Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case

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Requests for arbitration

Arbitration Committee proceedings

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Case requests

Request name	Motions	Initiated	Votes
Conflict of interest management		29 February 2024	0/0/1

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Open cases

Currently, no arbitration cases are open.

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Recently closed cases (Past cases)

Case name	Closed
Venezuelan politics	25 May 2024

Clarification and Amendment requests

Request name	Motions	Case	Posted
Amendment request: Conduct in deletion-related editing	none	(orig. case)	30 April 2024
Clarification request: Palestine-Israel articles 4	none	(orig. case)	13 May 2024
Amendment request: Article titles and capitalisation	none	(orig. case)	13 May 2024
Clarification request: Extended confirmed restriction	none	none	25 May 2024

Arbitrator motions

No arbitrator motions are currently open.

Conflict of interest management

Initiated by Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} at 09:45, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Proposed parties

• Ritchie333 (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA), filing party
• Nihonjoe (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
• Primefac (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Fram (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• diff of notification Nihonjoe
• diff of notification Primefac
• diff of notification Fram (note that Fram is currently indefinitely blocked and cannot participate directly)

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

• AN : Nihonjoe and COI

Statement by Ritchie333

I have been reading the above thread involving conflict of interest editing from Nihonjoe for the past few days, and note that editors have attempted to close it four times without success. The key issue is a disagreement between the conflict of interest guideline and outing policy, and how they should be enforced.

Although some insightful comments were made earlier on, the later discussion hasn't felt as productive and I feel the useful parts of the discussion have now passed. This has now culminated in Fram getting an indefinite oversight block from Primefac.

I realise the Arbitrators and Oversighters are discussing this privately, and hoping for a diplomatic resolution. However, on the AN thread linked above, I see an admin and a former admin both publicly calling for an Arbcom case to sort this out, viz Wikipedia:A/G#Exceptions "Adjudicate an especially divisive dispute among administrators.". So you could consider this a procedural nomination.

@Dennis Brown: Yngvadottir has pretty much spelled out the underlying reasons for this. Essentially, the conversation at AN has become a train wreck, and I would like discussion of the issues to be shunted out of the public arena of AN, and moved privately where they can be discussed away from the spotlight. Potentially this would need to be an in camera case. I'm not calling for any sanctions or bits to be removed - hopefully that can all be avoided. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 09:59, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Nihonjoe

I'm not sure what else I can add to this discussion outside of what I already wrote. As I said there, I made a mistake, and I'm sorry that I made it. Since it was nigh on a decade ago, I don't have any way to recall what was going through my mind at the time, but I should have declared my COI at that time. I'm human and I make mistakes, and I try to learn from them. I will definitely be applying that here. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 17:47, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Primefac

Mea culpa. I had requested review of the content posted by Fram that I had suppressed, with the observed outcome that the content should stay suppressed. I was genuinely shocked when 48 hours later Fram posted suppressible content again, and I did not proceed in the most appropriate manner because of it. I do not want to use the "any reasonable admin" clause of INVOLVED because I should know better; at the time my immediate thought was that it was a second blatant breach of our policies in as many days and thus a block was necessary. Recognising my involvement in the situation (and per our protocols) I again asked the Oversight Team for review of my actions, which was supported (see comment by Dreamy Jazz here). It was a lapse of judgement, plain and simple, and getting the right result through the wrong means does not excuse it. I will strive to do better in the future.

Statement by Fram

Thanks, my initial statement: This case should look at

• the years-long and quite recent COI editing by Nihonjoe on topics where they seem to have a clear personal and financial interest, and their apparent lies about it this week on their user talk page
• the outing by me, whether it was warranted or not (based on on the one hand the cat already being out of the bag anyway, some of the COI already acknowledged, the fact that they didn't make a secret of the association between Nihonjoe and the supposed RL identity elsewhere, and their eleveated position in the enwiki hierarchy), whether it was correct or not, and whether the block should have happened and should be immediately indefinite
• the involved role of Primefac, who after repeatedly trying to minimize the issues (including prematurely closing the thread) and after baiting me into an outing reply by pretending that some obvious severe COI editing was no such thing (and using some very weird interpretation of the COI guideline and the English language to support their comment), then made a clearly WP:INVOLVED and heavy-handed block, while still failing to address the actual issue of the COI editing to boot
• I guess the completely unnecessary and short-lived removal of talk page access by User:Ingenuity is peanuts in the light of all the above, but some acknowledgment that it was unwarranted and that talk page access shouldn't be removed on such a flimsy basis would be welcome as well

General discussion of COI vs. outing can happen as well of course, but for me the above is sufficient to keep me busy I guess. Fram (talk) 10:57, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

(copied from user talk page Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:15, 29 February 2024 (UTC))

@Barkeep49:: the involvement of Primefac in that discussion was more than an attempt to close it and the "so what" (though those would be enough to be considered involved in my view), they replied directly to me[1], to which I answered with the oversighted material, after which they blocked and continued to reply about the actual matter. Basic rule of WP:INVOLVED is that you can't both discuss the merits, the contents, and use the admin tools: either you join the discussion and become an editor without extra powers (for that discussion), or you don't join the discussion and can "clerk" it neutrally. Once Primefac started discussing the merits or lack of provided diffs and whether an edit was COI editing or not (never mind the very weird distinction between "COI editing" and "Editing with a COI" they tried to make), they should have refrained from using the admin tools about that discussion and certainly against someone they were in a discussion with (and who happened to contradict their previous nothing-to-see-here position). Oh, and for the record, I did not repost any oversighted material. Fram (talk) 17:04, 29 February 2024 (UTC) Copied from Fram's user talk. Barkeep49 (talk) 17:55, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Dennis Brown

I'm a little confused. Are you asking for Nihonjoe's admin or crat bits to be removed? Are you saying the community tried but can't manage the case? The reason I ask is you are saying "you could consider this a procedural nomination." but I don't get what procedure you are following, or what you hope Arbcom to do? As to what POLICY should be when balancing the two policies, that is normally left to the wider community (which hasn't attempted to modify policy yet), as Arb doesn't create policy. This seems to be throwing gas on a dying fire, unless of course you clearly state that you think he needs to lose the admin/crat bits over the issue. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 09:53, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

• If Arb has actual evidence of paid editing, rather than a simple COI, then of course a case makes sense (in private), but would have made more sense a week ago, due to outing concerns. I would argue that outing is a more important concern than COI when it comes to PUBLIC discussions, because the damage isn't reversible. In the absence of actual paid editing (ie: COI), are we are saying that non-disclosure of a COI (due to fear of outing) is grounds for losing the advanced bits? I don't know of any precedent. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 10:36, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
• I don't consider editing about your employer as "paid editing" unless that is a function of your job, which is impossible to prove. When I think of "paid editing" (and I have done a GREAT deal of SPI work in my early days of adminship on this topic), I think of 3rd parties who have no conflict of interest, they are just paid to edit. Maybe I haven't looked to see where this changed, but there is a huge difference, in my eyes, between the two. One has a conflict, the other is a mass spamming machine. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 11:00, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by 0xDeadbeef

I concur with what Dennis Brown has said above. The request as of writing this does not make it clear what exactly is up for arbcom for consideration. If the scope of this request is about COI management, I would see Fram's oversight block as tangential to the discussion. 0xDeadbeef→∞ (talk to me) 09:58, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

After reading the AN section I think I can understand the scope of this request. I'd urge Arbcom to accept this case and consider whether actions (if any) are necessary based on private evidence and our COI policy. I have no opinion on Nihonjoe or Fram, but I believe a case could set a good precedent for how our COI and outing policies should be enforced, as this is indeed a divisive issue. 0xDeadbeef→∞ (talk to me) 10:14, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Joe Roe

I've been loosely following the AN thread, mostly with a feeling of "what's the point?" There is clearly not—despite the efforts of several closers to find one—going to be a consensus that Nihonjoe's COI editing is nothing to worry about. At the same time, there is an ironclad policy basis and precedent for paid editing being incompatible with adminship (see WP:PAY, WP:TOOLMISUSE, Wikipedia:Paid-contribution_disclosure#Administrators, Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Conduct_of_Mister_Wiki_editors#Salvidrim!_and_admin_tools and Wikipedia_talk:Administrators/Archive_17#RfC_about_paid_use_of_administrator_tools) so if there's even a reasonable suspicion that has happened, a desysop must be on the table and therefore it's out of the scope of AN. So thanks to Ritchie for finally bringing it where it belongs. An accusation that an admin has editing where they have a financial conflict of interest is a serious matter that threatens the integrity of the entire project.

I think it's in everyone's best interest that ArbCom accepts and moves quickly to establish the facts. There's been enough airing of opinions at AN and elsewhere; what we need know is to find out exactly what Nihonjoe did, what his COIs were at the time, and whether this is compatible with the community's expectations of advanced rights holders. Even if this mostly happens behind closed doors, having a parallel public case so that the rest of us can follow what's happening and offer what evidence can be offered publicly. – Joe (talk) 10:25, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

• @Dennis Brown: As I understand it, Nihonjoe has now admitted to editing article(s) about his employer. In day-to-day COI enforcement, we usually consider this "paid editing", and disclosure is required by the Terms of Use. – Joe (talk) 10:55, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Question by Jo-Jo Eumerus

Are the propriety of the various closes and reopenings of the AN thread, and the question of how much private (or not) information can be shared during a COI investigation in a public venue like AN, also part of the case request? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 11:04, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Fram has posted their statement on the talk page. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 11:06, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Yngvadottir

As Ritchie333 notes, the disagreement arises in large part because of a conflict between the COI editing and OUTING policies. The guideline speaks of a personal connection, not merely of a financial interest in a topic, and therefore the suspicion of a conflict of interest will often touch on aspects of an editor's off-wiki identity. The guideline page states that the first step on suspecting that editing with an undisclosed conflict of interest has taken place is to raise the issue in a civil manner on the editor's talk page, but there is a tension between that statement and When investigating COI editing, the policy against harassment takes precedence. The case scope should include both Nihonjoe's editing and his response to two editors who made such inquiries, from the perspective of the behavioral expectations of admin accountability, and also the conduct of Primefac and others in the AN discussion with respect to those two editors. ArbCom can usefully clarify how best to raise an issue of suspected COI in a user of long standing or holding advanced permissions, such as at what point editors are expected to e-mail ArbCom to avoid harassment. The guideline may no longer reflect best practice. As such, ArbCom should take this case. The community has not been able to resolve the impasse at AN. If the committee does so, the repercussions of the week's fruitless discussion make it necessary for it also to consider civility in the discussion, and whether Primefac's block of Fram violated INVOLVED. Yngvadottir (talk) 11:07, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Rotary Engine

I thank, and have "thanked", Moneytrees for their comment in the Arbitrator's section. But do note that, despite comments about a consensus to do so, the WP:AN close does not actually admonish the editor.

Believe, personally, that it should be amended to do so; so as to accurately reflect the consensus of that discussion.

Also acknowledge an involvement this matter per my edit to uncollapse the discussion at WP:ANI.

Am happy, therefore, to be added as a party; should the consensus of Arbitrators support that option.

Finally, believe that there is a prima facie case around COI editing, and that this should be examined by ArbCom.

Add that administrative actions which may have acted to suppress or prevent discussion of the COI issue, including, but not limited to, the discussion closes, the collapse by Ganesha811, and the block of Fram by Arb Primefac should also be examined.

Therefore, urge acceptance.

Note the subsequent comment by Ganesha811 below, and concur that their view of the close and collapse, and description of motives, are more than reasonable. Sincerely apologise for any implication of intent in my comment above.

Statement by Ganesha811

As one of the editors who attempted (and failed) to close the discussion, my motivations were simple.

1. I felt that the discussion, although it was still in progress, had reached the limit of productivity based on public evidence, and that any further discussion at WP:AN would just lead to repetition and outing issues.
2. Therefore, any further discussion should happen at a forum where non-public evidence could be considered, such as this one.
3. That the discussion was clearly not going to find consensus for any action against Nihonjoe beyond admonishment, based on the publicly discussable evidence.

I should note, however, that I did believe that there was a consensus to admonish Nihonjoe, and my closing statement was intended to be that admonishment (as I subsequently explained). However, I evidently failed to make this clear, and the thread was rapidly re-opened. I would also note that my administrative action was certainly not intended "to suppress or prevent discussion of the COI issue", as Rotary Engine described; it was intended to encourage that discussion begin at a place where it could actually be openly talked about and actioned without oversighting and outing bans.

I urge ArbCom to accept the case. I think COI editing is a scourge and given our (necessary but extremely strict) stance on outing, ArbCom is one of the few venues that can effectively deal with it, especially in the case of a long-time bureaucrat and admin. —Ganesha811 (talk) 13:23, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

To add, in response to the hesitancy below from ArbCom members - I agree with Levivich's basic argument. COI/outing concerns involving long-time, trusted users *cannot* be adequately handled in public by Wikipedia's processes. ArbCom is the right place to deal with these issues and needs to say so affirmatively by handling this case. Even if ArbCom determines that no further sanction is required (and that should not be a forgone conclusion), it needs to be actively involved in resolving this case. That's what it's for. Otherwise, as Levivich says, anyone with a concern will be incentivized to take it off-Wiki rather than trusting Wikipedia to police itself. —Ganesha811 (talk) 19:53, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by David Fuchs

I think if there's something that's obvious from the entire AN thread, it's that ArbCom failed here, massively. Given the potential outing concerns, this is something that, in the most conservative reading of WP:OUTING, could only be handled by ArbCom. It was not, and it showed up on-wiki. At that point, ArbCom could have shut things down by saying that it was going to be addressed and the community updated at the conclusion; this did not happen, with Primefac instead deciding to try and shut it down with a bad "nothing to see here" close that only continued to enflame the situation. If this case gets accepted or there's any sort of motion that suggests bringing this up to AN was unacceptable and a block-worthy offense, then it needs to be paired with a public apology that ArbCom failed to do the job they were elected to do. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 13:49, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

@Maxim: The Aquaveo AfD seems to be largely what sparked this whole situation on-wiki. Nihonjoe was insisting he had no COI there, and even wanted the deleted article userfied so he could work on it. That's not someone learning from years-ago mistakes. That's doubling-down on them and lying about their connection to a subject. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 18:53, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf

The responsibility for preventing OUTING lies with all editors, not with arbcom, and experienced editors (as almost all participants in that discussion are) should know this. Oversighters exist to clean up messes other editors' leave as best we can, but when non-public information is posted on the highest profile noticeboard there is our ability to do so is limited to the sorts of actions seen here. When that information is posted to external sites our ability to do anything about it is almost zero - this is why we have non-public channels for reporting things that cannot be posted publicly without potentially outing people, and that includes suspicions of COI editing. In many cases outing can have serious real-world consequences for the editor (who may or may not be guilty of anything) which should be contrasted with the risk of a small part Wikipedia being potentially biased for a short time. At minimum, I think this request should result in a reminder of this with consideration of sanctions for editors who contributed to this mess - up to and including bans if the evidence shows intentional outing here or elsewhere. Thryduulf (talk) 14:10, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by SN54129

Per Rotary Engine, I also reopened the case, so I might also be a party to it should that be decided.

Noting it was Ganesha811's close (as they note above) that I reverted, mainly because, in my view, while all the closes mentioned an admonishment for Nihonjoe, none of them (also referred to above) actually did so. Let alone a requirement to log it, as should have been absolutely obvious in the requirements of transparency. This is not a poke at Ganesha811's close, but rather all of them, which—included the latest non-admin close—all smacked, with a certain inevitability, of circling wagons, even if unintentionally.

The closers—and worryingly, including a fair number of admins— also all seemed to believe that Nihonjoe had apologised for his transgressions. Wrong. What he actually said was: It was never my intention to be evasive... I apologize for any appearance of evasiveness and for not indicating my COI as I should have done. With yet more evasion. That was their sole comment at that entire thread, and while no-one can be made to comment, more suggestions of CoI emerged, more questions were raised, and the discussion lasted another week. Did Nihonjoe really think that non-apology would suffice. Even when his understanding of PAID / CoI was questioned? What about recent statements which might be blatantly untrue (off-wiki evidence that the committee is well aware of!)?

So yeah, take the case. Add everyone you want. Expand the parameters. But don't pretend that, by now, the drums have not been beating for some time. ——Serial 14:14, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

• @JayBeeEll: Don't beat yourself up—your close was no poorer than the admin closes, and has probably only stuck where theirs didn't because arbcom was looking more likely by then  :) ——Serial 18:15, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
• @Firefly: Unfortunately, you see, Nihonjoe lied to his colleagues in the midst of a discussion over the deletion of an article with which we now know he had a conflict of interest with (Note, it's COI, not PAID). While we now know that he had this close connection, how does this tie in with his assertion at the AfD that t's just found within one of many topics I find interesting (I've edited a fair number of river and lake articles over the years, and Aquaveo's software is used by a lot of people writing academic papers analyzing rivers and lakes). The question might be, does lying to colleagues by a multi-permissioned and highly trusted editor get resolved with merely a trout and a request to knock it off? Now that would be a precedent to set... ——Serial 19:45, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Usedtobecool

This whole thing should have been handled privately by arbcom to begin with. It was always going to be impossible to shut off public discussion without at the same time providing a proper private alternative. The failure to do so led to people concerned that the matter was being covered up to share more and more evidence attempting to establish the seriousness of the issue. At the same time, people worried more about Nihonjoe's wellbeing in particular and/or in general with protecting privacy and preventing harassment ended up downplaying the seriousness of the COI issues in an attempt to close the discussions to prevent further outing. That made a circle that reinforced further deterioration of trust in our admin corps and institutions on the one hand and more unfortunately further publicisation of details about Nihonjoe's private life.

I don't see how a case can be avoided at this point. I think Primefac's suppression was justified in that it was not clear what was private and what was public at that point, and precaution in such sensitive matters is laudable. I am not sure how they can justify the block though, given that they did not revoke talk page access. Fram should know well what should be shared publicly and what should not. But we need to establish first, what exactly Fram shared, whether what they shared was easily deducible from onwiki activities or it involved offwiki evidence in violation of outing. Contrary to Fram's position on Nihonjoe, I believe Nihonjoe is in a tough position, so them not being forthcoming with everything unless forced to, especially while they are being asked to do so publicly may be understandable. That does not excuse their violations of COI guidelines to begin with which appear to be extensive. Editing as a favour to a family member, a friend or yourself is COI that can be excused; editing for your employer, or about your own financial ventures is more a PAID violation than a COI violation because of the obvious financial incentives involved, so that can't simply be waved away with an apology. Finally, we still need to identify all the affected articles, and let independent editors double-check for NPOV. ArbCom is the only party that can establish facts and pass down judgement about all of these things. Usedtobecool ☎️ 14:23, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

• Then have a case, and in it, vote for that finding, Maxim. How do you know everything is above board without having a case, unless you are saying we should take bureaucrats at their word even when evidence surfaces to the contrary? It sounds to me like you are saying we should see the suppression and the block as the same action. Not all suppressions come with blocks, so they clearly are not. — Usedtobecool ☎️ 15:26, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by RoySmith

I've seen the supressed edit. I agree that supressing it was necessary. I'm not entirely convinced that it had to be primefac who did it. I get the "tool of first resort" argument, but I assume it would have only cost a minute to find another (i.e. non-involved) OS on IRC. On the other hand, it's a reasonable argument that this was time-critical, so I can accept not wanting to take that minute. But, the block is another story. There wasn't anything time critical about the block, so taking the minute to find a non-involved OS to do it would have been appropriate. Primefac had to know they were involved and had to know how incendiary his action would be. Going ahead and issuing the block was, in my opinion, inappropriate and contrary to WP:INVOLVED. RoySmith (talk) 14:40, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Barkeep49 you are correct that INVOLVED does have an administrative action exception. But at the same time, it says it is still the best practice in cases where an administrator may be seen to be involved to pass the matter to another administrator via the relevant noticeboards. I think admins in general (and primefac in this case specifically) rely too much on the former and not enough on the later. RoySmith (talk) 17:28, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by El_C

We have investigated ourselves and found no wrongdoing. El_C 17:01, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Rosguill

Should ARBCOM decide to accept this case, they should also be aware of the independent but topically-related issue of UPE by editors who are admins of az.wiki, for which I had blocked Atakhanli and Wertuose on en.wiki following a COIN report and raised a metawiki discussion for the broader community to assess whether further action should be taken. Perhaps ARBCOM will find this irrelevant (and it is largely irrelevant to the questions of oversighting and related blocks), but I would rather err on the side of ARBCOM being fully aware of the various glass houses across Wikipedia projects while stones are in-flight. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 17:29, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by JayBeeEll

I include this comment only because my closure has been repeatedly alluded to above.

Some members of the community feel that any editing in the presence of a COI is inherently problematic, while others feel that editing in the presence of a COI is only problematic if there is a substantive problem with the edits being made. For many people (perhaps especially in the first group), these feelings are quite strong. One thing the discussion at AN illustrates is the lack of an obvious compromise position between those two views, and the inability for many people with one view to understand or appreciate the other view. The idea that the portion of the discussion I closed (which included a long, unconstructive, and in some places rather nasty discussion in which no sanctions of any kind were proposed, followed by a proposal for admonition that was supported by only a bare majority of participants after being open for more than 48 hours) could have been closed any other way strikes me as silly, notwithstanding the strength of feeling of some participants. I am also not convinced by the distinction drawn between "actually" admonishing Nihonjoe and the closing statements by RoySmith, Ganesha811, and myself.

I have no opinion about whether ArbCom should open a case. I would be happy if ArbCom does not require further involvement from me in this issue, although I will attempt to assist if requested. --JBL (talk) 18:07, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by Levivich

The edits at issue were from 2016-2023. Here is WP:COI as of 12/30/2015, and it already said "must disclose their COI" for those with a "financial" COI, which is defined (in the 12/30/2015 version) as "a close financial relationship with a topic you wish to write about – including as an owner, employee, contractor or other stakeholder".

Here is where Nihonjoe failed to disclose the COI when asked about it directly, and repeatedly asserted he didn't violate WP:PAID while ignoring questions about WP:COI and arguing they were inappropriate: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 times before admitting it here and here. Still, Joe declined to post a disclosure when asked. Joe also denied more-recent COI edits: 1, 2, 3.

There is no doubt that Joe violated the WP:COI guideline, as then-written with edits in 2016 and 2017, and possibly up to 2023, and again in 2024 by failing to disclose (perhaps multiple COIs) when asked directly.

Here are one, two (*, **), three, four arbs saying, in so many words, there isn't a problem here worth opening a case over.

Do not make edits about your employer or your business without disclosing the COI. That's the rule, and it's been the rule for many years now, including when these edits were made. If Arbcom "sits on the evidence" without taking action, if arbs publicly state that it's no big deal, or -- worse -- help sweep it under the rug by STFU-closing threads, blocking people, etc., then how do you expect the rest of us to trust arbcom with private submissions of COI violations? There's an argument to be made that COI evidence is better sent to WPO than arbcom, because at least WPO will do something about it.

Accept the case, make a public statement of findings. Even if all it amounts to is an admonishment that has already been given by the community, you, as arbs, need to show that you are the proper venue for raising this concern. Otherwise, you outsource the job to anybody with a website.

I have a theory about "what's really going on," which is that some (maybe many) long-time editors (like 10+ years) used to, before the COI rules were tightened, edit about their employers, businesses, etc. Now that the rules have been tightened, they don't want to disclose those old COI edits because doing so would effectively out themselves. Even though this doesn't apply in this case, this theory would explain the reluctance to do anything about old COI edits amongst some long-time editors. If my theory is correct, I wish those editors would say so, because I'm quite sure the community would be amenable to some kind of "historical amnesty" to avoid a "gotcha" ex post facto outcome. It's just a theory though, I might be wrong. Levivich (talk) 18:47, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

@Firefly (over 500 words now): trying to avoid making a suppressible edit here, but to answer the question:

1. determine whether or not there were any COI violations in addition to the stuff from 2016-2017 that was already admitted-to, including but not limited to if Joe made edits relating to a product that is sold by a business he owns
2. review Joe's ADMINCOND/ADMINACCT compliance and determine whether "disclosing COI" is part of ADMINACCT/ADMINCOND or not (so the community can consider whether to amend those or not)
3. confirm that Joe is now in compliance with COI by making all necessary disclosures
4. determine if any sanctions beyond the already-issued admonishment are necessary

And make a public statement answering those four questions. Levivich (talk) 19:21, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {Non-party}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the case request or provide additional information.

Conflict of interest management: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

• If there are doubts as to the appropriateness of posting certain material on-wiki, it may be emailed to arbcom-en-bwikimedia.org. Maxim (talk) 15:36, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Conflict of interest management: Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter <0/0/1>

Vote key: (Accept/decline/recuse)

• Recuse, obviously. Primefac (talk) 09:54, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
• I wrote this last night and fell asleep before I could put it on wiki, so I'll say it here: So to clarify my comment about what we received, @Yngvadottir and others, I'm saying we weren't informed of this beforehand, not that we weren't informed. I actually informed Arbcom about this not long after the inciting offwiki post and was the first person to do so. The thread did not get many comments and there wasn't a consensus for anything. Now personally speaking, I think a quiet note from an individual Arb to disclose COIs and be mindful of COI rules would've been a good idea and probably could have avoided this thread, but there was no consensus for that. After this went to ANI, Nihonjoe made his above COI clarification/declaration, which made an Arb sending a note feel moot/redundant. We haven't been sent further evidence other than the inciting offwiki post, so nothing is really happening right now unfortunately. If people have further evidence of COI stuff, please email it to Arbcom. And please, really, do email us-- we know a lot, but we don't know everything that's happening. If you see something, email us something. There have been much more problematic editors over the years that were never reported to us, and it seems like no one sent us anything because it was assumed someone already told us/we must know about it.

The issue of reporting COI vs outing is one that has been relevant for years (see Special:diff/1111807998#RfC:_Updating_BLOCKEVIDENCE and Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Jytdog) The issue here isn't really reporting of COI/UPE though, it's communicating when functionaries have decided to do nothing about a report or didn't really get a response in. Plus, the ~paid Checkuser queue is backlogged and most offsite issues being reported to Arbcom unfortunately take longer to resolve for various reasons...

Now for accepting/declining this case? I don't know, I think it really depends on the evidence we get emailed. The community has admonished Nihonjoe via the AN thread, and the Oversight team has endorsed Primefac's block upon review. This should probably be In Camera if we are to open it, this should've stayed behind the scenes in the first place. But it didn't and we're in a bit of a mess and here right now. So, let's try and find the best solution. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 12:22, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

• I'm not sure we have anything that requires a case, and thus am leaning to decline, while awaiting statements. If anything, the usefulness of this case request is to settle the AN thread.
  As far as the questions as to Nihonjoe's COI edits, I think he has been responsive to the concerns raised in the AN thread. If his responses were wholly inadequate, we would have ended up with a case request much faster. As far as the edits to Aquaveo go, the bulk of these are from February 2016; the edits to the product pages were in March and August 2019. Given the scale and timing of these edits, a request to knock it off seems most appropriate, and the AN thread has largely done that (realistically, the blog post did that function already). Our COI rules get interpreted more strictly with every year, and that's something to keep note of when evaluating edits from five or eight years ago.
  As far as the Primefac and Fram angle, I have two broad thoughts. First, an {{OversightBlock}} isn't permanent; a credible promise to no longer re-add the oversightable material should make such a block go away. Second, as far as the INVOLVED aspect, that gets tricky with the present approach to Oversight. Suppression/oversight is considered a tool of first resort; when there is questionable material that may reasonably need to be deleted, it is first suppressed and then brought to review to the mailing list. If it is determined that revision-deletion was more appropriate (or no deletion whatsoever), that is decided on the mailing list and actioned appropriately. OversightBlocks are used, in general, either in very egregious situations or when oversightable material has been reposted (and usually the user was already asked to stop). All OversightBlocks are referred to the mailing list for review. It would therefore follow that the first available oversighter should suppress and block if reasonably appropriate, given that suppression is a tool of first resort and suppression is used for especially problematic material. The point I'm getting to is that WP:INVOLVED may conflict with how suppression is done in practice; provided that the suppression and/or block were reasonable actions (i.e. clearly not a spurious use of suppression), INVOLVED does not apply, because the practice of suppression is a first-resort action for urgently problematic material.
  And concerning the conflict between the outing policy and COI guideline, there is an interesting disjunction between what may be posted on-wiki, versus the kind of research routinely done and disseminating off-wiki, whether to ArbCom or potentially individual administrators. An example of what I recently reviewed was a dossier sent by an administrator to the committee, which involved the cross-referencing of old OTRS tickets with Facebook profiles to establish multiple editors' real-life identities and a specific conflict of interest. In practice, that is considered completely appropriate provided it's off-wiki such as by sending it to arbcom-en, and it happens all the time; were an administrator to post that dossier on-wiki, it would likely end with a ban and desysop for the administrator. (For the avoidance of doubt, none of this is meant as a judgment of whether how we do things is right or wrong; it is merely a description of current practice.) As far as this specific case, there are arguments that could be made that the AN thread should have been suppressed right off that bat, while emails to arbcom-en on the matter, including oversightable material, would have been entirely appropriate. Of course, with the community's desire for transparency, a balance between preserving editors' privacy and investigating misconduct becomes tricky to find. Maxim (talk) 14:36, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
• I am reasonably convinced by the off-wiki evidence of Nihonjoe's COI; the sum of which I'm aware of - and I've been inactive so perhaps there's private evidence I need to catch up on - is from the blog post. I have not seen compelling evidence that Joe meaningfully violated Wikipedia Policies or Guidelines at the time he made COI/paid edits. If there is such evidence I would encourage someone to present it (most likely to arbcom-en-bwikimedia.org).
  Bigger picture I share the concern of some, including Fram, of the ways that our OUTING policies are used by knowledgable insiders (or even knowledgable outsiders) to prevent accountability from violating our content policies and guidelines. During my time as an Arbitrator I have consistently been the voice on the Oversight team, and I think I am less alone in this view than I was 3 years ago, of keeping first principles in mind: we are here to build an encyclopedia. OUTING is a vitally important policy because it helps to create a safe space for many editors to have the safety to help build that encyclopedia. It is not, for me, a get of jail free card when it comes to content policies and guidelines, most frequently COI and paid editing. So there is going to be tension there.
  For me there is a right way and a wrong way to address that tension. Email arbcom? The right way. Getting suppressed and warned, ignoring that warning, and doing it again? The wrong way. Fram has more than once restored suppressed information in my time as an oversighter and, to disagree slightly with Maxim, I would be looking for credible assurance that not only will this suppressed info not be reposted but that Fram properly appeal OS decisions they disagree with in the future. This still is a pretty low bar and so I would hope Fram could be unblocked soon.
  Finally there is the matter of Primefac. I admit to not understanding what made him WP:INVOLVED. If it was What the hell Fram I view that as interacting purely in an administrative role as part of the suppression. If it was Primefac's closure of the thread, that still, for me, falls in the administrative action exception thought a bit more weakly. As such I think it would have been wise if Primefac had merely suppressed Fram a second time, gone to the OS list, reported the suppression and said "someone needs to block Fram". Given that the feedback has been strongly in support of the block it seems like some other oversighter would have blocked Fram and we could have avoided part of this drama. But lack of wisdom means at most a trout, and in this situation maybe not even that. So if I understand the concerns about Primefac's INVOLVED correctly that's where I land.
  All of this means to me this is an excellent case request but, with the evidence I've analyzed above, that I am a decline. But I await to see if there is other evidence (or if I misunderstand one of the facts above) before formally making that vote. Barkeep49 (talk) 16:15, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

  @RoySmith The best practice piece is certainly what I had in mind when I said it would have been wise for Primefac not to be the one not to make the block. In my experience I find in any given situation a number of editors focus on INVOLVED, because it is such an important policy and ArbCom has (rightly!) shown a willingness to sanction admin for violating it. But that focus is spurred often more by underlying dispute than an actual community sentiment about where the line is for INVOLVED. If this progresses to a case it is absolutely going to be an important part for ArbCom to consider fully because it is, as you point out, very tricky. Barkeep49 (talk) 17:52, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

  Thanks @Fram. I will consider that new information. I appreciate the correction that you posted two different pieces of oversightable material in this discussion rather restoring information that had already been removed and would adjust what I said for what I was hoping for in an unblock to "credible assurance to avoid posting oversightable material". Barkeep49 (talk) 17:58, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

  I am now inclined to vote to accept a private case based on the information shared here by Levivich and the private information shared by Fram. I'm still not convinced there is enough here to have a broader scope that would include Primefac or Fram. Barkeep49 (talk) 19:54, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

• There are valid concerns about WP:COI, WP:OUTING, WP:INVOLVED, and concerns and questions about the prioritization of certain policies over others when they seem to contradict. As far as accepting or denying a case, I would like to hold off until interested parties have a reasonable amount of time to make statements and/or email ArbCom any information as appropriate, which I would encourage so that the most informed decisions can be made. - Aoidh (talk) 16:57, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
• I also share the concerns around the tension between our COI and OUTING policies, and think there could be an opportunity to clarify best practices in this area. For the specific matter in front of us I don't think there's much to do given what we have - however I join with my colleagues in saying that if anyone has any credible evidence that we are missing something, please submit it. Even if you think "they already know this" - we'd rather hear something three times than not at all. firefly ( t · c ) 18:41, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

  I will say that am sympathetic to those who say that we should take the case and do [our] jobs. Having looked more closely at the Aquaveo AfD after David Fuchs' comment (thank you, David, for highlighting that) I am unimpressed with Nihonjoe's comments there, and they do - for me at least - move this away from being purely a historic issue explainable by changing norms and guidelines around COI. That said, what would those telling us to take the case be looking to us to do that hasn't already happened via the AN thread? firefly ( t · c ) 19:11, 29 February 2024 (UTC)