[WikiEN-l] Arbitration Committee elections, 2005 - still no information!

[Chris Jenkinson]

Hi all,

It's been one month since Jimbo Wales edited the Arbitration Committee 
elections page for this December (now just a few days away) to change 
the procedure, adding some brainstormed thoughts. Those thoughts are 
still all the information we have on the procedure, and we're almost in 
December.

A number of potential candidates have said they don't wish to put their 
name forwards if they don't know the election procedure, yet recently a 
member of the current Arbitration Committee said that all Wikipedians 
wishing to become arbitrators should put their name forwards immediately.

This is really a terrible state of affairs for a number of reasons:

Firstly, we have no idea how the new Arbitration Committee is going to 
become the new Arbitration Committee at all. Not even the current 
arbitrators say they know how it's going to be done.

Secondly, it has been almost a year since the last elections, and there 
has been plenty of community discussion about what was good and bad 
about the procedure, and action has been taken on this by the community 
(for example, the deletion of the endorsements/disendorsements page).

Thirdly, Jimbo has been deathly quiet. These are probably the most 
important positions in the Wikipedia community and the process deserves 
to be discussed openly. Yet all we've seen are some brief thoughts from 
Jimbo. He hasn't responded to other suggestions or to criticism of his 
thinking.

Come on Jimbo, sort it out! It's been almost a year since the last 
elections, there has been plenty of discussion from the community 
(including the current arbitrators) on reform of the system, but all 
we've heard from you is a "current line of thinking". Yes, we know you 
have other things to do, such as the incredibly important role of 
getting funding. However, the encyclopaedia project relies on its 
community to exist and we have to get this right. Please join in the 
discussion and make your thoughts clear.

Chris