Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Encephalon

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

[edit] Encephalon

final (125/1/0) ending 07:03 March 27, 2006 (UTC)

Encephalon (talk · contribs) – Encephalon is one of the finest Wikipedia editors I have come across. He is intelligent, courteous, and articulate. Within months of his arrival, I knew he would make an excellent administrator, and informed him of my intention to nominate him once he had a bit more experience and if he were willing. Encephalon has shown himself to be very well-versed in Wikipedia policy, he is able to communicate extremely well, and remains calm and rational during disagreement. He is a highly experienced editor and and has been active in several policy areas. He is well-respected and friendly, and I can think of no better embodiment than he for the qualities we value in our administrators. In short, Encephalon will be the sort of administrator I would like to be. Several of us have been attempting to persuade Encephalon to allow us to nominate him for quite some time; I consider it an honor to put forward this nomination. Titoxd previously tried nominating Encephalon for adminship; I have invited him to co-nominate. — Knowledge Seeker দ 23:03, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

  • There isn't much I can add to Knowledge Seeker's nomination, but I think Encephalon is the standard to set with respect to civility and administrative knowledge all nominees should have. He has excellent grasp of Wikipedia policy, and has a flair for language, using the best possible words to defuse even the most tense situations surrounding the thorniest issues. I've "had my eye" on him since December, but Knowledge Seeker has finally brainwashed him into accepting what he has deserved for at least half a year now. He has already declined two nominations, and as they say, the best administrators are the ones that have to be dragged to get the mop and the flamethrower. Titoxd(?!? - help us) 04:58, 18 March 2006 (UTC)


Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: I'm honored (and more than a little embarrassed) to accept this nomination. —Encephalon 06:41, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Support

  1. Support as nominator. — Knowledge Seeker দ 05:28, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
  2. Support, as co-nominator. Titoxd(?!? - help us) 04:58, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
  3. Support - He secretly must be an admin, right??Blnguyen | Have your say!!! 07:06, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  4. Absolutely. Christopher Parham (talk) 07:18, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  5. Support. Absolutely. Sjakkalle (Check!) 08:50, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  6. Support - He's an excellent candidate. - Richardcavell 09:33, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  7. Support as per nominator Leidiot 10:36, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  8. Support unquestionably. Hiding talk 10:51, 20 March 2006 (UTC
  9. Support GizzaChat © 11:43, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  10. Support --Terence Ong 11:57, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  11. There's not really much to say. Johnleemk | Talk 14:10, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  12. Support by all means. (Aargh! Edit conflict x2!) haz (user talk) 14:13, 20 March 2006
  13. Support A great contributer. Will be an excellent admin. --Siva1979Talk to me 14:16, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  14. Support with the expectation that Encephalon will make a fine admin. --Syrthiss 14:54, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  15. Support looks good. ¡Dustimagic! (T/C) 15:06, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  16. Support. A steady hand and a cool head coupled with a thorough knowledge of guideline, policy and practise as well as outstanding contributions to the encyclopedia mean that Encephalon will set a standard that most admins will have to aim at. One other important quality he has that certainly some editors don't is actually reading a discussion before adding his commentary to the bottom of it — you can be sure that a comment from Encephalon is one that takes into account all that has already been said and thus is the kind that actually moves things forwards. -Splashtalk 15:12, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  17. Support A fine editor with plenty of experience. --NormanEinstein 15:20, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  18. Support. Everything I've seen from Encephalon has been good. Paul August ☎ 15:23, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  19. Support Looks good to me. --kingboyk 15:31, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  20. Support. Seems pretty obvious why :) Petros471 15:34, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  21. Support. I'm at the point where the adminship is something I would not wish on my worst enemy. But I do wish it on you:>--R.D.H. (Ghost In The Machine) 15:41, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  22. Support A great editor. mmeinhart 15:52, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  23. User:Go for it!/Vote Support he'll do fine. If he wants the mop and bucket, then let's take advantage of that and give them to him! --Go for it! 16:02, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  24. Support. Will be a good admin. --Ghirla -трёп- 16:36, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  25. SUPER STRONG MEGA GIANT SUPPORT Editor is plainly brilliant, extraordinary thoughtful... just amazing. I think he was certainly qualified for adminship on his first day here. Xoloz 17:16, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  26. Support, overdue. Dragons flight 17:24, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  27. Support as per nom - Aksi great 17:29, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  28. Support, user has certainly shown good judgement and willingness to take on maintenance tasks. --Deathphoenix ʕ 17:34, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  29. Support. Unlikely to abuse admin tools. Haukur 17:47, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  30. Support. -- DS1953 talk 18:06, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  31. Support (insert superlative of choice). Sandy 18:09, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  32. SuperduperSupport, good user, works on RC, CP AfDs, been around long enough, etc. I'm happy to support. feydey 18:55, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  33. Support: comes highly recommended. Jonathunder 19:11, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  34. Support: Excellent nominee for Admin.--Isotope23 19:13, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  35. Support, where did the standard bot-inserted comments go? JIP | Talk 19:20, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  36. Support. Dedicated Wikipedian. Thorough answers to questions. --Fang Aili 20:00, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  37. Support What hey said. joturner 20:40, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  38. "More candidates like this one, please"TM support ++Lar: t/c 20:58, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  39. Speedy --Jaranda wat's sup 21:09, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  40. Strong support - another cliche I'm afraid. --Celestianpower háblame 21:27, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  41. Strong support without reservation. Robert 22:35, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  42. Support    GUÐSÞEGN   – UTEX – 23:23, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  43. Support Joe I 23:54, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  44. Support; strong candidate. Antandrus (talk) 23:57, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
  45. --Sean Black (talk) 00:23, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  46. NSLE (T+C) at 00:43 UTC (2006-03-21)
  47. Support Just another star in the night T | @ | C 00:44, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  48. Support Moe ε 01:39, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  49. Big support. Yup, big. Coffee 01:54, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  50. Support. Looks good. — Rebelguys2 talk 02:01, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  51. Support. His edit history is solid, would do well with admin tools. Jude (talk,contribs,email) 02:01, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  52. Support. Massiveego, you so funny. --Jay(Reply) 02:47, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  53. Support Looks good! Prodego talk 02:56, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  54. Support good user with a great contribution history. Jedi6-(need help?) 03:10, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  55. Support--Jusjih 03:17, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  56. Support Yes!! --HappyCamper 04:59, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  57. Support, or more like a ceremonial display of confidence at this point. --TantalumTelluride 05:17, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  58. Support per above. --Khoikhoi 05:38, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  59. Support will be good admin --rogerd 05:40, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  60. Support absolutely. ×Meegs 06:51, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  61. Support, of course. - Mailer Diablo 13:48, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  62. Support. Need I say more...--May the Force be with you! Shreshth91($ |-| ŗ 3 $ |-| ţ |-|) 15:46, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  63. Support. Certainly. Mikker ... 16:22, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  64. Support highly qualified and easily up to the admin role MLA 17:42, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  65. Support --Latinus 23:16, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  66. Support per above. Yamaguchi先生 01:08, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  67. Support I see no evidence that this nominee will abuse admin tools.--MONGO 02:44, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  68. Support shows every sign he'll be a fine admin. Taking a wikibreak, far from disqualifying him, shows sense of balance in my book.--CTSWyneken 03:18, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  69. Support Finer user and if Titoxd recommends you than I will follow his lead. -- Patman2648 21:34 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  70. Support —Quarl (talk) 2006-03-22 05:37Z
  71. Support. --Alan Au 06:20, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  72. Support - Looks like a good all-rounder. ProhibitOnions 08:50, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  73. Support, good user. --Terence Ong 08:55, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  74. Support - about time. --Ixfd64 09:43, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  75. "He wasn't one already?"-style Support +sj + 10:13, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  76. Support, all the right qualities Deizio 11:59, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  77. Support, good editor. |→ Spaully°τ 12:20, 22 March 2006 (GMT)
  78. Support; will be a great administrator. - Liberatore(T) 14:00, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  79. Support. great job. pschemp | talk 14:59, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  80. Support Great editor, no reason not to promote. OhNoitsJamieTalk 21:05, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  81. Support Great admin material. ➨ ❝REDVERS❞ 21:50, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  82. Yup. - Taxman Talk 00:16, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  83. Edit conflict support. the wub "?!" 00:17, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  84. Support. See no reason for concern. Jayjg (talk) 00:31, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  85. Support. Another one who's looking very good! Mmounties 01:53, 23 March 2006
  86. Support - Definitely. Sango123 (e) 02:07, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  87. Support Sarah Ewart (Talk) 02:15, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  88. Mega-strong Support. E, was absent for a while, but now, back and fully functional. Good luck. Oran e (t) (c) (e) 03:58, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  89. Strong Support Pretty impressive edit count, I'd have to say. Meets my requirements 100%. Keep up the good work and good luck. Crna tec Gora
  90. Strong Support exceptionally well mannered, courteous and cool-headed in his dealings with others. I think will have a very sensible approach when it comes to issues of POV disputes and wikipedia development, especially in what is likely to be a critical year for wikipedia (its size now over that million mark, issues of accuracy/libel, ?Wikipedia 1.0 etc). David Ruben Talk 06:45, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  91. Yeah, I guess. - brenneman{L} 07:00, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  92. Support. --Rory096 08:35, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  93. Strong support per nom. - Wezzo (talk) (ubx) 08:36, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  94. Support =Nichalp «Talk»= 08:45, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  95. Support, it is always a pleasure to deal with him, and he will make a great administrator. -- Natalya 12:24, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  96. Strong support. Encephalon is, undeniably, the finest Wikipedian I have ever had the good fortune of coming across. He routinely reads the archives, keeps himself informed, is polite, well-mannered, thoughtful, and concientious. He can apologize for his mistakes (which are few and far between). He has a extremely thorough understanding of the workings of Wikipedia and rather than sling mud always, always, gives good rationales for his opinions and discusses them, rather than arguing. This editor is so far above the necessary bar for adminship that this RFA is practically unneeded. We need more people like Encephalon: the sooner he's given adminship the better. Blackcap (talk) 17:33, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  97. Very Strong support. -- I tried nominating him as well, I guess he just doesn't like me ;) -- Avi 18:15, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  98. Strong Support. Good experiences when encountering the user, also has strong experience with deletion review, afd, ... --Aude (talk | contribs) 21:59, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  99. Support Diplomacy is an absolute necessity in Wikipedia. Ziggurat 22:01, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  100. Support and welcome to WP:100 -- Samir (the scope) 00:54, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  101. Support a truly decent candidate. I've always found Encephalon's manner and activities perfectly suited for the role of admin. --cj | talk 02:22, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  102. Cliché support - I thought he already was an admin! — Kimchi.sg | Talk 04:01, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  103. Support Ahonc (Talk) 12:29, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  104. Support. Kirill Lokshin 13:02, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  105. Support Because I didn't get to be #100, I get to use the cliche "I thought he already ..." Good contributions and a chap with a sense of humour, will be a fine admin. --Cactus.man ✍ 14:58, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  106. Support - very strong candidate. --JoanneB 17:06, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  107. Support. — FireFox • T [18:42, 24 March 2006]
  108. Support. Hall Monitor 21:16, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
  109. Pile On Support --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 12:04, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  110. Support It all looks good. --DanielCD 15:04, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  111. Support Good editor. --a.n.o.n.y.m t 15:34, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  112. Suppoty Really a good contributor. Shyam (T/C) 23:59, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
  113. Support. Seeing as his name is Encephalon, I'd love it if he helped me clean up the Xenosga lists :) — Deckiller 00:22, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  114. Support gets my vote of support Gryffindor 01:18, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  115. support this person to become administrator Yuckfoo 03:09, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  116. Support - Encephalon's contributions to disease articles are very impressive. Green Giant 06:28, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
    Support - Its a no-brainer. Jedi6-(need help?) 07:29, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
    This user is so good I accidently supported twice! Jedi6-(need help?) 19:50, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  117. Support: I am late to the party? --Bhadani 07:37, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  118. Sounds vaguely familliar! El_C 14:23, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  119. Support - looks good to me. —Whouk (talk) 16:39, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  120. Support: I nearly missed this one. Geogre 17:08, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
    Geogre's been a tad under the weather, but he got up off his deathbed to support. Paul August ☎ 22:15, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  121. Of course Lectonar 19:08, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
  122. Support, naturally. A very qualified, intelligent editor. Matt Yeager ♫ (Talk?) 03:35, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  123. Support. Fail to disagree with anything above. Flowerparty■ 07:17, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  124. Support. In case 123 doesn't make it obvious that this person should be an admin. Marskell 11:55, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
  125. Support Per prior 123 people. ⇒ SWATJester Ready Aim Fire! 15:59, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Oppose

  1. Oppose Noticable drop in post counts per month. May not be emotionally qualified for the job. --Masssiveego 08:24, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
    Can you please elaborate on 'emotionally unqualified'. Tintin (talk) 09:15, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
    Encephalon was only not active for two months which is reasonable, but then continued to make good contributions again. GizzaChat © 11:45, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
    Further expanding on that, Encephalon's break was due to professional obligations [1], not because of stress. The fact that he came back and resumed editing in his usual areas is a good indicator of the kind of committment to the project he has. Titoxd(?!? - help us) 20:46, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
    If anything, leaving this place for personal reasons for a while and then coming back to resume his activities makes Encephalon a better candidate as he's proven that he's got his priorities straight. It certainly is not, as was implied, a sign of emotional instability. What's more, he seems to have the full support of those who know him. That makes him a very strong candidate in my book. --Mmounties (Talk) 01:53, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
    First, I'm sorry to see an unopposed nomination go away because of a pointless confusing objection. First, emotionally unstable people often ignore real life issues and focus on Wikipedia without taking breaks. Those people should get priorities straight, which, in my mind, shows emotional issues. Encephalon did the right thing in getting his priorities straight, which shows a lot about his character. — Deckiller 03:12, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
    Hi there. As Masssiveego's concerns seem to have generated some interest, I thought I'd briefly address them. Tito is indeed correct: I took a short break at the time because of increased professional duties during that period. This had been scheduled well before November, in fact, and quite a few of my wikifriends were aware of it. I returned to editing once I'd more free time. Thank you for your concern, Masssiveego, and DaGizza, Tito, Mmounties and Deckiller for your kind remarks. :-) Happy editing —Encephalon 04:07, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Neutral

Comments

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, if any, would you anticipate helping with? Please check out Category:Wikipedia backlog, and read the page about administrators and the administrators' reading list.
A. Hi. I have some familiarity with Special:Recent changes patrol, and those fora concerned primarily with maintenance of the Main space (for example, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion, Wikipedia:Copyright problems, Wikipedia:Deletion review, and Wikipedia:Redirects for deletion). I watch the administrator boards whenever I'm online, and therefore usually have a reasonable idea of the daily issues being brought forward for administrative attention.

If I'm granted SysOp permissions, I forsee using them where appropriate in activities related to the above. Of the three permissions (page deletion/restoration, account/IP blocking, and page protection) and the automated tool (rollback) given administrators, I will probably find rollback and page restoration/deletion the most useful. This is probably similar to the experience of most (see for example Haukur's report), with the notable exception of those technically gifted individuals who manage to code and run vandal-blocking bots n' things that do so much to protect our encyclopedia (see User:Curps).

I am less involved with some areas of the encyclopedia to do with more specialized functions, for example Wikipedia:Categories for deletion. While I've observed it with interest and participated in a limited capacity, I do not forsee taking an especially active administrative role there. (I remain quite impressed, however, with how WP's category scheme has evolved via the wiki process; in many areas it compares quite favorably with the schemes in longer established encyclopedias (compare Wikipedia's vs Brittanica's)). I am fairly clueless in the technical side of many things, and have no plans at present to write code (of any kind) or develop (anything).

I think an important thing for administrators to have is the inclination to say sorry, if when they've managed to screw something up nicely (which with most people happens inevitably). I'm happy to report that my qualifications in this regard are quite good, having had many opportunities for practice.


2. Of your articles or contributions to Wikipedia, are there any about which you are particularly pleased, and why?
A. I'm fortunate to be member of an informal group of editors involved with Wikipedia:Medical Collaboration of the Week and Wikipedia:WikiProject Clinical medicine, who pick articles every so often to bring up to featured standard, and address issues related to the very incomplete but steadily improving set of medical articles on Wikipedia. I have never met a nicer, friendlier, more industrious bunch of people online, and it's been an honor to be of some assistance to them. Of the current set of featured medical articles, I made substantial contributions to Asthma and Pneumonia. I also sometimes write shorter, "satellite" articles that help support the main featured article, for example Wheeze and Hopkins syndrome. My modest contributions to the article space will likely continue to be associated with the activities of WP:MCOTW and WP:CLINMED.

The other type of contribution I make to the article space is of the clean-up variety. This includes RC patrol, Wikipedia:Disambiguation pages with links, and Wikipedia:WikiProject Fix common mistakes. RC patrol has been an on-off affair for me. When I first started out I reverted manually, but this was often a very suboptimal use of time because of its slowness (most of the time one of you unbelievable vandal slayers would revert ahead of me). After getting godmode things were much better, and I did RC patrol regularly—until godmode started malfunctioning for various reasons (eg. the ampersand bug, contribs page bug, poor function with IE7 etc). Hence, these days I mainly revert vandalism that I catch on watchlisted articles, as setting aside time to do RC patrol using CDVF + manual reverts might mean spending one hour only to manage 1-2 reverts ahead of someone with a quicker draw.


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. I don't think I've had conflicts, which I take to be of a more serious character than disagreements. I don't recall being stressed by something on Wikipedia—surprised yes, and, on two or three occassions, even rather shocked.;-) Conflict on Wikipedia seems to follow some broad patterns. In the article space, most disagreements that attain the sort of intensity we regard as indicating conflict seem to start because of NPOV-related issues. In the project space, conflicts seem often to occur over a background of disparate wiki-philosophies. In the sysop world, they often involve repeated reversals of sysop actions (ie. delete-undelete, protect-unprotect, block-unblock) and can have their bases in many different things. It seems to me that, regardless of the proximate cause of a disagreement, a few common factors tend to escalate conflict, and I try to pay attention to them. The first is suboptimal communication. When faced with an article edit that one does not necessarily agree with, it is a good thing to talk to the editor who made the change, stating the reasons for disagreement and seeking to understand the reasons for the edit. It will often turn out that there were good reasons for it; WP can be an excellent learning experience in more ways than one. If after a discussion it becomes quite clear that the edit was indeed suboptimal, providing the opportunity to the other editor to rework his own edit can be a very positive thing (instead of simply reverting, ourselves). A second factor is impatience, and an unwillingness to relinquish some control to the wiki process. In a discussion that is at an impasse, there is sometimes a tendency to revert war—patience always runs thin when it is needed most. Revert wars rarely result in anything productive. Being willing to allow an unfavored edit to remain in an article or policy page for one more day will not end the world, but instead may help de-escalate a conflict and allow the focus to shift to thinking about solutions, rather than the most biting edit summaries.;-) A third factor is disrespect, which can escalate a conflict very quickly. WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA should be unfailingly adhered to; the latter is not very hard to do, but the former can sometimes seem impossible for even the best among us. I have found that if I'm feeling exasperated or incredulous at another's behavior that the best thing to do is often to hold off replying for a moment or two. I try to bear the above in mind when editing WP, and so far it has been a positive experience.
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of either this nomination or the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.