Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 48

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Deletion of never accepted RfAs

Since the policy change requiring nominations be accepted before being posted at WP:RFA, nominations that have not been accepted have generally been deleted once the nominee indicates lack of acceptance. There's no policy or guideline about this though. Today, I came across Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Terenceong1992, and it's been added to Wikipedia:Unsuccessful adminship candidacies. I'd like to see what people's opinions are on deletion of never accepted nominations. Personally, I don't see the point in keeping them around. They are not posted to WP:RFA anymore, and do not contain really much in the way of useful information since they never received much public scrutiny. Thoughts? --Durin 16:01, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Like a redirect someone will almost certainly never type in, they're cheap. They don't hurt to be kept around, and in the very very rare instance that they're required, they can be called up again. (Besides, don't people often look at past RfAs if a nominee has failed before?) Johnleemk | Talk 17:14, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

As a general rule I think an RfA would have to be 1) accepted by the candidate, 2) added to WP:RFA, to be counted as legitimate. But there are exceptions (i.e. an RFA added by a troll in bad faith). However, for historical purposes and the appearance of transparency I would like to have them remain undeleted and be able to see the links here of even those RFAs that are not legitimate. Maybe move them to a paragraph at the bottom of the page patterned after this). NoSeptember ^talk 17:31, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

I think they could certainly be deleted at the request of the nominee, if not by default. The problem is that they're catalogued at unsuccessful candidacies by the name of the nominee, when if they are useful information they are only useful about the nominator. Chick Bowen 02:33, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Warn the creator, give him a chance to userfy or copy the page (for, say, a future nom) then delete... unless the prospective nominee suggests that they may be ready at some point in the future. I have an RfA I've been holding open for acceptance for a month, and will hold open for ten more if that's what it takes for the editor in question to feel ready. bd2412 T 02:59, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Hmm. Perhaps a distinction should be made between an RFA that hasn't been accepted and one that's explicitly been declined. Chick Bowen 03:06, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

As proposed above, you could make a list at the bottom of Wikipedia:Unsuccessful adminship candidacies (or, since that page is alphabetized, on a subpage of it). A good example of this was Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Encephalon. He never accepted it, but eventually someone will nominate him sooner or later. So, the new nom could either overwrite the old one, or it could be on a new subpage. However, it's nice to be consistent about this. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 03:10, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Administrator activity for January

Some of you may be interested in having a look at User:Durin/Admin activity. I started this as a trial balloon, and was rather surprised to find that the top twenty from each category were responsible for >50% of the activity. Enjoy. --Durin 19:42, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

A rider: - Care needs to be exercised in interpreting these statistics. For example, some one protecting/unprotecting main page images would score very high as in the case of Petaholmes or myself (I should be on 20th position along with Bishonen, dunno why I don't figure there) but I rarely protect disputed pages or vandalised pages (simply 'coz other admins beat me to it). The usefulness of this statistic lies in our ability to monitor a bulk of admin activities easily. For example, in the case of blocks, we can check if each of those blocks had a corresponding talkpage message or not. Great work, Durin. --Gurubrahma 10:59, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

It is interesting to note that because of User:Curps's automatic blocking bots, he has blocked more users than the next fifteen admins put together. JIP | Talk 09:25, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I noticed that. I'm sure it's good faith but it also seems trigger-happy. Marskell 09:35, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, look who he's blocking - hardy good faith editors... User:I love a block from JoanneB in the morning for instance. Or how about User:Fuckyouwhore? --Celestianpower ^háblame 09:42, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

The population statistics are interesting:

• 2/3 of admins use their ability to delete or restore, but only 1/3 to protect and 1/2 to block;
• the top 10 and top 20 in each case account for over a third and over half (respectively) of the relevant admin actions.

I wonder how many of those 200+ "inactive" admins (like me, I guess) are away, or just writing articles. -- ALoan (Talk) 22:06, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Who changed everything here to "vote"?

We are not voting here, this is very misleading Kim Bruning 13:29, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Argh! Since september! I haven't been paying attention here, have I? :-( Kim Bruning 13:42, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, so much for me thinking I've been doing a good job. I mean, drat. Ok, and now I just know I have adminitis. I'm outta here before I do damage. Kim Bruning 13:44, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Freestylefrappe

For what appears to me to be the first time ever, we managed to promote an admin who was clearly unsuitable for the task, and who was then demoted by the AC mere months later. I am struck by the similarities between the RFA objections and the AC decision findings. I note that this is a clear example that the AC is doing its job, which is a good thing. I also note that this is a rare enough occurrence that it doesn't necessarily indicate a need for process change. All the same, I thought I'd bring it up here so that we could gain whatever insights we might from it regarding the adminship process. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 16:36, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Could you clarify a bit more...? I don't quite understand your query. -Zero^Talk 16:40, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

An immediate point that comes to notice is that FFF was promoted on just 73%, well below the usual thresholding and noticeably outside the region commonly considered to be discretionary. I wonder did this happen because the notvotes after the deadline were discounted? If that's the case, we need to be crystal clear than anyone who expresses an opinion is entitled to have that opinion counted. -Splash^talk 16:40, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

I believe I brought this point up in linuxbeak's rfa refomation project - rfa is not an "vote". The voters should always provide an reason for their stance in an matter. Perhaps votes lacking any explanation or thesis should be discounted. -Zero^Talk 16:46, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Full agreement here, but those oppose votes had rationales, while on the contrary, most of the support votes had none. I say that "votes" after the deadline should be counted; if the 'crats don't close on time, it's their fault, not the "voters'" fault. Johnleemk | Talk 16:50, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

"but those oppose votes had rationales, while on the contrary, most of the support votes had none." - See Raul's 10th law of wikipedia for the reason why this is so. Raul654 06:57, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Uh, that would leave 'Frappe and most RfAs with unanimous opposition. -Splash^talk 16:52, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

In general, I think it's pointless to require justifications for support votes; we already know the justification for most support votes. If a user has been editing decently for a sufficient period of time and contributed enough to the encyclopedia to understand policy and to give people a chance to decide that they're not gibbering lunatics, then that's enough to support them as an admin. I'm not sure what would be gained by requiring people to essentially say that over and over... Certainly, there are cases where a support voter could cite a user's excellent work at such-and-such an article or in resolving such-and-such a dispute or whatever, or places where they might want to use their support vote to comment on issues that might lead other people to oppose, but those things seem to be the exception and not the rule; in general, we don't need specific reasons to make someone an admin. The basic idea, after all, is to give adminship to as many (sane) people as possible. --Aquillion 19:39, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm not usually one for number crunching, but counting just pre-deadline comments it seems it was 77.5%. It seems kind of strange to say it (since 80% is after all, an arbitrary figure, right?) but this seems to strongly indicate that RfA works if process is closely followed. --W.marsh 16:48, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

His figures are based on 38/52 (support/total). This is correct if the intent is to gauge specifically the level of Support against the total entries. If you remove the three neutrals, it becomes 38/49 which results in the 77% support. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 16:53, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

No they're not. He had 38 support and 14 oppose. As is always the case on any other time-limited process, everyone who gets in before the closure is listened to. -Splash^talk 16:57, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

I know, I was explaining to Wmarsh why you were getting 73% and he was getting 77%. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 17:04, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Splash, while I understand and respect your views, I'm not sure that what you propose is the best answer. It sounds as if you're suggesting an 'eternal RfA'. At what point does an RfA actually close if post-close opinions are counted? Is it an hour after the close time? A day? Two days? Why isn't seven days long enough? Participation in the RfA process is a responsibility. There are 7 days allocated for the process, and it is the responsibility of those who contribute to, at some point during the week, add their entry. For them to demand to be heard after the period has expired shows a lack of respect for members of the project who are willing to abide by the widely published and openly viewable guidelines already established. Regards, CHAIRBOY (☎) 16:49, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

It closes when the 'crats close it. The RfA is supposed to end at a certain time, but if the 'crats don't close it then, it is their fault for not doing so, not the fault of those who added their opinions while the RfA was still open. Johnleemk | Talk 16:51, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

No, no. I mean that, if an RfA is closed slightly after the 7 day deadline, then anything that was posted until the close is fine (this is a statement of current practise, note). I in no way mean we keep going until there is a result, just that anything said until the closure is fine. -Splash^talk 16:52, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree. However, the bcrats should still take the validness of the vote into consideration after this time period as to make sure no one plays the system. -Zero^Talk 16:59, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

How do you measure the validness of a vote? How can expressing an opinion in good-faith ever be gaming the system? If the comment is in bad-faith, it's worthless whenever it is made. -Splash^talk 17:02, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry. I was not clear enough; I was referring to an lack of clarification at all:

• invalid - Oppose/support-User:Bad faith

• valid - Oppose/support, user likes to eat gravy. -User:Good faith

That's what I was trying to say, sorry for the confusion. -Zero^Talk 17:06, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

I see. -Splash^talk 17:23, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Is this current practice? Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_adminship/Archive_32#Votes_after_closing seems to suggest otherwise; Uninvited Co. provides a couple reasons why votes after the deadline should not be counted. Christopher Parham (talk) 21:04, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

On the more substantive point, I think that the part of RfA reform that calls for a discussion prior to the poll is useful in such situations. I personally would normally oppose an RfA where the problem exhibited in the oppose section are found, but I had supported days before that came to light. Whether I returned to reconsider or not, I do not remember, but if I had, then certianly I'd have had to give the opposition very serious consideration. This kind of change is the exception rather than the rule as Uninvited Company observes, but it's a good example of the exception in action. -Splash^talk 17:23, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

No question about it. Voting is good for only two things: 1. Seeing if any consensus exists (if it's close to unanimous, there is consensus); 2. Determining people's opinions prior to a discussion. Otherwise, discussion trumps it, anytime. Johnleemk | Talk 18:05, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

I have to say, I'm not sure I see a problem here. I see a mistake, absolutely, but such mistakes have historically proven to be very rare, and no matter what solution we employ, mistakes will be made because we are all humans and we all err. I know I've done things on the wiki that I regret (although not many, thank God). The new system doesn't seem bad, but we can't go in pretending that we're never going to annoint a rouge admin if we just change systems, and if we do make a change it can't be for that reason. Lord Bob 18:15, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, there is no problem. Might have not even been a mistake in promoting Freestylefrappe; as one can't always guess what kind of admin a person may turn out based on user comments. The current system works just fine, at least as well as it can work in an imperfect world. :) New complicated rules would just be a burden, and I doubt any benefits they may provide. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 18:33, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but DFA will likely reduce errors (just read the concept and you should understand why). We can't be perfect, but we should strive for it. And DFA isn't complicated; just discuss the nominee for a few days, and then after the discussion, "vote". Johnleemk | Talk 18:34, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Freestylefrappe's promotion was right on the borderline, and I guess that shows why some of these folks get so many oppose votes. However, this and other cases show that perhaps the Arbcom is more likely to desysop a rogue admin. If that's true, I'd say the RfA process doesn't need too much of an overhaul, since part of the reason we were looking into it is because it was nearly impossible to get anyone desysopped. I wouldn't mind people asking additional questions, of course ;-), but I don't think RfA needs too much of an overhaul now that the Arbcom no longr sees desysopping as a taboo remedy. --Deathphoenix 21:20, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Amen! Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 06:12, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, it might not be that "ArbCom" no longer sees it that way, it may be that the community selected new Arbiters that always saw it that way. New blood type of thing. Changing of the guard. You get the point. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 04:19, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Since the section header of this enthralling conversation is cited as "Freestylefrappe", does this mean that the fellow users here believe FF was an unsuitible admistrator..? -Zero^Talk 06:51, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Just look at the evidence section of the ArbCom case against him. He protected his own talk page. I know we can't know how a user will use the admin tools until they have them, but this behaviour is everything I try to avoid when supporting an admin candidate, and it is indeed comforting to know that ArbCom will deal with bad admins to the same extent they deal with bad users. Raven4x4x 09:46, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Arbitrators in touch with the current RfA standards?

I think how the Arbitrators think about their requiring a desysopped user to reapply is worth considering. You can get an idea of what they expect by reading this discussion. What they do impacts how we act here. I wonder how aware some of the arbitrators are about the current RfA situation. The standards for candidates expected by "voters" are quite different from those a year or two ago. NoSeptember ^talk 11:32, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm not pretending to speak on the arbcom's behalf here, but I think anyone as active and as experienced as they are should be well aware that any election is a popularity contest, and not judging on the merits. Generally people decide whether to support or oppose first, and then find reasons to support their decision. Johnleemk | Talk 11:39, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't know, Wikipedia is a big place, you can't stay current in all areas. In the section I linked above, the comments of Morven, Mindspillage and Sam Korn make me wonder how often they read the RfAs that are currently up for review. Do they know how many votes are cast on the issue of edit summaries for example? Btw, your comment in that discussion shows that you do know what is going on here, not surprising since we see you here often anyway. But what is this about a popularity contest - are you saying the ArbCom is ruling that if you are popular you don't get punished but if you are unpopular you do get punished? That would be an odd way to dish out punishments ;-). NoSeptember ^talk 11:53, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Frankly, I don't think this is a problem with the arbitration committee, do you? Kim Bruning 12:06, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I just want to make sure they are fully aware of the likely low RfA success rate of a desysopped-by-ArbCom user. I have no problem with desysoppings by them if they know the practical effect of it will be semi-permanent (It took Guanaco 4 tries and over a year to become an admin again). Being an admin is a privilege, so a bad admin being desysopped is a good thing. But if they intend a desysop to be only a temporary measure, before the community rushes to re-admin someone, then they may be deceiving themselves. And I do think ArbCom is doing a good job in general. NoSeptember ^talk 12:21, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I think the ArbCom is aware that a desysopped user may not be given the mop back soon. And I don't think they necessarily mean things as a "temporary measure".

I strongly disagree with parts of the comment "any election is a popularity contest, and not judging on the merits. Generally people decide whether to support or oppose first, and then find reasons to support their decision." If you are implying that worthy people fail to get elected, but people who would be bad administrators but are "popular" do get elected, then I will ask for evidence. And implying that voters are naive enough to not reconsider their decisions/biases based existing information about candidates is just naive. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 16:57, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Um, there's some pretty silly admins out there at the moment, and there's also some very cool folks who failed. Right now I'm probably being stalked to bits though, so it'd be wiser for me not to name names. Ugh... how's that for a useless comment... maybe mail me or something. Kim Bruning 18:04, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Being a silly admin is fine, as long as the tools don't get abused. :) As far as cool people failing to get elected, well... one could try again. If plenty of people think a given person is cool, I guess they will vote for him/her... :) Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 18:54, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I never said this is necessarily a bad thing; most of the time, the set of popular editors coincides with the set of people who should be admins (IMO). There are occasional cases where elections fail, though (note: I was speaking in general about Wikipedia elections, not just RfA). This is especially true with elections that have higher standards than RfA, i.e. the arbcom elections (where people like JamesF have never made the cut without a little help from Jimbo). And if I really believed people won't change their minds, why would I support DFA, which is predicated on the presumption (which, from my experience, is correct) that most editors are capable of weighing the material evidence and then deciding? I'm just stating what appears to be a fact, IMO -- people decide whether they like/know X, and only then start weighing the evidence. (I really need to learn precision in the art of making remarks, because my original comment should read "any election is first and foremost a popularity contest".) Johnleemk | Talk 02:07, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I'm fully aware of the situation here; I do follow this page. (Note that no one is required to reapply: they are simply allowed to; also note that I expressed some misgivings about the process on the vote page.) And yet—what else can we do when a case is about misuse of sysop powers? The idea of a requests for deadminship page continually gets shot down with the idea that it would only be a troll magnet and that good sysops who get on the bad side of bad users will get unfairly shot down, and where it has been shown that an admin has misused powers the matter can be taken to arbcom. Well, it was. If you don't like that it's too much of a popularity contest (and I don't, myself), make strong arguments against it. Have talks (not accusations, just talks) with people you think are harming the process, especially if they're your friends.

I would strongly urge that people would consider their decisions to accept or reject a re-request without holding the arbcom decision against them. That is, suppose the person asking for adminship again had done exactly the same admin actions, but hadn't been taken to arbcom: what would you think about that person retaining admin status? I'll repeat this as a comment on the RfAs themselves, should they choose to reapply. (Unless someone rebuts it well enough.) Mindspillage (spill yours?) 19:17, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

• Do we actually have evidence that it's happening like this? That is, can someone point to a re-adminship application that is clearly being shot down because of 'bad users' the candidate offended while being a good admin? Granted, de-adminship is so rare that there aren't very many examples to look at, period, but before we have all this discussion over it we should at least check whether it's really a problem or not. --Aquillion 01:06, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Mathbot

I'd like to see Mathbot stopped from adding the usual bunch of statistical nonsense to the bottom of nominations. For starters, it promotes needless numeric criteria. We're not here to vote for the person with the most interesting edit summaries. We're here to discuss people who we think would find the administrator tools useful, and who wouldn't abuse them. If people want to impose numeric criteria, let them; but let them also go and get their own facts. Having them lurking about promotes bad feeling; RfA is enough of a mudslinging contest at times without having to accept that you missed an edit summary at some point. In addition, it means newcomers to RfA (who would otherwise put forward useful points) resort to using numeric criteria. Rob Church (talk) 18:55, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Would it be feasible, I wonder, if Mathbot's computations were converted to a tool just like (or integrated with) Interiot's edit counter? That would still make the information accessible for those who feel it's relevant, but it wouldn't make it the first thing you see on a new nomination. (ESkog)^(Talk) 18:58, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, provided it wasn't linked to, I suppose that would be OK. People would still be aware of it if it was useful to them. I just don't like the stigma attached to a lot of RfA's these days, and am working to cut it down; this is part one - beginning to remove the reliance on pure numbers. Rob Church (talk) 19:12, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Now that there's assistance (in most major browsers) to ensure 100% completion of edit summaries, I think it is significant when an editor chooses not to give summaries, and absent an explanation why not, I'd tend to see that as a factor (a semi minor one, and one of many possible factors, mind you!!!) suggesting oppose. So I appreciate having the stats there in the nom so I don't have to follow links. It gives more time to spend looking at other things relating to the nom, which is goodness. Why make info harder to find? ++Lar: t/c 19:35, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Just like to point out that I rarely give edit summaries. Probably I should for main article namespace, but for talk pages and user pages? I don't really want to and I don't see the need. - Ta bu shi da yu 02:07, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Why not? I find edit summaries quite useful. Even on talk pages. In fact, especially there, sometimes, as the summary can give you a clue where to look in a long long section to see what new comment was added. For example THIS comment was added in the middle (to preserve threading) and the summary I used will help readers find it. I think that "because you don't want to do something" is not a reason not to do it. ++Lar: t/c 18:20, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

For the record, the bot looks only at the article and category namespace in calculating the edit summary usage, as those are most important (and I may remove the category, not sure). But I agree with Lar that edit summaries are important in general. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 18:50, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Per TBSDY, I'd like to say I almost never use edit summaries on talk pages. I strive to use them as much as I can in my article edits, but on talk pages they seem kind of pointless. If I'm editing Talk:Foo, section ==Bar==, it's plain to see I'm talking about Bar, which relates to Foo in some way. Szyslak ( [ +t, +c, +m, +e ]) 06:58, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

I had promised to myself to not get involved in this discussion, but can't abstain. :) I don't care a thing about the fate of my silly bot, but I am not happy with Rob's suggestion about his intent in "beginning to remove the reliance on pure numbers". How often a user puts edit summaries is a number, how many edits he/she has is a number, how many of those are in the Wikipedia namespace is a number, how many months the admin nominee has been here is a number, how many times a user reverts an article is a number, and so on. Surely the numbers don't tell the whole story, maybe not even a tenth of it, but they are of some importance, albeit each person has his own views on how much weight these are worth. If you remove any quantitative analysis, what are you left with? Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 20:17, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

The Mathbot results were probably the last straw that killed my first RfA, but I still support Oleg. The more objective results are provided, the more informed are the voters. If somebody would write a similar bot that would provide other objective summaries (number of reverts, number of articles ever reverted, number of AfD votes, number of edites per categories, etc. it would also help) abakharev 22:23, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

My own feeling is that the mathbot is useful but can be easily gamed. It gives edit summaries for last 150 major and minor edits - how difficult is it to notch that 100% over a period of 15 days (esp. given the fact that people tend to get active just before getting nommed)? I'd believe that we should have a look at edit summary usage throughout the history of the user - we should probably be ready to accept that we may need to be ready to embrace a lower % as the standard in such a case. --Gurubrahma 20:32, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

All numerical criteria can be gamed. For example, it takes only a couple of weeks to get more than a thousand Wikipedia space contributions by just voting with the majority in AfD's that have a couple of votes already. That's why the quality of contributions should always play a role, more than their number. Also, increased edit summary usage immediately before the RfA is only bad if the candidate stops using edit summaries after having been promoted. Kusma (討論) 20:42, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

• Eh, I've observed that a candidate can easilly appease the edit summary crowd just by installing software to force edit summaries. The candidates who've done this have all been promoted, as far as I know. The recent candidates who haven't, and instead have either challenged the opposers or ignored them, have all been unsuccessful. So it's not like someone is doomed to fail if they have a poor edit summary score, they can just pledge to change their ways and most people will be happy with that. Edit summaries are good, after all... --W.marsh 20:44, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Numbers are important, but they are not critical. There is a problem when a nominee is analyzed completely with numbers. However, there is also a problem when a nominee is analyzed just by nepotism, so eliminating the statistics isn't the best solution. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 20:45, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I wonder if it would be possible for Mathbot to provide a history, like Interiot's edit counter does? That would help answer the objection about gaming the system, I should think. Also, I'm curious if Rob Church is proposing eliminating all numerical criteria? I think that might be a good thing. However, as long as edit count is emphasized, usually as part of the nomination, I think that use of edit summaries provides another dimension to those who are inclined to weigh numbers heavily. To respond to ESkog, Mathbot is available in a manner similar to Interiot's edit counter. [1]

Well, we provide a link to the edit count rather than transcluding the number in the RfA itself. It seems to me that a fair compromise would be to link to this report as well, unless server strain and other concerns would outweigh this. (ESkog)^(Talk) 21:15, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Providing a link to the edit summary usage may give some strain on the server, as my bot now sheepishly goes through the user's contributions fetched with an HTTP request, instead of Interiot's tool which talks directly to the database. I will talk to Interiot about absorbing my tool into his edit count tool. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 22:31, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Of the current RfAs, I count 7 where the edit count is quoted in the nomination and 5 where it is not. The edit count for one of the 7 is in bold-face. For those 7, including the summary usage numbers explicitly helps to broaden the numerical picture of the nominee. I think Oleg Alexandrov's work is commendable. Walter Siegmund (talk) 23:25, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

When MathBot began doing the numbers, I noted that there would be significant flack. Well, above you can see I was right. Edit summary usage as an RfA metric has been and will remain controversial. In fact, all numeric metrics for evaluating a candidate have been controversial. As most of you know, I used to do charts for admin nominees with <2000 edits (example). I did a few dozen of them over the span of a few months. I was roundly attacked by a small, but vocal minority who were adamantly opposed to the charts. Eventually, I stopped making them. Interestingly, I later on looked at the success/failure of those RfAs compared with other RfAs in the same category that I did not do charts for. The comparison showed that RfAs with the charts had a ~10% greater chance of succeeding than those that did not. The point in my making the charts was to reduce people's utter reliance on arbitary numbers (999 edits is unacceptable, but 1,001 is...). It seems it was working. Interiot's tool has largely replaced the efforts I was engaging in. I think the general stance "number metrics suck" is flawed; they can and have helped. --Durin 14:57, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree with this. Metrics are like any data, like any tool, they can be misused, or used wisely. Work to change the usage, not the tool availability. (when numbers are outlawed, only outlaws will have numbers!!!) ++Lar: t/c 18:20, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

I dislike people giving too much weight to purely statistical things (edit count, edit summaries, time at project) but in general people should be able to post whatever they want on people's RfA (vandalism, obviously, excluded). If even one person feels like its relevant, then they should be able to add it in the comments section. That having been said, these newbies that you speak of: if they are going to make uninformed decisions based solely on this data, then they are just as likely to make equally uninformed decisions without it. Many editors do care about these facts and theres no reason they should have to go trace all of it down themselves every time. This discussion seems to be addressing a symptom, not the problem. savidan^{(talk) (e@)} 17:44, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

DFA Discussion

The link got swept away during archiving. Please see WP:DFA do not let discussion die down. — Ilyanep (Talk) 21:48, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Still seems to me that there's no point in fixing what's not broken. Where's the evidence that we're generally either producing bad admins or rejecting obviously qualified candidates? —Cleared as filed. 21:51, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I can't name any immediate cases, but Freestylefrappe (see above) comes to mind -- would all the people that supported him have continued supporting had they known the incidents mentioned by the opposers? I also think the "Can't sleep, clown will eat me" RfA shouldn't have failed, but I may be biased, since I supported (I think). Johnleemk | Talk 02:12, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Clearly in the user community there is some angst about the current set of admins. While there have been accusations that some such users are socks and/or trolls, etc., I think it is irresponsible and naive to say that all such users are. Immediately coming to mind are User:Splash, User:Tony Sidaway, and User:MarkSweep. I'm not really going to comment on their actions, but clearly there is presently a feeling in the community at large that the admin community is broken, and there should be a more stringent or effective process at culling the bad ones (yes, FSF comes to mind) before they get into a position where the harm cannot be reversed. aa v ^ 02:26, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Sure - but that doesn't indicate a need to change the process of gaining adminship - it's more a call for there to be a way to desysop people. If any process change is necessary, it's the addition of a RfD (Requests for de-adminship). But suggestion of the possibility of that sort of process seems to be taboo. Grutness...wha? 04:10, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Immediately coming to mind are User:Splash, User:Tony Sidaway, and User:MarkSweep. Calling names is a poor way of making a point. Please abstain from that in the future. Thanks. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 04:25, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

[2] ... aa:talk 18:08, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

In response to Johnleemk's comments above, I'd look at those cases as exceptions; considering the number of editors who go through the RfA process, a few failures once in a while is not unacceptable, and I'm not sure I see how CSCWEM's nomination would have been helped by the new proposed system. As far as User:Avriette's charge that current admins are being too bold with their admin powers, I note that a look back shows that two of the three admins named above breezed through their RfAs with almost no opposition, so this problem (if it exists) isn't a problem for RfA reform, it's a matter of coming up with some way to take care of problem admins. And we already have that in the form of arbitration. So again, what problem are we fixing here? —Cleared as filed. 05:28, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

That's a very valid point that I hadn't considered. I gather this has been brought up before? ... aa:talk 18:11, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

If DFA can help seal all or most exceptions, all the better. Johnleemk | Talk 05:48, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

But why do you expect it to seal those exceptions? What was it about the FSF RfA or the CSCWEM RfA that the new proposal would change? —Cleared as filed. 06:25, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

See above: "Freestylefrappe (see above) comes to mind -- would all the people that supported him have continued supporting had they known the incidents mentioned by the opposers?" If even one rogue sysop is never admined because of DFA, we'll already have saved ourselves the trouble of one RfAr and a bunch of angry posts on WP:AN, IRC, and the mailing list. Johnleemk | Talk 14:04, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Agreement with Cleared as filed. ANY system we design will result in some people becoming admins that in retrospect probably should not have become admins. This can't be avoided. There is no 'perfect' system. Citing less than five 'problem' admins and asserting a (unsupported) "feeling" by the community that the admin community is broken is not illuminating of the problem. In fact, I think it rather shows that RfA is working quite well, if only a small handful of admins can be identified as being "problem" admins. --Durin 13:51, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

No process is perfect. We promoted 389 admins in 2005 (source), three of those have been desysopped with restoration by RfA required (Freestylefrappe, Carnildo and Karmafist). You won't get much better than less than 1%. NoSeptember ^talk 14:56, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Those successful at under 80%

I read that the percentage supporting the above mentioned Admin was lower than usual. If that is the case, you have your problem (and maybe your solution.) Does anyone have the stats on the number of admin taken with lower percentages. It's logical that over time more of these admin would be problematic. Sorry if this offends the discuss don't vote folks. : ) FloNight ^talk 14:36, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Here's a list of RfAs since June 23, 2005 that had less than 80% raw vote support and passed. The numbers are support/(support+oppose). Neutral votes have not been taken into account.

Nightstallion 79.7%

BorgHunter 79.3%

Aaron Brenneman(2nd) 78.6%

Lucky 6.9(4th) 78.3%

Nandesuka 78.2%

The Land(2nd) 77.8%

Alkivar(3rd) 77.5%

Extreme Unction 77.2%

Ramallite 77.1%

EvanProdromou 76.5%

Hedley(2nd) 75.8%

Johann Wolfgang 75.5%

Freestylefrappe(2nd) 74.5%

Luigi30(3rd) 72.4%

--Durin 15:58, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

A great list Durin. I hope you don't mind, I added the bit about 2nd, 3rd and 4th attempts to your list, since that seems to be a factor too. NoSeptember ^talk 16:16, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

For comparison, the other two mentioned were Carnildo (RfA, 40 support, 4 oppose, 2 neutral, 90.9%) and Karmafist (RfA, 53 support, 2 oppose, 96.4%). -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 20:10, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

• 2 out of ??? for 80% or more since June 23, 2005
• 1 out of 14 for less 80% since since June 23,2005

Looks like a indicator to me. FloNight ^talk 20:33, 20 February 2006 (UTC) What was the number Admin given since June 23 2005? (minus 14 less than 80%)FloNight ^talk 20:37, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

• From the same data: 531 RfAs since June 23, 2005 have completed. 342 were successful (64.4%). --Durin 22:29, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

I think that we're also confusing the acute problems (like Splash ;P you know) with the chronic ones, and trying to apply one solution to both of those problems. We're also using one metric to measure both of these.

• We're never going to detect every potential acute problem admin early. That will only be solved by either "trial periods" which add a huge load and wastes time for the >95% that will pass or request for dead-minning/reconfirmation. I see Durin's numbers as supporting this: low rate, poor entry metric. This isn't the problem this is intended to address.
• The chronic problems of "worthy" candidates missing out and "unready" candidates getting promoted is harder to measure. In fact, I don't see any way to mesure the former. For the latter, I've proposed looking at a count of how often admin actions are reversed as a way to get a handle on the second. This is what this is meant to improve.

The current DfA proposal is a very slight tweak on the current system. It amounts to making the nomination a collaborative effort, while retaining every other aspect: the voting, the way it's closed, everything. The potential for harm is very low, and even if it does nothing but make people feel that the system is better it will have provided someincremental improvement.
brenneman^{T}{L} 00:19, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

I disagree that we ought to change a system that is, by all evidence, working very well, just because it might make some people feel that we've improved even though we haven't. Sure, the risk is low, but why take even a low risk just for its own sake? Why do we have this solution in search of a problem if so many people supposedly think RfA is broken? Why can't anyone pinpoint exactly what it is that we need to fix? —Cleared as filed. 01:13, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Ah, here's one case I've had in mind for quite some time. Look at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Lulu of the Lotus-Eaters. Right until the RfA closed, there was a lot of discussion on the RfA about Lulu, and quite a bit of vote-changing here and there because of this discussion. Most RfA voters (well, at least me) don't look back at RfAs we've voted on, so for all we know, Lulu could have gained (or lost) more support votes if DfA (where all that discussion occurs before voting) was in use. Lulu even lost a few votes because he "campaigned" on people's user talk pages when he was just trying to point out new developments in the discussion or show why the reasoning for opposing could be faulty. All this could have been averted under DfA. Johnleemk | Talk 04:18, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, that's one. ...of >500. Single point failures is not enough to condemn RfA in my opinion. Also keep in mind that RfA is not a one time shot; people are welcome to reapply at a later date. Lulu can reapply. --Durin 14:02, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Nobody is condemning RfA. DfA is an extension of RfA, and is largely based on it. It only splits it into two sections; one for discussion, and one for voting. You just discuss for a few days, and then go on to vote. Just like RfA, except you're a lot less likely to need to change your vote. And this isn't a single point failure -- this is just one case I can think of. My failed RfB might also be a good example. And I've already brought up Freestylefrappe. If I had the time to dig through the archives, I could find more. Johnleemk | Talk 14:25, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

• My arguments against the DfA proposal as it now stands are on the discussion page for it. DfA might be a great idea, and it might not. The main problem I have is the manner of the genesis of the idea. It's a blind shot into the dark, and just as likely to cause harm as not. --Durin 14:33, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

I stated my own opinion on DfA sometime ago on that page also (concur with Durin). This discussion can't go forver, seems quite a bit of people are already familiar with what is going on and made up their minds. There's got to be some kind of poll to gauge how community feels about adopting or not this new DfA thing. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 17:06, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

We could do a poll, but the choice of trying DfA out for a trial run should be an option. We can continue this theoretical debate forever without conclusion. If we had a dozen real DfAs, then we could compare the two methods and decide on the results. NoSeptember ^talk 17:30, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

de-indentingJohnleemk has used an example, which, imo, does not still establish the need for DFA. Also, it is a dangerous idea. As the adage goes, "A man who doesn't change his mind has no mind at all." What DFA assumes is that after discussion, voting would take place. What if, after the discussion period, I find something in the candidate's history that is detrimental for his becoming an admin. The current rfa is much better in the sense that some rfas can swing from one end to another with availability of new evidence. DFA does not provide for that and unless discussion takes place, in several situations, it is difficult to even establish that a particular behavior is egregious. Also, a community gets the leaders it deserves. People would and should change their votes as it happens now, with the availability of new evidence and discussion of that evidence. If the concern is that people change votes, I am sorry, it is healthy for the process. If the concern is that people do not change votes with availability of new evidence, I cannot see how DFA would solve the problem, because new evidence can be available even after the discussion period is over. There may be some flaws and fads with the rfa system but we can easily live with these. --Gurubrahma 17:41, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

We use common sense. The point is RfA will reduce such vote-switching because many people who would have switched their vote won't need to — by having seen most/all of the evidence, their mind can change several times without requiring constant flip-flopping and constantly keeping up with the discussion. If suddenly some new point of evidence to oppose comes up, then it should be perfectly fine for someone ('crats? They don't have enough work as it is ;-)) to notify every voter on their talk that something has come up. Since most discussion (and thus most of the muckraking) should have already been completed, such incidents should be uncommon. Your argument is predicated on the misconception that DfA is about reducing how much people change their minds. It's not. It's meant to encourage people to change their minds by having all the evidence neatly compiled prior to voting, so they don't need to flip back and forth between support/oppose/neutral. Johnleemk | Talk 18:01, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

This process *really* needs to be changed.

The entire thing is too subjective and there exists too large a faction that will simply vote oppose no matter what (e.g. user:Radiant). I think that the entire process to become an admin should be changed so that it's more objective and more than .8% of users can become admins. Here's how I think it should work:

The user wanting to become an admin presents what he/she feels is his best work on wikipedia and writes about that and why he/she would make a good admin. He/she then has to get a certain number of "endorsements" from users he or she has come across in the encyclopedia (say 10-15). After the required number of endorsements is met, other users can sign the comments section regarding their opinion on the candidate. Finally, the bureaucrats, taking all "evidence" into consideration, have the support/oppose vote themselves.

Infinitely more fair, no? Juppiter 08:34, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

What you propose is more similar to how it actually works than you think. Bureaucrats already have discretion, and there are no hard-and-fast rules for how large a majority is required for them to promote someone—so if a user is being blocked for what seems not to be a good reason, they'll be promoted anyway. There are already descriptions of what administrative jobs a user would do, and "endorsements" in the form of Support votes. The only things that are different from what you say are that a) only one Bureaucrat makes the decision, because it would be a waste of time to require several to vote against each other, and b) we really don't need a large number of new admins. -- SCZenz 08:48, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

If we were to call these folks "trusted users", which is accurate (and wikinews is thinking of switching to that name) , well, do you really want large numbers of *untrusted* users let loose on the site? Indeed. Kim Bruning 10:06, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

I'd really oppose that term "trusted users". If anything the term should be made somewhat unflattering, like "bureaucrat" already is. I think the term "bureaucrat" helps dissuade people from trying to become one for the wrong reasons, and is thus a good thing. Maybe "admin" could become "janitor" or something. Phr 14:21, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

I disagree that we have a large faction who oppose no matter what. Radiant, who you mention, had pretty strict criteria for supporting, stricter than mine, but he supported several candidates, some of them contentious like Aaron Brenneman and Hermione1980. Sjakkalle (Check!) 11:14, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Is there some sense that there's currently an admin shortage? If there's enough admins now, why look for ways to speed up the process of making more? Why not slow it down, even? Is there really .8% now? That's something like 8000 admins, a pretty big number IMO. Phr 12:31, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

No we are not at 8000 admins, according to Wikipedia:List of administrators we have 824, 683 of which are "active", 93 "semi-active" and 48 "inactive". I believe that the bulk of admin work is carried out by a hundred or so admins. Take a look at RC patrol some time, nonsense does slip through the cracks there, so there at least I think that we are understaffed with admins as it is. Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:36, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

I heard there was about a million users, so .8% would be 8000. I guess it should say .08%. RC patrol can be done by anyone (I've done it a little) and doesn't need admins. Non-admin RC patrollers can put notices at WP:AIV and they get handled pretty fast. So stuff slipping through RC patrol doesn't indicate lack of admins. Does anything else? Phr 14:14, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Here I am butting in again with my "2 cents worth". Normal editors should be able to apply for rollback to help with vandalism. But admins are often looked to to settle disputes, more and more often. The criteria should be a bit tighter there. Perhaps Admin level 1 and 2, who knows. But there seems to be a lot of wheel warring lately, and people who are trusted shouldn't engage in this. Perhaps wheel warring should carry a stronger penalty. Also: Admins are often not being held accountable for what they do, and at articles like Brian Peppers, have created masses of conflict by arbitrarily bypassing procedure. I think this is going to have to be altered, as there should be another level between "trused users" and Bureaucrats. Trusted can be immature to some extent, but administrators need to be a little more firm in the maturity department. So we have more complicated, beaureaucratic policy on one hand and chaos on the other. We'll likely have to choose the lesser of two evils. --DanielCD 16:16, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

IMO, we should just create more 'crats and give them the authority to butt into wheel wars, etc. Johnleemk | Talk 16:22, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Below I didn't mean that 'crats shouldn't get involved. Just that admin have the best chance to stop conflicts early. FloNight ^talk 19:08, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Peer to peer is much better. Calling in 'crats may increase the tension in admin to admin disputes. Far better if they can work it out between each other with the least intervention possible. Two or 3 Joe Average's giving *quality* feedback is better than one 'crat. After new admin are comfortable with the nuts and bolts, they might actively practice dispute resolution. It is a learned skill. FloNight ^talk 17:06, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

There needs to be editors, then basic trustee level, then admins. Amin should be strengthened a bit, and reduced in number slightly, or at least have entry tightened. Self-nominations should just go. --DanielCD 19:31, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

If we were to change the way groups of permissions are granted, the wisest thing we could do is limit the blocking of logged-in users. Blocking and unblocking of logged-in users (not IPs) has been a major part of nearly all serious conflicts involving admins, particularly considering that its effective and proper use is fairly rare compared to deletion, protection, and blocks of IPs, all of which are done routinely. I'd like to see us grant that priviledge fairly routinely but only after someone has already been an admin for a considerable time. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 20:01, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. While most of our block-worthy vandalism comes from IP addresses, there is a sizeable amount that comes from logged-in users who create accounts just to vandalize. I don't think the community would be served by having fewer people able to perform that essential part of fighting vandalism. (ESkog)^(Talk) 20:50, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Totally with ESkog on this. Some vandals have gamed the WP systems so well that they register to indulge in page-move vandalism and image vandalism. Also, if a registered user's account is hacked and the hacker is vandalising, a block is immediately called for. Also, it is a good idea to dig the archives before saying things like "self-noms should go" as it has been discussed in the recent past and the consensus was against dis-allowing self-noms. --Gurubrahma 11:19, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

It might also be a good idea to take a good look at admins who were selfnoms to see if there's anything whatever less trustworthy or trusted about them. What's the point of having a system where self-nomination is obligatory for bureaucrats and outlawed for admins, other than the pure pleasure of legalism? We should try to trim the rule system down to a tight package instead of encouraging it to sprout into such luxuriance. Extra bishpoints for selfnoms! | talk 15:12, 23 February 2006 (UTC).

I'm a self-nom, and aside from applying the mischief rule instead of the literal rule, I don't think I'm a rogue admin. Johnleemk | Talk 15:18, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Self noms are fine when done by a user who has been here long enough to understand the system. Its the newbies who nom themselves at 150 edits that makes self-noms look bad. So we should strongly urge getting yourself nominated to reduce the later, but ignore self-nom concerns about the former. NoSeptember ^talk 15:26, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

user:swatjester's "no big deal" supports

I am concerned at the macro-esque voting by this user. We recently wholesale discounted votes by a user during the arbcom elections who was making the same vote over and over again without explanation. Is this okay to do? It's been going on for weeks now. ... aa:talk 08:38, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Weeks eh? Nice hyperbole Avriette. Still holding a grudge against me? Does my opinion not count here? Are you telling me that I can't vote for half a dozen or so admin candidate the way I want? Welcome to censorship at it's finest here. Administratorship is SUPPOSED to be no big deal. I point you to this [3]. Finally, Lets look at a grand total of how many times I've edited the RfA page shall we? Oh look...I made 10 edits yesterday to the page. 10 votes is hardly "macro voting" for "Weeks now" considering I've made a grand total of 20 administrator votes my entire time here, and the last one was "2006/02/07 17:02:27" and the last one before that (was only 1) was "2006/01/11 07:58:06". You know, I'm really quite a bit offended by this Avriette....⇒ SWATJester ^Ready Aim _Fire! 22:39, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Ironically Avriette, (or should I say pot) your kettle looks in need of a paint job.....Nearly 70 votes on the Jan 2006 arbcom elections [4] and you question MY voting here? ⇒ SWATJester ^Ready Aim _Fire! 22:47, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Let us avoid the personal attacks, please. Both of you. bd2412 T 22:51, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Um, ya--just bewildered per BDA. Was there a criticism/suggestion about RfA in here somewhere? Or just two users having a tiff? Marskell 23:00, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Beats me. No September requested my input here, and I gave it. Don't need to snap at me about it. ⇒ SWATJester ^Ready Aim _Fire! 23:07, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

"Don't need to snap at me about it." Sir, I'm no turtle. I do no snapping. But I love, respect, and accept any users who are turtles/do snap. Marskell 23:31, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Heh. You show me a turtle who can operate wikipedia, and we're in the money! ⇒ SWATJester ^Ready Aim _Fire! 23:54, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Swat, since you like that Jimbo quote, let me direct you to another one where he discusses admins, status, and obscene material. :o ;) NoSeptember ^talk 23:40, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Nice! I think I might like that quote even better: It's less ambiguous. Anyway, I hope you all can understand where I'm coming from with my reasoning behind my vote, and why I feel a bit perturbed at the accusations against me. ⇒ SWATJester ^Ready Aim _Fire! 23:56, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Okay, folks, chill out a little bit. SJ, I am not complaining about the frequency of your votes, but rather because you say the same thing continually, and don't seem to be making a judgement on the user. I voted on every member in the arbcom elections, and generally gave reasons for my support or opposition. The same is true of the RFA's here. When I say "the user is too new," or "I like the user's edit spread," or "come back in two months," it is clear why I have cast my vote. If I were to cast an additional seventy votes, and all of those had the same message, I might be criticized for them. Let me explain.

1. User:Masssiveego votes nearly 100% oppose [5], except when everyone else is voting oppose [6].
2. This is complained about, at least by a few people (including you, BD2412)
3. Such behavior is referred to as trollish, "very strange", and violation of WP:POINT.
4. Another user refers to this behavior as disruptive.

And so, when I say above, "I am concerned..." and "Is this okay to do...", I am not attacking anyone. I am simply stating that I am concerned. I am also asking whether this sort of behavior (which is voting with a repetitive message and seemingly little attention to the discussion, for whatever reason) is okay or within policy. One of the reasons I ask is we have recently been discussing "very close" closed admin promotions. In some of these cases, one vote on one side or the other may have changed the outcome.

BD2412, I have not attacked anyone. I have no "tiff" with the user. I was polite, civil, and simply asked a question. SJ, I don't know why you'd be offended. You still haven't explained your reasoning behind this. Additionally, I am confused as to why you would suggest that my voting "requires paint". I am very careful to list the reason for each vote I cast. I view it as very important, as many people do not seem to realize that votes are important in these sorts of discussions.

Lastly, I also concerns me that I believe there has been no mention of this pattern because the user is voting for promotion rather than against. I suspect if I had voted against all the arbcom candidates (all 70 of whom I cast a vote for or against), that similar focus would have been placed on me. So please, do not divert the discussion. I would like it if somebody who knows policy better than I could explain this to me. SJ, you're of course not required to explain your votes, but it would be polite, if you are going to vote in such a mechanical fashion.

And before I forget, I don't hold a grudge against you or anyone. I rather resent your implying I do. ... aa:talk 00:27, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Note - my comments about User:Masssiveego were with respect to his votes with no explanation whatsoever. I over-reacted in that situation, and later apologized to Masssiveego (and to Boothy, for bringing his name up). Your comments atop this section implied that Swatjester was "making the same vote over and over again without explanation", which was not the case. Since I saw no evidence of an effort on your part to discuss this with Swatjester before bringing it here, I found that implication to be excessive. bd2412 T 02:22, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, I apologize for assuming that then. Let me explain myself: I don't think administrator status should be a big deal. Just as Wikipedia keeps vandalism in check by other users being able to fix it, I'd say administrators are kept in check by other admins being able to fix their mistakes, and bureaucrats, and arbcom oversight. It'd be one thing, as No September's link pointed out if there were only a small number (say 30) admins. But there are (i believe) several hundred admins. It's more than enough to keep any one or two from going out of control.

What I feel was the original intention of the No Big Deal statement was that Admin should be granted on a presumption of worthiness: meaning that an individual requesting admin should be presumed worthy of it unless they can distinctively and remarkably be shown otherwise. The vast majority of admin rejections I've seen here have been "He doesn't use edit summaries" or "He's too new" or "Not enough edits in XXX namespace". I don't think I've ever seen one that was like "Has a history of blatant vandalism" or "Is a well known troll". None of those first 3 reasons to me seem to be a good enough reason to deny someone administrator access: Lack of edits in a certain namespace, or lack of 6 months to a year of editing time says nothing at ALL about whether the user will abuse his admin powers: And based on a presumption of worthiness, nearly the ONLY good reason I can see to turn someone down is a belief that they will abuse the power. None of those people that I supported, ever, have had something jump out at me that they will do so. Therefore, I'm supporting my beliefs that they'll do a good job: I'm assuming good faith. Isn't that supposed to be one of the fundamental rules of Wikipedia? Because I'm seeing a LOT of potential administrator candidates being turned down for reasons that don't show a lot of faith placed in the individual. And what if the candidate I vote for turns out to be a bad apple? As rare as that would be: there are hundreds of other admins and dozens of 'crats who are ready to fix the mistake. The community policing itself, that's what wikipedia should be about right?

I mean, a vandal gets what: Test 1-4, BV, and a half dozen other warning templates and is STILL allowed to edit wikipedia even after a couple blocks, but god forbid a promising editor who's been here for 3 months and has over 1000 constructive edits be given tools to further improve this encyclopedia? Why, cause he can't be trusted? Doesn't that strike you all as a little ironic?

Now, I'm no idiot. The policy is not going to change, and I'm far from the person to go on a rampage trying to change it. I've got far less stressful things to do with my time. But, when I do see a person on the RfA list, unless I can either think of a better reason why to support them (i.e. I have had positive dealings with them), I'll list my reason as "Because admin should be no big deal, right?" UNLESS THEY HAVE SHOWN POTENTIAL TO ABUSE THE POWER OR SOME OTHER SIGNIFICANT REASON FOR ME NOT TO, IN WHICH CASE I WILL VOTE NO. There. Bolded, and in caps. I've just explicitly stated under what circumstances I will vote no. Until then, I will maintain a presumption of worthiness.

So finally, Avriette, I apologize for reading into your comments more than I though. I was a little ticked off that I had to hear about this from someone else, but apparently your comment on my talk page got lost in the shuffle (that's what I have the inbox up at the top for). ⇒ SWATJester ^Ready Aim _Fire! 01:15, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Kicking DfA in the pants

Cross post, please reply at Wikipedia talk:Discussions for adminship
I've suggested a notice be placed on the main page that's a "half way" step towards trying out DFA.
<reverse psychology>Comments totally unwelcome. </reverse psychology>
brenneman^{T}{L} 23:37, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

voting subpage layout

I figured I'd post this here as the template is a little hidden. In case people weren't aware of it (and as someone adjusted one nomination already to the previous format), the voting subpage layout has changed. See Template talk:RfA#Reformatted for discussion. --PS2pcGAMER (talk) 06:49, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Request blanked by candidate

I've removed Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Minan from the main page, since it was blanked by the candidate (a self-nom) after five oppose votes. I'm not sure what's done these days with aborted requests, so I've brought it up here. android79 19:16, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

It really shouldn't be blanked. It should be archived and linked at the unsuccessful nomination page as "withdrawn by candidate." -- Cecropia 19:23, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

• I've unblanked it and closed it our properly. --Durin 19:58, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Request Retracted

My request for adminship is hereby retracted. --NightDragon 04:43, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Help

Can someone put Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Mrs Gastrich up please?? It wont let me add to the list.Mrs Gastrich 07:42, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The page has been semi-protected, so users can't sign themselves or others up until they have at least some undertstanding Wikipedia. Unfortunately, with only 4 edits, you really don't stand a chance, which is why you can't edit the list. smurrayinchester^{(User), (Talk)} 07:49, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

What is the procedure for signing to edit Semi-protected pages? Thanks-- Shyam ^(T/C) 08:14, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The system lets you edit once you have been on Wikipedia for at four days. smurrayinchester^{(User), (Talk)} 08:38, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Is it four days or after you're within a certain percentile of users by date joined? — Ilyanep (Talk) 01:14, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

It's four days. The percentile method was dropped when a "user_creation" field was added to the user database. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 01:15, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Which is also now the threshold for moving pages. -Splash^talk 01:30, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

RfA standards going up??

Are they going up? I have only been looking around this place since late jan06, but it appears that in the past, a lot more editors got through with only about 5-10% projectspace edits, on the basis of doing good work? I have noted the % of successful RfAs has dropped significantly in the last two months, are they because the candidates in question weren't suitable, or do we expect more these days??Regards, Blnguyen | Have your say!!! 05:53, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I've also noticed this trend. I'd also say that I have contributed to some of this as the more familiar I have become with Wikipedia, the more that I have felt that my own standards must go up. I also think the number of RfA nominations has increased in the past few weeks. --PS2pcGAMER (talk) 06:19, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

They very well may be, but the point is that the standards of consensus (other than the numerical markers) are whatever the participants at RfA think they are. If tomorrow everybody thinks that new admins need 50% workspace edits, or edit summaries on 99% of edits or whateve, and vote accordingly, that will be the standard until other perceptions comes down the pike. -- Cecropia 06:20, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

As the population continues to grow and it becomes more and more impossible to actually know most admin candidates well, one would expect that cheap signalling factors like edit summary usage or project space edits would become more important. I agree that there has been a recent burst upward in standards, though, and I'd attribute that mostly to the scrutiny of RfA raised recently, especially at the accountability poll. It is quite likely a temporary deviation from the expected long-term trend of rising numerical standards. Christopher Parham (talk) 08:00, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't know if they're rising, or just weirding. Recently we've had one unsuccessful nom due to an alleged insufficiency of project namespace edits (though there was a lot of strangeness with support-socks/newbies on that too, it seemed to me), and one successful, with barely any main namespace edits, other than vandalism reverts (though also, only barely successful). As Cecropia says, they is what they is, but that's not to say some rumination on where the de facto standard seems to be headed is necessarily amiss. Alai 06:50, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I believe they are weirding in some sense - I personally believe that if we have a well-established editor who wants the adminship for convenience (rollback, blocking, image deletions etc.), the community shd give it to him rather than stress on project space edits. I came across a situation recently where an image vandal was adding morphed soft-porn pics of Indian actresses, and in such a scenario, ability to block really helps, even if the person performing the block primarily remains an editor, using the admin tools very sparsely. --Gurubrahma 07:59, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

The trend is not just over the last two months. In fact, if you look at the trend over the last two months alone, we're actually increasing the RfA success rate slightly (~10% or so). Going from July 2005 through February 2006, there is a very clear decline in RfA success rate (see chart at right). Please keep in mind that the rate of RfA success is just one measure. There are many, many other factors to consider.

• Has the average candidate been decreasing in quality (subjective, hard to measure)?
• Are we promoting admins fast enough for the purposes of maintaining Wikipedia? Hard to know. Some measures to consider;

• the ratio of articles to number of admins has remained essentially constant, rising just 1% over the last year.
• The ratio of users to admins is a poor figure; a huge number of our accounts are sockpuppets, unused accounts, etc. The ratio of users to admin has more than doubled over the last year.
• Another possible measure; the ratio of edits per day to number of admins. I think this ratio is perhaps most revealing; the more edits admins have to watch, the less likely admins will see all edits that need to filtered for vandalism. This last ratio has risen more than 95% over the last year. In other words, admins are nearly twiced as burdened with maintenance as they were a year ago.

I think one of the major threats that faces Wikipedia is an overburden of maintainance that continues to worsen over time. The project as a whole needs a better ability to deal with vandalism before it happens. There are a number of potential ways of doing this such as new user edit throttling, or making only registered users able to edit and have them be forced to acknowledge a confirmation e-mail. We have no hard measure of evaluating how much vandalism is happening on a given day, and as a result we have no means of evaluating how well we are doing in undoing vandalism. It is disheartening to go to the back a few hundred edits on the recent changes list and see how much vandalism isn't being caught. Though I have no specific measures to cite, I believe this problem is getting worse. If we reduce the burden on admins, the rate of success of RfAs over time matters less. --Durin 14:17, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

You might consider instituting a mentoring program to help new admins learn the details of things that need maintenance from another experienced administrator. Reading the policy is something I think a lot of people (administrators) avoid, even when it is about simple mainteinance stuff, because it can get labrynthine and confusing. If volunteers were there to help new admins find niches where they could help out, and train them so they are solid and confident in their actions, it might go a long way toward helping out with some of the more needed maintenance stuff. --DanielCD 14:33, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

• It's virtually impossible to mentor admins on what is proper behavior. Recently, Jimbo and ArbCom effectively vacated all policy. Policy is now based on "common sense" and tradition at Wikipedia, and not what is written down in Category:Wikipedia policies and guidelines. This is generating a great number of problems within the project, but the powers that be insist on maintaining this party line. I had hopes that the recent ArbCom elections would help to rectify the situation. I am not ready to conclude that the new ArbCom is not making headway on this, but I have so far been disappointed. --Durin 15:21, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I believe WP:IAR has been around for a logn time before the powers that be "vacated all policy". (Which they didn't, btw; they just clarified that you can ignore process if the encyclopedia is immediately threatened by following process. The problem is that some people took this to mean they can IAR on everything.) Johnleemk | Talk 17:07, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

• It's been heavily discussed elsewhere regarding policy being vacated. There's been precious little direction from the powers that be on the issue, nor indeed much disagreement. Even Jimbo has stated that "common sense" rules. If you want to debate this further, feel free, but this particular talk page probably isn't the best forum for it. --Durin 18:22, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that you appear to be assuming that common sense didn't rule prior to Jimbo's declaration. He was just restating existing policy, not creating a new one. (Btw, you're right -- maybe it might be best to take this discussion to our own talk pages.) Johnleemk | Talk 18:42, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

The success ratio also only correlates to "admin standards" if the inputs to the process remains constant, which is by no means necessarily the case. In particular, we seem to be seeing quite a few "early" nominations, and a number of "repeated" noms (and indeed, noms that are both early and repeated). I don't know if that's a significant factor, or just an anecdotal impression. Alai 16:28, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I missed it in reading these posts over, but hasn't it occurred to anyone that the promotion rate may be going done because the candidacy rate has been going up? There have been continuing advocates of much broader adminship over quite some time, and this seemed to reach a crescendo last August or September or so, just about the time I took a Wikibreak, when the number of consecutive candidacies went up considerably. I think a lot of editors are being put up, or putting themselves up, before they are really ready for the community to accept them. I also sense that potential admins no longer worry about being rejected in terms of future success, and that some candidacies go up "just to see if they might succeed." -- Cecropia 16:47, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

• As I noted, there are quite a few potential factors in the rate. There's no definitive way to identify how much weight each of these factors has. I could generate a chart showing the number of noms per week, or the number of successul noms per week, etc. But, I don't think they'd shed any more light. We can conclude the success rate is going down, but why is a much, much broader question. --Durin 17:08, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, asking for edit summaries and project space edits are frivolious requirements to a degree. On the other hand, cases of abuse of admin powers pop up every now and then at the ArbCom (now we have at least two) so I guess people would like at least some signs that the candidate is a serious person. Also, using edit summaries say 3/4 of the time and having say 100 project edits ain't that much to ask. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 17:21, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think edit summaries are a frivolous requirement by any means, though clearly many people consider them an optional extra (or worse), and indeed many actual admins don't bother with them. OTOH, requiring project space edits is to some degree dictating to admin candidates what type of editing they have to do to be considered "adminable". Granted it would be problematic if someone inexperienced in the project space suddenly went berserk with a number of controversial process-closures or the like, but I think that's rarely a serious for long-standing contributors of "fixed and conservative habits". What I find more troubling is over-eager nominations of people purely on the strength of being a "bonny vandal fechter" after about two months. Those tend to be the people who attract the attention that leads to an early nomination, and it's a very limited type of experience on which to judge someone's suitability. OTOH, if someone's been around doing uncontroversial work for a year, it seems reasonable to presume they're likely to remain uncontroversial, without artificially demanding a different type of editing altogether. Alai 22:18, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I've got to ask: what does OTOH stand for? JHMM13 (T | C) 05:29, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

OTOH = On the other hand Naconkantari e|t||c|m 05:32, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Ah. Seems kind of odd that someone would write a long, well-written paragraph like that and seemingly arbitrarily pull out odd short-hand usage! JHMM13 (T | C) 07:44, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Since it has survied AfD, this should be required reading for you ;-) NoSeptember ^talk 16:23, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Hey, I'm 21, a child of the internet age, and I've heard 'em all...but never OTOH. Seems a bit much to actually use in intellectual conversation :-D. JHMM13 (T | C) 02:56, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

My statistics also show quite a drop in the success rate. In terms of growth in admins, it looks like we went through a growth spurt in late 2005 (Oct to Dec). The last previous spurt was in early 2004 (March to May). So seeing a downward trend may overlook the fact that it could just be a return to normal slower growth. NoSeptember ^talk 17:25, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I would say the standards are going up based simply on the editcountitis. If you take a look at some of the older guys' standards, they will say, "at least 500" or "at least 1,000," and those were the tops! These days, it seems it's unreasonable to promote someone with less than 2,500, and 4-5,000 is a sure bet. This isn't based on any statistical survey or anything, just my own perception. I think a lot of this has to do with the older folks wanting to keep roughly the same rate of admin creation (or at least a slower-growing rate) as the rate of new user signups increases. JHMM13 (T | C) 19:01, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

When I went up, over six months ago, the standard was roughly 2000 edits and three months of activity; people were opposing then for not using enough edit summaries, for not having enough project space edits, for being too active/inactive at VfD (as it was called in those days) or for being inclusionist/deletionist/mergist, and a host of other reasons, just as they do today. I don't think the standards have risen that much since then; rather, I think it's that a lot more underqualified candidates are going up.

It has never been required that a user be active in every nook and cranny of the project to become an admin, but most in my time had at least touched on most of the high-profile areas. With broader use of godmode-light, popups, and AWB (which were unknown in my time; godmode may have been around, but wasn't well known), users are able to rack up 2000-3000 edits in a matter of weeks, without having ever looked at some of the big areas of Wikipedia, or having any interaction with the policyspace. As a result, they appear to fit the "standards," while having very little that actually demonstrates what kind of admin they would be, or indeed, that they have any idea what adminship is about.

I don't think it is a bad thing that we have these tools available, or dedicated volunteers who are willing to use them; we need every RC patroller, every dedicated stub-sorter or image tagger armed with AWB that we can get. However, we also need to acknowledge that what used to be considered evidence that a user had seen much of what was to be seen can no longer be considered such. I think the simple answer is: With the advent of so many tools that make editing easier, "voters" have begun to look more closely at the quality and diversity of the individual's edits, and are making their decision based on these subjective criteria, rather than on the old formula of edit count + tenure + not banned yet = admin. And this trend towards more informed voting is a good thing. Essjay ^{Talk • Contact} 09:51, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Hm..I do see your point. It seems the old vetting process wasn't too intense, and I haven't been around forever behind the scenes, so I don't really know the rationale, but I suppose there were instances of abuse, so the standards went up a bit. I agree with you, more informed voting is more gooder. JHMM13 (T | C) 02:59, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Just another point of data; over the same time period as the chart above, the average # of edits per nominee has trended upward about 7-10%. That's just one indicator of potentially many, but total edits is frequently used and this appears to indicate that the average candidate has been improving, at least in edit counts. --Durin 16:12, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I have to agree with both Essjay and Durin here - the changing ways of Wikipedia means an inevitable shift in RfA trends. Just as Essjay said - with new tools it's possible to rack up 1000 edits in two or three days; does this automatically qualify someone for admin? Something that I've also noticed is the increase in support votes for successful candidates - back when Essjay and I were promoted, 30 to 40 support votes was considered high; now, there's been quite a few RfAs surging into 70s, 80s, or even triple digit support votes. Perhaps it's just that there are more RfA voters? Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 16:25, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree as well. I look at the history of RfBs, new bureaucrats have come in clusters (several in Feb 2004, several in June 2004, then a long almost one year gap until late 2005 without any promotions, and then several promoted in the last 6 months). The point is, the community responds to the situation and the perceived need. If we feel we need a lot more admins, our standards will relax a lot. Right now it appears it is more important to the community that we don't promote mistakes, so we are rejecting some people if we are at all unsure, and many who would be good admins get flunked because of it. But thats the way it goes, and why we need to keep the human element in the process - there is no correct standard, just varied and changable opinions about it. NoSeptember ^talk 16:39, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

• Over the last 9 months, the average # of support votes for successful RfAs has indeed risen rather dramatically, by more than 60%. Most of that 60% gain has been in the last 3 months. Counting all RfAs (including withdrawn and fail), the upward trend is much more muted, only about 25% increase in the same 9 months. --Durin 18:20, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Revert of addition

Aaron Brenneman added a paragraph to the RfA intro with a link to Wikipedia:Discussions for adminship/Nomination cabal. I've reverted his addition because I don't feel that a link to a DfA page, which is currently only proposed and has not gained widespread support, is appropriate at this time. Not only might it confuse people, but DfA is only proposed at this point; linking from it from the RfA main page doesn't seem necessary at this point. Thoughts on this? Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 16:42, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Problem is that we currently have one person nominated for DfA. We probably should publicise this fact on RfA, just to test out the process (instead of endlessly speculating on how effective it might be). Thoughts? Johnleemk | Talk 16:58, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

My only comment is that people keep complaining that the DfA process (which needs to be renamed to RfA 1.2 or something) is untested and incomplete, and then when people want to try it out with someone, it gets blocked. I understand that the process is not necessarily 100% robust yet, but we're a wiki, we do things in progress, and as currently constituted it is a VERY incremental change over the current way we do RfA. -- nae'blis _(talk) 17:00, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Flcelloguy that the text and link added by Aaaron can be confusing to people who come here solely for the reason of seeing the current nominations, nominating somebody, or being nominated (which is almost everybody). I would suggest you nominate somebody for admin using the DfA process, and just transclude that nomination from this RfA page, as any other nomination; without chaning anything about this RfA page. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 17:49, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Would that not be terribly confusing, with DfA's different format? Johnleemk | Talk 17:56, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Um, that's vastly more radical and controversial than what Aaron did, since that would involve actually nominating someone using the DfA process. The link that was removed does not do that; it nominates people under the RfA process, and just uses some ideas from DfA to help write the nomination statement. Christopher Parham (talk) 18:49, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

This strikes me as another attempt at ram-rodding the DfA process down RfA's throat. This was tried once before, and reverted. As I've repeatedly argued, DfA needs at least a heck of a lot of improvement before it can 'go live' for any purpose. Personally, I think it should be scrapped and a far better process for developing a solution be used. I'd apprecaite it if, at a minimum, the promoters of DfA please accept that the community does not yet accept DfA in its current form. --Durin 18:10, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

What are you referring to, the nomination of a fellow who *wants* to go through DFA, or the addition of the link? Johnleemk | Talk 18:20, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Um, this seems like a pretty unobjectionable link. I find it hard to imagine how it could be characterized as "ram-rodding the DFA process down RfA's throat" -- the page linked to neither changes anything about RfA nor advocates changing anything about RfA as it stands. Nor do I see why the status of DfA as a proposed policy or rejected policy has anything to do with the matter of this link. I don't think it's healthy to display this level of reflexivenss. Christopher Parham (talk) 18:49, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

• What I don't find healthy is the attempt at "suspending" RfA while DfA was implemented without any attempt at gaining concensus regarding its suitability. This was (thankfully) undone. Now, weeks later after considerable debate and virtually no change at DfA, there's now an attempt to include a link to DfA from RfA? To include a link on the front matter gives the appearance of authority for this process, which it most definitely does not have. So yes, I do perceive it as an attempt to ram-rod DfA through, again. And, as others have noted, it does change RfA by potentially confusing voters about what the process is...and this was all done without any attempt at notifying people here on this talk page (yet again). Twice now changes have been made by the DfA advocates to RfA without prior discussion on the RfA talk page. You should not be surprised that it was reverted, nor should you be surprised that people would be upset at these attempts. Furthermore, it was known from discussion on the DfA talk page that this change to RfA would most likely be opposed...yet you guys went ahead and did it anyway. Work with the community, not against it. See my comments on this from a month ago. --Durin 19:40, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Sorry if I seemed a bit antagonistic earlier, but I don't think this is at all similar to the previous issues, which had to do with making substantive reforms to the RfA process. It's understandable why there would be a reluctance to make changes to an important process without airing them to proper scrutiny. This, on the other hand, is just advertising a service for a new way of jointly writing nomination statements. It doesn't force anything on anybody, it just points to a page that is possibly helpful to people using the RfA process, similar to the links to the standards page or the list of non-admins with high edit counts -- both of which are far more likely to confuse people than this link. Christopher Parham (talk) 01:50, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

The problem is, many, if not most, people believe that the current system is not broken, and that the DfA system may not be better (personally I think it is worse). I start to think that there is even no need to test the new system, it is clear enough that there is no big community enthusiasm in switching, and I would suggest this reform attempt be scrapped. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 03:22, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

But adding this link isn't a "reform" attempt in the sense that it does nothing to change the current system, which is why I'm mystified that people are treating it as if it involves a change of policy. But it's clear that there is opposition to including the link on this page, so the "nomination cabal" will just have to advertise its services in other ways, I suppose. Christopher Parham (talk) 07:04, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, um, gosh. I'm astounded at the level of opposition to what is about as low-impact a change as it is possible to make. I've moved it to Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Nomination cabal for now, and will re-link on the main page in a couple of minutes with some new text to distance it from the apparently toxic DfA. - brenneman^{T}{L} 00:12, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Inoffensive version

I've replaced a version on the main page that is pretty mild. There does exist some indication on the nomination cabal sub-page itself that this has its roots in DfA, but please tell me that we're not so precious that I have to remove those as well. They will only be seen by people actually working on the potential nomination, and most of them will be aware of the history anyway. - brenneman^{T}{L} 00:42, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

The way this would work now is that interested candidates contemplating an RfA could go through this process first, gathering input and identifying issues, and then the results of this process used to formulate their nomination statement, as they would then go through the rest of the RfA process as is. This seems a great idea to me. Since it's entirely optional, I fail to see how it's ramming anything anywhere, but I may be missing something of course. That said I'll certainly be taking the results of DfAs into account in my evaluation and comment on candidates. ++Lar: t/c 01:52, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

• This DfA process still has a number of shortcomings that have yet to be rectified. To expect people to go through it at this point is premature. --Durin 00:02, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok, which parts of the collaborative nomination process need work? And it's been pointed out quite explicitly that this is an optional extra. Complain less, {{sofixit}} more. - brenneman^{T}{L} 06:16, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

• By complaining, as I have done amply on the DfA discussion page and elsewhere, I have already contributed to assisting forward progress on DfA. Several of you are considerably more wedded to the effort than I am. It's incumbent on you to do something about it. --Durin 13:58, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

• Yes, but what? I've reviewed your comments and I confess, as a bear of very little brain, I'm not totally sure what to do next. I'm at a loss as to why collecting pre-nomination information on a candidate is a bad idea, which is all this proposal is at this point. I am somewhat surprised because usually your commentary is so cogent and lucid it leaves no doubt about how to proceed. (I've said more than once that a RfA nom by you is like a quality certification of the candidate)... ++Lar: t/c 23:57, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

• As noted, DfA does nothing to address the shortcomings of RfA (whatever they may be). Further, the manner in which DfA is currently constructed is rather likely to lead to revert/edit wars on people's DfAs. I've noted these issues in my comments on the DfA talk page. Primarily, if there is going to be RfA reform, then it needs to address what the problems are with RfA. Right now, it's just a shot in the dark and just as likely to cause harm as not. I'm of the opinion it is actually more likely to cause harm because RfA, if it is broken, isn't significantly broken. Regardless, if DfA is going to actually do good things, then some baseline analysis of problems extant with RfA needs to be done. From that, discussion needs to ensue about what are the core problems with RfA. Then, discussion regarding all possible courses of action to address those core problems. Then, some consensus building on which of those possible courses are the best. DfA, for all the effort that's been put into it, is little more than "Hey, RfA sucks. Isn't this a great idea to replace it?". Well, nobody knows. The DfA supporters are looking for test candidates. That sounds reasonable except you don't have any idea yet what it is that it being tested. I'm quite concerned that the next step DfA is going to take is to run, say, a dozen test candidates and when everything goes smoothly it's going to be trumpeted as a victory. From that it's going to replace RfA and then all hell is going to break loose when we find all sorts of problems with it. RfA is a matured process. Go back through the archives of this very talk page and you can see all manner of 'reform' proposals. The vast majority of them have never come to anything because by and large RfA is a pretty well honed process. Like anything human generated, it has flaws..but it is pretty good. --Durin 02:17, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • The majority of these objections don't adress the actual issue to hand. I'd urge a less adversarial stance, and ask that everyone try to examine the contributions, not the contributor's stance on DfA. I will thus remove all connections to the DfA process so that perhaps we can discuss this with a bit of clear air. As to the conjecture that edit wars will occur, we have a well-developed system for dealing with those, and seeing someone breach the three revert electric fence on their own nomination would be a nice indicator to future behavior. Additionally, this could serve as a filter to self-nominations from very new contributors without them having gone through having ten oppose votes appear and the su-page moved. If we could hear some discrete and actionable objections to the very limited and unofficial page linked, that would be helpful. - brenneman^{T}{L} 03:49, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• What would be helpful is to first get an understanding of what is wrong with RfA before building a brand new bureaucracy to replace it. I'll keep saying this until I'm blue in the face if necessary. As for revert wars, it isn't just about the nominee, it's about everyone who contributes to the development of the narrative. As for forcing out new editors, that would create a defacto (and moving) standard for who is and is not acceptable to be nominated for admin. Every time a suggestion has been made to have minimum standards for nominees as a benchmark policy, it's been shot down. At this point, I don't really care all that much what is wrong or right with DfA. What I am most concerned about is identifying what is wrong with RfA as a first step. That hasn't been done yet in any substantiative way. --Durin 12:36, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• So I'm taking it that the admin accountability poll's response to your question was not substantiative enough for you? Read the answers, the majority of them (if not an outright consensus due to the way things were worded) support more discussion in RfA, but keeping "voting"/objective ways of defining support, and more reasons for such. Isn't that exactly what DfA as currently constituted tries to address, in a very incremental way? I'm really trying to figure out why both sides seem to be speaking different languages on this question, so forgive me if I seem adversarial, Durin. I don't mean to be. -- nae'blis _(talk) 16:30, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• re-indentingI've read that. I don't view that as consensus. I also read User:Linuxbeak/RFA_Reform#What_is_not-so-good_about_the_existing_RFA.3F, and responded to it. I recognize that there's a gulf of understanding between sides on this issue. I too am sorry if I seem adversarial. I readily admit to being impatient on some of the points related to this because of frequent calls for RfA reform without a reasoned process to ascertain what is wrong with RfA and adequately respond to those concerns. --Durin 16:55, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think anyone is arguing that RfA is seriously screwed up. (At least, I'm not.) Instead, we believe RfA can be improved on. If the changes improve RfA -- even if only marginally -- at least something will have been accomplished. Even if there are only one or two cases where DfA would have a better result than RfA, if there is no downside, overall, DfA is better. I agree that DfA hasn't gotten its details ironed out properly yet, but I think that its basic principle -- that we should gather and collate information about a candidate before voting on him/her -- can't do much, if any, harm. Johnleemk | Talk 17:26, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• I disagree. --Durin 18:15, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
  • You disagree that RfA can be improved on, you disagree that people are arguing that RfA is seriously screwed up, or you disagree that there's not much, if any, harm? Or all three? I know you feel you've been through this before, but please be as specific as possible with regards to the current concept being proposed, if you can? -- nae'blis _(talk) 18:49, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Durin, can you help me with this cross-cultural translation over at Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_adminship/Nomination_cabal? I'd appreciate your outside viewpoint, so we're not just navel gazing and going in circles. I hope I never gave the impression that I was claiming WP:AAP gave consensus for change, only impetus and concrete concerns about the process, which you asked for. -- nae'blis _(talk) 18:49, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Deleting aborted RFA attempts

I deleted Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Sujithk, which had no actual content--just the user's name and a nowiki'd version of the nomination template. I don't know what the consensus on this sort of thing is, so I thought I should bring it up here. Chick Bowen 21:01, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

They are normally kept just so that we have a complete historical record of a candidate. In this case, I can confirm that the RfA was completely empty save for a broken attempt at substing inside nowiki tags. -Splash^talk 21:23, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Really, these are kept? --HappyCamper 05:00, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Ricardo Lagos

Just so everyone would know, I closed the above RFA due to lack of support. It was a self-nomination by a user that vandalized before and his account was only a few hours old. If you have any complaints about the delisting of this nomination, please let me know. Moe ε 23:49, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I haven't got a problem...though if it was only "hacking," perhaps he deserves it :-D. JHMM13 (T | C) 07:55, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

It appears to be ok. Is not it? --Bhadani 14:14, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I am also in favour of delisting the candidate. -- Shyam ^(T/C) 21:04, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Chaz365

Just so everyone would know, I closed the above RFA due to lack of support. It was a self-nomination by a user that vandalized before and his account was only a few hours old. If you have any complaints about the delisting of this nomination, please let me know. Moe ε 21:34, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't, but do we want (or have) a more formalized way of dealing with joke requests in future? ProhibitOnions 23:32, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I just removed a nom from a new user, and left a note on his page to explain kindly that he could use a little more time here. I think that should be policy, if not talk to them first to avoid embarrasment. Thoughts? -Mysekurity 23:47, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

• Every time a proposal comes up to have minimum standards for someone to be nominated or self-nominate for RfA, it gets shot down...even if it's something as small as 100 edits and 1 month. --Durin 02:18, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

• While any such proposal gets shot down, I've never seen the removal of a brand new user (under 100 edits) cause any serious objection from the community. If those of us who watch RfA closely just removed those on the spot, those who are trolling would soon find it isn't as rewarding as it is now. Just leave a nice note on the user's page and then refuse to be baited if that user turns out to be a troll. NoSeptember ^talk 17:34, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Proposals for minimum standards get shot down because I don't think such rules are bound to accomplish anything. New rules always have a price attached to them, and where common sense suffices most of the time I think it is good to leave it at that. :) Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 17:40, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

And while we are at it, why not just semi-protect it? --Gurubrahma 17:43, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

This page does get protected on and off, but the trolls just wait for their moment. As to Oleg's comment, just going ahead and removing these names without waiting for a formal rule is "common sense" and is why no one tends to object when it is done. So why don't we just systematically apply common sense instead of try to create a new rule ;-). NoSeptember ^talk 17:55, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

((de-indenting) If it is statistically impossible for someone with 4/50/100 edits to become an admin, doesn't that make it a de facto rule/guideline? Aren't guidelines on WP supposed to be descriptive, rather than proscriptive? I'm genuinely asking, because it seems that if no consensus can ever be reached on a user of that few edits, there's no point in a) feeding the trolls or b) letting the genuine newbies get their feelings hurt. -- nae'blis _(talk) 18:17, 14 March 2006 (UTC)