Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Sortan/Proposed decision

Three points:

1. I have served my time. Like any editor who has developed a pattern of editing in a particular editor, I found it difficult to completely switch off and have made some mistakes. For this, I have suffered two blocks - one of four hours (despite not breaking the terms of the ruling given to me, but apparently breaking the summary on the requests for admin enforcement page, which I hadn't seen and hadn't been brough to my attention), and one of four days for one edit, which I realised I had made in error straight away (but by then it was too late (when you have a wikistalker, no error goes unpunished!). The evidence is clear that the earlier remedy is working. There is no need to make any further ruling against me.
2. It may interest the Committee to know my thoughts on the matter. I no longer see the point of my earlier activities. I have always argued we should prefer BC and AD notation solely because it is overwhelmingly the most common notation, and the only one generally understood. Although I still think this is a good principle, it is clear that for the foreseeable future it is a view that will never gain consensus, and so there is little point in pushing the issue. As with other issues of linguistic preference, Wikipedia will swing back and forth between various notations, but (absent a general external force preventing or enforcing change - which ArbCom, and probably the community at large, is against) it will flow in the direction of the most common usage - not because of any nefarious reasons, but simply because people tend to edit using words and phrases they are most familiar with. Of course, if CE/BCE notation does become more popular on a worldwide level, we should use it more frequently, and we will - and I have always said that that should be the case. Similarly, if its already low level of popularity dwindles further, then its usage on Wikipedia will dwindle too. I fully accept there is no need to fight this - editors editing naturally will keep a balance, jguk 20:52, 13 January 2006 (UTC)Reply
3. I brought this case because I was being wikistalked - and the proposed findings written by Fred Bauder support this argument. I was wikistalked to such an extent that, had it increased to include the cricket-related edits I made, I would have been forced off Wikipedia. Very few significant contributors to Wikipedia (and I suggest i am a significant contributor to Wikipedia) can truthfully claim to have an unblemished record - to have had no edits which, on reflection, they would wish they had not made. Bringing an ArbCom case is a risk for such editors (and I admit I knew it was a risk when I started this one - but, quite frankly, had Sortan continued his behaviour unabated I would have chosen to leave WP anyway as I would have remained restricted to making edits that Sortan personally approved of). Bringing in further remedies against me when, had I chosen not to bring this case there is absolutely no question that all I would be subject to is the earlier remedy (not enhanced ones), will only show that editors with a genuine grievance come to ArbCom at a terrible risk to themselves - and that having a long history of contributions is a distinct disadvantage, jguk 20:35, 13 January 2006 (UTC)Reply