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The Wikipedia Mediation Committee was set up, along with the Arbitration Committee, in January 2004 by Jimmy Wales to assist in resolving disputes between users. It is part of the formal dispute resolution process on Wikipedia. Requests for a mediator to assist in a dispute are made at Wikipedia:Requests for mediation.
The role of the Mediation Committee is explicitly to try to resolve disputes, especially those involving content, to the mutual satisfaction of all. Mediation must be an honest attempt on the part of all parties to resolve disputes; parties to mediations should understand that they will be given the opportunity to express any concerns they have, but mediation is not a court hearing, and mediators do not issue binding decisions. The decision to mediate, and to abide by the result of mediation, is voluntary.
If you wish to contact the Mediation Committee via email, please do so by following this link while logged into your account. All emails will be then automatically forwarded to the Committee's internal mailing list for viewing and discussion.
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Members
- A sortable table listing all Committee Members is available at Wikipedia:Mediation Committee/Members.
Active Mediators
As of July 3, 2008.
Active Mediators
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Away (on a known and/or temporary absence) |
Mediators Emeriti
These members are the emeriti of the Mediation Committee; in practical terms, this means they are inactive on Committee activities, including mediations. Many are inactive having gone on to other duties, including the Arbitration Committee or the Board of Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation.
Mediators emeriti are welcome to re-list themselves as active at any time, and resume mediation of cases and other duties. Emeriti are often active on the Committee mailing list, and in other "behind-the-scenes" operations of the Mediation Committee, such as commenting on current nominations; they may choose to do this while inactive, as they wish.
Active Committee members who are taking a temporary leave of absence, including wikibreaks, may choose to list themselves as away instead of emeritus. Information on all Committee members, and their general activities, is available here.
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Click [show] to display the complete list of Emeriti Mediators
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Chair
The current Chair of the Mediation Committee is WJBscribe.
The role of the Chair is one of coordination, facilitation, and administration, rather than oversight or supervision. The role does not involve a hierarchy or authority within the Committee; instead, it provides a recognized spokesperson for the Committee's decisions and a designated individual to maintain Committee processes. Election of the Chair is held as needed on the Committee's internal mailing list.
The Chair will often initiate discussion on the mailing list in the event of an important or controversial decision, rather than immediately acting as the representative of the Committee as he or she does normally. Furthermore, cases are not assigned to mediators by the Chair; rather, mediators are independent in their choice of which cases they mediate, and how they conduct their mediations.
The typical tasks of the Chair, also carried out by other members of the Committee when the Chair is unavailable, include those listed here. Former Chairs have been: Daniel, ^demon, Essjay, Redwolf24, MacGyverMagic, Jwrosenzweig, Danny, Bcorr, Sannse and TUF-KAT.
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Click [show] to display the timeline of Mediation Committee Chairs
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MediationBot
- Further information: User:MediationBot1
MediationBot1 (talk • contribs • tasks • flag log • actions log • block log • other logs • count) is an automated Wikipedia bot used by the Mediation Committee to perform case management and other tasks as needed. As an official project of the Mediation Committee, MediationBot is only used for official Mediation Committee business.
The original bot, put online in July 2006, was the product of efforts by Tangotango, Misza13 and Pgk. ST47 kindly offered to rewrite the bot in November 2007 as the old bot was becoming slightly unreliable, and the new bot was written and put into action during late 2007. The Mediation Committee expresses sincere thanks to all these users for their efforts in developing and producing the bot.
If you have any comments, concerns or suggestions about this bot, please feel free to leave a message at Wikipedia talk:Mediation Committee. If you are forced to block this bot due to it malfunctioning, please also leave a note on the Committee's talk page so the problem can be fixed and the bot unblocked; you may also wish to contact the mailing list.
Membership and selection procedure
Members are selected by consensus of the Mediation Committee as a whole; nominations generally last between two weeks and one month, and are open to comment from both Committee members and non-Committee members. Emeritus members of the Mediation Committee retain the option to participate in nomination discussions as regular (active) Committee members. Non-Committee members are invited to comment and provide advice to the Committee about candidates and their suitability.
There is not a strict minimum amount of support necessary for a nomination to be promoted. However, the Committee does enforce a "two oppose rule"; the Committee has determined that any nomination opposed by two or more members of the Committee cannot be promoted. Final approval lies with Jimmy Wales, though he rarely comments on nominations. Promoted candidates are requested to join the Committee's internal mailing list.
There are no set standards for Committee members, though certain trends have developed over time. Appointment to the Mediation Committee is an appointment to an official Wikipedia committee, and requires a certain level of community trust. Involvement in the Wikipedia community is also a key factor, as is experience in Wikipedia dispute resolution; nominees should be able to demonstrate a strong history of resolving disputes on Wikipedia and interacting positively with the community. Self-nominations from prospective mediators are always welcome and current Committee members are often on the lookout for strong candidates to nominate. Interested candidates should read and follow the procedure outlined at Wikipedia:Mediation Committee/Nominations/Procedure to submit their nomination.
Current nominations
- Old nominations are archived at Wikipedia:Mediation Committee/Nominations.
MBisanz
MBisanz (talk · contribs) I'd like to nominate Matt to join the committee. He's been an administrator for quite a few months now showing he has the communities trust (he hasn't had any problems so far anyway!). As far of solving disputes - he's quite a regular on the admin noticeboards, always adding a voice of reason into debates and stopping them esculating. He's got substantial experience with the mediation cabal and has helped them solve a number of disputes. Last month he mediated a case for us (Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Peter Yarrow) and brought it to a successful ending. If you take a look at the case, you'll see he's a calm guy and isn't phased by disputes - he makes sure he understands disputes before walking into them, and then offers sound advice to all parties. Hopefully everyone will understand his ability to mediate cases and support this request. Ryan Postlethwaite 00:59, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
Questions from Committee members:
- What are the core principles of Mediation Committee mediation?
- The core principles of mediation are that it is voluntary, privileged, content focused, impartial, and participant driven. This means that all parties must agree to mediate a matter, that the Medcom discussions cannot be used in other forums such as RFC/RFAR, that the Mediator must take an impartial position with regard to the matters being discussed, that only content and not behavior is discussed, and that solutions are only reached through all parties working together to resolve their differences.
- Discussions during formal mediation are privileged; they cannot be used against the parties in later proceedings (e.g. RfArb/RfC). Why is that important?
- Parties in mediation may make offers of compromise as to their position on content, if these offers can be brought up later as a sign of flip-flopping, they may be less likely to make such offers, and hinder the mediation process. Also, individuals are encouraged to be honest as to their positions and beliefs in mediation, if those beliefs could be cited later in behavioral dispute resolution proceedings, it would hamper the free flowing nature of the mediation process.
- What prior experience do you have in resolving disputes on Wikipedia? Please provide links, and how will these experiences help you to be an effective Committee member?
- At the request of the MedCom I mediated Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Peter Yarrow to a successful conclusion of a stable article version that complied with relevant policies.
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- I mediated Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-01-07 Bates method which resulted in a no-decision due to the inability of the parties to focus on content.
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- With Doug (talk · contribs), Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-01-18 Political positions of John Edwards resulted in early closure due to a party declining to participate in the process.
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- Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-01-19 Australian rules football was closed as at an impasse due to party bickering, later one of the parties began attacking and harassing me for mediating the matter, resulting in an indef block on his account at enwp, commons, meta, itwp, eswp, and a current debate at simple-wp.
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- I participated in setting up the formatting of Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-03-18 Second Intifada and some initial efforts, and handed it over to Steve Crossin when it appeared the parties were at a deadlock and needed fresh assistance.
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- I believe these experiences have prepared me for service on MedCom by giving me a firm understanding of the Mediation process at its best and its worst. Some of these cases showed where individuals could overcome internal prejudice in the interests of writing an accurate article, others showed the worst in editors, with threats of violence, non-participation boycotting, etc, so I've seen a good spectrum of what I imagine mediators would see in cases. Thank you again Ryan for your nomination.
Mediation Committee:
- Support as nominator - Matt is a good guy and would do well in the role. Ryan Postlethwaite 01:01, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
- Support - Matt has an excellent track record in mediation and general common sense. Shell babelfish 06:50, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
- Support Level headed and not bound by preconceptions. KillerChihuahua?!? 22:59, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
Community opinions:
- Has the right experience for the job and is very trustworthy. I can support this. Acalamari 23:23, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse. Appropriate experience in mediation, always willing and capable of providing a reasoned voice to disputes. Rudget (logs) 19:22, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
Discussion and comments:
Decision of the Mediation Committee:
See also
- Wikipedia:Mediation, the Mediation policy by which the Committee operates.
- Wikipedia:Requests for mediation, the page on which requests for the Committee to mediate a dispute are presented.
- Wikipedia:Resolving disputes, Wikipedia's page describing the process by which disputes are to be resolved on-wiki.
- Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal, a "gathering area" where informal mediators are invited to take cases. It provides informal mediation.
- Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee, the MedCom's sister Committee. The ArbCom handles user conduct issues, as opposed to content disputes.
Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 24 June 2008, at 17:04.
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