Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Royalguard11

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

[edit] Royalguard11

Final (58/2/0); Ended 22:30, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Royalguard11 (talk · contribs) – Royalguard11 is an exemplary user, with very nearly 8000 edits at the time of nomination. I'm personally shocked that he isn't already an admin - hopefully this will change very soon. My interaction with Royalguard11 has mainly occurred on the AMA IRC channel, where he and I are channel ops. He is an active member of the AMA, with a thorough understanding of dispute resolution policy. In other areas, he has a strong history of XfD experience and has showing a willingness to do the "thankless" work by migrating many many userboxes by hand (using a Mac, without AWB for help), with a lot of vandalfighting thrown on the side. To this end (of using a mac) he has created AIV'er to allow mac users to quickly and easily list users on AIV, with a graphical interface :). In my opinion, Royalguard11 will make an excellent admin, and I'm certain that the community will agree. Thanks, Martinp23 21:39, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: I humbly accept. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 22:19, 9 December 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: I know lots of the sysop work is dirty and long, but I'm up for it. I'm often posting something at WP:AIV, so I would definitely help out there, especially during, err, up times (like last week). CAT:CSD is almost always backlogged, so I would help out there as much as I can. I would also help in closing xFDs (and I have closed some obvious keeps before). I also would pitch in with move requests that require admin help (like over edited redirect and the like). I would also help out with protected page requests. I guess what I'm trying to say is that if you need me to help with something, and you ask me, then I'll be there to help you out with it. Sometimes I get in that state where you click a wikilink, and another, and another, and you find yourself ten pages away from where I was, so I do have lots of time to pitch in with the admin effort.
2. Of your articles or contributions to Wikipedia, are there any with which you are particularly pleased, and why?
A: The article I'm most proud of is Newfoundland referendums, 1948, which I spent some time researching online (after I took it in class some months ago, and discovered that it didn't exist on wiki!). Even though I live in Saskatchewan. I have tried to also contribute to articles related to Saskatchewan, and I've started over 30 articles in that are alone. I also tried to give Saskatoon City Council a little cleanup and added short bio's about councillors, since some of them wouldn't meet WP:BIO on their own. I realize that I'll have to update it every 3 years (at each election), but that's the beauty of wikipedia, you can update as things change. Articles should never look historic (unless of corse they're about historic/static places/people).
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 have not been in too many major conflicts really. I try to help other editors with conflicts through the AMA (which every new user seems to be able to find even though it took me several months). I'm not a person that will go "I'm right, and everyone else is wrong", and if I'm tired or in a hurry then anyone is allowed to hit me over the head and remind me (it did happen once, as looked at on my editor review).
4. Question from Centrx: What is your opinion of this action, in which a user who displayed a Nazi userbox was indef-blocked by Jimmy Wales and and the user page was deleted? Should users be allowed to post flashy, sensational banners espousing hateful political positions?
A (edit conflict) Yes, I was following that thread on the mailing list the last week. On such a diverse place like Wikipedia, it is impossible to legislate and make rules for everything. Some people were arguing that it was the same as have an "I support <party> userbox". I believe that Jimbo did the right thing. You can't troll around on wikipedia. I remember that the user also hade some other userboxes that were just as distruptive too. Now, I know that the question is meant to ask basically about political userboxes in general (because I'm part of WP:UM of corse). I believe that users should be able to have something suttle like "This user supports <party>". But, there are some invisible lines in the sand that must be drawn. It is basically universally agreed on that the Nazi's were, dare I say, evil. Anyone who supports the Nazi's and Hitler are outcasts, because of what they did. I know that the communists were just as bad, but everyone's forgotten them since the Cold War. And the US and China are traiding partners (PRC is communist still).
Where are these lines drawn and who decides where to draw them? Why should infamy decide whether a userbox is allowed? Is a userbox more conducive to creating an encyclopedia simply because fewer people will know enough to be revolted by it? —Centrx→talk • 23:27, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
Consensus. It's what wikipedia lives on. Most people agree that no Nazi's is a good thing. It can also come down from above, from Jimbo or the board. When they decide to draw lines, it's our job to follow them. If we don't know where to draw the lines, then we need to decide by consensus. Consensus was agaist something like mass userbox deletions (and depending who you talk to it may also be against WP:UM). (Now to the part of the question that was added while I was writing that) Many userboxes are not encyclopedic, I'll give you that. That is the reason why they were migrated out of template space and into userspace (now if someone could just explain that part to the people who hate UM). Why are they allowed? Because consensus has allowed them. If Jimbo declared tomorrow that all userboxes should die, I would comply though. But he hasn't, and consensus hasn't turned against userboxes yet. So they are still here. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 23:44, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
What is consensus; how is consensus formed? Do consensus decisions result from counting numbers in a poll advertised to partisan allies? Should a userbox be allowed simply because the political position in it is more popular? —Centrx→talk • 00:30, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
The post that I made on WT:UBM was to inform a group of editors who are heavily involved in migrating userboxes that what we do might be for naught. If it was decided that the userboxes would stay deleted, then there would be no point in TGS/GUS/UBM, and the userbox wars would probably re-breakout. I also posted to AN/I, with no responce whatsoever. And for some reason, I failed to find the Wikigroup dedicated to the utter destruction of userboxes, so I couldn't inform them. In responce to the second one, how popular is it to be a Republican right now? How about a Bush supporter? Boxes about them may exist. How about the Liberal Party of Canada? They were basically thrown out of government, but userboxes for them exist. Consensus, well, is done on a case by case basis. Sometimes it's a poll. Sometimes it's a discussion. Sometimes it may be a !vote. A bureaucrat must determine consensus of this RFA. How? Only they truely know the secret formula. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 03:46, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
5. Question from Centrx: What is the purpose of a Wikipedia user page?
A: Well, according to WP:USER, Your userpage is for anything that is compatible with the Wikipedia project. It is basically a little of your space. You can put what articles you've written, some userboxes that state your biasses to inform other editors of, babel to inform other users what language you speak, user categories which are intended to help Wikipedians with similar broad interests to congregate and converse. Some user's put a short bio on their userpage, because most wikipedian's are not-notable. A userpage can basically be used for anything that doesn't violate policies or guidelines (especially WP:USER, but excluding WP:NPOV). So no advertising, no fair use galleries, no attack pages. Some users do overuse userboxes (and I have seen them when migrating userboxes). If there is something wrong with someones userpage (in the opinion of someone), then the best thing to do is to talk to the user about it, and point them in the right direction. The overall point? I know the point of mine is to inform about articles, and biasses.
6. Question from Centrx: What is the reason behind why one should assume good faith on Wikipedia, other than smoothing relations? What evidence is necessary before one no longer needs to continue to assume that an established user is acting in good faith?
A: The answer is WP:BITE really to start. We are to assume that some people have a little "fun" (if you can call it that), but we're sure that they will go straight, and begin to become a good editor. We must AGF for many reasons, many of them brought up on the mailing list, well, today I believe. There was a question about a Star Trek episode being used as a source. Then of corse mayhem ensued and there was a question of whether it was verifiable. If we AGF, then we realize that they have checked their facts and we leave it be. If we don't, then someone who is perinoid would spend their whole real life™ checking every reference on wikipedia to see if it's correct. Of corse anyone is free to do that, but there simply isn't enough time to do that. Of corse, if you assume good faith, then you believe that everything's done in the best interest of the project. If you don't, then you spend your probably-short-wiki-career fighting with everyone, makeing personal attacks, legal threats, ect. It's a mind set really. If you go in with a AGF mindset, then you'll try to see everything from that angle. If you don't, then you might not get the idea of a wiki.
An established user deserves good faith. An established user is usually someone that has been here at least a month at least, and probably know's (many-most) policies. If a good faith user breaks down and starts to vandalize, or just do anything that is counter to the project, then good faith is lost, and is usually followed by ArbCom, or at least a RFC.
7. Question from Centrx: What is policy on Wikipedia and how is it formed?
A: A policy is something that everyone on wiki must follow (excpet when WP:IARing). A policy is universal law on wikipedia, and many of them are WMF based, like WP:NPOV, and the everyone-can-edit edict. According to WP:POLICY, they are started in one of three ways. Either by making a policy for something that's already generally accepted, and has been for a while (I can't think of one at the moment), by declaration from godJimbo, the WMF, or the Devs (server related things), or by the magical thing we call consensus. Hypothetically, if we did not have WP:NPA at this moment, we could write it down, advertise it at the villiage pump, and everyone could say "Yes, that's how we do things already", and we could call that policy because it's basically writting down the status quo.
8. Could you please comment on your 2718 userspace edits? - crz crztalk 03:37, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
A: WP:TGS (as I remember it) mostly. User:Royalguard11/Status, because it took me a while to get the right table for it (and of corse I only use it half the time now). My monobook.js I have changed quite a bit, because I like to change it a lot. A bit was labelling socks of the Quebec Vandal (there's 51 of them). Some vandalism reverting. I used to update my userpage a lot when I used to patroll Special:Crossnamespacelinks so I would update where I had checked (because I couldn't remember). But it's mostly WP:UBM (as it is now) related things, bypassing redirects that I did with every box I adopted (without using AWB). I'm one of the more heavily involved users.
9. Question from Voice of All: You said you would help at WP:RFPP, but that area usually seems to be under control. I find that I can do other things and it rarely builds a backlog in my absence. WP:PP is another matter, I seem to be the only one that does much there consistantly. Would you be willing to help out there?Voice-of-All 20:32, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
A: As I understand from the page, and from your admin log, the "patrol" of that page appears to be making sure that pages aren't being protected for too long, and hoping that unprotecting will improve the articles. Now, unless I'm in left field there, then I'm sure I can pitch in and help out with that. It isn't very wise in wikipedia to have pages protected from editing for too long. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 20:47, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
10. Question from Kingjeff: What is your opinion of permently semi-protecting pages that are high-risk for vandalism? Kingjeff 21:06, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
A: As I said in my answer above, it isn't wise to have pages protected for too long. That being said though, there are some pages that recieve a lot of IP/newuser vandalism, George W. Bush being one of them. If it is getting to a point that there hasn't been any constructive eding from IP's or new users over a long period of time (say, two-three months at least), then it may be smarter to save good faith editors the trouble of having to revert vandalism perpetually, and getting edit conflicted while trying to make good edits because of vandalism, and semi protect the article for an indeterminate amount of time. Of corse, eventually everyone will forget about Bush and it will be unprotected sometime in the distant future. I would say though that as a new admin, I wouldn't be indefinitely sprotecting articles without getting a second opinion from another more experienced admin. But, then again protection time isn't specified, and may be undone by any admin at any time (without wheel-warring of corse). -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 21:29, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
General comments

Discussion

Support

  1. Nominator support you didn't beat me :P Martinp23 22:27, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
  2. Support I almost beat you here. Basically per nom this user is a great example of what an admin should be. — Seadog 22:32, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
  3. Support Why aren't you an Admin yet? Sharkface217 22:34, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
  4. Support TSO1D 22:37, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
  5. Support I know this has gotten really old but: You're not an admin?? –The Great Llamamoo? 22:47, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
  6. Strong Support 100% certainty he'll be an enormous asset to the team Glen 23:09, December 9, 2006 (UTC)
  7. Support Looks like a good candidate for the mop and bucket. (aeropagitica) 23:48, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
  8. Support a good candidate --Steve (Slf67) talk 23:58, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
  9. Strong support. Wow, why didn't tell me about this? A great user and also a great colleague to work with in AMA. --Neigel von Teighen 00:26, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  10. Strong support. Of course. --SonicChao talk 00:37, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  11. Support. Without a doubt, admin worthy. AuburnPilottalk 00:46, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  12. Support per above and dealings with at the AMA. Addhoc 00:53, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  13. Support John254 03:06, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  14. Support. A thoughtful editor who can work effectively with those from diverse perspectives. Rfrisbietalk 04:41, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  15. Support Shows promise of being an admin more interested in process than in agenda-pushing. The project can always use more than that, because process is important. One mild disagreement: I don't agree with the answer given to #4 above. Making a Nazi hide that fact doesn't (to my mind) improve the project. I'd rather know who I'm dealing with. --Ssbohio 05:21, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  16. Support. A good editor Brian | (Talk) 05:29, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  17. Strong Support - crz crztalk 05:31, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  18. Support seems good to me, should use the tools well. James086Talk | Contribs 05:55, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  19. Support. Glad to give the tools to this outstanding vandal fighter. One minor concern that I have, though, is the number of spelling errors in his contributions to this RfA. An administrator who is also a native English speaker should take care to always spell his contributions correctly, in order to be both well understood and taken seriously. Sandstein 07:10, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  20. Support seems like a great candidate, definitely worthy of the tools. Hagerman(talk) 07:12, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  21. Support I'm confident that user will make a great admin. He has answered all answers very well, impressive. Good luck! ← ANAS Talk? 12:32, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  22. Support Good number of edits and time. Good quality edits. AMA mediator. God answers. Cheers, :) Dlohcierekim 13:23, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  23. Support A good contributor and editor. Friendly, levelheaded and hardworking. CharonX/talk 15:06, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  24. Support I thought he already was an admin, to be honest. CameoAppearance orate 17:26, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  25. Support. Great user, will make fine admin. Nishkid64 18:30, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  26. Support. No reason to oppose and with Martin nominating, I have confidence in the candidate. Kind Regards - Heligoland | Talk | Contribs 19:22, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  27. Support Tyson Moore es 19:39, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  28. Support Looks like a good editor who will make a good admin.-- danntm T C 20:26, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  29. Support No problems here. teh tennisman 21:15, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  30. Suport Congratulations. м info 01:08, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  31. Support What a great asset to Wikipedia! Katalaveno 03:04, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  32. Yes. Daniel.Bryant [ T · C ] 09:30, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  33. Support, per nom. --Carioca 14:24, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  34. Wikipedia can always use another guard. (Radiant) 17:43, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  35. Support per nomination. --Siva1979Talk to me 18:23, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  36. Support. Your work at the AMA is great, I am sure you will make a fantastic admin! Wikiwoohoo 19:55, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  37. Strong Support Hurry up, get the mop, get back to work, and start AD-MIN-ING :) — Deon555talkdesk 22:48, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  38. YA RLY. Admin tools would probably benefit your AMA-ness. --Deskana talk 23:43, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  39. Support Unlikely to abuse admin powers.--TBCΦtalk? 02:20, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
  40. Support per all of the above. Alex43223 Talk | Contribs | E-mail 03:08, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
  41. Support. G.He 04:29, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
  42. Support Responsible, friendly and dedicated. Mop him boys. Dfrg.msc 1 . 2 . Editor Review 04:48, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
  43. Support Per all above. Mirror, Mirror, on the wall... 04:12, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
  44. I'm Mailer Diablo and I approve this message! - 05:59, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
  45. Support. Zaxem 06:41, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
  46. Support Terence Ong 08:16, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
  47. Support Just H 23:21, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
  48. Support. Mainly due to moral opposition to Centrx's badgering of the candidate. RyanGerbil10(Упражнение В!) 08:30, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
  49. Support, per Interiot's tool a lot of edits in such a short time (most edits in the last 6 months! Booksworm Talk to me! 15:08, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
  50. Support Trustworthy editor. Xoloz 16:14, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
  51. Support: A good editor who will use the mop wisely. s d 3 1 4 1 5 final exams! 01:37, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  52. Support nothing more to add --Agεθ020 (ΔT • ФC) 02:42, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  53. Support Sarah Ewart 06:03, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  54. Support. Mostly based on handling of Centrx. --StuffOfInterest 14:18, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  55. Support. Looks like a stong candidate. And if you can handle that grilling from Centrx, you can handle anything.- WJBscribe (WJB talk) 19:43, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  56. Support very strong understanding of policy and will use the tools just fine.¤~Persian Poet Gal (talk) 20:55, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  57. Support Looks ok. - Yaf 21:29, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  58. Looks good, I don't find the opposition very compelling here. Christopher Parham (talk) 03:43, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Oppose

  1. I asked the questions above in relation to this assumption of bad faith and the user thinking that this userbox is appropriate for Wikipedia, but the answers to the questions above about AGF and policy formation are weak, many automated edits, and most of these AfDs are empty votes added at the end of a long list of deletes (e.g.: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5]). The answer to one question is simply a resort to a generic "oh, it must decided by consensus", but the answer to what "consensus" is I don't see that this user understands that consensus must comes from reference to the principles and policy of the encyclopedia. It is not a poll and it has nothing to do with political parties or a "secret formula". —Centrx→talk • 20:23, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
    • You know how to hold a grudge, Centrx. Though regarding to the userbox incident above, you - yet again - are twisting the facts. You, for example, failed to mention that this box was only one among a large number of userboxes you speedy-deleted from userspace. An action that was overturned with a great majority - dare I say consensus - of editors. Still, I believe everybody is entiteled to his own opinion, though I choose not to share yours. CharonX/talk 23:03, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
      • No, my opposition is based on the answers to the questions, which, in addition to not showing improvement about the specific issues that prompted them, show a lack of or weak understanding of policy that I was actually surprised at. I could simply have opposed initially with a few diffs if I were "holding a grudge", but I asked these questions and the result was unexpectedly weak responses. Also, I don't think any user who uses Wikipedia as a site for partisanship, especially of the emotive glowing userbox kind, should be an administrator. This was one of several user boxes which are absolutely inappropriate, which the user wished to be undeleted en masse either without consideration of the matter or as a part of some general principle that favors political advocacy on Wikipedia. There are communist ones, fascist ones, death penalty expansion ones—and a small minority of relatively innocuous political parties which are still inappropriate to building an encyclopedia. The deletion review was advertised at the user box migration project, and no where else, which is one of the major problems with polling. —Centrx→talk • 04:05, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
      • If you really want me to explain the comment, I will. Two-stepping is a political term, refering to when politicians are asked questions, which they ignore and instead give an answer that better fits with their party line/propaganda. The current Harper/Canadian government is excellent at it, for when they were asked an uncomforable question, they would ramble on about their five pillars, or accountability, or how everything was the fault of the previous government. T1 doesn't apply to userspace is pretty self explanitory. Supporting a political party is not a)a crime or b)a speedy deletion criterion is also self explanitory. Then I mentioned ANI, where admins did not even comment on the situation, and the only comment was a crytpic "It is regretful Centrx did not link to the pertinent discussion in his deletion edit summary." from El C. As for consensus, there are a hundred different factors that could be taken into account in every different situation. There is not one end-all-be-all definition. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 23:33, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
        • I know what the cliche is. The issue is assuming that I was purposefully ignoring your questions, when to my mind I directly answered them. AGF has nothing whatsoever to do with verifiability—we must not assume that everything cited is accurate and inaccurate interpretations of sources come from good-faith users—and it does not stem from biting newcomers. You simply have no idea whether I "ignored" your questions, and it should certainly have been clear to you that I did not ignore "every single question". —Centrx→talk • 04:05, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
        • Err, ok. I didn't see that box before, and it's pretty closely identified with Nazism. As I said on the DRV, it's hard to tell sometimes from just titles for us that can't see deleted material. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 03:30, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
  2. Oppose, although not for (all of) the same reasons as Centrx. Weak answers to questions are a real concern for me, and I have a hard time understanding why so much of this user's edits are to userspace (yes, I know Userbox Migration is a lot of them, but that leaves you with under 6000 other edits in six months. I expect this will pass regardless, but I hope this user will take to heart some of the criticism leveled here and proceed carefully and neutrally, rather than becoming a partisan admin, of which we have had plenty in the past. -- nae'blis 19:03, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Neutral

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.