Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Single/2006-08-14

Single-page Edition

WP:POST/1

14 August 2006

Wikimercenaries
Editing for hire leads to intervention

Wikimania series
Meetups And Newsworthy International Assemblages

Interwiki report
Report from the Chinese Wikipedia

News and notes
News and notes

In the news
Wikipedia in the news

Features and admins
Features and admins

Technology report
Bugs, Repairs and Internal Operational News

Arbitration report
The Report On Lengthy Litigation

2006-08-14

Editing for hire leads to intervention

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By Michael Snow

Last week's announcement of a business offering to create Wikipedia articles on behalf of corporations prompted Jimbo Wales to intervene directly. Amid a debate about the ethics of this practice, Wales blocked the account being used, but later reported that he had reached an agreement with its operator to address the problem.

The incident began with the appearance of a press release from MyWikiBiz.com, a company that identifies itself as a family business run by Gregory Kohs and based in West Chester, Pennsylvania. The press release said the company "authors Wikipedia articles for companies and organizations that presently lack exposure on the world's largest encyclopedia", calculating that some 30,000 or more noteworthy companies are not included. The coverage of business entities in Wikipedia has previously been the subject of some criticism (see archived story).

The service

Offering to create articles on behalf of companies, MyWikiBiz said it would offer three different levels of its service, all of them for under $100. These were outlined on its website as follows:

$49 for a "basic stub"
$79 for a standard article of 2-5 paragraphs, with infobox, image, and inclusion in a relevant category
$99 for a service including submission to other sites and a "check up" after one year

On its website, MyWikiBiz included a page discussing the "eligibility" of potential clients for this service. The eligibility requirements essentially track Wikipedia's notability guidelines for companies and corporations.

The community response

Reactions to this announcement from Wikipedia editors were mixed, with natural concerns about how neutral such articles would be. Andrew Gray observed that paid-for editing would inevitably happen, and that having it be relatively open and transparent was preferable to the alternative. A number of people indicated they would reserve judgment until seeing the actual articles.

Arguing to delete one of the articles thus produced, FloNight argued: "Wikipedia is not a business directory. We need to aggressively monitor this user's other contributions for more of the same." Shortly afterward, Wales stepped in and blocked User:MyWikiBiz indefinitely, calling it a conflict of interest to get paid for adding articles by the subject of those articles. (Another account, User:Thekohser, was not blocked.)

Wales then reported that he had a phone conversation with Kohs in which they agreed that MyWikiBiz would post articles on its website, and other Wikipedia editors would independently add them on the basis of their own judgment. He also unblocked the account. Kohs called this a compromise, and is also soliciting opinions from the community on User talk:MyWikiBiz about various ways to proceed. Erik Möller suggested developing a guideline for dealing with conflicts of interest, which is currently under discussion.

The actual product

In the press release, Kohs was quoted as saying, "Not one of our corporate articles has ever been deleted by a Wikipedia admin." However, as Mathias Schindler pointed out, the MyWikiBiz website included screenshots from an article on the Farsight Hotel, which User:Thekohser created on 21 July, but had deleted after a day with an apologetic comment that the hotel doesn't exist and the article should have been kept in a sandbox.

User:MyWikiBiz began editing in May, and created its first articles about companies on 25 July. User:Thekohser had created Jacobson Stores as early as 22 May, 2005 although it's not clear which of these articles were created on behalf of clients, if any. At least one additional article, Norman Technologies, has been nominated for deletion, and subsequently deleted by administrator Naconkantari.

Curiously, an article was also created about Kohs himself (by the MyWikiBiz account, rather than by Thekohser). This article was subsequently deleted, with the support of Kohs, this time editing as Thekohser. As Thekohser, he had previously created the Kohs disambiguation page, and an IP address had added his name to it the following day.

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2006-08-14

Wikimania recap

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By Brassratgirl and Sj

Proceedings, audio/video, and archives

Audio and video streams of Wikimania sessions may be found at the Wikimania 2006 archives. Full text of presentations and slides are also being added to the proceedings.

Comments on presentations are still welcome on discussion pages, and some presenters are themselves still watching that space for input. If you have your own recordings or transcripts of a session, please link to it from that event's discussion page.

Comments

A great deal of feedback was received from presenters and attendees; more would be welcome from participants who were watching and taking part from afar. Please leave your feedback, comments, and suggestions for next year here. Feedback is extremely useful in helping make next year's conference better.

Next year's bid

Planning is already underway for Wikimania 2007. The conference location will be chosen via bid; the bidding process is described on the Wikimania 2007 page. The successful bid will host the 2007 conference and have a chance to make it the best Wikimania yet.

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2006-08-14

Report from the Chinese Wikipedia

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By Arbiteroftruth and Littlebtc

Status and community news

As of Saturday, 5 August, 2006, the Chinese Language Wikipedia contained about 81,458 articles. Of these, 70 articles are considered Featured Articles (Traditional Chinese: 特色條目, literally Special Articles). Until March 2005, Chinese Wikipedia had no formal mechanism to select Featured Pictures (Traditional Chinese: 特色圖片, literally Special Pictures). Since that time, however, 31 pictures have been selected as Featured Pictures. Counting those that were chosen before the formal process was established, there are 67 Featured Pictures in total.

Chinese Wikimedia Conference 2006

The Chinese Wikipedia Community is currently gearing up for its first ever Wikimedia Conference. The conference will be held at the Chinese University of Hong Kong from 26 August to 27 August, three weeks after Wikimania 2006. In addition to prominent editors within the Chinese Wikipedia community, Jimmy Wales is scheduled to appear at the conference as the first speaker on the first day, 26 August.

Spoken Wikipedia Project

As of August 2006, the Chinese Wikipedia community is beginning to create a spoken Wikipedia. However, the endeavor will create some challenges, as spoken Chinese consists of at least a dozen mutually unintelligible languages. The challenge will be somewhat lessened with the existence of vernacular Min Nan (zh-min-nan) and Cantonese (zh-yue) versions of Wikipedia.

Media reports

The Chinese Wikipedia has received more press coverage in recent times. Almost all press coverage surrounds the overall availability and the future potential of Wikipedia. Another article criticizes the People's Republic of China's decision to censor Wikipedia. Another article revolves around the perpetual argument amongst Taiwan and Mainland China users over the political status of Taiwan.

Chinese Wikipedia blocked in Florida

Since 7 August, 2006, Wikimedia proxy services in Florida have not been able to access the Chinese Wikipedia, the Wikimania 2006 Introduction pages or the Chinese Wikimedia Conference pages in Meta-Wiki. Some Wikipedians in Mainland China considered the block to be a URL-level block, believing that it might be related to a 2-page news article, "Wikipedia-maniac", that was reported in the 6 August issue of Beijing News (新京報).

As a result of PRC's policy of filtering the internet (see Internet censorship in mainland China), Wikipedia has been blocked in Mainland China since October 2005. The blocking technique is rather trivial and easy to get around, and a number of work-arounds exist; however, these are intentionally not well publicized, for fear of having them blocked as well.

Reader comments

2006-08-14

News and notes

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By Flcelloguy and ForestH2

Number of candidates for Board elections doubles

The number of candidates for the Board elections doubled this week as seven new candidates announced their intentions to run. Joining the previous seven candidates are Cartman02au, Eloquence, Hadraj, Jon Cates, Mindspillage, Ross.Hedvicek, and UninvitedCompany. Wikimedians have until August 28 to join the race.

Editorial note: The Signpost will begin an in-depth look at the candidates and the elections beginning next issue.

Preparations for Wikimania 2007 begin

Even as Wikimania 2006, held in Boston, was just wrapping up (see related story), preparations started for Wikimania 2007. Bidding to determine the host city for the annual gathering officially opens Tuesday; however, several preliminary bids, ranging from Chicago to Istanbul, have already been started. The timetable for host city bidding calls for all entries and bids to be submitted by 10 September, 2006.

Novel translator boxes available

An effort to make translation and inter-language cooperation easier resulted in a series of new translator-combination "Babel" boxes on Meta. These boxes indicate that the user can translate from a certain language to another language; intended to "streamline the translation process", there are currently 20 such templates available.

Briefly

The English Wikipedia has reached 2,000,000 accounts.
The Russian Wikipedia reaches 100,000 articles.
The Cantonese Wikipedia has reached 800 articles.
The Urdu Wikipedia has reached 2,000 articles.
The Dutch Wikibooks has reached 1,000 modules.
The Haitian Wikipedia has reached 5,000 articles.
The Ripuarian Wikipedia has reached 4,000 articles.
The Bengali Wikipedia has reached 4,000 articles.
The Tagalog Wikipedia has reached 4,000 articles.
The Maltese Wikipedia has reached 500 articles.
The Georgian Wikipedia has reached 10,000 articles.
The Croatian Wikipedia has reached 20,000 articles.
The Tibetan Wikipedia has reached 100 articles.
The Dutch Low Saxon Wikipedia has reached 1,000 articles.
The Vietnamese Wikisource has reached 500 edits.
The Thai Wikipedia has reached 9,000 registered users.

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2006-08-14

In the news

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By Ral315

TTAB says OK to Wikipedia citation

Five weeks after the International Trademark Association sent a letter to the Commissioner of the USPTO requesting that Trademark Examiners should be barred from citing Wikipedia as a source, the Commissioner responded with a decision permitting continued use of Wikipedia as a source, and noting that Examiners would be trusted to weigh information from the site in light of its collaborative nature. See The TTABlog report - PTO Responds to INTA's Wikipedia Letter: No Blanket Prohibition on Collaborative Websites.

Chinese e-Wiki shut down due to political pressure

Agence France-Presse reported on the closing of e-Wiki, a Chinese encyclopedia based on Wikipedia. In a press release issued on 7 August, Reporters Without Borders "expressed regret" that the encyclopedia was taken down. Reportedly, the site was taken down due to an article on Taiwan, expressing beliefs that the Taiwanese government was the "government of the Republic of China", and an article on James Lung, a political activist from Hong Kong closely tied with the suppressed organization Falun Gong. Access to the Chinese Wikipedia has been blocked by the Great Firewall of China, though Baidu Baike, a censored encyclopedia hosted by Chinese search engine Baidu, is still accessible. The site included a lengthy message in Chinese, as well as a quotation by Hungarian poet Sándor Petőfi: "Life is dear, love is dearer. Both can be given up for freedom."("Szerelmemért föláldozom / Az életet, / Szabadságért föláldozom / Szerelmemet.")

Wiki-crack

The Guardian published an article on Wikipedia, referring to editing as "wiki-crack": "...in the summer of 2003 it took just one puff to change Mark Pellegrini's life." Raul654 was interviewed in the article, mentioning his status as featured article director and a member of the Arbitration Committee (the article incorrectly stated that "only those who make 100 edits a week" were able to vote in ArbCom elections.) The article also tackles vandalism, mentioning the list of protected pages.

Hometown paper features Wales, Wikipedia

The News Courier in Athens, Alabama featured an article on Jimmy Wales. The article deals mostly with Wales' childhood in nearby Huntsville, Alabama, and includes quotes from Wales' mother, Doris.

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2006-08-14

Features and admins

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By Ian Manka, ForestH2 and RoyBoy

Administrators

Six users were granted admin status last week: MisfitToys (nom), Cowman109 (nom), Goldom (nom), Robdurbar (nom), Mets501 (nom) and Agentsoo (nom).

Correction

Last week, it was reported that there were only three users who held the unique distinction of garnering 100 support votes in an RfA, but fail to be promoted to admin status. However, a fourth (Joturner's second nomination) also accomplished this feat. Thanks to Tariqabjotu (formerly Joturner) and NoSeptember's Admin Project for pointing this out.

Featured Content

Fifteen articles were featured last week: Shadow of the Colossus (nom), Battle of Blenheim (nom), Final Fantasy X-2 (nom), FA Premier League (nom), Chrono Trigger (nom), Elliott Smith (nom), Mandy Moore (nom), Satyajit Ray (nom), Eric Bana (nom), Roy of the Rovers (nom), Night (book) (nom), Bricker Amendment (nom), Autostereogram (nom), Atomic line filter (nom) and Green and Golden Bell Frog (nom).

Six articles were de-featured last week: Billboard (advertising), Lego, Mercedes-Benz 450SEL 6.9, Race, Papal conclave and Bicycle.

The latest portal to reach featured status is Portal:Biology.

No lists reached featured list status last week.

The following featured articles were displayed last week on the main page as Today's featured article: Schabir Shaik trial, Libya, Shotgun house, Kargil War, Manchester City F.C., Augustan drama and Caroline Atoll.

These were the pictures of the day last week: Cathode ray tube, Carcassonne, Château de Chambord, Salad, Tulip, Center pivot irrigation and Nilov Monastery.

Seven pictures reached featured picture status last week:

World

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2006-08-14

Bugs, Repairs, and Internal Operational News

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By Ral315

AOL implements XFF

As most Wikipedians already know, AOL users tend to change IPs with almost every edit, and IPs tend to get reused frequently. This plays havoc with our blocking system. The X-Forwarded-For (XFF) HTTP header is a technical solution to this.

Soon after Tim Starling's overhaul of the block system in July, Angela reported to wikien-l that AOL would supply XFF information. This was enabled as of 13 July (see earlier report). However, it appears that, for now, it applies only to about one third of AOL's customers; XFF information is not available for the other two thirds due to AOL's network infrastructure (which one knowledgable person characterized as "weird").

Last week in MediaWiki software

New functionality

Various JavaScript variables were added for the benefit of user-script writers. (bug 6806)
DjVu images supported (bug 6420)

Bug fixes

Error in Special:Export fixed (bug 6971)
Special:Imagelist revamped, new information added.

Last week in servers

Account creation on Japanese Wikipedia briefly broken; captcha images were not set up properly.
Captcha enabled, semi-temporarily, on German Wikipedia due to vandal attack.
Wikimania 2006 registration page disabled due to major Ruby on Rails vulnerability.
Stewards-l, new stewards mailing list, added.
E-mail notification for Meta-Wiki watchlists enabled.
djvulibre installed on wikis in the Korean yaseo cluster.

Reader comments

2006-08-14

The Report On Lengthy Litigation

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By David Mestel

The Arbitration Committee opened four new cases this week, and closed three cases.

Closed cases

Moby Dick: A case brought against Moby Dick. Administrators Tony Sidaway, Bishonen, and MONGO have alleged that Moby Dick is a sockpuppet of Davenbelle, violating previous arbitration rulings in his political edits and his relations with Cool Cat. Moby Dick was banned from Turkish and Kurdish-related articles, and threats for him to be blocked should he continue to harass Cool Cat or Megaman Zero.

Iloveminun: A case brought against Minun. Evidence presented asserted that Minun and various sockpuppets violated fair use and image deletion policies by uploading copyrighted images and removing tags. Minun was banned for a year for various actions (with all bans running consecutively), limited to one account, and placed on probation, personal attack parole, and revert parole.

Saladin1970: A case involving an appeal of Saladin1970's indefinite block originally placed by Jayjg, and later by SlimVirgin. Saladin was banned for one year and placed on probation, general probation and personal attack parole.

New cases

Kehrli: A case involving the actions of Nick Y and Kherli on Mass-to-charge ratio and related articles. Both protagonists accuse each other of POV pushing, adding unsourced information, and adding dispute tags without reason.

Israel-Lebanon: A case involving the actions of AdamKesher, Tasc and others on 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict. AdamKesher accuses Tasc of removing relevant external links which satisfy WP:EL, and he denies the allegation. In response, Denis Diderot accuses Kesher of "using Wikipedia as a tool to promote his POV".

Deir Yassin massacre: A case involving the actions of KimvdLinde and Guy Montag on Deir Yassin massacre. KimvdLinde alleges that Montag has violated his probation by rewriting the article, unilaterally moving it to "Battle of Deir Yassin", violating copyright and votestacking. In return, Montag refuses "to participate in any of these proceedings", and alleges that KimvdLinde has abused her admin tools by exercising them in a dispute in which she is involved.

Warren Kinsella: A case involving the actions of Arthur Ellis, Pete Peters and others on the Warren Kinsella article. Both users accuse the other of disruptive edits on the page, and Peters and others acccuse Ellis of sockpuppetry using anon accounts, while Ellis alleges that administrators dealt inequitably with him and Peters.

Evidence phase

Zer0faults: A case involving the actions of Zer0faults and Nescio on Template:War on Terrorism, War on Terror and related arguments. Nescio alleges that Zer0faults has engaged in violation of WP:POINT, disruptive editing, and "uncivil remarks". In return, Zer0fault alleges that Nescio has failed to assume good faith, violated WP:POINT and WP:RS, and failed to provide explanations for his reverts.

Intangible: A case involving the actions of Intangible. Cberlet alleges that Intangible has used an "aggressive and confrontational" editing style to push his POV (partly through the wholesale deletion of the term "far right" from numerous pages), making sweeping edits and reverts with little or no discussion, and being "contentious and confrontational" in talk page discussions. Intangible vigorously denies the allegations.

Voting phase

CoolKatt number 99999: A case involving the actions of CoolKatt number 99999 on WWOR-TV and related articles, as well as the actions of Crossmr, Kramden4700 and others. Rollosmokes and others allege that CoolKatt has violated WP:POINT, WP:OWN, and WP:NLT. They also allege that he has made unfounded allegations of sockpuppetry and vandalism against themselves and other users. In response, CoolKatt denies the allegations, describing them as "slander" and "Wiki-stalking". He also accuses Crossmr of incivility, and alleges that Kramden4700 has vandalised the WWCP-TV article, and that Rekarb Bob and Buckner 1986 are sockpuppets of Kramden4700. A temporary injunction has been proposed and enacted, which bans CoolKatt from editing pages other than his own user pages and the arbitration pages for the duration of the case. Fred Bauder has proposed remedies banning CoolKatt for one year, placing him on probation, and ordering the deletiong of all but five of his subpages. However, no other arbitrators have yet commented on these proposals.

Ericsaindon2: A case involving the actions of Ericsaindon2, Coolcaesar and Will Beback. Coolcaesar claims that Ericsaindon2 has tried to insert original research, has disrupted Wikipedia, used sockpuppets, uploaded images violating copyright law, and failed to assume good faith. In response, Ericsaindon2 claims that Coolcaeser has contributed equally to the dispute, and that Will Beback has misused admin powers, in particular with incorrect and biased application of the 3RR. Remedies have been proposed limiting Ericsaindon to one account, placing him on probation, and banning him for one year. They have attracted the support of two arbitrators.

Heqong: A case (formerly referred to as Chiang Kai-shek) involving the actions of Heqong (formerly Chiang Kai-shek) on China and Taiwan-related articles. Fred Bauder has proposed remedies placing Heqong on personal attack parole and probation, and banning him for one month for personal attacks. No other arbitrators have yet voted on these proposals.

His excellency: A case involving the actions of His excellency. The case involves the actions of His excellency on Islam-related talk pages. Remedies banning His excellency for four months and placing him on personal attack parole have attracted the support of two arbitrators, as has one permitting the use of "traditional Muslim usages" such as "Salem, brother" on talk pages, so long as they do not create a hostile atmosphere for non-Muslims. Consensus has not yet been reached on other proposed remedies.

Sathya Sai Baba: A case involving Andries and SSS108's actions on the article Sathya Sai Baba. Both have accused each other of "POV pushing", and violating Wikipedia's policy on original research. Fred Bauder has proposed remedies to the effect that the set of articles dealing with Sathya Sai Baba be merged into one or two articles, that unsourced information be removed from these, that on the application of Sathya Sai Baba or a representative (SSS108 is specifically named as acceptable for this), the main article, as well as any related articles, may be deleted by any administrator and replaced with a stub, in order to remove "poorly sourced negative information" from the articles' histories, as well as a complete amnesty for Andries and SSS108 for any unreliable information they may have added in the past. SimonP has supported the removal of poorly sourced information and amnesty remedies, but has abstained from the others.

Eternal Equinox: A case involving Eternal Equinox. Several users complained that Eternal Equinox has been trying to claim ownership of articles with edit wars and abuse directed at those who try to edit them. Eternal Equinox claimed to have left Wikipedia, but the other parties argued that this was not credible because of a number of similar statements made previously. Eternal Equinox has since returned, editing anonymously from several related IP addresses while acknowledging his or her identity. Remedies have been proposed to the effect that Eternal Equinox is placed on probation and personal attack parole for one year, and Jim62sch is "cautioned to avoid teasing or taunting sensitive users". All these proposals have so far attracted the support of three arbitrators; other remedies are split.

Israeli apartheid: A case involving the actions of editors and administrators on Allegations of Israeli apartheid (formerly at Israeli apartheid). The article was the site of a move war during a poll to determine the article's naming. Fred Bauder has proposed findings of fact to the effect that "Israeli apartheid" is as a title inherently POV, but that Wikipedia as a whole has a slight pro-Israeli bias towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He has also proposed remedies to the effect that: editors to the article are directed to engage in good-faith negotiation, or, if it fails, mediation, to determine an acceptable title; all administrators involved in the matter are admonished not to use their admin tools without prior discussion, and five named administrators are reminded to make more use of dispute resolution procedures; and editors involved in the dispute are granted amnesty for past actions, except for Zeq, who remains banned from editing the article. Most of these proposals have attracted the support of three arbitrators.

Hunger: A case involving a dispute about articles related to The Hunger Project. One of the parties, Jcoonrod, identifies himself as John Coonrod, an executive with that organization. The dispute has been in mediation about how and whether to include unflattering material about the organization in the article. Fred Bauder has presented voting measures, including findings of fact relating to the dispute and remedies to the effect that the articles on The Hunger Project and Joan Holmes (a related article) may on the motion of Jcoonrod be deleted and replaced with stubs, but the remedies do not include any sanctions for any editors. SimonP has expressed support for these proposals.

Alienus: A case involving Alienus. Users Tony Sidaway, Nandesuka, and Jossi have presented evidence in the case, noting that Alienus has been blocked 15 times, has assumed bad faith, and has been warned many times about making personal attacks, edit warring, and incivility. A measure to ban Alienus for a year for edit warring and personal attacks has the support of five arbitrators.

Añoranza: A case involving Añoranza. Users asserted that Añoranza had been incivil, and had filed a retaliatory request for comment and request for checkuser. The dispute involves the usage of terms such as "Operation Iraqi Liberation" for the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Remedies banning Añoranza for a week for the disruptive way in which he went about bringing the terms to light and encouraging the parties to enter into good-faith negotiations into the matter have the support of four arbitrators; other remedies are split.

8bitJake: A case involving 8bitJake. badlydrawnjeff, the initiator of the arbitration request, has asserted that 8bitJake's editing on political articles was biased, and that 8bitJake was incivil to other editors on the articles. Remedies brought by Fred Bauder, and supported mostly by three other arbitrators, would place 8bitJake and related editors on probation and ban them from articles relating to the politics of the State of Washington.

Dionyseus: A case involving Dionyseus and Danny Pi, and their actions on Veselin Topalov, an article on a Bulgarian chess player accused of cheating. Remedies brought by Fred Bauder and supported mostly by three other arbitrators, would ban Danielpi for a week for "discourtesy and personal attacks".

Motion to close

Pudgenet: A case brought against Pudgenet, involving a dispute between Pudgenet and -Barry-. The dispute involved pages relating to Perl, as well as Wikipedia:Wikipedians with articles. If closed, Barry would be banned indefinitely from editing Perl and its talk page, all parties would be warned, and Pudgenet placed on personal attack parole, and, by a majority of five to three, Probation for one year.

Irishpunktom: A case involving Irishpunktom, Karl Meier, and Dbiv. Measures to ban Irishpunktom and Dbiv from editing Peter Tatchell for one year, place Irishpunktom and Karl Meier on probation for one year, place Irishpunktom on one revert per article per week parole and place Dbiv on administrative parole for one year have the support of eight arbitrators. However, Fred Bauder has opposed the motion to close, citing an edit to the proposed decision page which has been confirmed by checkuser to be Dbiv. As a result of this, Bauder feels that the remedies for Dbiv may need to be reconsidered.