute powers in control of our work could all just fold up this ephemeral medium any day, for any reason. How do we know that they won't treat this as a throw-away encyclopedia. We don't. We can't know that.

Wikipedia fulfills a function in the modern world as a primary information database underlying the internets and a dozen tech toys.

All information in every format is ephemeral so there is no sense obsessing about whether WP will last forever; it most certainly will not because nothing does. As John Kenneth Galbraith famously noted, "In the long run, we're all dead."

RfB

I believe it was John Maynard Keynes who famously noted it. Whether Galbraith ever said the same thing, I've no idea.

Whoops. ;-)

t

[CoffeeCrumbs]

I believe that the pithy Galbraith quote was that "under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's just the opposite." Just swapped the Keynesians.

[CoffeeCrumbs]

I mean, Fram may be a jerk, but he was just defending himself. That's actually the basis of this whole fiasco; it's not like some unpopular ArbCom ruling. As the most basic level, these people are worried that they can be banned from their favorite hobby without being allowed to defend themselves against whoever wants to ban them.

Fram started in 2005. That's 14 years of his life sunk into this hobby. He must be sad. They have to be some real coldhearted jerks to ban him in this manner.

There is no empathy or sense of proportion or justice. This reads like Blue Bloods or some other police procedural drama: An honest young man spends the best part of his working life (14 years) doing his best to enforce the law fairly, without regard for the race, religion, gender or nationality of the people he has been asked to police. He is called before internal affairs a few times, but is cleared by them. He wakes up one day and goes to work and starts giving speeding tickets, including one to the wife of the U.S. Attorney. She protests and says, "You can't give me a speeding ticket, because 1) I am a woman and 2) I am the wife of the U.S. Attorney." He says, "Madam, when you drive your car, my radar gun can't see your gender, and the law is applied fairly to everyone. Please stop speeding. Also, I am a city cop, and your speeding ticket is in municipal court, not in federal court." Her car license plate reads "GNDR GAP", but he does not ascribe it any meaning as he writes the ticket. Everyday for a month, the cop stands at the same school cross-walk writing speeding tickets, and every day the wife of the U.S. Attorney gets a ticket. After a few days, she cries "Harassment." and he calmly says "It is your duty to learn to drive within the speed limit." His supervisors tell him, "Good for you, do your job."

Suddenly, he is suspended without pay and subject to a civil rights investigation conducted by a special FBI task force reporting directly to the U.S. Attorney. The cop says, "You have no jurisdiction over speeding tickets." And the FBI agents say, "This is a special case governed by secret rules that were changed behind you back -- in other words leave the wife of the U.S. Attorney alone."

When Buzzfeed does a story about the cop, the U.S. Attorney denies any knowledge of the investigation, claims she never would interfere in the investigation of her spouse, and makes an analogy to Gamergate. The Deputy U.S. Attorney tweets that the Buzzfeed story is "shitty." [end with dramatic music].

---

I can understand that the wife was frustrated by all of the speeding tickets, but she did not have to speed all the time. The U.S. Attorney and FBi trying to assert federal jurisdiction over local traffic laws is very hard to justify.

I don't think that the Wikipedia Community will be happy with the current state of affairs, and I hope that the WMF Board will undo this.

However, there are other audiences -- the donor base and grant-making institutions. I cannot foresee that they will look past the improper conflict of interest between the Board Chair, the significant other, and how this case has played out. If it is not already prohibited, people will expect better ethic rules to cover such conflicts.

Don't romanticize Fram. He is a tone deaf, rule-obsessed, pushy prick, not entirely unlike Eissfeldt. And yeah, you hear me slamming their mutually Vogon attitude towards rule enforcement because that is a big part of the problem with both of these two knuckleheads — neither have traits like empathy or courtesy. They're both bureaucratic pricks in their own way.

Fram has the saving grace of being willing and able to call out the mortally incompetent dunderheads of WMF Engineering on their shitty products...

Eissfeldt has no saving graces.

I personally couldn't care less if Fram gets indeffed to the moon................ by Arbcom, after a proper case in which he has the ability to challenge his accusers, present exculpatory evidence, and appeal whatever punishment that results through normal channels at the appropriate time.

RfB

I don't think anyone's really romanticizing Fram. It's just that there's a cadre of people (Gamaliel, Smallbones, Megalibrarygirl, BURob, etc) that just can't grasp the concept that it's quite possible for bad people or jerky people to be treated in a fundamentally unfair fashion. It's especially troubling when one of those is trying to become an actual lawyer. Maybe he's going to try and pass the bar in Beijing (or whatever the equivalent there is).

The "teh journalism!" aside is particularly embarrassing. No reputable newspaper would have acted like Smallbones did, you don't generally threaten your anonymous sources. You also give the people being accused a fair forum to respond to specific things, you don't tell them one thing and then hamstring them on publication. And the crybully brigade saying that BLP doesn't cover Signpost CUZ JOURNALISM are full of it. If the Signpost had instead alleged that LauraHale used her connections to punish an enemy based on anonymous sourcing, there's about a 0% chance that group wouldn't be demanding revdels, global bans for the author. A fearful Rob would have demanded Wikimedia secure him a new identity through the Justice Department so that he could feel safe.

[Randy from Boise]

I don't think anyone's really romanticizing Fram. It's just that there's a cadre of people (Gamaliel, Smallbones, Megalibrarygirl, BURob, etc) that just can't grasp the concept that it's quite possible for bad people or jerky people to be treated in a fundamentally unfair fashion. It's especially troubling when one of those is trying to become an actual lawyer. Maybe he's going to try and pass the bar in Beijing (or whatever the equivalent there is).

Dunno, have you checked out the federal bench in the US lately?

I completely agree that the crybullies are incapable of fair play for their opponents. That is one of their defining characteristics, related to their self-righteousness. They are willing to use any method to "win." Expedience over principle..

RfB

[Guido den Broeder]

Yet as we can see, they get harassed further by the likes of you.

Over a thousand commenters, yet so far very few have stood up for Frams victims or have given us a chance to speak. Shame on the community. The WMF will need to do more, like banning the lot. Shame on you and others here at Wikipediocracy.

[CoffeeCrumbs]

"Victim" used to mean something actually real. Fram's annoyed people and gotten on nerves, but in terms of "victims", he's tied with alien death rays, sentient hot dog golems, and Rubik's Cube poisoning, at zero. He probably ought to lose admin, but let's not cheapen meaningful words.

[Midsize Jake]

I dunno, I actually kind of like this "banning the lot" idea of his.

Why can't we have more "idea people" like him in the WMF?

[LynnWysong]

Saving this for Brenda Wahler's inevitable RfA

Those who understand the feelings of frustration that arise over problematic editors and editing are actually in an excellent place to discuss where the line needs to be drawn, Ernie. This is about Fram's behavior and no one else's. He was the one who allegedly was reported to the WMF by multiple parties. And he is the one who still is not acknowledging that he did anything wrong. Montanabw (talk) 21:14, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Let me rephrase that for her: "When it's my abhorrent behavior, it's due to "problematic editors and editing, so we're not going to discuss it. Besides, I never did anything wrong."

But, we're getting off topic. Wouldn't mind taking it over to the "Montanabw@RFA" thread though.

[Vigilant]

Yet as we can see, they get harassed further by the likes of you.

Over a thousand commenters, yet so far very few have stood up for Frams victims or have given us a chance to speak. Shame on the community. The WMF will need to do more, like banning the lot. Shame on you and others here at Wikipediocracy.

Bite me.

Fram can be a dick, but he's scut work that nobody else wants to do.
He's not even in my top 100 of people who need to be shown the door.

The other side is playing dirty pool all the time.
Any method, any means, against anyone who opposes them, forever.

[Vigilant]

Saving this for Brenda Wahler's inevitable RfA

Those who understand the feelings of frustration that arise over problematic editors and editing are actually in an excellent place to discuss where the line needs to be drawn, Ernie. This is about Fram's behavior and no one else's. He was the one who allegedly was reported to the WMF by multiple parties. And he is the one who still is not acknowledging that he did anything wrong. Montanabw (talk) 21:14, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Let me rephrase that for her: "When it's my abhorrent behavior, it's due to "problematic editors and editing, so we're not going to discuss it. Besides, I never did anything wrong."

But, we're getting off topic. Wouldn't mind taking it over to the "Montanabw@RFA" thread though.

It's more like, "I do what Fram does, but for the wrong reasons, and I'm much more of a bitch than he's a dick, but these are my FUCKING articles."

[Vigilant]

Fram murders Smallbones online.

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_ta ... e_Arb_Case

News at 11.


Jesus H Christ... Fram eviscerates him.

Smallbones aka Peter D(ickless) Ekman will be lucky to avoid an indef for that Signpost article.
I've never seen Fram get caught lying. Ever.
Smallbones is known for his skeevy ways.

If Smallbones is, as it appears by his panicked thrashing, lying directly to ARBCOM in a case request and Fram has the emails...
That's the ballgame.
Anyone defending Smallbones at that point should get their contributions scrutinized closely at that point.

[Capeo]

Smallbones best change his argument going forward.

Surely the practical solution is for Smallbones and his source to satisfy themselves that the quote misremembers some key details of an incident that is very recognizable to anyone who followed it at the time. It therefore isn't appropriate to keep in the article, so that portion can be blanked, the rest of the material can be restored, and we can all move on with our lives and not spend weeks increasing the prominence of the underlying incident and fragmenting our collective attention. (Smallbones, you said at ANI that you'd had a lot of emails about this, so I expect you now know the ways in which the facts are different than described? If not, what steps have you taken to find out since you were first asked about this?)

She doesn't even want to take the case, but she makes clear the obvious: the quote is a misrepresentation of the facts and there's no way in hell it can be considered "anonymous."

[mendaliv]

" This isn't a lightly sourced article." And did you "check" any of these sources? Or did you simply reprint their statements "as is", without any care about correctness?

Oh he really needed to phrase this more assertively: "And did you 'check' any of these sources? Or did you simply reprint their statements with reckless disregard to the truth or falsity of the matter?" That is, tee up the "actual malice" element of defamation to more squarely return this argument to its BLP moorings.

[Capeo]

And of course Kirill dropped in to further the Gamaliel is a victim of Fram narrative. That charade is so easily disproved, the entire episode is on wiki, that I don't understand the persistence in repeating it.

[Randy from Boise]

Yet as we can see, they get harassed further by the likes of you.

Over a thousand commenters, yet so far very few have stood up for Frams victims or have given us a chance to speak. Shame on the community. The WMF will need to do more, like banning the lot. Shame on you and others here at Wikipediocracy.

Again: this is not about Fram or Fram's behavior. This is about an end-run around existing procedures for disciplining bad behavior, in which WMF is now trying to make it unilaterally their purview, extending their "secret complaint, secret evidence, no protection for the accused, no appeal of the decision" methodology.

Nobody, least of all me, is making excuses for Fram, who, as I have indicated multiple times, is an asshole and a rules Vogon entitled to little sympathy.

If there is a case to be made against him, there will be time to make such a case — later, through proper channels.

As for the so-called (and very melodramatically put, might I add) "victims" of Fram — they will have their opportunity. I "harass" no one.

RfB

[10920]

Smallbones best change his argument going forward.

Surely the practical solution is for Smallbones and his source to satisfy themselves that the quote misremembers some key details of an incident that is very recognizable to anyone who followed it at the time. It therefore isn't appropriate to keep in the article, so that portion can be blanked, the rest of the material can be restored, and we can all move on with our lives and not spend weeks increasing the prominence of the underlying incident and fragmenting our collective attention. (Smallbones, you said at ANI that you'd had a lot of emails about this, so I expect you now know the ways in which the facts are different than described? If not, what steps have you taken to find out since you were first asked about this?)

She doesn't even want to take the case, but she makes clear the obvious: the quote is a misrepresentation of the facts and there's no way in hell it can be considered "anonymous."

How PC of her. It "misremembers the facts". It's a bald-faced lie, the person saying it knew that, and smallbones probably did too.

[mendaliv]

Again: this is not about Fram or Fram's behavior. This is about an end-run around existing procedures for disciplining bad behavior, in which WMF is now trying to make it unilaterally their purview, extending their "secret complaint, secret evidence, no protection for the accused, no appeal of the decision" methodology.

And let there be no mistake: WMF has made clear that their action against Fram is contrary even to the TOU, based on their statement to BuzzFeed News:

In a statement to BuzzFeed News, the organization said it had leveled the ban to maintain "respect and civility" on the platform. "Uncivil behavior, including harassment, threats, stalking, spamming, or vandalism, is against our Terms of Use, which are applicable to anyone who edits on our projects," it said.

Emphases mine. A cursory look at the TOU makes clear that this is false: The word "uncivil" appears nowhere in the TOU, and the word "civil" (in reference to behavior) appears only once:

We encourage you to be civil and polite in your interactions with others in the community, to act in good faith, and to make edits and contributions aimed at furthering the mission of the shared Project.

Emphasis mine. This is not a prohibition on incivility nor is it a mandate on civility. It is aspirational, and therefore not only nonbinding, but the further absence of any reference to civility in the TOU (which is a contract) means that WMF is not adhering to the TOU in good faith by enacting civility bans at the TOU level. Furthermore, the TOU makes clear that it is the entire agreement between users and the WMF:

If you have not signed a separate agreement with us, these Terms of Use are the entire agreement between you and us.

This means that if there is no separate, signed agreement with WMF, no terms or conditions falling outside the TOU are part of the contract between any end-user and WMF. So WMF cannot, outside of modifying the TOU, prohibit incivility, at least at the TOU level.

[Fram] is an asshole and a rules Vogon entitled to little sympathy.

Well put.

If there is a case to be made against him, there will be time to make such a case — later, through proper channels.

Also well put. When ArbCom gets jurisdiction kicked back to them over Fram, which I believe they will, they should open a Fram conduct case. And they should not do so a moment before, or WMF will just let the status quo persist.

[The Adversary]

Again: this is not about Fram or Fram's behavior. This is about an end-run around existing procedures for disciplining bad behavior, in which WMF is now trying to make it unilaterally their purview, extending their "secret complaint, secret evidence, no protection for the accused, no appeal of the decision" methodology.

And let there be no mistake: WMF has made clear that their action against Fram is contrary even to the TOU, based on their statement to BuzzFeed News:

In a statement to BuzzFeed News, the organization said it had leveled the ban to maintain "respect and civility" on the platform. "Uncivil behavior, including harassment, threats, stalking, spamming, or vandalism, is against our Terms of Use, which are applicable to anyone who edits on our projects," it said.

Emphases mine. A cursory look at the TOU makes clear that this is false: The word "uncivil" appears nowhere in the TOU, and the word "civil" (in reference to behavior) appears only once:

We encourage you to be civil and polite in your interactions with others in the community, to act in good faith, and to make edits and contributions aimed at furthering the mission of the shared Project.

Emphasis mine. This is not a prohibition on incivility nor is it a mandate on civility. It is aspirational, and therefore not only nonbinding, but the further absence of any reference to civility in the TOU (which is a contract) means that WMF is not adhering to the TOU in good faith by enacting civility bans at the TOU level. Furthermore, the TOU makes clear that it is the entire agreement between users and the WMF:

If you have not signed a separate agreement with us, these Terms of Use are the entire agreement between you and us.

This means that if there is no separate, signed agreement with WMF, no terms or conditions falling outside the TOU are part of the contract between any end-user and WMF. So WMF cannot, outside of modifying the TOU, prohibit incivility, at least at the TOU level.

Very interesting.

So, in essence, WMF have banned Fram because he did something which according to the WMF own rules were not illegal.

[mendaliv]

Very interesting.

So, in essence, WMF have banned Fram because he did something which according to the WMF rules were not illegal.

And keep in mind that statement could be great evidence in a lawsuit claiming breach of contract, at least for the purposes of getting past the motion to dismiss phase and into the discovery phase.

[Vigilant]

The "article" is a left over cesspit and should also be deleted.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... ial_report

Nick being reasonable again.
I've got half a mind to take him to T&S.

I would be extremely interested in the number of threads raised at AN and ANI which claim harassment, over, say, the past two years, because we need some sort of baseline for what is about to happen... You see, what is clear now, from the way T&S have fucked this case up beyond any possible recognition, is that every administrator is likely going to be repeatedly accused of harassment by any users who they warn or sanction for breaking our policies and guidelines. T&S have likely ushered in an era where generally vacuous allegations will become nothing more than a means to win various content disputes or to avoid editing sanctions. The desperately sad thing about this is that any new user reporting system will drown under these fake reports, and we risk witnessing the genuine, infrequent but significant and serious harassment issues that do occur going unnoticed and unresolved as everybody who is given a well deserved bollocking for repeatedly uploading copyright violations or frequently making BLP violations squeals harassment. Nick (talk) 07:40, 1 July 2019 (UTC)