Why are you doing what could be construed as "asking for it?" The Brandt Treatment, that is.

TW is a glutton for PUNISHMENT....

I'm oddly reminded of the old joke in which the masochist says "Hurt me, please hurt me!" and the sadist says: "Noooo!"

Arguably, if Taxwoman and Poetlister both get on hivemind, it's yet another argument against them being sockpuppets of Runcorn.

Maybe that's what Daniel Brandt believes, and maybe it isn't, but you're a better person than that, aren't you?

Why stoop to his level when he hasn't even done anything to you? ..."Eye for an eye" and soon everyone's blind.

It appears to me that Mr. Brandt is starting to anger people who weren't even ever involved in his issue with Wikipedia before. Thus, his conflict with Wikipedia is beginning to escalate into involvement by previously uninvolved people.

I am sure he doesn't care. I don't care. This isn't a popularity test. Your cult is out of control.

And your clue dispenser is out of clues, but don't let that stop you. I think putting Cla68 in the "cult" camp is probably a bit wide of the mark.

I believe the unstated subtext of Taxwoman's action in this regard is that Daniel actually has done something objectionable to her, in so far as his public identification of User:Newyorkbrad caused the departure from WP of perhaps the only ArbCom member who might have been willing to take up her case to be unblocked, along with that of Poetlister. At the moment there would seem to be very little chance of either of them being reinstated any time soon, despite the absurdity of the idea that either of them are "sockpuppets" of anybody.

That is, unless you'd like to give it a shot, Lar? Right now might not be the best time, of course.

Who could Daniel sue?, just about everyone connected in fact. You, LFS (unless they can show they took reasonable steps to comply with a take-down request) and quite possibly even any ISPs involved.

UK libel laws with regard to online defamation differ substantially from the American laws that cover Wikipedia's arse. There is no CDA sec 230 defence. There is now even a precedent in English case law with a substantial finding in favor of the defamed party, that any subsequent Judge could find binding.

The OiNK torrent tracker case last year showed with painful clarity just how UK ISPs will fold like a chinese laundry when presented with a writ, so I'd suggest to you that 'it aint just The teddy bear that nominally controls Wipipedia' who needs to consider this proposed action very carefully.

I've precious little love left for Brandt at this juncture, so it galls me to be seen to be taking his side here, I'm not. I'm taking yours, and telling you to tread very carefully. Here be tygers.

all usual IMNAL's apply

This is correct. The last thing Daniel Brandt wants is more eyes on whether or not he's notable. He has shown himself to be pretty irrational about his interests in the past few days.

Actually Brad was working on the poetlister case as an arb both at my request and that of other he didn't name.

...and there is also a different level of proof. In the UK, you do not have to show that someone meant something to be defamatory, the test is that it could be reasonably interpreted as such. So to defend, you can't rebut by proving that it could be interpreted as a non-defamatory statement, you have to demonstrate that the statement could not reasonably be interpreted as defamatory - recognised to be tricky.

And the other problem is that you can get far bigger damages over in the UK for this which is why there have been a number of cases where Americans have come across here to fight their cases if they can find some link to the UK.

So, I'd guess that this would not be likely to get to that point, but recognise that you cannot rely on the law to protect you, instead you are relying on the inertia or the lack of funds to finance a legal case.

To be honest, if TW were threatening the same to me, I'd send a C&D letter to her ISP who would take the site down so fast it would make her pretty head spin.

I'd recommend against it TW. You're in the wrong country to play games with libel.

I saw this thread as slightly tongue-in-cheek (or somewhere) Hence the teddy lol, though I think perhaps he needs a gimp mask (just because gimp is an intrinsically funny word and they look silly).

Anyway, Taxwoman hasn't even said what would be in the article, she is not stupid she wouldn't put anything actually libellous. Honestly, getting all 'ooooh, you'll be sued, and/or we'll get your site taken down,' when she hasn't even written a word. Talk about intimidating and trigger-happy on the old threats.

Exactly. He was working on the case. As he's no longer an arb, thanks to a certain person who has nothing whatsoever to do with the management of the site (and we all stress that), he can't work on the case any more.

PL. Perhaps you should reflect on why, after all you know about Wikipedia, you would want to waste more of your precious lifespan editing Wikipedia. Its really a psychological addiction to a drug that you should be grateful that you're blocked from taking, but instead you crave more.

Why?

Brad had also invited me to submit my own inquiry to him via email, which I did just 10 hours before NYB disclosed here his intention to resign.

Taxwoman, I can't help feeling that this came a bit late. Shouldn't you have done it while Daniel was doing his blackmail act?

On the other hand, everyone is entitled to an opinion. If Taxwoman says "I believe that Daniel Brandt acted against the best interests of Poetlister and myself, and did nothing to further his own interests, by doing something after he was repeatedly warned not to", that is not libel. Similarly, if he replies "I am old enough to be Taxwoman's father, so I believe that I know better than she does about whatever subject you may name" (as he may well do), that is not libel either.

Also, if someone believes something is true and acts under that belief, doesn't believe or know they are spreading a lie, that's not liable under libel law either.

Anyway, Taxwoman hasn't implied she'll say anything libelous, it more looks to me from her first post in this thread, with the ted etc, that she will be witty and light-hearted.

I really shouldn't speak on her behalf, but don't forget she's an admin/bureaucrat on WikiQuote, and I think maybe even WikiSource now as well. So that kind of treatment of her on WP undermines her on those other projects, and probably has a general divisive effect between the two (or three) "communities." It's actually kind of dumb, when you think about it.

It's also possible to find PL's real name on the interwebs, so by calling her a "sockpuppet," WP is insulting an identifiable real person and effectively accusing her of cheating. (Obviously we do that sort of thing around here too, but we're not as highly ranked, obviously.)

Entirely incorrect!

Ignorance is no defense in English law

From all I've heard/read, it is- if the person believe it is true they're not knowingly spreading falsehood.

"There are defences in law for libel. The publisher could prove the statement to be true, it could be fair comment - so long as the opinion is based on true facts, is genuinely held and not influenced by malice" http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2006/...ticsandthemedia

"Statements must not be published `maliciously'. Reports are published with `malice' if the publisher knew the report was untrue, or was reckless as to its truth, or intended to injure the complainant." http://www.hse.gov.uk/enforce/enforcementg.../defamation.htm

"Other factors that may be considered in making a finding of defamation are whether the person making the statement knows or believes the statement to be true" http://www.faceintel.com/defamation.htm

Blackmail is a crime, Guy.

Last one is an American web site. Note in the other cases, falsehood was not an absolute requirement.

But basically, publish the truth, in a way that is not intended to be injurious, and you are OK. Publish the truth in a way that is malicious then you can still be in trouble. For example, it might be that Dan has parented a mad axe murderer.* If you went around posting notices that Dan was the parent of a mad axe murderer, that might be held to be defamatory in that is was entirely true, but the implication of responsibility for the actions of his offspring was unfair and injurious, and the posting of notices could be assumed to be malicious.

It is worth considering that some BLPs are likely to be actionable in the UK.

For example, there is a local business woman round the corner from me who is nationally famous. Her biography on Wikipedia repeated some rumour that she had been having an affair. She is married with children. I have no idea whether it was true or not, but no mainstream newspaper would bother printing it, and they would have to demonstrate that they had a good reason. It was uncited and removed quickly, but it still remains in history, giving the name and profession of the other person, from over a year ago. I would think that she could still get the WMF for holding that in history.

So Wikipedians spout away about how they are safe publishing BLPs as long as they are cited. Well, wrong. Forget about American law. Wikipedia is published in the UK, and therefore can be sued in the UK. WMF could be forced to defend themselves in the UK, because if they refused to take part in the trial, they could have summary judgment against them. They might live in the US, but they would not be able to visit Britain.

The other thing you need to be careful on is that in the UK there is a court case about a member of the Royal family being subject ot a blackmail attempt. No UK publication can repeat the accusation because of the court order, and because of the damaging nature of the allegation. The name is well known outside the UK because foreign publications are not subject to the law. Guess what? Wikipedia publishes the allegation. Is that appropriate?

*No doubt your average Wikipedian admin would find this entirely plausible.

Really?

I didn't know that holding delusional beliefs excuses someone from being accountable for spreading malicious falsehoods.

And if I'm wrong about that, then here I am deluding myself whilst propagating a falsehood.

I dont think you're entirely on safe ground there citing a source that concerns itself primarily with californian law. English courts are far more apt to follow english case law.

Again: a principle tennent of English law is that ignorance of the law is no defence.
As previously the caveat of IANAL applies, compouned by the factor that I'm currently considerably drunker than youw! (old Harry Enfield ref ) & watching Liverpool taking a kicking at the hands of chelsea!)

Our NY lawyer may indeed practice law in tenant/landlord cases, but he would still adhere to the tenets of the law.

I'm sure that's true in the US, too, but it's hardly relevant to the question of whether ignorance of _facts_ is or is not a defense.

Yes that's what I mean.

Amazing... an administrator on a wiki with single-digit edits per day is blackmailing or otherwise threatening another person with their authority on said wiki. In the words of Jim Halpert, "This is the smallest amount of power I've ever seen go to a person's head". Taxwoman, you are pathetic.

You are confusing ignorance of the law with ignorance of the fact an allegation was false. Ignorance of the law is no excuse, but that's not really the point here.

English Common Law does not have strict liability - that means you need to show both harm and fault. "No liability without fault" (Donahue vs Stevenson). If I do you harm, you need also to show fault - malice, negligence or "evil intent". If the posting is innocent, and the person had a reasonable belief it was true, then it is impossible to show negligence.

With libel, you need to show that someone propagated a damaging untruth, and that they either knew or should have known it was untrue. That is, that they acted with malice or grossly negligently, with indifference to the consequences.

Oh, I am not a lawyer, but I am right (I think). Usual disclaimers.

The "other he didn't name" was either me or a respected administrator who I asked to whisper in an arbitrator's ear.

I concur with Poetlister and others that a positive outcome is substantially less likely now that Newyorkbrad has left the building.

I wish the arbitrators could see what I see.

1. Poetlister is innocent.
2. Even if she's guilty, isn't 11 months long enough?

The evidence of Poetlister's innocence, taken as a whole, is rock-solid. I've come full circle. I began this discussion a month ago thinking Poetlister was 100% guilty. Now I know she's 100% innocent. The claim that Runcorn's alleged sockpuppets never, or almost never, interleaved edits with one another is demonstrably false. The claim that Runcorn's sockpuppets never, or almost never, voted against one another is demonstrably false. I have demonstrated these points to Poetlister in private correspondence.

Although ArbCom was wrong to ignore the exculpatory evidence in May 2007, I understand why they did. Everyone makes mistakes. I can demonstrate that Poetlister is innocent, but it would be difficult to demonstrate that ArbCom should have known she was innocent.

The situation has changed. It no longer matters for Poetlister's sake whether she had sockpuppets or not. When is it time to make peace? Counting the original ban in December 2005 and January 2006, Poetlister has already been banned for more than a year. Should she be banned for a second year? Five years? Ten years? Twenty years?

Poetlister says on meta that she was born in 1980. She's 27 years old (maybe 28). She has a long, fruitful life to be blessed with.

Maybe it's better for Poetlister's sake that she not edit Wikipedia. But it's better for Wikipedia's sake that they let her back in. If only I could convince someone of that.

What should I do? Post on the administrator's noticeboard? Firsfron of Ronchester tried that in August 2007 and was shot down. Post to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration? Firsfron tried that too, and was shot down again. Email the committee, which ArbCom has said is the only way they will hear this case? I've tried that, and evidently I'm not the first person who has done this. So far, we are on the way to being shot down, I fear. I hope I am wrong about this. Ask Jimbo to intervene? Some guy tried that in 2005 and was shot down.

Seriously, people, what should I do? What can I do?

If I were an administrator on Wikipedia, I could act unilaterally. Remember Yanksox? He deleted the Daniel Brandt article and wheel-warred to keep it deleted. Jimbo wasn't too happy about that, but in the hindsight of historical perspective, it's clear that Yanksox did the right thing.

Where's is Poetlister's Yanksox? Who will do the right thing for her? Or is there some other way to solve this intractable problem?

Note to moderators: I'm sorry that I keep hijacking every thread to comment about Poetlister. If you want to move this post elsewhere, that's fine. We should have a Poetlister's Law on Wikipedia Review: as the length of a thread approaches infinity, the probability that someone will discuss Poetlister's ban approaches one.

Shalom

I want to clear my name. At the moment, the second Google hit for Poetlister is an allegation that I am a sockpuppet, that I'm a fraud and don't really exist.

Please learn a bit of basic numeracy and common sense, Mr Miltopia. Wipipedia has a lot more edits than Hivemind. Where were you when Daniel Brandt was blackmailing or otherwise threatening NYB with his authority on Hivemind?

Weird.

Jon

Mr Awbrey, please stop discussing yourself in this thread.

That is about how I saw it too, but I couldn't come up with a pithy quote or anything. Well said.

Please learn a bit of basic numeracy and common sense, Mr Game. Wipipedia has a lot more edits than Hivemind. Where were you when Daniel Brandt was blackmailing or otherwise threatening NYB with his authority on Hivemind? Shouldn't someone in your line of business be a little more supportive of NYB?

Why, then, is Brandt not more pathetic? I imagine that Hivemind is even less well known than Wipipedia.

The whole world's not a wiki. Brandt's sites have immeasurably more influence than a fetish wiki. Come to think of it perhaps all wikis are driven by fetish motives. It seems to me Wikipedia is to scholarship almost exactly what a fetish is to a complete sexual relationship. I think the psychodynamic folks call it "partialization."




I have no problem with anyone posting IRL identifying information about any WP admin or official. I do not believe that it should be posted or removed based on specific conduct or meeting demands. I said as much during the discussions.

Can You Spell …

"Identification With The Oppressor" ???

Jon

Why do you have a problem with a responsible adult posting what will no doubt be a fair and balanced article about Daniel?

First of all, I'm in two minds as to what Daniel Brandt "does" is ever justified - believe it or not, "eye for an eye" is not my personal philosophy (any behavior that would indicate the contrary was more likely geared towards getting lulz then vengeance, and revenge was a likely unintentional byproduct), but there are times when I think eye for an eye is justified even if it doesn't suit my taste. So this shouldn't be taken as necessarily condemning or cheerleading Brandt, particularly in Newyorkbrad's case, which I know almost nothing about.

That said, the threats are a bit different. Hivemind has a bit more relevant of an audience than Wipipedia. Wikipedians read Hivemind and fear it. More importantly, anyone with a grudge against Wikipedia reads Hivemind - trolls and other malcontents, some of them quite malicious. But who cares about Wipipedia? How many people who actually know about Brandt and would give a shit if his "biography" was up there are ever going to see? So a lack of "numeracy"' isn't what's causing my contempt here, as Brandt's threats - again, not that I'm endorsing such threats - carry a good deal of weight, as we've seen time and time again, while Taxwoman's carries basically zero.

The motives of the two are different as well. Brandt often, thought not always, makes these threats of his in order to get damaging stuff about him off a Google-friendly website. No doubt there's some malice there, but you know what? They're shitty to him. They kept that biography for him out of pure spite. And they used any discussion of the subject as an excuse to drag him through the mud at NO benefit to the encyclopedia, while their most "responsible" and "trusted" site administrators joined in the pig-pile rather than do their duty to put a stop to such nonsense (I for one will not soon forget Lar's asinine, vulgar characterization of Brandt, bolded and capitalized like a 4chan tantrum). So Brandt at least is doing what he can out of self-protection here. Taxwoman, on the other hand, has nothing to gain from this blackmail, and just has a stick up her posterior (and not in the usual way either).


So go ahead and check off "numeracy" as a flaw in my judgment here, and then common sense too. I dunno, having thought about this enough to write this much actually makes me think all the worse of Taxwoman's pitiful threat.

Brandt and the vengeful faction of Wikipedians are playing PaintBall with India Ink.

Really, GlassBeadGame as a moderator here should know better than to repeat what Miltopia says.

Taxwoman has played it wrong; she should have said this when Daniel Brandt was bullying NYB. But beyond doubt she has been wronged by Daniel; I told him so, and so did other mods. And it is not an empty threat; Daniel does not want a biography anywhere that would show up on a Google search, and unquestionably a Wipipedia article would show up, though not as prominently as a Wikipedia one.

Miltopia would have had more credence had he warned Daniel as others did before this happened.

GlassBeadGame was likely repeating what I said because he agreed with me, guy. Has this entire forum in my short absence already degenerated to dismissing viewpoints based on from whom they come rather than their substance, or is that just something unique to you?

I wasn't attacking the observation because it came from Miltopia. I was saying that it was a silly and hypocritical point; I'd have said the same if Somey had made it. My point was that GBG ought to have known better than to make the same observation.

On second thoughts, if Somey had made it, I wouldn't have replied. I'd just have left the site quietly.

Is there any credible evidence that Daniel heeds any warnings from any quarters?

If not, then I daresay he would be susceptible to the kind of hubris that generates yet another variant of The Hamartian Chronicles.

He's a bit short on straight answers when it comes to such matters. Same as the silly and pointless piece of revenge he indulged in when he put me up there. And as for Lar, well who knows why he did that.

Guess that makes two of us, so.