Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Trialsanderrors

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

[edit] Trialsanderrors

Final (73/4/1) Ended Sat, 11 Nov 2006 20:16:52 (UTC)

Trialsanderrors (talk • contribs) – Trialsanderrors has been a registered Wikipedian since the end of February, 2006, and now has over 6000 edits, well-distributed over all namespaces. I became aware of this extraordinary gentleman through his numerous insightful observations at Wikipedia:Deletion Review, and also here at RfA on a regular basis. A Ph.D., educated in Europe as well as the United States, the candidate's expertise covers a wide range, from politics, to science and mathematics, to sports and popular music, and his wealth of experience in article composition and improvement qualify him to write on nearly every topic in the encyclopedia. In each of these areas, his calm judgment is always on display; an excellent dispassionate negotiator, he never loses his composure, or his focus on improving the encyclopedia as our ultimate goal. From our work together at DRV, I've come to admire his deep grasp of policy, and his dedication to fair and thorough discussions. Giving the mop to Trialsanderrors will make Wikipedia a happier, more efficient place; I know of no one more qualified to handle all the challenges that arise during an administrative day. Xoloz 16:00, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: Thank you, I accept, and very nice of you not to bring up the A's debacle in Detroit... ~ trialsanderrors 19:13, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Questions for the candidate

Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia in this capacity. Please take the time to answer a few generic questions to provide guidance for voters:

1. What sysop chores do you anticipate helping with? Please check out Category:Wikipedia backlog and Category:Administrative backlog, and read the page about administrators and the administrators' reading list.

A: Well, since I've been the sorcerer's apprentice at WP:DRV for the last few months, I hope I can take some of the burden off Xoloz's shoulders there. I'm also patrolling new pages, so I'm familiar with WP:CSD, have paid my dues at WP:AfD and frequently check out WP:RM, so I expect to help out there whenever need be. Few of the articles I edit are riddled with vandals, so although I figured out the protocol of vandal warning and reporting I don't expect this to become a major part of my role. I also have a working knowledge of copyright/fair use issues from my profession, so I could see getting engaged there, although my contributions in that have so far been restricted to sniffing out copyrighted lists and tagging for blatant copyvio.

2. Of your articles or contributions to Wikipedia, are there any with which you are particularly pleased, and why?

A: My sentimental favorite is Brede Arkless for the simple reason that it was facing certain death when I discovered it at AfD and turned it into a readable, sourced article. It's also characteristic of the work I do in that 1. I've never heard of the subject before and only found out about her thanks to Wikipedia, and 2. I am mostly interested in the long tail of articles and am trying to turn some of our many D-class articles into B-class articles. So unless something unforeseen happens there'll be no FA-class article from me. I also keep a watchful eye on some articles like European Graduate School and Jeff Lindsay to keep them from slipping into gush territory, and since I'm a trained economist I did some work in game theory, especially on coordination games, and I also helped on the templates for {{game theory}}, {{Infobox equilibrium}} and created {{payoff matrix}}. But then again, looking over my contribution record, I'd say 70% of my mainspace edits come from roaming and gnoming.

3. Have you been in any conflicts over editing in the past or do you feel other users have caused you stress? How have you dealt with it and how will you deal with it in the future?

A: Since most of my edits happen in the neglected million of articles I rarely run into other editors at all outside of WP space, but I learned my ropes in contested editing when I stumbled on the Mary McCarthy (CIA) article in April. I got both my 3RR and my barnstar from keeping the POV's in balance there, so I consider it my school of hard knocks for editing in a contested environment. Also the 2nd AfD for Armando (blogger) I started in June turned unnecessarily testy, although I still think that the underlying questions regarding WP:BLP required community consensus after the botched 1st closure was overturned at DRV. That's pretty much been it, and I much prefer discussing interpretations of policies in WP or talk space than getting into edit wars.

Optional question from User:Badlydrawnjeff

4. What are your feelings about how DRV works now, since you're hoping to become a second Xoloz? If DRV ever moved to a consensus model similar to everything else we do here, how do you forsee yourself weighing arguments when it comes to deletion process?

A: Well I agree with Xoloz that the purpose of DRV is mostly to provide cloture, i.e. to decide whether a subject has received sufficient attention or if debate needs to be reopened due to procedural errors or new evidence. Where I think the process can be improved is in areas where discussions could be better held in other locations. In particular there is a propensity for DRV to be used as AFD2's, or in case of speedy A7, as the sole AfD. Although I don't know if a debate model would correct these problem or exacerbate them (and I notice that DRV's are usually more extensively and better debated than most AfD's). As per how I would close DRVs then, I tend to give more weight to opinions based on research and evidence than to unsupported assertions or "looks-good/bad-to-me" reasoning. So I expect to follow up on provided evidence in AfD's and would do the same in DRV's if there's a change in process.

Optional questions from Mangojuice

5. Can you tell us something about User:Trialsanderrors/SCIENCE? What's the history, and where do you see that going?

A: The impetus for writing this was my observation that we have quite a modicum of articles that try to promote fringe science or use fringe science to promote POV positions. Since not every Wikipedian is a scientist my goal was first to establish it as an informational resource, i.e. how the notability of scientific ideas can be evaluated per our policies. My current opinion on it is that it's still far from even proposal stage, and I'm somewhat inclined to merge it with WP:PROF since there is now a considerable overlap in ideas.

6. What are your favorite and least favorite Wikipedia guidelines, and why?

A: I think I'm a fairly well-known WP:RS pusher, and I tend to be uncomfortable writing articles in my own field of expertise since I'm inclined to write from experience rather than from independent sources. I have a very ambivalent relationship to our notability guidelines since they tend to be interpreted as strict yardsticks rather than informational guides to gauging encyclopedic viability (there's also an unfortunate tendency to misread "notability" as "worthiness"). I dislike the common interpretation that WP:NOT paper overrides WP:NOT a collection of indiscriminate information, but as long as its interpreted in its original sense — that the limits to detailed description are set by our core policies rather than physical limits — I can live with it.

General comments

• See Trialsanderrors's edit summary usage with mathbot's tool.

Discussion

Support

1. Strongest Support as nominator. Xoloz 16:01, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
2. Strong support I could've swore this user was an administrator already. I've seen him around so many times, excellent work.--Húsönd 19:40, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
3. Strong Support I have seen him numerous times, and I know he will make an excellent admin. Yanksox 19:51, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
4. Strong Support Nice work. Jehochman (^Talk/_Contrib) 20:19, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
5. Support - see no reason why not, seems to have a good understanding of fair use[1] --T-rex 20:36, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
6. Support --Alex (Talk) 21:07, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
7. Suport Wikipedia needs him. (I voted here before without logging in. My bad) Sharkface217 21:16, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
8. Support Awesome editor all-around. No reason to believe the tools will be misused. --NMChico24 21:40, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
9. Support Perfect candidate for the mop and bucket. --Doc Tropics ^{Message in a bottle} 21:45, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
10. Support Have seen this user around, extremely productive to Wikipedia and the community in general. Worthy of the mop. --²¹⁰physicq (c) 22:10, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
11. Strong Support an insightful voice of reason at Afd and DRV, quite a good all-around admin candidate. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 22:30, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
12. Support Always a clear thinker on Afd, should make a good admin. Dina 22:37, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
13. Support Good user, will make great admin. Nishkid64 22:44, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
14. Support Looks like another good candidate. (aeropagitica) 23:03, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
15. Support, sound understanding of policy, good editor, uses his head. Guy 23:40, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
16. Support I've seen him around and know he does good work, but even if I didn't, his letters alone overqualify him for adminship on Wikipedia hoopydink^{Conas tá tú?} 23:43, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
17. Support A cool, level-headed user. Cheers, :) Dlohcierekim 00:34, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

    Having read Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Classes in World of Warcraft, I just don't see what Havoc is talking about. Trialsanderrors seems to be explaining his ratioanle for delete and countering arguments to keep. Staying with support. Cheers, :) Dlohcierekim 19:14, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

18. Support. Definately worth interrupting my wikibreak to support. Agent 86 00:38, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
19. Support He wasn't an admin before?! -- Kicking222 00:55, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
20. Support per answer to question 5, and my past experience with him/her. Shows good perspective. Mangojuice^talk 02:18, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
21. Support - Good answers.-- Lost^(talk) 02:59, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
22. Support per above; hear hear. Dryman 03:14, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

    Support He's practically an admin now with the work he does. Let's give him the mop. Sharkface217 03:29, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

    Duplicate - crz crztalk 07:32, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

23. Support per nom. Michael 03:58, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
24. Support. The old cliche: He wasn't an admin? I thought he already was. --¿¡Exir Kamalabadi!? 04:06, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
25. Support in spades. Long time coming. - crz crztalk 04:37, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
26. Support obviously. riana_dzasta 05:07, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

    Poor taste in baseball teams, but I'll support anyway ;-). - Mike | Talk 05:29, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

27. Support This is a team player. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Storm Rider (talk • contribs).
28. Support I've seen him around - good guy, deserves a mop. (The A's debacle in Detroit? What about Detroit's debacle in St. Louis?) KrakatoaKatie 09:46, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
29. Support. I have seen him around also, and he looks like a very valuable editor. NauticaShades 10:37, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
30. Support per nom. Sarah Ewart (Talk) 11:16, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
31. Support A very intelligent user and the PhD he has just re-emphasizes how important his contributions to this project is. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 11:39, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
32. Support. Good answers, and have seen intelligent contributions from him, seems level-headed. Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:11, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
33. Strong support, I wanted to nominate him myself... Kusma (討論) 14:53, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
34. Support, long overdue. - Mailer Diablo 16:26, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
35. Support. Angus McLellan (Talk) 17:22, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
36. Support. My, this takes me back, Trialsanderrors was actually one of the first people I encountered at AfD. Anyway, he knows what he is doing, and he deserves the mop.-- danntm ^T _C 18:28, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
37. Strong support. Judges encyclopedic content exceptionally well. -- Samir धर्म 20:45, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
38. Support, an excellent candidate, no issues. Newyorkbrad 20:52, 5 November 2006 (UTC),
39. Strong Support, excellent candidate; thought he already was an admin; trust Xoloz to only pick excellent candidates; no problems with his arguments in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Classes in World of Warcraft though he could have kept his cool better. Eluchil404 23:25, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
40. Strong Support per Xoloz whose judgement I trust implicitly. Jcam 01:19, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
41. Support A good candidate --Steve 01:33, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
42. Support many, many interactions (starting with Wikiproject Game Theory involvement)), all very positive. An exemplary wikipedian: knowledeable, energetic, and brimming with common-sense. Can't imagine a more deserving candidate. Pete.Hurd 02:56, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
43. Strong Support per nominator and questions. --Daniel Olsen 03:22, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
44. Support: His/her comments in the WoW debate may not have been a greatest moment. In general this is a civil, level-headed editorm one with whom I've been able to strongly disagree with one day and work with the next. -MrFizyx 04:14, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
45. Frank Thomas-sized support I have in the past questioned a user's judgment upon his accepting a nomination by a nominator about whom I had concerns, and, for consistency, I must, as Jcam, inter al., observe that I am reflexively disposed toward support here in view of my confidence in the judgment of the nominator, especially in view of his generally exacting RfA standards, especially insofar as T&E's accepting a nomination from Xoloz speaks to the former's judgment as well. In any event, though, it seems quite plain that T&E is possessed of a deliberative temperament (and, as a component thereof, a reasoned sense of judgment) and amicable demeanor the presence of which in him, in concert with his knowledge of policy and practice, is quite auspicious; I am wholly confident that T&E will neither abuse nor misuse (even avolitionally) the tools, such that I am certain that net effect on the project of his becoming an admin will be positive (the latter is my RfA standard). Joe 05:20, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
46. Support thought he was one an admin already.--Kchase T 10:50, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
47. Support per the oppose votes. Moreschi 13:04, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
48. Support --Terence Ong _{(T | C)} 13:15, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
49. Support per nom. A PhD, thats excellent for a wikipedian considering when the average wikipedian is a teenager --Ageo020 (Talk • Contribs) 16:48, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
50. Support per Ageo020  Doctor Bruno  17:07, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
51. Support - Seen him around, knows what he is doing, remains calm. --CBD 19:12, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
52. Belated support. Do we agree on everything? Absolutely not. Is he one of the most stand-up types in this project? Without a doubt, and I'm embarrassed it took me this long to support. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Badlydrawnjeff (talk • contribs).
53. Support --Ed (Edgar181) 19:51, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
54. Support only if he promises to help out on game theory articles more. :) I found him very easy to work with and think he would make a good admin. --best, kevin [kzollman][talk] 07:56, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

    But if he did that, then we would have nothing left to do with our free time! ;) Pete.Hurd 18:00, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

55. Support no reason to believe this editor will abuse admin tools.--MONGO 09:58, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
56. RFA cliche #1. >Radiant< 10:01, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
57. Yes. --Doc^g 16:32, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
58. Support, Good editor who will likely make a good admin... even if he is an A's fan.--Isotope23 18:04, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
59. Support. Olessi 18:36, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
60. Merovingian ※ Talk 01:00, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
61. Support good thinker on AfD. Will close debates appropriately.Blnguyen (bananabucket) 01:33, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
62. I trust Xoloz as a nominator, seen user around as well. Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 01:49, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
63. Strong Support from a straggler - just found out about this nomination! Trialsanderrors is a consistently well-reasoning, diligent, fair-minded, cool, calm and collected contributor, collaborator, and editor. His interest in formulating sound new guidelines is very valuable. He does much behind-the-scenes procedural editing work too. In short, Trialsanderrors is an all-round good egg and would make an excellent admin. Bwithh 06:15, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
64. Support. I thought he was one already. ~crazytales56297 ^{O rly?} 13:03, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
65. Support per nom. John254 05:18, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
66. Support, from my encounters with T&E, I believe Wiki would be better if he had the tools. No doubt about it - the model RfA candidate. Daniel.Bryant ^{[ T · C ]} 08:12, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
67. Support per nom. Anger22 (Talk 2 22) 12:22, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
68. Support. Pretty unconvincing opposes. -- Steel 15:30, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
69. El_C 10:10, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
70. Support semper fi — Moe 17:07, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
71. Support. See no serious issues. Jayjg ^(talk) 17:36, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
72. Support.per nom, good replies.Mustafa Akalp^TC 11:31, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
73. Support --thunderboltz^(Deepu) 16:05, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Oppose

1. Oppose His argumentation in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Classes in World of Warcraft leaves much to be desired. Seems to actually have a "grudge" against the article or its subject, which leaves me wondering if he would be neutral enough to do his job as an admin. Havok (T/C/c) 11:45, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

   You're opposing for that ? Not that your 1000+ edits on WoW subjects make you biased or anything. Jcam 01:31, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

   And what does that have to do with anything? Seeing as that is where I first saw him on Wikipedia, that is where I base my vote. And his persona in that AfD goes against everything I would want in an admin, regardless of where he would vote like that. If he did that in any other AfD I would still vote oppose. Havok (T/C/c) 06:29, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

   And what "persona" would that be ? Someone who refutes your flawed logic in an Afd ? Honestly, if I had read the Afd first before I read this Rfa, I think I would have suspected that you and the others in that thread were strawman sockpuppets of Trialsanderrors. And for the record, if I were to vote in this Afd, I'd probably disagree with Trials on this and vote weak keep. But the arguments made by you and the others in the thread (the whole Mario line of thought) did nothing to persuade me. And though I disagree with Trials, his line of thought on this Rfa, in my judgement, shows he thinks things through in a precise way, not with some sort of "grudge", as you claim. Jcam 14:51, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

   Oppose changed from support per Havok. - Mike | Talk 14:04, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

2. Oppose per Havok, behaviour was slighty uncivil. T Rex | talk 00:17, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
3. Oppose - Definitely needs to learn to keep cool under the pressure of a heated AFD debate. I'm concerned that with the extra tools, a hot collar will cause some confrontations best left untouched. Torinir _{( Ding my phone My support calls E-Support Options )} 00:38, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
4. [2].--SB | T 03:21, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

   Just to put that remark in context, I also took exception to fuddlemark's tone in that DRV, and corresponded with him at his talk page, where he admitted kindly to being overly harsh. Trialsanderrors was simply responding in a manner consistent with the tone fuddlemark himself had set. Xoloz 17:30, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

   So you missed the part where he completely misunderstands the way deletion discussions work? Oh, wait, I forget that you do too. Never mind.--SB | T 13:11, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

   Thanks for your usual exemplary kindness. Xoloz 15:53, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Neutral

1. I hate to jump around so much on one RfA, but thinking it over, getting a little hot under the collar at an AfD is not a reason to oppose. I think I'll go neutral on this because I still have some civility concerns about this user. Good luck! - Mike | Talk 21:49, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

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