User talk:WereSpielChequers/Archive 28


 * This is my archive for RFA related threads from 2016 onwards. Previous RFA archives were up to early 2011 and early 2011 to the end of 2015.

Appreciation
Thanks for your recent support and for all the insightful comments you made. You pretty much said what I would have said if I had not chosen to hold my tongue. Widr (talk) 22:33, 26 March 2016 (UTC)
 * You are very welcome, there were some further comments that I managed to restrain myself from making, I think one person described you as barely qualified for autopatroller! But I tried to focus on nonsense that might have got traction. RFA does bring out some strange comments, and some people treat it as a zone exempt from NPA. One of these days I will create a "Hyperbole will destroy the world! Ask me how." userbox and link the first part to RFA and the second to a page of mine that I get my potential nominees to read. I just hope you won't be our newest admin for quite as long as the last one.  Ϣere  Spiel  Chequers  07:13, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

Telegram
you've got mail -- samtar whisper 15:50, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Replied  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  18:24, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

you've got mail -- samtar talk or stalk 17:39, 19 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Just a prod to say I've recently followed up --  samtar talk or stalk 14:18, 23 May 2016 (UTC)

RfA nom
Hi! I was reading through a few discussions on WT:RFA and thought I should look into doing another RfA. Since you nominated me last time, would you consider (co-)nominating me again? Like last time, I'd be focused on technical work, but also some AfD or uncontroversial CSD work. Thanks! APerson (talk!) 16:32, 12 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Hi APerson, great to here from you again. I passed on my second RFA so am very positive about multiple runs. However I've never nominated the same candidate more than once. I'm of the view that if my nomination didn't work someone else should be the nom next time. Sorry about that and good luck.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  16:36, 12 April 2016 (UTC)
 * No problem, and thanks for the response! APerson (talk!) 18:53, 12 April 2016 (UTC)

RfA criteria RfC
Hello WereSpielChequers, you've given some pretty good benefits to establishing criteria to look for in RfA candidates, and I'm convinced! I've got far too much time on my hands over the next few weeks, so would you like to run an RfC on the topic? I have absolutely no experience making RfCs on enwiki, and you have years of experience in the area, so it would probably be best if I didn't do something like that alone. Plus, you're a current admin, I'm just a nosy outsider with an interest in how wikis manage their advanced permissions :-) Ajraddatz (talk) 23:20, 27 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Hi Ajraddatz, not being an admin doesn't make you an outsider, except maybe on a training module in how to actually use the admin tools. I have a number of RFCs that I want to launch, and while this isn't the first or second it is on my list, but I'm a bit busy in real life for the next few weeks, and I'm not sure if there has been long enough since that specific idea was last mooted.  Ϣere  Spiel  Chequers  09:11, 28 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Well, as a steward and sysop on other projects I know how the admin tools work. I meant more that as an admin who's been active with RfA reform for a long while, you have more knowledge of the terrain and legitimacy to start an RfC than someone like me who's been active here for ~three months now. No concerns with self-serving (not that I want to be a local admin anyway - I spend enough time mashing buttons in other roles), and none of the other usual stigma facing non-admins here. If there hasn't been enough time since the last one failed then that would be a good reason to hold off for a while. If you ever do want to start one, then let me know, and I'd probably be glad to help organize it whenever it is more convenient and likely to pass. Ajraddatz (talk) 14:26, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

WT:RFA
So, I'm now 2 for 2 when it comes to people assuming bad faith when I make a suggestion regarding admin practices in general. First, at WP:AN, I asked if mass-checking accounts with IPBE really fit within the checkuser policy, suggesting that it didn't and maybe the practice should be modified. The checkusers that responded assumed that I was just trying to pick apart the actions of an individual checkuser. Now, I suggest a general confirmations process as a method of reducing the status associated with being an admin, and you respond by suggesting that I have a bone to pick with a particular admin, or want to do mass-desysoppings out of process?

I am honestly very confused over this. Why are people so quick to assume I have some sort of agenda? I've been active here for just about two months now - what agenda could I possibly have in that time? Most importantly - is there something in what I am saying that makes it look very suspicious? I'm not used to being a "newcomer" or so to speak; on meta and wikidata, people know me and don't jump to assume that I have some kind of nefarious plan in the making. Anyway, if you have any feedback on how my comments or formulated or what I can do to make them seem less confrontational here, I'd appreciate it. I've never experienced this problem before, and certainly don't want to continue to participate in those discussions if that's the impact it's going to have. Regards, Ajraddatz (talk) 20:38, 4 April 2016 (UTC)


 * As an aside, thinking back to my overall desire to have adminship be less of a big deal and status, you're right that confirmations and strict inactivity removal don't work towards that. I'd been considering confirmations already when looking at the steward processes and reform proposals for them, so my mind must have adopted that as kind of a paradigm. Ultimately I think that there are non-RfA reasons why we see the current types of behaviour at RfA, but I'm not really sure how to "fix" those, or what those really are... Ajraddatz (talk) 21:13, 4 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I'm not assuming bad faith, apologies if it came across that way. I've been following the RFA process for years, at least since we started talking about the drought in 2009 and seen innumerable attempts to get more admins sidetracked into attempts to get rid of more admins. I've listed two dozen of the the main proposals for change at User:WereSpielChequers/RFA reform. Why don't you have a read of that and tell me what you think? Fresh eyes might bring a fresh perspective.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  22:17, 4 April 2016 (UTC)
 * I must have read it to it too far; in that case, sorry for assuming the assumption of bad faith :P. I've read over your page, and it's a good read - thanks for linking it. Especially, I think your comments about confirmations are pretty good. While I still think they are useful for the steward role, for local sysops (which really shouldn't be a big deal), confirmations shouldn't be necessary.
 * On your page, you have a section for "training and evaluation", but it seems to be for after a user is already elected. What about a system where any user can become a temporary / training sysop for a month, under the supervision of another sysop? After the period of one month, they go to RfA, and people can evaluate them on how they act as an admin rather than basing comments on strange edit count metrics. Some vetting of candidates would need to happen of course, and trainee admins should stay away from the abuse filters. This is done on enwv, and while that community tends to be a cesspool of trolls, I wonder if that idea would work well here. I seem to remember the WMF saying that they wouldn't grant access to deleted revisions without an RfA, but that's frankly untrue and easy enough to convince them otherwise. Edit: Also reducing the standard for adminship, from 80 without issue to something like 60-70? I'm not sure the historical basis for the 70-80% discretionary range here. While a reduction would mean that people could get in with less community support, as you mention on your page, that is probably already the case for existing admins who might need re-election. Ajraddatz (talk) 00:01, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I've expanded the training and evaluation section. I think its main future is to make things easier of returning admins or admins who have not been sufficiently engaged to keep up with policy change or who are moving into new areas. Over the next few decades as we morph from a fifteen year old organisation to a fifty year old one so the need will increase to be able to welcome people back after a decade or two in a demanding career or bring up kids. I'm not convinced by the probationary sysop idea. Two of our biggest oppose camps are those who think that admins need to have first made some significant contributions to the pedia; and those who consider that looking at a candidate's deletion tagging they know all too well what would happen if that person got the delete button. We also have RFA !voters who deliberately go back a few months to check edits the candidate did before they started being cautious in advance of their RFA. None of those group are likely to be appeased by a probationary system. As for lowering the support requirements from the de facto 70-75% of the last few years, in December the threshold was lowered to 65-75%. Though it could be a while before we have many examples where that makes a real difference. Those who pass usually get much greater support than that and those who fail much less.  Ϣere  Spiel  Chequers  14:23, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
 * That makes sense. To be completely honest, the topic of RfA reform isn't something I want to spend much time on, though it's an interesting topic to think on. We both seem to agree that adminship should be less of a big deal, and more accessible. If confirmations don't accomplish this (which they most likely don't), and a probationary period would not be appreciated (I can see that as well, people opposing a candidate with a month's experience due to issues before, and that's fine), maybe establishing criteria is the most helpful step. Anyway, I should probably move on to more productive things, and HighInBC's continuing insistence that I name names or have an axe to grind would seem to confirm this. Have a good one, Ajraddatz (talk) 16:09, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

Comments regarding User:WereSpielChequers/RFA reform
This is a good document. It's nice to see something in this form.

A few notes --Hammersoft (talk) 15:31, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
 * RFA is broken point #2; it is very uncertain as to what number of administrators we need to keep the site running properly. Nobody really knows. We do know that bots have had a very significant effect on this. I think eventually we will have to rely on ClueBot do block new accounts/IPs. ClueBot does phenomenal job as is. Not perfect, but it's at least on par with humans now.
 * Qualifications; There's a nebulous character to all of this. I can assert I would pass all these criteria, and can even prove some of it. Yet, I know beyond a shadow of doubt that it is impossible for me to pass RfA. I tell things like that are, and have no interest in gaining friends on Wikipedia. The result is I'm unpopular. That's fine by me, but means it is impossible for me to become an administrator. I know you address the popularity contest aspect of RfA. But more to the point, we should be allowing people to be admins who have a demonstrated track record of commitment to the project, not doing damage to it, and having enthusiasm for the final product. We're very, very far removed from that right now.
 * Crat decision: I change the range to 65-75, vice 70-75. I think you know about the recent changes.
 * Upbundling; while bureaucrats have a lot less to do these days with global renaming coming to the table, I don't think they would take this on. Recent objections to related topics have included the fact that bureaucrats were not appoint to their roles to do this.
 * Voting rights: 2015_administrator_election_reform/Phase_I/RfC shot that down, 3-1.
 * Optional pre-vetting: You might want to add Requests for adminship/Optional RfA candidate poll to this.
 * Research: Indeed. We need considerably more research. Of note; I once did an analysis of 20 administrators who had lost admin status due to an RFAR. Only one had an RfA that was below the 75% threshold for bureaucrat scrutiny to come into play. One. 15 of 20 scored 90% or better at RfA. From this (albeit limited) data, it appears RfA is a terrible predictor of problematic administrators.
 * Make it easier to remove the mop: You might want to link to Requests for de-adminship


 * Regarding the number administrators we need, I do note that there are currently articles in the speedy deletion queue which have been there for eight days and counting. Just one data point of course, but I do think in general we need more admins (or even better, give qualified non-admins the right to perform non-controversial deletions.). Thparkth (talk) 15:51, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Data collection...I've been thinking it would be nice to have a bot that kept track of various queues and their statuses, recording the data somewhere. --Hammersoft (talk) 16:56, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
 * I agree that reports on queues would give some warning of when particular shortages were going, and especially on how long it takes us to delete G10s and respond to AIV reports. But I'd prefer that the debate was about what sort of community we want rather than how close we are to the minimum. There are two philosophies as to how many admins we should aim for. One focuses on the minimum, how many admins contributing how many hours of their time do we need to keep this site running smoothly. The other philosophy is that this should be a self governing community where every clueful member of the community who wants to be an admin is or can become so with a not unreasonable amount of effort. I'm very much in the latter camp. I will sometimes use or support arguments about particular shortages, especially when there is an RFA candidate who I think merits the mop, but I leave it to others to research that. I fear that to talk in terms of how few admins we could run the site with is to accept the idea of mops being scarce and expensive, without a philosophy of governance to go with that.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  14:35, 6 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Your differentiation between the two philosophies is an excellent point. We do need to be liberally giving out the mop to clueful people. There is what I think an irrational fear that unless a candidate is near perfect they will cause irreparable harm. While harm can be caused, we have to remember we are a wiki; almost anything can be undone. I don't think there's ever been a case of an administrator going bonkers and causing enormous harm. Mild harm, yes. But I don't think there's been a case where harm was caused that was not reparable. Given that, we should not be fearing promoting admins who don't fit various metrics. Those metrics have never been shown to have any correlation to administrator success. Administrator "success" isn't even defined in any objective terms. Yet, people are absolutely certain they know what requirements a person needs to meet to be an administrator. I'm going to call you out as an example, one of hundreds, of this issue; User:WereSpielChequers/RFA criteria. If we are to liberally give out the mop to clueful editors, then criteria like this are anathema. I think long before we come up with criteria for what people need to become an administrator, we need to define what a good administrator looks like. Even if it were done in subjective terms, it would be a far cry from the empty vacuum we have now.
 * Then of course there's the way things are (and, sadly, is unlikely to change). The philosophy of how many admins we need to keep the project up. This approach is akin to declaring an emergency and mustering assets to avert disaster. Sure, it helps, but fails to address the underlying problem of what caused the emergency in the first place. I've long noted that Wikipedia is in decline. I don't need to go on about this here; my userpage has a number of sections noting this issue. Suffice it to say for this discussion that I believe it :) Given that, trying to anticipate when we'll drive off the cliff might help spur the community into thinking about ways to avert disaster. Having some quantifiable measurements, over time, of various administrator backlogs can help identify our key problems. This might help us to identify solutions not currently in place; perhaps an unbundled userright to help address the most egregious issues, or a new admin bot to do the same. This data would help to focus our efforts. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:36, 6 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your comments Hammersoft. I've made several updates. As for your own chances of passing RFA, I'd be happy to discuss that by email, I think such discussions are better done off wiki. My experience is that more fear RFA than really need to, and most regulars who think they can't pass RFA could within months if they made certain changes. On the broader point of RFA results predicting whether people make good admins, you need to allow for the fact that most successful RFAs are very successful indeed. I'm not sure if it is more than 75% of all passes that are by >90% but both this year's have been, along with a clear majority of last years. I'm pretty sure that very few passes have been in the discretionary zone. If the norm was a narrow pass and >90% was rare then you'd be right that RFA was a terrible predictor of bad admins, I think the last time it was looked at there was a small correlation. My suspicion is that the borderline candidates get heavily scrutinised and some of the near unanimous ones would fail if they were more heavily scrutinised.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  14:35, 6 April 2016 (UTC)
 * To be clear; (1) I don't fear RfA. I never have. (2)(a) I've little desire to be an administrator. This sums up some of my philosophy on the point. (b) There is a considerable segment of this community that hold an admin's status hostage against them. Even ArbCom does this. I've seen them strip someone of adminship for something that had nothing to do with the use of tools, but simply because they did something bad. Not being an admin gives me considerable freedom I would not otherwise have. Case in point; I'm a very heavy critic of ArbCom (as a body; not any individual). I know of a few ArbCom members, past and present, who would like to see my head on a platter. But, there's nothing they can do about it in part because I am not an admin. (c) I have eschewed having any special userrights below (yes, below) editor. Doing so allows me the perspective of an editor new to the project who runs into problems because they are part of the great unwashed, the heathens who built this project.
 * I may look into assembling some more data regarding 'bad' admins. It may help to inform future discussions.
 * Sorry to get so long winded. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:36, 6 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Point taken. I believe that many who could pass are deterred by RFA's reputation, happy to consider you an exception. As for ARBCOM and the defence of not being an admin, there are some cases which support your "gadfly" view, and others that support the rival "Super Mario" theory. My belief is that ARBCOM is so inconsistent that both the gadfly and Super Mario theories can be proved or disproved depending on the incident you look at. I would add though that if one is going to criticise ARBCOM or even just check what is happening, then sometimes it helps to be able to see deleted edits (Sometimes it doesn't, there are at least three cases where I doubt if I will ever understand how ARBCOM came to the decision they made).
 * One really useful bit of extra research would be around AIV and the 24 hour clock. Anecdotally we have increasing numbers of incidents where AIV has no admins for half an hour or even more, how to measure that and work out most likely hours for such gaps.
 * Another would be to look at the effect of removal of tools on reactivation. One theory is that removing tools from accounts would make people less likely to return, another is that removing the tools from an account reminds people they are Wikipedians. Return rate by length of gap over time would be good to have, especially before and after we started to autodesysop.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  17:16, 7 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Interesting comparison of gadfly/mario situations. If you think I haven't been long winded enough already, just ask me to talk about ArbCom :) More to the RfA/Admin issues...
 * Yeah, AIV is a problem from my perspective. But, that's subjective. A bot's data collection might be interesting. I think I'll make a request for something to monitor that and a few other backlogs. WP:UAA comes to mind. The bot that removes people from that list when they are blocked just now reported 38 users left on it . That's just the user reported problems. There's another 48 in the bot reported ones, so 86 reports total reports that need to be processed. The oldest bot reported is coming up on 4 days old. Oldest user reported is 5 days old. The turnaround on these should be minutes, at most hours. These accounts are often disruptive in one form or another.
 * Yeah uncertain about the removals/return stuff. There's just so many factors at play it is difficult to isolate. We do need better data. I've long argued that so many proposals come forward as the next great idea, but without groundwork being done. We need this data. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:04, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

I've made a request for a data recording bot at Bot_requests. Please feel free to add on to or modify the request. --Hammersoft (talk) 14:22, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

RfA 2016
Unless there';s a stampede toward the end of the year, it looks as if we're going to close 2016  with  yet another near  50% drop over the previous year. None of 's December 2015 changes have affected the trend or encouraged more candidates to come forward. You can now plot when there will be no  more new admins, so by the end of 2018 a new solution must be in place and up and running. Someone more adept at stats can factor in the attrition and the theoretical desysops 'for cause' and plot when we'll have only a handful left  who  are not likely to  retire soon. Which is more worrying than it looks on paper because already very few admins are what I consider truly active. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 10:41, 15 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Hi Kudpung, It is a little more complex than that. In the last few years, 2013 had a slight rally and 2015 was almost a reprise of 2014. If you take out those two years then yes 2008 to 2016 shows a year on year decline of a third to a half in new admins. No telling yet whether 2017 will be an exception year like two of the last four or a trend year like 2014 was and 2016 looks set to be. As for when our remaining admins retire and when our need for admins outstrips our admin numbers, I will leave such speculation to those who for some unexplained reason think that mops are expensive and should be scarce and have an as yet unexplained theory of community governance. I remain of the opinion that mops cost nothing and should be given to all longterm clueful, civil contributors. To me we already have a problem, have had a problem since early 2008 and the focus on when we run out of admins to keep the site running is a distraction from that problem.  On the bigger picture the mystery 2015/16 editing rally has run its course but left us with more editors saving >100 edits a month in mainspace than in 2014. So the pool of candidates is growing at least as fast as admins are leaving, and a qualified candidate can still get circa 90%. I suspect the problem with the last batch of reforms is that one of them has gone sour and cancelled out all the gains from the rest. Light weight pre vetting has turned into something akin to AFC. Diverting candidates who would have run and might have passed into a process that has higher standards than RFA. Perhaps we can reform that or at least nominate the candidates it has flushed out.  Ϣere  Spiel  Chequers  11:52, 15 October 2016 (UTC)


 * These are the people who scored at least an average of 7.0 at the pre-RfA pool. Some of them much higher who have still not run although they should (I would nominate a couple of them). Some earlier pre-poll candidates by now will have better chances than ever. Wouldn't it be fun if we could get half of them to all run at the same time? It would be like the old days, and it might even encourage a whole lot more editors of the right calibre to step forward. Thoughts?

* Already an admin *  also already an admin --  samtar talk or stalk 08:03, 17 October 2016 (UTC)

Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 05:31, 17 October 2016 (UTC)
 * That is 21 editors who would probably pass RFA, and we only had 21 passes in the whole of 2015. If we could get those people to run or nominators to nominate them then we could at least stabilise RFA - we might even get pre vetting to work if there were nominators active there. On the down side I already have a candidate I've promised to vet and am personally unlikely to nominate more than one of these before christmas. At the best of times I don't nominate more than a candidate a month and I'm a bit preoccupied elsewhere at present. Can you think of other nominators who we could ask to look at this lot?  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  05:59, 17 October 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm in the process of contacting them all. I've already had an email from Cullen who is unfortunately tied up in RL at the moment. I'll see what the others say and if any of them are ready I'll nominate some and organise some other nominators too.Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 07:46, 17 October 2016 (UTC)

I'm slightly more optimistic, in that there have been RfA candidates this year who got in such as Oshwah who I think got "oppose" votes from both Kudpung and myself but still passed. So there's at least once instance where Biblioworm's changes worked. Rehman's RfA seems to be going better than it might have been 4-5 years ago, so that's an obvious improvement. I was in talks with Schwede66 some time back about putting a nomination together, but it stalled because we couldn't pinpoint a specific requirement for the tools, and I have sounded out Sparklism (as has ) but I don't think he's interested. Incidentally, I did take up your suggestion of taking the kids to HMS Belfast yesterday and we all had a great time. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont)  13:01, 17 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Hi Ritchie, glad to hear about the Belfast, the Tower and the Imperial War Museum are both close to it. I think Rehman would have been closer to 100% if he equivalent sort of editor had run four or five years ago, but I'll admit to being a little biased on that one. More to the point there are some opposes or at least questions that are more relevant to Arbcom "if you were running for Arbcom rather than RFA what would be your views on this toxic battle that you have thus far stayed out of". Unfortunately they seem to skip the "if you were running for Arbcom rather than RFA" bit of the question. I'm also worried that content contributor is being stretched to the point of not disputing that someone earned autopatroller x years ago but still taking the opportunity of RFA being sort of exempt from RFA to say someone isnt a content contributor. Then there's the business of creating articles from scratch. As an unashamed inclusionist I use RFA to keep the deletion button away from those who haven't got it. But at RFA I don't give two hoots if someone has never started an article in their life, especially if they have gone through the unreferenced stubs of a wikiproject and referenced, merged or prodded them.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  14:28, 17 October 2016 (UTC)
 * I have received replies already from most of the editors on my list. While I'm impressed with their rapidity of response, most of them feel they are not ready to run or have RL commitments. Clearly the climate at RfC is not encouraging them either. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 02:24, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
 * I think this is a golden moment issue. Hopefully some of those people will come back to you when the timing looks good for them. We need to nominate people when they are ready to run, not some months after they had got ready.  To make pre vetting work we need potential nominators to go to that site when they are ready to nominate someone and see if there is a candidate there who is suitable for them to nominate. If we can do that I think we can increase the number of successful RFAs - it is generating a prospect pool of potential admins we just need to make a bridge between pre vetting and RFA  Ϣere  Spiel  Chequers  07:23, 18 October 2016 (UTC)

Hello WereSpielChequers, Kudpung, and the RfA community. Kudpung's message has made me give this matter serious consideration. I have slowed my editing in recent months since I have taken a new, demanding job, but I would be honored if one of you would nominate me. My RL work will slow down by mid-November, so perhaps my RfA could begin Saturday, November 19th? I only hope that I honor the nominator and the community should I be given this role. (P.S. Everyone of course knows about the list of administrator hopefuls?) All the best, —Prhartcom ♥ 14:38, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

No one has replied. That's fine. If anyone wants to nominate me next year some time, that's fine too. If you'd like to know the meaning of my username, click User:Prhartcom. Best, —Prhartcom ♥ 13:26, 21 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Hi, thanks for your interest. I was out yesterday and I know Kudpung is a bit preoccupied at present. I have a short queue of potential nominees that could take me a few weeks to review and guide, hopefully it won't take me until next year and maybe Kudpung would be available before then.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  20:40, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

RfA
There are a lot of RfA on the go right now (waiting for your votes too...). Quite like the old times! Like you, people keep telling me I should run for 'crat. But I'm still far too active (and noisy). Happy New Year! Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 23:35, 4 January 2017 (UTC)
 * And a Happy New Year to you too. Unlike my family, RFA is certainly looking healthier than for a while. Most of those RFAs are too far from the discretionary zone for me to spend time assessing an unfamiliar candidate, or enough time to assess them sufficiently to !vote. Plus I'm one of the few members of the SpielChequers temporarily enlarged household not to be afflicted with a nasty cough, in case it is a virus I feel I should limit myself online this week. I suspect we are both too invested in the RFA process to make Crat, years of trying to shift the community consensus on RFA is not an ideal prelude to fairly and neutrally determining community consensus on contentious RFAs. Even if both of us are quite capable of going into the oppose column when appropriate.  Ϣere  Spiel  Chequers  17:48, 5 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I hope everyone gets better soon - not that the current climate at RfA is in any danger of improving in spite of a spate of courageous candidates! Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 23:38, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

RfA
Hello! i spotted you in this list stating that you are willing to nominate people satisfying your criteria. So, since I was thinking of going for it in about a month, I would like to request your opinion.--Kostas20142 (talk) 11:58, 4 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Hello Kostas and thanks for your interest. Yes I'm looking for RFA candidates, but as I said on that list, they need to meet my criteria. My nomination criteria are higher and more arbitrary than my support criteria - I haven't looked at your account in detail, but if your first edit was in August last year I might be willing to support you but I'm not ready to nominate you. That isn't because I take a view as to whether you would be a good admin, but because I doubt the community would be ready to support you until you have been here longer, and I don't like to nominate when I think it will be close. I can only think of one recent candidate who passed in their first 12 months and that was tight. Also I have a little bit of a queue at the moment. But if you can hold off until late July email me then and if I'm free I'll review your edits.  Ϣere  Spiel  Chequers  16:41, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

Your RFA comment and my reply there
Just now I realised my answer to your comment to my oppose vote may have sounded more spikey than intended. I mean, I see your point. Basically it's my point too. Because there's hardly any activity in admin related areas, it's impossible for me to judge how well Vin understands CSD/AFD/UAA/etc criteria. Just wanted to clear that up. Cheers,  Y intan  10:25, 15 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Well we both would up in the Oppose column, though with different rationales. I'd have been happy to support if the page protection requests and AIV reports were more justified, Admin time is in short supply and someone who can decide when to protect and when not would be useful. I'm OK giving the tools out to longterm users who I think will use them well, and while I appreciate that there are some who want admins who have qualified by a certain route, I remember admin coaching and I prefer candidates who are established editors offering to help with admin stuff - there's no shortage of things needing doing. If someone is involved in deletion then I tend to be wary in case their tags show that they might be overly heavy on the deletion button. This may be the first time I've opposed for protectionism. Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  08:49, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

RfA this year
We’re at the end of the 5th month of this year already (gosh, how time flies!) and although we had 9 new admins in January we seem to be back at the ‘new’ monthly average. Thus with 7 months still to go we’ll probably do slightly better than last year, but it won’t be anything to get exited about. I see the same old perennial discussions going on at WT:RfA as if the topics have never been discussed before. Why don’t people just read WP:RFA2011 where all the work was already done for them? Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 20:34, 26 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Hi Kudpung. Yes, the last four months have been a disappointment in raw numbers, but we've had one RFA that has reset the arbitrary and unhelpful editcountitis standard, and whilst the UAA question fad is unhelpful, it is one of the most harmless of these RFA fads that I've seen. Also a certain badsite isn't trolling us even when we have a female candidate running. With more than half the year yet to go I'm still cautiously optimistic that we can do better than last year. January of this year may turn out an isolated rally, but at least it shows such rallies are possible. We shouldn't give up hope for the possibility of similar months again.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  13:42, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

RfA

 * You are among the best, so your support has special meaning to me. Cullen328  Let's discuss it  05:56, 24 July 2017 (UTC)
 * You are most welcome, thanks for those kind words.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  21:51, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

Thanks
Thank you for taking the time to consider my candidacy at RfA. I appreciate the time you took to craft such a detailed statement and also for taking further time to participate in discussion with other users. Know that the feedback that you and other editors have offered me has been heard. I am not sure it will change my mind but it's definitely given me food for thought. And I very much hope in the spirit of WP:MUSHROOM that I will not spiral into inclusion or deletion but will instead continue to act in the ways that caused the community to express support in me. Know that if you have further feedback or concerns in the future that my door is always open. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 02:31, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Your commentary on RfA in the 2019-12-27 Signpost
I thought what you said was well thought out and right on the money. I wish I had a brilliant idea about how to fix the process. I have been an admin for almost 14 years (I see you have been one about as long) and I am not sure I could make it through the process. I have a very simple criteria when judging an RfA, can this user be trusted to not abuse the tools? Anyhow, thanks for a well stated commentary. --rogerd (talk) 20:03, 27 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi Roger, thanks, that's very kind of you. You have been an admin longer than I've been an editor, I started editing in 2007 and became an admin in 2009. One of my concerns at the moment is that the reputation of RFA is such that perfectly good candidates don't run, or don't run until they are so clearly qualified that they pass almost unanimously.  Ϣere Spiel  Chequers  11:38, 29 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Perfectly true, but it's not so much a 'reputation' as what it actually is. Any potential candidate doing their homework and checking out a bunch of RfA is going to reach the obvious conclusion. I doesn't need people to sow doom & gloom ! Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 16:04, 29 December 2019 (UTC)
 * WSC and Kudpung, I completely agree with you and I wish I knew what we could do to bring those potential candidates people in who don't even try. <500 is a very small number for such a large project, especially when a lot of those admins who are "active" are not doing a lot of admin work (like me). --rogerd (talk) 19:54, 29 December 2019 (UTC)