Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Mantanmoreland/Proposed decision/Archive3

Yeah, it's demoralizing, but it's not worth quiting yet. I admit there [http://www.wikback.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=3593#Post3593 might be good reasons that ArbCom is doing this.] It's surely chilling to realize that a Wikipedia verdict might find its way into a real-world court battle some day. I would hesitate to sign such an opinion myself.

So I'm just waiting for the community to get the case back. I have a lot of real life work to do in the next two weeks, so I've got to stop following this impotent ArbCom; I'm taking a Wikivacation.

I find that this discussion has become unreadable anyway. It's also increasingly populated with people radically unfamiliar with the evidence, who ask asinine questions about what "SH" means. I've also been disappointed with the Arbitrator's candor. For example, I'm not sure how many times I've asked about the supposed stylistic dissimilarities between Mantanmoreland's and Samiharris' emails, but no one to date has answered this question. I can only assume that either (1) we're found contemptible by certain members of the community, or (2) that these claims are based on analysis significantly more prone to selection bias and mysterious methodology than anything I've posted.

Someone email me when the community has the case back. I suggest three remedies as a starting point for discussion:

1. Indefinite block of User:Samiharris, an account which has engaged in prolific POV-pushing, and is also apparently a sockpuppet. Some suggest that he might actually be WordBomb. I think that claim is absurd on its face, but if you really believe that, then he should still be blocked—unless we honestly believe that WordBomb is welcome to edit here. [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/Mantanmoreland/Proposed_decision&diff=195960578&oldid=195960104 Pascal.Tesson summarizes this case very well.]
2. Topic ban for User:Mantanmoreland on W/Overstock topics, including naked short selling. I think the community can safely draw a conclusion of COI from this evidence, and based on apparent promotional and POV-pushing edits. I also think it's a reasonable restriction. We're only talking about five articles here. Except NSS, Mantanmoreland has been avoiding these articles since September anyway. I should hope that the Wikipedia community, acting on sound and public evidence, should command as much respect as SlimVirgin's private request based on a hunch.
3. Optionally, a block of Mantanmoreland for sockpuppeteering. I don't think this is absolutely necessary, but there has been severe gaming of the community's trust here. I think the block on MM should be shorter; perhaps three or six months, and certainly not over a year.

Anyhow, good luck with this ArbCom. Cool Hand Luke 05:59, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

:Sorry to hear that, but enjoy, u:Cool Hand luke, you have contributed majorly, and will again, so you certainly deserve a break if you want to take one! Now, you have reminded me, that, many days ago in my#Evidence, I posed this very question concerning the 600emails, and have had, I think no satisfactory reply, which is to say, no reply at all. Therefore, I with low esteem at this point, do assume that i newbyguesses is also found contemptible here, but, helpfully, not by all here. I respect the Arbs. and their deliberations, and may not give up just yet, though I am due a break, especially as i mis-speak at times, and am harsh in my own ears, Ah, well—Newbyguesses - Talk 07:29, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

The community has always had the case - delaying community action to allow arbcom to finish is done out of respect for the committee - respect it seems to be rapidly losing (I'm waiting for Newyorkbrad to post his thoughts as he said he would, before I give up hope.) —Random832 17:09, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

"Comment on the content, not the contributor" it says in the nutshell for WP:NPA, but that very philosophy is what the entire encyclopedia is all about. GWH in [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3ARequests_for_arbitration%2FMantanmoreland%2FProposed_decision&diff=195972067&oldid=195971748 this edit] summarizes one philosophy: that edits by a banned user are automatically bad edits, and once a banned user makes an edit, anyone repeating that edit is by definition acting on behalf of the banned editor. I describe this philosophy as the socialization of content. The other philosophy is that it does not make a difference who makes the edit, the only issue is whether or not it adds or detracts from the article. I call this the who cares, is it good for the encyclopedia? philosophy.

It doesn't matter who is a sockpuppet of whom here. The harm that Mantanmoreland and SamiHarris (whoever they may be in real life) have brought to our encyclopedia is the ritualised restriction of content, regardless of the value of the content, in several articles. That other good faith editors were blocked, humiliated, and threatened when pursuing the improvement of the encyclopedia is the real damage. That administrators, many no doubt acting in good faith or having had their own personal foibles taken advantage of, protected articles, deleted RfCs and blocked editors, and have now had their own reputations tarnished by those decisions is another harm that has come to the encyclopedia.

We keep being reminded that we're here to write an encyclopedia. Anyone who gets in the way of good faith editors doing that, not once but repeatedly, should not be here. Risker (talk) 05:55, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

:I'm going to give a concrete example of the issues I raised above with regards to "proxying for a banned user" and how broadly this should be interpreted.

:Not long ago on [http://www.wikback.com/forums/ WikBack], [http://www.wikback.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2700 Gregory Kohs posted] a question that asked whether certain BLP articles were appropriate. I reviewed the examples he gave, and determined that some of the articles he pointed out were indeed not appropriate for Wikipedia. I nominated Leah Mates for deletion (and it was deleted), and I moved Elecia Battle to Mega Millions lottery fraud incident to reflect the content (this article was later prodded by another editor, and then deleted). In my judgment, these actions were appropriate by Wikipedia policy and helped to improve the encyclopedia by removing material that clearly failed WP:BIO1E and WP:NOT#NEWS. Other editors clearly agreed with this.

:But Gregory Kohs is a banned user (MyWikiBiz). Does that mean I was obligated to disregard his statements on WikBack? Was I acting as a "proxy for a banned user" by making these changes and should I be blocked as a result? Again, I did not make these changes simply because he said to; I made them because in my own judgment they were the right thing to do. (Other articles named by him, in my opinion, did not fall into the same category, so I did not propose deleting them.) If Daniel Brandt pointed out another instance of plagiarism on Wikipedia (as he did before) should we refuse to correct it on the grounds that this would be proxying for a banned user?

:We ban users. We don't ban ideas or concepts. The notion of "proxying for a banned user" was obviously meant to apply to cases where people were posting whatever else someone said to, without applying judgment or discretion. It was not meant to apply to established editors. *** Crotalus *** 06:21, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

::Well I must say that I concur with u:Risker's setting out, and with u:Crotalus' supporting the case for the "who cares, is it good for the encyclopedia? philosophy." as well. So, I will state then as I should, a counter-argument; and that is: this philosophy is most appealing when it is evident that all observers are, um, intelligent and independent-minded. There does arise the danger, however, of a feedback loop, and the bandwagon effect, whereby more and more (people) become convinced, in toto by actually less and less (real evidence). I believe it was this type of worry which was uppermost in some minds at the time of the banning of u:Cla68, and perhaps is still uppermost in some minds, I wonder, User:GWH.

::I will ask then, for now, as I sure have no answers at this stage, sorry: on behalf of which set of abusers, and sock-puppets is it that we should be most afraid, if we are afraid, at this time.

::And if we are not afraid, then what considered and conclusive action do we, in our full splendour, and candour, take? Newbyguesses - Talk 07:15, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

GWH, you’ve asked people to “step up to the plate” with diffs that convince you serious abuse has taken place. Others have provided you with excellent evidence of traditional sock abuse – vote-stacking, manufacturing consensus, 6RR, and so on. As you may know, I’m much more concerned about gross violation of NPOV by Weiss’s sock farm, coupled with a systemic failure to correct it so absolute that it amounted, in effect if not intent, to systemic unwitting complicity in a campaign of propaganda, self-promotion, and defamation. In other words, pretty much the worst sort of abuse conceivable on Wikipedia.

The components I’ve studied most closely are self-promotion on the Gary Weiss article and character assassination on the Patrick M. Byrne article. In this post I’ll focus on the latter, both because I think long-standing defamation on Wikipedia (in this case almost two years) is a more serious issue than promotional puffery, and because I think your tart remarks directed at User:PatrickByrne above are inappropriate. He’s not here to improve articles on tree frogs; he’s here representing his real-world self, as a victim of a campaign of defamation in which we are all somewhat complicit, some of us more than others; we owe him a collective apology, not smug links to guidelines covering our internal etiquette, which isn't his problem.

The problems with the article Patrick M. Byrne are manifold, but my case study will focus on a single word: “Jihad.” From early 2006, when the first pair of Weiss socks arrived at the article, until last week or so, when the article was finally released from Weiss’s OWNership, the word “Jihad” was used (with ever-increasing prominence) to describe Byrne’s campaign against naked short selling. The word was first added to an ordinary paragraph by one Weiss sock, then was promoted to a subheading by another Weiss sock, and at one point was even installed into the lead sentence (!) by Mantanmoreland himself. Once ownership of the article was handed off from Mantanmoreland to Samiharris, the latter did any necessary revert-warring to keep it in. In the history of the article, apart from a couple of whole-sale reverts by Fred Bauder of multiple edits by WB socks, I can’t find any non-Weiss-sock who supported the material, or who generally thought “Jihad” was a good NPOV synonym for “campaign” – in the English language generally, or in this article on a living person specifically.

The various Weiss socks argued that “Jihad” was the preferred term of Byrne himself for his campaign. Two minutes of research reveal that claim to be a rank deception. [Wrong – MM has corrected me on this point. See our exchange below] Here’s the background: in late 2005, after a particularly bad third quarter for Overstock, Patrick Byrne said self-deprecatingly, “Some will criticize me for taking my eye off the ball to pursue a jihad." Then, when Byrne's father stepped down as chairman of Overstock, he told the Wall Street Journal that he "couldn't tell whether this jihad adds to the value of the stock or subtracts from it, but what it does is take from Patrick's time." That's it. ''[Not exactly – again, see our exchange below]]

The real-life Gary Weiss immediately seized upon the possibilities for character assassination afforded by Byrne’s self-deprecating comment. In early 2006, on his attack/harassment site, garyweiss.blogspot.com, Weiss wrote that Byrne’s use of the word “jihad”

got me to thinking about his politics. What other "jihads" does Byrne endorse? After all, my only personal experience with jihads is this one, which happened down the street from me a few years ago. It was unpleasant, but I'm willing to keep an open mind on the subject. Maybe there are some good "jihads" out there that Byrne can suggest...[http://garyweiss.blogspot.com/2006_02_01_archive.html]

...and so forth and so on, blah blah jihad blah blah. "This one" in the passage above is hyperlinked by Weiss to photographs of the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center.

In early April, Weiss’s “Tomstoner” sock [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=prev&oldid=47289777 added a brief paragraph] about the father’s resignation, quoting the word “jihad.” This is a justifiable edit. If foregrounding the word “jihad” skirts the edges of WP:UNDUE, it does at least give the flavor of fatherly exasperation with the junior Byrne’s management style, which after all is what made the story notable in the first place. But then a couple weeks later Weiss’s other sock Lastexit changes the title of the section on "Media Attention" to [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=prev&oldid=50763734 "'Jihad' against naked shorting"]; LE's new edit also featured a sentence that read "Byrne subsequently commenced what he described as a "jihad" against naked short selling."

In October of that year Mantanmoreland joins in with the "jihad." After a series of skirmishes with a WordBomb sock over whether The Register was a reliable source (nota bene: this was before The Register had published material critical of Weiss, and both Mantan's position and Wikipedia's at that time was that The Register was reliable), Mantan performed a [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=prev&oldid=79000331 curious edit], which claimed in its edit summary to merely "rv POV pushing" by the WB sock, but in fact installed a new lead sentence that had never been introduced or discussed before. It read, "Patrick M. Byrne is President and CEO of internet retailer Overstock.com best known for his "jihad" against Naked short selling." He then edit-warred four more times in October to protect this extraordinary lead. [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=prev&oldid=79008401] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=prev&oldid=80762917] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=prev&oldid=81182775] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=prev&oldid=81534160]

After more edit-warring from WordBomb socks, Mantan finally settled for a lead that read "Patrick M. Byrne is President and CEO of internet retailer Overstock.com. He is best known for his allegations that naked short sellers, whose alleged leader he referred to as the "Sith Lord", targeted the stock of Overstock.com." The last clause – this is the lead sentence of a BLP, remember – refers to a jokey Star Wars reference Byrne made in a phone interview.

One thing should be clear by now. As awful as the Byrne article has been for the last two years – that is, as grossly as it violates BLP and NPOV – we have, by and large, only WordBomb socks to thank for its not having been much worse. No ordinary editor was going to go in there and fix the grotesquerie, and when Cla68 – an editor of sterling reputation – tried to fix problems in related articles – he was accused of being a WordBomb sock. One of the wilder conspiracy theorists on Wikipedia – the same editor now floating the theory that Samiharris might be Wordbomb – even suggested she had undisclosed evidence that Cla68 lived in Utah. And you, GWH, are still claiming – with what I would call breathtaking audacity – that Cla68 acted as a sort of meatpuppet, that his hands are somehow not clean, to which I can only respond that no hands remain clean after scooping up Weiss’s leavings. I do not think that statement of yours merits much response, but I will say that either your impossibly high standards of evidence for sockpuppetry and COI are coupled with alarmingly low standards of evidence for meatpuppetry, or pridefulness has gotten the better of your reason with regards to the present matter.

Back to “jihad” on the Byrne page. After the baton hand-off from Mantan to Sami, Sami took up the mantle of edit-warring over prominent references to “jihad.” Here he is in March of 2007, [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=116144951&oldid=116144584 “adding reference to "jihad" oddly omitted from article"], but of course not simply adding a reference but adding a prominent heading, changing “Campaign against naked shorting" to "'Jihad' against naked shorting." Then again here ([http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=158752603&oldid=158680441 "reverting POV changes and removal of sourced material and links by SPA"]) and here ([http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=158870694&oldid=158855287 "rv vandalism by SPA"]), and here ([http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=173826429&oldid=173793723 "rv"], no further explanation).

This is a case study of one word. As Mackan has eloquently pointed out, however, the process of strangulation of an article by propaganda has to be looked at holistically.--G-Dett (talk) 17:35, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

:Thank you for this excellent evaluation of one piece of the problem. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 18:31, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

::The various Weiss socks argued that “Jihad” was the preferred term of Byrne himself for his campaign. Two minutes of research reveal that claim to be a rank deception. One minute of research reveals seventy media references to Byrne's use of the term "jihad."[http://news.google.com/archivesearch?q=jihad+patrick+byrne&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&tab=wn]. Multiple references in Fortune, the New York Times and Wall Street Journal.--Mantanmoreland (talk) 18:43, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

:::Well, putting "Patrick Byrne" in quotes in your search bar eliminates such curiosities as the local Charleston Gazette 's list of high-school honor roll students – Keely Dawson, Phillip Hall, Peyton Jackson, Jihad McGraw, Kalik Ross, Andrew Yianne ... Scott Adams, Brandon Beasley, Natalie Byrne, Kelsey Crookshanks – limiting the raw haul to thirty-four. Eliminating mirror-sites and non-RSs brings it down to about a fifth of that. What remains, I should hastily concede, include CNNMoney, Forbes, Salt Lake Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, and a piece in Salon by our very own Gary Weiss.[http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2006/05/31/enron/print.html] So your septuapedal point still stands, or sort of staggers anyway, on the half-dozen legs remaining to it. I should however concede that in an interview with one of the non-RSs, Byrne does say, in another bit of gauche self-deprecation that I confess to finding poignant, especially when I think how fully you've exploited it on Wikipedia and in the real world: "I developed a bit of a heart issue that has slowed me down. Really, for the last year-and a half, this fight has sucked up all my spare time. I spent 10 to 12 hours a day at Overstock, and I spent sometime each evening working on the 'jihad' – that's what I call it."

:::Irony aside, in light of that quoted comment, even if it is in a non-RS, I wish to retract what I said above about "rank deception," with apologies.

:::Given that the same search engine gives [http://news.google.com/archivesearch?q=%22patrick+byrne%22+overstock&btnG=Search+Archives&um=1 1840 hits] for "patrick byrne" + Overstock, do you think this handful of passing mentions provided a solid basis – per WP:NPOV and WP:BLP – to change the "Media attention" section to a "Jihad against Naked short selling" section? And change the article's first sentence to "Patrick M. Byrne is President and CEO of internet retailer Overstock.com best known for his "jihad" against Naked short selling"? How do you square this with Mantan/Sami's vehement opposition to even a single sentence in the Gary Weiss article about the New York Times' observation that Weiss "has made a second career out of ridiculing Mr. Byrne on his blog"?

:::Hard though it may be to give them a Tombstone twist, "Kelsey Crookshanks" and "Jihad McGraw" would make excellent names for future socks.--G-Dett (talk) 20:06, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

::::Brilliant, G-Dett! Please put this up on the evidence page. Also, I hope you have a copy handy in case anything here is ever wiped away for BLP reasons. This should be useful in the community case. In the Google search I saw, the results got cut down from 70 to 34 with the quotes added around "patrick byrne". In almost every remaining case, "jihad" is attributed to Byrne or his father (prominent exceptions being articles in Forbes and Red Herring, or opinion pieces). Wikipedia articles, particularly BLPs are not supposed to be written in the breezier style of a magazine article or a comment in an ArbCom talk page, especially with something considered negative. Oh, by the way, Mantanmoreland, you wouldn't happen to be LastExit or Tomstoner, would you? You never have answered that question after Durova and I repeatedly asked you, have you? Noroton (talk) 20:33, 5 March 2008 (UTC) (edited to add the first word & "!" Noroton (talk) 20:36, 5 March 2008 (UTC))

:::::Oh, and just in case any editor at all doesn't understand the full weight of the WP:BLP references above, it's useful to quote just what the policy says about that:

::::::Biographies of living people should be written responsibly, conservatively, and in a neutral, encyclopedic tone. [...] The article should document, in a non-partisan manner, what reliable third party sources have published about the subject [...] The writing style should be neutral and factual, avoiding both understatement and overstatement.

:::::And let's not forget the Jimboquote in all its gray-ensconced glory:

{{quote box|bgcolor=#eee9d9|salign=right

|quote = Real people are involved, and they can be hurt by your words. We are not tabloid journalism, we are an encyclopedia.

|source = –Jimmy Wales . [http://mail.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2006-May/046733.html "WikiEN-l Zero information is preferred to misleading or false information"], May 19, 2006}}

Noroton (talk) 20:52, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

:One final point. I do not present the following as evidence against Mantan per se, but rather as food for thought when we consider the possible stakes and consequences of all this. In sifting through the raw haul (i.e. including blogs, mirror sites, non RSs, etc.) of the 34 citations from Mantan's corrected search (Jihad + "Patrick Byrne"), I can't help but notice that only a few had occurred before Lastexit made his [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Patrick_M._Byrne&diff=prev&oldid=50763734 April 29, 2006 edit] elevating "Jihad against Naked short selling" to a prominent subheading. My point is not that Lastexit's sourcing was problematic; though his edit was an obvious violation of WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE, and WP:BLP, his source – a [http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11652266/from/RL.3/ brief AP article] hosted by MSNBC – was good enough. My point is that the bulk of media references came afterward, in the late spring, summer, and fall, and in 2007 – at a time, that is to say, when the first hit anyone (blogger, stringer, journalist, what have you) googling for information on Patrick Byrne would get would have been a Wikipedia article with a prominently featured section titled "Jihad against Naked short selling."

:Remember that Weiss is simultaneously flogging "jihad" for all its worth on his blog, having invoked it some [http://www.google.com/custom?domains=garyweiss.blogspot.com&q=jihad&sa=Search&sitesearch=garyweiss.blogspot.com&client=pub-1355060805724840&forid=1&ie=ISO-8859-1&oe=ISO-8859-1&cof=GALT%3A%23008000%3BGL%3A1%3BDIV%3A%23336699%3BVLC%3A663399%3BAH%3Acenter%3BBGC%3AFFFFFF%3BLBGC%3A336699%3BALC%3A0000FF%3BLC%3A0000FF%3BT%3A000000%3BGFNT%3A0000FF%3BGIMP%3A0000FF%3BFORID%3A1&hl=en twenty-four times]. The first of these was posted on February 19, 2006, at a point when only one mainstream outlet had mentioned the word (in the fifth paragraph of a breezy, sarcastic piece on the "phantom menace" of naked shorting). This [http://garyweiss.blogspot.com/2006_02_01_archive.html post] is the one I quoted above, where Weiss wonders to himself, "What other 'jihads' does Byrne endorse?" That post begins:

:

I see that the CEO of Overstock Inc., Patrick Byrne, got heat last week from [http://www.agora-vox.com/article.php3?id_article=4507 some bloggers] for describing a suit he is pursuing against short-sellers as "my jihad."

:"Some bloggers" is hyperlinked to a single piece by the anonymous blogger Mediacrity, who – if Bagley is to be believed – is Weiss himself. The question of Bagley's online ethics aside, I sense we're at a tipping point towards faith in his forensic claims. And Mediacrity certainly sounds like Weiss ("next time Byrne is in downtown New York, he may want to stop by Ground Zero to see what a real ’jihad’ is all about. And it ain’t about hiring some guys in pinstriped suits").

:Now, of course Weiss is free to do whatever he likes with his blog or blogs, including "socking" with them to create the illusion of a consensus of outrage at Patrick Byrne. But insofar as it's indicative of Weiss' agenda, the techniques employed to advance that agenda, and the strategic dovetailing of these techniques with the ones he's employed on Wikipedia, I think it merits our consideration, in the same way that Bagley's off-wiki actions have been seen to merit our consideration.--G-Dett (talk) 23:45, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

<--Good catches all. To the extent anyone might still question your first point, I'd also note one of the more blatant uses of the same method with the "Sith lord" quote, where Byrne's entire argument is reduced to the following:[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Overstock.com&diff=52565202&oldid=52564655]

The company has received attention, not all of it favorable, for CEO Patrick Byrne's battle against alleged naked short selling of his company's shares. Byrne has claimed that his company's shares have been attacked by "miscreants" in the stock market, headed by a "Sith Lord." Critics maintain that Byrne is seeking to divert attention from the company's failure to turn a profit.

G-Dett has covered the point such that I won't try to repeat it. Mackan79 (talk) 01:36, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

This is significant evidence and one of the reasons I supported FloNight's proposal (now added to the proposed decision) for a topic ban. Newyorkbrad (talk) 17:47, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Comment from Patrick on preferred terminology: For the record, in my campaign to stop what I believe may prove to be the greatest financial crime in US history I have widely used and strongly prefer the words "crusade" and "mitzvah (N.B. "Mitvah" is Hebrew for "an obligatory good deed," as in the Big Ten Ones that Moses brought). I first used "jihad" when characterizing how critics portray my efforts ("Some will criticize me for taking my eye off the ball to pursue a jihad," as is noted above). As I have stated, the spin-job that has met me at every turn, over and over, has been to portray my efforts as simply the anger of a CEO angry that his own stock went down, no matter that I made these claims when it was going up, down, and sidewise, and no matter how adamantly I tried to describe the problem as a national problem rather than one affecting the company I run. This spin-job was greatly furthered by characterizing these efforts as a "jihad" (as if to imply an unreasoned and purely emotional, faith-based, and possibly destructive effort). Yes, at times I have said, OK, let it be a jihad, and fought for it on those terms, but I have also insisted over and over, in interviews and social media, that I prefer the terms "crusade" and "mitzvah". And in fact, the responsible press has covered it that way. [http://www.forbes.com/2007/07/18/naked-shorting-overstock-biz-wallst-cx_lm_0718overstock.html Forbes honored this request]. [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E02E0DB1231F933A25755C0A9609C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all Even Joe Nocera, in a rare lapse of honesty, honored this request in his article "New Crusade for Master of Overstock"]. Student journalists get it right (http://media.www.dailyutahchronicle.com/media/storage/paper244/news/2008/03/05/News/Russian.Mafia.In.Bed.With.Wall.Street.Ceo.Says-3252089.shtml "Russian Mafia In bed With Wall Street, CEO Says"). Using the standard of evidence suggested above, [http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&safe=off&rlz=1T4GZHZ_enUS242US242&q=%22patrick+byrne%22+crusade+wall+street it has been described as a "crusade" 851 times per Google]. I have been less successful with "mitzvah", [http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&safe=off&rlz=1T4GZHZ_enUS242US242&q=%22patrick+byrne%22+mitzvah+wall+street inserting it into the discourse only 51 times per Google]. It is only Gary Weiss and, of course, Mantanmoreland (haha) who insist on jumping up and down on this note. As I said, the spin-job has relied upon dozens of such little touches.

Another great example is my now-famous (infamous?) [http://investors.overstock.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=131091&p=irol-EventDetails&EventId=1294980 "Miscreant's Ball" webcast]. At the start of that hour-long talk, I described the circumstances that behind a lawsuit Overstock had filed the day before. Then I said, "I'm going to talk about, I'll call it, 'The Not Necessarily Miscreants' Ball.'" I spoke for the better part of an hour about a massive scheme of corruption that I had come to believe was affecting our national capital markets. Nowhere in that did I mention "Overstock." Near the end, [http://library.corporate-ir.net/library/13/131/131091/items/191196/OSTK%20(8-11-05)%20Transcript.pdf I used the phrase "Sith Lord" in two sentences of one paragraph]. In the aftermath of the webcast, the Party Line quickly emerged, Byrne says that a Sith Lord is attacking Overstock. The pages on Wikipedia still portray it that way. Only in the last week do people seem to be going back to read the original and seeing how skewed this portrayal is.

Incidentally, just as I have used "crusade" and "mitzvah" far more than I have "jihad," I have also repeatedly said that an Al-Queda, a loosely organized network of people who share operating methods and goals but who do not need to coordinate, is probably a better description than "Sith Lord." The "Sith Lord" comment has been regurgitated on command by Gary and others of his ilk because, like "jihad," it suits their needs better, as is described above.

Making a big deal about these little spin jobs has always seemed to me like it would be beneath me, but I confess I am greatly heartened to see others at last deconstructing the spin-job, as is being done so ably here. I have always hoped it would happen, because I figured that if it ever came to pass that people saw that something that was getting repeated so frquently it had become accepted truth, in fact turned out to be a lie, they would finally question the medium of that discourse itself.

By the way, I apologize in advance for whatever transgressions I am making against Wiki-etiquette regarding participation, formatting, etc. As someone noted above, I am not really here to write about tree frogs (although I do greatly enjoy Wikipedia, and would like to be a contributor when this smoke clears). But I do have something to contribute to this debate, and wish to do so in a responsible way. It is incredibly difficulty to stand back and watch as the community works its way through the smoke-and-mirrors that is still being created for it. PatrickByrne (talk) 03:59, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

: Patrick, without commenting on your beliefs about who has edited your article and why, if there is something inaccurate about the reporting and you inform us (as you have done) then it's our responsibility to fix it. I'll take a look at the article and fix what needs fixing. I don't know whether you've ever contacted info-en@wikipedia.org, it's usually pretty good at this kind of thing. When people make complaints about the content of their own biographies we do take those especially seriously, whatever the form of the complaint. My sincere apologies for any harm done. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 06:27, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

:: I took a look and removed a lot of the negative stuff. For whatever reason, there was a lot of comment on the "Sith Lord" thing which didn't really inform, and put too much weight on the opinions of a few columnists and journalists. I also restored a paragraph about positive media attention that was apparently removed by a vandal in mid-October. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 06:54, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

I have intended for the past couple of days to post some additional comments regarding my views of this case. Unfortunately, real-world time constraints plus my desire to make sure that I speak with greater clarity this time around have interfered. I expect to post my further thoughts sometime this evening (east coast US time). Newyorkbrad (talk) 19:24, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

:Thanks for the update! While many are eagerly awaiting your thoughts, I think we understand the need to think it through carefully. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 19:28, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

:Oh, you're such a tease... LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:21, 5 March 2008 (UTC)