User:Useight/RFA Subjects/Accepting nomination

Nominations (Archive 33)
On the "how to nominate" page instructions it says: "Please do not add the Rfa to Wikipedia:Requests for Adminship yet." How long is it until one can nominate somebody? Thanks  Ban e  s  11:34, 8 October 2005 (UTC)
 * If you're nominating yourself, you're free to add it once the questions are answered. In the case of nominating someone else, you need to get them to accept the nomination and answer the candidate questions before adding it to the RfA page. &Euml;vilphoenix Burn! 14:39, 8 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks, I'm nominating somebody else. He/She is aware of it and will accept once I nominate. So, I just go ahead and follow the instructions on the nominate page then?  Ban e  s  15:53, 8 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Write the nomination page Requests for adminship/Your candidate's name as per the instructions and tell your candidate that he/she has been nominated, and should fill in his/her acceptance and answers. Once that has been done, transclude the nomination page into the main listing. &mdash; J I P | Talk 07:28, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Success (Archive 33)
Anyone notice taht since the new procedure has been used that more Rfa's are successful? Job E  6   15:22, 10 October 2005 (UTC)


 * I think that is a case of correlation does not imply causation! Talrias (t | e | c) 16:04, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Actually, I think this is in part a case of post hoc, ergo propter hoc - the new procedure prevents unaccepted nominations from building up, which otherwise might lead to lingering strings of neutral or oppose votes based on nonacceptance, and which may raise doubts about a candidate's availability in general. BD2412  talk 16:25, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Promoted even if nomination is not accepted (Archive 40)
Can an editor be voted and promoted even if he doesn't want the job? There is a very senior member in fact pioneer of one of the groups here but is just happy being an editor. Metaphor: A policeman has to have a badge to do his work. The Janitor has to be apointed. I'm just asking. --Jondel 05:21, 22 November 2005 (UTC)


 * No. Any even if they could be they could ask to be deadmined over at meta.Geni 05:38, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Yuh. I 'm sure he'd win by a landslide in elections. Just that he'll say no.--Jondel 05:45, 22 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I wouldn't vote for someone who said he/she didn't want to be an admin. —Cleared as filed. 05:47, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

It would be imposing. Although he does a lot of the dirty work already.--Jondel 06:13, 22 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Note that nominations aren't put onto the voting page until the nominee has accepted, so the answer's no. In any case, it would be an insult to the nominee for the nominator to say "I don't care if you don't want the job, I'm nominating you anyway". Grutness...wha?  06:17, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Agree with Gruntness; while nominating someone without asking them would be rude, nominating someone you knew didn't want to be an admin would be a massive breach of the WP:CIVIL policy. Christopher Parham (talk) 07:42, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
 * there's that extra N again... sigh. Grutness...wha?  07:49, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Indeed, sorry about that. Christopher Parham (talk) 08:27, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
 * S'aright. My fault for having a silly user name (it's a place in Scotland, BTW). Grutness...wha?  08:42, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Maybe we're just accustomed to your air of grunting ;) --Durin 17:39, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
 * And he is often one to take on the grunt work (as opposed to Grunt work)... Mindspillage (spill yours?) 20:54, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
 * :) Back to the discussion's topic, folks! Grutness...wha?  00:31, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
 * I personally think people shouldn't be promoted to admins against their will. I just can't see any reason for it. I've nominated two people for adminship who declined the nomination, and that's fine with me. If someone is promoted to admin against their will, they could drop a quick note to a steward or a developer asking to be de-adminned immediately. &mdash; J I P  | Talk 20:06, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Respect others' wishes, I think. If they don't want it, then don't give it to them. If I offered you a coffee, and you didn't want it, would you like it if I forced it upon you? Enochlau 22:54, 24 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Actually if coffee was forced upon me I'd just drink it so they'd leave me alone. But yeah, if they don't want it, they don't get it, it is very simple stuff. Quentin   Pierc  e  05:08, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

While "only the true admin would deny!", or the image of Speaker of the House of Commons being dragged with real or feigned reluctance to the chair, both appeal, I don't think it would be practical. For one thing, it would effectively preclude getting meaningful answers to the standard questions, even if refusal to accept the nomination in the first instance doesn't itself imply "if elected I will not serve". Alai 21:59, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Deletion of never accepted RfAs (Archive 48)
Since the policy change requiring nominations be accepted before being posted at WP:RFA, nominations that have not been accepted have generally been deleted once the nominee indicates lack of acceptance. There's no policy or guideline about this though. Today, I came across Requests for adminship/Terenceong1992, and it's been added to Unsuccessful adminship candidacies. I'd like to see what people's opinions are on deletion of never accepted nominations. Personally, I don't see the point in keeping them around. They are not posted to WP:RFA anymore, and do not contain really much in the way of useful information since they never received much public scrutiny. Thoughts? --Durin 16:01, 13 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Like a redirect someone will almost certainly never type in, they're cheap. They don't hurt to be kept around, and in the very very rare instance that they're required, they can be called up again. (Besides, don't people often look at past RfAs if a nominee has failed before?) Johnleemk | Talk 17:14, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

As a general rule I think an RfA would have to be 1) accepted by the candidate, 2) added to WP:RFA, to be counted as legitimate. But there are exceptions (i.e. an RFA added by a troll in bad faith). However, for historical purposes and the appearance of transparency I would like to have them remain undeleted and be able to see the links here of even those RFAs that are not legitimate. Maybe move them to a paragraph at the bottom of the page patterned after this). NoSeptember   talk  17:31, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I think they could certainly be deleted at the request of the nominee, if not by default. The problem is that they're catalogued at unsuccessful candidacies by the name of the nominee, when if they are useful information they are only useful about the nominator.  Chick Bowen 02:33, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Warn the creator, give him a chance to userfy or copy the page (for, say, a future nom) then delete... unless the prospective nominee suggests that they may be ready at some point in the future. I have an RfA I've been holding open for acceptance for a month, and will hold open for ten more if that's what it takes for the editor in question to feel ready. BD2412  T 02:59, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Hmm. Perhaps a distinction should be made between an RFA that hasn't been accepted and one that's explicitly been declined. Chick Bowen 03:06, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

As proposed above, you could make a list at the bottom of Unsuccessful adminship candidacies (or, since that page is alphabetized, on a subpage of it). A good example of this was Requests for adminship/Encephalon 3. He never accepted it, but eventually someone will nominate him sooner or later. So, the new nom could either overwrite the old one, or it could be on a new subpage. However, it's nice to be consistent about this. Tito xd (?!? - help us) 03:10, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Surprise RfA nom's (Archive 57)
Yesterday there were a couple of unsigned RfA's that were removed quickly. User:Funnybunny had a previous unsigned RfA. Is it possible for someone, for whatever reason, to nominate a user and the user not know about it until everyone had opposed per not answering the questions? Or worse, to not know about it till someone brought it up on a subsequent RfA? Thanks :) Dlohcierekim 12:40, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
 * If a candidate has not yet accepted a nomination, it is inappropriate to put it up for voting, or to vote on it. So, hopefully. Generally, I don't think anyone would hold an unaccepted nomination against a candidate under any circumstances. Christopher Parham (talk) 12:53, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Possibly stupid suggestion (Archive 59)
I know there has been a lot of controversy at various times over people voting before the nominee has accepted the nomination, and I was thinking that a simple change in the nomination procedure would stop all that. We currently create the nomination page before asking the candidate whether they will accept or not, and it strikes me that we are doing this the wrong way around. Why don't we ask the candidate first then create the nomination page if they accept? This way we wouldn't have comments or votes being placed before acceptance, as the page would only be created once the nomination was accepted. We also wouldn't have nominators taking the time to create the page only for the candidate to decline.

The reason I say this is possibly a stupid question is that this just seems so obvious to me that in the back of my mind I'm thinking there must be a reason why we don't do this already that I don't know know about. I honestly can't think of a reason why are doing it the way we are instead of this way, but I'm feeling a little like there must be one I haven't thought of. Raven4x4x 11:16, 8 June 2006 (UTC)


 * It is at the very least a courtesy to ask someone before proposing them, as well as practical, as you point out. I certainly wouldn't propose someone without asking them (not that I have yet proposed anybody). Furthermore, if the candidate doesn't accept (for whatever reason) this can then be brought up again if at a later time they do accept, although the first nom was nothing to do with them. Thus an unsolicited nom can actually be a later hindrance. Tyrenius 11:53, 8 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, it's not that bad of an idea really. Perhaps it could be like RfArs in a way, where in lieu of the candidate accepting on the nomination, the nominator just links to a diff showing them accepting on a talk page. Self-noms wouldn't need this, obviously. But the problem is off-Wiki discussions... e-mail and IRC. Either they'd still need to accept on the nom, or they'd have to post to the person's talk page in acceptance. Either way it does seem like a good way to come up with a pre-formed RfA with minimal instruction creep. --W.marsh 15:21, 8 June 2006 (UTC)


 * RfAs are often created and worked on by nominees/nominators for some time before actually being posted to RfA. Creationo of an RfA does not automatically indicate acceptance of the RfA in its current state. The current bit-flip is the nominee accepting the nomination. Changing it to creation of the RfA would remove the time frame needed by the candidate and/or nominator to fully craft the RfA. The current instruction works well, and is easy to understand; if its accepted, it can be on WP:RFA. If not, then no and the RfA can exist in limbo indefinitely. --Durin 15:28, 8 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Why the rush? I'd say that a simple comment to the effect that no votes should be entered before the nomination has been formally accepted would be sufficent. Just zis Guy you know? 15:40, 8 June 2006 (UTC)


 * An RfA shouldn't be added to the main RfA page until it's accepted, so people shouldn't even see it before it's ready for votes. If people are going around looking for unlisted RfA's, they're just being foolish - there is no point.  The current system works fine. --Tango 15:58, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

A small tweak to the nomination process page (Archive 61)
Please see Requests_for_adminship/nominate and Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_adminship/nominate, there have been several cases now of people getting an RfA subpage (nomination page) made for them when they didn't necessarily want that, and it perhaps put them in a bit of an awkward spot, so I tweaked the page to suggest that one should ask first before creating the RfA subpage if there is any doubt... I am mindful of instruction creep as always so maybe the wording could be tightened a bit but I do think it's caused some people needless stress lately.  + +Lar: t/c 01:14, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
 * We should also make it clear that it is ok to delete RfA subpages that are never used (not accepted and transcluded), and when the candidate is ready, they can start the page again (without restoring the deleted edits). NoSeptember  16:03, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Indeed, a very good idea. Of course the candidate will have to ask someone else to do it for them in almost all cases (reconfirmations excepted) as they're not an admin. :) Please enhance the text if you think it proper, and thanks for catching that.  + +Lar: t/c 17:56, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

An inquiry on a case study (Archive 67)
I have an inquiry to make on users declining adminship, if they were being nominated by another user for a second or more times. Allow me to provide a typical case study. As some of the more expereinced editors on RfAs know, Computerjoe, who in my personal opinion is a great editor, recently declined his fourth RfA. However, I strongly believe that he would run for adminship in about a couple of months time. The point I would like to make is this; what if the user in question delays in accepting this nomination? For example, if he states that he would not officially accept this now but maybe in a few months time. This would result in keeping the RfA nomination at #4 instead of #5. Is this a correct procedure to follow if a user feels that he/she is not yet ready for adminship? Or instead of creating a #5 RfA in a couple of months, why not use the #4 RfA by asking the user in question to delete his earlier non-acceptance instead of creating a new #5 RfA page? Any comments on this would be greatly appreciated. NOTE: I personally delayed in accepting my own recent RfA by about two weeks as well. -- S iva1979 Talk to me  11:15, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Ideally the RFA page shouldn't be created until the candidate agrees to be nominated. That's just a lack of communication on the part of the nominator.  In this specific case I would have no problem deleting #4, since there are no answers to the questions and no votes/discussion, so his next full nom would be #4.  There may be other specific cases suitable for deletion under the same principle as far as I am concerned.  In general I would say that the nominator should get the candidate's permission before creating the page in the first place, which would eliminate your concern in the first place. Thatcher131 (talk) 11:32, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * A nom that isn't accepted never goes on the list, never gets seen by anyone not involved (unless they hunt for it), and no discussion or decision making goes on there. There's no need to archive it, so it might as well be deleted and replaced with a new RFA when he's ready. --Tango 11:37, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I'd have to disagree on that. It seems significant when someone does decline a nomination in that it can give some insight into the individual's character.  That may be significant in the event of a future nomination. --StuffOfInterest 12:46, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * A nomination that's not accepted can have two possible sorts of influence on the candidates 'image': on one side "Hey, this guy is honest/humble/patient/etc., great!", on the other "Hey, this is RFA 5, what's wrong with this guy?". When a candidate tells the nominator "No, I'm not quite ready, could you ask me again in two months?", this can be done on a user's talk page, in a conversation on IRC or via email or something like Skype, MSN or any other medium of choice. All of those will, most likely, remain unseen to the rest of the Wikipedia community. However, if the nominator is impatient and goes ahead and creates the nomination page, the nomination suddenly 'counts' - with the possible negative effect described above. The only difference was the behaviour of the nominator, not something that should reflect on the candidate. I think therefore that in cases like these, where the candidate doesn't accept, the candidate should be allowed to ask the nomination page to be deleted. --JoanneB 13:13, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I declined a nomination, and my current one is officially version 1. Of course, there have been many "you should be an administrator" comments of varying strengths, which could have led to a nomination if I had responded positively. It is this grey area which complicates things if you want to undertake serious research. Stephen B Streater 13:21, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
 * If one of the people who told you "you should be an administrator" had instead created the page and said, "guess what, I nominated you", I don't think you should be stuck with that on your "record" so to speak. I do think that if someone agrees to be nominated the results, postive or negative, should be kept. Thatcher131 (talk) 14:15, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree that accepted nominations are what is important, as the RfA process itself involves a huge amount of work and straightens out a lot of issues, in a way not reflected in any way by a "want to stand?" - "Nah" doesn't. Stephen B Streater 14:42, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't think a declined nomination should go in the "count"; as mentioned above, there's no valuable information conveyed by the page, and it can either be overwritten by the next (accepted) nomination, or deleted outright and recreated anew. Obvious CSCWEM 2 was sort of a special case... -- nae'blis 14:24, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * 'Declined' and 'withdrawn' are seperate entities. ~ PseudoSudo 15:43, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Declined nominations submitted by other editors should not count towards the subsequent numbering of the candidate's future efforts. If the candidate declined, whether aware of preliminary voting or not, this should not be rolled forward to any future "numbering regimes". This is entirely different to a failing RfA withdrawal. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  17:38, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * My wicked side is prompting me to say Nobody asks you if you want a RFC, you just wake up one day with it. ;-) Whether to inform an editor if he wants to be a candidate is, from my point of view, simple. Wikipedia is a free encyclopedia relying on the good faith of its editors. Until now, I haven't seen someone nominating someone else in bad faith. Thus, if someone nominates an editor, it is because he, personally, thinks the editor would be a good administrator. I believe any of us should be free to nominate whoever we believe has the necessary conditions for adminship, based on my assumption of good faith. The same way we edit a paragraph in an article without having to post an explanation of the edit in the talk page. It is up to others to interpret that as "a nice surprise" or "lack of communication". -- ReyBrujo 20:30, 28 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, "a nice surprise" could turn into a bad expereince for the user who was nominated. His RfA could turn out to be a disaster. And, if my memory is correct, there had been very few cases where someone had nominated a user in bad faith (please correct me if I am wrong about this). This could, of course be very subjective, but I can't seem to find solid evidence to back up my statement. Perhaps, some of the more veteran users could bring out a few evidence of these bad faith nominations. -- S iva1979 Talk to me  18:46, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

New idea of nomination process (Archive 69)
As I was thinking about that the nominatiopn process shouldn't be considered as a vote, I've came up with this idea for reformation of the process:

The nominator forst as usual apply a nomination for a nominee, another person or him/her self, and then the nominee approve or reject the nomination and as usual reply to some standard questions. The main difference is that now when a user have read the nomination, he/she has the option to sign that he/she have read the nomination, not that he/she support it or reject it. The user have thou an option now to add a comment with reasons against the nomination, or some neutral comment covering the nomination/nominee, but he/she may not simply add a comment with the sole purpouse saying "I support this nomination", because that's irrelevant.

The logic for this system is "A user should be appointed administrator unless there are reason against that", valid reason could be that he/she havn't been on the wikipedia too long, have had receent uncivil discussions etc...

→ A z a  Toth 16:10, 17 September 2006 (UTC)


 * This is quite a good idea. I have a question - can you elaborate on how the bureaucrat should come to a decision regarding consensus? Does he/she still have to count how many criticize the nominee and how many approve? Rama's arrow  17:33, 17 September 2006 (UTC)


 * I mean, if there are a couple of criticisms while a larger number have a favorable opinion, what decision should emerge? Rama's arrow  17:37, 17 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Be mindful of one thing - if people have negative or "pseudo-political" intentions, these will manifest in any system one devises in one way or another. There is a good chance for your idea to address some issues, but it needs to be clear and decisive. Rama's arrow  17:42, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Perhaps a system where people can object to objections... → A z a  Toth 18:16, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
 * See RfA/Draft for a draft I made how I think it could be. → A z a  Toth 18:25, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Quick question about accepting a nomination (Archive 73)
The third instruction to nominees who want to accept a nomination at Requests for adminship/nominate is "Change the time on your RfA page to indicate the current time." I can't figure out what this is referring to, though. I see an "End time", but no current time that I might change. Looking over other nominations' edit histories hasn't helped, and I can't find any other reference to this in the Guide or other pages. Am I missing something obvious? — Saxifrage ✎ 05:19, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
 * The time of ending of the RFA should be the time of listing the page on WP:RFA. List the nom on the main page, check the UTC time in the history, and change the ending time accordingly. – Chacor 05:20, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
 * That makes sense to me if I think of "time" as being only the clock time portion apart from the date. (I tend to think of "time" at Wikipedia meaning "timestamp", which includes the date.) If I'm understanding right, then if a nomination is accepted, say, three days after the nominator created it, the end-date should be increased by three days as well? — Saxifrage ✎ 05:28, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Technically it should be from the time of listing on the main WP:RFA page, actually, AFAIK. – Chacor 05:29, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I think we're saying the same thing, but I'm not sure. From what I understand, the Ending time and date should reflect when the nomination was listed rather than when it was created. Since the date on the nomination right now reflects when it was created, I would expect that it needs updating. Since changing the date isn't mentioned anywhere though, I'm doubting that line of reasoning. (Sorry, this is ending up being less quick than I hoped.) — Saxifrage ✎ 05:44, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Basically, all RFAs run for a minimum of seven days on the main page. Therefore, it's time of listing + one week. – Chacor 05:59, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes. It is NOT seven days from when the RfA is created. It is seven days after it is listed on the main page. That's what "change the time on your RfA page to indicate the current time" means. Grand  master  ka  06:05, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Right then, those answer my questions! Thank you both for your help. — Saxifrage ✎ 06:09, 28 October 2006 (UTC)