Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Ad Orientem

MartinZ02's oppose
This is getting out of hand. This new user has repeatedly cited his extreme requirements as a reason to oppose, his stats indicate he opposes more for the same reasons, lack of 25 created articles, but supports 2 candidates, with the rationale "we need more admins". He has received advice from 2 different users about it and has chosen to ignore it. He never elaborates on the same reason he gives on opposing when other users ask about it. I think it's time this user's presence on RfA is discussed, and what, if anything, should be done about it. Inviting User:Kudpung to this discussion.

I'm not proposing a topic ban or anything, I will let the course of the discussion decide that, but I do think we should discuss it at least. Thoughts?

User:MartinZ02 please do chime in as I would like to hear from you about this.

As an FYI, I am a neutral uninvolved observer.—cyber power  Merry Christmas:Unknown 23:48, 20 December 2016 (UTC)
 * We have editors saying that they plan to put editors' oppose comments on their left leaning bias list, but a poorly-reasoned oppose that will be discounted by the crats is what we're worried about?- MrX 00:09, 21 December 2016 (UTC)
 * That's not what I'm discussing about. People can be left or right all they want, it's not my argument, and it's not anything I've observed.  I'm trying to discuss my perceived observation on MartinZ02's oppose.  If you want to bring up left an right issues, please start a new section below.—cyber power  Merry Christmas:Unknown 00:22, 21 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Politically or ideologically motivated opposes should be discounted by crats as well - we have had people whining about candidate being "controversial" in RfA before, when they just held different beliefs or failed to be sufficiently politically correct by some arbitrary standard. I agree with Cyberpower678 that someone needs to hand a bag of clues to this 14-year old RfA participant or limit his participation, as he is basically wasting everyone's time with his unreasonable criteria/reasoning. I don't understand much about template editing myself, but certainly can use admin tools competently to block vandals or delete crap in template namespace. Opposition based on belief that admins who have never had the autopatrolled flag might end up getting their new articles deleted is even more ludicrous. Problem with RfA is the impossibly high standards and partisan/wikilawyering opposes, not that we promote total incompetents. jni (delete)...just not interested 11:10, 21 December 2016 (UTC)
 * As some of you might have noticed, I want candidates to be able to use all of the admin tools. This is because said tools come as a complete package, I think editors should only be granted tools if they know how to use them, and if they want a package of tools, they should be able to properly use all of those tools. Hypothetically, if a candidate requests adminship because that person wants to edit the main page, should we really give that person the ability to block or delete, despite not having any idea about how to use the latter tools? There's also the possibility that a potential candidate—who's interested in using several admin tools—claims to only be interested in using one of the tools, because that would increase the chances of their RFA succeeding. I can elaborate further if this isn't enough. —MartinZ02 (talk) 21:55, 21 December 2016 (UTC)
 * There is a trust aspect here that you're not accounting for. We are giving our trust to the admin hopeful that they will use the tools they know how to use, and either not use, or, learn to use the tools they don't. No admin knows how to use all the tools. Template editing for example has been handed out to less than 150 non-admins total. Most (95% at least) would never have done much template editing before or even after getting the tools. Imagine if I were to take away your computer because you didn't know how to overclock your CPU, install a new hard drive, write in html, etc, etc. Similar if not exactly the same with our admins. We let some admins handle vandalism, some handle CSD and AFD, some handle our templates, others handle disputes, edit-warring, etc. Our admins are specialists who use the tools for specific duties. If all admins had to be "jacks of all trades" then we'd have "masters of none". One of the support rationales I'm seeing recently is that adminship is no big deal and that "a demonstrated need for the tools" is not a requirement. It never has been. Our earliest sysops just e-mailed Jimbo and received the tools if they were active positive contributors. That was satisfactory enough for the founder, but, it's not for us. I do expect some level of demonstrated need, but, not all tools and all jobs. There's too many. They would become full time unpaid employees. Keep in mind that our admins, are normal contributors who are volunteering their time to help out the project where they know how. They have lives beyond Wikipedia, jobs, families, other duties. No admin, not one, knows how to use all of the tools or do all of the jobs. I defy you to find me a single admin who claims otherwise. Mr rnddude (talk) 23:00, 21 December 2016 (UTC)
 * People have told me that before, and still I stand by my beliefs—I'll explain why later. —MartinZ02 (talk) 00:02, 22 December 2016 (UTC)
 * You may want to explain it now rather than later. You're a new editor, a young one, and are lacking a serious amount of WP:Clue which can land you in hot water at some point.—cyber power  Merry Christmas:Unknown 00:34, 22 December 2016 (UTC)
 * It's currently 2:10 am where I live, so I should actually be sleeping, which is why I said I'm going to do it later; but, due to a comment posted a few hours ago, I can't really sleep anyway, so I might just do it now instead. —MartinZ02 (talk) 01:18, 22 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Well, it's been 2 days with still no explanation.—cyber power  Merry Christmas:Unknown 16:09, 23 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm busy. I'll explain sometime before the RFA ends. —MartinZ02 (talk) 18:01, 23 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I won't be able to explain today, so I'll strike my !vote.

MartinZ02, the problem is that for most candidates, the level of familiarity with every possible tool that an administrator might use, or task that an administrator might perform, is not possible. I've been editing for more than 10 years and I have never seen such a candidate. I became an administrator in January 2007 and in all that time I have not performed every possible administrator task on this project&mdash;do you think I should resign because I'm still an amateur at template syntax? It's no more valid to say that we shouldn't allow an editor to register unless he or she shows ability to edit articles about anime and about vector calculus and about African villages and about 19th century legal history and about Pokémon and about Star Trek and about complex number theory and about the ancient civilizations of the Aztecs and Incas, because any editor is permitted to edit articles about any or all of these things. We trust editors to stick to areas they are knowledgeable and competent to write about, and we trust qualified candidates for adminships to stick to the aspects of administrator work they are knowledgeable and competent to perform. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:17, 21 December 2016 (UTC)
 * My personal criteria: the candidate needs at least a PhD about the influence of Mayan division algorithms on Ace attorney. Tigraan Click here to contact me 08:35, 22 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Doesn't seem like a big deal to me. It's just their opinion. If one of MartinZ02's criteria is not considered a very good one, then it should just get a low weight in the consideration of all factors. If one really doesn't like one of MartinZ02's criteria, then one doesn't have to read it. Nothing should be done except to continue to let MartinZ02 voice their opinion. – ishwar  (speak)  08:57, 24 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I can read your comment two ways, either of which I disagree with: "RfA is a vote, hence you don't need to provide a good rationale for your vote" - in which case, no, technically RfA is not a vote, per WP:RFA (see "Discussion, decision, and closing procedures"), or "Let bureaucrats discount the irrelevant !votes", in which case, they are entitled to their opinion, but they are not immune from criticism for it - why do we even have a discussion section at all if no rebuttal of arguments is allowed. Tigraan Click here to contact me 21:16, 27 December 2016 (UTC)


 * No, I didn't say that one shouldn't provide a good rationale. And, I'm not saying that MartinZ02's rationale is good or bad. It's just a rationale. Whether it's good or bad depends on some evaluation of the rationale, which may differ for different people.


 * I also didn't say that one can't rebut arguments. One can and should do so if warranted.


 * I also didn't say anything about voting.


 * It seems to me like some are trying to prevent MartinZ02 from expressing their opinion because they don't like the opinion. Seems unnecessary. The merit or demerit of any rationale can speak for itself. In other words, I'm challenging folks to justify their desired censorship. – ishwar  (speak)  21:51, 27 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks for clarifying. I disagree with your relativistic view that no rationale is inherently good or bad, but that was not the focus of your comment anyways. I am not among those asking for a topic ban, but there are certainly arguments for "censoring" (see WP:FREE, by the way, if you meant "censorship" literally). If an editor's contributions prove a net negative to the collaborative process, and they ignore consensual warnings to stop, they may be subject to sanctions on the grounds of disruptive editing. The point is not so much to remove the opinion here where it has already been expressed and generated a wall of text, but rather to prevent the creation of another wall of text in a future RfA. Tigraan Click here to contact me 22:11, 27 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Ok. Cool. Just for further clarification, I'll also point out that I didn't say that all rationales are neither good or bad. I only said that I wasn't making a judgment call on MartinZ02's rationale. I'm aware that Wikipedia censors opinions. So, to be clear, MartinZ02's position doesn't strike me as completely unreasonable so as to prevent them from trying to express that concern out of hand. Obviously, if lots of folks disagree and want to prevent that opinion from being expressed, then they can do so. My comment is merely a single opposition to that. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ish ishwar (talk • contribs)

FYI...
Bureaucrats' noticeboard. Lourdes 12:04, 24 December 2016 (UTC)

Post hoc comment on sourcing
While I did not get into concerns raised about the candidate's sourcing choices, I do want to quibble with the idea that ever citing Ancestry.com is somehow a WP:RS no-no. It has to be evaluated on a cite-by-cite basis. The site provides many things, only some of which are WP:UGC. Many other things on the site are the direct equivalent of WikiSource, Project Gutenberg, etc.: scans and OCR of actual manuscript materials. I've cited it for this very purpose myself. Don't confuse the content being sourced with the hostname of the site the copy was provisioned from; our citation templates have a via parameter for a reason. This is essentially the same judgement call as citing something on YouTube; a large amount of material on that site is user-generated, unreliable blather, but that is not the only thing to be found there. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  13:57, 26 December 2016 (UTC)