[WikiEN-l] Re: Arbitration Committee term lengths

Thu Dec 23 09:46:43 UTC 2004

Sometimes I have the sense that the current mold of arbitration
committee has been decided upon as an ideal, stable, long-term
solution for devolving authority to make tough decisions about problem
users.   Unlike wiki itself, the AC arrangement is not scalable, save
perhaps through making mediation (which can readily absorb new
community members) better and more active.

If this has not been decided, and even the AC members are actively
thinking about ways to improve on the current system in scalable wiki
ways, then the length of the terms doesn't matter so much.  If the AC
members are setting out to design a system that will become the only
recourse for serious conflict resolution, and if being an arbiter 
will give them more of a say in how this system is structured than the
average community member will have, then it would be a tad worrisome.

On Tue, 21 Dec 2004 01:04:13 -0800, Michael Snow
<wikipedia at earthlink.net> wrote:
> It seems like a long time not just because Wikipedia is young, but
> because realistically, it is a very long-term commitment relatively to
> the contributing lifespan of quite a few Wikipedians. Turnover and
> attrition will happen among arbitrators as well.

I think that a good half of all admins (including many who would never
volunteer or campaign for such a post) would make fine arbiters.  Just
as adminship is no big deal, and involves taking on extra work for the
community, it might be useful if Arbitration posts were "not such a
big deal," and presented as posts that need filling for the community
to run well.

To address one of Angela's points, these posts should not be ones for
which one aggressively campaigns for reelection, perhaps not even
posts for which one stands for reelection.  If they are now being
fought over, rather than so undesirable that Jimbo has to twist a few
arms to fill seats, then perhaps we should address that issue, rather
than opting to hold elections as infrequently as possible.

On a tangent : the community *does* need more ways to acknowledge the
contributions of devoted community members.  This should not be
confused with the need for an effective AC.

-- 
+sj+