User:Smallbones/ACE2017

Voting recommendations for the 2017 Arbitration Committee Elections

Voting will take place from Monday 00:00, 27 November until Sunday 23:59, 10 December, UTC

An editor is eligible to vote who:
 * (i) has registered an account before Saturday 00:00, 28 October 2017
 * (ii) has made at least 150 mainspace edits before Wednesday 00:00, 1 November 2017 and,
 * (iii) is not blocked from the English Wikipedia at the time of their vote.

__NOINDEX__ The elections for the Arbitration Committee this year are IMHO about paid editing. This voters' guide lists my recommendations of candidates to support and those to oppose based on
 * their willingness to enforce the the terms of use section on paid editing and their awareness of the problems caused by paid editing.
 * their experience (good, bad, or mixed), but I don't feel that multiple years of experience in several areas are needed to be an arb.

So far, the candidates' answers to my question about paid editing have been very positive about enforcing the Terms of Use prohibition on undisclosed paid editing (in contrast to attitudes in previous elections). Thus I may subjectively consider the candidates' strength of commitment in stopping harmful paid editing and their experience more than I had planned.

Recommendations*
*See notes on candidates below

To vote, click the vote link in the green box at the top of this page. I'll suggest opening this page in another browser window, so that you can check my recommendations as you vote.

Pick your voting strategy
The mechanics of the election suggest that there are only 2 reasonable voting strategies. A neutral vote is effectively discarded - you are throwing your vote away if you vote neutral. Candidates who get more than 50% supports out of the remaining votes are then eligible to be elected, but only the 8 with the highest percentage of supports will actually be elected.
 * Strategy A - which I recommend, support all candidates who meet your requirements, oppose all who cannot convince you that they meet your requirements.
 * The issue for this election is whether ArbCom will enforce rules related to paid editing, especially the terms of use section on paid editing. I believe that a large majority of editors support enforcing the rules against undisclosed paid editing. Thus, if most editors vote according to this strategy, candidates who support enforcement of the rules will all get more than 50% supports and other candidates will all get less than 50% supports.  Eight friendly candidates will win the election.


 * Strategy B - mostly ineffective. Vote only for your favorite 8 candidates, or fewer if less than 8 meet your standards.
 * Perhaps in a normal election this would be the strategy to use. You are giving your favorite candidates the best shot by voting this way. The problem is that many, perhaps most, of the votes cast according to this strategy will cancel out. "Extreme candidates", those with the most supporters, or those with the fewest opposers may win, but more moderate candidates - those who meet your basic standards - are at a disadvantage. While this strategy results in many votes canceling out, it is not completely useless.  Among those candidates that get 50% supports, voters who use this strategy may determine the final winners.

Notes on candidates
 * All candidates that I strongly support have convinced me that they will take serious action to enforce the terms of use section on paid editing, when such a case comes before ArbCom. This is based on their candidate statements, answers to questions posed during the election, or in a few cases to actions or statements they've made on-Wiki.
 * All candidates that I support have convinced me of the above, but have experience or made previous statements on-Wiki that raise some questions. In general these actions or statements look like their positions have been evolving over time.  Fair enough.
 * Candidates that I'm neutral on - I wouldn't be disappointed if they were elected, but feel that they might not have the temperament to effectively serve on arbcom
 * Candidates I oppose seem to be confused about paid editing issues.