User:Parent5446/Drafts/RFA Research

== Research on the RFA process ==

Hello, I am an anthropology student researching the Wikipedia Requests for adminship procedure. As you recently voted in this process, I was wondering if you would be willing to answer a few quick questions.


 * Do you believe that the current RFA process is an effective way of selecting admins?
 * Do you notice a difference between users who are nominated vs selfnoms?
 * Is a week an appropriate length for process? Should it perhaps be longer or shorter?
 * Do you think the user's status in the community changes while the user is undergoing the RFA process? How about after the RFA process is over?
 * Was the candidate Q&A beneficial in helping you choose to support the candidate?

If you are willing, please leave your answers on my talk page or e-mail them to me.

This research will not be published academically, as this research is primarily to demonstrate the feasibility of doing online ethnography in online only communities such as Wikipedia, though I intend to make my findings available on Wiki. Your name will not be associated with any information you provide in any published work. If you have any questions please let me know. Thank you. --Cspurrier (talk) 18:46, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Answers to Questions
1. Do you believe that the current RFA process is an effective way of selecting admins?
 * A: The RFA process is very effective at selecting admins. However, it is not perfect. Some of the time, editors base their opinion of a user solely on the information on the nomination page and their edit count information. There are a lot of editors that will seriously look through the user's history and judge them, but others do not have time. Another fault is that not a lot of people vote in RFA. Out of the thousands of editors who know who admins are and deal with them daily do not express their opinion in any way for who they want as admins. Because of this, consensus is only determined amongst the metapedians who patroll the RFA page. Personally, I think that a good idea would be to first continue with the normal questions, but in between the voting and the questions, insert a short grace period to allow users to comment on the candidate. This would better inform users who do not fully access the user and establish a better consensus. As for the lack of participation, it cannot really be helped. It would be monstrous if thousands of editors were supporting or opposing a candidate in an RFA, so that will have to remain.

2. Do you notice a difference between users who are nominated vs selfnoms?
 * A: Since I have not had much experience with RFAs, I cannot really determine a different between selfnoms and other RFAs. However, I would assume that no matter who nominated the user, if the user is determined as a good admin-to-be, then he deserves the sysop flag (though others might argue otherwise).

3. Is a week an appropriate length for process? Should it perhaps be longer or shorter?
 * A: I think that the process should be a little longer. Though a lot of RFAs establish obvious consensus, some RFAs argue for a long time over the credibility of the user. An extension of the process would allow more time just in case an argument is continuing past the deadline.

4. Do you think the user's status in the community changes while the user is undergoing the RFA process? How about after the RFA process is over?
 * A: While undergoing the RFA process, I think the user's status remains pretty much the same. However, this always depends on how the nomination is going. For instance, if you have a newcomer who does not know much about the process and nominates him or herself for adminship, their status does change a little. In other words, the user points him or herself out as an obvious newbie. However, that is beside the point.

5. Was the candidate Q&A beneficial in helping you choose to support the candidate?
 * A: The candidate Q&A is always very helpful in choosing whether to support the candidate or not, as it is not just their answer to the question, but in what tone they answer the question. If they answer a question in a calm and intelligent fashion, it indicates a sort of levelheadedness in the user in contrast to a user who would answer a question as if he knew everything, which would show a kind of egocentric personality that might not be desirable for an admin.

I hope these answers help in your research. Parent5446(Murder me for my actions) 03:17, 24 February 2008 (UTC)