User:Giraffer/ACE2022

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About the guide
Hello! I'm Giraffer, and this is my second year writing a guide. I was inspired to do so because when I first voted in an ArbCom election, in 2020, it felt a little overwhelming to have to conduct research on the candidates myself. Other guides and pages had information on candidates, but they were generally presented in an opinionated form, which made them difficult to rely on.

I will strive to present each candidate fairly and without preference, giving a bigger picture of what they do day-to-day, their history on the project, and their how their previous actions may indicate what they could be like as an arb. I've listed below a few things I look at when writing my summaries, although with incumbent or recently retired arbs I tend to focus more on their time on the committee.

I welcome all feedback on the talk page, from voters and candidates alike – if you spot any errors or have any suggestions please do point them out. Thanks for reading my guide!

Note: The pre-election RfC this year changed the procedure to make candidate questions only begin after the conclusion of the nomination phase. Given that there was an influx of candidates in the last 48hrs, I still have some summaries (SilkTork, Sdrqaz, Barkeep49) left to write, and the question phase is now open. For those candidates remaining, I will be taking into account their responses to questions, but aside from anything significant I won't be making retroactive changes to other summaries because, frankly, I don't feel like re-writing nine statements. 18:22, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

What I look at

 * General field of work
 * Tenure as a sysop/functionary
 * (Recent) participation in arbspace
 * Experience with handling unblocks
 * Previous arbitrator experience
 * CheckUser experience
 * Participation in community processes outside of arbitration (VPP, VPR, etc.)
 * Experience in closing discussions
 * Experience in dispute resolution
 * Experience with working mailing lists
 * Activity level
 * Candidate statement & responses to questions
 * Experience with investigating sockpuppetry

These are in no particular order, nor do I expect any candidate to have all of these attributes.

Guerillero
Guerillero is running on a similar platform to last year. In his statement, he mentions his work as an admin at the AE noticeboard and his interest in DS reform. As one of the more heated areas of the wiki, Guerillero's ability to work AE may prove to be a strong asset when dealing with tense and complex case requests. He would bring his experience in the enforcement of sanctions to the table where the sanctions are created, helping to create a smoother system of DS. He currently serves as an Arbitration clerk and previously as an arb from January 2015 to December 2016.

He is also an experienced CheckUser, having held the position since his election as an arb in 2014. He has frequently been one of the more active CheckUsers this year, and his experience with the tool would no doubt benefit the committee. He ends his candidate statement with a opinion that ArbCom's management of functionary-issued blocks is a, and his proposition to delegate some of that responsibility to the functionaries themselves appears to be an extension of the update issued by the committee earlier this year on how functionary blocks are handled.

Lastly, Guerillero also admits to being ; having writen a substantial amount of reviewed content, his empathy with content creators and their frustrations may be encouraging for voters who feel ArbCom does not act fairly towards them.

However, Guerillero has previously run unsuccessfully in 2012, 2013, 2020, and 2021, finishing in all but the first as runner-up. Especially given the last two runs, there is definitely opposition to him becoming an arbitrator which he will need to overcome, should he wish to pick up a seat.

Ultimately, Guerillero has formed his candidacy uniquely, leveraging his experience working on the other side of ArbCom to try to accelerate and initiate DS and functionary reforms (respectively). His previous community rejections in favor of other candidates may diminish his overall appeal, but with his work and increased activity this year, he may be the breath of fresh air voters desire.

GeneralNotability
''In the interest of transparency, I'd like to declare a COI with GeneralNotability's candidacy – GN and I message off-wiki quite frequently. I will strive to be as neutral as possible in assessing his candidacy, but please take what I write about him here with my connection to him in mind.''

Our first new candidate for ArbCom, GeneralNotability would be a familiar face to anyone at SPI, where he is consistently one of the most active CheckUsers. Having obtained the tool during the 2021 appointments, he has regularly been among the top 3 most active CheckUsers, and highlights in his statement his confidence with the tool. L235 and GN are the only community CheckUsers running for ArbCom this year, and there are none in the other tranche. Furthermore, experienced CheckUsers are listed as strongly beneficial for the committee in Maxim's November update to his arbitration essay, so GN's skills with the tool would be of particular use.

GeneralNotability points to his work clearing the checkuser and paid queues as particular accomplishments – the volume of mail received by the committee is no secret, and GN's willingness (and demonstrated ability) to work email queues could be appealing. His candidate statement places emphasis on the need for an empathetic and compassionate committee, which tries to make arbitration less stressful for everyone.

GN has experience in arbitration, being an arb clerk and a frequent commenter on case requests. He filed the request for the Skepticism and coordinated editing case, and provided evidence and proposals.

However, GeneralNotability has acquired permissions relatively quickly: starting editing in early 2019, requesting adminship in mid 2020, and applying for CheckUser in late 2021. This is not inherently bad, but it may give voters concern over his experience with the tools. A polarizing block of at an ANI thread (which ultimately led to a declined case request about BHG) demonstrated his stance on how we handle civility – some may find his approach to this appealing for arbitration, while others may find it overly harsh.

GeneralNotability would bring new blood to the committee. His relative account youth is something unlike what the committee has at present, and for some voters he ticks many boxes with his work. A vote for GN appears to be a vote for a continuation of the current committee procedures, albeit with a fresh face.

CaptainEek
The first incumbent arb to run, CaptainEek is seeking a second two-year term as an arbitrator. She was elected in 2020 to a two-year term, with 68.18%, placing her 6th out of 7 elected candidates (11 candidates ran in total, excluding one withdrawn). During her time on the committee, Eek has drafted two cases: (Conduct in deletion-related editing & RexxS) and participated in many more. She has remained consistently active on-wiki throughout 2021 and 2022, getting Gallic Wars to GA status – becoming an arb has not removed CaptainEek from the editing community.

In these past two years, CaptainEek has almost always voted in line with the committee's ultimate consensus on major decisions, with her only dissenting votes being those opposing TheresNoTime's CheckUser & Oversight removals. This should not be misinterpreted as following the crowd – she is frequently one of the first voters on proposed remedies. In her candidate statement Eek also mentions her involvement in facilitating the ongoing DS reform. She is listed as being one of the three drafting arbitrators for the new sanctions.

Her statement highlights a few major principles she believes are important for ArbCom: empathy, transparency, and fairness. She stresses the importance of recognizing the person behind the screen, and that.

However, Eek has been the recipient of some criticism during her time on the committee. Following the RexxS case (in which she did not vote on the desysop, but drafted the case), Eek was widely criticized for a TPA removal of a user who continued to criticize the committee (see the initial block above the TPA notif) after being blocked by arbitrator Primefac for for edit-warring to keep their own comments on WT:ACN, which were initially removed as personal attacks by Bradv in a clerk action. The TPA removal (and initial block) were criticized as being INVOLVED, as both sysops involved were arbs – whom the criticism was levelled at – and especially given that the comments were related to the desysop of RexxS, in which INVOLVED was a factor.

Aside from those events, CaptainEek has remained relatively uncontroversial, and extending her time on the committee for another two years would mean retaining an active and productive arbitrator.

BoldLuis
BoldLuis' statement consists only of They have no prior edits to any arbitration page or any adminboard, and only 5000 edits total (251 in projectspace). They have provided no rationale of why they want to serve on ArbCom other than to help, nor is there any apparent evidence of a motivation or platform in their edits, so it is impossible for me to attempt a summary.

Robert McClenon
Possibly one of the most frequent non-arb commenters at ARC, this year Robert McClenon is running for a seat on the committee. He has opined on every case this year plus a few declined ones. Having read through his comments on the accepted ones, he appears to be largely in keeping with the overall result, with the notable exception of the Athaenara case, where he said, which I interpret to mean that (at the time) any ArbCom investigation of TheresNoTime & Lourdes was not needed.

Outside of his participation in arbitration, McClenon is extremely active at the dispute resolution noticeboard, with over 5,400 edits to the page. He also spends his time reviewing drafts at AfC and commenting at MfD. He has years of experience in all of these fields.

In his statement, McClenon expresses his opinion that ArbCom should lower the threshold for accepting cases, and that the community should be encouraged to submit requests sooner, to avoid disputes escalating yet remaining unresolved. Of course, to allocate more time to cases, something else would have to be cut – McClenon suggests appeals (but does not suggest how). Interestingly, this is in line with recent comments by other candidates and arbitrators: see my comments in Guerillero's section about appeals.

However, McClenon is not an admin, having twice run unsucessfully for the mop, most recently in 2017, when he withdrew on the fifth day at 46% support. While adminship is not explicitly required to become an arbitrator, it is a de facto requirement on the basis that a sizeable portion of voters want candidates to have had the prior assertation of community trust that RfA brings, and to have experience in working with a higher sense of accountability. Furthermore, desysops are an important part of ArbCom's role, with 4 this year, and having never been an admin, it may be difficult to have McClenon making decisions on them.

Overall, Robert McClenon's candidacy is unusual: a non-admin with extensive experience in arbitration and dispute resolution, yet twice rejected by the community for adminship. Outside of permissions, he matches the admin candidates in his profile and background for the role, and will be a real test of the community's opinion on adminship as a precursor to becoming an arbitrator.

Moneytrees
Moneytrees is our first sysop and non-functionary candidate. He is a CCI workhorse – something that won him near-unanimous praise in his otherwise divided RfA. In his statement, he discusses how his work at CCI has given him skills he finds applicable to arbitration, namely: examining context, understanding burnout, addressing large workloads & backlogs, and the importance of helping other editors. In terms of hands on arbitration-experience, he was a committee clerk from January 2020 to September 2021. Similar to other candidates, Moneytrees stresses the importance he places on community advocacy, especially given the ongoing UCOC formalization process. He explicitly mentions that he is willing to go against the grain, and do what he believes to be the right thing, even if it is unpopular.

Moneytrees' actions back up his statement. Despite his close RfA, he has remained a generally uncontroversial administrator, yet one unafraid to make complex blocks or start difficult discussions. He has experience in areas outside of CCI, from closing big threads to nominating candidates for adminship.

However, Moneytrees' administrative tenure is definitely on the shorter side, and this is perhaps exacerbated by the nature of his RfA. The bus factor at CCI means that him delegating a large portion of his time to ArbCom may cause the others at CCI difficulty, and therefore that may be a better resource at CCI. Having said that, no person should be tethered to a specific place.

Overall, Moneytrees is a well-rounded administrator who, if elected, would serve the community and its interests diligently and fairly. He brings to the table his skills and experiences in context analysis and work ethic, and a determination to keep the English Wikipedia on the best possible track. If voters can overlook his controversial RfA and shorter administrative tenure, they may stand to gain a productive and hard-working arb, with enwiki's best interests at heart.

Primefac
You need not look much further than the table at the top of this page to see that Primefac does a lot around the wiki. Outside of his work as an arb, he can be regularly seen working at Templates for Deletion, granting AfC reviewer rights to users, or (not seen!) suppressing material in his role as an Oversighter. As an Oversighter, Primefac is frequently the most active holder of the right, in some months (e.g. May this year) accounting for more than 35% of all suppressions, and as a result understands what it is like to be a community functionary. He also holds CheckUser rights, but these are as a result of being an arbitrator and are used much more infrequently.

Primefac has drafted two cases this year: Kurds and Kurdistan & WikiProject Tropical Cyclones, both of which were relatively well received. He has not dissented in any major votes during his time on the committee, save for one favoring a case over a desysop motion, and has remained active onwiki and off throughout his time on ArbCom.

In comparison to other candidates, Primefac's statement is quite succinct. He lists some of his work as a committee member, and highlights his ongoing and (if elected) future work: working with the WMF to increase the safety of users, and advocating for community concerns with ArbCom. He does not list any particular opinions or suggestions for the committee that may influence his next term, should he be re-elected.

Perhaps counterintuitively, Primefac holding the bureaucrat permission may cause a little concern among voters. Wugapodes, an incumbent arbitrator, filed a request for bureaucratship earlier this year, which was unsuccessful – largely due to the concerns over ArbCom—bureaucrat overlap. At present, there are 3 'crats on the committee (of 15) out of 21 crats overall. The concentration of these advanced permissions among a few individuals may be something that some voters consider: should those who give the sysop permission also be able to decide when to remove it?

In summary, Primefac is running for another term on ArbCom to continue his current work. His platform is not one of change or reform, but for voters satisfied with the current composition and direction of the committee, this may prove to make him a compelling candidate.

L235
Our third incumbent to run for a second term, L235 is seeking to continue his time on the committee. When first elected, he sought to work on discretionary sanctions reform. Kevin was largely successful in this endeavor: as a drafting arbitrator (alongside CaptainEek and Wugapodes) he assisted with the Phase I and II community consultations, and helped write the proposed decision for the project. This year he has been the only community-appointed CheckUser on ArbCom – something highlights there being an ongoing need for more of in his November update to his essay on arbitration. Retaining Kevin on the committee would help that.

During his time on the committee, Kevin has been a drafter on two cases: Skepticism and coordinated editing & Reversal and reinstatement of Athaenara's block. He has cast no dissenting votes on any major decisions.

In his 2022 statement, L235 outlines four major focuses for his second term: finishing the DS reform, streamlining the clerk system, improving ArbCom's relation with other movement bodies, and working with block appeals. Despite the proposed decision for the DS reform being posted, Kevin wishes to go further, offering to work on templates, guidance pages, and just generally ensuring a smooth transition to the new system. His ideas for changing the clerk system are unique among candidates, and having served for five years as a clerk and two years as an arbitrator, his ideas would be valuable. Changing how block appeals are handled by ArbCom seems to be a common theme among candidates this year. Kevin's commitment as an incumbent arb to improve the committee's processes in this area is a sign that it may be an item on ArbCom's agenda.

A vote for Kevin is a vote to continue his and ArbCom's initiatives. He would continue with the direction the committee is currently heading in, making changes to policy and process where he believes they are needed. As with Primefac and CaptainEek, for those satisfied with the current behavior of the committee, he may be an appealing candidate.

Tamzin
Tamzin is the first candidate this year from the RfA class of 2022. She primarily works at RfD, as an SPI clerk, and at AE. Having only served as a sysop for 6 months, she is the shortest tenured admin running this year. Her RfA was the most supported since the process began, but resulted in a (successful) cratchat, with the final tally coming in at 340/112/50. Having not served as a sysop for long, Tamzin would bring a fresh perspective on adminship to the committee.

In her candidate statement, Tamzin does not suggest any major reforms or changes to ArbCom's procedures, but places a strong emphasis on her commitment to ensure that the committee improves its transparency and accountability.

She proposed an RfC to update BLOCKEVIDENCE in September, which would have enabled administrators to consider off-wiki evidence while blocking for on-wiki misconduct, provided it was shared. While it was rejected by the community, it does give an insight into her thoughts on transparency and the handling of off-wiki evidence – the former of which she mentions in her statement.

However, Tamzin's RfA may prove to be problematic for her. Practically all of her opposition stemmed from her response to Q14, in which she re-affirmed a prior comment suggesting that she believed continuing support for Donald Trump was disqualifying for adminship. As a result, her opposition was not because !voters believed she wasn't ready for the tools, but that they found her position inherently incompatible with adminship. She clarified in Q18 that she did not intend to recuse (and hasn't) from all AMPOL AE threads, but would do so for ones which she has shared relevant political opinions about on-wiki. In summary, having a candidate who went through a cratchat this year due to opposition for her comments on the intersection between politics and adminship assume a position where she is able to cast votes concerning others' adminship may be concerning to many.

If elected, Tamzin would aim to serve transparently, pushing for greater delegation and involvement of the community where possible, however her RfA and comments within may hinder her chances of getting a seat.

SilkTork
SilkTork is the second former arbitrator to seek a seat on the committee for the 2023-2024 term. He has served twice: from January 2012 to December 2013, and from January 2019 to September 2019 – his second term cut short by his resignation (in good standing) after the Fram case, due to burnout. He says he is running this year because he has been impressed with ArbCom's recent actions, and that he believes that some passed time has better equipped him to deal with whatever may come the committee's way.

During his second stint on the committee, he casted no major dissenting votes, and was a drafter on one case (Rama), where the only remedy was a desysop for one user. He signed the open letter to the WMF Board about the Fram-WMF controversy, and co-drafted (along with the rest of the committee) the Fram case.

In his statement, SilkTork expresses his pride in enwiki's advocacy for self-governance, and how it played out in the Fram controversy. He mentions his extensive content work and general admin work around the wiki, and that experience in those is important.

SilkTork may find opposition in the same way I mentioned Primefac would, due to his position as a bureaucrat. Despite this, he was actually one of the opposers on Wugapodes' RfB. He opposed the RfB to avoid increasing the number of arbitrator-bureaucrats (that's a mouthful) to four, via Wugapodes' promotion, but since one arbcrat is not up for election and another is leaving, electing both crat candidates to the committee would keep the same number for 2023.

Electing SilkTork would mean gaining an experienced voice on the committee, from someone who has previously served. While his role as a bureaucrat and his 2019 resignation from the committee may give some voters pause, his administrative and arbitration experience could make him a desirable candidate to many others.

Sdrqaz
The second new sysop this year to run for ArbCom, Sdrqaz has thrown their hat in the ring because they believe that, and that they are that person. Sdrqaz holds no other hats than sysop: they passed RfA in March (202/5/5). Their work primarily involves speedy deletions, helping requests at RfPP, and dealing with username violations, as well as some content.

Sdrqaz's statement summarizes their experience as a sysop, their content work, and repeats some core principles of ArbCom and how it operates (that it should be cautious, communicative, and loyal to the community). But having read their statement and questions, I am struggling to find any particular reasons why they are running, other than to help. They do air some opinions in the questions though, suggesting that tool restrictions for sysops could be used in some scenarios, and that their stance towards (or against, rather) desysopping in Reversal and reinstatement of Athaenara's block would have been less lenient that some arbs.

However, Sdrqaz's short tenure as a sysop may be the cause of some opposition. While their eight-month tenure has been relatively uncontroversial, they have made some mistakes. This is of course to be expected of any new sysop, but serves as an indication that Sdrqaz could be better served continuing as a sysop at the moment, rather than taking on additional responsibilities as an arbitrator.

In conclusion, Sdrqaz doesn't make any major motivations for running obvious, nor do they voice any major ideas for ArbCom. Their sysop tenure (or lack therof) may cause concern among some, but the idea of a sysop entering the committee with no (public) pre-existing agenda, but purely to serve, may be appealing to many others.

Barkeep49
Barkeep49 is seeking a second term on the committee, to continue the work he is doing. He was first elected to a term in 2020, garnering 81.36% support, and came out as the top candidate of the election. For 2020, Barkeep set out an ambitious platform in his candidate statement, and has done so again for this year.

During his time on the committee, Barkeep has drafted three cases: Skepticism and coordinated editing, Conduct in deletion-related editing, and Iranian politics, all of which were generally well received. He cast no dissenting votes in any major ArbCom decisions (on which he was active), except for opposing RexxS' desysop. In brief, he wrote that he accepted the case request to examine whether conduct meriting tool removal had occurred, and while there was serious fault with said conduct, it did not reach the desysop threshold.

Barkeep's platform for this year is very long – over 3000 words. The full thing can be found in his userspace, but here are the key points:


 * He believes that accountability, empathy, responsibility, responsiveness, loyalty to the community, and teamwork are all essential traits for arbitrators, and that he brings those to the committee
 * If elected he would try to reform the ARCA (Clarification & Amendment) processes to be quicker
 * ArbCom should listen to feedback
 * Admin conduct cases should have a lower acceptance threshold than other cases, since ArbCom is the only body that can investigate and action them
 * ArbCom is underutilized by the community
 * He would advocate for more WMF money to be spent on community priorities
 * He acknowledges a need for CheckUser candidates, but that the Oversight team is well-staffed
 * He believes OUTING to be a behavioral policy, but that BLP takes precedence in article space (in other words, that we can add reliably sourced information (to articles) about editors who haven't revealed it on-wiki)

The question from Spicy asked about Barkeep's self-initiated recall process in August, which occurred when TheresNoTime claimed that Barkeep was not acting in good faith on an issue, which the latter interpreted as a request for recall, despite TNT explicitly stating that it was not.

As a member of both the Arbitration Committee and the Universal Code of Conduct Revision Committee, Barkeep currently holds a large amount of responsibility for steering community governance. In a similar vein to  mentioned above, the overlap between roles may be a factor among those who are concerned with the concentration of responsibilities.

Overall, Barkeep presents an in-depth candidate platform, which gives voters a clear idea of what he aims to achieve if re-elected. He has been very active on-wiki these past two years, and that coupled with being an incumbent arb means that he will primarily be judged on the merits of his current term. Despite this, his writings on which direction he hopes to help the committee move in may influence other voters, for better or for worse.