Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 23

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Older talk

Archive 1: June-August 2003
Archive 2: August-December 2003
Archive 3: Discussion in December 2003 about time people should wait before making request and a note
Archive 4: Some January 2004 discussion
Archive 5: Discussion on January 8, 2004 about distributing the task of making other admins
Archive 6: (Greenmountainboy's claim about being attacked on this page (January 8-9, 2004))
Archive 7: Complaint against tannin (January 24-25, 2004)
Archive 8: Abuse of de-sysop area (January 30-31, 2004)
Archive 9: Discussion on January 31, 2004 about how to deal with misuse of admin privileges
Archive 10: Recent discussion archived in advance (February 2004)
Archive 11: Policy on Anons and this page (February 9, 2004)
Archive 12: Discussion on 19-25 February, 2004 about who can vote and how bureaucrats should be appointed
Archive 13: Discussion of what consensus is needed for a request (February-March 2004)
Archive 14: Polls on making all admins bureaucrats, and on possible minimum requirements for adminship (February-March 2004)
Archive 15: Discussion of nominators, self-nominations, and nominating procedures (March 2004)
Archive 16: Possible minimum requirements for voting, discussion and poll about bureaucrats exercising individual judgment in determining consensus (March-April 2004)
Archive 17: TOC tallies, relative merits of a firm 80% threshold compared to "bureaucrat" judgement, creeping upwards of requirements for support of adminship, possible periodic renewal of adminship, issues regarding specific nominations (March 4-May 20 2004. No discussion May 20-June 1)
Archive 18: Questions about adminship, Lst27, JediMaster16, this page needs an image...
Archive 19: Discussion and poll about early removal of nominations, possible timelags between re-nominations (July 2004)
Archive 20: Sockpuppets and qualifications for voting (August 2004)
Archive 21: Edit counting, subpages, boilerplate questions and more (September 2004)
Archive 22: Promotions to bureaucrat (October 2004)

Standards for adminship (too low?)

I'm new to the process of voting for adminship. I actually just noticed that any user can vote. I thought it was only users who were already admins who could vote on a nomination. After going through the process myself (for a few days) I would like to help decide who becomes an admin, but the process/idea seems to be flawed in my mind.

In my time on Wikipedia, I have seen some very heated debate on talk pages, VfD and the mailing list. Some of the debate really didn't come off as very responsible or friendly and I came to notice that some of the people engaging in these debates were admins. It may have started out with adminship being "no big deal", but that's not how I am viewing it.

Admins are supposed to be considered the trusted faces of Wikipedia and yet I have seen banning wars between admins numerous times. Admins ban their enemies and unban their friends. As a common user, I have to say that this does not reflect well on the community as a whole. Even if adminship should be no big deal, new users see admin and think "power" or "leadership". From some of the arguments I have seen, it seems like some users should have their adminship revoked and yet this does not happen.

I am not trying to change the process. If that's how the community wants it, that's fine, but that wouldn't be how I want it. I have seen some users answer nominations by saying that the user does not meet their standards (and they have user sub-pages that state their standards). I am trying to form my own standards now and I would like to hear what other users who frequent this area have to say on the matter of admins not living up to the higher standards it appears they should be held to.

I am trying to play more of a role in the community rather than just working on my WikiProject. I have joined the Association of Members' Advocates and now watch other community based pages, but I would like to contibute my input here as well, so any explanations would be helpful.

Skyler 02:27, Oct 18, 2004 (UTC)

Personally, I think it would help if administrators were given a less authoritative name, such as custodians. Part of the problem is that the title (when it appears such as in "An administrator has banned you with this message: 'you suck'") conveys an authority that really shouldn't be assigned liberally. I don't agree with raising standards for access to this particular suite of features however (indeed, lowering them might be wise), as we need more counterbalance and accessibility to the system, not less. Very Verily 01:15, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I refer you to Wikipedia:Administrators, specifically:

Current Wikipedia policy is to grant [Admin] access liberally to anyone who has been an active Wikipedia contributor for a while and is generally a known and trusted member of the community.

and:

"This should be no big deal," as Jimbo has said.

If anything, adminship standards are too high. {Ανάριον } 07:32, 18 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Admins ban their enemies and unban their friends

I haven't seen much of this going on at all. But if you have then the way to deal with it is to start a rfc on the admin in question, not to make it more difficult to become an admin.

it seems like some users should have their adminship revoked and yet this does not happen.

The reason it doesn't happen is that most ordinary wikipedians are not prepared to speak up against admin bad behaviour. What needs to happen is for more ordinary people to become active in reviewing admin actions and be prepaired to do something about misdeeds.We have an AC which has the power to deadmin. More people should use it. Again though, making it harder for people to become admins in the first place will not solve this problem. Theresa Knott (The torn steak) 07:48, 18 Oct 2004 (UTC)

No one speaks up because it will gain you enemies and accomplish nothing. Only if one offends a bigwig will one's admin status be in any danger. Very Verily 01:18, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Personally I haven't seen a lot of problems, but I can assure you that making it harder to add new admins would make the situation you describe worse. Raising the standards widens the gap between admins and other users, making for a more stratified community. Isomorphic 14:46, 18 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Anarion, Theresa Knott, and Isomorphic. Additionally, it's interesting that you thought that only admins could vote for other admins - what would happen if only current U.S. Senators could vote for new Senators? Talk about a Cabal....

If anything, I believe that people like blankfaze, Netoholic, and others are making admin access into a bigger deal with their standards, and others are politicizing adminship and bureaucratship by voting against people because of their not Wiki-related opinions - for example, for being anti-American, as in Grunt's bureaucratship. Andre (talk) 21:16, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)

Or they could be just trying to make Wikipedia a better place by making sure that admins really are experienced users with the proper experience to know the full range of tools Wikipedia puts at users' disposal and to understand the full set of Wikipedia policies, and the proper judgment to handle disputes. Think about it this way: how long was it before the first real, real dispute you got into at Wikipedia and found out whether you were really prepared to handle it? How many edits was it before you really, really stopped discovering new tricks in editing? When I was a new to Wikipedia, I really appreciated the fact that the admins truly were extremely knowledgeable and nearly all very fair people, good at handling disputes. I'm less sure that's as true nowadays. —Lowellian (talk)[[]] 23:51, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)

Making adminship harder would discourage people from fighting vandalism, confronting unconstructive editors, and other actions that are necessary for the proper operation of Wikipedia but could gain you some enemies. Gadykozma 00:05, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I'm strongly in favor of the defined policy for administration, and find in general "personal standards" for adminship to be a violation of policy. I for one will never vote against anyone with a reasonable amount of credibility and no specific negative criteria against them, and have found the standard have increased enormously over time, which kind of upsets me. Sarge Baldy 00:30, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

There is no rule saying that everyone must use the same criteria. Wikipedia policy is not set from above, it is constructed from the individual opinions and actions of editors. I agree with you that many people use standards that are unnecessarilly high, but some disagree and that is their right. Isomorphic 22:12, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Help please

I nominated a user (my first) and things seem less than perfect. Some advice, assitance please? User:Dbachmann is the one I am refering to. Sam [Spade] 16:02, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Better now? Lupo 16:08, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Not for me, the "vote here" still looks crazy in my browser. Sam [Spade] 16:16, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia :A Great Fun Place to Grow and Contribute

When people , especially sysops, stray from these, problems occur.

These are only suggestion and proposals.I am not asking that they actually be implemented. I 'm just stating or repeating the o-b-v-i-o-us ...

To present and future administrators please,
1) FUN & GROWTH.
Please focus on making wikipedia a fun great place to grow and contribute. Please don't be abrasive, sarcastic, impolite. If people get pissed off, they won't say why, they just totally loose interest and leave.

2) 3 Cheers for the Policeman!
I agree with Gadykozma.Fighting vandalism and protecting copyrights are a must. Cheers to the unsung heroes! Policemen get misinterpreted. But...
Don 't overdo copyright violation checking don't expect innocent contributers to be happy about being misconstrured. Sincere policemen admins are needed. Authoritive , Wrath Of Khan types NOT.

With some wannabees, you can almost feel abuse fo adminstrative powers or disasters about to happen.

3) Keep the engine running!
Other administrator stuff to keep the wikipedia engine running.--Jondel 04:19, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Standards page

Please consider expressing your views at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Standards, a page I've just created for users to set out their views. —Lowellian (talk)[[]] 02:38, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

Admin suggestions

I offer this list as a possible source of inspriation for nominations (posted by User:UninvitedCompany).

Please be aware that these represent old and active users. You should take the same care in nominating and voting for these as for any other potential administrator. Some of these have been nominated in the past but the nominations failed.

This is not an A-List for nomination. Feel free to nominate (or not) whoever you want for adminship. (Posted by User:Cecropia)

 mysql> select * from tenure where months_active > 11 and
 total_edits > 4000 and admin = 'N' and yyyymm_last = 200410;
 +-----------------+--------------+-------------+---------------+-------------+-------+
 | user_text       | yyyymm_first | yyyymm_last | months_active | total_edits | admin |
 +-----------------+--------------+-------------+---------------+-------------+-------+
 | Andre Engels #  |       200103 |      200410 |            38 |       16425 | N     |
 | RK              |       200110 |      200410 |            35 |        7584 | N     |
 | Derek Ross   *  |       200111 |      200410 |            35 |        7514 | N     |
 | Ortolan88    *  |       200111 |      200410 |            16 |        6669 | N     |
 | Jeronimo     *  |       200201 |      200410 |            32 |        7175 | N     |
 | Gsl          #  |       200203 |      200410 |            12 |        4771 | N     |
 | Maury Markowitz*|       200205 |      200410 |            30 |        5342 | N     |
 | Daniel C. Boyer |       200206 |      200410 |            29 |        4507 | N     |
 | KF            * |       200208 |      200410 |            27 |        6863 | N     |
 | Ericd           |       200209 |      200410 |            23 |        5447 | N     |
 | Frecklefoot  #  |       200209 |      200410 |            26 |        8102 | N     |
 | Kchishol1970    |       200210 |      200410 |            25 |        4308 | N     |
 | Liftarn      #  |       200211 |      200410 |            22 |        4016 | N     |
 | IZAK            |       200212 |      200410 |            15 |        9724 | N     |
 | TakuyaMurata #  |       200212 |      200410 |            18 |       14097 | N     |
 | Wapcaplet    *  |       200212 |      200410 |            23 |        5981 | N     |
 | Arpingstone     |       200301 |      200410 |            22 |        6846 | N     |
 | Karada       *  |       200301 |      200410 |            22 |        6797 | N     |
 | Ruhrjung        |       200304 |      200410 |            17 |        4396 | N     |
 | BRG          *  |       200305 |      200410 |            18 |        5130 | N     |
 | Lee M           |       200305 |      200410 |            18 |        7144 | N     |
 | Mulad           |       200305 |      200410 |            13 |        4069 | N     |
 | Mydogategodshat |       200305 |      200410 |            18 |        4621 | N     |
 | Hyacinth     *  |       200307 |      200410 |            16 |       10185 | N     |
 | Zoicon5      *  |       200307 |      200410 |            16 |        8457 | N     |
 | VeryVerily      |       200308 |      200410 |            15 |        7383 | N     |
 | Wernher         |       200308 |      200410 |            15 |        6628 | N     |
 | Adam Carr       |       200309 |      200410 |            14 |       10562 | N     |
 | Timc         *  |       200309 |      200410 |            14 |        4026 | N     |
 | Wetman       #  |       200309 |      200410 |            14 |        8624 | N     |
 | Robbot      %   |       200310 |      200410 |            13 |       13158 | N     |
 | LGagnon      *  |       200311 |      200410 |            12 |        5261 | N     |
 | Sam Spade       |       200311 |      200410 |            12 |       11413 | N     |
 +-----------------+--------------+-------------+---------------+-------------+-------+
 3433 rows in set (0.00 sec)
 
 mysql> quit

I have added a * for users recently nominated, a # for users who have declined nomination, and a % for bots.

This is very amusing. Can somebody please take my name out of this table? Suggestion (specially for UC or whatever the name): Instead of nomination frenzy, what about joining Danny's Contest? muriel@pt 09:30, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Your name is in the list with a decline symbol - that way nobody will think you're an admin candidate and nominate you. Andre (talk) 15:58, Nov 17, 2004 (UTC)

Then take her off the list as she has requested. Since this is a list of "possible source of inspriation" that she does not want to be on. - Taxman 17:17, Nov 17, 2004 (UTC)

Erm - is there any reason why you or Muriel couldn't be bold and do it yourself? I've commented it out, but its still in the source, in case anyone is interested. -- ALoan (Talk) 17:33, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Believe me i tried but the result was a total mess with the table format. I wonder what made uc and Co. think that i wanted to be an admin again... muriel@pt 10:06, 18 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Slow Down!!!

Why is there this sudden flurry of activity on RfA? It seems a little silly. Contrary to popular believe, adminship is a big deal. There shouldn't be so many names put forward at once. No more than 4, I should think. People need time to evaluate each candidate. This flooding of the page just makes things too hard to manage. Is there a shortage of admins that I don't know about??? func(talk) 20:00, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The more responsible and skilled admins we have, the better. Andre (talk) 20:02, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

And we need to vote on all of them this week, do we? func(talk) 20:14, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The reason for the flurry of activity, such as it is, is that I completed Wikipedia:Another list of Wikipedians in order of arrival some days ago and upon reading through it, saw several users who I felt were long overdue for adminship. Had I realized previously that Hyacinth, or Karada, or any of the others were not admins I would have nominated them long ago. The nominations are hardly a flood. I cannot speak for the others, but each of mine was done with individual care and consideration. uc 20:31, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Adminship moratorium

Is this an official policy of any kind? I think it's a bad idea and would to like to nominate someone anyway, but I'd like to know if I'd be violating policy by nominating someone during this moratorium. Andre (talk) 20:00, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

There is no set policy, except in violation of the ability of editors to give due consideration to each nomination (many take this very seriously) when there are so many at once. This is the most nomination we've had at once, and they're continuing to pile on. As PedanticallySpeaking mentioned on my talk page, there is no harm to any individual nominee in waiting a week or so. I am posting a poll below on this matter. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 20:06, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Poll on Moratorium

As reference to the above two subjects, please indicate a preference as to whether we should limit the number nominations running at the same time, in order to give voting Wikipedians an opportunity to give as much consideration to each nomination as they feel appropriate. We run from almost zero candacies to now more than a dosen. This is not an attempt to limit adminships, just to stretch them out so each gets the attention it deserves, and isn't simply a popularity contest. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 20:15, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

No limit to outstanding nominations

Andre (talk) 20:19, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)
One does not have to vote on all candidates. If you don't know a candidate and you don't have time to research his/her editing history, that's all right—someone else will surely point out if there is anything exceptionally good or terrible with the candidate. After all, there are plenty of people watching RfA daily.—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 20:25, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)
—No-One Jones ^(m) 20:31, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC) I'll note that UninvitedCompany is responsible for most (6/16) of the current flood, and that all of his nominations were of excellent users who have somehow been overlooked. Since all of these are slam-dunk obvious cases (all are currently unanimous in favor of the candidates), I don't see any harm in having so many active at the same time. Now, if there were sixteen highly contentious nominations up at once, we might consider a moratorium just to prevent this page turning into another unreadable leviathan like VFD.
uc 20:37, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC) (I modified the language of this choice slightly after the 3 votes above were made)
I agree with Ezhiki's comment and have no concerns regardless of who is doing the nominating. Instead of trying to vote on every candidate and casting uninformed votes that piggyback on previous voters, you can just look through the table of contents for names you recognize, go vote for or against those, and be done with it. --Michael Snow 21:19, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Do you think it's not useful for voters to examine users they don't know. Such voters would be more impartial than one's friends and enemies, no? -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 21:31, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Given the ever-higher-creeping standards people are expecting of admin candidates, it becomes increasingly impossible to do a thorough investigation of a candidate if you've never heard of them before. And I think we already have plenty of people voting who are not particularly friends or enemies (let's not encourage "you're either with me or you're against me" factionalist attitudes), but take an impartial approach because they focus on what is best for Wikipedia. --Michael Snow 21:53, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I don't see the problem here. Sam [Spade] 22:05, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
More admins = good. Isomorphic 22:16, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Just another new rule. Not necessary. --jpgordon{gab} 22:42, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
A rule to solve a non-problem. If you don't have time to consider a candidate, don't vote, I'm sure there will be plenty of people who will. Shane King 23:38, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)
Neutrality (hopefully!) 00:53, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
I really don't see what the fuss is about. Wile E. Heresiarch 01:32, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I don't see a problem in need of fixing. Tuf-Kat 02:17, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
Nor do I. Filiocht 16:14, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
Many of the others above make excellent points. - RedWordSmith 17:59, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
Snowspinner 18:26, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
Michael says it well -- we're getting too convinced that Wikipedia is made up of "friends" and "enemies". It's not. And I don't see a problem with high volume needing to be legislated (though I think it's probably wise to encourage editors to avoid piling on the nominations, I don't think it should be a rule). Jwrosenzweig 23:21, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Lst27 (talk) 23:41, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
No need to limit. Rick K 23:52, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
Becoming an admin is supposed to be no big deal, so it shouldn't require a lot of rules and regulations or agonizing over minutiae. I don't spend time carefully researching a user that I don't know; there are bound to be others who know these users without having to research them.So, it didn't take me long to dispose of the fourteen new candidates. I glanced at them, saw four names I recognized, and one that I had an opinion on. I voted on the one I had an opinion on. Dpbsmith (talk) 00:31, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Nothing we cant handle so far -- Chris 73 Talk 05:58, Nov 11, 2004 (UTC)
the rule would not scale with WP's exponential growth. if we feel we have too many admins, the required standards may be raised. And sooner or later we may need clearer guidelines on how to de-admin someone who abuses the position. If RFA were flooded with nominations, an ad-hoc remedy would be voting "oppose -- please try again after we have dealt with the pile already in progress". dab 16:05, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
-- Grun t ҈ 22:32, 2004 Nov 11 (UTC)
Unlike VFD the nomination page is frequented by good manored and polite representives of the community, and nominations are not coming in in any unmanagable numbers. I say keep the status quo. --BesigedB 23:40, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
no limit -- just don't vote if you can't do the research... just like any other edit. I'm not an admin, (wouldn't accept it right now, not enough time) and I'd like it if there were more people to handle the chores I don't want to do. we can always deadmin anyone who doesn't work out.Pedant 03:15, 2004 Nov 12 (UTC)
/Tuomas 11:02, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Right... no. ugen64 16:16, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Insert witty remark here... -Fennec (はさばくのきつね) 01:32, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Suspend when the outstanding nominations = 24

Added this choice for liberal nominators who still don't think everybody on Wikipedia should be nominated in the same week

Taxman 23:29, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

Suspend until the outstanding nominations < 12

ALoan (Talk) 12:23, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC) (even though I generally don't vote, I think the candidates need to be given due consideration)
Whosyourjudas (talk) 20:32, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC) - another week waiting to be nominated won't hurt anybody.

Suspend until the outstanding nominations < 8

Cecropia | explains it all ® 20:15, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
At least. func(talk) 20:22, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Schnee 21:00, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Voters and nominees alike deserve sufficient time for carefully considered votes to be cast on all cases. —Triskaideka 22:25, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Please. --Slowking Man 07:11, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
Gady 15:05, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Netoholic @ 16:14, 2004 Nov 10 (UTC) -- This roughly equates to one admin nomination per day. That seems like a good pace to keep. If we're going to say that adminship is still about 70-75%, then we need to even out the tempo of nominations so that each is weighed equally. I don't want someone squeaking by because they have a lot of friends or losing out because of a few enemies just because noone impartial had time to evaluate them objectively.
Eight is Enough. If it worked for Dick Van Patten, why not us? PedanticallySpeaking 16:47, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
Acegikmo1 00:09, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I have to agree with the thought that nominations have gotten out of hand. I have also heard my opinion expressed by others that, even though when originally started adminship was no big deal, I think it has become a sort of political position now. New contributors often look to admins for guidance. When everyone becomes an admin, it will be a meaningless role. I, personally, consider it to be an honor and while I think it should be capped at, say, 4 nominations at a time, I can live with 8. Skyler 1534 17:41, Nov 11, 2004 (UTC)
One a day sounds reasonable to me. Noisy | Talk 10:44, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Suspend until the outstanding nominations < 6

Other standard for moratorium

Comments

I'd like to make sure that I understand Andrevan's position with regard to No Limit to Standing Nominations. So, if there were, say, 100 current nominations, you would see this as no problem, correct? func(talk) 20:25, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Well, theoretically. I don't think that's going to happen, but we can address it if it does. But I think, say, 30 nominations at a time is fine. By which I mean, that's the highest I think it will realistically get to. Andre (talk) 20:36, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

There are over 190 editors with more than 3000 edits and well over 450 with over 1500 that are not now admins. I was considering nominating many of those that I know are responsible, so this poll is timely. So yes we need to consider a limit. But also I don't think every editor needs to vote on every candidate and we do need to make room for a lot more admin noms. There are simply more good admin candidates than their used to be. - Taxman 23:18, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

Yes, but there are reasons that most of them aren't admins. The top six non-admins are bots. Wik left. Robbot is a bot. Bobblewik is somewhat controversial. And so on.... ugen64 16:19, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)

You say most, and I don't know the number, but I believe it is well less than a third of users with over 1500 edits are problem users. I had already removed all the bots, known (to me) problem users, and (known) no longer active wikipedians from the list I took the above numbers from. - Taxman 15:07, Nov 15, 2004 (UTC)

I took out the changed wording "hard and fast" in the "unlimited" option. If we're going to have a moratorium ever, we need some kind of standard. I think there are too many now, and I wanted to head off the "snowball" effect of "let's see if we can put up a record number of nominations." Valid nominations will be just as valid in a week or two and we'll have more time to give them proper considerations. If you don't feel there should be a numeric standard, please say what standard you would use. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 20:45, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I thought this was about numeric ones. Andre (talk) 20:53, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

That's why I posted an "Other Standard for Moratorium". -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 20:56, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

If a user meets some obvious standard by which they can be almost assured of promotion, let's do it. I would say anyone that's been here over one year and has over 5000 edits should be promoted unless they have been 1) Inactive (less than 250 edits in the last two months), or 2) had any major dispute problems. How about for the "slam-dunk, obvious" admin promotions, make the process simply this:
1. Create a list of all the users.
2. Contact them and ask if they would like to be an admin. If so, instruct them to leave a brief statement and their acceptance on the vote page.
3. Open that listing only to "oppose" votes.
4. If after one week, there are no significant objections, promote them.
-- Netoholic @ 20:57, 2004 Nov 9 (UTC)

Isn't that a proposal for a different promotion standard, rather than a moratorium srandard? -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 20:59, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Time and edits alone do not a good admin make. Andre (talk) 21:13, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

No thanks, this simply re-enforces the idea that adminship is a mathematical formula based on number of edits and time registered. It's supposed to be about whether wikipedia would be better off with that person as an admin. Shane King 01:24, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

Did either of you read it? I'm not proposing any "auto-promotion" or proposing a replacement for the present system, just a more stream-lined way to handle "obvious" promotion candidates by only cataloging "oppose" votes. Seems like something like this could easily handle Uninvited's list in the above section. At any time, if there is dispute with a candidate, they could be converted to a regular RFA vote process. -- Netoholic @ 01:31, 2004 Nov 10 (UTC)

My objection is that I don't believe a large number of edits makes anyone an "obvious" admin candidate. I also don't see how this streamlines the process: we still have to have the vote anyway (just if you support you don't have to edit the page), so why make two classes of users? Shane King 05:36, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

A significant problem of your suggestion is that these editors would be annointed with the rebuttable presumption of adminship. I am opposed to the formation of "A-Lists" for promotion. After meeting a generally accepted minimum requirement, all editors should have an equal opportunity to be vetted by the community without the mantel of a presumption of adminship, which relegates those not on the A-List to a second-class status.

A practical problem of soliciting "oppose" votes only is that the bureaucrats will not have a gauge of support (and arguments in favor) for that candidate that provide dimension to negatives assessments. So the bureaucrats must rely on subjective interpretations of the opposes, rather than determining community consensus, as now. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 07:45, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

You've both made very good arguments, and I've moved this whole thread down to the Comments section. -- Netoholic @ 16:10, 2004 Nov 10 (UTC)

There is already too much stress on number of edits which is a very poor judgement of an editor. This proposal will only make this worse. Gady 15:08, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

This whole thing strikes me as a example of a poll in search of a problem rather than a problem needing a poll to decide on a fix. Filiocht 16:16, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

The problem is that some of us take the adminship process very seriously, and we like to give each candidate careful consideration. I don't search for problems on Wikipedia, the problems with this project keep jumping up and smacking me in the face. func(talk) 16:35, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

As there is no consensus at all that moritoriums are appropriate or a good idea, and, in fact, very nearly consensus against moritoriums, I am removing the moritorium notice. Snowspinner 18:26, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

As this idea had had due consideration, I removed the large, prominent banner regarding it from the RFA page. I see that Cecropia, who clearly has rather strong feelings on this matter, has already reverted. I leave it to others now to decide how much longer it should remain. uc 17:08, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The general standard is a week. That is why I haven't moved the "de-admin" poll on the project page, which I will do today. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 17:22, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Requests for De-adminship due to inactivity

I've moved this from the project page as no consensus was reached. However, this should have been a straw poll (at most) from the beginning. We have no standards whatsoever for de-adminship (except maybe at RfC or RfAr) and there is no real way to determine when a consensus has been reached. I suppose we should have a structure for determine under exactly what circumstances adminship should be removed, but that's for another discussion.

I'll also note that, even if the vote on de-adminship were unanimous, we would still have to cite some policy to one of the Stewards (probably Angela) in order to have the de-admining accomplished. Bureaucrats are not empowered to de-admin. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 17:44, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)

As suggested below by Kim Bruning, if inactivity of admins is really thought to be a concern, I suggest that administrator status is automatically suspended as a technical matter after 3 months of inactivity as a protection against password guessing, i.e. admin status is removed temporarily (preferably in software, so no-one needs to deal with it manually) and reinstated immediately on request.

If suspension of admin status is not thought to be sufficient for longer-term inactivity then I suggest again what I suggested below: that admin status is removed permanently (meaning that a proper WP:RFA re-application would be necessary to be re-adminned) for admins who:

have been inactive for at least 12 months;
have not responded to a preliminary warning that has been on their user talk page for at least 1 month; and
do not request reinstatement within 3 months of being de-admined.

The idea would be to have sufficient warnings and safeguards that it would not be necessary to have a vote to de-admin someone on this basis. We would need a page, something like Wikipedia:Pending de-adminship to record who was where in the process. On the other hand, I'm not entirely sure what the problem is meant to be: this could be m:instruction creep ... -- ALoan (Talk) 18:02, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)

De-adminship of several inactive users who were never especially active (20/18/0)

After compiling Wikipedia:Another list of Wikipedians in order of arrival, I noted that there are several stale accounts with admin status. I list here those accounts that had been idle for a year or more, and that would not meet the minimum requirements for adminship if nominated today:

User:LC. About 1000 edits between 8/01 - 10/02.
User:Peter Winnberg. Fewer than 500 edits between 11/01 - 8/02 and a handful more through 1/03.
User:Mirwin. Fewer than 500 contributions 2/02-11/02 with about a dozen since then.
User:Khendon. About 700 contributions between 9/02 - 4/03 and another 50 or so through 12/03.
User:Sugarfish. Fewer than 1000 contributions between 7/03 - 11/03

I suggest that the accounts above be changed to ordinary user accounts. In the event any of these users return and wish to continue to serve as admins, I believe their requests should be handled on a case-by-case basis.

Vote Here

Support de-adminship

uc 17:36, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Support all requests unless any of the listed users expresses opposition to being de-admined. BLANKFAZE | (что??) 21:39, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Netoholic @ 21:53, 2004 Nov 4 (UTC) -- Provisionally. A message to this effect should be left on their talk pages for at least two weeks before removing access.
Adminship should not be for life Shane King 23:40, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)
Support. There's no reason adminship must last forever. Angela . 00:12, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)
Emsworth 00:21, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
[[User:Rdsmith4|User:Rdsmith4/sig]] 04:32, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Aha, the ideals of my proposed (and dismissed) policy come back for all to see... this is exactly the sort of action I think we need around here. -- Grun t ҈ 16:08, 2004 Nov 5 (UTC)
I don't see the lack of established policy as any kind of a problem here. Wile E. Heresiarch 17:32, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Support, comment below.--Bishonen 02:49, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Support. ugen64 20:01, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Whether we're following precedent or establishing it, support. --Michael Snow 06:51, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I'll support this bunch, but I want to see policy instances for the latter bunch. Andre (talk) 17:37, Nov 7, 2004 (UTC)
Noisy | Talk 22:39, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I posted a link to this vote on the de-nominated user talk pages Wolfman 01:45, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Support. Adminship should only be retained by active users. Jayjg 03:06, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Support in these cases. Several of these users should not have been given adminship under the standards we have for adminship, and that following their adminship they have not risen above those standards testifies to the inappropriateness of their adminship. Note, however, that I oppose de-adminship of admins who do meet standards, even if they haven't edited recently. —Lowellian (talk)[[]] 07:01, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)
David Cannon 10:13, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC). Strongly support. Sysophood should not be a sinecure or some kind of meaningless title of nobility. Users who have clearly been doing nothing for a long time should be assumed to have quit. BTW, I don't mean anything personal by this, but should the rule also apply to admins who have declared themselves to have quit the project? Secretlondon, for example, has a note on her user page, "I don't edit here any more. 22:02, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)." but is still listed as both an administrator and a bureaucrat (albeit as an inactive one). I think that not only she, but all admins in the same category, should be asked whether their withdrawal from the project is merely temporary. If so, they should be allowed to stay; otherwise, their admin/bureaucrat access should be cancelled. Just my two cents' worth.
SWAdair | Talk 09:32, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Support all except User:Khendon, who just edited, and User:Sugarfish, who had a few edits in the last year. Incidentally, why the hell was notice not posted on their talk pages? We inform sysop nominations, after all. One year seems like a resonable standard. Cool Hand Luke 00:56, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Oppose de-adminship

anthony 警告 17:56, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
silsor 21:16, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)
Chris 73 Talk 00:33, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC) I think this should be a separate vote for each of them. Also, could you provide us with a link to the policy? -- Chris 73 Talk 00:33, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

As noted in comments, there really is no policy on this since in the project's youth this wasn't a problem. If you wish to vote differently on some candidates, you may indicate that above in the candidate list. uc 14:46, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Since several people have brought this up, I suggest that you indicate your vote in the candidate list if you wish to vote for some but not others. uc 14:46, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Still Oppose deadminship for all, because i dislike the style of the mass de-adminship. If i (and others) would write between the above lines, the whole thing would become a awful mess and it would be very hard to sort out who voted for what. I may support or oppose deadminship for the candidates only if there is an individual vote for each one. Same goes for the second list below. I would like to point out that I am NOT opposed to de-adminship due to inactivity in general, even though the reasons (potential stolen passwords) don't make sense for me either. -- Chris 73 Talk 05:41, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)
Please list them separately. Until you do, I'll vote against the en gros de-adminification. -- Schnee 03:05, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

You may indicate your votes in the candidate list if you do not wish to vote for them en gros, as you put it. uc 14:46, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Agree with Schneelocke. --Lst27 (talk) 00:28, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Don't like wholesale de-adminship either. Dori | Talk 02:58, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)
Agree with Dori, also some sysops who left sometimes do return (I.E. Zoe)--Comrade Nick @)---^-- 03:37, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
There's no policy for deadminship other than by request or bad behaviour. Inactivity is neither of those. - Nunh-huh 07:03, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Oppose - if I were an admin and were in a coma for some time, I wouldn't want to wake up and find this. Granted, that'd be an unusual case. But besides, what good is this going to do? Do unto others... - RedWordSmith 18:24, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)
Sarge Baldy 02:07, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)
Oppose. PedanticallySpeaking 17:34, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)
Very strong oppose, see comments Kim Bruning 20:34, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Rmhermen 23:45, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC) We should make a policy first then I would probably support.
This is a solution without a problem. Convince me that these accounts are somehow harmful (and I don't consider the password-theft bit compelling) and then I might support. Isomorphic 15:17, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Oppose. What good would that do? Rules and policies change all the time. I don't see why we should apply today's version of this/that/any standard/policy/rule those who have served Wikipedia in the past and have not demonstrated any lack of compliance with the rules (and more importantly, the spirit) of this project. Prolonged inactivity is also not a good reason. Several of the best Wikipedians have taken extensive Wikivacations and I can't see why an admin should not be allowed to. Kosebamse 15:47, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Strongly oppose. Look, people sometimes wander off for a while because they need a break, or because of stress in their lives, or whatever. And it can be a long break, too - I was gone for the best part of a year. People were made admins (which is supposed to be "no big deal" anyway, right?) because they demonstrated judgement, and they aren't going to lose that just because they are gone for a while. From personal experience, yes, you have to be careful when re-appearing, because policy on some things will have changed subtly in the interim. If there is a security issue with inactive accounts, by all means lets find some way to deal with it. However, if it involves turning off the admin bit on the account after some period of inactivity, there ought to be some simple mechanistic way (e.g. contacting a bureacrat and asking) to get it turned back on. Noel (talk) 02:37, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I'd like to note that I'm no longer inactive. On a more general note, I don't understand the purpose of this. The only reason I've read, "security", doesn't make any sense - an active user is just as likely to have their password guessed, I'd have thought. I'm strongly opposed until somebody explains the benefit. --Khendon 17:08, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Oppose. We have no agreed policy for this, and I do not see simple inactivity as a cause for de-adminning. De-admin "for cause" by all means, but if a person was thought sensible enough to be made an admin in the first place (whether they meet the current criteria or not) simple inactivity is not justification for their removal. -- Arwel 01:29, 18 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Strongly Oppose. As on of those listed, I can vouch that there may be many very good reasons why an individual may have been on a 'virtual vacation'. Now that I am in a position to be active once more I would have been most upset to have ben de-adminified. sugarfish 08:47, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Comments

Is a user with a dozen edits since 4/03, including 7 from 10 to 15 Sept 2004, "inactive"?
- I'm not sure who you mean. Mirwin had 7 edits in September 2003, not September 2004, if that's who you're referring to. uc
  - Oh, mea culpa. -- ALoan (Talk) 21:44, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Shouldn't there be a separate vote on each one, rather than a slate? -- ALoan (Talk) 19:13, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
- I suppose so, if there are people who would vote differently for different users. But, I thought that most people would either support or oppose for all, since it's really an administrative matter rather than something related to each contributor, so I listed them as a group. uc 21:01, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Housekeeping isn't a bad thing, but do we have any kind of settled policy? For example, what constitutes consensus to de-admin? I think it would be better if we just had a firm up or down policy: i.e., no contributions for one year, or user formally left Wikipedia (i.e., "I'm leaving") and still gone after six months, just de-admin w/o vote. I don't know if those are the right time periods, but you get the idea. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 03:26, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
- Efforts to address this as a matter of policy have been divisive, in part due to a lack of examples. I think these cases in particular are clear-cut and hope we can reach a consensus on them. The best policymaking at Wikipedia has arisen from series of small decisions on specific cases made by consensus. uc 14:46, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
In any case, the de-nominator should sign his/her de-nominations. As for now I can only guess that the first support vote also nominated -- Chris 73 Talk 04:29, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)
- Done. uc 14:46, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Can we propose deadminning of active admins this way? I have a few in mind. anthony 警告 15:21, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
- You can propose anything you want. For de-admining people you don't like, your're supposed to list them at WP:RFC, and if you list them here instead the listings are likely to be moved there. There is a form for you to fill out, I believe. uc 15:58, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
  - Maybe this should be moved to RFC as well, considering there's no policy for it and considering that when someone proposed a policy for it it failed. anthony 警告 17:57, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I am a little surprised that policy is created on the hoof like this - surely it would have been a good idea to start a discussion in Wikipedia Talk:Requests for adminship and/or Village Pump. I vaguely remember an inconclusive discussion about the "inactivity" of some admins recently: was there any consultation about this "de-admin" procedure? (Please point me at it if there was: I don't remember any.) For example, to avoid frivolous or malicious sniping at active admins (see above; the presence of the RfC, etc, procedures are surely enough already), I would suggest that this procedure is only used for admins who:
1. have been inactive for at least 12 months;
2. have not responded to a preliminary warning on their user talk page for at least 1 month; and
3. do not request reinstatement within 3 months of being deadmined.

These are just examples of the sorts of policies and safeguards that I would expect to see. If such safeguards can be developed, I think we could dispense with the "de-admin" vote, but the policies they need to be developed in a proper, unhurried discussion, not alongside a vote like this.

I believe the RfC procedure can lead to "de-admin"ing as a disciplinary measure, and some admins have volntarily surrendered their admin status: are there any other ways to "de-admin" someone? -- ALoan (Talk) 16:02, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I agree with uc that we're more likely to get good policy from discussing specific cases and building consensus than from discussing in a void. It's important to get many people involved, and I think more of us feel comfortable contributing to an empirical format like this vote, and more of us have the time to do it. Take me, I'm probably not a singular example: I'm glad to vote here and write a modest comment, but I just don't have enough time to attempt philosophy in an abstract policy discussion. Not really the lungs for the rarified air of it, either. --Bishonen 02:49, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"Policy" on Wikipedia isn't some sort of legal code, it's just a set of traditions and practices. We should not avoid things just because there "isn't any policy" on it. Isomorphic 15:16, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

No: I accept entirely that we can create policy as we go along, mainly because policy is generally created to address a particular issue when that issue first occurs rather than deciding in abstract and in advance how things ought to be: however, I don't see why we can't discuss things before we start to do them - I suppose you would say that this is the discussion: well, fine; but it is nicer to discuss policy without a metaphorical gun pointing at your or someone else's head. -- ALoan (Talk) 15:42, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Adminship is when you've convinced folks you can be trusted with the broom and mop. These folks might not be around much anymore, but um, why wouldn't they be allowed to employ broom and mop whenever they are? :-/ Kim Bruning 20:34, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

If this is a measure to stop password guessing, I suggest we set it up so that anyone who has not been on wikipedia for a couple of months automatically looses the admin flag in software, as a technical measure to prevent such cracking. If/when he/she/it comes back they can re-request at any time from a bureaucrat. I'd certainly support such a measure, since it wouldn't be a big deal. That's not what's being voted on here at the moment, so my vote remains oppose. Kim Bruning 17:06, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Oh, I like this last suggestion much better. Can it be done? Do we need to vote on it? -- ALoan (Talk) 20:12, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Ditto. Automatic 'inactive' status (based on last login, not last edit), with immediate reinstatement on request... useful, NABD. +sj + 18:35, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Another request for de-adminship due to inactivity (8/15/3)

These two accounts have been dormant for over a year. It has been our policy to remove adminship from accounts that have been unused for a year or more, chiefly to protect against password guessing by vandals, and we should do so in these cases. If these users should return to Wikipedia in the coming year, it would be customary to restore adminship status upon request.

User:--_April. About 3000 contributions between 12/01-5/03 and under a dozen since then.
User:Scipius. About 2500 contributions betwee 2/02 - 6/03.

Vote Here

Support de-adminship

uc 17:36, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Support all requests unless any of the listed users expresses opposition to being de-admined. BLANKFAZE | (что??) 21:39, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Netoholic @ 21:54, 2004 Nov 4 (UTC) -- Provisionally. A message to this effect should be left on their talk pages for at least two weeks before removing access.
As above Shane King 23:43, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)
Support. There's no reason adminship must last forever. Angela . 00:12, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)
[[User:Rdsmith4|User:Rdsmith4/sig]] 04:34, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Agree with Netoholic, but with at least two warnings spaced two weeks apart with a further two weeks before deadminship. -- Grun t ҈ 16:09, 2004 Nov 5 (UTC)
Support, as above. Jayjg 03:10, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Oppose de-adminship

anthony 警告 17:56, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
silsor 21:16, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)
Chris 73 Talk 00:36, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC) I think every admin should have its own vote. Also I would like a link to the policy. Right now I don't know the policy, i.e. if one of them comes back and wants to be an admin. I may change to support in these two cases, but I don't like the current mass-deadminship at all. -- Chris 73 Talk 00:36, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)
As above, please list them separately. Until you do, I'll vote against the en gros de-adminification. -- Schnee 03:05, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Very Verily 12:01, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC) This is unprecedented, is it not? And the stated reason makes no sense to me - how are the two inactive accounts more vulnerable to password guessing than the three hundred active ones?

If someone were to guess, say, User:Angela's password, we would find out right away, because she would notice and draw attention to the imposter. Dormant accounts are susceptible because, if somebody were to guess a password for User:Scipius, for example, we would probably not be the wiser.

I'm not sure I agree. If a vandal took over one of those two accounts, we'd know almost right away, wouldn't we? And why would Angela (alas being picked on) notice before anyone else, unless she happened to be paging through her own contributions? Very Verily 01:32, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

So, umm, someone is going to steal the password for User:Scipius and then start using the account for non-suspicious admin activities? Sounds like a positive thing. anthony 警告 01:45, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Please list them separately, or I won't support. --Lst27 (talk) 00:29, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Dori | Talk 02:59, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)
[[User:Plato|Comrade Nick @)---^--]] 03:42, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
De-adminship of admins who wouldn't meet qualifications today is one thing. De-adminship of admins just because they haven't edited recently is another. Oppose deadminship of these admins who meet admin qualifications. —Lowellian (talk)[[]] 06:58, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)
There's no policy for deadminship other than by request or bad behaviour. Inactivity is neither of those. - Nunh-huh 07:04, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Sarge Baldy 02:07, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)
Oppose. PedanticallySpeaking 17:35, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)
Oppose for now, see above. Kim Bruning 20:49, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Strongly oppose. Look, people sometimes wander off for a while because they need a break, or because of stress in their lives, or whatever. And it can be a long break, too - I was gone for the best part of a year. People were made admins (which is supposed to be "no big deal" anyway, right?) because they demonstrated judgement, and they aren't going to lose that just because they are gone for a while. From personal experience, yes, you have to be careful when re-appearing, because policy on some things will have changed subtly in the interim. If there is a security issue with inactive accounts, by all means lets find some way to deal with it. However, if it involves turning off the admin bit on the account after some period of inactivity, there ought to be some simple mechanistic way (e.g. contacting a bureacrat and asking) to get it turned back on. Noel (talk) 02:41, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Oppose. I strongly disagree with the principle of de-adminning people without cause, and simple inactivity is not "for cause". I note that User:Jtdirl, one of our most valuable contributors, disappeared without warning for about 6 months earlier this year before returning. I notice that some of you seem to think that 2 weeks' notice on someones talk page is sufficient notice – I can only conclude you're all Americans with trivial amounts of vacation time -- in civilized parts of the world it's not unusual to be away from home for 2 or 3 weeks, and I would consider a calendar month to be the minimum reasonable notice time if any such de-adminning policy were to be adopted. -- Arwel 01:40, 18 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Split vote

Support de-adminship for Scipius. However, with an edit as recent as July of this year, even if it's only one, I'm not prepared to support the request as applied to April. --Michael Snow 06:54, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Agree with Michael Snow. Support de-adminship for Scipius, Oppose de-adminship for April. SWAdair | Talk 09:34, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Ditto above. [[User:Neutrality|Neutrality (hopefully!)]] 00:10, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

Comments

It has been our policy to remove adminship; it would be customary to restore adminship
- Are these policies and customs enunciated somewhere?
- Has anyone been de-admined for inactivity before?
- Has anyone been re-admined after being de-admined for inactivity?
User:--_April last made an edit in July 2004 - is that inactive? (to be fair, the previous one was in December 2003).
Shouldn't there be a separate vote on each one, rather than a slate? -- ALoan (Talk) 19:17, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
- I'd like to hear more about this policy, too, before I vote on this or the other Inactive one. Andre (talk) 20:39, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)
  - I believe that User:Eloquence handled this last time. I'll leave a note on his talk page. uc
As above, the de-nominator should sign his/her de-nominations. As for now I can only guess that the first support vote also nominated -- Chris 73 Talk 04:29, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

Ending times for RfAs/RfBs (Andrevan's nomination)

My bureaucratship nomination recently ended with a vote of 12/3/4, but not an hour after the nomination ended the tally was 15/3/4. First of all, I thought that this is exactly 80% support (neutral votes are abstentions, right? otherwise, they're not any different than oppose votes) - but disregarding that, with such a close vote that became not close really quickly after the time limit, what is to be gained by denying the request citing a lack of consensus? If consensus existed, why should it be held to a hard and fast time limit? Andre (talk) 02:20, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

Andre, I stated in my opposition why the consensus failed, and also cited and linked to the poll that expressed Wikipedian sentiment on the issue. Your nomination was up for the full seven days. In the last three days of the poll, you added just three positive votes, then you had a flurry of three positive votes immediately after the end of voting, at least two of which were apparently solicited.

When I saw the votes both weak and close, I looked at them in more depth. As I commented, several of the votes were doubtful. I commented out the Oppose vote of the one-vote apparent sockpuppet. Looking at the positive votes, three were from editors with under two months on Wikipedia, with fewer than 150, 100 and in one case, exactly 14 edits, 2 of which were a vote for you for admin and bureaucrat. One of the voter's user and talk pages are redirects to Pirate. This simply failed consensus. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 02:43, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Excuse me? That would be myself. My user and talk pages were redirect to Pirate. I am not a sock puppet; I have been on Wikipedia for months. My first contribution was nearly a year ago on 9 Jan 2004 and although I'm not a humongous contributor to Wikipedia, I like the project and have remained active and since then contributed 200 more edits and started several articles, some of which I am more or less happy or disappointed that they've fruited or not into good sources of information. Although I'd agree with you that more consensus really would be required, and that the application in question probably failed, I'm not happy that you're just arbitrarily discounting my vote in matters. I'm hardly a nobody, a sockpuppet, or anything, and the notion that the voice of some people is more important than that of others, I don't like. Especially when the voice that doesn't count is my own, of course! :-)

Actually the pirate redirect is something I was playing with, I was sort of testing redirects to get the hang of them I guess. Incidentally, glad you mentioned it, I removed the redirect for my talk page, though left it for my user page since I like whimsical things like that.

Again, I really do not appreciate that I be referred to as a second class Wikipedia.

And on an unrelated note, wasn't it usually policy to extend time if the vote if is close? But on that matter, that's just my two cents. D. G. 03:02, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I'm sorry if I insulted your sincerity--my point was that many Wikipedians take adminship seriously, and bureaucratship even more so, because, as here, a bureaucrat has to be ready to explain his/her reasoning. My point is that this nomination attracted little positive attention, especially among the more active parts of the community, and a good deal of doubt that didn't show up in, for a recent example, UCs nomination for bureaucrat. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 03:46, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Apology accepted, sorry if I came off brusquely, I just didn't like that I was badly characterised just for my user page, even if the redirect is silly. I'd agree with your points anyway, there really needs to be more real consensus on something like this. Still again--and this is a question, not an argument--wasn't it supposed to be that when it's close like this the vote is extended for a while more...? D. G. 09:38, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

This can get into a long rehash of discussions a year or so ago. Many of the veteran Wikipedians (more veteran than I) did not like the drift toward numerical qualifications for admin—even protesting against arranging the votes in "for", "against" and keeping running tallies. "Consensus" is supposed to determine, but we have had to imperfectly hash out what "consensus" means. Fast forward to (almost) the present and we had discussions on whether bureaucrats should use their discretion (overwhelmingly yes) and whether promotions for bureaucrat should be at a higher standard (firmly yes). So the simple achievement of a number, bolstered by a small number of votes, and enhanced by one's acquaintances, may make it for admin, but not bureaucrat. Bureaucrats are charged with deciding difficult cases and explaining them. There have been suggestions that maybe bureaucrats should only be proposed (and voted on?) by current admins. I didn't participate in that discussion and do not have a formed opinion on it. Maybe that discussion will be revived, I don't know. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 17:15, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Ok. First of all, I saw the poll, and the majority voted for an 80-85% cutoff for bureaucratship. None of the supporters were sockpuppets - you can have a developer check this if you don't believe me. The ones with low edit counts are friends of mine from outside of Wikipedia - but, again, are not sock puppets. Indeed, as you say, some votes were solicited, however they were not solicited to be positive; these were people who I worked with, some positively and some negatively, on Wikipedia. Unfortunately, I thought to ask them rather late in the nomination, so they arrived a tad late, and some didn't arrive at all. See my contribs and you can tell who I asked to vote.

Now, counting everything I said above, I either had 80% support (not counting the late votes) or 83% support (counting the late votes). Although I understand that the late votes were past the deadline, I think that they should be counted, since they were awfully close and theoretically I could renominate myself tomorrow - nothing will have changed, but I would get likely the same votes on both sides. It seems to me that discounting these votes is pointless and hyperlegalistic. However, regardless, it would appear that I had between 80-83% support, which should be enough, according to the Wikipedian poll you mentioned. Andre (talk) 02:53, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

Stop whining. Try again in a month or two. BLANKFAZE | (что??) 03:07, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

That trademarked Blankfaze hospitality. Very Verily 03:16, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

While I sympathise with your plight, I think that the vote falls within the borderline of cases where judgement is called for. You say yourself the standard is 80-85%, and even by the most favourable count, you got 83%, which still falls into the grey area zone. Maybe there is a case that the poll could have been extended for longer, but I can understand Cecropia's view that with the low level of interest it attracted, that wasn't worth the while. It's a tough borderline decision, but isn't that the reason we don't just auto promote based on numbers and have a human input into the situation? Shane King 03:14, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

If the standard is 80-85%, that is the range my count must be within. 83% is smack in the middle of that range. Andre (talk) 15:20, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

The standard is consensus, not simple numbers. In the polling numbers, the lower number represents the bare minimum that will ordinarily promote. The upper number is the number at which most Wikipedians feel comfortable with consensus.

As to the poll, a plurality (9 of 36 votes), not a majority wanted a standard of 80%-85%. A majority (19 of 36) wanted a standard of 85%-90% or even more restrictive with 8 looking for something approaching effective unanimity. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 03:42, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

7 users voted for 75-80%, 9 voted for for 80-85%, 5 voted for 85-90%, and 6 voted for 90-95%. 80-85% is the plurality, yes, but 75-85% beats 85-95% by 16-11. 8 users voted for a "different standard," most of them saying that any substantiated objections to the user's nature should disqualify the nomination entirely, which is not merely unanimity - it's something different than a percentage-based consensus determination. All objections to my nomination were along the lines of "we don't need any bureaucrats," so they wouldn't fall under this category, anyway.

At any rate, I don't care as much about winning this particular bureaucrat nomination as I do about understanding RfA consensus, specifically in this case, because I do intend to renominate myself later, perhaps as soon as next week. Andre (talk) 15:20, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

Which speaks volumes. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 20:34, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I'm not really sure what you mean by that, uc. Andre (talk) 20:57, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

I would guess that it reflects a degree of concern about this attempt to rules-lawyer your way into getting a borderline request granted. Many people have serious concerns about users who are obsessively attached to the idea of becoming an admin, and I'm sure the same would apply to bureaucratship. To rephrase what Blankfaze said, a little more politely, please let it go. If you don't, you jeopardize your chances of ever becoming a bureaucrat, not just in the next month or two. --Michael Snow 22:13, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Ok, I won't discuss it any further. I just want to establish that after the initial posting I was no longer trying to fight for this particular nomination, but rather understand what exactly occurred this time around, since if I am ever to be bureaucrat myself, this will be necessary. It had seemed to me that I won, and I was trying to understand how that translates into a loss. I'm going to put it down to Cecropia's higher standard for consensus and discuss it no further, as per your recommendation. Andre (talk) 22:29, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

And, in case there's any doubt, I'm not obsessed or even that enamored with bureaucratship. I just enjoy helping out, and I wouldn't even pursue a renomination if I didn't know that there were definite supporters who didn't make it in time for their votes to be counted. I didn't realize that anyone thought I was "rules-lawyering" my way into anything - I didn't cite the rules once in my discussion here. As a matter of fact, I suggested to discount them to put the several late votes in. And to clarify, when I said that I cared about "understanding RfA consensus, specifically in this case, because I do intend to renominate myself later" I meant that I would be renominating myself for the position of bureaucrat, and obviously bureaucrats need to understand RfA consensus - this is their job. I did not mean, as apparently uc has implied, that I wished to understand it so I could better succeed in my nomination. I hope that this discussion hasn't given blankfaze, uc, or you a bad impression of me - though my initial posting was an appeal, as it were, after that I was merely trying to comprehend how Cecropia determined the outcome of the nomination. Andre (talk) 22:48, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

As I've expressed ad nauseum, an important part of a bureaucrat is to try to understand community sentiment and be able to explain how decisions were reached when called upon to do so. When I feel unsure of how the community feels about a broad issue, I post a poll, such as the one to gauge wikisentiment on bureaucrat promotion. I posted a recent poll on whether there should be a limit to concurrent nominations, sentiment was evidentally to not do so unless something got out of hand, and I am bound to respect that, whatever my own view.

Now to the instant matter. I've tried to communicate my thinking to you, but I'm not certain I've done so well enough, since you are parsing the numbers and so on to indicate you should have been promoted. First, please take another look at the comments I made here and on your nomination page. I've tried hard to indicate that more than just numbers are involved, giving an important nod to many long-time Wikipedians who argue that we should be determining the quality of nominations through the posted comments and discussion and not just (or even primarily) numbers. I have been an advocate of trying to determine numerical sentiment simply because humans (especially the male of the species) are bean-counting beasties, and statistics help to set a baseline on decisions.

If we deal just with the straight numbers, even there I believe we have some misunderstanding. We cannot simply throw out the "other standard" voters because they didn't express a specific numeric goal. Reasonably, they are looking for near unanimity, even beyond the top numerical choice of 90%-95%. Therefore, it is far more reasonable to count these votes in the area of 95%-100% than to throw them out. Tallying all the votes in the full range of opinion from 75% to 100%, weighting the votes by mutiplying the number of votes by the "comfort level" percentages, then dividing by the total, we end up with sentiment of ~85% as a bare minimum, and ~90% as preferred (to be exact, I ran this on Excel—the percentages are 84.86% and 89.86%, rounded to two decimal places).

But I've done what I tried to avoid, coming up with a "magic number." There is more. Look at UC's recent successful bureaucrat nomination. Well, at (25/2/1) - 92%, it was an easy promotion, but note other factors--lots of interest, including a lot of familiar Wikipedians, extensive discussion, no indication of solicited votes. And even one who expressed the opinion there are enough bureaucrats, but voted in favor, anyway. That is what consensus looks like, especially since Wikipedians seems to take the people who push the promote button extra seriously. All this IMO, of course. ;-) -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 07:13, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think in all this, it might be good to mention why bureaucrat is so hard to get. We make admins liberally because there's an advantage to having lots of them. On the other hand, we only need a handful of bureaucrats, and there's little reason to promote more unless there's a shortage. Hence, some of us feel that any doubt about a nomination is enough to disqualify. Isomorphic 23:35, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Nominees not accepting or rejecting

We currently have four nominations, one overdue, who have neither accepted nor rejected their nominations. The RfA page states:

Note: Nominations have to be accepted by the user in question. If you nominate a user, please also leave a message on their talk page and ask them to reply here if they accept the nomination.

and the instructions for promotion say:

If [the nomination] is not a self-request, check the user has accepted the nomination

I believe seven days is sufficient time for a nominee to be aware of, and express an opinion on, his or her own nomination. I extended Jeronimo's nomination for a day to give the user time to respond. Beyond this please be aware nominees will not be promoted. This is a matter of the simple rules, but also a simple courtesy to the community for someone who will be entrusted with some extra responsibilities and the trust of the community.

Please, if you nominate someone, make sure they are aware they must accept or reject their nominations on the RfA page. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 01:17, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Categories: Wikipedia talk archives