Wikipedia:Editor review/The Random Editor 2

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[edit] The Random Editor

The Random Editor (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves • rights) I had a previous editor review here. I had a recent RFA which passed, see here. Just curious to see what Wikipedia thinks of me now. Тhε Rαnδom Eδιτor 03:32, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Reviews

  • Review by Shalom - I'll keep it short because you're quite experienced and don't need much help from me (though you're always welcome to ask). Username issues can seem quirky: what seems innocuous to one person might bother someone else. I never thought twice about "The way, the truth, or the light" being an acceptable name, but I ended up accidentally biting a newbie when I suggested to Perversedork (talk · contribs) to find a different name. Vandalfighting can be stressful, but the way I avoid the stress is not to do much of it in the first place. I've been very consistent in my editor reviews in suggesting that RC patrol and newpage patrol is an inefficient use of your time on Wikipedia. I do it occasionally myself, but I'd say 95% of my time here is spent elsewhere, especially at deletion discussions and backlogs such as uncategorized pages. Now that you're an admin, you can do things that I and most Wikipedians cannot do. If you spent more time killing unlicensed images and less time doing RC patrol, you'll be bored as hell within 5 minutes, but the project will come out ahead, I guess. That's the tradeoff: you want to be doing what you enjoy, but you want to use your time and your access level effectively. Besides, does anyone enjoy RC patrol? I'll be quite happy when stable versions arrive, so that I won't feel so motivated to check for silly vandalism in the first place.
  • I'm happy that you've started working on Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets. For whatever reason, that page doesn't receive the administrative attention it needs. One thing I learned about SSP that's different from XFD is the following: XFDs require consensus: you don't delete an article or template without discussion unless it's really obvious (that's why we have WP:CSD). However, you are allowed to close a sock puppet case without soliciting comment from anyone else if you're certain beyond a reasonable doubt that you've made a correct determination, and that you've selected the proper remedy. This has more to do with practicality than fairness. In my opinion, blocking a user account is a more serious matter than deleting a page, but since nobody cares about sock puppets and everyone cares about deletions, the idea of consensus is applied to deletions. Go figure. Anyway, if you think you see a group of accounts who edit the same small set of articles in pretty much the same way at pretty much the same time, you can determine that they are sock puppets and apply an appropriate remedy: block the accounts with fewer edits permanently, and the main account temporarily unless it's really bad. If you're wrong, there's always requests for unblock to remedy a possible mistake. If you want to request a checkuser, it's pretty easy to do that, but the response time is several days, and it makes work for other admins which may not be necessary in the more obvious cases. These are just some thoughts from my experience working on the sock puppet noticeboard.
  • Like everyone here, I have a lot of respect for your consistent approach, and I wish you the best of luck. Shalom Hello 02:34, 25 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Reply by The Random Editor - Thank you for giving up some of your time and energy to review me. All reviewers after this please keep your reviews in the same format as above. --Тhε Rαnδom Eδιτor 12:13, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Dihydrogen Monoxide's review

Hello Random. I suppose I owe you a review; after all, I did comment on this ER, and I have been very involved in a few of the things you’ve been doing as an editor. I think I’ve gotten to know you fairly well in that time, and hopefully I can provide a slightly different viewpoint to anyone else who reviews you.

My main comments in this ER are related, inevitably, to adminship. As you probably know, Majorly recently lowered his activity around here a good deal. Shortly after this initially happened, I was talking to AndonicO on MSN, and he told me that he had spoken to Majorly. One of the reasons for his departure, according to Majorly (who confirmed this reason when I spoke to him later) was the drama and hype that surrounded RfA in these parts. Another reason, according to AndonicO’s summary of their conversation, was editors who edited “purely to gain adminship.” Your name was mentioned alongside this statement.

I don’t know, don’t pretend to know, and don’t particularly want to know why you started editing Wikipedia - as far as I know it’s not stated publicly anywhere, so it’s not my business to ask. However, Majorly was of the opinion that you had sought out adminship from an early stage, and in some respects I agree with him. I’ll stop quoting Majorly now - everything that follows is my opinion. It may sound hypocritical that I’m judging you on wanting adminship considering my record in that area, but I’ll attempt to overlook that. What bothers me, and has bothered others I’m sure, is that you haven’t done a great deal towards the project’s ultimate goal (as far as I can see, anyway). Look at your answer to Q1 of this ER - AIV, UAA, and other such activities. I know I would support RfAs for users who displayed ability and proficiency in these areas, but I never (despite what some people like to proclaim) was an advocate for these being your major areas of work.

What am I getting at? Articles! From what I, and several others, have seen, you haven’t done as much in this area as many other users, and admins. Whilst I generally disagree with OrangeMarlin in his stance on RfA, I must emphasis that article creation, improvement, and collaboration aren’t just important parts of the project. They are the single most important aspect of the project. Vandalwhacking is important, obviously, and I suppose username patrol is too (although I’ve always thought it’s bullshit that we can block users for picking a name we don’t like...), they are “important parts of the project”. But they aren’t #1.

I believe I know you quite well as an editor - we have been interacting since June if I recall correctly, mainly as admin coachees of Husond. We also spoke briefly (I never see you on gmail/Google Talk anymore :( ), but I haven’t gotten to know you must outside of a wiki context (I’m not trying to imply stalking, although reading this over it certainly sounds like it). So I’ll try to limit myself to wiki comments. A few random memories spring which relate to what I’ve already said, concerning what you’ve done, what you haven’t done, but most importantly what you’ve aimed to achieve.

I watchlisted your admin coaching subpage, and read through it occasionally. I haven’t looked at it for a while now, and don’t intend to, but I do remember there was a point where Husond stressed rather strongly that you had minimal experience in the (main) and Talk namespaces. I can’t remember his exact suggestions, although I know one of them was Wikipedia:Requested moves for the Talk namespace, and I remember you fulfilling some of the tasks he suggested. He also asked for productivity, creation, etc. - the goal of the project, to which you created a portal. Don’t take this the wrong way, I love portals. I discovered portals from Husond too, and I created one, which is at FPOC now. I’ve also found commenting on other FPOCs, and indeed just sampling other portals, is awesome - it’s something I really enjoy. But your portal (Portal:Roman Empire?) didn’t make it to FPOC or anything like that. It was just a run-off-the-mill portal, rarely maintained or updated, just sitting there static. If I may do, I’d hesitate to suggest that you just created this portal to shut Husond up - to satisfy him when he came back asking what you had created or worked on. Feel free to correct me, but I don’t think my assumption is unjustified. I’ve gotten the impression from a lot of your contributions that there is always a reluctance to perform them willingly, that there is always another force acting, to satisfy someone else, or to use the edit to achieve your own personal goal.

Whilst I’m here, I must also make mention of your answer to Q2 of this ER. Again, correct me if I’m wrong, but it bears a distinct resemblance to the Q3 answer in your RfA. And I think I remember seeing the same answer in your first ER (again, correct me if I’m wrong). You say you’re an active vandalfighter, active username patroller, etc., yet you’ve only ever had one conflict, one event that’s caused you stress, one event where you screwed up and learnt an important lesson? This simply doesn’t seem plausible, especially when this particular conflict doesn’t seem like such a big deal. He had a username which you thought went against policy, but actually didn’t. Big deal. If I (and I know I shouldn’t bring myself into this - apples vs. oranges - but I will anyway) had spoken about conflicts as minor as that one in my RfAs, Q3 would need to have been compiled into a collapsible table, a la Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Daniel.Bryant 2 (nominations) - there would be so many.

I hate to do this, because you’ve been a nice guy and all, but since this is a critical editor review, I’m going to be blunt, and ask some pressing questions. Feel fee to completely ignore these questions, and think of me what you will after reading them and the rest of the review. But here goes - answer if you wish.

  • 1) Why did you want to be an administrator?
  • 2) Other than your work vandalfighting etc., what article contributions are you proudest of, and why? (Revamping of Q1 of this ER)
  • 3) Have you ever been in any conflicts other then the username conflict alluded to in Q2 of this ER?
  • 4) Are you considering bureaucratship any time in the future? (Regardless of how far away) If yes, why, and what do you think you can bring to the project as a crat?
  • 5) How would you have felt if your RfA made it onto WP:100?
  • 6) What do you think about the fact that my RfA had greater participation than yours? (Not personally, I’m sure there are plenty of other failed RfAs with more then 100 participants. Replace me with Gracenotes if you must, or find someone else...)

These are my questions, and that is my review. I hope you gain something out of it, although ultimately that’s up to you. If you have any further comments, please don’t hesitate to leave me a note, and please consider answering the questions, for my curiosity if nothing else. Happy editing, and all the best, from your long-time companion, — Dihydrogen Monoxide (H2O) 07:21, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Comments

  • I'm still really curious as to what the hell this was all about. Dihydrogen Monoxide (H2O) 07:49, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
    Dihydrogen, if you felt this way, why did you co-nominate him? Or was your statement in that nomination. there "The Random Editor has surpassed them with ease. Basically, they are; a kickass signature, a groovy persona, and an amazing username" not perhaps entirely serious? DGG (talk) 18:55, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
    It occurred after the nom, I hadn't seen such events before that. Well, I had, but I chose to overlook them...  Dihydrogen Monoxide (H2O) 05:07, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
  • You misquoted Majorly and myself, first of all (besides, you shouldn't post MSN content on wikipedia, right?). Secondly your review violates WP:CIVIL, very blatantly. Third, those questions are personal attacks when asked after the rest of the review, in which, by the way, you make comments that are completely unnecessary, are your personal opinion, and are also very rude. Fourth, the whole thing reads like a flame. · AndonicO Talk 14:48, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Questions

  1. Of your contributions to Wikipedia, are there any about which you are particularly pleased, and why?
    I have to say, the amount of vandalism reverting, is something that I'm quite pleased of. I have over 110 edits to WP:HD, another thing I enjoy doing. Finally, my participation at WP:AFD, WP:RFA, and WP:RM.
  2. 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?
    Yes, I have been in situations of that nature. I felt that the user The way, the truth, and the light, username was sort of a violation of policy. I informed the user of my beliefs and we both requested comments. The result was that he got to keep his username. Even so, he has been invovled in numerous controversial situations, and even blocked once. Also, just the pressure of vandal fighting some times gets to me. When that happens, I just sit back and take a break.