[Wikimedia-l] Will Beback, Arbcom and Community oversight

[James Heilman]

So why did I not notify the arbcom list? I am sure all the arbcoms are
watching this one so I did not see it as necessary.

I am also not appealing arbcom's decision to arbcom. I am appealing
arbcom's decision to the editing community at large. I guess I lack
faith in the functioning of arbcom as a whole especially in light of
the recent resignation of a couple of arbcom members and the persons
attacks against me from members of that group. I do not agree with the
secrecy that surround the majority of the deliberations of this
committee. I believe that conversation should be open / public as much
as possible. Thus I have elected for an open conversation.

To add to this the arb who drafted the case in question has agreed
that Will Beback never outed anyone on Wikipedia. The evidence for
"outing" was a private email sent to the arbitration committee itself
among a few others. So yes I will keep my conversations public. I do
not wish private email to the arbitration committee to be used for my
own banning.

Per Will "I have honored the ban for more than one year, during which
time I have neither engaged in any ban evasion nor in off-wiki
campaigning. I have apologized to TimidGuy, expressed my remorse for
my errors, and promised to avoid repeating them. In my appeal, I did
challenge some of the findings in the case, which I believe were based
on insufficient evidence or misinterpretation of policy. Apparently
banned users are not allowed to argue for their innocence and can only
admit to total guilt and beg for mercy. The appeal was rejected
without explanation, and without even telling me who voted for or
against it. I am not sure how the ArbCom processes these appeals,
which is done entirely in secret. I have been a constructive editor in
the past, and believe that I can be again."

With respect to "very good show of trying to insinuate that Will
Beback was banned in relation to conflict of interest" I am just
quoting the evidence arbcom has provided. The rest of the evidence is
equally poor IMO but others are free to look and judge for themselves.

--
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian

The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine
www.opentextbookofmedicine.com