Wikipedia:Adminship poll/F

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[edit] Is ArbCom a sufficient check and balance?

Currently, only the Arbitration Committee (including Checkuser outcomes) has the power to desysop an admin for abuse of the mop and bucket (excluding obvious incidents that resulted in ad-hoc removal). Do you feel that this measure alone is sufficient in acting as a check and balance against abusive admins? If not, what other process should be adopted?

[edit] Yes

  1. working fine. Christopher Parham (talk) 20:21, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  2. Yes, though I wouldn't mind seeing other additional alternatives discussed. - jc37 20:53, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  3. Daniel (talk) 02:08, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  4. Despite many claims to the contrary, nobody ever points out a decision I can see as faulty. At least not more often than any set of humans makes a mistake. The failure in checks and balances rests on the segments of the community that either tacitly or intentionally enables such failures. The idea that established members who contribute a lot should be given a free pass for policy violations is one of them, it creates a system where a senior member has an advantage over a new member. (1 == 2)Until 16:08, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  5. - Philippe 16:56, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  6. Y Archtransit. Rudget 17:00, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  7. ArbCom pwns --Koji†Dude (C) 23:47, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] No

  1. Certainly not. Majorly (talk) 20:00, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  2. -- Naerii 20:02, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  3. Mr.Z-man 20:05, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  4. J Milburn (talk) 20:13, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  5. Peer review perhaps? There should be a step below arbcom for admins who don't make serious mistakes but make a large number of minor ones. Have a "recent admin action notice board" and let people review actions. Administrators who have a larger-than-normal number and percentage of negative comments across multiple admin actions can have their adminship put up for review. This peer review concept goes for any privileged function. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 20:27, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  6. Wizardman 20:29, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  7. There appears to be no way of removing the bit from consistently poor admins (you know, those whose names are always appearing at WP:ANI). It seems you have to annoy the WP:TINC before desysopping is possible. EJF (talk) 20:48, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  8. I also think that there should be a way to desysop admins without the bureaucracy of ArbCom. bibliomaniac15 20:49, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  9. I don't know how it should be done, but there should be another way to do this. Captain panda 20:54, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  10. No. It simply doesn't work, and it's occasionally used really oddly. Plus, it takes too long to make any decisions. --Haemo (talk) 22:08, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  11. The ArbCom does not do a good job. --JayHenry (talk) 22:31, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  12. There is sometimes a fundamental disconnection between what is requested from ArbCom, and what ArbCom provides; issues are laid before the Committee, who then decide among themselves what the questions should be and decide the answers on that basis. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:45, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  13. There needs to be a swifter way to deal with the more obvious abuses. Also, ArbCom has sometimes shown itself unable to deal with more contentious cases in a reasonable or timely manner. Black Kite 23:14, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  14. Agree with the above, in general. Something else is needed, a lower level than ArbCom that can provide quick response to situations that arise. Tony Fox (arf!) 23:18, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  15. ArbCom cases more often than not take too long and require too much prerequisites for them to be much use in curbing abusive administrators. I agree with a peer-review system or a compulsory recall system. -Jéské (v^_^v Karistaa Usko) 23:33, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  16. We need a requests for de-adminship process, if not recall. dihydrogen monoxide (H2O) 01:08, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  17. No, Arbcom is for emergency abuse of admin tools or privacy stuff like socking. We need a way (universal standard recall, etc) to deal with the bad apples on a regular basis. MBisanz talk 02:04, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  18. No, but every admin recall proposal goes nowhere fast. Last time someone tried, it got hand-waved away as a "solution looking for a problem", etc. Maybe it's time to see if the community's opinion has changed. shoy 03:19, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  19. Dorftrottel (canvass) 03:41, April 21, 2008
  20. ArbCom is for when the community consensus is not capable of reaching a solution, and they seem unwilling to defintively settle things. By the time it gets to them, a verdict of advice that people be more polite to each other is usually a good deal besides the point. We need some group with the power and resolve to make definitive solutions.DGG (talk) 05:48, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  21. Per my answer to "bad eggs", above: ArbCom only deals with the admins that have completely lost their minds. All admins should be be subject to some form of community-driven recall when they are disregarding standards of conduct.--Father Goose (talk) 08:51, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  22. Absolutely not—a community process is needed. (I am amused by Father Goose's suggestion above that I have completely lost my mind.) Everyking (talk) 09:07, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  23. The Arbcom has had trouble with its vertebrae recently, and I've not enough confidence that they won't merely issue a "have a cup of tea" remedy for anything short of the so blindingly obvious the culprit steps down in embarrassment first. (This is as identified by DGG, also). The 2006 ArbCom was significantly better in this regard. Splash - tk 12:14, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  24. It's a very bureaucratic process. Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:39, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  25. No, sorry. Much respect for the members though. They are still a happy bunch outside of ArbCom. - Mtmelendez (Talk) 13:26, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  26. Perhaps it's time for an Administrators for Recall process analogous to AfD. Closing an AfR should be a job for a Bureacrat. Similarly to DRV, in contested cases there should be a Recall Review process. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 16:05, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  27. Absolutely not. The good voices are drowned out by partisans, and top-down influence, and back-room gaming. Problems: Arbitration Policy being under the control of the Arbitration Committee is as fucked as is possible. The AC was formed by Jimmy Wales, but for English Wikipedia internal functions, Jimmy Wales has left the building and rarely does anything of use to the community any longer. The AC is now a function of the community, and thus should be under Community control in every aspect. Arbiters, like the WMF board, are our elected delegates and serve us under our own terms. The AC list needs to be just duly elected and seated arbiters. There needs to be a mechanism of checks and balances like a real government requires to function--and yes, we're not a democracy, but lets not play games and call the AC/admin/editor structure anything but what it really is: our government. It's time to move past our pedestrian and antiquated Wikispeech to just be pragmatic and literal. The Community needs to take control and tell the AC what it needs. Because, given how milquetoast the AC is now and unwilling in all but the most glaringly obvious cases to do the right thing, it's useless. Sorry, guys. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 16:13, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  28. ArbCom is the Star Chamber of the English Wikipedia, in just about every sense. krimpet✽ 17:45, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  29. Community desysopping mechanism (proof to being hijacked by trolls and socks) is needed. Incidentally, making desysopping less of a big deal, would also make sysopping a no big deal, just as it used to be and as it should be. --Irpen 22:39, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  30. Sorry, but no. We elect non-controversial people to ArbCom, then expect them to dig into controversial problems with ease and grace without necessarily having the temperament or ability to do so. Another problem is that we're working with the same structure and format that we used when we were a small project, but we're not small anymore. We have more than 5 million registered accounts and 13 arbitrators. How in the world do we expect 13 people to manage the problems of the 8th-most-visited site in the world? We keep complaining about this situation, but we keep getting the same result - nothing changes except the number and volume of our cries. We may need to form another group, or to elect more ArbCom members, or to change the position description or the method of selection. We may need a combination of these or something else entirely. Regardless, we've got to find a solution for these controversial issues like de-adminning or throw up our hands and forget about it, 'cause the status quo is broken. KrakatoaKatie 22:44, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  31. It is much to severe in most cases. Malinaccier (talk) 01:10, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
  32. Nakon 01:48, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
  33. Overkill in most cases. — Werdna talk 02:48, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
  34. On some things yes, but on many important issues, no. (Ie, the bad admins case mentioned above by FatherGoose). --Bfigura (talk) 04:46, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
  35. With the greatest of respect, this doesn't work. The fact that you have to be really egregiously bad as an admin for a very long time before you get desysopped (wheel wars and rampages notwithstanding) is making people nervous at RFAs. Stifle (talk) 08:27, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
  36. See my comments in the section above this one. J.delanoygabsadds 21:01, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
  37. I honestly can't imagine it working through any miracle of God Cthulu. Ziggy Sawdust 00:37, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
  38. No. There needs to be a way to de-admin someone before they are generally regarded as bat-shit insane. ➪HiDrNick! 19:23, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
  39. No. Per Stifle. Obnoxious admins should be dealt with before ArbCom and without the overhead. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:28, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
  40. ArbCom's continued blind eye towards anything even vaguely content related means that acting in bad faith goes uncorrected. The common wisdom is correct "Be civil, don't sock, and ArbCom will let you get away with murder." and it's a huge problem. WilyD 14:23, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
  41. Answering in this section is the easy part, but how do we prevent a new process from becoming a lynching-ground? Would it be adequate to require that Rf~A discussions require the sysop bit in order to be opened? Sure, we can require a 'crat to close them, but that won't keep everyone PO'd about a single event from starting them. We'd also need good guidelines on what actions constituted grounds for this (e.g., multiple reversed actions in a certain period of time, incivility, COI, other?). Matchups 02:46, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
    If adminship were not a big deal, deprivation of it would not be a big deal. If someone loses his bit, he can reapply for it in a few months, just like those who have failed RfA candidacies now; if it was a momentary anger that recalled him, it will have subsided again. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:01, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
  42. Greeves (talk • contribs) 21:13, 26 April 2008 (UTC)
  43. ArbCom is good, and I think the members do a good job overall, but it alone does not provide a hugely affective check and balance on administrators, with it requiring high levels of abuse and a lot of time to produce results. I still support a full administrator recall system, and I do feel consensus is slowly changing to "yes" for such a process. Camaron | Chris (talk) 19:36, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
  44. ArbCom shouldn't be needed for some routine desysoppings. On principle in favor of tasks being devolved to the community over time. For example, bans were initially "Jimbo only", then ArbCom on his behalf. Nowadays it's routine and many bans are managed quite well by the community itself, with ArbCom still doing some, and acting as review and appeal on others. There is no reason in principle why desysopping could not follow a similar path over time. No obvious reason why a desysopping should need ArbCom stamp of approval any more than granting adminship does, provided there are clear grounds and such, room for appeal to ArbCom, and standards that crats can review ?RFD's? against.
    One possible objection that might copme up is, the main reason ArbCom is always involved is that desysopping is rare, high profile, and "the kiss of death". If desysopping became easier then community handling would be reasonable. (Counter-objection: even if it's rare, the community will probably take it seriously, set a high standard for removal, and ArbCom will still handle review/appeal. And we could have 2 or even 3 crats needed to concur for a RFD if quality of close was a concern.)
    Overall, then, in favor of the community itself handling more routine things like this and ArbCom less, on the whole. FT2 (Talk | email) 02:08, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
  45. No, ArbCom is the last resort. In its entire existence, ArbCom has averaged around 6 1/2 cases per month. Currently there are 15 arbitrators and 1,539 admins. That's 1 arbitrator for every 100 admins. Why not have a Admin review process? The loss of sysop privileges doesn't even have to be permanent. We block vandals for increasingly longer periods of time. We could de-sysop admins for increasingly longer periods of time. First failed admin review? 24 hours. Second failed admin review? One week, two weeks, one month, two months, six months, a year, forever, etc. Or you could just remove certain privileges, like the ability to block or protect pages. Or have one-year term limits, after which a user would have to run for admin again. You could even have a vote among existing admins. If a certain number or percentage of admins support a desysop for one month, forever, etc, the admin loses the mop. All admins should be eligible for recall. A further check against abuses would be gradually granting user privileges like Locke Cole suggested. Rollback, protection, deletion, blocking — and a user would have to go through an RFA style process for the last three. That would necessitate a change to the user rights system, but I'm sure there's someone who could do that. --Pixelface (talk) 02:41, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
    Point of information: - the reason English Wikipedia doesn't have annual reconfirmation or time limits (where some wikis do) is 2000 admins ÷ 12 = 200 reconfirmations a month. Reconfirmation consistently stumbles over that statistic, leading to a preference to trust admins once appointed, and deal with problems as they come up case-by-case. But the rest of this (admin review) is viable. FT2 (Talk | email) 02:57, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
  46. We should have something faster and less bureaucratic (no pun intended) than Arbcom. Perhaps something like a reverse RfA where opposition could be discredited if the user has been blocked by the admin (provided it was a valid block) or similar. The admin up for reverse-RFA could point out that the pair have a history and it can be decided whether or not to discount/weaken the position of the opposer. That would reduce the effect of grudge votes. Of course if the admin had acted innappropriately toward the user the opposition would remain valid and probably lead others to oppose as well. That's only a suggestion and there may be better alternatives. James086Talk | Email 08:43, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
  47. ArbCom is massively overworked and can't be bothered every time an admin does something stupid. There needs to be some other way to deal with problematic admins. Shalom (Hello • Peace) 06:31, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
  48. I don't have problems with most admins, but I do think there need to be more checks and balances in the system. JKBrooks85 (talk) 07:46, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  49. ·Add§hore· Talk/Cont 09:00, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Other

  1. I think it works fine the great majority of the time. But the Archtransit debacle made me see that a community desysopping process would be good... Something like a ban discussion would suffice, as long as a good number of people participate. Grandmasterka 20:26, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  2. Here's the problem. The tasks of an admin can make them (at times), less-than-popular. So who makes the choice in whether someone should be desysopped? Arbcomm seems a valid choice. Though I think we should be able to trust the bureaucrats (based on current standards for bureaucrat promotion) to have the ability to de-sysop (emergency, or per finding of arbcom). - jc37 20:52, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  3. I think I agree with Jc37 above. Seeing admins, uh, discussing stuff on ANI makes me wonder how well an admin-led de-bitting would work. A bunch of hard-working respected admins have left recently, and some have been through RfC, and some of that has been bitter. Taking a step away from the conflict, which some admins can't do, should help. But I guess you'd till get people complaining about evil ARBCOM. Dan Beale-Cocks 21:02, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  4. Admins can put themselves up for voluntary recall. I don't feel that a "community-led" desysop process would work very well, but I'm not averse to trying it if someone comes up with a workable method. I think that working on improving ArbCom is the better solution. the wub "?!" 00:14, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
  5. Arbcom is always going to be contentious and many will always express their unhappiness with outcomes. Given the area, I am surprised it is not more complianed about and suspect this is because the job is being done adequately if not well, however I have not scrutinised it in great detail. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 04:40, 21 April 2008 (UTC)