1. Skills/interests: Which of the following tasks will you be prepared and qualified to perform regularly as an arbitrator? Your responses should indicate how your professional/educational background makes you suitable to the tasks.
   • (a) reviewing cases, carefully weighing up the evidence, and voting and commenting on proposed decisions;
   • (b) drafting proposed decisions for consideration by other arbitrators;
   • (c) voting on new requests for arbitration (on the requests page) and motions for the clarification or modification of prior decisions;
   • (d) considering appeals from banned or long-term-blocked users, such as by serving on the Ban Appeals Subcommittee or considering the Subcommittee's recommendations;
   • (e) overseeing the allocation and use of checkuser and oversight permissions, including the vetting and community consultation of candidates for them, and/or serving on the Audit Subcommittee or reviewing its recommendations;
   • (f) running checkuser checks (arbitrators generally are given access to CU if they request it) in connection with arbitration cases or other appropriate requests;
   • (g) carrying out oversight or edit suppression requests (arbitrators are generally also given OS privileges);
   • (h) drafting responses to inquiries and concerns forwarded to the Committee by editors;
   • (i) interacting with the community on public pages such as arbitration and other talk pages;
   • (j) performing internal tasks such as coordinating the sometimes-overwhelming arbcom-l mailing list traffic.

   A: Please forgive the colour, it's the best way I can think of to distinguish my text from the questions (if anybody has trouble seeing it, let me know and I'll change it). All of these are essential tasks, but no one person can fulfil each and every role all the time. I would certainly be active in hearing cases, requests and drafting statements etc. I've had considerable experience in copy editing and content writing and, in real life, I've studied Law, so I'm not afraid of writing. I'd also be willing to help with the administrative side of things, such as handling emails and mailing lists. I would also be keen to help with the AUSC, while`monitoring the oversight requests for the kind of things that require swift actions.

2. Stress: How will you be able to cope with the stress of being an arbitrator, potentially including on- and off-wiki threats and abuse, and attempts to embarrass you by the public "outing" of personal information?

   A:I've dealt with many of these things as an administrator. At first, I was bothered by it, but I quickly learned to laugh it off and deny recognition to the trolls, vandals etc. The best way to deal with such people is to revert, block and ignore

3. Principles: Assume the four principles linked to below are directly relevant to the facts of a new case. Would you support or oppose each should it be proposed in a case you are deciding, and why? A one- or two-sentence answer is sufficient for each. Please regard them in isolation rather than in the context of their original cases.
   • (a) "Private correspondence"

     A:I strongly agree with this principle. The contents of emails etc should not be made public without the consent of the sender. If they thought it necessary to communicate privately, then their desire for privacy should be respected. However, it may sometimes be necessary, in cases of abuse, to discuss the communication itself on-wiki and this principle should not prevent action being taken as a result of email evidence (for example of sock-puppetry).

   • (b) "Responsibility"

     A:Couldn't agree more. If an editor or administrator can't justify an action, then they shouldn't do it. If their justification is private or sensitive, then they should refer it to ArbCom (preferably before taking action) and let the Committee decide on the best course of action and how much, if any, information to make public.

   • (c) "Perceived legal threats"

     A:I agree with this to a certain extent. One should refrain from using wording that might make another editor reasonably believe the first editor might be contemplating legal action. However, using legal terminology is not necessarily the same as a threat of legal action. For example, an editor might accuse me of being negligent in in one of my actions, but I wouldn't assume that they intended to sue me for negligence. The context should be carefully considered, both by the threatened party and by those considering any action against the editor making the threat.

   • (d) "Outing"

     A:This is a little weaker than I'd like it to be, however, I agree with the principle that information posted by an editor cannot be considered "outing" if later posted by another editor. For example, I post openly that I'm an Englishman so, if somebody were to later post that about me, it couldn't be considered "outing". I do believe, though, that a pseudonymous editor who discloses their real name should be allowed to redact that and that later posting of it (with malicious intent) should be considered the same as "outing".

4. Strict versus lenient: Although every case is different and must be evaluated on its own merits, would you side more with those who tend to believe in second chances and lighter sanctions, or with those who support a greater number of bans and desysoppings? What factors might generally influence you? Under what circumstances would you consider desysopping an admin without a prior ArbCom case?

   A:ArbCom has a very broad range of potential sanctions at its disposal and deciding which is the most appropriate requires judgement and obviously depends on the merits if the case. I would tend to believe that a full site ban should be a last resort and, in most cases, topic bans, interaction bans or other measures should be attempted first. As for desysopping, only in the case of serious abuse of the tools or a compromised account do I believe this should be used without a full case. After a full case, it is a measure that should be used in cases where an administrator has clearly lost the trust of the community or where they have consistently exercised poor judgement in the use of the tools or have conducted themselves in some other way unbecoming an administrator. ArbCom desysoppings should not preclude that editor standing at RfA in the future and the question of their regaining the tools should be up to the community.

5. ArbCom and policies: Do you agree or disagree with this statement: "ArbCom should not be in the position of forming new policies, or otherwise creating, abolishing or amending policy. ArbCom should rule on the underlying principles of the rules. If there is an area of the rules that leaves something confused, overly vague, or seemingly contrary to common good practice, then the issue should be pointed out to the community". Please give reasons.

   A:As I see it, ArbCom fulfils a role very similar to that of a Supreme Court. While policies and guidelines are decided by community consensus (rather like statutes being passed by a government), ArbCom, as the "Wikipedia Supreme Court", deals in "common law", adjudicating disputes based on an interpretation of policies and guidelines. It may take the opportunity to clarify or interpret a particular policy but the community should ultimately decide if that interpretation is correct. ArbCom should not be in the business of creating or abolishing policy. It is, after all, ArbCom, not GovCom.

6. Conduct/content: ArbCom has historically not made direct content rulings, e.g., how a disputed article should read. To what extent can ArbCom aid in content disputes? Can, and should, the Committee establish procedures by which the community can achieve binding content dispute resolution in the event of long-term content disputes that the community has been unable to resolve?

   A:ArbCom should stick to ruling on principles and findings of fact. It can clarify what a particular policy says or even what it says with regard to a particular case, but exactly how it applies to a disputed article or passage should be determined by the community. Of course, if the community can come up with a working, binding dispute resolution mechanism, this would be preferable to decisions being imposed from "upon high".

7. Success in handling cases: Nominate the cases from 2010 you think ArbCom handled more successfully, and those you think it handled less successfully? Please give your reasons.

   A:This is difficult, because, obviously, the full effects of many of these decisions have yet to be seen. I think the banning of ChildofMidnight was one of the more controversial decisions. It's always extremely regrettable when such extreme action is being taken against somebody who has done much good for the project, but the project is bigger than any one of its editors. It has to be. Global Warming and Israel-Palestine have also been controversial, but, from my experience at AE, the latter at least appears to be having some positive affects in that some of the years-long edit wars have been cooled. I think it's too early to tell for the former.

8. Proposals for change? What changes, if any, in how ArbCom works would you propose as an arbitrator, and how would you work within the Committee towards bringing these changes about?

   A:The way that cases are handled needs to be refomred. The sheer size if the average case is enough to put anyone off. Cases need to be shorter and quicker. I would also be keen to see AUSC take on a role which sees it investigate complaints about improper admin actions with the power to restrict or desysop admin found to have abused their tools or used poor judgement. Not having been on ArbCom, I'm not sure how I could bring this about, but I would certainly be keen to keep raising the issue.

This section is for individual questions asked to this specific candidate. Each eligible voter may ask a limit of one "individual" question by posting it below. The question should:

• be clearly worded and brief, with a limit of 75 words in display mode;
• be specific to this candidate (the same individual question should not be posted en masse onto candidates' pages);
• not duplicate other questions (editors are encouraged to discuss the merging of similar questions);

Election coordinators will either remove questions that are inconsistent with the guidelines or will contact the editor to ask for an amendment. Editors are, of course, welcome to post questions to candidates' user talk pages at any time.

Please add the question under the line below using the following format:

1. Question:

   A:

1. Question: Is your questions talk page open for additional questions? NW (Talk) 22:09, 22 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   A:A question about more questions? Yes, absolutely. Feel free to ask anything you you want to know. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 00:39, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

2. Question: It's not surprising that hotly contested content areas (such as Israel-Palestine) generate ArbCom incidents. You mention that ArbCom can remind people of policy on a topic area to reign in truly fringe editors and resolve the dispute. What about areas where policy negotiations have failed? Should ArbCom ever apply a remedy that creates a community-run dispute resolution mechanism to find agreement on even a few principles for that topic? Shooterwalker (talk) 00:36, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   A: In a dispute such as that, there are, inevitably, going to be editors with opposite, but equally extreme and strongly-held views. Such people may never come to some kind of compromise (but that's not to say we shouldn't try). More co-operative editors (often the ones with the less "extreme" viewpoints) from opposite sides of a dispute should be encouraged to discuss how a certain policy applies to this dispute and to try to come to a compromise in a small group. The hope is that they can reach some form of agreement on smaller, "bitesize" issues rather than focusing on the entirety of a sprawling dispute such as I/P. This fosters good will (hopefully they stop seeing each other as "the enemy") and they can then try to work out other smaller issues and encourage other editors to co-operate with this process. That's not to say that they'll be able to find a mutually-agreeable solution on everything, but finding solutions to some, smaller issues would hopefully reduce the acrimony and limit the scope of any decision that has to be imposed by ArbCom. I suppose you could call it "divide and conquer". HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 00:51, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   Just for clarification... it sounds like you're supportive of ArbCom at least trying to encourage a new round of community-led dispute resolution, if the situation calls for it. Are you suggesting that ArbCom creates an RFC with a smaller negotiating table, or an RFC with an enumerated list of smaller issues that might allow even one or two areas of agreement to emerge? Or both/neither? Shooterwalker (talk) 01:00, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   Both, but probably in a much more ad-hoc format than an RfC. Perhaps a dedicated page in the WT namespace where a relatively small number of editors from each side try to hash out some kind of compromise on smaller slices of the pie rather than a free for all scrap over the entire pie. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:26, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   Thanks! Very clear now. Good luck! Shooterwalker (talk) 02:10, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

3. Question: As recently as August you reacted to criticism of your admin actions by making an involved block on the on the other party. Your reasoning of "legal threat" was resoundingly rejected at ANI and your block was quickly overturned. If you react this poorly to criticism why should we think you'd react better with an even increased level of criticism?--Cube lurker (talk) 06:07, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   A:That was not a response to a criticism of my admin action, but a response (later held to be a poor one at ANI) to what I felt was an accusation of libel. It resulted from my blocking an account that was either evading a ban or impersonating somebody evading a ban. I deal with criticism by trying not to take things (including myself) too seriously and by taking a break from the keyboard if necessary. I anticipate ArbCom being a high-stress role, so my content contributions will probably get better as I find article writing another good way to relieve stress. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 14:19, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   The link to the incident in question along with further comment can be found at WT:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2010/Candidates/HJ Mitchell.--Cube lurker (talk) 15:35, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

4. Question: According to this tool, you have at the time made 4 edits to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case. How familiar are you with the arbitration process? Why do you think you would handle the arbitrator post well? HeyMid (contributions) 09:36, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   A:Interesting. I thought I had more edits there. It's fairly rare that I have a strong enough opinion on a dispute that I feel the need to make the case page even longer than it already is, so I don't often comment. However, I do keep a lazy eye on what goes on over there, so I'm familiar with the procedures, at least from a non-arb point of view. I've also participated in arbitration enforcement, so I tend to do my homework and read the relevant past cases as well as monitoring the progress of cases in anticipation that I might end up enforcing the decisions made there. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 14:19, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   So you mean that you usually keep a good eye at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case (and other ArbCom-related pages), but not making any statements/edits there so often? Also, you've made 8 edits at the enforcement page. I don't know whether most (or all) of those edits were related to one case only. HeyMid (contributions) 14:34, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

   I keep an eye on them, but tend not to get actively involved. I've made a few actions from WP:AE, but I've also issued a lot of warnings relating to ArbCom sanctions and imposed a few 1RRs, particularly a few months ago in the I/P dispute. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 14:51, 23 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]