Talk:Cross-wiki arbitration committee (2007 proposal)

Again...

Why do proposed arbcommers have to be stewards? wouldn't it suffice to ask sysop in at least 2 projects? drini ^[es:] _[commons:] 16:04, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

The proposed committee arbitrates disputes crosswiki, so members are selected from among those with demonstrable crosswiki trust. An administrator on two projects is fine if the dispute is on one of those two projects, but otherwise why should a user on another wiki trust them? I wouldn't trust someone to impose a binding decision on me simply because they administrate two little wikis I didn't even know existed. —{admin} Pathoschild 23:02:30, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think proposed ArbCom members ought to be stewards - they are elected via meta, but they are elected as stewards - which is an entirely different process and skillset from ArbCom members. I'd be much more comfortable if the inter-wiki ArbCom is composed of ArbCom members from affected wikis - it seems to make a very clear sort of sense that way. Avruch 19:13, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

All we have to do is elect the ArbCom members on Meta in the same way as we elect Stewards. Then they would surely enjoy the same cross-Wiki legitimacy. On an entirely different issue, would this be a court of appeal from local ArbComs where they exist?--Cato 16:10, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I think the election of this Meta-Arbcom the way we elect stewards is a correct thing. Before we do this can the members of the Arbcoms of the ten biggest Wikipedias+Commons+Stewards being such an InterCommitee? I think each of the arbcom members of a large diverse project has trust of pretty diverse group of people. Obviously people can not arbitrate committees on their homewiki. I would suggest Orangemarlin/FT2 mess on en-wiki to be the first case for such a commission Alex Bakharev 03:53, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm totally against the arbcommers being limited to stewards. Arbitrating disputes is completely different to being able to grant and revoke userrights and I see very little evidence of dispute resolution investigations in the names listed already. Of course they need community trust, but the stewards aren't the right people for this. Ryan Postlethwaite 09:45, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Not being around when this was proposed, I can imagine a reason why it would be stewards only. This body is for making decisions for an entire project that lacks the ability to do so on its own. In theory, the only people having universal trust from all projects are the stewards and the community elected board members. Board members can't because of Sec. 230, so by default the Stewards are the only people who have the universal approval to decide matters for any project. MBisanz ^talk 21:59, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Maybe the members should be elected from the pool of stewards? --Tiny plastic Grey Knight 17:18, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Maybe the members should be appointed by stewards (or WMF)? Alex Bakharev 21:51, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

No, stewards do not appoint anything (remember, we don't decide). Members should be (at least have once been) local arbcom members, (or have a real life profession that deals with conflict solving if one likes that). I guess there should always be two stewards in the committee (they can easier look up CU/OS logs if necessary and the like), but there is absolutely no need to restrict membership to stewards. --Thogo (talk) 19:52, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Hm. It come to my mind that, for example, we may say that the two (or N) second-placed during the elections for the Board should become new ArbCom members. So, every new Board elections would bring a couple of new ArbCom members. Or, even better, ArbCom member would be elected for the time as Board members are elected. If we want to have, let's say, 10 members of ArbCom -- 5 would be elected each year. --Millosh 08:04, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

If so, this wouldn't be only cross-wiki, but the global ArbCom. Actually, the first case for talking about is not a cross-wiki one, but it is about a dispute at one wiki. --Millosh 08:04, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Stewards are trusted and may be used as some default, but I would like to see separate judicial and enforcement roles. Theoretically, it would be the best if ArbCom members are not stewards (as well as it would be the best if the Board members are not stewards, too). If some steward would be elected as an ArbCom member, their position as steward may be frozen. --Millosh 08:04, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Opt-in arbitration

A number of times recently the idea of having a global arbitration committee (especially for SUL conflict cases) has come up in various fora. Given that it's not likely that the larger projects will voluntarily relinquish sovereignty, I'd like to suggest the following changes be implemented, to give a global arbitration committee some semblance of both utility and legitimacy:

1. This project may be declared by fiat and activated by participation.
   • Okay, "this project exists". Now, people start helping out, ok? :)
2. Arbiters will be elected in global elections, similar to that of Stewards.
3. Any Wikimedian in good standing (using the same requirements as Stewards) may run for the position.
4. Nine seats (A number I chose arbitrarily. See? It's working already) will be picked initially.
5. This committee gains jurisdiction by consent of the communities it assists. '
   • That is, it's opt-in. Each individual project may elect to have this committee handle all of its disputes, only a certain subset of disputes (such as interwiki SUL conflicts, checkuser and oversight abuse, or other subset as defined by the local community), or refer only specific cases to this committee as the local community sees fit. It is requested that the local arbitration committee refer cases to this global arbitration committee in the event that one exists.
   • Most importantly, it means that by the same means that the committee attains jurisdiction, it may lose that jurisdiction. If a local community loses confidence in the arbitration committee, it may vote or discuss leaving the committee's jurisdiction.
6. Cases will be performed in full community view with public evidence. In the event that privacy-policy related concerns arise, the committee will need to rely on the word of the stewards and/or Board of Trustees to verify sockpuppetry cases and the like.
7. Arbiters will not be required to have, and will not be granted for this position, any userrights. Adminship is not a prerequisite, nor are checkuser, oversight, nor bureaucratship attained automatically by virtue of the position.
8. Voters will be encouraged to elect arbiters who are honest, fair, and considerate, not those merely well-liked, well-behaved, or passionate contributors. Candidates are warned that they may become wildly unpopular due to case decisions.
9. Arbiters are requested to not perform any enforcement (rights modifications, blocks, or otherwise) related to the cases they oversee.
10. Specific procedures and policies will be determined later, once the "seed" arbiters are selected.

Any volunteers? Kylu 21:05, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, I don't think I'm interwiki enough to serve on it, but maybe helping draft it and clerk it. MBisanz ^talk 17:29, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I think it's a bit early for that yet. :) In other news, talking to someone on Babel gave me the idea to suggest term limits. Frankly, arbitration groups tend to be power sinks, so anything we can do to limit any future abuse would be a plus. Not to get too overly bureaucratic, but perhaps we could also have some group (one from each local arbcom or somesuch?) oversee this one with the ability to vote and either dissolve the current group or eject an abusive member... I mean, that sounds horribly overly bureaucratic, but some sort of checks are needed. Suggestions welcome. Kylu 04:19, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

What about having the Volunteer Council (once in working) having this arbitration committee appointing as one of their committees? Of course assuming this would be agreed upon by the VC, and assuming that there will be a VC at all within reasonable time :) Effeietsanders 08:02, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Then that takes power away from the community and grants it to the VC. If you get the VC working, I fully support giving it some sort of check over this group, but not at the cost of taking away the consent of the global community. Kylu 04:57, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

One of the ideas behind the VC is that it makes community influence (I count the VC as a community body) more useful, and if the VC is properly organized, it would just mean an extra step, hence an election less :) And I doubt you want to do this by election anyway... Effeietsanders 13:12, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

(<-)Every once in a while, something comes up on OTRS for which it would be helpful were there a body that could adjudicate cross-wiki issues. However, I think that members of such a body need to be identified to the foundation, even though there is no "automatic" userright such as CU or OS as these people will undoubtedly be dealing with sensitive personal information. -- Avi 05:22, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

I think this proposal is very important and should be implemented as soon as possible. We had to solve several issues on wikis without a local arbcom in the last months that could probably have been solved by such a body (and people even asked for such a body). Since my local (dewiki) arbcom term ends on Nov 30th (and I don't want to run for another year), I would be happy to volunteer for this after that date (I guess it will not be implemented earlier anyway.) I think identification to the foundation is not necessary, because if the members don't get additional userrights they don't have more access to privacy-related/confidential information then before. (And I bet, most of the volunteers will well be identified for other functions across Wikimedia.) --Thogo (talk) 12:00, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

does this good idea sleep now? 87.160.196.80 12:13, 10 September 2008 (UTC)