Wikipedia:Requests for bureaucratship/SoWhy

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for bureaucratship that did not succeed. Please do not modify it.

SoWhy

Final (101/36/11). Consensus not reached. Closed by WJBscribe at 14:45, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Nomination

SoWhy (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) – SoWhy has been an editor since 2004 and an admin since 2008. In that time he has shown himself to be a diligent user dedicated to the best interests of the project.

SoWhy is active in crat areas, having nominated over half a dozens users for adminship and regularly clerking WP:CHU. Further, he is involved with policy discussions, helping to contribute to the speedy deletion definitions and other guidelines. Also, he is a content creator, with 24 DYKs to his record. He has shown himself to be a calm individual who adheres to policy and is able to work with others.

I am nominating SoWhy for bureaucratship today because I believe he can apply that same diligence to crat tasks. I believe he will assist in flagging bots and renaming users on a regular basis. In particular, his German language skills will be useful in coordinating SUL issues with de.wiki natives. For these reasons, I present him to the community today for consideration. MBisanz ^talk 02:18, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: I am humbled by this nomination and the trust Matt placed in me. I will do whatever I can to live up to it and I am looking forward to your feedback and comments. I will, of course, try my best to answer all questions that you might have. Regards SoWhy 14:28, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Questions for the candidate

Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia as a bureaucrat. You may wish to answer the following optional questions to provide guidance for participants:

1. Have you read the discussions on when to promote and not promote? What do you understand the criteria for promotion to be?

A. To give a short answer, there is no way to answer this question in general. There are rough percentages that are generally accepted (i.e. an RFA fails with less than 70% and is successful with more than 75-80% in support) but since every RfX is a discussion and we do not count votes, such rough percentages cannot be applied 1:1 to a specific request (e.g. a 70% RFA can be successful and a 80% RFA unsuccessful). Instead, the job of a bureaucrat judging such a discussion is to determine why people !voted a certain way, i.e. why they supported or opposed the candidate and whether the community (as far as it has participated in that discussion) has reached a consensus on the question whether the candidate in question should be promoted to administrator. Unfortunately, the answer to an abstract question like this can only be equally abstract but I am happy to answer more specific questions that anyone might have.

2. How would you deal with contentious nominations where a decision to promote or not promote might be criticized?

A. Discussions on Wikipedia are sometimes heated and filled with controversy and RfX is not a exception to this rule. First rule of judging the consensus of such a discussion is that a detailed rationale should be provided whenever you close a discussion. For example I have closed a number of AFDs, including a number of such discussions that had no clear consensus and I have been careful to always explain why I decided to close a discussion the way I did (for example I would never close an AFD as "no consensus" without explanation). I think the same applies to a bureaucrat closing RfX discussions and it might be a way to avoid criticism later. In such a case, I would have spent a considerable amount of time carefully reading the whole discussion and weighting arguments, so it would only be fair to take the time to explain exactly how I arrived at this decision. Of course, if I think that a explanation alone will not suffice and/or I think the request is especially contentious, I would initiate a bureaucrat discussion ("crat chat") before making a decision myself. After all, there is nothing wrong with asking for more input when it's needed.

3. Wikipedians expect bureaucrats to adhere to high standards of fairness, knowledge of policy and the ability to engage others in the community. Why do you feel you meet those standards?

A. Only the community can really judge whether I have adhered to those standards but I think I have shown in multiple discussions I participated in that I know policies and guidelines quite well and I have managed to engage other users in a variety of ways, from welcoming them to adopting them and successfully nominating multiple users for adminship as well as helping whenever I could and trying to initiate discussions. As for fairness, I have always tried to treat everyone as best and civil as I can, I have and there have never been complaints (that I know of) that I had been unfair to anyone (also, I have always tried to separate my personal views on any particular topic from my admin or editor related actions).

Optional additional question from Phantomsteve

4. If a candidate self-nominates themself on an RfA, which is then closed by an admin/'crat as WP:SNOW or WP:NOTNOW, yet insists that they want the RfA open for the full 7 days:

a. under which circumstances would you consider re-opening the RfA?

A Generally, when the RFA in question could end positively, e.g. if a non-crat closed it very fast after only a couple of opposes on a request by someone with much experience and further discussion can likely be a positive thing.

b. under which circumstances would you not consider re-opening the RfA?

A Closing an RFA early is not the normal thing to do, so it should only be done when exceptional circumstances exist. Usually, a NOTNOW/SNOW close serves to avoid further negative !votes that might demoralize the candidate while not contributing anything new to the discussion. If the candidate is faced with such a situation but insists that it should not be closed, their wish should be taken into consideration and probably allowed. That said, I would still not re-open an RFA which has already gone a while with many opposes and where there is not "a snowball's chance in hell" of the request ending in a successful outcome or giving the candidate constructive feedback. The point of WP:SNOW after all is not only to save the candidate time, embarrassment and/or being disillusioned but also to avoid wasting the community's time and resources on a process that is "doomed to fail" anyway (so to speak).

Clarify (in response to Lara and Ucucha): I think it's common and correct practice that the candidate's wish is usually the main reason to reopen a SNOW/NOTNOW closed RFA, so I replied in a way that takes this into consideration already. If am editor requests that their closed RFA should be reopened, there are two scenarios:

1. The editor acts in good faith, because they either think that the RFA can succeed or because they think that further !votes will help them. In this case, the request should be reopened, except if one can predict with almost 100% certainty that further discussion will not be in the best interest of the candidate and the project
2. The editor acts in bad faith, because they want to prove a point, want to troll their RFA etc. In that case their wish is irrelevant since it should only be considered if further discussion is possibly beneficial for the project, not just because they want it. Someone's wish is important but it's not always the deciding factor whether to act in a certain way.

Optional additional question from Ironholds

5. Would you describe yourself as having any particular "wikiphilosophy"? Does this ever colour your thinking when making judgement calls?

A I once tried to write it down at User:SoWhy/Philosophy, that was 1,5 years ago. I think it can be summed up as "be nice, be helpful, never abuse your tools or status, be calm and be bold". Of course I have taken stances on some issues but I never followed any other philosophy completely. And I have never let my personal beliefs, no matter which kind, influence any judgment calls I made as an admin. If I even suspect that they might, I avoid making the call.

Another optional question from Phantomsteve

6. As an admin, you would certainly have mistakes, just as all editors do (and I'm sure we'll find out some in the discussion here!). What mistakes in your admin career would you say you have learnt most from, and what lesson(s) did you learn? (If you want to provide diffs showing "what I was like before" and "what I am like now" then you are most welcome to do so!)

A Of course I have, who hasn't? But I fear I am unable to give specific examples (other than those that I recorded at User:SoWhy/My mistakes). In general, I can say that I probably was a bit hasty and less careful when I started and I have learned that it's important to take the time to carefully handle a situation and that part of being an admin is to know when not to use the tools or when to step back. Also, I have learned that good communication is a important thing and that fixing things can be easier and more helpful than simply criticizing them (as such, I used to tag articles for problems that I could easily fix and leave people generic warnings instead of individual replies). I'm sorry I cannot supply more specific examples but I will do so if I recall them.

As it has come up multiple times, the participation in WP:NEWT can probably be considered a mistake. It certainly was in retrospect. Unfortunately, I cannot learn to have 20/20 foresight but it certainly taught me to approach such ideas more carefully though since one user's good-faith actions may be considered bad-faith and disruptive by the next, which is something we should try to avoid as much as possible.

Optional additional question from Narson

:7 What do you view as consensus to promote when it comes to RfX?

A

8 How would one handle a RfA that gets successive majority supports but each time falls short of what ever consensus detirmines to be the level?

A I don't think this can be answered in general. Each RFA is unique and as such, each has to be viewed separately. But an RFA that does not achieve consensus, can only be closed as such.

9 Do you view RfA as needing reform? What problems do you identify with the process?

A Ah, yes, the age-old question. Any process on Wikipedia can do with improvement, nothing is perfect and neither is RFA. But I do not belong to the "RFA is broken!" group. There might be things that can be improved but so far the process remains unchanged despite numerous claims that it needs to be reformed, so it can't be that broken. I have participated in the WP:RREV recommendation phase in September 08 here and most of it is still valid today.

10 Under what situations would you WP:IAR (obviously this becomes more important the higher up people go)?

A Well, I am pretty strict on IAR but the general answer is: When I think ignoring the rules improves the encyclopedia. We have many rules but even many rules cannot cover any eventuality. If I encounter a situation which was not considered when the rules were written, I will consider ignoring them if it's in the best interests of the project. But if there is no need to make a IAR decision, I will probably raise the question on a relevant noticeboard instead.

Optional Question from User:Balloonman

- :11. I'm personally not a big fan of these questions, but they are asked every RfB. How would you close these RfA/Bs? Your only options are "Successful" and "Unsuccessful, as even if it goes to a crat chat, you must express an opinion there as the the final determination of the outcome.

RFAs

Candidate1 61%: crat chat with the opinion of unsuccessful This is certainly a difficult RFA and I would not attempt to close it myself. That said, I would go into a crat chat with the opinion of unsuccessful. While the candidate's work, especially in their previous admin area and with their bot, has been praised by opposers and supporters alike, there is a huge amount of people opposing the candidate over trust issues and because they did not admit to have made a mistake until later in the same request. There are good reason for promoting this user, for example that they did invaluable work with images before being desysoped, but they do not outweigh the concerns raised. Candidate2 63%: unsuccessful (maybe crat chat) Another difficult example. One might want to take into consideration that the candidate resigned their status and could have simply requested it back without a further RfA. But since they explicitely stated that they want a new consensus about whether they should be promoted, this should not be taken into consideration at all. Judging this as a RFA like any other, there was a considerable amount of opposition citing the candidate's tendecy to drama and an incorrect application of policy, far too much imho to close this as consensus to promote. While it is true that on the one hand that many opposes do not cite reasons that are relevant to adminship itself, many supports on the other hand do not either and a number of them are simply votes. Since many !votes on both sides have to be considered closely, another crat might come to a different conclusion, so a crat chat might be the best way to go (as it's also a special situation). Candidate3 67%: successful Most opposes are about the short time this candidate was with the project, not about any problems and quite a few of them are explicitely saying that the candidate can be a good admin, albeit (in their opinion) only in a few months. The other only concern was about some minor incivility that I cannot review but which seems to have been long ago and not that bad according to some of the supporters. On the other hand, all supporters and a number of the opposers agreed that the candidate does good work and is clueful, so, despite the numbers, the consensus is in favor of promotion. Candidate4 67%: unsuccessful While part of the opposes were not based on admin-related reasons, there were strong concerns that this candidate simply did not have the necessary experience in the areas they wanted to work it. Coupled with the not strictly adminship-related reasons that still were about concerns with the candidate's policy knowledge. The !votes cast in support largely failed to address those concerns. Of those who addressed the lack of experience at all, support #28 was changed to weak and based that on "feeling" and #35 is "concerned" with it but neither explain why the lack of experience should not be a reason to fail the request. Based on this, I think there was not sufficient argument to support either side of the discussion and as such the request would have been closed as no consensus to promote. Candidate5 68%: crat chat with the opinion of unsuccessful Another special RFA: Someone who already held a number of positions on several projects and the foundation resigns and then re-requests adminiship. The level of support is huge but the opposes are equally strong in numbers and raise some problems that are not addressed by the supporters, for example oppose #87 which summarizes a lot of what other opposers thought. Despite the huge level of support and the amount of prior participation of this candidate, I don't see a convincing enough argument in favor of promotion that is based on the candidate's contributions that could swing consensus to promote. Candidate6 69%: unsuccessful While the candidate's work with anti-vandalism and content building has been cited as positive on both sides, there is a number of concerns that this candidate is very WP:BITEy and unable to deal with new users that are not addressed sufficiently (if at all) by the supporters. Candidate7 72%: successful Most opposes are about low activity, not about low levels of clue. Exceptions are the opposes #11 and #16 which cite problems with the user's approach to AFD but since those are the exceptions (#13 claims disruption without explanation), they cannot along make the request a failure, especially since the candidate managed to convince Neutral #2 that those were mistakes (and as such #11 and #16 might have supported as well if they could assume that their reason to oppose would not happen again). As such, there is consensus that the user is clueful and knows enough to be an admin, something even some of the opposers agree with and thus enough consensus to promote. Candidate8 73%: successful In this RFA, the main reason for most (probably all, but not explicitely said so in all cases) opposes was the perceived lack of experience by this user when it comes to admin related tasks. That said, some opposes were not against granting adminship to the user in general, only at this time (opposes #2, #4, #5, #12, #14 and #18). The concerns over experience can still be a reason to fail an RFA but in this case the supporters actively discussed those concerns and decided to support anyway. As such, considering also that a number of opposers indicated that they can accept this user as admin (albeit not at this time), the consensus lies narrowly on the side of support. (Disclaimer: I remember this RFA as it was at the same time as my own RFA, so I remember how it was closed) Candidate9 73%: successful This request only has one major opposing reason, Musical Linguist's concerns that the candidate has a problematic view when it comes to linking to attack sites. The !vote was only added after the request was already running for 3 days and as such the supports #1 to #27 can be argued not to take those concerns into consideration (except #2) but on the other hand the supports #28 to #44 were added despite those concerns, some explicitely arguing against them even. As such those concerns cannot be said to have been serious enough to turn consensus against the candidate. Candidate10 74%: crat chat with the opinion of successful Almost all opposes are based on a single issue, i.e. the question #4 and the candidate's approach to external attack sites. The question here is, whether the support !votes can address these concerns sufficiently to promote the candidate despite such concerns. Not a small number of opposes (e.g. #3, #5, #6, #22 etc.) are based on the assumption that the candidate supports linking to such sites while they have clarified that they are against them but only oppose a general ban without considering the specifics of each case. As such, those opposes need to be weighted less when determining consensus since they are not based on the candidate's actual statement but on the !voter's interpretation of the statement. On the other hand, the majority of supporters has indicated that they interpreted the candidate's reply as not meaning to support such sites and/or that they can support them despite holding different opinions on this topic. That said, the special nature of those concerns that deal more with policy rather than the candidate itself makes a crat chat almost inevitiable in this case. Another way might be restart but that's not an option for me when answering these examples. Candidate11 75%: successful Well, what is there to judge? It's one of the very early vote-like RFAs. The three opposes are mainly because of few edits and activity on the project but even with them, there is clear support for the candidate. And opposers #2 and #3 both indicate that they would promote the candidate at a later point anyway and #2 even points out the excellence of the candidate's contributions. Using current terminology, those probably would have been "weak" opposes. Candidate12 75%: unsuccessful Another early RFA. I think I would judge this request since my own RFA had some controversy over an userbox and as such I might be biased in this case. Almost all of the opposition (except #2, which is not about the candidate, and #11) is based on a pretty tasteless userbox and the user's reaction to that userbox. Only supports #43 and #45 mention this userbox at all but they fail to address the concerns of the opposition (which partly consists of concerns that the candidate is unable to change things if he was told that others have grave concerns over it). The main reason for failing this request would not be the userbox or the reaction itself though but the fact that almost the supporters #36 to #42, #44 (i.e. those cast after oppose #1) fail to address these concerns at all and as such it can't be said that concensus for promotion despite those concerns exists. Only those 9 supports were cast despite the opposes while in the same time 15 opposes were cast, indicating that the consensus in favor of promotion that existed in the first 3 days of the request did not exist anymore in the last 4 days, i.e. also not when it was closed. Candidate13 76%: unsuccessful Opposes #1 and #2 cite no reason at all (nor do supports #5, #11, #13, #15, #16, #21, #23, #24 and #30 of course but those can be considered as "per nominator"), #3 and #5 are "weak". The main concern here is the amount of experience the candidate had or rather with them not being with the project long enough. Quite a number of people supported the candidate despite those facts. On the other hand, the first oppose for experience reasons was added 4 days in the RFA and the second (#4) which many others cited a day later than that. In the days after this happened, only 7 supports were added (those being the ones that were added despite those concerns but there were also 7 opposes added citing experience concerns. Only the supports #28, #29, #31 and #33 address these concerns at all and only #29 and #33 explain why they !voted in support despite those concerns. As such, I don't see here that the community has considered those concerns and still was in favor of promotion. Candidate14 79%: crat chat with the opinion of unsuccessful Note: Since there was only ever an RFA with so much participation, I will admit that I know which one this was. It will not attempt a complete analysis of all !votes, it would be far too long for this page. This request had a huge number of issues raised on both sides, far too many for a single crat to come to a fair conclusion. I would initiate a crat chat in order to have some time to assess the request, to see what happens afterwards and receive much needed input by other crats. As for why I would opine for unsuccessful: While the numbers were indeed impressive, a significant number of supports does not address the concerns of the opposers at all and during the RFA many things changed that made a number of people switch sides, almost all to oppose from support, even one of the nominators. Despite the huge level of support, I cannot say that there was consensus to promote at that time, especially since discussion was still very active at the end of it. If I did not have to answer "pass" or "fail", extend would be the appropriate action here. With most requests, the main part of the discussion happens during the first days but here it had not ended by the time the RFA was scheduled to end and I think it's a bad idea to cut discussion short when it's obviously still desired by the community.

RFBs

RfB1 79%: successful Judging the little discussion there is, there are only three opposes to consider. #1 and #2 mention concerns but do not elaborate further on what those concerns consisted of. #3 does not oppose the candidate as a crat itself but rather the idea of separating crat/admin and editing account and neutral #2 is more of a support as well, so consensus is in favor of promotion. RfB2 86%: successful (but maybe crat chat) This RFB includes a number of concerns (some of them are based on diffs that I cannot review anymore though) but not all concerns are unique: The nomination of a candidate who was unsuited for adminship and where the community has expressed this rather explicitly. This is of course a reason for concern that the candidate is unsuited to judge candidates and as such requests for adminship as a crat. On the other hand, a large number of supports (e.g. #63, 71, 73, 93, 97, 109, 135, 147, 150, 152, 154 etc.) explicitly mention that they trust the candidate despite this nomination that they view as a single mistake that the candidate has learned from and that this incident lied (at the time of the request) several months in the past already with no further mistakes like this happening. The concern that the candidate has bad judgment (for example oppose #7) for other reasons than the RFA mentioned above. Those concerns were not substantiated by diffs and only a minority compared to a huge level of support that trusts the candidate's judgment. Concerns over diffs that I cannot read (#15 and #30) and thus cannot evaluate. I think the support is sufficient to overcome those concerns so that consensus to promote can be said to exist. If faced with this request, I would initiate a crat chat probably since a.) the amount of support and opposition is very high for a RFA and thus more eyes can serve to reach a clear decision, b.) the request falls into the discretion range numerically speaking and c.) because the first and main reason for opposing concerns the candidate's actions on another RFA and thus that RFA has to be partly re-evaluated from that viewpoint as well. RfB3 88%: successful Another request from the time when crats were something new. Judging the discussion, the only serious concern raised was that the candidate acts unilateral at times and minor concerns were that role a crat had not been really defined at this time and that the candidate wanted to be desysopped shortly before (probably as a joke). Considering the concern of the candidate acting unilaterally, a number of supports have expressed that the very fact, that the candidate ran for cratship instead of appointing themselves which they could and that they admitted to have made mistakes, was proof that the candidate will not continue to act like this even if they previously did so. As such, the concerns are noteworthy but not enough to not grant cratship in this case.

I collapsed the answers since they are quite long. Regards SoWhy 15:04, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

(Note: The above RfA/RfB's are from real cases. A few months ago, it was agreed discussed that using individual names simply rehashed bad feelings/negative experiences. While we have made every effort to remove the dates and names of pertinent parties to protect their privacy, it is entirely possible that we may have missed somethings.) <moved discussion on anonymous format to talk page>

A non-Rfx related question from Phantomsteve

12. As mentioned at this discussion, Rfx closure is usually a role which most 'crats do not have to do that often. What can you offer with regard to renaming at WP:CHU and Bot approval at WP:BRFA, which is where is more work which can be done by a 'crat?

A WP:CHU is actually the main reason for running. I am actively clerking there for some time now, especially handling requests that have been misplaced or are malformed, fixing SUL requests and notifying users on their home wikis. CHU is not backlogged but it always has a couple of open requests and I thought more help is never a bad thing. While I'm not a coder, I also comment on bot requests from time to time and I have both suggested a few bot tasks that are currently running as well as managed to get some ideas integrated into other requests.

Questions from Triplestop

13. How would you handle the following issues should they arise in an RfA?

A. Note: Of course it's hard to answer this situations in general without a specific example. I have tried my best to give a general answer though.

Canvassing: In support or opposition, on or off wiki, where the canvassing is suspected (for good reason) or confirmed

A. Depends:

• If there was significant suspicion that canvassing has happened, it might be required to put the request on hold (if it was almost over) in order to coordinate with other crats and users to determine whether canvassing has really happened. If there are only suspicions that cannot be substantiated, it should be noted when closing but the close should be made as normal.
• It canvassing was confirmed, the !votes resulting from it should be weighted accordingly. An answer as to how exactly would depend on the amount of canvassing, the person(s) doing so, the specific !votes affected by it etc. so it's hard to give a answer without a specific example. In most cases, canvassed users !vote similar to the person who canvassed them to the discussion, so they usually do not add anything new to the discussion and the amount of concern/support for a certain candidate can be scaled down accordingly.

"Politics": "Grudge" votes, support or oppose votes from "friends" or "enemies" of the user, opposition or support solely due to agreement or disagreement over various issues, "cabal" involvement, etc

A. Depends:

• If the !votes were substantiated with valid concerns (with diffs or explanations), for example that the candidate ws not impartial, that they tended to favor a certain group of users, that they treated the !voter worse/better because they do not/do like them, etc., I would take them into consideration even if the user in question only !voted because they wanted to harm/help their "enemy"/"friend". Valid concerns do not become less or more valid based on the person who articulates them.
• If the !votes were simply "I do not like them", "I do like them", etc. they are just as unvalid as WP:IDONTLIKEIT is at an AFD and as such would be weighted less if at all. On such a big project, no user can manage to please everyone and everyone will take actions that might be disliked by other users. But simply liking/not liking a certain user is not a strong argument to judge whether they are suited for adminship and as such should be treated like every other argument of this kind.

14. How would you judge the importance of various arguments? How would you judge what sort of arguments are important or amount to "nitpicking"?

A. Arguments can be strong or weak in itself (for example abuse concerns are obviously more important than "I don't like them" !votes) but as RFA is a discussion, a closing crat will also need to judge what impact those arguments had on the other participants of the discussion. For example: If only a single person opposed on abuse concerns but the support took that into account and stated to support despite those concerns, the argument itself is less reason to fail the RFA as if a dozen people shared it and/or people switched to oppose because of it. Words like "important" or "nitpicking" are thus not always useful to apply to concerns that are raised and the same kind of concern can be important on one RFA and nitpicking on the other. I will use the example of tagging for speedy deletion since one !vote here mentions it using the term "nitpicky".

Let's take two example RFAs. Both are opposed by a user for making mistakes with tagging for speedy deletion, substantiated with multiple diffs and explanations why those were mistakes.

1. On candidate1's RFA those concerns are shared by two other users but multiple supports state that they find those concerns not enough to outweigh the candidate's otherwise strong contributions. In this case the concerns are obviously not shared by the rest of the community and as such are not that important when closing the RFA.
2. On candidate2's RFA those concerns are shared by more than 2 dozen users. Supporters in this request concede that these are valid concerns and several users switch from support to neutral or from neutral to oppose because of them. In this case, the same exact concerns that also were voiced for candidate1 now are much more important since the community approached the issue differently. Now the crat closing the RFA has to consider that those concerns are shared by a significant part of the community and as such there is much less reason to assume that those concerns were only the result of a "nitpicky" opposer rather than valid concerns that the candidate were unfit for adminship.

I hope I managed to explain how I would approach such arguments in closing a RFA (I am unsure whether I managed to say what I think though, so please forgive me if it sounds confusing).

As with other abstract questions, it's hard to answer this one in a satisfying way. There are a number of arguments that are always unimportant (e.g. "candidate is X" without explaining why being X is a bad thing, "I don't like the candidate", "too many admins already" or other arguments irrelevant to the candidate in question, etc.) and some that are always important but for many arguments in-between their importance depends on the RFA in question.

15. What is the importance of acknowledging people who disagree with you? When would you compromise with those who disagree with you and when would stand by your own viewpoints?

A. Acknowledging those who disagree with you is important for a number of reasons. It shows them that you do not ignore their input, that you welcome their opinions and are willing and happy to discuss with them, no matter whether they agree with you or not (as the old Chinese proverb goes, "He who flatters me is my enemy. Those who find fault with me, is my teacher.") I am not perfect, far from it, and I am always happy if someone takes the time to explain why they are disagreeing with me. I might not always be persuaded by their argument and change my opinion but I have done so and I plan to continue to do so and it's hard to do it if people do not voice their disagreement. Hence it's important to tell them that they are invited to do it, otherwise I might not realize that I am incorrect if I am incorrect.

As for compromises, it depends on the matter at hand. If the matter is one that I can agree that the compromise is better than nothing and I know that there likely will not be a consensus for the solution that I think best, of course. Many good things started as compromises and if I think that a compromise would serve us better than doing nothing or than the idea I disagree with, it's the natural thing to do. OTOH, if I didn't think a compromise would help the project or fix the problem at hand, I would say so and explain why I thought so. There is no point in supporting a compromise if you honestly don't think it's helpful, even if it may appease other users.

16. You seem to follow certain policies strictly to the letter. In general, how would you judge when someone is "wikilawyering" or gaming the system (either in favor of or against following a policy strictly)? How would you counter this? Can you give some examples from CSD, RfA or other policy areas?

A. Probably true although I try to follow their spirit rather than their letter if possible. Following the letter of a rule bears always the risk of people disagreeing what the spirit behind those words is. Someone is trying to game the system, if they use the letter of a policy in order to justify actions that clearly are not meant to be allowed by the policy in question but can be considered allowed judging the text alone. And they are trying to do so, if they argue that the spirit of the policy sanctions their actions even if the text of the policy in question was specifically written to disallow such actions. It's a fine line to walk and it can happen in both cases. There are a number of ways to counter this, for example explaining to them that the written policies need to be read with the spirit of those policies in mind (per WP:BURO) and that sometimes rules can be ignored if they clearly were not intended to be applied in this way. To those who try to game the system by claiming the spirit supports their actions, I would try to explain that the very reason we have written down those policies is that the community expects all users to follow them in almost all cases and that, if they violate policies again and again without trying to resolve the conflict of written policy and what they think as the spirit, measures have to be taken. If they continue, I would open a discussion on the relevant noticeboard(s) to gather community input (since they might be correct).

As for examples (I hope I understood correctly what you requested, otherwise please clarify)...

For XFD and RFA, as well for other discussions, WP:SNOW can be a viable way to save everyone involved some time - and to counter attempts to disrupt such processes by following the policy to the letter. On the other hand, it can also be misused to cut valid discussions short, because the one doing so feels that discussion is not needed or disagrees with those discussing the subject. Users attempting to do so should be notified that this is not a way to handle this situation, that the policy requires discussion for a good reason and the action should be reverted.

As for CSD, it's a difficult question. I believe that it's a policy that has been detailed like no other has and which thus reflects community consensus much better in the words it uses. There are of course pages that are not covered but where immediate deletion is needed for the best of the project. OTOH, in many cases the policy explicitly states that deletion is not allowed under this policy (for example WP:NOT based reasons). In such situations, some admins think they should go ahead and delete those pages anyway and when I notice, I usually challenge them and if I think that the pages should stay and they disagree, I will open a DRV about it. On the other hand, sometimes people will argue that CSD does not allow deletion of a certain page where it also does not explicitly forbid it and where deletion is obviously and clearly the best way to handle the page. In those cases, one can explain to them that CSD does not cover every possible reason for immediate deletion and that it sometimes can be allowed even despite not being mentioned, i.e. if immediate deletion is in the best interest of the project and it would be harmful if the page was not deleted. Given the strict wording of the CSD policy, the latter case is much more rare though since most cases were considered by the community when the policy was written and specifically disallowed.

Question from Leaky Caldron

17.You passed as successful a number of the discretionary range RFAs at 72% -75% and one at 67%. Given the limitations of the examples you were provided (old, low turn-out, etc.) did you apply current day thinking or did you attempt to put yourself in the position you would have been at the relevant time? To cut long story short, if the circumstances arose now would you pass a 67% candidate who had 3 months editing experience? (#candidate 3).

A The job of a crat is to evaluate the discussion as it was held. I have not applied any <present, past etc.>-day thinking, I evaluated the discussion as it was held and judged consensus as it existed in those RFAs regardless of their age. As such, I did not decide "successful" for the 67% example because it was obviously an old RFA but because the community in that discussion made it clear that they wish to see that candidate pass despite the short time here. A current-day RFA with an equally experienced candidate would probably fail because the community would simply not support them in the same way than they did 5 or 6 years ago (but again, it depends on the circumstances, see Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/lustiger seth for example).

General comments

• Links for SoWhy: SoWhy (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)
• Edit summary usage for SoWhy can be found here.

---

Please keep discussion constructive and civil. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review Special:Contributions/SoWhy before commenting.

Discussion

• I would like to address the WP:NEWT thing that has come up quite a few times now. I agree that it was not the best idea, in retrospective we all are wiser, but I certainly did not do it to "fool" anyone or tried to prove a point. The idea was created out of the genuine desire to experience Wikipedia as a new user, something most of us cannot remember anymore and to see how their contributions are received (which is specifically listed as allowed by policy at WP:SOCK#LEGIT). It was not meant to prove a point since there was no point to be proven - it served to determine what happens, not to prove that a certain reaction will happen. The point of doing so was to see what can be improved for new users and how established users treat new user's contributions compared to those of other established users. And from what I experienced, new page patrol actually worked pretty good and the users involved all gave me positive feedback. Later, some users started pointing out that it could be seen as a "breaching experiment", something no one has raised before and it was stopped. When we learned anything from this, then that the community as a whole is actually pretty much able to deal with criticism. The project was not continued despite criticism, it was stopped and discussion started. I think this alone is a pretty good indication that it was not designed to be pointy, to "fool" people or to be a breaching experiment. It was an idea to collect some data from a first-hand perspective and when people objected to it, pointed out how it could be seen as well, it was stopped. In hindsight, we are all wiser now and I am of course happy to discuss it with anyone who has concerns but I don't think it's fair to claim that the project was created as a "breaching experiment" considering that no one active in it considered it as such and everyone stopped once they realized it could be seen as such. Regards SoWhy 17:07, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Pardon my French, but that's arrogant bullshit. If you're interested in what happens to new articles, go to Special:NewPages, pick one at random, and add it to your watchlist. You (plural) intentionally set out to create "borderline" articles, wasting the time of all those involved and discouraging people from carrying out desperately-needed work at New Page Patrol, and descended en-masse to abuse anyone who dared tag one of your articles for deletion, even if they had a perfectly valid argument for so doing (the example most readily to hand, but there are plenty of others). NEWT, and your refusal to admit that there was anything wrong with it, was nothing more than a disruptive exercise in "we know better than you, and if you say different you're wrong" baiting; if a genuine new account were to behave like that, it would at the very least get a stern warning and would quite possibly be blocked for trolling. – iridescent 17:40, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I said multiple times that, in retrospect, it was not a good idea. But that does not mean that I participated because I wanted to waste time, discourage or abuse people. Yes, it lead to consequences that were undesirable and in retrospect no one would do so again but that does, imho, not mean that you or anyone else should claim that those consequences were intended. There's a difference between consequences that come from good-faith actions and were neither intended nor expected and consequences that were intended to happen. I did not create NEWT but I am sorry to see what happened due to it and I would not participate in such a experiment again because now I know that others, such as yourself, interpret the idea differently. Regards SoWhy 18:01, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to ask Iridescent to redact a rather hateful personal attack leveled at the editors involved with the NEWT project. Saying that people "descend en-masse to abuse anyone who dared tag one of your articles for deletion" is an incredibly mean-spirited distortion of what happened and is a shameful thing to say. I regret participation in the project and think it was a bad idea, but to attribute this to everyone involved with the project (by stating "you (plural)") is disgraceful. I'd appreciate some clarification as to whom this is intended to include, as the only link given to demonstrate this shows a single editor from NEWT and some civil discussion, no "abuse". I'm concerned that some of the backlash to NEWT is due to misconceptions of what the project was about and what actually happened, caused by unsupported and extremely hyperbolic accusations like this. -- Atama頭 19:44, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I actually agree with Iridescent (though not in such strong terms). The only thing NEWT achieved was pissing off new page patrollers. The point was trying to see how new editors are treated - which, as said, could be done easily just by observing. Deliberately creating borderline articles to trick patrollers and admins, and then shame them on the NEWT results page, was nothing but disruption, hence WP:POINT (I rarely use that link, as it's so frequently abused to mean "making a point" when it's "disrupting Wikipedia to prove a point"). This was simply inclusionists disrupting Wikipedia, hence my opposition to those who are clearly such, and those who identify that way, getting further privs (such as bureaucratship). Majorly talk 19:56, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I retract nothing. As I clearly stated in my oppose, I used the example from Malleus's talkpage just because it was the one that most readily sprang to mind, and your pretending that there wasn't an issue won't change the facts. You can read the whole sorry saga in the ANI archives if you really think there wasn't an issue. – iridescent 14:23, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm somewhat surprised WP:NEWT came up at all here; another NEWT participant's RfB came and went without it being brought up at all just last week. A Stop at Willoughby (talk) 01:09, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Do tell! But I guess the process isn't really built to work exactly the same every time.
-Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 08:50, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Juliancolton submitted a single, intentionally malformated but otherwise correct article on a legitimate and uncontroversial topic. SoWhy submitted a string of BLPs, one of which was completely unreferenced. The two are completely different. – iridescent 14:23, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

And, FWIW, I now realize the flaws in NEWT and I regret participating in it. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 15:04, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Regardless of what mistakes you intentionally made when formatting that article it was never a speedy candidate. There's no comparison between the two examples. Vyvyan Basterd (talk) 15:15, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I know, I should not comment further but [1] was referenced at the time of creation (see wikicode). The ref was just hidden due to a common newbie mistake with the <references> tag and by the time it was new page patrolled the link was visible[2]. I know that some people created articles during NEWT that were borderline, violating BLP and unreferenced but I have to point out that all articles I created were about notable subjects and all contained at least one reliable source. The fact that I regret to have been involved in this experiment now does not change this. Regards SoWhy 15:48, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Support

1. I feel quite strongly that we need more bureaucrats, and SoWhy seems as good a choice as any. He's consistently friendly, yet stern when appropriate, knowledgeable, familiar with policy, and involved in the two main areas that require bureaucrat assistance: RfA and CHU. No qualms about supporting. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 14:33, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
2. Unequivocally. SoWhy has consistently shown time and time again that he can get at the heart of an issue, and always handles himself cordially. I think his current posts on WT:RFA and WT:BN show exactly why this nomination exists, and I think his continuous efforts at WT:CSD show an ability to read closely and examine the full effect a given statement implies. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 14:37, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   For no particularly intelligent reason, I want to add to my rationale above. It seems to me that this is devolving into pro/neutral-NEWT vs. anti-NEWT (at best) or Inclusionist vs. Deletionist (at worst) which is downright unfortunate. There are some very valid !votes in the Oppose section, particular those of Tan and Lara (both of which are very frank and refreshing, I just happen to disagree in this case). Still, the way I see it is that there are four issues here. The first two, renaming and bot flagging, nobody really seems to have an issue with. The third, as Andrevan and others note, relates to his activities on WP:BN regarding "backlogs," clerking, etc. I don't buy that argument because not only do I assume he's just interested, but maybe SoWhy just thinks it matters a bit more. Moreover, isn't the best way to get him to shut up to just promote him? (Not a good support rationale, but a rationale nonetheless)

   Finally, there is the determining of consensus. Now, I liked Majorly's response to my question, but I liked SoWhy's response to that even better. A bureaucrat must be able to determine consensus in an RfA/RfB, and on the few close calls vote-weighing will probably come into play. Still, vote-weighing is not the same as consensus, and while it can play an important role it doesn't have to be an enormous part of that process. Is it theoretically possible that SoWhy's views on CSD could impact his treatment of certain votes in an RfA/RfB? Sure, just like every other 'crat, but it's a very big step to go from NEWT to a relatively minor activity to be of concern to me. Likewise, I more than trust SoWhy as an extremely competent sysop (everybody on this page seems to be in agreement on that fact) and therefore would trust him to NOT close if he felt the slightest twinge of bias. Besides, as he said, odds are he would have !voted in that case anyway, since he feels so strongly.

   In short, I really don't see a strong connection to SoWhy's participation on NEWT and his qualification as a bureaucrat. I don't have to agree with him or what he did, but to oppose based on NEWT would be just doing what I was opposing him for. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:51, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

3. I was thinking just the other day that SoWhy would make a good 'crat, and was thinking of raising it. And lo, Support. GedUK  14:46, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
4. Per the nom really, not much more to say. I think SoWhy would make a great addition to our bureaucrats, and I see him taking interest in the areas that we need more of them :) - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 15:06, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
5. Support SoWhy is one of the 4 or 5 people who asked me about their running for RfB this past spring... he's only the second one to actually throw their hat in the ring... but this is IMHO a no brainer. Fully support.---Balloonman ^{NO! I'm Spartacus!} 15:22, 6 January 2010 (UTC) EDIT: While I still have confidence in SoWhy's ability to be a crat, I have to agree with the first opposer, the experiment to "catch" people was ill conceived. It is one thing to review edits/history, but to intentionally go out and create a scenario whose objective is to entrap people, that I'm not too sure about.---Balloonman ^{NO! I'm Spartacus!} 16:02, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
6. Unequivocally per Amory. Excellent editor. Ikip 17:39, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
7. Support SoWhy already had my confidence before his involvement in wp:NEWT - which for those who don't know was started by me not SoWhy and I'm a bit surprised that the issue has resurfaced so strongly here and now. For those who aren't familiar with NEWT, SoWhy created four articles, and their fate is detailed at Wikipedia:Newbie treatment at CSD/SoWhy. In my view the difference between what we did in wp:NEWT and a breaching experiment was that NEWT was about creating articles that didn't meet the deletion criteria, and seeing what happened to them and to the newbie accounts that created them. If we'd set out to create articles that did meet the deletion criteria it would indeed have been a breaching experiment, and a pointy one at that. ϢereSpielChequers 17:58, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
8. Absolutely. Excellent admin, would make a good crat. Not convinced by the opposes. Timotheus Canens (talk) 18:51, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
9. Support. SoWhy strikes me as smart, clueful, and dedicated. I dislike the way RfB has become such a steep mountain to climb, and I think the complaints that have been raised (not just here) about NEWT have been overblown. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:53, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
10. Support Great editor who has shown good judgment in the past and will make a good crat in the future. The WP:NEWT thing/incident and SoWhy's involvement does not bother me, it was an experiment that pissed some people off and did illustrate a point, maybe we will even become a better place because of it. (self disclosure, I did not participate in WP:NEWT) RP459 (talk) 19:02, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
11. Support a reasonable and fair-minded individual who is all about improving Wikipedia. I hope NEWT actually opened a few eyes to why so many negative things are written about the project in reliable sources. Any group of Admins who take proactive steps to try determine the scope of a perceived problem how it might be corrected, have my respect. Schmidt, ^{MICHAEL Q.} 19:04, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
12. Support - I've only seen positive things from this candidate, and his work in WP:NEWT is a positive, not a negative, for me. —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 19:21, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
13. Moral Support Doesn't look like you'll be endorsed, but I think the NEWT thing is being blown out of proportion. Yes, it's a great idea to try and make Wikipedia more newbie-friendly, but yes, that could have certainly been done differently. Calling it POINT, however, is unhelpful, and if we hold well-intentioned failures against RfB candidates, then only those who have never dared to try and actually improve Wikipedia could be selected. Jclemens (talk) 19:41, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
14. Weak Support I am an adoptee of SoWhy, so I'm a little biased – plus I'm at the bottom of the totem pole and don't know much about what it really takes to be a 'crat – so that's why my support doesn't carry much weight. But I do support him. He seems good at what he does, AFAIK. Also, the WP:NEWT issue is a positive for me, not a negative. I don't believe it was "entrapment" of other editors, nor was it "disruptive". It may not have been the greatest idea, but it was most definitely done in good faith. Also, I'm pretty sure a bureaucrat doesn't have to be perfectly flawless.
    -Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 19:52, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
15. (edit conflict) Unconditional support. SoWhy is the most diligent and sensible person on this project. His judgement is more than sound. Also, when I look in the oppose section, I believe it's safe to say that SoWhy has evidently not just done something, but everything right. Seriously though, he will be the best bureaucrat this project has ever seen. --Aitias (talk) 20:10, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
16. Strong support simply one of the best, most approachable admins and I very much trust his judgment. Probably my first choice for the job including those that have it already. Aslo per Jclemens who makes _really_ good points. Hobit (talk) 20:13, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
17. Support - I don't normally give a damn who gets to be an Admin or Bureaucrat, but my interactions with SoWhy in the past and every action of his that I have seen have demonstrated that he is posessed of fairness and good judgement. Nutiketaiel (talk) 20:21, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
18. Support. There were good intentions beind WP:NEWT and I don't think any of them intended to cause any disruption. In retrospect it may have been a mistake, but it doesn't (to me at least) reflect badly upon the type of judgement that must be used by b'crats. I have no reason to believe he would do anything less than a good job as a b'crat. Shereth 20:22, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
19. Moral Support per NEWT overreaction and having no reason to question SoWhy's judgement. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:45, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
20. Support. I am of the opinion that bureaucratship is best granted to any experienced admin with demonstrated good judgment. In my view, SoWhy definitely fits this criterion. While I do appreciate some of the instances brought up by opposers, none cause me undue concern - and I've personally had many good experiences with SoWhy's patient and helpful work as an admin. I should probably add that I generally don't subscribe to some of his views on inclusion and speedy deletion; but I do feel they are valid views grounded in sensible thought. ~ mazca ^talk 21:00, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
21. Support I'm not a big fan of the NEWT experiment, but it was a good faith attempt to understand certain problems that exist; trying to do something good shouldn't be cause for concern. The rest, per Mazca.-SpacemanSpiff 21:19, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
22. I've been waiting for SoWhy's RfB for a while now, and I have no hesitations about trusting them with a few extra tools. Jafeluv (talk) 21:26, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
23. Support An excellent admin and editor. And as I've said before, NEWT was an interesting, perfectly valid and totally nondisruptive way to explore how new editors are being treated. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 21:32, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
24. Support I feel that SoWhy has done a good job as both an editor and as an admin. With hindsight, NEWT was probably not the best way to see how newbies are treated, but everything I've seen seems to indicate that it was a GF project. SoWhy has clearly shown that they understand where its problems were, and would not be involved in anything like that again. Although recognising the opposers' arguments, they are not compelling enough for me to oppose, and my respect for SoWhy as an editor and admin is enough to enable me to support without a qualm. -- PhantomSteve/talk|contribs\ 22:00, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
25. Support As nom. MBisanz ^talk 22:07, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
26. I came here originally to oppose then realized that my argument was too weak. I think that you will make a good bureaucrat at some later time, but for now you seem to possess the judgment, intelligence, and maturity necessary for a crat. ceranthor 22:26, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
27. Support His overall record has been good, so I thus support this candidate. Dream Focus 22:33, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
28. Support I don't see how his judgement regarding the infamous NEWT project would be problematic as a bureaucrat. It's not as if the extra buttons would make him unreliable. ALI ^{nom nom} 22:38, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
29. Support As per MBisanz and user has been around since 2004 and a admin since 2008 and track both as user and as a admin is good,further the user is one of those who is here to stay.Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 23:24, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
30. Support Extremely helpful editor and I have no doubt that you won't misuse the tools. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 00:33, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
31. Support I have a lot of confidence in SoWhy's capability (currently in his admin capacity) to determine consensus correctly. In my experience, his AfD closes have been accurate reads of consensus in the discussion. SoWhy's contributions in the Wikipedia talk namespace, such as his comments at WT:RfA and WT:CSD, tend to show his ability to articulate and consider points in debates intelligently. In addition, SoWhy's clerking at WP:CHU and its subpages shows a solid understanding of username policy. For these reasons – combined with his extensive experience over the course of almost six years on Wikipedia – I think SoWhy will make a very good bureaucrat. I would like to take note that while I deeply opposed WP:NEWT in every way, I don't think it should be held against any of the established editors who were involved. This issue did not prevent me from supporting Atama's RfA, and it won't stop me from supporting SoWhy's RfB. A Stop at Willoughby (talk) 01:09, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
32. Support. Friendly, helpful, knows what he's doing. Not concerned by the opposes. -FASTILY ^(TALK) 01:14, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
33. Support, because: Hanging out at WP:BN or related pages isn't a bad thing if you're thinking about having an RfB at some point. People have in past RfBs asked for a certain amount of experience in the related tasks before they supported candidates. Of course a prospective candidate will look to gain it. Thinking about having an RfB is also not a bad thing. If one is interested in helping in a certain area, then by all means, nobody needs a bureaucrat who doesn't care about that area. I can understand if people are wary about editors who look for status, and I share that feeling generally, but I don't see this motivation here. Lastly, I don't know whether we need more bureaucrats. Everything seems to be handled quickly enough, from what I see and hear. In my opinion, that's still no reason to refuse an additional editor who wants to share the workload, as long as we trust him or her to perform the two, three additional tasks, and I trust SoWhy with that. Amalthea 02:20, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
34. Strong Support SoWhy is be far, one of the most trusted, respected and overall well like people here. (Up there with possibly J.delanoy and Julinacolton; hope you guys dont mind me useing your names) With that being said, I can see no reason whatsoever to oppose this RFB. I have looked over his actions as an admin and I see no flaws, mistakes, or controversial issues that we should judge this editor by. Just begause he's eager to become a crat does'nt mean that he's power-hungry or too eager. Rather, he thinks that this is the bast path for him to follow and I belive that as well. Im proud to support this person and I always will.--Coldplay Expért ^{Let's talk} 02:38, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
35. SupportWeakest possible support This support is a "default support" without reviewing the WP:NEWT fuss. I would not know why people in the oppose are making a big deal out of it until looking into the said page. However, according to this and that, SoWhy only made 4 and 9 edits to the page and its talk page respectively, so I will give him a benefit of doubt. On the other hand, I've always got a good impressions from SoWhy's demeanor and judgment, so quite don't understand the false labeling as "power hunger" due to his "diligent notifications" to BN. I also find myself tend to disagree to some of RFA regulars in the oppose camp, so I'll follow my gut feeling and observation for at least tentatively a while.--Caspian blue 02:43, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    I should've at least read the first five bullets on the WP:NEWT page and had a benefit of the doubt to the people's criticism in the oppose camp. I rarely use a profanity or slang, but can't come up with other than this one, WTF? SoWhy's experiment with this whole WP:POINTy project is my first big disappointment on SoWhy's judgment as well as people engaged in the project. So the people seem to forget that the project "in fact" wasted the time of the patrollers and administrators who didn't know the experiment and tagged or deleted the page. Even creating a WP:SOCK to deceive people's eyes, and not risking their Wikicareer are also tsk tsk tsk. However, given this mood, I honestly think that SoWhy's RFB would not succeed. Therefore, I would not switch my vote to oppose but relegate it to "weakest possible support" (="moral support") to encourage him not to repeat the error again.--Caspian blue 04:10, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

36. WP:NEWT is not a problem to me even though it encountered massive drama from people who felt "tricked" and thought it was "pointy". SoWhy's trustworthiness and general editing ability far outweigh any potential negative there so this is certainly a support.--Giants27(Contribs|WP:CFL) 03:21, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
37. Weak Support — Solid editor, who I've seen around quite often in my time here. NEWT was not the wisest thing to become involved in, and I personally, as a regular NewPage patroller, was a bit hurt at the apparent goals of the project. I think SoWhy has learned from this, though — it has only made him better — and I see no problems with entrusting SoWhy with the extra buttons. Best of luck! Airplaneman ^talk 03:30, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
38. Support. Efficient, trustworthy and experienced editor. Granting SoWhy the 'crat tools (ultra-mop? vacuum cleaner? ... yeah, I'll stop now...) will be of great benefit to the project and I trust that he'll use the tools well. —what a crazy random happenstance 03:56, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
39. Support. I am not convinced by the arguments about crat "power grabbing." SoWhy will do a good job with the crat tools. I am strongly opposed to WP:NEWT, but I do not see this as a reason to oppose, of all things, an RFB. A bureaucrat renames users and evaluates RFA, not hold the keys to heaven and hell. (And if it's otherwise, I've been stiffed) bibliomaniac15 05:03, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    "not hold the keys to heaven and hell" – Agreed. I'm pretty sure absolute perfection isn't a requirement.
    -Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 08:58, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

40. Support I'm sorely tempted to oppose per the NEWT thing, and per his views on RfA, but while I disagree with his opinions (RfA criteria, etc.) I trust his judgment and can't oppose in good conscience. Aditya Ex Machina 05:32, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
41. Support We need more 'crats for an ever expanding wiki. —Terrence and Phillip 06:43, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
42. SoWhy is he not a crat yet? ;) The Thing _{Editor Review} 06:54, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
43. Support. I have 100% confidence in SoWhy's ability to impartially determine consensus without letting his personal feelings interfere, a core quality that every bureaucrat should possess. Furthermore, he can always be counted on to adhere to the highest standards of conduct. His experience in crat-related areas is undisputable. A fully trustworthy admin who would do well as a bureaucrat. decltype (talk) 07:02, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
44. As I said I would. SoWhy has the experience and the know-how. He exercises good judgement. Support. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 08:57, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
45. Weak support I'm not crazy about WP:NEWT, and I think the discussion of well intentioned contributors' actions should have been handled better. Still I'll support. AniMate 09:15, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
46. Support - Happy to support SoWhy - overall a net gain to this project and is worthy of the next step.--VirtualSteve ^{need admin support?} 09:50, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
47. Seems to follow policy by the word but does have independent judgment - the hallmark of a good bureaucrat. And it's not that big of a deal. Master&Expert (Talk) 10:13, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
48. Support No argument has been posed to indicate thay the yoke of bureaucratship would misfit SoWhy. Having opinions on how newcomers may be treated is certainly an ill-chosen argument against SoWhy considering how Wikipedia's press coverage has run. Collect (talk) (appending) Noting Ucacha's post, I suggest that when this is closed, that the current bureaucrats note the number of votes based on one act at NEWT and discuss how much weight ought to be given such votes in the future, lest this scarlet letter become a litmus test for anyone ever seeking office. 11:42, 7 January 2010 (UTC)Collect (talk) 16:40, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
49. Support. Shown a sound path as an admin, so should do OK. Also, the WP:NEWT thing was not a WP:POINT violation, because it wasn't disruptive. The result of the experiment was a number of new articles (imperfect articles, but still valid), not a huge mess which needed to be cleaned up. Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:27, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    It was a WP:POINT violation, since it was disruptive; the participants increased one of the Wiki's largest and most pressing backlogs at the time, I've cleared it entirely to show that newbies were treated badly. How is that anything but disrupting Wikipedia to prove a point? Ironholds (talk) 12:33, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    One could argue tagging for deletion or deleting a new article despite it existing less than a week is a violation of WP:POINT as well. You are deleting someone else's work (disruptive) to show that not all articles are acceptable (making a point). I do not question SoWhy's intentions. Do you? Lambanog (talk) 15:15, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    You can't argue that at all, Lambanog. ⇦REDVERS⇨ 15:35, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    What Redvers said.---Balloonman ^{NO! I'm Spartacus!} 16:04, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    Why not? Lambanog (talk) 18:10, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    Because neither is deleting any article per policy in any way disruptive (WP:DISRUPTIVE), nor is doing so an attempt at making a point. As long as the deletion isn't done against the spirit of the respective policy, it's just the opposite: it's acting in line with community consensus. Amalthea 19:11, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    So how is NEWT disruptive per WP:DISRUPTIVE? Also those participating in NEWT still created articles they thought had value even if perhaps more marginal then they are used to making. To say they are making a point is presumptuous. It presumes they knew the point thery were going to make before the evidence came in---which if done in good faith they did not. Lambanog (talk) 21:02, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    BLP, vandalism, attack pages, copy vios... which of the above would you keep for a week merely because it is new?---Balloonman ^{NO! I'm Spartacus!} 01:42, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    But is that what those participating in NEWT were doing? Lambanog (talk) 07:49, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    That is a different argument, you wrote, One could argue tagging for deletion or deleting a new article despite it existing less than a week is a violation of WP:POINT as well. You are deleting someone else's work (disruptive) to show that not all articles are acceptable (making a point). You cannot make that argument.---Balloonman ^{NO! I'm Spartacus!} 16:47, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

50. Support, has my full trust as a thoughtful and cautious admin, as for the "shoot the messenger" attitude of the anti-NEWT crowd, in particular the wikilawyering about WP:POINT, I simply can't help but think that if every NPP was fully confident that they patrol in a thoughtful manner and always strive to mind WP:BITE, there would not be a single oppose here. MLauba (talk) 13:33, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
51. SoWhyNot. Stifle (talk) 14:13, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
52. Support I have no qualms about SoWhy's judgment, and no concerns about how he would execute the duties as a crat. I didn't consider NEWT to be disruptive (although the response and drama that followed it was), but rather an poorly conceived experiment that did return valuable information. SoWhy is polite, civil, well thought out in his opinions (even those I disagree with), and level headed. No doubt these are the qualities we should be promoting. Jim Miller ^{See me | Touch me} 14:24, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
53. Support Candidate is qualified, opposes are unconvincing. I don't care if he wants it way too much, he's committed to the project and does a good job around the project. Some opposes strike me as grasping at straws.--Wehwalt (talk) 14:30, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
54. Support. The main oppose reason is from editors that oppose NEWT in principle, perhaps because it provided objective data to gauge how WP:BITEy established editors are towards newbies; it all seems very retaliatory. SoWhy created an article (Richard Rogler) that was a valid encyclopedia article and wasn't even speedily tagged. I don't see much if any disruption here. It's an acceptable use of an alternate account too. Pcap ping 14:38, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
55. Per nom, Julian, JClemens and Biblio. - Dank (push to talk) 14:44, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
56. Support. As I've said before, I don't think cratship is a huge deal - I only ask for good judgement, and I think SoWhy has demonstrated that. Clearly NEWT provoked a lot of anger, but I don't think it was a bad idea in principle, and nor should it disqualify him from being a bureaucrat. Robofish (talk) 15:26, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
57. Support SoWhy is a hard-working editor with good judgment. I think he'd make a good bureaucrat. Theleftorium 15:36, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
58. Support SoWhy is, perhaps, over-invested in speedy deletion criteria (re the NEWT project and the many nitpicky RfA opposes based on the incorrect use of speedy delete tags) and, while the implementation of the NEWT project is appalling, we all make errors of judgement and I buy the mea culpa above that, though misguided, it was conceived in good faith. The RfA opposes are something I don't agree with but each one of us sees a different encyclopedia and without that diversity in views wikipedia would not work at all. Opposing based on differences in the way we view the encyclopedia, for example whether one is an inclusionist or deletionist is not something I can agree with. Finally, I think it extremely unlikely that SoWhy will do anything other than read consensus when closing RfAs and, I'm sure, can do the CHU tasks with eyes closed - so why not?--RegentsPark (sticks and stones) 16:39, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
59. Support for his general level of clue, communication ability, and the very thoughtful responses to the question above on how he would close specific controversial RFAs. This outweighs any concerns on NEWT, which I think as a controversy is a tempest in a teapot, and as an idea was at worst well intentioned, not absurd, but carelessly executed. Also outweighs the "do we really need more bureaucrats" oppose argument I gave on another recent RfB - to me, that's an on the fence consideration, which doesn't apply when the candidate has something distinctive to bring to the table. Martinp (talk) 16:54, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
60. Support A slightly retarded monkey could fulfill the duties expected out of an administrator, and the bar for 'crat is even lower. I really have never understood why the golden ring for crat is held up so high, I consider this position less of a big deal than the mop is. This user obviously had a pretty big "oops, shit" moment with WP:NEWT, but one stupid idea is not the same thing as a pattern of stupid ideas. I don't see any evidence of being overly mired down in Wikipolitics, and his actions seem extremely well meaning despite the occasional situation where (as above) he should have thought things out a little more before proceeding. Still, I see nothing that makes me think for a moment that this user can't perform the crat function adequately. Trusilver 17:55, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
61. Support He appears to spend several hours of each and every day doing little menial tasks, and he clearly enjoys it; and I agree with the above editor that a bureaucrat is of less consequence than a slightly retarded monkey. If he was problematic editor he would already have committed havoc with his existing powers. The plan mentioned above whereby he posed as a new editor as an experiment amused me greatly and shows a certain amount of spunk. I sympathise with the theory although I suspect that the process was futile and I would not have participated myself. -Ashley Pomeroy (talk) 18:28, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
62. Support Examining SoWhy's contributions, admin actions, and participation at RfA, I feel he would be a valuable addition to the crat ranks. --StaniStani  19:09, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
63. Support The "enough 'crats right now" argument is bullshit, no matter how many times it's been brought up (as is the "too many admins" argument at RfA). And frankly, I applaud NEWT. For once, someone decided to get some hard data on something instead of guessing whether there was a problem or not. Sure, it's easy to criticize the implementation. But I haven't exactly noticed the critics going out and getting data themselves. SoWhy isn't mental + won't abuse the tools = sure.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 19:32, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Thank you. If it's about quantity, let the community set a number or have a board for establishing when new ones are needed. If it's not about quantity, then it's about doing the job, and everyone qualified and willing should run and be selected based only upon the community's confidence in their ability to do the job. --IP69.226.103.13 | Talk about me. 20:16, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

64. I'm Mailer Diablo and I approve this message! - 02:06, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
65. Sorry for the late support, I've only just found my way to this RfB. I wholeheartedly support SoWhy's request, given his profound talent as an administrator and having enough clue. I find the oppose section concerning, but nothing which would overthrow my opinion. Regards, --—Cyclonenim | Chat  11:20, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
66. Support absolutely, fully trustworthyOttawa4ever (talk) 14:27, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
67. Support - SoWhy has done some fine service for the project and I think he would make a good 'crat. There has been a lot of strong words and emotion from the opposition, but not anything that makes me want to oppose. I am not concerned about SoWhy's bold changes to WP:SOCK, they were sensible and within common sense; the previous wording suggested using alternate accounts to edit the same page was banned entirely, and I'm pretty sure users would have eventually sighted it as such if it left. WP:NEWT caused lots of trouble, though it did have merits and could have turned out better if it was not run the way it was. I will certainly not be opposing SoWhy solely for participating in it, it is easy be anti-NEWT after the event, but predicting how everything you join is going to turn out is a lot more difficult, particular when you have no control over what the other participants are going to do. Nor when reviewing SoWhy's actual participation, did I see anything that was what I could consider disruptive. Camaron · Christopher · talk 20:01, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
68. Support. The NEWT opposition is puzzling to me. The experiment was started because of a claim that new articles by newbies would be deleted within a week. On that measure alone, WP passed with flying colors. Some have claimed the same information could be ascertained by careful review of diffs. I highly doubt it. The experiment did point out some shortcomings, and many suggestions for improvements were made and implemented. While some criticism of some aspects of the specific design of the experiment are valid, SoWhy wasn't the architect, but a volunteer contributor. Kudos are in order, not brickbats. --SPhilbrickT 22:09, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    What improvements were implemented as a result of NEWT? Mr.Z-man 22:57, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    Rereading my own post, it reads as if I'm talking about policy changes, but I was really referring to participants insights and claims to change future behavior, here. for example--SPhilbrickT 19:07, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

69. Support per User:A_Nobody/RfA#RfA_Standards (yes, I know this request is an RfB rather than RfA, but my general standards expressed there apply here as well). Anyway, I had earlier reviewed the candidate at Wikipedia:Editor review/SoWhy 2. Since then, the canidate has continued to impress. This argument is brilliantly put and thoughtful as is this excellent and intelligent argument. This well-worded rationale also is exactly the kind of maturity and sound judgment we look for in editors, admins, and crats alike! He has done a sound job as an admin with such good interpretations of consensus as we saw at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Suburbs (web series). It should indeed therefore be little worded that the candidate is recognized as a nice Wikipedian! Candidate has never been blocked and User:SoWhy/Barnstars is also nice to see! How wonderful of an evening to get to support both an administrator and bureaucrat candidate who made my userpage as nice editors even! Absolutely good things to see before I take a bath!  :) Best, --A Nobody^{My talk} 23:47, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
70. Support - I don't see any compelling reason not to support. I know that SoWhy does a great job as an admin, and none of the answers given are troublesome. -- Atama頭 04:55, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
71. Support NEWT may have been problematic, but the intention was not. Anyone who seriously tries to improve the project will make mistakes, it's inevitable. In fact, the fastest way to learn is to make mistakes, if we aren't attached to being right. --Abd (talk) 06:51, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
72. Support NEWT wasn't a good thing, but it wasn't the first bad idea tried, and it won't be the last. SoWhy is still someone I feel can be trusted as a 'crat. Bradjamesbrown (talk) 08:05, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
73. In a candidate for bureaucratship, I look for admins who have proved their familiarity with Wikipedia policy and how it is made and their ability to apply policy and in particular to gauge consensus. Thus, to determine my vote, I will look for evidence about the candidate's record there.

    There are many people who cite NEWT as an oppose or neutral rationale: Redvers, Ironholds (in part), Vyvyan Bastard, GlassCobra (in part), Iridescent, Garden, Wisdom89, Bali ultimate, Kcowolf, Datheisen, TreasuryTag, Hipocrite, SlimVirgin, MuZemike, Mr.Z-man (in part), December21st2012freak, (neutrals from here) fetchcomms (in part), Chuck Bowen, Ale-jrb, IP... . I think I agree with SoWhy's comment in relation to this point above, as well as that of Olaf Davis at his RFA, where I supported in spite of this concern. SoWhy was involved there in a genuine desire to improve the encyclopedia and is able to see what was right and wrong. I feel this is only a small negative point on his record, not enough on its own to not support over. Bonewah believes SoWhy does not see what was wrong with NEWT, an impression I do not share from reading his comments in the discussion section above.

    Ironholds also cites SoWhy's vote in a recent AFD. On first sight, I don't see as large a problem with it as Iridescent evidently does. Much of his text also sounds like he is opposing because SoWhy's judgment was different from the community's.

    Tan39's oppose is too vague to address in detail; I don't share his impression and urge him to get into more detail. Same for JayHenry.

    Lara's oppose comes down to the assertion that more qualified candidates have failed. I feel that is irrelevant; what I am looking for is whether this candidate is qualified or not. She also cites weak answers to questions, but does not go into details, and I don't see in the answers any points that would cause me not to support. fetchomms and WFCforLove (both neutral) also cite Lara.

    To judge Narson's oppose, I would first like to see whether opposers are able to find a substantial number of real lapses in judgment on SoWhy's part; if not, I feel his experience is enough to persuade me to support.

    Majorly's oppose is based on the assertion that SoWhy's judgment is poor because he is too nitpicky on CSD nominations. I beg to disagree: having policies and following them is important in order that people can predict what will happen in particular situations. If one feels CSD is an insufficiently powerful tool in deleting crappy articles, the solution is to change CSD, not ignore it. Majorly's further statement that he is "adamantly opposed to any editor who is clearly inclusionist-inclined to receiving further privs" is a low point in this RFB; if it were not such a ridiculous thing to do, it would cause me to support to offset this oppose.

    Andrevan opposes because SoWhy incorrectly said a backlog existed at WP:CHU/SUL. While power-hungriness may be a valid reason to oppose, in this case I feel we're reading too much into a comment. SoWhy's usage of "backlogged" may have been infortunate, but to infer that he did so because he wanted to paint a picture that more bureaucrats are needed is a strong claim that should get more evidence. Pedro opposes over the same concern. What SoWhy supposedly did wrong was that his good actions (clerking at bureaucrat areas) was done with the intention of promoting his own RFB. But on the other hand, this also gives him experience in the areas he'll need to work with as a bureaucrat.

    Datheisen cites a change SoWhy made to the sockpuppetry policy, but as SoWhy himself and Iridescent already explain, the concern is unfounded: SoWhy addressed a genuine oversight in the policy and I do not see how he was trying to justify NEWT after the fact in that edit.

    Coffee makes a lot of sensible points in his oppose, but his conclusion (with reasoning similar to Lara's) seems off; it would require that we judge not whether an RFB candidate is qualified, but whether they are more qualified than candidates who previously failed. I feel that is a needless complication of the process.

    Everyking's point I also disagree with. Perhaps we do not need more bureaucrats right now, but if we need them in the future, it's a lot easier if people like SoWhy are still available to help than when they have to be promoted at that time. IShadowed's oppose cites Everyking and invokes no other concrete concerns. Same (with some variations) for Christopher Parham, Prodego, Epbr123. SchmuckyTheCat cites "disagreeable opinions" by SoWhy, a poor reason to oppose, and cites further vague concerns.

    Shadowjams and Crafty think he is too much "on the vanguard" or "colorful", and Mr.Z-man has a similar concern. They do not provide evidence that SoWhy lets his own opinions interfere with his gauging of consensus, however, which would be a compelling concern for me.

    The neutrals by Hammersoft and Lambanog are rather comments on some other votes.

    The number of words I needed to discuss all the oppose and neutral votes in itself indicates that this RFB may not be likely to pass. Unfortunately, I would say--I see but a few pieces of evidence for the repeated assertion of bad judgment on SoWhy's part, and not enough to justify not supporting him. I therefore support. Ucucha 14:58, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    Lara has now expanded on her "weak answers" claim. Most of her points are well-taken, and it's easier to talk now we're speaking about concrete points. On question 4, I do see the contradiction (unlike SoWhy himself, apparently): the premise of Q4 is that the candidate himself wants the RFA to remain open, and SoWhy mentions this circumstance under 4b as a reason to keep the RFA open, but not under 4a. I would consider the answer to 4a to be concise yet comprehensive if it were not for the fact that SoWhy does not mention the editor's wish at all. Perhaps the answer to question 6 should be considered as weak, but I don't necessarily think it a bad oppose. Perhaps SoWhy just does not think as strongly as some of the other people around here that NEWT was a bad idea. His "probably" reminds me of the quote (the authenticity of which I am not sure about) from Zhou En-lai, who on being asked whether the French Revolution was a good thing said that it was too early to judge. I don't see the poke you see; SoWhy acknowledges that actions which were conceived with good, if perhaps misguided, intentions (to gain data on how new pages created by newbies would be handled) could be seen as taken in bad faith by other editors, and regrets that that situation arose. As for question 9, I also noticed that it is not as well-written as it should be when I read it (and then forgot about it--my bad). But I think SoWhy himself addressed some of that: he linked to the more detailed opinions in his RFA review piece and explained his reasoning why he does not view RFA as broken. I'll keep an eye out for further comments and perhaps have another thought about the things that have been said so far--my vote is not set in stone until the RFA is closed. Ucucha 22:27, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    Your analyses looks very good Ucucha. There are many undertakings that turn out to be net negatives at least in the short term but in no way showed poor judgment. Another example from the Napoleonic era would be the attempts to end slavery which initially achieved little but can be viewed as disrupting the British parliament and distracting from efforts to respond to events in France. It doesnt look like anyones disputing that Newt was launched in response to a genuine problem, theres years of press coverage saying we dont treat newbies well. While it was inevitable that some Patrollers would be discouraged, there was no way to tell the initiative wouldnt be a net positive. Its hard to conceive of a better plan, or a more polite and diplomatic editor to lead it that Mr SpielChequers. Using alternative accounts gave participants a closer feel for the newbie experience and captured the imagination in a way which monitoring genuine patrols would not. It seems likely NPPs would have been just as offended at any implied criticisms for treatment of genuine newbies to. Now Newt is ended at least we know more about the nature of the problem, so future efforts to make us more welcoming to new years and new content may have a better chance to succeed. FeydHuxtable (talk) 16:52, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

    Since I was mentioned above I think it's appropriate that I respond here. I can't speak for others specifically, but a few of the opposes, including me, are not bothered not by NEWT, but by what it indicates. It's not the push-pull on inclusion/deletion, which I think is important (I myself has some "inherent notability" ideas that are decidedly not spelled out in the policy... of course I'd argue they're there...). It's the almost knee-jerk opposes at RfA that have a chilling effect on new admins (to be fair, SoWhy is very much focused on recent edits, rather than dredging up old mistakes). Given that environment, it's much better to be a content editing admin that's rarely touched CSD than it is to have ventured in and done it right, with a few mistakes. I really do admire SoWhy's politeness, and his almost dogmatic approach to CSD. But compare the RfAs of the past year to those from 2007 or even early 2008. The difference is dramatic. Many passed with no opposes back then. Today, failures of high-volume contributors are often based solely on "erroneous" CSD work, some of which is a statistical drop in the bucket. This is what I mean when I say a "chilling effect" on CSD work and new page patrol. That to me is a significant reason to oppose an RfB. So I'm clear, I like the editor, I think he's valuable, and while occasionally wrong on policy issues, an obvious positive to the project. I have much respect, but I hope that those admirable qualities aren't used to overlook what I, and others, are concerned about. Shadowjams (talk) 07:30, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

74. Support Never interacted with the candidate, but have only seen positive in his/her work. About the NEWT controversy: I dislike playing games in the mainspace, and this minor project did have somewhat an aspect of that. However, as I understand it (I was not involved), NEWT was designed to investigate even worse game-playing going on in the mainspace on a massive scale: overzealous deletion and the irresponsible treatment of newcomers and contributors. That editors who put user contributions under the harshest possible review-- deletion-- label investigation of their own actions "disruptive" is an indication that this really is a serious problem with the status quo, and one which stems from elitism. That the candidate recognizes there is a problem, and is willing to investigate such problems indicates to me s/he has the best interest of the project at heart. Dekkappai (talk) 17:25, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    Your comment illustrates the problem with NEWT exactly. It started with an assumption of bad faith against new page patrollers, and then tried to create evidence to support it. However, most of of the articles weren't deleted, many were never tagged, and most of the users were welcomed. Hardly a sign of "irresponsible treatment." But it is entirely possible to investigate such possible problems without polluting mainspace with poor articles (including unsourced BLPs and some that legitimately weren't notable) or driving away contributors through the unethical experimentation method and the "naming and shaming" that the project devolved into. Mr.Z-man 17:41, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    I don't know why so many users are claiming that this was started in bad faith. I was watching the project from the beginning, and it doesn't seem that way to me. If anything, it was to prove that good pages could get through the NPP process. I also noticed that a number of the editors taking part in it were themselves NPPers or admins who regularly delete under CSD, I doubt they would want to "create evidence" to show they were irresponsible. I do have to agree that there are other ways to obtain information about newbie treatment at CSD. While some users may have been rude to NPPers (and vice versa), I never find SoWhy to be anything but polite to other users, and SoWhy's RfB shouldn't be opposed based on the actions of others. - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 17:53, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    Next time I have to take a test, I'll see if I can bluster out of it by saying, "You're assuming bad faith on me!"... I didn't follow the project at all. I only took a glance at it when it was mentioned at an AfD in which I was involved, and this illustrates exactly the perceived problem which I think NEWT sought to investigate. The AfD was on a Japanese celebrity and it had several !vote, 100% Delete, with not one Japanese-speaker's input. Within a few minutes, I found sourcing and awards for the subject. One of the Oppose !voters, after changing to Keep, commented, "I'll be pissed off if this is a NEWT"... Which tells me the project came from a valid concern. Dekkappai (talk) 18:19, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    If you're unfamiliar with the project, I would suggest you look it over. Many of the articles created, including those by SoWhy, were specifically tailored to be as borderline CSD cases as possible. SoWhy's articles were all biographies with weak assertions of notability, others were crappy articles about things not covered by A7, like software. In the end, no real data was gathered because the methodology was too inconsistent and inaccurate. However, several new page patrollers stated that they were too discouraged by the project and would not continue doing NPP work (at least 6 users made comments to that effect). To quote a comment by Black Kite on the NEWT talk page, "NPP is not an exam - all these people are volunteers. To continue the analogy, there are plenty of ways of checking that people are tagging correctly without throwing in trick questions." In response to Kingpin, SoWhy may not have been rude to NPPers, but he did create multiple biographies on marginally notable living people, created articles that wasted contributor time in cleaning up, and participated in a project that used poorly planned and arguably unethical experimentation techniques (performing a social experiment on users without their consent) without adequate community consultation. Mr.Z-man 18:47, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    I doubt I'll be looking through it, as I said, I'm not 100% gung-ho on this kind of mainspace tomfoolery. However, by mainspace tomfoolery I mean mainly unsightly tagging, and the inappropriate treatment of content-providing editors, especially inexperienced ones. A poorly-formed article can be improved and I've never seen the creator of one take offense when someone does that. On the other hand, editors who deface, rather than improve articles with those unsightly tags, and who delete good content, tend to be much more resistant to the removal of their "contributions", in my experience. To follow up on my AfD story: The creator of the page appeared to be a native Japanese-speaker. The editor gave every appearance of having been driven off by the action. Since good native Japanese-speaking editors are all-too-rare around here, and most any editor can volunteer for NPP, I consider that much the greater loss. Dekkappai (talk) 18:59, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    And just for completeness' sake, to put an end to the suggestions that SoWhy's part in the experiment was responsible for 6 people stopping NPP and to address this mounting outraged display of bad faith from the anti-NEWT crowd, here's the statement from the one admin who got tripped up by the dreadful experiment by SoWhy: "Huh. Interesting to have been a participant in this. It caught me alphabetically, since I tend to delete from the tail of the alphabet It's a good warning for me to be more careful with CSDs. A couple caveats- generally the CSD tagger, not deleter, leaves the talk page messages (I need to check for this). Second, I did offer to userify the article. (this is mitigation at best). Overall, I need to do some things differently". An exchange you can follow here.

    And I'll repeat that this offense at being reviewed, by people who are, after all, reviewing, smells strongly of elitism. As the poster below suggests, this is not an RfC on NEWT, but an RfB. And the candidate's actions in NEWT show me that s/he has the best interest of the encyclopedia at heart, even when speaking up for that goes against status quo, resulting in negative feedback to the candidate. Dekkappai (talk) 19:15, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    The issue is not that they were "reviewed", its that they were tested, without being told, using what amounted to trick questions (do they tag it for deletion even though it doesn't strictly meet CSD or do they let a poorly written article about a barely notable BLP stay), then they were publicly criticized as if they had screwed up an obvious decision, when in reality it was basically a lose-lose situation. Mr.Z-man 19:26, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    Whether NEWT was disruptive or not is something that has been argued to death already, but another thing that's certain is that the constant harping about it in this RfB has long passed the threshold of disruptiveness. Take your NEWT debates to WP:NEWT. This is an RfB, not the post mortem for the experiment. MLauba (talk) 19:03, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    I'm not suggesting that SoWhy was directly responsible for the loss of 6 volunteers, but his actions were not significantly different from those who were. It was mostly just luck that the users who reviewed his articles were more open to uninvited criticism than others. Mr.Z-man 19:26, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    Speaking of uninvited criticism, as I stated, let me reiterate that the NEWT trial in this RfB has become highly disruptive. MLauba (talk) 19:34, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    With all respect, criticism about a valid topic - that people clearly feel concerns the candidate - on an RfB is not uninvited just because you disagree with it: discovering people's thoughts, including critcism, is generally the point. Ale_Jrb^talk 11:14, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

75. Support. I believe SoWhy has the qualities to be a fine bureaucrat. I find his involvement in the NEWT project praiseworthy, Dekkappai said it all, better than I could. Power.corrupts (talk) 21:08, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
76. Support per nomination. Wikiwoohoo (talk) 21:31, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
77. Strong Support Reasonable candidate. As for the WP:NEWT issue, all the people involved used the account merely to see what kind of a reaction would happen. It's within reason, since they informed ArbCom of it. Glacier Wolf 23:03, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
78. Very Strong Support - I have very strong support for this user here. This is a good one. If only the other admin were as good as this one.Wiki Greek Basketball (talk) 12:33, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

    Indenting !vote of blocked user -- PhantomSteve/talk|contribs\ 15:06, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

    This indent may have been justified because the user was banned from RFA and placed this vote while the ban was in place. However, this is an RFB and not an RFA. I can't find in the original proposal any indication whether RFB was intended to be included in the ban. RFBs are transcluded at WP:RFA, which should speak in favor of interpreting the ban to include this RFB, but on the other hand, well, an RFB is not an RFA. Ucucha 17:10, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

    Conversation continued on the talk page Ikip 20:11, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

79. Support An excellent candidate who shows consistently good judgement. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:16, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
80. Support unreservedly. SoWhy has the temperament and judgement to be a good bureaucrat. The NEWT issue has little (if anything) to do with the role, and the fact that it wasn't brought up at Julian's RfB is case in point that it's all about the bandwagon and whatever the flavour of the week happens to be. Momentarily, I thought logic, reasonableness, and independent thought might visit this RfB, but apparently not. Shame. Maedin\^talk 13:44, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
81. Support I think the whole newt think was in good faith and it just didn't work out as planned. I trust this user.--Gordonrox24 | ^Talk`
82. Weak Support i do not know the editor well enough to provide full support but i like what i see. Warmest Regards, :)—_thecurran Speak your mind ^{my past} 14:19, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
83. Support I believe WP:NEWT was a blunder, but honestly, it was one mistake. No one is perfect. SoWhy has been a very good admin, used his tools wisely, and I think he would be a valuable bureaucrat. LittleMountain5 16:33, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
84. Strong support Sound judgment, helpful, meticulous and firm about compliance with guidelines when needed, has the project and its participants best instincts at heart. With respect to the passion of the opposition, the only concern I at all agree with is SoWhy does sometimes seem to have rather high standards for RfA. But he also never seems to react emotionally when others express conflicting views, I dont see a risk that hed try to impose his will over the community. To sum up, easily one of the best possible candidates for the role. FeydHuxtable (talk) 16:52, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
85. Support Looking at history he wouldn't abuse tools, WP:NEWT is misguided (in retrospect) but probably seemed reasonable at the time. I'm supporting in part because of his German Language Skills. NativeForeigner ^Talk/_Contribs 17:29, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
86. Support, an excellent candidate who would benefit the project. --Taelus (talk) 19:41, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
87. Support seems OK, I'm entirely happy with NEWT William M. Connolley (talk) 20:23, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
88. Support per the nomination. NEWT was a bit on the odd side, but it should in no way be held up as a reason not to entrust the candidate with bureaucratship. Does SoWhy overall show good judgement, and earn community trust with the tools? I'd say yes. Jusdafax 22:10, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
89. Support NEWT IMO is not a reason to oppose and I see no other reason to oppose. Everything I have seen shows that SoWhy will perform the extra duties with no concerns. ~~ GB fan ~~ ^talk 22:27, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
90. Support. Trustworthy and clueful, I'm convinced he can do the job effectively. -- œ^™ 04:51, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
91. Support. I'm going to give SoWhy the benefit of the doubt, here. Facts against the candidate largely boil down to NEWT - which seems to have been a debacle of the highest degree. In favor, though, is that the candidate recognizes the problems caused by the NEWT project, and seems otherwise clueful. What tips the balance for me is that NEWT seems to have been intended as something to benefit the project. We all know which roads are paved with good intentions, but in this case I'm impressed with the cajones it took to apply WP:BOLD in such a manner. I also note that the candidate seems aware that future applications of WP:BOLD will be met with the strictest scrutiny, so it seems unlikely that the events of the NEWT incident will be repeated, by the candidate or anyone else. As noted, above, by several other editors, NEWT isn't in itself enough to oppose. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 14:25, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
92. Definitely I would trust SoWhy with my life, if I had one. ···Katerenka (討論) 00:05, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
93. Support While the NEWT issue is somewhat problematic, SoWhy's willingness to come forward and put it right out there suggests they have the self-awareness, maturity, and willingness to be held to account that the position demands. Further, it is a show of both excellent judgement and honesty, combined with a desire to acquire cratship through open means. Full support. Throwaway85 (talk) 01:37, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
94. Support As a new page patroller who was twice caught in the NEWT experiment, once by SoWhy, I have no fundamental objections based on this. There seems little else to be concerned about. Revenge through opposing for what some consider to be a bad decision and others consider to be a good decision is wrong and no reason to question SoWhy's competance in judging RfAs. In fact when my failled RfA was technically closed incorrectly SoWhy (who had voted a very well reasoned neutral) quickly fixed it. Polargeo (talk) 09:24, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
95. Support--NotedGrant Talk 12:27, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
96. While I usually don't agree with SoWhy stances, the NEWT concerns needs to be countered with a support. Secret ^account 13:42, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
97. Support - yes, NEWT wasn't exactly the best of ideas, but, SoWhy has taken responsibility for it like a mature human being, rather than hiding it like some people would rather do. Compound that with my already high level of trust of the candidate, and you get an absolute support from me.--Unionhawk ^{Talk E-mail} 13:53, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
98. Support Great admin. What does NEWT have to do with evaluating consensus at RFA, BAG, and helping people change usernames? Ray^Talk 16:57, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
99. Support The candidate's overall track record demonstrates carefulness and good judgment; he is an excellent communicator, and I often find myself looking forward to his contributions to discussions on the AfD and CSD talk pages. I have read all the opposes, and for the most part appreciate where they are coming from, but there isn't anything there that has affected my own trust in SoWhy. Paul Erik ^{(talk)(contribs)} 19:59, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
100. Support I trust SoWhy's judgment, communication skills are excellent. Welcome to WP:100. Royalbroil 02:13, 13 January 2010 (UTC)
101. Support -- even though he's an atheist, a German, a social democrat, and a sockpuppeteer. Has possibly the worse sense of humor here. Easily passes my standards. Bearian (talk) 04:57, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Oppose

1. Your involvement in Wikipedia:Newbie treatment at Criteria for speedy deletion casts doubt on your suitability. ⇦REDVERS⇨ 14:45, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   May I ask why you view such participation negatively?  Frank  |  talk  14:52, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   I expect our 'crats not to take part in breaching experiments designed to prove a point and thus alienate some of our best editors. People who do that have no place as a 'crat. ⇦REDVERS⇨ 15:12, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   Thanks, I see there was quite a bit of backlash to this. (I was only peripherally aware WP:NEWT in the first place).  Frank  |  talk  17:58, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

2. Strong oppose. SoWhy's judgment is highly questionable; his subjective and policy-ignorant keep argument here, in an AfD that was confirmed as delete and easily survived a DRV, along with the involvement in Wikipedia:Newbie treatment at Criteria for speedy deletion (a project that created extra work for the encyclopaedia, prevented people from working on actual backlogs and deceived the community simply to prove a point), means that I don't trust his judgement as an admin. His decision here (excluding the subject of the article itself) again shows either a lack of policy knowledge or flawed judgment; to claim that G11 does not apply to the userspace? I think not. I am not prepared to give a user additional tools, with far greater ramifications for incorrect decisions, when he has repeatedly shown poor judgement as a user and as an admin. Ironholds (talk) 15:13, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   I admit that I made mistakes in the past, we all make them after all. But that speedy you mention was two days into my adminship, 15 months ago, and I did not say that G11 does not apply to the userspace, I just said, that I assumed good faith in this case. Regards SoWhy 15:18, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   "Assuming good faith I tend to decline such requests in user space, as G11 is not appropriate " is assuming good faith in just that particular case? But fair point about the age - I should've checked, doh. Ironholds (talk) 15:19, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   It was in this case. But the general approach to G11 in userspace is to decline it then when the page in question could be considered a good-faith attempt to write an article or to represent oneself without being aware of our guidelines on the subject. For example, the page in question in this case [3] did not look like a purely promotional page but like someone trying to write an article and was actively edited by the user in question at that time. I agree that spam has to be deleted asap but we should not delete pages that could simply be someone trying to write a new article in their userspace without knowing all our guidelines. Regards SoWhy 15:39, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   So your approach is to decline the CSD and then examine the content? Ironholds (talk) 15:39, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   I may have misunderstood that question but why would it be? You have to examine the content first in order to know whether to decline a speedy, don't you? Regards SoWhy 15:49, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   Sorry, my balls-up again; I speed-read it as "the general approach to G11 in userspace is to decline it [and see if] the page in question could be considered a good-faith attempt to write an article". Just ignore me :p. Ironholds (talk) 16:04, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

3. Oppose. Too frequently I feel SoWhy's judgment is wrong regarding ANI, RfA, and other subjective areas. Since this entire position is making one more judgment, I oppose this request. Tan | 39 15:14, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
4. It's extremely difficult to obtain this position. Better qualified candidates have failed; one as recent as last week. It seems to me it was made clear in JC's RFB that there isn't a need for more 'crats right now. I personally think "there is no need" is a bullshit reason to oppose and perpetuates the misconception that bureaucratship is more important than it really is. However, because people do pay attention to how many 'crats there are, and like to make it sort of an exclusive group, I'm not inclined to support someone less suited for the position than others who may find themselves unable to get into this over-exclusive boy's club because of it. Lara 15:50, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   You realise that by opposing this for that reason, you are effectively helping to make bureaucratship an exclusive group? I'd prefer to see something relevant to SoWhy in your oppose, rather then something which reads like you "saving the seat" for other users by opposing other's RfBs. Basically, you may personally believe that there are better suited candidates, but is SoWhy good enough? - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 16:03, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   Clearly not, or I would support. Lara 16:07, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   But your reason is that SoWhy isn't as good as someone else? - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 16:10, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   Classic badgering. You are not helping the candidate here, Kingpin. Tan | 39 16:16, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   The number of active 'crats is mentioned in pretty much every RFB as a reason no more are needed. Granted, it's a stupid as hell argument, and it causes 'cratship to be needlessly exclusive, particularly considering it's not an impressive set of tasks. I don't create the circumstances; I merely acknowledge them. Under the circumstances, I don't believe SoWhy is either qualified nor suited for the position. I also find his answers to the questions thus far to be weak. There are stronger candidates willing to do the job. Why should I support in this case? Because you think he's good enough? No. Lara 16:42, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   In response to Uchucha's unsolicited yet detailed reasoning for why he should never be a 'crat, I will elaborate on my comment about SoWhy's answers being weak. For example, responding to 4a he oversimplified a question with obvious implications to give a worthless one-sentence answer. Then, responding to 4b, he contradicts himself. Responding to 6, he wrote "NEWT can probably be considered a mistake." He continued, "It certainly was in retrospect." I don't know how to classify that first sentence there other than 'weak'. The sentences that follow acknowledge it was ill-considered, but they sort of come with a poke at the people who think it was a bad-faith deal to bite other editors, newbs or not. Personally, I don't agree with the people opposing over this. Of course, I don't get my panties all in a wad over things as easily as most others around here; but I digress. Moving on. One more example is his response to 9. When discussing whether or not he thinks RFA is broken, he states ". . . so far the process remains unchanged despite numerous claims that it needs to be reformed, so it can't be that broken." Really? That's the reason RFA isn't broken? Because it hasn't been fixed yet? Weak answer. Give some explanation about why you think it's a well-oiled machine, dispute some of the claims of those who do claim it is broken, or respond to some of the concerns about RFA with your own detailed views; but simply claiming that because something hasn't changed on a project that has made it all but impossible to make significant changes isn't an answer... well, it can probably be considered a weak one, I guess. Lara 20:48, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

   Can you explain how 4b contradicts 4a? As for question 9, well, I said it's not that broken. It might need improvements but by definition, something that is broken does not work. RFA does work, we still promote admins after all. That RFA can be reformed in order to avoid some of its problems is true but that does not make it broken. I have also linked to my answers to the RFA survey which are pretty detailed imho. Regards SoWhy 21:14, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

   4b does not contradict 4a, it contradicts itself. You first say the candidate's wish should be considered "and probably allowed", but then you go on to say that you'd not allow it regardless. The point is, with this response and others, you're not clear. You're not giving thoughtful responses. Regardless of the reason, it is one example of a few that leave me to believe there are more qualified candidates that would/will be a better fit for the position. Lara 02:27, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

5. Incredibly reluctant oppose - I've looked through some of SoWhy's actions and some previous successful and unsuccessful RfBs to try to support this, I have a great deal of respect for the nominator an have only seen solid work from the nominee before now, but unfortunatly I could not find that reason (Obviously I'm happy to be swayed by some compelling answers) but at the moment I believe SoWhy to be a good admin, but not quite up to the standard obviously demanded of Crats (As Lara Points out). I believe that, unlikely RfA, RfB switches the onous onto the one being nominated. Rather than it proving you will not do anything wrong with the admin tools, it is proving you will be a worthwhile custodian of the additional tools of a crat as well as the interpretative responsibilities over admin candidates. I am just not convinced, sadly. --Narson ~ Talk • 16:10, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
6. Oppose Not because I think you're a bad admin but because this is simply not okay. Deliberately trying to fool your fellow volunteers and admins like this does not indicate to me that you're suited to take on more responsibility than you already have. Vyvyan Basterd (talk) 16:49, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
   • Sorry but I'm not buying your response to this. You showed up on a fellow administrator's talk page and deliberately covered your tracks by "forgetting" to sign your message and then argue as if you were unaware of why he had chosen to delete it. Your articles were deliberately written to test if the np patroller would grab the bait and tag them. Do you have any idea how unpleasent it is to talk to someone and not know that you are in fact talking to someone else who is trying to mislead you? If you haven't been on the recieving end of this sort of abuse of trust then I suspect you don't but try to see this from the other person's perspective. How would you feel if someone did this to you? Vyvyan Basterd (talk) 18:21, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   It might have happened, I don't know. Honestly, and I know it might sound fake but I really think this, I would not mind. Quite the opposite actually: The fact that I never know who the person is that comes to talk to me makes me treat everyone the same and if someone came to me afterwards, saying they did so to see how I react when I don't know that it was them, then I would understand it and if someone discovers something that I did wrong while doing so, I'd be happy to find out about it. As I said in my NEWT statement, all editors involved with my part in NEWT (like tedder) actually responded positively and welcomed the possibility of constructive criticism. But I did not create the articles to see whether they would be tagged - I created them as a newbie would and wanted to see what happens to them. Regards SoWhy 18:39, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   I think we'll have to agree to disagree here. There's nothing you can really do now to change my opinion so I'll leave it at that. Good luck with the crat tools if this succeeds (I mean that sincerely). Vyvyan Basterd (talk) 13:16, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

7. Oppose per Redvers and Lara. Not the strongest candidate, and the entrapment experiment wasn't very impressive. I'll revisit this once all the questions have been answered, particularly Q11. GlassCobra 16:50, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
8. Per Redvers. Newbie treatment at Criteria for speedy deletion was as clear-cut as it's possible to be an example of disrupting Wikipedia to make a point, and I wouldn't trust anyone involved with it – and certainly not someone who fails to even recognize in retrospect just how disruptive their parlor-games were – with any position of authority; if there were a working desysop mechanism, I'd have nominated all those involved for it. – iridescent 17:22, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
9. I could overlook NEWT by itself, but in general I agree with Tan here. I would observe in response to Lara that people in the oppose section pointing out that we don't need more 'crats are often just responding to the supporters and even the candidate's nominating statement claiming that desperately, desperately we do need more. Since Jeffrey Gustafson left, I'm not sure need has been the sole basis of an oppose, merely that some people have felt it necessary to refute the claims of supporters that we need to open the bcrat trophy to as many people as possible. --JayHenry (talk) 17:55, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
10. I have concerns regarding inclusionism and participation in the disaster that was NEWT. We have enough awful articles that get "saved" by people following policy to the letter that are nothing but an embarrassment for Wikipedia. An admin holding an inclusionist ethos is bad enough, but a bureaucrat is worse. Too many times have I seen SoWhy oppose perfectly decent RFA candidates over nit-picking CSD so-called concerns (usually one-off mistakes from months ago; or, not mistakes, but the editor using a thing called common sense when dealing with a mess that is supposed to be an article). We will never be a respectable encyclopedia if junk is kept because it happened to be mentioned briefly somewhere. I think he misunderstands adminship, and that is not what I want from a bureaucrat at all. Majorly talk 18:13, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    So, to boil it down, you feel that SoWhy's beliefs toward articles would affect his ability to determine consensus on a close RfA? ~ Amory (u • t • c) 18:45, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    I feel he has poor judgement and may consider weak-reasoned opposes based on old CSD mistakes as more important than they actually are. Majorly talk 18:50, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    Cratship is judging consensus, not only weighting !votes. If there were only one or two such opposes, then they would not weigh much. If a number of opposes exist for the same reason, they would weigh more. Judging an RFA is not (only) about the reasoning of the !votes, it's about whether those !votes are reflection of what the community thinks of the candidate. If the community shares a certain concern that is related to adminship, it does not only show up in one !vote. It will influence a number of them. Whatever I personally think of CSD would not influence me, just as I can close an AFD as delete even if I think the article should be kept. And of course I would probably not close an RFA where such concerns feature prominently anyway because I most likely !voted in it. Regards SoWhy 19:02, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    Good to hear, but not worth the risk. I am adamantly opposed to any editor who is clearly inclusionist-inclined to receiving further privs. Majorly talk 19:20, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    Wow. Just wow. Next time anyone claims that "inclusionists are playing politics at XXXX" I'm going to point them to this. Hobit (talk) 20:18, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    I really appreciate the sarcasm. As it happens, I am sick and tired of inclusionists like SoWhy opposing people's RFAs with really minor quibbles over mistaken taggings. I think he has very poor judgement - there are much worse things than a couple of mistaken taggings. Such as plagiarism, copyvios, hoaxes, libel etc, all the kind of thing which inclusionists bend over backwards to "save". That is why I would oppose inclusionists, though I would always make exceptions. I would also oppose any editor who made questionable votes at RFA, as SoWhy has done often. Majorly talk 20:29, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    Inclusionists support plagiarism, copyvios, hoaxes, and libel? Please. I'd really like to see some diffs of SoWhy actually supporting any of these. Really: put up or shut up, please. Jclemens (talk) 21:41, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    Never said SoWhy supported any of those things. If you read what I wrote, you'll notice I said they (inclusionists) "save" articles from deletion, and yes, they often do contain plagiarism and copyvios. In fact, in Ironholds' RFA, some instances of "bad" tagging were in fact blatant plagiarism, and Ironholds was being opposed for tagging to delete blatant copyvios. But, the inclusionists so desperate to prevent the article being deleted, were careless and didn't check to see that this was the case. My issue is that with the mindset to keep anything and everything without actually caring to check, all sorts of rubbish ends up on Wikipedia, which is why no real scholar takes Wikipedia seriously. Majorly talk 21:54, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    So your oppose of SoWhy is a guilt-by-association issue, then? Jclemens (talk) 18:01, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Possibly, but if you think my oppose is poor, you might want to look at your own track record (particularly the last one). I've said what I have to say, now please stop hassling me over my completely reasonable oppose. I don't like opposing people, and hardly ever do so - why don't you pick on someone else to bother? Majorly talk 18:12, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Opposing people because they've failed to achieve consensus on three previous occasions is nothing like your petty and bigoted oppose. You don't seem to get the difference between holding an individual's particular past against them and holding a philosophical position against a person. Your oppose isn't in the least reasonable--it's the moral equivalent of assuming that because a person is a minority they are likely to engage in criminal activity. You're absolutely entitled to your say, but "your say" impeaches its own value more than it does SoWhy's suitability. Jclemens (talk) 22:06, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Bigotry? I supported this RfB, but Majorly's oppose is one of the more reasonable ones here, and it includes perfectly legitimate concerns. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 22:10, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Now you're just talking complete and utter rubbish. I don't want SoWhy as a bureaucrat because I dislike the way in which he opposes people over the tiniest minor incidents, and because of his participation in the disruptive NEWT thing. My philosophical view is any person who opposes for petty reasons at RFA, like you and SoWhy, does not have the suitable judgement required to be a bureaucrat. Don't like it? Tough. Now please go away and stop harrassing me. You'll notice I don't pester you over your contradictory support vote and I expect the same for me. Majorly talk 23:00, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    For the record, there wasn't the smallest bit of sarcasm in my comment. I'm honestly not sure what you think was sarcastic. I meant it literally. Don't know if that makes it better or worse in your estimation, but you appear to have misunderstood my intent. I'll take it to your talk page. Hobit (talk) 22:12, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

11. Judgement seriously questioned by allowing that oh-so-obvious WP:POINT breach to go ahead. I mean, I'm a bit of an inclusionist too, but even I could see that was disruptive and we were better off without it.  GARDEN  18:55, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
12. Strong oppose per interactions of the Bureaucrats' noticeboard and the above opposes. Andrevan@ 19:14, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    Could you please point out some instances of problematic interactions at BN? –Juliancolton | ^Talk 19:15, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    [4] [5] [6] Andrevan@ 19:30, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    I honestly fail to see the problem with any of those diffs. Unless you are using it as evidence that a potential crat should be aware of these things? Wisdom89 _{(T / ^C)} 19:34, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    (edit conflict) I'm not sure I see the issue with any of those. BN is currently a public noticeboard; if the bureaucrats don't want "regular" users to comment there or request attention to a certain matter, that's fine, but I can't see anything but good faith in SoWhy's posts there. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 19:34, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    My issue is with the attempt to paint the bureaucrat tasks as backlogged, which strikes me as a power grab or an attempt to set up a successful bureaucrat nomination. This is extremely silly, as bureaucrat is a very specific and technical position with no extra bonuses or benefits. Andrevan@ 20:06, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    Why assume the worst? People post at ANI all the time letting us know about backlogs at ANI, UAA, or RFPP, yet we don't take that as a sign of power hunger simply because they're trying to be helpful. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 20:13, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

    Number one, it wasn't even a backlog. Number two, there's no reason why users should be concerned about backlog on pages like CHU, which are completely non-essential to encyclopedia functioning, do not have deadlines or time constraints, and in fact concern only the users who request the renames and nobody else. And finally, consistent clerking at CHU suggests a desire to become a bureaucrat, and to then point out a non-existent backlog strikes me as simple power hunger. Note that I don't believe this should reflect negatively on this user's considerable content contributions, which I wish he would return to instead of running for dubiously worthwhile extra hats. Andrevan@ 00:05, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    So, just to clarify, are you opposing because he was trying to be helpful? I don't really understand your oppose. Even if he had some sort of unquenchable bureaucrat-lust, wouldn't helpful contributions in bureaucrat areas indicate he'd make a good.. you know, bureaucrat? I highly doubt he was setting up some sort of conspiratorial power-grab, yikes, talk about assuming bad faith. —what a crazy random happenstance 12:48, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    The comment was not helpful. Andrevan@ 22:34, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Well, with all due respect, Andre, that's among the most elitist things I've ever heard. Clerking at CHU indicates a desperation to become a bureaucrat? Does reverting vandalism then indicate a desperation to become an admin? –Juliancolton | ^Talk 18:09, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    It wasn't the clerking but the comment about the backlog that I took exception to. Clerking in and of itself is fine.

    Why did you say "And finally, consistent clerking at CHU suggests a desire to become a bureaucrat" then? –Juliancolton | ^Talk 22:38, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    @Andre: To sum up what you're saying: You don't like the fact that SoWhy was asking you to do what you were given the flag to do. Well as "elite" as you might suppose yourself to be, admins get asked to do things every day, and we don't complain about it and oppose people at RFA every damn time it happens. Your oppose and further elitist comments here definitely do not reflect a very good vision of yourself in the communitiy's eyes. You asked for the bit, so stop complaining about being asked to use it. — Coffee // have a cup // ark // 18:31, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    He didn't ask me to do anything. He complained about a backlog which in fact was not a backlog on a noticeboard which, in fact, is monitored by the same people who monitor CHU to begin with. It was not helpful. 22:34, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    mmm....it wasn't harmful either. Sounds more like protective empire building on your part IMO. Leaky Caldron 22:51, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Andre that's a weak excuse for your opposition. What, *gasp* was he making you look bad? There are a lot better reasons for opposing someone, than saying that a civil, kind request, on the BN was something unbecoming of a potential crat. I'm sure his small request there didn't take up server space, we get requests at ANI to delete articles that are in the CSD category already, and we don't complain. I think you're a little to comfortable with your position, when you start acting up on a simple question about your chosen duty. --— Coffee // have a cup // ark // 23:55, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

13. Oppose - I wasn't even aware of NEWT until this very RfB. What a terrible idea. It's more than enough to oppose this RfB. Wisdom89 _{(T / ^C)} 19:22, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
14. Oppose per evidence of terrible judgment with the breaching experiment called NEWT.Bali ultimate (talk) 19:54, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
15. Weak Oppose - Great guy, solid editor, waaaaaaaaaaaayyy to desperate for the 'crat flag. Ironically, when I reviewed Julian's recent RFB I had the impression that SoWhy also seemed to be far to "regular" at WP:BN - i.e. over and above giving input but trying to get himelf noticed. No disrespect, and I reiterate that SoWhy is a sterling admin and editor; it's just that these seems rather like hat collecting to me. Pedro :  Chat  21:33, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
16. Strong Oppose - per involvement with WP:NEWT. Kcowolf (talk) 04:59, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
17. Oppose-- with substantial regret but a nasty taste left in my mouth still. SoWhy is a damn good member of the community, but... it's that cursed NEWT, being still fresh and still worrying me if I NPP. Actually this oppose isn't primarily rooted in the project itself-- I greatly respect that SoWhy hung out in the project talk page (9 edits total) vs many admins posting data who just ran away instead of talk to improve the system. I'll also say that I've given support !votes for RfA candidates that were involved in NEWT and I'd shared a few grumpy comments with, but mutual respect in the end and isn't a dealbreaker by itself. This is: [7] ...where the candidate felt it took it upon themselves to rewrite part of the WP:SOCK policy page with zero consensus or talk page use, and the changes happened to cover precisely the earlier sock gaming concerns were. What many editors had objected about SoWhy's action in NEWT apparently no longer a concern! Coincidence, I'm sure. No, seriously. Changing policy to cover one's tracks or to cover future actions of a similar nature? Forget it. Thankfully it was reverted. ...I have other concerns but this alone kills it for me right now. I would be glad to view the candidate on standard merits after the standard 3-12 month unofficial community break to excuse it on good faith for actions since then. ♪ daTheisen(talk) 12:45, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Believe it or not but I have not considered NEWT at all when I made that change. I remember that change and what prompted it was ClueBot (talk · contribs). We all know that this bot does a great job on million of pages, right? But the way the policy was written, Cobi (talk · contribs) was not allowed to edit any of those pages since they were previously edited by his bot account and thus I added that this does not apply if it is made clear that it was the same person contributing. You don't have to believe me of course, I just thought you might want to know why I made that change (btw, it was restored by another admin and an ArbCom member after being reverted). On a side note, since you mention other concerns, could you elaborate on them? Regards SoWhy 13:20, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    That's a poor defence. Existing sockpuppetry principles allow multiple accounts if identified as multiple accounts. The great big honking sign on ClueBot's page indicating he's a bot run by Cobi makes the entire edit moot if that was your justification, which I highly doubt. Ironholds (talk) 13:56, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    I have to agree with SoWhy here. There are 37 pages which I've edited using both my primary and secondary accounts, and by a strict interpretation of the rules as they stood this would be considered "abusive sockpuppetry". SoWhy's change was entirely appropriate. – iridescent 13:58, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Not really; see WP:SOCK#LEGIT. SoWhy, if you were looking at ClueBot for example, why not actually read the existing policy? Such as under "legitimate sock accounts" "A common special case of maintenance involves bots, or programs that edit automatically or semi-automatically. Editors who use bots are encouraged to create separate accounts". Ironholds (talk) 14:12, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    I have. That's why I made the change (that and because of public PC accounts like the one Iridescent mentions). At that time, it sounded as if the policy was contradicting itself since LEGIT encouraged/allowed such accounts but WP:ILLEGIT sounded as if they were not allowed to edit the same pages, which clearly is not the point of policy. As you say yourself, it was not a change of policy. It was merely a clarification based on what was already in the policy. Regards SoWhy 14:18, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Sorry? The illegitimate uses section says "Editors may not use more than one account to contribute to the same page or discussion in a way to suggest that they are multiple people". How does "Iridescent" and "Iridescent 2" sound like multiple people? Or ClueBot and Cobi, when one is tagged as an automated bot run by another? Both legitimate and illegitimate uses sections support the idea that automated bots, doppelgangers, legitimate alt accounts and the like are fine to edit pages. Ironholds (talk) 14:21, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    If you take a look at the diff daTheisen posted, you will notice that I added that part - "[...] in a way to suggest that they are multiple people" was not part of the policy before I added it and thus sounded contradicting itself. Regards SoWhy 14:49, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    If the best explanation available is semantics, I'm still not dissuaded. If this had been discussed and planted in before the project we'd at least have had something to point to. I'd also make a case that "Iridecent" and "Iridescent 2" are self-identifiable and are co-existing in userspace and I'd fight to IAR disclosure on that, though I'm still not certain why used. This is two entirely different names, and the admin account was used in edits on the would-be CSD'd article without disclosure. If adding the policy wasn't related to NEWT, I'm not really sure what the purpose of sanctioning a sock to participate in the same article would be. It's giving a false sense of consensus by browsing the edit history even if not used no the talk page. Again, the sad irony being that if this were discussed before NEWT it's unlikely it would have been objected to, at least for use in the project. Legit sock definition is kind of a stretch to apply. Sorry for rambling, and I do very honestly hate to morally oppose on this now. It's not as though I'd be upset if this passes, though. I KNOW you're an outstanding editor, but still a major lapse here. Suggest collapse or talk page if this goes longer. ♪ daTheisen(talk) 14:44, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    The phrase "prominent users might create a new account to experience how the community functions for new users" was part of WP:SOCK at least since 2008. The change SoWhy made to the policy had comparatively very little impact on the (per letter of policy) WP:SOCK-compliant use of alternate accounts in WP:NEWT – common sense would have already accepted the edits referred to in SoWhy's change anyway as long as they weren't being done deceptively. Thus, even if the change were made with WP:NEWT in mind, I don't think it can be interpreted as an attempt at giving it additional legitimacy, but only as a non-controversial clarification. Doesn't change WP:POINT or judgment concerns you have, of course. Amalthea 15:20, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    It says so now, after the edit mentioned above. Before that it only had the absolute "Editors may not use more than one account to contribute to the same page or discussion." Amalthea 14:52, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

18. Oppose per the newbie-treatment experiment; completely inappropriate. ╟─TreasuryTag►sheriff─╢ 13:52, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
19. Oppose Creating bios of marginaly notable living person as a breaching experiment is abuse. We don't need more poorly watched bios of marginaly notable living people. Hipocrite (talk) 14:10, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
20. Oppose because of the recent involvement in a breaching experiment and the creation of a fake account to take part in it. SlimVirgin ^{TALK contribs} 14:43, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Just out of curiosity, did you take the time to read his contributions under NEWT? Or did you just blanket-condemn him for having been involved at all? —what a crazy random happenstance 06:48, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    Given that I opposed with precisely the same rationale just above, I'll answer if I may! I have looked into SoWhy's personal participation at NEWT, though merely out of interest: I would oppose regardless. The project involved creating an alternate account or accounts for an inappropriate purpose (none of the "legitimate uses" listed on the policy page seem to apply). There are other problems with the experiment too, but this is the main one. ╟─TreasuryTag►CANUKUS─╢ 10:29, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

    FWIW, as I've said above the phrase "prominent users might create a new account to experience how the community functions for new users" was part of WP:SOCK since at least 2008. Amalthea 10:42, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

    But that's not why the NEWT accounts were created: as far as I can tell, that exception is about personal experience taken on one's own initiative, not mass organised experimentation with the goal of bringing everything out into the open at the end. ╟─TreasuryTag►secretariat─╢ 11:04, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

    I think you're creating a distinction that has no basis in policy there. NEWT was about creating new accounts to experience how the community functions for new users. That people bring it out in the open in the end seems no more than a good idea: what is the point of such an experiment when its results are not made known? As for the "mass organised" part, if policy approves of such experimentation in general, I see no reason why it wouldn't approve of a larger experiment that would yield more reliable results. I think people agree that NEWT was in retrospect a bad idea, but it is not against WP:SOCK. Ucucha 11:26, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

    The sockpuppet issue isn't nearly as big a deal to me as the whole idea of the thing and the failure to recognize that people might not take this very well, but while the original goal may have been to see how the community functions for new users, it quickly became a test of how NPP handles borderline cases where the article happened to be created by a new user (because a long-term user would have been blocked for trolling for creating articles so bad), which I doubt is covered by the policy. Mr.Z-man 16:26, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

21. Oppose It takes strong character to admit you are wrong, especially if you are heavily invested in it, still, I dont see any indication that SoWhy understands why NEWT was so problematic, only that he regrets that people where offended by it. Bonewah (talk) 15:37, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
22. Oppose per his engaging in WP:POINT at WP:NEWT. I'm sorry, but that experiment was not designed to jerk good faith users around. –MuZemike 17:28, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Out of curiousity, was this oppose concocted from merely reading the other oppose section? If it was, you should re-evaluate (and note I am an opposer, although not over this NEWT nonsense). Was the candidate disrupting Wikipedia to prove a point AT wp:newt, or merely by participating in NEWT? Do you think he was jerking new users around himself, outside of the main goals of that project? I am sincerely confused by your statements. Tan | 39 17:36, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Essentially, it's the same reason as to why I opposed Atama's RFA. –MuZemike 19:23, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

23. Weak Oppose - I don't think that it's necessary for SoWhy to have the bit, as we've had much more respected admins come through this process and not get it. SoWhy's participation in NEWT does not affect this !vote, as NEWT was actually quite a smart process that was misunderstood by the NPP community. I'm frankly tired of all the opposers here who are whining about the NEWT project, just because they "weren't in on it"; the experirment was broadly broadcasted, and even was mentioned in the Signpost. If the opposers weren't smart enough to research what the project was about and therefore why they are opposing, then they shouldn't be opposing. However, all that being said, I still think that SoWhy is not the most worthy candidate for this bit at the moment, as it seems the !voters here are making this quite an "elite" group. My !vote is not to make it more elite, but to simply say that if it's going to be as excluded as it is today, there are definitely better candidates that have gone through here than SoWhy. My personal belief on cratship is that it requires a hell of a lot less scrutiny than a admin's actions do. Administrators make judgements on parts of the wiki that people aren't looking at all of the time, or sometimes at all, whereas crats make decisions that are right out in the public eye, where there's no chance of people not seeing the actions done by them. Therefore I would like to see our percentage requirments go down; however, the chance of that happening anytime soon is not likely, in the slightest, as they had an RFC on this not too long ago. Until those requirments go down, I will continue to only support admins that I trust to the utmost, to make decisions regarding consensus. Regards, — Coffee // have a cup // ark // 18:15, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Strong post Coffee, but with for once I agree with you! Well, at least what you said about NEWT. I'm not sure if they are "whining" because "they 'weren't in on it'", but I'm a little tired of everyone talking about such a bad idea it was. I'm not so sure it was the idea that was wrong; I think WSC had a great starting plan. However, it was implemented poorly by some, including me—some of the articles were borderline CSDs. Also, some editors took it quite badly when they were caught on a clearly wrong CSD. Instead of taking it in stride and improving their decisions, they turned their wrath on the project and everyone involved in it. No, I'm not saying that everyone was opposed to this project because they were caught, but I think that caused a lot of the negativity surrounding it all.

    Anyway, off-topic discussion over. Are you saying that you won't support SoWhy because you're afraid a better candidate will come along and be opposed because there are too many crats, partly because of SoWhy (assuming he passed)? —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 19:47, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Agreed (on NEWT). Now as to your question: I feel that the "number of crats" standard that we have currently is ridiculous, however, if they (the community) are going to only allow extremely low amounts of admins to become crats, then I feel that I can only support people who I know I can put my utmost trust in, as there are not enough other crats to refute their actions. I'm not saying that I think that others that are better will come along, but I do feel that there have been better candidates before this. This isn't saying that I know SoWhy wouldn't handle the bit well, simply that I don't know him enough. This is why I'm weakly opposing, as I haven't seen him do anything that merits me to strongly worry about him getting the bit, other than the low amounts of crats we have. I hope you understand, — Coffee // have a cup // ark // 20:32, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

24. Oppose. We don't need anymore crats. In the absence of need, I'd be willing to vote for only the most exceptional candidates, and SoWhy doesn't meet that standard. Everyking (talk) 18:59, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
25. Oppose A competent admin, yet I don't feel comfortable with the idea of bureaucratship, at least not yet. Also per Everyking.  IShadowed  ✰  21:02, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Could you please explain why? –Juliancolton | ^Talk 21:16, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Eh? IShadowed explained his oppose perfectly. He doesn't feel comfortable with the idea of SoWhy as a bureaucrat and he agress with Everyking. Now this may be considered a weak (or indeed strong) rationale by the closing 'crat but it hardly needs more explaining, surely. "I don't like the idea" seems a perfectly valid oppose at RFx, even if it may not carry much weight. I'm not sure what more you need Julian. Pedro :  Chat  22:47, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

    Just to lessen the awkwardness, IShadowed is a she, Pedro ;)  fetchcomms☛ 16:32, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

26. I have less trust in this user than in most existing bureaucrats and most recent candidates, for the reasons described by others above, although I would note that I place little importance on WP:NEWT. Given that the existing bureaucrats are handling the workload adequately, I don't see a need to lower the bar. Christopher Parham (talk) 22:44, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
27. Oppose There are a number of quite useful reasons from many people above. I won't bother to retype them. I have seen several questionable statements in policy discussions by SoWhy over the last several months. I saw the name attached to disagreeable opinions enough times for it to stick. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)
28. Oppose per general "only the best" philosophy at RfB. Prodego ^talk 00:35, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
29. Oppose - User is too much on the vanguard to be a crat. This user has a rather extreme view of CSD and deletion in general. That combined with their involvement with WP:NEWT, which has nearly derailed a few RfAs at that, should be a big red flag. Shadowjams (talk) 06:22, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
30. Oppose - too colourful for the role. Given to subdued flamboyance and has a tendency for independent thought. Nice chap though, nothing personal. Crafty (talk) 11:17, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    As per SlimVirgin, creating a fake account that is now blocked as a sockpuppet appears troublesome even if it can be argued as within policy . Off2riorob (talk) 14:05, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

    Wrong argument, I'm sorry. A quick check of the block log reveals that it was a self block to ensure the unused account can not suddenly become a security risk. MLauba (talk) 14:17, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

31. Oppose - Mainly per WP:NEWT, which was just tremendously bad judgment. To a lesser degree, I would be slightly worried that SoWhy has too extreme of an inclusionist view to properly weight AFD/CSD issues on an RFA, which come up rather frequently. Mr.Z-man 20:39, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
32. Oppose - per some of the above and your involvement at Wikipedia:Newbie treatment at Criteria for speedy deletion, and it also prevents people from working on actual backlogs and deceived the community simply to prove a point. December21st2012Freak ^{Talk to me} at ≈ 01:08, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
33. Oppose due to some cases of questionable judgement. If we need more bureaucrats, there are better qualified users around. Epbr123 (talk) 11:09, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

    Moved discussion to talk, it was clogging up the page. Regards, --—Cyclonenim | Chat  20:58, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

34. Oppose I'm not drawn into the inclusionist/deletionist banter above, as I think Wikipedia ultimately benefits from editors who want too much here, and editors who want to little. The tug-of-war does help marginal articles. I oppose entirely over judgement... more specifically, SoWhy is so deeply involved in Wikipedia that it appears he can no longer see the forest from the trees (mainly, that this is a website, not a world). The WP:NEWT situation is an easy item to glom onto as it demonstrates a good intention executed in a mind-blowingly stupid way, such as to paint anyone involved in that train wreck as a phallus of middling size at best. Let me put it this way; If you find yourself executing an experiment on Wikipedia, then you have too much time on your hands to begin with. However, if that experiement is meant only to prove what is already considered a well worn and proven point, and the manner in which you go about "gathering evidence" does little to nothing toward actually mitigating the known issue. Such effort does, however, create an entirely new set of problems which then distract from the real issues at hand. If anything, all you did with WP:NEWT was exacerbate by committee the problem you set out to fix. So while you obviously have the skill set to do the 'Crat job, it doesn't appear you have the judgement to warrant the trust of additional tools at this time. Now, that said, bear in mind I think you can rebound and do the job just fine, as we all have our bad moments. I stepped back on my activity in 2009 once it became clear I had lost sight of the forest from the trees as well... so I'm fully aware that this is probably a case of casting stones whilst living in a glass house. What you want to do at this point is step back and evaluate, not wade ever more deeply into the morass. Hiberniantears (talk) 17:48, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
35. Oppose - the WP:NEWT idea was a bit silly. There are better ways to go about what the candidate was trying to do. - Richard Cavell (talk) 06:19, 13 January 2010 (UTC)
36. Oppose - I try not to be neutral in these things. The NEWT thing was a mistake and SoWhy would be home and hosed but for that. However, I think he will be more circumspect as a result and he was a follower not the leader. Anyone who foresaw the shambles and had pointed it out would get my vote! My nagging concern is about closing discretionary range RFAs, which admittedly might be few and far between. I don’t want closers to veer towards passing marginal RFAs and I just cannot see clearly SoWhy’s position on borderline candidates. Leaky Caldron 11:21, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Neutral

1. Neutral I just can't seem to decide, this user is excellent in a variety of areas, but those opposing do make a good point (specifically NEWT, and a bit on what Lara said). Leaning toward support, but I'm looking into some things right now.  fetchcomms☛ 16:46, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
2. WP:NEWT was a lousy idea and counter to our basic principles of assume good faith and transparency, but SoWhy's participation was relatively minor. I don't see it as definitive. Chick Bowen 20:19, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
3. Neutral but want to say that the protestations of the opposers based on WP:NEWT is absurd. Patently absurd. This "breaching experiment" resulted in some articles being created. Oh the horror! We can't have new articles being created here! Whatever would we do!?!?!?!?!? Just a dash of common sense, please. Wow. Nothing was disrupted, and some useful information came from it. Nothing negative came of it. --Hammersoft (talk) 21:07, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

   It's not really true that nothing negative came out of it; see the talk page for discussion of this. If you believe that the positives outweighed the negatives, that's understandable, but I think your dismissiveness here is uncalled for. Chick Bowen 01:31, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

   You have your opinion, and I have mine. How about I don't dismiss your opinion as uncalled for, and you don't dismiss mine as uncalled for? Wow. --Hammersoft (talk) 14:53, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

4. I do see both sides, completely. I plan on coming back over the weekend to support or oppose if this isn't withdrawn by then. iMatthew ^talk at 22:54, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
5. Neutral for now. I am not familiar enough with the candidate to support but wish to comment on the NEWT business. It was a well intentioned initiative to improve Wikipedia. The vehement opposition to the candidate based on it alone contributes to a chilling effect on any such initiatives. Wikipedia is a volunteer effort that relies on the initiative of volunteers to be bold to make positive changes happen. Such boldness is enshrined as one of the 5 pillars that are the core principles of the project. This support for boldness and of individual initiative even with its shortcomings is recognized as a key strength. Those who participated in NEWT dared to approach a problem and try to understand it and are being shot down for it. I do not see those castigating them supporting another initiative and are by default leaving the problem alone. A business that follows such an approach will go bankrupt eventually. The exchange between SoWhy and Ironholds above should be illuminating. If one feels they should oppose SoWhy please find another reason. Lambanog (talk) 10:59, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
6. Neutral for now as well, largely for the same reasons that Lara has opposed. RfB should be a consistent process. While I think SoWhy is a good candidate, equally good or better ones have failed. Food for thought. FWIW, if I felt this candidate was likely to reach the "crat chat" threshold I probably have lent my support. WFCforLife (talk) 11:22, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
7. Neutral - I like SoWhy a lot. I think he's an excellent admin, and an awesome content contributor, even though I occasionally disagree with his CSD views. Unfortunately, none of that can overcome, at this time, his participation in the horrific thing-called-NEWT. Now, I dislike holding things against people, but although SoWhy states that he realises that participation may have been a bad idea, he doesn't seem to realise just how bad of an idea it definitely was. For those reasons, I am neutral. Best of luck, Ale_Jrb^talk 11:45, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

   If I sounded doubtful, I apologize for it. In retrospect, it certainly was a bad idea since the reaction it caused by far outweighs the positive things it meant to achieve. Unfortunately, I did not know of those things when I participated and those concerns were not voiced until a week after my participation ended (see WT:NEWT#Bad_idea). It's not an excuse for not foreseeing those concerns (but who can foresee every possible concern?) but it maybe shows that I did not participate regardless of valid concerns. Regards SoWhy 12:42, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

   You may not have foreseen the problems with the breeching experiment, but they were foreseeable. That kind of foresight is something a number of people here would like in a 'crat. ⇦REDVERS⇨ 12:59, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

   I didn't follow NEWT at the time, only finding out about it relatively recently (but quite a bit before this RfB). If these problems were foreseeable, why is that I can't find anything showing that several of the 'crats voiced their opinion about these problems? This isn't being picky - I've looked and can't find a discussion about this which included crats voicing their concerns, so would genuinely appreciate it if someone could provide a link/diff to where any of the 34 'crats showed their foreseight and voiced their concerns over these foreseeable problems (and yes, I'm aware that WP:BUR shows that as of 28 Nov 2009, only 19 were listed as active). -- PhantomSteve/talk|contribs\ 17:21, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

   I would point out that a number of objections were raised early on to WP:NEWT. There was a hearty defense of the project there too by many of the members; it's not as if they realized objections and stopped. It was more that they realized it became politically unpopular and backed off. But of course, that's my obviously biased opinion. I would encourage you to read the discussion from early on on the talk page. I know I raised concerns, but others may have done so before me. I believe that User:NuclearWarfare's RfA was the first to address the issue too, but I might be wrong about that. Shadowjams (talk) 06:31, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

   Thanks for your reply, Shadowjams - but my question was specifically about 'crats: if 'crats are meant to have the foresight which Redvers is expecting them to have, I would have expected some of them to have mentioned this right at the beginning of NEWT, while it was being discussed and before it was "in action". I haven't been able to find any such objection from a 'crat, but would be grateful if someone could point out some diffs showing that some of them did have such foresight and pointed out the foreseeable problems. -- PhantomSteve/talk|contribs\ 08:12, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

   Fair response, but I think that it's not the crats that matter, but rather the active community, and my point is only that some of the defenses of the NEWT members is that they didn't realize the project's controversy, or something similar to that. My only point is that other editors raised the issue early on, and they didn't flinch. I'm not a crat, or even an admin, but I have been here for a while and I think those like me, as a group, are relevant to the project, so my point is just to say that there were non-novice dissenting voices that were somewhat ignored, until public opinion changed. As I said, I could be wrong about this, but that was my perception. I don't think it's any coincidence that these are the same editors that are very active at the relevant policy pages--there's an agenda here, and while occasionally reasonable, it occasionally isn't. It is the latter that convinces me to oppose. Shadowjams (talk) 08:21, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

   For reference, my concern was based off you saying, "I agree that it was not the best idea..." - IMO, with hindsight, it was a terrible idea. It's not just that the reaction was bad though, either. I'm not sure anyone really anticipated just how bad the negative result would be - it's definitely not just you - but when I found out about it, I never really saw what people thought they would improve by doing it. How, exactly, would creating poor quality articles that almost-but-not-quite meet the criteria ever improve the encyclopedia? (That's a rhetorical question.) I wouldn't oppose over this, but it means I can't support at this time. Ale_Jrb^talk 09:48, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

8. Neutral NEWT was wrong in so many ways. I did create a new account for it, and had planned to try it myself, and was only stopped by the logistics of the deceptive sock editing (not by the moral qualms of the seat-askers). However, discussing it afterward with editors involved, there seemed so little forethought of violation of other wikipedia policies and guidelines besides the creating a sock account, namely civility, newbie biting (their biting newbies, as, it turns out that a lot of new page patrollers are themselves new editors). I think some serious discussion would have led to not doing this in the first place, or doing it in a way that expressed community spirit rather than the bad faith assumption that NPPs were the bad guys at wikipedia when it comes to newbies. In my experience they're not. I would like bureaucrats to understand the entire community, not just the convenient part of it they've designated as being involved in a particular area. That said, it can't be an oppose because I have no doubt that SoWhy would be a 100% better bureaucrat than Andrevan, with his 100% off-track comments above in his/her oppose. Bureaucrats serve the community, if a bureaucrat has no clue about that, and is offended that a member of the community acts like a responsible member of the community, the bureaucrat should resign. --IP69.226.103.13 | Talk about me. 18:56, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
9. neutral, feh - I disagree with Majorly on the 'inclusionist' thing, but this user does not give me the warm and fuzzies. And the whole Newt thing....wow. everyone who participated and thought at any point that it was a good idea should spend an hour a day for the next month doing new page patrol. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 06:01, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
10. Neutral A lot of good work, but the NEWT gotcha game gives me pause. Warrah (talk) 17:22, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
11. Neutral I've had a hard time this week deciding where to weigh in. I value SoWhy's extensive knowledge of Wikipedia policy and he would likely be a net positive to the crats. However, I don't know how much I can trust someone who participated in NEWT to have the best interests of wikipedia in mind. On the contrary I think this had the potential (possibly unintentionally) to harm Wikipedia and its reputation. I don't think this single issue should cause me to oppose but I can't support at this time either. I know you can get past this, but seeing as NEWT was so recent, his time around I think I have to affirm neutral. Valley2city^‽ 17:26, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of either this nomination or the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.