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Posted by: gomi

A new member to the Review has posted several threads from the putatively secret Arbcom-L mailing list.

The Wikipidiots http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee#Who_is_responsible.3F.

Posted by: It's the blimp, Frank

Boy, that was a quick response. They must all have the Wikipedia Review on their watch lists.

Posted by: MaliceAforethought

But isn't it nice to feel so loved?

Posted by: gomi

More on the leaks here on WR:

http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=34096 and http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=34099.

Posted by: SB_Johnny

ED goes down, some guy gets arrested in England, and embarrassing emails get released from arbcom-l. Hmmm.

While it's not exactly popular around here to give the arbcommies the benefit of the doubt, I think stupidity is more likely the cause than malice on one of their parts.

Posted by: Malleus

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Malleus_Fatuorum#Apparently_arbcom-l_does_leak.

Posted by: MaliceAforethought

>
> I have credible evidence that Iridescent's email may have been, and
> probably still is, compromised. That email address needs to be removed
> from this list immediately, and all his rights should be revoked on all
> priviledged wikis (since that same email is almost certainly the one he
> uses).
>
> Iridescent, if you still have read access to your mailbox, please
> immediately contact me from another email that you have not made public
> and which is unambiguously connected to you.
>
> -- Coren / Marc
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> arbcom-l mailing list
> arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/arbcom-l
>

Bonus points for guessing stupid was the cause. Extra points if you realized this means they are arrogant enough to think they have the problem fixed now. Anyone have any requests then?

Posted by: A Horse With No Name

Well, you've already outed Malley. Can you pull back the curtain on Iridescent and any of the other unidentified arbitrators?

Posted by: SB_Johnny

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee#brief_status_update, yeah, that didn't look to me to be the likely root of the problem. How many trees will be barked up before somebody figures it out?

Posted by: MaliceAforethought

I'm afraid it appears Iridescent doeesn't trust the other nutjobs, but I did find:


Subject: [arbcom-l] Introduction
------------------------

From: Jonathan Clemens <clem4609@pacificu.edu>
Date: Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 17:22
To: arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org


All,

This email should serve two purposes: first, to make sure I changed my email address correctly (more on that in a bit), and secondly to provide a bit of an introduction and brief CV on myself.

While I tend to have all my email sent to jclemens@jclemens.org, that's a domain-name-sans-mailserver ever since every ISP started blocking tcp/25 inbound, so I use one of my other two email addresses (school and personal ISP) as outgoing. So, I guess I need to use a mail address where incoming and outgoing match.

I'm Jonathan Clemens. Up until June, I was employed by Intel Corporation, where I had been an information security practitioner (professional staff or first-line manager) since 1999. Previously, I'd worked full-time IT jobs for World Vision (2 years) and Unisys (3 years). I'm 39 at the moment, and currently in graduate school to become a Physician Assistant. The differences between that and medical school are of interest only to those within the field. I'm leaving the IT realm for medicine for a number of reasons; ask offline if you care.

I currently work as a volunteer EMT/Firefighter here in Oregon while going to school, but I've lived most of my adult life in Washington state, though born and raised in Alaska. In addition to my undergraduate degree in computer information systems, I have an M.Div. from Pepperdine. I've been married 15 years, and my wife and I have three kids, the older two of whom are in Boy Scouts.

I've been on the 'net since it was BITNET (in 1987) and ARPAnet (in 1988), and am fully conversant in Windows, Mac, and Linux, in addition to a bunch of oddball operating systems that no one actually uses anymore.

I hope my eclectic background brings something unique to the committee for this coming year.

Jonathan
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From: David Yellope <dyellope.wiki@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 20:47
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Ah, another techie guy (Technical Support engineer for EMC)

Welcome Jonathan.

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From: Carcharoth <carcharothwp@googlemail.com>
Date: Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 21:24
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


The e-mail came through. Does that mean the changes worked?
You seem to be moving from north to south along the US West Coast.
California next? :-)

The nice thing about running through background stuff like this (not
that anyone is obliged to do this at all) is that it does give those
on the committee an idea of the diversity in geographical,
professional and personal backgrounds. For comparison, some of what
I've divulged about my background on this mailing list (though I don't
give my name on-wiki) is the following:

Name: Christopher Kreuzer
Age: 33 (born 1977)
Location: Twickenham, London, UK
Education: Undergraduate sciences degree 1995-1999 (Chemistry in final
two years)
Employment: Writing, keywording and cataloging (science photography),
2000-present
Interests: Chess, Tolkien, Science, History

Jonathan talked about eclectic backgrounds. Looking back on the past
two years, I'm not sure how much my background actually helped when it
came to arbitration. Certainly from what was said on the election
pages it looks like the new committee will have a fairly diverse
background, and hopefully that will help, though the most important
thing seems to be people willing to do things and/or organise their
time effectively to do what they are best suited to doing. Well, that
and a flair for dispute resolution, of course.

Carcharoth

----------
From: Risker <risker.wp@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 22:16
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Well, I'm Risker, My real-world name is Anne Clin, but I do not use it on-wiki and request that you not do so either. I respond to either Risker or Anne on the mailing lists.

This is a photo of me taken by Sage Ross at the NYC Wikiconference in 2009.

I work in health care administration and have a rather enormous portfolio, but it has given me lots of life experience that I've put to good use. (Dealing with difficult people, simplifying messages, getting along with people one doesn't actually like, etc...)

Right now I'm not quite myself; I had an emergency appendectomy on Wednesday night, and am just finding my feet. Luckily my advance planning to get all the new arbs up and running on the various lists and the arbwiki meant I just had to hit "send" a lot of times.

Best,

Risker/Anne

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----------
From: Newyorkbrad <newyorkbrad@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 22:18
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


In case any of the new folks are interested and haven't seen it before, here's my real-world bio:

http://www.ganfershore.com/sub/ira-brad-matetsky.jsp

(I just posted this on Functionaries-l as well, but I'm not sure whether the discussion will centralize there or here.)

Regards,
Newyorkbrad/IBM



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----------
From: Frank Bednarz <frank.bednarz@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 22:24
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Did you ever know a software guy called Steven McGeady, who has a wikipedia biography? I don't think you overlapped much, and Intel's a big place, but I'll be curious if I don't ask.

Frank

On Dec 17, 2010 3:22 PM, "Jonathan Clemens" <clem4609@pacificu.edu> wrote:

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----------
From: Jonathan Clemens <clem4609@pacificu.edu>
Date: Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 23:11
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Nope, at the time he left Intel, I wasn't anyone important. I knew people who knew him, but my career hadn't really taken off until after he left.

Jonathan



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From: Elen of the Roads <elenoftheroads@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Dec 18, 2010 at 06:48
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Risker

Hope you're feeling better soon

Elen



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----------
From: Elen of the Roads <elenoftheroads@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Dec 18, 2010 at 06:53
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Local Government officer in Bradford, Yorkshire here. Currently looking at the snow, and sending messages from the Council's Twitter account (anything you ever want to know about gritting and refuse collection.....)

Real name is Helen Clipsom - rather people didn't throw the surname around, as it's a bit unusual, but feel free to google me. I turn up taking parti in boring local government discussions about new technology etc.

Elen/Helen

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----------
From: <philknight@mail.com>
Date: Sat, Dec 18, 2010 at 08:34
To: arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org


Yes, hope you're feeling better soon, and all of your help to the new arbs is much appreciated.

Phil

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From: Cas Liber <casliber01@yahoo.com>
Date: Sat, Dec 18, 2010 at 08:36
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


-->Anne - gawd, 2nd appendicitis of people on func-l in two weeks (!)

-->(H)elen - gosh, that's alot of bangles on your facebook acct

cheers (nice to be back)
thankfully cooler here after a few hot and sticky days...and the aussies are doing better in the cricket too...
Cas

To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>
Sent: Sat, 18 December, 2010 10:48:14 PM



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----------
From: Jonathan Clemens <clem4609@pacificu.edu>
Date: Sat, Dec 18, 2010 at 12:49
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Sorry to say, I won't be able to help the rest of you keep up the trend. Lost mine a dozen years ago.

Jonathan

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From: John Vandenberg <jayvdb@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Dec 18, 2010 at 17:06
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


I intend to keep mine.

More info about me here:

http://wikimedia.org.au/wiki/User:Jayvdb

I'm about to go on holidays until the first week of Jan, and will have
only limited internet during that period.

--
John Vandenberg

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From: Michelle Kinney <shell.kinney@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Dec 18, 2010 at 18:31
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


My bio's pretty boring I'm afraid (that's what comes of letting
somebody else do it): http://www.dotconcepts.net/users/michelle-kinney

Additionally, I'm 34 with 4 kids, 2 dogs (if the little one really
counts as a dog), a hamster and a herd of cats (I work with animal
rescue). When I'm not doing artisty stuff, I run a web development
business and in my spare time help out with a variety of charities.
Most of my contact info in on Wiki (along with a few more personal
details), while my phone and usual hours are on the Arb wiki. I'm
notoriously horrible at remembering to set my status on IMs and IRC,
so please don't get offended if I don't answer - I'm not ignoring you,
I'm probably asleep

Shell Kinney

----------
From: Carcharoth <carcharothwp@googlemail.com>
Date: Mon, Dec 20, 2010 at 09:38
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Since we seem to be doing biographies of some sort, I hope Jimmy won't
mind me pointing out this interview published in 'The Independent'
today (I spotted the link on his talk page):

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/jimmy-wales-its-not-about-how-many-pages-its-about-how-good-they-are-2164840.html

Carcharoth

----------
From: Kenneth Kua/ArbCom <kenneth@planetkh.com>
Date: Mon, Dec 20, 2010 at 15:23
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


Kenneth Kua, based in Singapore, currently working in Operations at a large multi-national transporation company.

Too lazy to write a profile these days. Don't keep a Facebook account either, glad I didn't since I saw my colleague getting sacked for a related matter, after someone sought revenge. (This happens more often to ArbCom than you think!)

Kenneth/MD

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From: Xeno <xenowiki@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, Dec 22, 2010 at 21:29
To: English Arbitration Committee mailing list <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org>


I'm from the General Toronto Area and work at a financial institution. Before that I sold IT security products.

I used to run a BBS back in the early 90s. When I got onto the Internet (back when dialup charged by the hour), I spent an awful lot of time on a MUD called Realms of Despair (which lead to some hefty connection fees). I had a fairly lengthy addiction to World of Warcraft as well. And then came Wikipedia...

I'm an avid video gamer, and writing/editing articles on video games is what drew me into Wikipedia (unfortunately, I don't do much of that anymore).

I've got a three-year-old boy that keeps me on my toes. I maintain a blog at http://xenocidic.com, but I've not written anything there in a while (and it's really mostly only of interest to video gamers, and more specifically, Xbox 360).

I'm on vacation until the 29th, so won't really be contributing much in the way of discussion, but I am keeping on top of all the emails that are going out over the list so I can hit the ground running when I'm back to work.

Looking forward to working with you guys.

Have a safe and happy holidays =)

-xeno

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Posted by: A Horse With No Name

He is the only smart one on the list -- he didn't give out his real name!

Posted by: Theanima

I don't think it's Iridescent, but it would be amusing to see his smug response to it.

Posted by: RMHED

Mod's note: in response to several complaints, I am sequestering all the "outing" material until the mods have a chance to discuss the ramifications of airing it here. At first blush, it does not appear to violate our rules, because I don't see residential or work addresses or phone numbers. However, it also seems gratuitous to publish it -- it doesn't help criticize WP in any meaningful way. -- HK

Complaints from whom?

Restore the information and stop being a stupid cunt.

Posted by: Craftyminion

Not the first time arbcom-l has leaked, it would seem:

http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=16758

Posted by: Abd

This appears to be confirmation that the leaks are real. Or have I misread that discussion.

Frankly, it couldn't have happened to a better bunch. Remember when they threw the book at the EEML people for what was little more than schmoozing with a very little bit of canvassing tossed in. They showed no concern for the privacy of that material, in fact they abused it, selecting, in the RfAr based on it, only the juiciest excerpts, cherry-picked to make list participants look as bad as possible.

They really wanted to nail anyone collaborating off-wiki. Well, they collaborate off-wiki. Of course, they are the good guys, right?

They seem quite certain it's an arb. I have no idea how they could be so certain, all it would take is one compromised computer, or someone who hacks the mail server.

Posted by: Milton Roe

Philosophically, the leaky arbcomm-l list is also one more way in which Wikipedians are so damned full of themselves that they figure they reinvent an entire society and never have any of the problems of previous governments or advisory groups.

All groups of a dozen people leak like crazy. Two people can keep a secret if one of them is dead, but you generally have to figure that any group of arbcomm's size will leak like the Whitehouse.

Remember Nixon and his Plumbers, the purposes of which was to stop his chronic leak situation. Well, it wasn't just Nixon; every administration has this problem. Again, the funniest thing about WP is that their Executive Committee thing thought SO highly of themselves that they figured it wouldn't happen to THEM.

Coren/Pelletier wants to "crucify" somebody. How Christian. Better to start making up an enemies list. Maybe convene a HUAC.

Posted by: Craftyminion

This is what I find so amusing. That the arbs and assorted hangers on (hey Malley! ) appear so shocked that this stuff has found it's way out.

Write it down, share it around and eventually it sees the light of day.

Thus far there is not much of any real note, lots of gossip and other squalid stuff. Slim is as much of a high handed bitch behind closed doors as she is on wiki. that's no great shock.

Bit surprised to see that Malley is so hopelessly devoted to the project, though. Almost craven, isn't he? Grovelling away to Iri. I expected better from Wikipedia's Original Angry Man.

Ah well.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

Well, we've long known that Coren is a jerk. Honestly, I'm still looking for anything in all this that is really new. Yeah, confirming evidence is nice, and all that.

Posted by: Zoloft

Exploited an unpatched listserv vulnerability, did we?

Remember, when you play croquet, you should always strike the ball with mallets towards none.

Posted by: gomi

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3AArbitration_Committee&action=historysubmit&diff=435911275&oldid=435910979

The very idea that "self-respect" should somehow inform us to protect the secrets of people who routinely participate in the defamation of others is laughable. Get your own house in order, Mbz1, before criticizing ours.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Well, now I feel all bad. We didn't get the really good stuff?

Posted by: Zoloft

Consider who these people are in real life. How interesting could it be?

Posted by: thekohser

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3AArbitration_Committee&action=historysubmit&diff=435911275&oldid=435910979
Again with the "banning"?

Posted by: Abd

It obviously depends on whose Gore is being axed.

ArbComm had no problem with publishing selected private emails from the Eastern European Mailing List. Sauce for the goose.

Posted by: NuclearWarfare

Did the Committee actually ever publish anything from that mailing list? I thought they only ever summarized them or referred to them by timestamps.

Posted by: Milton Roe

Good point.

He is-- the most interesting man in the world. When he's in Rome, the Romans do as HE does.

"I don't always edit Wikipedia. But when I do, I edit List of Glee episodes. Stay thirsty, my friends."

Posted by: Zoloft

I mean, these folks are just mostly techies, nerds, academics. I looked at my email correspondence and imagined anyone who took the time to hack in and reading it falling asleep and drooling out one side of their mouth.
"Your Amazon order for sixteen plastic plate holders has been shipped."
"Hey, Steve, it's possible the heated platform on the Cupcake CNC might not be at the proper temperature."
"Our model doesn't have a heated platform."
"Stick some painter's tape on the platform before printing and see if that works."
"Do chopstick rests ordinarily have little feet or are they flat?"

Reading nerdy emails can cause severe gout.

Posted by: Sololol

Ack, I'd hoped her absence was permanent but it looks like she was at her yearly performance review in Gehenna. There's new levels of nonsensical self-pity in this http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:AGK&diff=prev&oldid=435914364 (worse use of that quote imaginable),she must be feeling well rested.

Unimportant! Must stay on topic! If our mystery benefactor did really manage to get his e-paws on the entire ArbCom email archive this could be one of the most revealing episodes in the institution's history.

Posted by: gomi

This little gem appeared in the conversation linked to in my first post (emphasis added):

Of less amusement value, but perhaps greater importance is this brief exchange:

The "functionaries" list contains all the checkuser chatter, n'est ce pas?

Posted by: Peter Damian

The other stuff they have posted (the FT2 one which is particularly obscure) confirms this beyond all doubt.

Posted by: Milton Roe

Kliban! One of my favorite old cartoonists. He will be missed.

"Never eat anything bigger than your head."

Posted by: gomi

This one should perhaps be re-titled

Posted by: MaliceAforethought

We're down a case of Watts, but we've now a lovely searchable format for most everything that's happened behind the curtain. If you'd like to suggest a nip under the Red Queen's skirts, consider the size of her knickers. If you don't give details or a date range, you're not getting anything worth a shit and I'll probably ignore further requests to boot.

--Malice, now in Wonderland

Posted by: -DS-

Can we have something about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Thesevenseas?

Posted by: Peter Damian

You've already given me the basic facts I need about the oversighting case - and thank you so much for that - but if you could locate the following correspondence it would be a bonus. Do the IDs help?

22 April 2008 FT2 email to Arbcom 480dbb5d.1f15300a.0410.01b4 with a summary of the events of December 2007 (his role in the oversighted edits incident).

24 April 2008 some arbitrator comments in a separate thread,e.g. 16032ea0804241712n3ee276cayd178991b1e0df657 which shows the problem was properly understood.

25 April 2008 (481265c7.2435440a.29eb.0c79), FT2 gives the arbs a ‘brain dump’ of how he thought the arbs should handle the matter, whilst also indicating that he knew he was considered involved. Another arb promptly told him to keep his opinions to himself. FT2 responds acknowledging that his comments are as a party rather than as an arbitrator.

Posted by: MaliceAforethought

http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=34124, but looks like the AC wandered onto the correct path. An accident for sure.



That one's about a block of Dbuckner; is that what you're looking for? If so the IDs match up and I'll put those together - if not, give me a bit more detail about what oversighted edits incident and we'll track the bugger down.

Posted by: Peter Damian

Correct, they match. The one I am interested in is the third 481265c7.2435440a.29eb.0c79 . This was the infamous 'brain dump' where FT2 sent a 50k email to the Arbcom.

Posted by: MaliceAforethought

http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=34116&st=0&gopid=277740&#entry277740

Posted by: Peter Damian

I see that Coren is browsing around here. What happened to the official explanation from Arbcom that the only reason pre 2011 material was leaked was because threads were forwarded from that date. Clearly Mr Malice has absolutely everything that exists.

Posted by: MaliceAforethought

Tell me you didn't really think they'd gotten the root cause? Give me a wink and I'll load the other dumps. Should give us the wiki and rather complete transparency eh? Amazing what you can pilfer with enough green.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Kirill, who unlike KW is not a moron, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee&diff=436132358&oldid=436128741:

I would like to request that one of the legions of our members or lurkers that are active participants in that Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee discussion post the following response to Kirill: our posting rules prohibit the release of addresses, telephone numbers, or employers, and Mr. or Ms. Maliceaforethought has agreed to abide by those rules. We don't intend to facilitate any stalking in the Real-World sense. However, the embarassment that Kirill mentions may have an important therapeutic effect. As SB Johnny put in on that very same WP discussion page,
And from those members of the Communityâ„¢ who do not subscribe to those ideals, I am looking forward to an updated "Son of BADSITES" campaign.

Posted by: Wikileaker

Hey MaliceAforethought,

As you can see from my editing history, I was the last person to grab the mailing list and wiki archives, although I was far too lazy to collate and release it.

I admire your initiative and hope to see the new stuff from the archives soon.

Posted by: Jack Merridew

Yes, yes, yes; post it. somewhere. let it all hang out

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Jack_Merridew&oldid=436116729

--user:puputan

Posted by: radek

I admit that my first emotional reaction was a profound sense of irony. But 1) it's not a nice feeling to have and 2) they aren't all exactly the same people as the ones that were on the ArbCom back then.

Posted by: MZMcBride

Carcharoth http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Carcharoth&diff=prev&oldid=436605175#Preamble on his user page that he asked I reference here.

Posted by: MZMcBride

This is important to note, in my opinion. I certainly wouldn't want to have the contents of my inbox scattered across the Internet. This situation has some distinct differences, obviously.

I remember the contents of Sarah Palin's Yahoo! e-mail account being posted by WikiLeaks and it didn't sit well with me then. This site (Wikipedia Review) has been huge on privacy in a lot of areas, but this is one area where a breach of privacy is being actively encouraged.

I also remember (much more recently) all of Sarah Palin's e-mails as governor of Alaska being released. I still don't understand what the hell that was about. People say things in private that they wouldn't say in public. That's no revelation. But being able to not worry about what you're saying constantly also allows for a much more efficient, less stressful workflow.

Yes, there are differences between private communication by private parties and public communication by public officials. In a lot of ways, the Arbitration Committee is a group of public individuals. That's something to consider academically, I suppose.

Eliot Spitzer's advice should be heeded: "Never write when you can talk. Never talk when you can nod. And never put anything in an e-mail." For the wiki-world and ArbCom in particular, e-mail was inescapable. But this is (yet another) very good lesson in the dangers of electronic communications today.

None of what I'm saying is particularly new or even interesting, but I felt it should still be noted. Even though I'm as curious as the next person about what's in the archives and I'd like to see ArbCom abolished, that doesn't make any of this something I would want to experience on the other end.

Posted by: tarantino

Here is a statement from an anonymous onlooker.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

Of course MaliceAforethought is doing this for some motive of his (or her) own, and of course it would be helpful for us to ascertain what those motives are, since (as noted) it's possible that MA will exclude or redact material that doesn't advance his agenda(s).

That said, I don't care. If the ArbCom is concerned about the possible effect of incomplete disclosure by MA, its only options are to attempt to completely discredit MA, or to make a full disclosure of its own. They're obviously not going to do the latter, and while they're clearly attempting the former it's unlikely that the attempt will ultimately succeed. Even if they did make a supposedly full disclosure, their history of misrepresentation will lead at least some of us to distrust that the disclosure was, indeed, full; at least some of us would assume, their earnest assurance notwithstanding, that some critical bits would be held back. The parts that have been disclosed so far have done quite a bit to support the observation that the ArbCom routinely engages in both misrepresentation and misdirection in its dealings with the community, with outside parties, and even amongst themselves.

Posted by: The Adversary

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3AArbitration_Committee&action=historysubmit&diff=436666793&oldid=436664062 is a reflection from Seth Finkelstein:

Posted by: Milton Roe

Might as well post it:



Carcharoth is one of the admins I've noted in the past for his lack of being a WP:DICK (which makes him stand out). But his statement above is kind of useless. No piece of information is ever as useful as it would be without "wider context", but since this is a bunch of secret leaks, we're not going to get that, and are unlikely to in the foreseeable future. So the idea that we should not draw any conclusions in the meantime is rather silly. We'll never have all the information we need for any purpose anywhere, on this planet, in this life. We're stuck with the job of thinking with the information we DO have, in the meantime. That is all. It's a continuous fact-of-life and it's inescapable.

If Carcharoth has any information he'd like to add to help WR put this arbcom-l information "in wider context" he's welcome to post it. Otherwise, quit whining. You can't keep some bunch of crap secret, then complain that people are apt to fill in (strange 17-minute) gaps for themselves, when they find out the rest of it. What exactly do you expect? The gaps are YOUR fault. Nobody's going to keep an open mind and suspend judgment due to lack of information, when YOU-ALL are the one withholding it.

This is very reminiscent of the govenment, which normally "classifies" its crimes, lies, and mistakes-- then goes off on a tangent about espionage and national security when somebody finds out some of the dirt. Sorry, but nobody should be deflected from finding out about malice and incompetence, when secrecy is not the real issue and never was. When secrecy is mere coverup for crimes, lies and mistakes, it should be seen as what it is, which is abetting, further lying, and coverup that propagates error in the future, including all future damage that will be caused. Such secrecy is no more deserving of respect than the confidences kept by any person of ill-will and ill-action. Which is to say, it's not. It requires sunlight as disinfectant. We'd like to hear all those whitehouse tapes.

Fuck you with the partial transcripts we already have, Tricky Dicks.

Posted by: EricBarbour

I'm starting to suspect this may be correct. If those were truly honest leaks, don't you think the WMF and current ArBlubberers would be somewhat more angry and demonstrative? Instead, we get an objection from Coren, and near-total silence from everyone else. Yes, someone's pulling a dirty trick.

(If anyone wants a REAL slab of dirt, PM me. Courtesy of their "archenemy" Tim Usher, as it happens.)

Posted by: Kelly Martin

That would imply a remarkable degree of heartlessness with respect to the leak regarding the former arbcommer who was blackmailed into resigning (the content of which has been suppressed even here, for good cause, but which was posted and visible for several hours). If this is all just a "dirty trick" on Wikipedia Review, then they are just heartless bastards who will fry one of their own just for a few yuks. Which, to me, suggests that David Gerard is behind it somehow or another.

Posted by: LessHorrid vanU

I love you.

Posted by: EricBarbour

I'll take that as a "yeah, it's probably Gerard".

Posted by: MZMcBride

Carc asked me to post a response to your post (which he described as baiting, and I'd tend to agree). This will be the last time I proxy for Mr. Carcharoth for now. You're free to e-mail him as you see fit.I'll note that I'd completely forgotten that Mr. Carcharoth is no longer an Arbitrator, and I think many others have forgotten this or don't realize it. His term expired in December 2010, (among other things) removing all his access to the archives, etc.

Posted by: MZMcBride

There are some clues in MaliceAforethought's posts, but I don't think most of them point to Mr. Gerard.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

At this point I think Carcaroth is attempting to create the belief that the leaks are fabricated, without actually saying as much. Given that, and some other things that have happened, I also believe that Carcaroth is more than capable of posting on WR if he wants to, using any of the number of secret socks he almost certainly has here. Don't act surprised, we know that virtually everyone on the ArbCom has at least one account here.

Posted by: SpiderAndWeb

Link?

If true then this approach is truly bizarre, as if the leaks were fabricated the Committee would have jumped on that explanation instantly when the drama re Malleus and Iridescent first appeared on-wiki.

Posted by: SB_Johnny

I got some of those from a certain WR contributor a few months ago as well....