On Sun, Jun 28, 2009 at 8:13 PM, stevertigostvrtg@gmail.com wrote:
<snip>
Good point, Emily. Ironically enough though, Arbcom itself doesn't participate much in openly discussing its cases. Strange isn't it?
If you catch us in a good mood, maybe. :-)
[I'm currently one of those arbitrators, if that's a bit cryptic for some.]
More seriously, if you find the right venue and present a good case that something needs discussion or clarification, even after a case is closed, you stand a good chance of getting a reasonable level of responses eventually. The main problem, as those who are current arbitrators and those who were former arbitrators, should be able to attest, is time and the amount of stuff to deal with. Some of it is pure overload, other bits are time-management (some of us deal with simple or interesting stuff first, before tackling the difficult stuff - it's human nature really).
One of the things that has been suggested, is reviews of cases after the dust has settled. Not returning to the old discussions, but seeing how effective the remedies have been, and looking at the enforcement of cases, and whether the articles involved (if the case involved articles) have improved at all. Another aspect of review would be whether any of the policy-related stuff suggested by ArbCom principles would gain community consensus to be incorporated into polices. Technically, the principles should be interpreting existing policies, but sometimes ArbCom does strongly suggest that change is needed in a certain area. Whether that happens or not, as Fred points out, depends on the resulting community discussions. In some cases, though, those community discussions don't actually take place, and six-month reviews could point this out.
Eh. I seem to have six-month reviews on the brain for some reason.
Carcharoth