Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 91

Second attempt at moving forward
If we hope to move towards RfA reform, I believe it's important that we start by making sure we can agree on what the objectives of RfA 2.0 should be. I feel that without such an agreement there's really no hope of achieving anything beyond an unproductive shouting match. One of my chief concerns (and I know I'm not alone) is that the discussion on this page has often turned very dogmatic ("voting is the only way to be fair", "we don't do voting on Wikipedia because it's evil" etc.) whereas it should be adressed in purely pragmatic terms. RfA is one of the most critical processes on Wikipedia and all we want is an efficient system that ends up giving adminship to people who will use it wisely. Here's my own finding of facts and I hope this can be the basis of a discussion that will help us plan future evolution of the process. Pascal.Tesson 16:49, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * 1) There are not enough admins on the English Wikipedia. The situation is not catastrophic but it would be preferable to have more admins.
 * 2) The current RfA process is pretty grueling for candidates and so a number of good candidates are probably hesitant to go ahead with RfA. (note that this last bit is pretty speculative)
 * 3) Because bad admins can really hurt the project and because it's very difficult to desysop, it's more important to minimize the number of false positives than the number of false negatives.
 * 4) The current system has very few false positives, probably too much so.
 * 5) Clique voting is routine in the current system. However, cliques won't go away, no matter what system we use.
 * 6) We should have a system that ensures that more people participate so that the overall importance of cliques is reduced.
 * 7) It's the b'crats responsibility to determine the outcome of RfAs. Nevertheless, the system should be such that the result is not overly dependent on which b'crat closes a particular RfA. In particular, b'crats shouldn't participate in closing RfAs they've participated in.
 * 8) The RfA process should ideally be fair (candidates are all treated the same), simple (easy to participate in), friendly (format that avoids mud-slinging and is not unnecessarily stressful for all those involves) and transparent (easy to understand on what basis candidates are/aren't promoted).


 * The thesis begins, in my opinion, poorly. You say, "RfA is one of the most critical processes". That's incorrect. It's been made into a major social arena, and has gained the patina of being critical. It isn't. Adminship used to be given out liberally to almost anyone who wanted it. Approvals were done with barely any input, and on the mailing list no less, in a generally disorganized manner. No significant harm was ever caused to the project by this. What has become critical is the massive barrier that RfA has become to the proper functioning of the project. The process should in no respect ever be "critical" to its proper functioning. Responding point for point.
 * Agreed.
 * Agreed, except we have evidence of this. It's not speculative; it's just difficult to assess how much this is affecting potential candidates.
 * Bad admins can't really hurt the project. We have just had ample proof of that, with a nutsoid admin being shutdown in minutes, and their impact undone in very short order. It's little different than a vandal going crazy, except they can affect the main page and block people. Nothing that can't be undone. If we presume that bad admins can hurt the project, then the same logic applies to vandals and we should ban anyone from editing until they prove themselves trustworthy! :)
 * The current system has proven itself incapable of preventing false positives. Of the admins who have forcibly been de-adminned, almost all of them had heavy support well above 75% in their RfAs. RfA can not predict the future, nor should we expect it to. Further, we shouldn't expect any system to replace it to be capable of doing so.
 * Cliques can be readily de-emphasized, by allowing bureaucrats to do the job they were put in place to do.
 * See last response. Also, more people just means more cliques.
 * Unless you have a strict vote bases system, you can not avoid bureaucrats having an impact on the close.
 * Lofty, and commendable. Except, when a person is being affected by the outcome, stress can't really be avoided except for unanimous support RfAs. --Durin 17:03, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * When active vandals outnumber active editors, I must question the wisdow of the idea that adminship should be "given out liberally to almost anyone who want[s] it".


 * Agreed.
 * Agreed.
 * Agree with Pascal. Bad admins can hurt the project. However, bad admins are not the ones that delete the main page; they're the ones that push POV on certain articles, are quick to block users, and who ignore consensus and policy when they think they can get away with it. The ones that go on a spree are not as much a problem as the ones that deliberately or otherwise drive off potential or current editors.
 * The current system has few false positives and I doubt any other system could do better.
 * Agree with Pascal. Re Durin: your statement presumes that a bureaucrat can't be a member of a clique.
 * Agree with Pascal. More participation means better representation of the community.
 * Completely agree with Pascal.
 * Agree with Pascal and Durin. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 17:17, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Thx for the reply Durin. It's a shame we disagree but it's probably good to clear this up because it's no surprise we disagree on reform ideas if we disagree on even more fundamental issues. I have to agree with Black Falcon about what constitutes a "bad admin". If the only problem we had with admins was deletion of the main page, why we could almost give every new user admin rights and only take them away if they commit deliberate attempts to harm the project. We're long past the time when everyone working on Wikipedia knew one another and RfA should take this into account imo. I'll go out on a limb here and say that your view that adminship should be given out liberally to almost anyone who wants it is very much a minority view. Pascal.Tesson 17:26, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not going to go out on that limb with you. Jimbo stated this is the way things should be, and still holds to that opinion. Wikipedia is not a democracy, and I prefer to follow Jimbo's vision in the vast majority of cases. As to the bad admins being what Black Falcon describes; non-admins are equally capable of running people off the project. You don't need the admin bit to do that. I've seen this happen over and over and over again. Running people off the project is not the sole purview of admins. In fact, it's not typified by "bad admin". It's typified by "bad editor". We can not cure the ills of the project from "bad admins" (of this flavor) by making RfA more restrictive. In fact, very much the opposite. The very notion that you can protect the community by making RfA more exclusive is flawed. See my note earlier where I noted that the admins who have been forcibly de-adminned by and large cleared RfA with flying colors. RfA can't predict the future. Attempting to make it do so is pointless and hopelessly flawed. --Durin 17:31, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Re: "When active vandals outnumber active editors, I must question the wisdow of the idea that adminship should be "given out liberally to almost anyone who want[s] it". (Black Falcon)
 * Then you stand in disagreement with Jimbo, who founded the project. --Durin 17:27, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I have no problems being in disagreement with Jimbo and I'm not even so sure in any case that Jimbo still believes that adminship should be given out liberally to almost anyone who wants it. I'd also like to note two important things: first, I'm not saying that we need to make RfA more restrictive and in fact I thought it was sort of clear that I favor a process that promotes more admins. Secondly, I'd like to point out that "Wikipedia is not a democracy" is by far the most misquoted bit of WP:NOT. Certainly, it was never meant to be interpreted as "when there's a disagreement, we turn to Jimbo" or "when we disagree, we just wait until someone forcibly imposes something and then we say that's ok because actually making decisions in a collegial manner, well that would be democracy and we are not a democracy." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pascal.Tesson (talk • contribs) 17:45, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * You and I disagree Pascal. I think I finally managed to figure that out, even if I am a blithering idiot. --Durin 17:49, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Ah yes, it's good to know a 100kb of discussion finally yielded a valuable piece of information! Cheers, Pascal.Tesson 17:51, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Boy, can't you even get BASIC facts correct? This page is already 256kb large. Not 100kb! You blithering idiot! :) Geez, we can't agree on ANYTHING...even the amount of discussion! :) (if humor not detected by anyone read this, please turn in your humor detection device...it's broken). --Durin 17:56, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

I wish to bring up two points. First, disagreeing with Jimbo on some points, especially points that are not central to the project (e.g., free-content), is itself not necessarily "a big deal". Second, I agree with Jimbo. I agree that "adminship is not a big deal", but simply don't interpret that to mean that we ought to "give it to almost anyone who wants it". To me, the phrase that "adminship is not a big deal" means the following things:
 * Editors who are made sysops are still editors. They must still abide by all rules that govern editors, their decisions may be challenged, and they do not merit any preferential treatment, exceptional deference, or worship.
 * You don't have to dedicate your life to Wikipedia to become an admin. Adminship is not a "prize" or a "reward" or a "right". The role of admins is more secretarial than administrative. If you want to be an admin, then be a good editor, have a basic understanding of policies, and ... that's it!
 * Any user can harm the project, but all else equal, admins are more able to do so because they possess more tools. If Wikipedia is thought of as a construction project, the role of admins can be considered similar to that of crane operators. Not everyone is allowed to operate the crane. Why? Well, for one thing, being a good operator requires some technical knowledge. Likewise, being a good admin requires knowledge of Wikipedia's policies and processes. Another factor is that crane operators must be trustworthy ...
 * You don't give the crane to someone who might drop two tonnes of lumber on the guy who's sleeping with his wife. Likewise, you don't promote candidates who are liable to misuse their tools to gain an advantage in personal and/or content disputes.
 * You don't give the crane to someone who is liable to ignore orders from the construction foreman because he thinks he knows better than everyone else. Likewise, you don't promote candidates who are liable to ignore consensus based on their personal preferences.
 * You don't give the crane to someone who operates the crane in a way that terrifies everyone in the neighbourhood. Likewise, you don't promote candidates who are liable to bite new users, be trigger-happy in any respect, or otherwise contribute to a negative environment. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 18:03, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Some good points made here by Black Falcon about what adminship being "no big deal" means (or should mean). I have several times seen a person involved in a content dispute say something like "let's ask an admin to decide what we should do", or "well, me and admin Joe Smith think this" - both examples revealing an attitude that admins are super-editors, or arbitrators of content, which is of course completely wrong, but a common misunderstanding, I fear. This misunderstanding may partly be due to adminship being seen to "be a big deal". Carcharoth 23:00, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Possibly helpful
If you are looking for details from a non admin who is "admin material" (~2k edits, a year with the project, experience in administrative functions, external experience...) that is very hesitant about the RFA process I'd be happy to answer any questions. I also happen to think there is a massive shortage of admins. Tons of things that could be created to make this place work more smoothly aren't because there aren't additional admins around to assist. jbolden1517Talk 17:34, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Insight away! Please tell us more! --Durin 17:36, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * A person's entire history is fair game in an RFA. This is very unusual in an election for a minor office.  For example in the US political process a candidate for Congress generally doesn't receive this level of scrutiny.  A even surface full life review reserved for supreme court justices, senators, gubernatorial candidates....  Moreover the first time you go forward for an RFA people feel obligated to bring old stuff up.  (2nd and later times there is a sort of a "since your last RFA rule").
 * Your RFA is part of a permanent record that people in other disagreement will look for. It cites back old dirt.  In effect an RFA ends up being a lot like a User/RFC.
 * Evidence used against you cannot be contested because contesting means you don't respect community opinion. In effect, this means things can (and are) quoted out of context.  To pick a harmless example, I frequently forget to sign talk posts.  Not once, not twice but probably 30+x.  I almost always catch it and then add 4~ within a few seconds, but I certainly make that mistake a lot. There is no question that something like that could be brought up as evidence that "I don't understand the rules".   Now normally I could then show the list of mistake/correction within 1 minute to prove that I was well aware except that... building a counter case proves that you don't understand the process.
 * There is a real tendency for "powerful people" to gang up any time you go for any title.  This stuff can be outright lies and f this isn't counter balanced by having powerful advocates your RFA will fail.  This means you (in effect) have had to do some humiliating work for the wikipedia "aristocracy" if you want to make admin.  And the recent joiner of the discussion can tell you about how that process works from the other side.
 * Taking all that is a lot to ask in exchange for a job which means getting attacked more on wikipedia. Either RFAs have to be given out reasonably lightly or you have to accept having a very low ratio of active admins to users.  Most people who edit are interested in only a small number of articles.  Most people who edit a large number of articles have demonstrable flaws and failure in their record.

jbolden1517Talk 17:54, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Interesting. I've always been very uncomfortable with this horrible RfA practice that says you shouldn't argue with opposition. I think this is actually a big problem and one of the root causes of the perception that RfA is like running the gauntlet. The only solution I see is to make sure people are told when they are asking for a shrubbery or when they are not being consistent with opinions they gave on various candidates. Not that I want to pose as a martyr, but I remember on my own RfA for instance being very frustrated by people opposing me for lack of experience with images when they had never held this against other candidates. I also knew full well that if I called them out on it, I would get some "oppose: too confrontational"... One way out I see is to encourage bureaucrats to comment on RfAs during the process so that people who are using crappy reasoning are told so in no uncertain terms. This is much preferable I think than having B'crats close and say "some of the opposition wasn't convincing." Being more precise in what opinions are being discounted might help cleaning up RfA culture in the long run. Pascal.Tesson 18:28, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * If bureaucrats were expected to highlight those opinions being discounted, their heads would be on a gilt platter faster than you can melt butter in a microwave. --Durin 18:30, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Also used as reasons to oppose are candidate's mistakes. People aren't perfect. And last time I checked Wikipedians are people (except some days when we all go on vacation and the others take over :))! People opposing candidates for a mistake that the candidate admits they are wrong is not right. If they admit it, good for them. It shows us no one is perfect. And if admins were perfect I wouldn't be going around every day telling admins to "disable autoblock on [user] since username blocks should have autoblock turned off" and other mistakes. Admins aren't perfect, so why do RFA candidates have to be. -- TeckWiz is now R Parlate Contribs@(Let's go Yankees!) 18:41, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * There is a difference between one mistake and a pattern of behaviour (i.e., multiple mistakes). Also, some mistakes may alone constitute reason not to trust a user for a long time. Take, for instance, death threats. This is a rather extreme example, I know, but the point is the same: some mistakes are such that they shatter others' confidence in an editor. The nature of those mistakes will vary from edtior to editor. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 18:55, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * What I meant was one mistake. For example, on my recent RFA, I think I go at least 5 oppose votes for nominating a cricketer article for deletion. I was wrong, and discussed it with the writer of the article. I soon admitted I was wrong and withdrew the AFD. I still got more than 5 opposes for being wrong, though I admitted it. If a candidate is willing to admit a mistake, and it isn't something as heavy as you example of death threats, I'm not going to oppose for that mistake. I don't know why anyone would. No one is perfect. -- TeckWiz is now R Parlate Contribs@(Let's go Yankees!) 19:02, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * In extreme cases, a single mistake can be enough. I would probably oppose anyone who's made a death threat ever, be it one day ago or 10 years (I write "probably" because I've never encountered the situation and/or had to make a choice). However, I think you're right overall. Everyone makes mistakes and single mistakes should generally be forgiven and forgotten. Single mistakes for which there is no precedent are better ignored as time passes. For instance, a misapplication of policy from 5 days ago may be relevant, but one from a few weeks ago is much less so. In your RfA, I think the fact that the mistake was so recent was a factor. A lot of times, a recent mistake can make editors think that a candidate does not yet have a firm grasp of policies (whether this assumption holds true is a different matter). I doubt anyone would hold the cricketer article incident against you in 2 or 3 months. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 19:24, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * A death threat probably is a pretty good example of what I'm talking about, better than my failure to sign.  I can easily imagine a situation on wikipedia getting heated and someone issuing a death threat.  If it specific "I know you like to jog at 7:15 past west 3rd street I'm going to run you over..." then its a criminal act and it has not much more to do with wikipedia.  If its general "I would really like to bash your head in with a baseball bat" then its just a stupid thing to say.  I can easily imagine lots of very good candidates for adminship who have said stupid things like the baseball bat comment.   Its disqualifying people for one mistake like that which is the reason that people won't run the RFA gammit.  Most active editors have that kind of stuff in their past.  Anyway there is your answer. jbolden1517Talk
 * It seems we are in disagreement on the issue of death threats. The specific threat is a criminal act and takes precedence over adminship and related issues. However, I would also oppose based on the "bash your head with a baseball bat". I'm sure everyone has though that at some point, some may have said it out loud, but it's different to have expressed it in written form. I think very few active editors have made death threats here on Wikipedia. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 19:39, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Regarding Durin's comment: I have no objection putting anyone's head on a platter (so long as it's not mine)... I feel we should be consistent: if we ask of admins to discount trivial opposition, we should make sure they point it out. But to a certain extent, we also have to share that responsibility. The current system wouldn't be so bad if we collectively took it upon ourselves to make RfA culture healthier and too often we only scrutinize oppose reasons on RfAs that we support. Take as a rather extreme example Badlydrawnjeff's latest RfA. There are tons of good reasons to oppose Jeff's RfA bid and I don't feel that he actually has enough support to be an admin but I think it's rather sad to see some opposition below the belt from a number of established users. (Mind you, most of the criticism was perfectly ok and valid) And at the risk of being uncivil, let me be more specific: Kelly Martin's "oppose cause he says AfD can only be closed by admins", Hipocrite "oppose cause he's with Encyclopedia Dramatica", etc, all of these would, in an ideal process be pointed out by bureaucrats and other RfA participants as irrelevant. But when irrelevant, unfair criticism is on our side of the argument we tend to shrug it off. Pascal.Tesson 19:18, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Comment by Kim
Adding a data point: I no longer nominate people for admin, and am also known to actively encourage experienced admins to hand in their admin flag.

Hmm, put that way it sounds kind of wierd. I think everyone knows, but just to be sure: Does everyone know (or guess), my reasons for doing that? --Kim Bruning 17:56, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Not a clue, Kim. I am befuddledness personified. Enlighten us, do. Moreschi Talk 18:05, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * No. Do tell.--Anthony.bradbury 18:50, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I can think of a few possibilites (though this is certainly not an exclusive list).
 * (1) You no longer believe that Wikipedia is a viable project. Possible, but then why comment?
 * (2) You are a secret agent of a rival project of Wikipedia, probably Citizendium, and you wish to destroy Wikipedia. Certainly a fun prospect to entertain, but probably not the most plausible. ;)
 * (3) You think we do not need admins as no one ought to be blocked and nothing deleted. Yikes!
 * (4) You are trying to create a shortage of admins so that more people will support RfA reform. Hmm ... that's seems a lot like a malicious plan to attain world domination ... I like it!
 * (5) You think no one should be an admin until everyone is an admin. See #3.
 * (6) You are lying. You still do nominate people for adminship and don't actively encourage admins to resign, but you just wrote this to see if anyone would actually try to figure out why. Again, that's rather malicious of you ... but a damn good practical joke!
 * So, which is it? Are you a disillusioned Wikipedian who see no hope for humanity, an evil and elitist spirit bent on destruction, an über-tolerant incluionist hippie (no offense intended to anyone belonging in that category), a cunning and wily villain, a radical egalitarian, or a mischiefous practical joker? -- Black Falcon (Talk) 18:52, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Hmmm,
 * en.wikipedia may yet still be viable, but I think currently it's mostly running on already gained momentum. (ut oh, we better not look down)
 * A rival project? Not so much, though I do work on other projects. I don't want to destroy wikipedia though. :-P
 * Oh it's theoretically possible to run the project without ever deleting or blocking, but it's very tricky to work that way. We lack sufficient numbers of people of sufficient skill to really do that. If you think you can handle it: try and hand in your admin bit, and see what you're really made of! "Come on trolls and vandals, I'll take on all y'all bare handed! ;-)"
 * Nope, RFA is causing the shortage of admins, not me! They're not going to gain world domination this way either. (I do want world domination though, so I kersupportize RFA reform! :-) )
 * Make that almost everyone is an admin, and there's actually a viable project that works that way O:-) Though I'm not sure it's right for wikipedia.
 * Call me a Vulcan.
 * Kim Bruning 19:32, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Hmm ... not nearly as scandalous as I'd hoped it would be. ;) Regarding #3, I'd recommend you wear gloves ... it can git purty darn messy. On a more serious note (regarding #1), I do share your concern about the growing disparity between the number of articles we have and their quality. Although I think that most Wikipedia articles are mostly accurate, I hope the issue of sourcing and safeguarding against vandalism can somehow be resolved, even if it is by making sure that every page is watchlisted by at least one active editor. Maybe there ought to be a WikiProject Watchlisting ... -- Black Falcon (Talk) 19:57, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * OMG, befuddleness! I'd better kerunbefuddelnessafy :-D


 * The two different things have slightly different reasons.


 * I no longer nominate people for admin:
 * My admin criteria and admin criteria of RFA regulars no longer overlap.
 * I have strict requirements to do with actually looking at (and criticising) people's edits in diverse namespaces, as opposed to merely counting them.
 * A person might have a high number of edits in a particular namespace, and yet be totally incompetent, or inversely might have a low number of edits, but those edits show great wisdom and competence.
 * I count experience on multiple wikis in favor
 * I count other positions of trust. (ie I am more likely to support developers or stewards)
 * I count demonstrated skill at using the wiki on RFA in favor. (I'm more likely to support someone if they edit their RFA)
 * Likeliness to take action. (any actions people have taken to help the encyclopedia above and beyond what guidelines suggest)
 * Demonstrated skill at predicting consensus is also hugely in favor (I'm even more likely to support candidates whos actions go only lightly opposed or unopposed)
 * Demonstrated skill in areas where admins often work such as *FD, RF*, etc. (yes, non-admins are allowed to do practically everything admins are, except actually "use the buttons".)
 * I actually question candidates on core guidelines (TRI/5P and foundation issues), and they must show a keen understanding and dedication.
 * I require at a minimum that the person does not *harm* a situation further during a conflict. My preference is that they are able to mediate and are able to reach a peaceful resolution
 * Heavy bonus points for Featured or Good articles.
 * Despite the above criteria being very strict, sometimes people I support on that basis will garner much opposition. Some people I oppose garner much support. Apparently my criteria and views on adminship are not shared by the RFA subcommunity.
 * My last nominations failed. (Whereas some earlier nominations broke records)
 * I don't want to subject people to unpleasantness on RFA
 * There are too many hoops to jump through before an RFA nomination can start.
 * People are attacked on RFA more often, it is no longer at all pleasant.
 * Comments on RFA are often not constructive or fun, so the net gain is lower.
 * I Encourage experienced admins to hand in their bits:
 * Currently, adminship is seen as a big deal by some. The hypothesis is that most of the most experienced community members hold admin bits. Correlation is not causation, but lots of people draw the erroneous conclusion that admin==experienced. If more highly trusted/experienced people hung out without an admin bit, the correlation would no longer be there, and people might draw more useful conclusions. :-) This would also hopefully reduce admin requirements at RFA accordingly.
 * Being an admin is hard work. After 1 year, I think it's ok to retire and do something else.People are also more likely to support people if they know they are willing to retire.
 * Admins are watched more closely, and missteps are scrutinized more readily. Handing in the admin bit gives you lots of much needed air.
 * After some time on wikipedia, people build up enough skill in dealing with people that they no longer need to rely on PowerAnswers as much. Handing in the admin bit is the ultimate test to see if you've reached that level. ;-)
 * Some users actively distrust admins as a group.
 * Like the roman Cincinnatus, it is a good thing to hand in privileges as quickly as possible. You didn't want to be an admin in the first place, after all, right? :-)


 * --Kim Bruning 19:22, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Agreed with all of that...the problem is that we need more admins to keep on top of the backlogs, in the absence of adminbots. If the experienced ones quit, and you won't nominate new ones, we're stuck. I can't see as that many right now would spit blood at your criteria. When did you last nominate someone? Should you start trying again? RfA standards change very drastically and very quickly: sometimes the arrival or departure of just one person can change things. Moreschi Talk 20:11, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Ooh. I really like some of Kim's points here. I wonder if someone running for admin and saying they want to help with backlogs, but at the same time they say they don't want to deal with admin stuff for more than a year, would stand a chance? Something like:
 * "Say you are currently editing, but want to give something back to the community, so will carry out admin tasks for a year, but will then return to editing after finding a suitable candidate that passes RfA?"
 * This neatly fulfils a lot of criteria: (a) Makes clear adminship is not a big deal and is more a way of helping out; (b) results (after a year) in an experienced non-but-former-admin, to foster the sense of allowing a new generation of admins to come through; (c) clearly addresses issues of admins being "powerful", and discourages those who want adminship for the "power trip"; (d) keeps the focus on editing and contributing content. Of course, this is a route for 'editing' admins to go. There always will be those who like to focus on admin tasks alone, but how to deal with that is not something I have any answers for (as it can be both good and bad). Carcharoth 23:23, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Candidate in an impossible position
Kelly Martin sounded positive, but wrote on my Request for adminship that she was withholding support until I was endorsed by a WikiProject. Now there is a problem with that: WikiProjects don't endorse candidates for adminship. There are two possible WikiProjects that I have helped and I could drop them a note asking what they feel, but as explained on User talk:Kelly Martin, some editors might consider that to be canvassing. This puts me in an impossible position: asked for an endorsement, but unable to either confirm or deny it. Sam Blacketer 19:48, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Let it go. Kelly has been doing this for a couple of weeks now and when people point out to her that it's ridiculous she replies that everyone's being uncivil to her. Pascal.Tesson 19:52, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm with Pascal. I cannot understand why Kelly Martin feels so strongly about this, but you should have no trouble gaining adminship even without her support, so don't worry about it. YechielMan 19:55, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * What they said ... Besides, you are hereby formally and officially endorsed by WikiProject Endorsements. I believe that my status as the 16th member of the project and the first editor to oppose its existence while simultaneously becoming a member gives me the right to speak on the project's behalf. ;) By the way, someone should really consider deleting that thing already ... -- Black Falcon (Talk) 20:08, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Seeing as Kelly hasn't gone campaigning in favor of the idea (I don't think she's actually wrote up a proposal, instead simply referring to it on RfAs), it appears that she hopes to see her endorsements idea take root and become standard practice, simple as that. How is the question: how is this going to come about? Force of personality? I'm not sure if Wikipedia ever functioned so spontaneously, but it certainly doesn't nowadays. Anyways, it's not like she's opposing over it, just "witholding support," so you shouldn't worry about it. Picaroon 19:59, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Which projects might endorse you? And I think Kelly Martin is obliged to help me at the talk page for the canvassing guideline then. O:-) --Kim Bruning 20:00, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * The two I was thinking of were WikiProject UK Parliament constituencies (because I have written a lot of biographies of British Members of Parliament) and WikiProject Baronetcies (because some of them have been Baronets, and I have also written stub articles about the Baronetcies in these cases). I can give you more details if you want. Sam Blacketer 20:03, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Done, + full disclosure at Wikipedia talk:Canvassing. --Kim Bruning 20:31, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

shrubbery. I fully realize that it's very incivil to refer to botany in adminship discussions, but there you go.  &gt; R a d i a n t &lt;  08:24, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Discussion to make all sysops bureaucrats
Following discussion after Nihonjoe's RfB, I bring forward the idea that all admins should be made bureaucrats when promoted. We're close to the longest period EVER without a new face on the bureaucrat list, and as RfB has now turned into the worst of catch 22 occasions (too many bureaucrats, do you use % or good judgement, not enough RfA discussion, too much RfA discussion...) it really is time we do something radical to change it. Please discuss below whether this is a good idea or not. Thanks.  Majorly   (hot!)  20:51, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I think this is a good idea. Although admins may not stick to the strict guidelines on promotions, I have a hard time thinking that people will promote abusive bureaucrats too. I ask that everyone else consider this- Do you think abusive bureaucrats will exist if this happens? I do not. I also bet most if not all of the current bureaucrats will oppose this. --Deskana (fry that thing!)  20:54, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Do abusive admins exist? The incident with Robdurbar just 2(?) days ago proves that there are. Is there any reason to think that an editor who abuses admin tools will not abuse bureaucrat tools? Unless the answer is 'yes', it is certain that this will create abusive bureaucrats. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 21:11, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Everything is reversable. That's a one off incident, who was removed minutes after. If this system were to be put into place, the rights log would surely be watched more closely to ensure nothing bad happens.  Majorly   (hot!)  21:34, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * No, everything is not reversible. There are several actions that are extremely damaging, some of which are irreversible, some of which would require developer intervention. —Centrx→talk &bull; 23:08, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * What can a bureaucrat do that is not reversable? Other than promoting, where a steward is almost always around to intervene, I can't think what...  Majorly   (hot!)  23:46, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * It's the admin actions that are irreversible, and the possibility of having 100 sockpuppet or newly promoted admin accounts all doing those actions, bots, etc. —Centrx→talk &bull; 23:50, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Good point, but we'd get a system in place for this to not happen - e.g limit number of promotions a day. Should it ever happen, which I don't think it will, there are always stewards available. You're thinking of a worst case scenario.  Majorly   (hot!)  00:05, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Some stewards might support? --Kim Bruning 21:00, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I guess my question is what problem do we expect this will solve? It seems a number of RfB have failed on the sort of strange rationale that we don't need any more bureaucrats so we certainly don't need an extra 1000. I also see a potential for disasters of colossal proportion if all admins are able to promote new admins. It took 15 minutes to shutdown an admin gone beserk the other day. Pascal.Tesson 21:05, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * So... the way to fix RfB is to tick everyone who's participated in the last three years off? Because giving admins tools that nobody ever said they should get is not going to go over well. -Amarkov moo! 21:07, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * (ecx2) I would modify the proposal slightly to say that anyone who has been an admin for six months in good standing can ask for bureaucrat powers and receive them without further discussion.  I don't endorse removing the distinction between admins and bureaucrats because that makes it harder to become an admin, and we really do need more admins.  At the same time, it's impossible for anybody to pass RFB, so I say we should go to the other extreme and promote anybody who has logged time as an admin without formal disciplinary problems. YechielMan 21:08, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That I could support, although I might make it a year. Anybody who's still an admin in good standing after a year must be doing something right (or be slightly insane, or both). --kingboyk 23:06, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * /me likes that idea! But what is good standing?  Majorly   (hot!)  23:09, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Somebody who could pass an RFB? Oh... erm... wait a minute! ;) OK, how about just "has been an admin for a year". --kingboyk 23:13, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * What I don't get though is this: if the only problem we've identified is that RfB is ridiculously hard, why not just lower the standards of RfB? Seems less controversial. Pascal.Tesson 21:20, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That just isn't going to happen.  Majorly   (hot!)  21:31, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * ok. But then if you have no hope in convincing people we need to lower the standards of RfB, how exactly do you hope of convincing anybody to go for the ultimate lowering of standards? Seems to me like you're running towards a brick wall. Pascal.Tesson 21:37, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * It isn't lowering standards, since there would be no standards to lower.  Majorly   (hot!)  21:40, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Removing standards == lowering standards to 0. -Amarkov moo! 21:41, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Ummm, bad idea. We have two different sets of standards. Also, in which area is the supposed lack of 'crats effecting? HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 21:45, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Why do we have two different sets of standards? People who want to volunteer their help are simply shot down in this system. On the Spanish Wikipedia, all admins are bureaucrats - tell me, what is problem with doing this?  Majorly   (hot!)  21:50, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

There would be too much of a free-for-all after a close RfA with potentially a couple of hundred admin-crats rushing to be the one who decides whether to promote or not. But I wouldn't object to letting any admin do a name-change or a bot-flag (although I don't think that's doable now for coding reasons). Newyorkbrad 21:54, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Other Wikipedias have no problem with that (in example, the Spanish one). I am not against the general idea, but I don't think it is the right solution, mostly because there are already too many administrators. Although I don't like it, an administrator that closes his first AFD ever is more questionable than one that has closed thousands before, especially if the discussion was controversial. The same happens with bureaucrats: one who has promoted a user for the first time after months is more disputable if the request is controversial than one who has closed 5 in the last month. You need reliable bureaucrats, not a huge amount of new ones. I still think there should be a new bureaucrat per month, but 1,000 ones is just too much. -- ReyBrujo 21:55, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Too many administrators? How, exactly, would the backlogs be managed if there were less than we have now? I think the fact that we have unending backlogs is proof that there are not enough. Picaroon 21:58, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I shouldn't speak for ReyBrujo but I think he meant that there are too many admins to make them all bureaucrats. (I think) Pascal.Tesson 22:00, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Indeed. Getting 1,000 bureaucrats in a day won't help us, because as explained by Newyorkbrad (incidentally, my reply was an edit conflict handled by MediaWiki) they will clash, so we will end in a year with 300 bureaucrats each promoting a couple of admins. We need bureaucrats with experience, and that experience won't be available if 50 admins get an edit conflict everytime a nomination should be closed. -- ReyBrujo 23:58, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Newyorkbrad brings up a good point. Perhaps split the jobs up? Reybrujo, instead of 1000, how about only admins who are currently classed as active?  Majorly   (hot!)  22:03, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * There's still the problem that there are admins, even active ones, who people might not trust with bureaucrat tools; not because there are "enough already", but because people just don't trust them with bureaucrat tools. How do you solve that problem? -Amarkov moo! 22:06, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * There really is not much difference between the trust level needed - people just make it that way, and seem to think bureaucrats are something very special, when really they're not at all. I've said this before, an admin can do more damaging things than a bureaucrat. Once they're trusted enough to be an admin, all they're doing is determining consensus like in AfDs, so it shouldn't be a problem. But for some reason it is. The Spanish Wikipedia's admins are all bureaucrats, and they have no problems.  Majorly   (hot!)  22:41, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * And how we determine who is active and who is not? Software based stats? Removing admins that are not active, and those that haven't been admin for at least a year, but then we would have to do that manually, and may imply 400 reviews (we don't trust a bot to protect all the pages linked from the main page, I doubt we will agree with one doing the initial promotions). -- ReyBrujo 23:58, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Unless I'm mistaken, there are currently about 850-900 active admins ... it's really not much different from 1000. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 23:17, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * We currently have nearly 1200 actually. We have 863 active admins, but they haven't all been admins for more than a year (and I don't want to count how many have more than a years experience). As suggested above, how about active admins who have been admins more than a year?  Majorly   (hot!)  23:23, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Right we have 1182, of which about three-fourths are active. Again, 863 is not much different from 1000 (that's in reply to the comment by Reybrujo). As for me, I'm strongly opposed. In addition to all the problems already noted above, we do not need to create the possibility of one rogue admin ... I know a rogue bureaucrat can do the same damage, but the chances of that are much greater when we're dealing with hundreds of individuals as opposed to 20 or so. You note that we're close to setting a record for the amount of time no new bureaucrat has been promoted, but I can't help but note that there've been only a few RfBs since I started following RfA/RfB a few months ago. If we really need more bureaucrats, we should have more nominations. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 23:35, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * There's been 12 since the last successful one. The reason is probably because no one wants to take the chance of each and every edit they have every made (or not made) being carefully inspected, and opposed for the trivial reason "we don't need anymore". It's sad when one wants to volunteer their time, even when they are fully capable (which I think most admins are), they are shot down for the most trivial of reasons that are nothing to do with being a bureaucrat.  Majorly   (hot!)  23:44, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * The problem I see is that while cleaning up after an admin gone mad is not too hard, a 'crat that decides to give admin rights to the most recent 500 vandals can leave a real mess on our hands. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 23:30, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Not really, if someone is really that decisive they would have used a vandal admin bot (which can delete and block thousands of pages and other users in a matter of seconds) on their account now anyways instead of promoting 500 vandals which would be more than likely having no idea how to use the tools. Also, it is unlikely there would be 500 active vandals at the same time and that there is going to be someone yell foul for the first sign of trouble in the user rights log. --WinHunter (talk) 00:39, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That's without doubt (in my mind at least) the major flaw in the argument.
 * OK, how about this. Community decides how many bureacrats are needed (or how many as a percentage of registered users). Every so often, every admin of at least 3 (or 6 or 12) months can put themselves onto the request for bureacrat rights list. People vote (yes, vote!) on which of those to promote.
 * Example. Say we decide that we need 50 crats as of now. We get a list of eligible admins who self nominate, and hold an election from that list for the 30 places. --kingboyk 23:41, 22 April 2007 (UTC) (e/c)


 * For the record, the Spanish Wikipedia grants bureaucrat status to all active administrators. However, Wikipedia:Candidaturas a bibliotecario is a straight vote. There's no such thing as bureaucrat discretion. Tito xd (?!? - cool stuff) 23:38, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Perhaps then, RfA should be turned back into a straight vote.  Majorly   (hot!)  00:16, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Perhaps people are trying to fix something that is not really broken. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 00:46, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Perhaps. To me the lack of promotions for nigh on a year, despite some pretty decent candidates running, is a fair indicator it's broken. I accept that others may quite legitimately disagree.
 * Maybe we should restart the discussion, starting first with the question "Is RFB broken?" --kingboyk 01:50, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * The problem, Kingboyk, is that there is little or no consensus on whether RfA is broken or not. Many say it is. Many say it is not. RfA reform is a controversial issue and I doubt that there is going to be consensus involving it. Captain   panda  03:39, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * But people are being promoted, good admins. The people not passing are not passing for good reasons. I have been watching. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 03:43, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * RFB. --kingboyk 10:51, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I have a question here, barring the fact that there has been a long gap of non-promotion of bureaucrats, do we need more bureaucrats? There don't seem to be much of a backlog in bureaucrat related tasks. --WinHunter (talk) 07:18, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

RfA, for the fifth(?) time
The sections have been removed. I'm almost sure there is no consensus for this, but I would never have noticed had a new RfA not just come in. Could we please not change things on the template without some sort of note here? -Amarkov moo! 21:25, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Please do revert that. We've pretty much agreed to experiment slowly. There certainly is nothing close to consensus regarding this and Moralis' RfA was not too conclusive on that kind of format. Pascal.Tesson 21:29, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * The sections were added without consensus, so I duly removed them. Is there a problem? We're having a discussion, not a vote, sections aren't needed, the bureaucrats aren't stupid.  Majorly   (hot!)  21:30, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * It's not about the bureaucrat's stupidity, it's about making it easier to read the darn thing. Pascal.Tesson 21:32, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * They were promoted to do the job, in whatever form RfA may take.  Majorly   (hot!)  21:37, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't think you understand what I mean. Sure, bureaucrats can still evaluate the RfA without these sections (and did so in the Moralis experiment). However, it is unquestionably making the RfA harder to read and harder to review in retrospect. Note also the not so enthusiastic comments of the closing b'crat. Pascal.Tesson 21:44, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, please don't remove those again. I'm not sure how many ways I can state this, but "There is not even a consensus that change is needed. There certainly is not a consensus for what changes would be made." -  auburn pilot  talk  22:10, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure what people really imagine a b'crat is going to do in an RFA without sections... still going to count up the supports and opposes, it'll just take them longer. The RFA equivalent of security through obscurity... it just makes things more difficult but the same stuff is going on. --W.marsh 22:17, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Please note Majorly has removed them again. . This is getting tiring. -  auburn pilot  talk  22:28, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Now protected/reverted (not by me on either count). --W.marsh 22:31, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * The bureaucrats will be doing nothing of the sort. If they were counting, I'd ask them to resign. We do not need pointless sections in a discussion.  Majorly   (hot!)  22:37, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Majorly. perhaps you could leave the RfA template alone for a while. Quite a lot of the recent edits there are yours, and such things rarely help achieve consensus on talk pages. There's more to writing an encyclopedia than hanging around RfA, you know. :) Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 22:47, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Oleg, I'm rather offended by that. I am actually free to edit pages as I please. I've been continuing to add references to List of English monarchs this afternoon, closed an AfD or two later, and now I'm here. Please don't say I'm "hanging around RfA". I'm concerned, and I can comment and make changes as much as I like.  Majorly   (hot!)  22:54, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * They'd all better resign then, because I guarantee you none have closed an RFA in years without some ballpark idea of what the % was. --W.marsh 22:44, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * My point exactly, check all recent successful RfBs, answer to question 1. We have like 5 exceptions that are under the magic 75%, which goes to show that they stick to numbers so carefully. In light of these discussions, if there are any who do, I hope they change.  Majorly   (hot!)  22:50, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That conclusion is not supported by your initial premise. You note that few RfAs below 75% have succeeded, yet seem to reject the possibility that they failed because there actually was no consensus. I think "failed because of no consensus" is a more plausible explanation than "failed because they act like bots", especially since there are exceptions. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 23:25, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * They shouldn't be exceptions though, they should be the norm. Read the answers to Q1 on all recent successful RfBs, and you'll see how they determine "consensus".  Majorly   (hot!)  23:32, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Majorly, the sections are not just for the sake of the bureaucrats. They are also for the sake of anyone who wants to participate in an AfD discussion without having to read the exact same comments repeated dozens of times by different people. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 23:21, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Do we have sections in an AfD? No. Is AfD a discussion? Yes. Is RfA a discussion? Yes. Do we have sections in an RfA? Yes. Is this logical? No. And exact same comments are made on AfDs as well too you know ;)  Majorly   (hot!)  23:32, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * An AFD can produce roughly a dozen common decisions (transwiki, merge, delete, redirect, etc.) and numerous wacky other decisions rarely. An RFA can produce one of 2 decisions, period. So you're kind of comparing apples and oranges even before mentioning the fact that the average AFD gets 3-5 participants and the average RFA gets 50+. --W.marsh 23:40, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Hmmm... Not so convincing. For one thing AfDs rarely attain the same level of participation as RfAs. In any case, the goal here is not to dogmatically figure out a way to impose a structure on RfAs so that it looks like Afd but rather to pragmatically find a structure that makes RfAs easy enough to follow. Pascal.Tesson 23:42, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Think of those rare XfDs (Daniel Brandt, Esperanza, Encyclopedia Dramatica) that get a lot attention. The admin that closes that has the same job as a bureaucrat.  Majorly   (hot!)  23:55, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I sure wish that these were refactored to make the discussion more intellegible and less painfully redundant. Pascal.Tesson 23:57, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Majorly, my response is ... what W.marsh said. RfA has only 2 outcomes, whereas AfD has many. Also, RfA has many more participants. Also, I would think that we would want to avoid RfAs that look like the Daniel Brandt AfD. That thing was awful! -- Black Falcon (Talk) 00:07, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Suggestion: how about leaving the sections in, but having people bullet their comments under support and oppose instead of numbering them? I don't mind the tally myself, but that seems to be the major point of contention. Dekimasu よ! 23:49, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Tried it here, but auburnpilot decided voting sections were better in a discussion, and re-added them.  Majorly   (hot!)  23:53, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * If I found the diff you were trying to point me to, that wasn't quite what I had in mind. I meant leaving in the support, oppose, and neutral sections, but using * instead of # at the head of each comment. Dekimasu よ! 23:57, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, let's not try to paint a different picture than actually exists. Completely removing the sections (as you did Majorly) is very different from replacing a "#" with a "*". -  auburn pilot  talk  00:05, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Not really. What I did was removed the sections, so the discussion area could be used instead. This uses bullets.  Majorly   (hot!)  00:07, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I think it's great and refreshing that people are finally being WP:BOLD about trying to make improvements to requests for adminship. I hope this trend continues. :-) --Kim Bruning 23:55, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Everything I try is reverted, Kim, so I doubt I'll be doing much else BOLD :(  Majorly   (hot!)  23:56, 22 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm having severe difficulty reading this section of WT:RFA because it's not sorted into support/oppose/neutral sections. Would someone please refactor this discussion so I can make sense of it? --Durin 12:25, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * While we're removing the useless headers from the template, can we also remove the useless "standard questions" as well? Kelly Martin (talk) 12:29, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Can't do that. The only thing left for people at the RfA to review would be their contributions. You can't expect people to actually go through someone's contributions to evaluate them! --Durin 12:46, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I have added a note reminding editors that the questions are optional and that lack of answering them by a candidate does not merit an oppose. — Hex    (❝  ?!  ❞)   13:42, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Reckless renegade! Of course, those who think against that will either a) revert you, b) insist on voting against a person anyway, and just couch their vote a bit differently, or c) insist bureaucrats should never ever ever discount their vote...or all the above. --Durin 13:52, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'll take b). I do understand the meaning of optional, although I think it's just plain rude for a candidate not to answer questions asked by RfA participants (i.e., the extra questions submitted by individual participants) and that does give me cause to worry on how these candidates would react when random users question their admin actions. Pascal.Tesson 13:58, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Told you so! Only took 13 minutes too. --Durin 13:59, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I reverted it, not because I think against it (If not answering the questions is someone's only problem, I'll certainly support), but because people can oppose for whatever stupid reason they please. Attempts to discount certain opinions, even ones that are demonstratably stupid, have failed before. -Amarkov moo! 14:00, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd like a reference for that, and some proof that leaving my change in instead of knee-jerk reverting it would actually have made future RfAs worse. — Hex    (❝  ?!  ❞)   17:15, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Not to state the obvious, but being snarky and trying to make fun of people who disagree with you isn't all that helpful. It just makes this thing more combative than it needs to be. The surest fire way to avoid change happening here is to be a jerk in advocating your changes. --W.marsh 14:21, 23 April 2007 (UTC) And it flares up again with the inexplicable edit summary "there was no consensus to include a tally on top of a discussion" (as if there was a consensus to include it on the bottom?) --W.marsh 15:50, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Perhaps it would be useful to add some examples of stupid reasons, since we're going out of our way to support stupid reasons anyways. --Durin 14:08, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd like to nominate "Oppose because of userbox saying he loves chocolate. That is waaaaaay divisive." Pascal.Tesson 14:17, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Please check your humor detection device. It appears to be malfunctioning. --Durin 14:29, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Uh I pretty clearly said you were trying to make a joke... it was also a joke on people. My comment was that making fun of people isn't productive in this situation. --W.marsh 14:33, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Didn't seem clear to me. Anyways, adding humor isn't unproductive either. Pascal.tesson and I, for example, disagree very strongly with each other. But, thanks to the introduction of humor into our commentary, we've come to User_talk:Durin and User_talk:Durin. Seems pretty positive to me. --Durin 14:38, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Well we'll see. I have observed a lot of animosity between the two camps and making fun of eachother doesn't seem likely to help any change actually occur. --W.marsh 14:41, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * In the last week, I've seen a dizzying array of admonitions from various people towards various people. If we were to take all of these admonitions as gospel, and treat them as inviolable, we'd be reduced to saying about three different words here. "Support", "Oppose", and "Neutral". Except, there wouldn't be anything to vote on because people wouldn't be permitted to talk. --Durin 14:48, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That's simply false... people are allowed to post comments in RFAs. This is increasingly becoming an example of exactly the kind of dialog that is counterproductive to getting anything done... just making incorrect or ridiculously exaggerated claims about the positions of the other camp. --W.marsh 15:15, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Umm, I was talking about WT:RFA, not WP:RFA. --Durin 15:21, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Then why were you talking about converting everything to support, oppose and neutral sections? That was the reference to WP:RFA. But nevermind... this is clearly some sort of a miscommunication. No need to reply but you probably will... --W.marsh 15:25, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Protected
Since there's eviddently a dispute (resulting in a edit war) over the template's content, it shall stay fully protected until this matter is resolved. Also, while administrators may still edit the template, they should (and I believe they will) observe the protection guidelines, as the edit page suggests. Миша 13 18:33, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Archives: annoying task
ShadowBot3 has been sending archived discussion to archive 86 instead of archive 88, and manual archiving has been done that has sent other things to archive 87. The two seem to overlap as well, but archive 86 is generally newer than archive 87. ShadowBot3 is correctly set to archive 88 now, but would someone helpful like to go through and clean up the order of the archives? Dekimasu よ! 23:53, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm all for taking the task away from the bot. We were archiving just fine without it. Now, when the bot is supposed to be archiving, we're up to over 314kb of discussion on this page. This is silly. Archiving manually was working just fine, and now we have a bot breaking it. Nice. --Durin 12:30, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * If we have editors willing to do manual archiving, they should deactivate the bot immediately and archive by hand (which is superior). If we don't have anybody willing to do that work, the bot is better than nothing. Kusma (talk) 14:24, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * We've had editors willing to do it for four years, and editors had been happily doing it through that entire time. There's no reason editors can't continue doing it now. --Durin 14:29, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I removed the bot code; probably not having an archive bot is more likely to induce people to archive manually and to write a nice summary (this page's archives before bot usage were among the best archives on Wikipedia). Kusma (talk) 14:33, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * A few different people helpfully fixed the archives, and now I've created a few new ones to cut the page down to a slim and fit 130Kb. I'll go through and create summaries of the contents soon. Dekimasu よ! 10:01, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Why not the same
Even the RFAs that are not experiments aren't the same. Why do some current RFAs have the vote summary and some don't? We should process them all the same for uniformity's sake, and all this experiment should cease for the time being until the boat settles back to an even keel; no wonder they're all akilter right now.Rlevse 00:06, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * No they're fine. If you see any with a tally it can be removed though :)  Majorly   (hot!)  00:12, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh yes, very subtle.  I'd rather have active RfAs see no format changes; they should end the way they started ... unless the format is so horrible that the RfA is stopped prematurely and restarted. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 00:25, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Where's the rule that says they shouldn't have a tally? They should at least all be the same. No they are not fine. Changing the format of an RFA once it starts is just plain wrong.Rlevse 00:44, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Woah calm! Remind me why there is a tally again? Give me a reason why they should have a tally. And how is it plain wrong?  Majorly   (hot!)  00:48, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * God, the tally is a non issue, have one or don't, but don't argue over it. A tally does not change how people cast their opinions. If they want to know the count they will find it. There is no reason they have to be uniform either. I would leave it up to the person running. If he wants to do it in ROT13, then let him, I won't support, but all the power to them. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 00:50, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I didn't say they should or shouldn't have a tally, i said the RFAs should be consistent and the format of a specific one should not change once it starts. What I said is wrong is changing format on one after it starts. I don't think it's a nonissue, they should all be the same so everyone gets an equal shot. You give a reason they should not have one.Rlevse 00:53, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Because it's not a vote, that's why.  Majorly   (hot!)  01:00, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Then why'd it ever get started with the tally? The tally makes it easier to see how it's going. Actually, I don't care that much about the tally, but I firmly believe the formats should be consisent, that way no one can claim another had a more favorable format. Take a look at the recent RFAs that were victims of the experiments.Rlevse 01:06, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * It got added in without discussion, by Ed Poor in 2003/4. Why on earth would you want to know how it's going? Do some research and make your own mind up. This isn't an experiment, this is common sense.  Majorly   (hot!)  01:12, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That was uncalled for and you should know better.Rlevse 01:14, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * ?  Majorly   (hot!)  01:22, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * If it was common sense it would be common to other people. I like the tally, it saves me time. I have not heard it explained how it causes any harm. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 01:16, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * The explanation I've heard is that the tally manipulates people into treating RFA like a vote, and removing it learns them better. Personally I give people more credit than that... and never really thought it was our job to tell people how to think about RFA in the first place. I agree that the tally is just useful, some people see it as a psychological key to RFA or something like that. --W.marsh 01:20, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, the tally in my RfA was in ROT13, it's just that it contained no letters so nobody else noticed. --ais523 13:16, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

By the way, is there any reason why we essentially vote for ArbCom members rather than use only discussion? (where, say the closer would be the Foundation board) I'm asking because I'm still puzzled by the dogmatic mantra of RfA is not a vote. Pascal.Tesson 01:21, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm also confused. Since everyone loves the tally so much, we may as well make most use of it :)  Majorly   (hot!)  01:22, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Call whatever you want, but supporting and objecting is a vote. Otherwise, we should just nom someone and let a bureaucrat decide it on their own without them worrying about whether they got 85% (or whatever).Rlevse 01:24, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Well actually, I think that there are people who think this would be a good solution, provided we have a weeklong discussion on the candidate beforehand. I happen to think it wouldn't simplify the whole process but it's not an incoherent proposal either. Pascal.Tesson 01:27, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, RfA is a vote. And there is nothing wrong with that. Voting is the best way to gauge the opinions of a large community. And the larger Wikipedia becomes, the more more vote-like things will get. Yes, that scares some people away from adminship, I've seen that first-hand. Yes, some people's votes are silly. Some people think other people's votes are silly. That's sad, but mixing people's comments together and hoping that the enlightened bureaucrats will just read everything and come up with a magic decision which will please everybody and remove the pain from the process is just not realistic. The current process is simple, and it works. Giving bureaucrats more authority will make things not better, I'd argue. And perhaps not everybody's meant to be an admin after all? And perhaps the current backlogs are due to people like me not using their admin powers too much, but what can you do in a community of volunteers? And anyhow, no attempt of reform I've seen in two years has produced anything. This one generated more discussion, but I doubt the outcome will be any different. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 03:35, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Well I do not know how many registered users we have, but I found the number 4,000,000 at English_Wikipedia page (not sure if that includes not registered or not), so say that we have 400 voters for one admin that would make it 0.01% that actually did vote, I'm not sure that is a good way to 'to gauge the opinions of a large community'? At least I do not think so. Stefan 13:55, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * In statistics, a poll of 1000-2000 random people is enough to tell how the entire US population feels about an issue with an accuracy of a few percent. Granted, the RfA voters are not a random bunch, but surely they are more representative of the community feelings than the bureaucrat who would make the "hard decisions". Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 14:55, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * True, but as you say, I do not think the people voting now are very random, nor representative of the average user. Stefan 15:09, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, aside from the fact that statistical significance can be attained in relatively small samples (e.g., 1200 of a population 300 million), we should also keep in mind that although the English Wikipedia has 4 million registered users, only about 50 thousand are active (I remember seeing the figure 43000 somewhere; I'd be most grateful is someone could tell point me in the right direction). -- Black Falcon (Talk) 17:02, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Majorly-I see why Rlevse interpreted what you said the way he did. You may want to be more careful how you word things. Oleg-well said.Sumoeagle179 10:11, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Format changes good. Learn to understand what needs to be truely stable and what need not be truely stable. --Kim Bruning 16:53, 23 April 2007 (UTC) ''why am I starting to sound like a zen type person? Must be that time of year again. Zen season! ''
 * Stable the universe is ... visions of instability reflect inner turmoil and failure to attain oneness with the self and with life. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 17:50, 23 April 2007 (UTC) How's that?

Hey guys, I like Support and Oppose section and !vote tallies. This allows me to see how an RFA is going and decide if I want to participate in it or not. I will not participate in an RFA which is clearly going one way or the other unless I personally know the person or I feel strongly (usually an opposition based on evidence provided by someone else). I try to avoid "me, too" votes that are just piling on support or oppose. Also, the tally is already on WP:BN so you wouldn't be getting rid of !vote counting, you'd just be hiding it from the RFA community that didn't know or didn't feel like running over to WP:BN to get the "official" tally. --Richard 17:43, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and while I'm here, I'll add that I tend to focus almost exclusively on the Oppose opinions. All I want to know is whether anybody has presented a good reason why the candidate should not be an admin. All that support stuff is only to get the candidate over the 75-80% threshold which is made necessary by the fact that RFA is really a cloaked vote masquerading as a !vote. I would much prefer it if we had only an Oppose section and bureaucrats evaluated the candidate on the basis of whether any of the Opposes were substantive enough to deny adminship. --Richard 17:46, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * With respect, why shouldn't their be tallies, it makes it ten times easier to judge how an RfA is currently going and peoples opinions, as well as making it easier for for the closing b'crat to view the tally then decide of promotion, changing it now is silly. Te ll y a ddi ct  20:11, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
 * How can an RfA be judged by the tally? You voice your opinion whatever it may be. I really, really hope the bureaucrat ignores the tally as it is completely redundant. No, it is not silly to remove it, logical is the word. It's not a vote, it's a discussion, and you cannot count a discussion.   Majorly   (hot!)  20:22, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Seriously though
Wouldn't RfA be a lot better if those voting were only those that had interacted with the candidate or had made the effort to look at their contributions? Just require voters to provide a diff or archive link to a thread, edit, or whatever. Those voting support should have an easy time of it, and those voting oppose would have to justify their opposes. Carcharoth 16:32, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * For every candidate in whose RfA I participate, I look through 50-200 random diffs. Any single diff is not going to make up my mind (unless it's a death threat); I look for patterns of behaviour. It really does many RfA regulars injustice to automatically assume that they do not make the effor to look through candidates' contributions. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 17:07, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Good point. I apologise for assuming that. Carcharoth 17:15, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * To clarify further, do you state on every RfA that you have looked through 50-200 random diffs, or do you assume that people realise you have done that? If you said you had done that, and said what patterns you saw, I'd be happy. Carcharoth 17:18, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Hmm ... interesting question. Somtimes I do note that I looked at the contributions history (e.g., ) and other times I don't. I suppose I operate on the following principle: If I'm supporting a candidate, I do not provide extensive justifications. I assume that people will realise that (1) I have checked the candidate's contributions, (2) deemed him suitable for adminship per my standards, and (3) find the reasons to oppose (if any) given by other editors to be insufficiently convincing. If I'm opposing a candidate, I feel it's necessary to provide a detailed justification with supporting diffs as needed. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 17:31, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, I think one of the things that are broken now is that when the people that I have interacted with and have a strong opinion for or agains is up for RfA I do not know, and they are not allowed to tell me. I think that RfA should be published more directly, on project pages, home pages and so on, now this is not allowed (I assume) since it is a direct vote and if I where running I would send a note to all the people that I know and that like me, but IF RfA is not supposed to be a direct vote but instead we should promote good people, the correct way should be to get in touch with the people that have interacted with the user and let them know that the RfA is running.
 * Have a one week discussion, publish the names, lets editors that have interacted with this user have their say, I'm sure someone can make a bot that figures out who have interacted with thsi user, let that bot post on the talk page of these people, have everyone list good and bad points, THEN maybe have a vote. Stefan 23:32, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Random voters
Or, even better, randomly generate voters! I'm sure I remember a "random user" generator somewhere. Spam 100 randomly generated user talk pages where the user has been active in the past week, and say they have been granted the singular honour of voting on this candidate's RfA. This is a bit like jury service in the UK, which, with checks and balances, is essentially a random selection of your peers to sit in judgement on you. Carcharoth 16:35, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Seriously. People selected at random tend to take their duties very seriously. If this idea took off, and if even only 20% of the 100 random users participated, then you would get 20 people carefully picking through the contributions history and giving their opinion on the candidate. Also, in case you get a random selection of 100 trolls, allow the candidate to rebut oppose votes, and still leave the ultimate decision to the bureaucrat. Randomly selecting from the entire pool of users might be a bit much, so instead maybe randomly select from a large of list of those "willing to serve at RfA". Carcharoth 16:42, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That's an interesting idea. Want to add it to Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Reform? — Hex    (❝  ?!  ❞)   17:19, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * A random user generator is located at Random, although that only takes you to users who have created user or user talk pages. I do not think your proposal will have the desired results. First, editors may not appreciate being spammed. Second, we may accidentally spam vandals and trolls. They, for the time being, are not overly interested in disruspting RfAs ... I hope we can keep it that way. Third, the proposal creates a new level of bureaucracy that goes against the principles expressed in Avoid instruction creep and WP:NOT. Fourth, it restricts participation and discussion by active editors. Fifth, I believe your premise that "People selected at random tend to take their duties very seriously" may not hold. Those things for which I've been randomly selected are usually the ones I take least seriously. If someone considers sampling me just as good as any other poor sod, I see no reason to take things seriously. I am, of course, referring to surveys and not to to jury duty, which I'd take a little bit more seriously. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 17:21, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the phrase 'jury duty', which led me to Jury duty, which I've now added above and over there. I was looking for jury service, which I might turn into a redirect if no-one else beats me to it. Carcharoth 17:34, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

OK. I've added the proposal at Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Reform. Could further disussion be copied over there? Thanks. Black Falcon, I hope you don't mind me asking you to copy your comments over there. I'll respond to them over there later, as I have to leave the computer for the next few hours. Carcharoth 17:31, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
 * No problem ... I'll do it right now. Cheers, Black Falcon (Talk) 17:52, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * You have been chosen to join the Justice Squadron, 8 a.m. Monday at the Municipal Fortress of Vengeance. Oh, I am *so* there.  &gt; R a d i a n t &lt;  08:17, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Hey! Humour is not allowed in the Municipal Fortress of Vengeance. Seriously, there are some valid points here, mostly that a simple bureaucracy (backed up by bot-generated lists) may be needed to counter the dynamics of large groups. Carcharoth 09:20, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Matt Britt RFA
I have closed Matt Britt's request as unsuccessful because the community appears far from convinced of the validity of this format. I am sorry to Matt, who I suggest should run again under the regular format until such a time as consensus favors the new format -- which, while intriguing, certainly has its issues. My mandate as a bureaucrat permits me to promote administrators under very specific circumstances; with so many users objecting to the very premise of this request, I cannot in good faith promote Matt. I have, however, studied the request in an attempt to reason out how I would evaluate the request; had the format been accepted as valid, I believe I would have promoted him. If this format, or some revised version thereof, ever gains the community's acceptance (and I think it has much promise), I will start dialogue among the bureaucrats to decide on a standard way to evaluate these requests. &mdash; Dan | talk 00:58, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Good call, I also left a note at the Matt's user talk page. --WinHunter (talk) 01:07, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Does this mean he can re-apply immediately? -- TeckWiz is now R Parlate Contribs@(Let's go Yankees!) 01:19, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Of course. —210 physicq  ( c ) 01:20, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Ooops. Should rephrase. Does this mean he can re-apply again imediately, without every Wikipedian opposing for it being too soon? -- TeckWiz is now R Parlate Contribs@(Let's go Yankees!) 01:23, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I should hope so. If I were to close that request, I would certainly ignore any users opposing on that basis. &mdash; Dan | talk 01:24, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Given that the closing decision essentially amounts to "no consensus exists for a decision to be made in this format; try again under a normal format", I don't think anyone would argue that it's "too soon". Some people may oppose him because he agreed to the format (presenting it as an example of poor judgment), but I'm fairly confident that a normal RfA would attain consensus to promote. One other thing: a new RfA should quote Dan's statement ... just in case anyone hasn't been following this issue over the past week. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 01:50, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * This is precisely why experimenting should not be done on an actual RFA and they should all be formatted the same. It's the candidate who've suffered here.Rlevse 01:59, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I suggest that in the circumstances we just petition the bureaucrats to promote. Running another request for adminship would be a waste of effort. --Tony Sidaway 02:10, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * He should probably just run again immediately, as he would've passed no problem with the proper format.-- Wizardman 02:14, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * No he wouldn't have. I'm not sure how you can conclude that. -Amarkov moo! 02:26, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Dan, that's insane. --Kim Bruning 02:22, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I would have thought if a bureaucrat assesses that there is a consensus to promote, its still a consensus to promote even if we expressed ourselves on the back of a postage stamp and no matter how many people thought the postage stamp was a bad idea... WjBscribe 02:25, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Dan, that's insane.

The task of a bureaucrat is to act based on consensus.

If your argument had been that this format does not allow you to figure out what the consensus is, Fine.

In this case you actually took the time, and stated that you think there *was* a consensus to promote. In that case, you should promote.

Hmm, on the gripping hand, if you're actually saying that consensus is unclear, we can look at clarifying it in some way (up to and including running the RFA in a different format. Though perhaps we can shorten the process somewhat, by just having a brief section "anyone seriously opposed to promoting in this case?" open for 24-48 hours? ).

--Kim Bruning 02:22, 24 April 2007 (UTC) (After edit conflict: WJScribe said this shorter than I did)
 * I think one of the item in the RfA, "This method of RFA is so confusing that I am unable to participate.", has shown that there are a lot of people did not participate in this RfA because of the format, so if anyone is promoted this way some may argue that it did not really reflected the community consensus and thus resulting in doubts of the candidate. If this format has gained consensus and "everyone" participated, that's fine for someone to be promoted this way, however it is currently not. Therefore, It needs to be re-run in the "old" format in order for the candidate to gain trust of the community. --WinHunter (talk) 02:44, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Has to be re-run in order to gain trust? Is there something in his edit history to suggest he is not trustworthy that would somehow be cured by having a "normal" RfA? --Durin 03:12, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * (edit conflict with Durin, Resp WinHunter) Huh? What? This dude either already had the trust he needed to make admin on day one or he did not have that trust. That's what RFA tries to get a handle on.


 * In this case we have some cross section of the community who did participate. Is the cross section accurate enough to figure out what people think? Dunno, that's something we do need to look at.


 * But people are making up strange excuses not to do that right now. That's not good. --Kim Bruning 03:19, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I think it's fair to say that some people said a lot of daft things about the format because they didn't like it. This doesn't mean the current format is any better (I'd argue that it's much, much worse) but we don't exclude consensus that arises from that format. --Tony Sidaway 03:19, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * The point is about participation. Imagine that if a lot of people did not participate because of format, what "consensus" does it reflect? I think re-run would be the best course of action. To respond to Kim Bruning's above, just imagine that if there's only "some cross section" of the US population, say only the Republicans, voted for the congress, do you think the result should be made valid? --WinHunter (talk) 03:48, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree with Winhunter's interpretation that perhaps the people who voted for Matt Britt's RfA were not as representative of the community as in other RfAs. I also agree that the format in that RfA was awful. Nevertheless, Dan (Rdsmith4)'s original explanation is rather weak, a bureaucrat should have been able to show more insight than that. I guess people who hoped that a better RfA may be achieved by complicating the format and trusting that bureaucrats would do a good job at untangling that and delivering "the one wise decision" may be disappointed. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 04:00, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * A problem I have with the new format is that many of the suggested "views" on Matt were irrelevant to adminship, based on logical fallacy, or proof-by-assertion.  &gt; R a d i a n t &lt;  08:14, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I think re-run at once is a good call, if Matt still wants to be an admin. Personally, I think the format is promising, but I understand what Dan means when he says that he suspects there is a consensus to promote which the format did not make clear.  Regards, Ben Aveling 11:04, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I, for one, did not participate in Matt's RfA because of the confusing format. · AndonicO Talk 11:24, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * You know, in the United States there hasn't been a general election in decades where more than 65% of the eligible population actually voted . We didn't invalidate a single one of those elections. In the Matt Britt RfA, 112 people overall commented in one form or another. Of those, 42 indicated an inability to use the format (thought at least 6 of those 42 were in fact able to use the format to comment in other sections), or 62.5% of the people using it were able to use it (if we accept that people endorsing a summary that they can't use it were in fact incapable of endorsing/opposing other summaries).
 * RfAs are intended to draw input from the community to generate consensus. 70 different people used the RfA just fine. This is only slightly less than the 75.6 average participation in all full-term RfAs for 2006. The notion that Matt Britt's RfA was a failure based on lack of participation is fatally flawed. I'll grant, though I disagree, that the format does not support consensus decisions for some people. But, arguments that it failed because people could not participate are groundless. --Durin 13:03, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I find it strange that so many claimed they were unable to use the format yet were able to successfully use the format in order to make this claim. They all got their opinions in the right section and everything. --bainer (talk) 13:31, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Okay, this point has been beaten to death already. Presumably those who endorsed the "too confusing" view felt that, while they could endorse or disendorse opinions in RFC-style sections (duh), they felt that the format was so Byzantine that they could not meaningfully participate in the RFA, i.e. getting what they really wanted to say across. Haukur 13:37, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I refused to take part because I found the format to be overblown and the statements we were required to comment on ridiculous. As somebody else said above, reading it was akin to reading a small novel and a less useful way to spend the time. It has nothing to do with being unable to understand the format in my case, I just chose to pass on by and will make the same choice in future if this format is adopted. --kingboyk 13:39, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I think a considerable number of people in opposition to the format conflated "can't use" with "don't want to use". --Durin 14:11, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Would you want to participate in a format that, if you follow its guidelines, gets you to oppose a candidate whom you actually support? -- Black Falcon (Talk) 17:33, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

How sad and how bizarre
After an absence of several weeks from WP policy and process pages, I came by to take a peek. We used to have an RFA process that wasn't great, but by and large promoted the people who would clearly be good admins and did not promote those who would be bad ones. There was occasionally some gnashing of teeth, probably some mistakes, and a gradually increasingly higher bar, but it by and large worked. Now, in the name of "making the atmosphere less poisonous", I see an awful lot more poison on both WP:RFA and this talk page that I recall before. Are we really making progress? Martinp 03:54, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * What is this "poison" that you speak of? —210 physicq  ( c ) 04:02, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I believe he's referring to my comment on Kelly's oppose to Requests for adminship/Mallanox. Now I'll readily admit I could have chosen kinder words but opposition on the basis of behaviour which is accepted by an overwhelming majority of Wikipedians (and completely inline with our guidelines) is destructive as it creates the impression that going through RfA is like running the gauntlet. Pascal.Tesson 04:37, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I think your opinion was a little strained, really. The presence of these items on a user's page does certainly suggest a certain cluelessness that doesn't enhance one's confidence in a user's fitness for adminship. Would I oppose that candidate's adminship?  Perhaps.  Would I take into account his userpage?  Perhaps.  Would I look at other factors?  Certainly. --Tony Sidaway 04:44, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh come on Tony. Kelly is using RfA to campaign against userboxes, in favor of WikiProject endorsements (not to be confused with WikiProject Endorsements) and this is in effect asking for shrubberies. It also perpetuates the idea that an RfA is some gruesome process that you can only escape without a scratch by being superman. Not only is she being unreasonable about it, she's also spouting incivility warnings at anyone who tries to explain this to her. The culture of RfA is horrible precisely because it's filled with opposes that concern things that no candidate had ever assumed (and were never told) might cause the slightest problem. Pascal.Tesson 04:50, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * (Let me be harsh for a moment) Welcome to the world of adminship, where everything you do is wrong. No, really, when you're an admin, your actions will be scrutinized closely, and there will be at least one person who doesn't like what you did, what you're doing, what you will do, or any combination thereof, and will raise the tattered banner of "admin abuse." RfA is the first step in seeing this reality. —210 physicq  ( c ) 04:57, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Join the secret cabal of non-admins who help out at admin stuff without being admins yet. Joooin uss... -Amarkov moo! 05:01, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Me? I'm an admin, and already part of the Cabal, not a cabal. Heheheheheh...wait, are you talking to me? —210 physicq  ( c ) 05:03, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Physicq, if we want to train our admins at getting unfair criticism, let's do that outside of RfA. And is it really that much to ask that the obnoxious behaviour of systematic critics of admins come from another source than longtime Wikipedians who should know better? Pascal.Tesson 05:06, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not condoning some of the...eh...strange opposes that I have seen. Some of them are, as you have said, essentially asking for shrubberies and cutting down trees with herrings. However, it is also expected that as an admin, such implausible and arbitrary complaints will be coming their way, and one way to see the candidate's fitness for adminship is their response to such opposes. For one thing, since when did this opposes make a real dent in promotions? Unless you want to say that this is hurting some editors' feelings, in which I will say that it is not Wikipedia's job to mollycoddle a person who is willing to dip their hands (and their entire bodies) deep in mud. —210 physicq  ( c ) 05:11, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't think it's fair to say that Kelly is "campaigning" on userboxes. We know they're not suitable for Wikipedia and that they're severely deprecated.  If users persist in using them even when they know this, then it may be taken to suggest that they're not really admin material. This isn't campaigning, it's commonsense. --Tony Sidaway 05:09, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * So am I unfit for adminship, under your assertion? —210 physicq  ( c ) 05:11, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * But Kelly has some userboxes herself. Not that I'd judge her suitability for adminship based on that... the wub "?!"  08:25, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Tony: Kelly is using RfA to campaign for changes. Don't take my word for it, take Kelly's word. Pascal.Tesson 12:26, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Well, Kelly is just applying Cyde's criteria for adminship. I don't see how there's anything wrong with that.  &gt; R a d i a n t &lt;  08:12, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Heh. Damn my bad credit rating and being born a Brit! :( --kingboyk 13:33, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Those saying Kelly is being disruptive should remember this. Could be evidence either way, but if she can be a guinea pig for several RfA formats at once, that could be interesting. Carcharoth 09:30, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes. Only 27 mainspace edits this year. Rather more of a failing than having a userbox methinks. --kingboyk 13:34, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * And an article I started is on the main page today. Second time that's happened to me (here's the other).  I may not be the world's most prolific editor, but I do contribute real content.  One's qualities as an editor cannot be measured in mere edits.  Kelly Martin (talk) 19:13, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I do find that is concerns are well founded. I think the one thing we will all agree on is that we are here to create an encylopedia! -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:18, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * That's not entirely fair to her, she's been using more than this one account. Haukur 13:46, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * OK. --kingboyk 13:54, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Heh, the userbox people should get an alternate account that has no userboxes... --W.marsh 14:22, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Second war coming? I hope not! *Runs for cover* - Mailer Diablo 15:10, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Second war coming? I hope not! *Runs for cover* - Mailer Diablo 15:10, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

The edit war now being spilled over to the live RfAs?
Like,. Should we now start protecting the whole WP:RFA page and its subpages until this issue is being sorted out or is there a consensus that the live RfAs should be left alone as it is being started? --WinHunter (talk) 17:24, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Proposal for new RfA rule
I suggest that we adopt one of the following as a new rule at RfA: Modification includes any action that does not fall under asking questions, discussing, commenting, and stating opinions. Any editor who violates whichever of these provisions is adopted may be subjected to abuse by herrings while being forced to mutilate a tree. Or, we can just follow an established policy: do not use Wikipedia or any parts thereof (including RfA) to make a point, especially if you know that your point is contested. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 17:46, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * 1) Do not modify the format of an RfA once it has started.
 * 2) Do not modify the format of an RfA once it has started without the consent of the candidate.
 * 3) Do not modify the format of an RfA once it has started without the consent of the nominators.
 * 4) Do not modify the format of an RfA once it has started without the consent of the candidate and the nominators.
 * 5) Do not modify the format of an RfA once it has started without the consent of the candidate, the nominators, and all other participants.
 * I am striking this "proposal". I will quote a part of a comment I made below: "I did not intend [the proposal] to be taken entirely seriously. Please note the part about abuse via fish." To avoid any confusion, I feel it's better to strike this. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 18:36, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Instruction creep. Grossly misformed RFAs can be restored to readability; giant monster RFAs can be refactored for readability and accessibility. Removing vandalism does not fall under your definition; this is instruction creep, pure and simple. 'This is a wiki, and subject to modification due to changing consensus and bold edits. So long as those edits do not disrupt (which has not been proven in the cases of the modified RFAs), they should be allowed. -- nae'blis 17:50, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Object to all as instruction creep. Use common sense.  Kelly Martin (talk) 17:51, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * What are you talking about instruction creep? It is your belief that everybody should know your unspoken rules, your own personal instruction creep on how to be your ideal rfa candidate.  Similarly, your capitalised gibberish could bee seen as said instruction creep, and as a matter a fact, it looks like much of everything you are trying to push through RFA could also qualify as such.  A bit hypocrytical if i do say so myself. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 17:54, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * How does your comment above pertain to the issue under discussion? Kelly Martin (talk) 18:13, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * It is in regards to my beliefe that certain editors (you included) are attemtping to use RFA to push personal agendas. It is a point made (while in a convulated manner), expressing my concern that you are quick to call anything you disagree with "instruction creep", but quick to require it for others, which confuses me as to what you define instruction creep.  Perhaps I should have clarified better and you have my apologies. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:17, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * So your comments were, in fact, an ad hominem, intending to address not my position that the proposals above are instruction creep, but instead intended to demonstrate that I am a hypocrite for holding that position. Thank you for making your intentions clear.  Kelly Martin (talk) 19:01, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, my comments above were part of a discussion, in which I weigh all parts of the conversation, including any conflicts of interests or other issues that may affect a particular editors judgement. It was in reference to you, however I felt it appropriate to this particular line of conversation, in an effort to understand what qualifies as instruction creep in your eyes.  If you read much further into it, I apologise if my agenda seems deeper than you deem it to be.  -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:06, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Chris, referring to Kelly with things like "unspoken rules" and "gibberish" and calling her a hypocrite is really out of line. --Durin 19:21, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, I am sorry that you find it out of line. I found it appropriate for this line of discussion.  Also, "capitalised gibberish" is there campaign.  Please show to me how they do not apply to this conversation?  Thanks! -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:24, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry, but you're speaking gibberish, forcing your unspoken rules and are a hypocrite. --Durin 19:28, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Wow. I've never seen someone presented so clearly with the fact that their argument is a logical fallacy and then just continue on.  I see wonders every day.  --Iamunknown 19:29, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * First off durin, thank you for your concerns. Second off, I am a little bit confused here.  Please point out to me my gibberish, and I will kindly correct it.  As well, If you believe that I am applying unspoken rules, or acting in a hypocrytical manner, you are welcome to address them with me and I will amke every attempt to correct it.  I have adressed my concerns with Kelly martin on her talk page and felt this was along the same lines to discuss further.  Again, I appreciated and respect your cocnern for my content, but would apprecated a friendly note (or even a not so friendly note) explaining it to me.  Thanks! -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:36, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * You call someone else's edits gibberish, hypocritical, and having unspoken rules. Now when you're called on it, you become conciliatory? You can comment and object to someone's thoughts on something without referring to it in such terms. --Durin 19:42, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Durin, you may be unaware that Kelly Martin has a "no meaningless gibberish" rule on her talk page (meaning acronyms), which is probably why the phrase is being invoked here. -- nae'blis 19:44, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * First off, please read the lengthy conversation kelly and I had on her talk page in regards to "capitalised gibberish". Please not, I am not commenting that any of her content is gibberish, and to the fact, based on her beliefes, she is strongly against it. My references to "capitalised gibberish" are a reference to her expectations that people will not quote wp policies in capital letters. Please again, you have my humble assurance that I am not calling anything of hers gibberish. I believe the comments about unspoken rules being hypocrytical were appropriate in the context of this conversation, however could have been stated perhaps in morre apporpriate terms. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:46, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Also please note, I have attempted to discuss my concerns with her, most recentlyhere, which she promptly removed as an "intrusive comment." Please note that I am taking every effort here to be appropriate, discuss this with the correct people, and when my concerns are removed as intrusive, i will start addressing them elsewhere. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:49, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Just use the damn template; don't allow anybody to modify the format from the one in the template; and don't change the template except by consensus. Why is this an issue? --Richard 17:53, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Because there exist users trying to make a WP:POINT by modifying existing RfAs instead of changing the template by consensus. --WinHunter (talk) 17:59, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Don't allow? WP:NOT. Further, enough of the constant WP:POINT accusations. Myself and others have been subjected to several of these over the last week. If you have a legitimate gripe that someone is actually disrupting something, take it to WP:AN/I. Stop making the accusations. I don't think anyone here is editing in bad faith. Knock it off. --Durin 18:01, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I to an extent agree with winhunter. I feel that RFA is becoming a place to push agendas, force policy and expirement with life RFA's.  I am not always saying it is bad faith, however I feel it is ill advised.  I do not see winhunger as making an accusation of bad faith and feel his concerns are well founded.  Discreditng them because you disagree does not help this project very much.  We are supposed to discuss things, not shoot them down as quickly as we can and call it bad faith (that is my interpretation of the wiki way). -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:05, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Umm ... maybe I should have made that clearer ... I did not intend my comment to be taken entirely seriously. Please note the part about abuse via fish. I do think that RfAs should not be modified once they have started, but don't think an outright ban with the threat of blocking (or something similar) is the right way to go about it. Also, removing the tally with the edit summary "RfA is not a vote" from multiple RfAs is WP:BOLD the first time, OK the second, but starting to border on WP:POINT by the third. I view the existence or non-existence of the tally to be a minor issue which is not worth violating (or even coming close to violating) WP:POINT, edit warring, and certainly not starting a case at WP:AN/I. Also, I don't remember having accused you or anyone else of WP:POINT ... if I did, please refresh my memory; if I didn't, please don't try to hold me responsible for the actions (justified or otherwise) of others. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 18:14, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I am not saying i agree or disagree with winhunters proposal. I am also not accusing anybody in particular of point violations right now and hope that I am not engaging in them.  If you have concerns that I may, you are welcome to address them with me.  I make every effort to work within wikipedias guidelines, and attempt to enhance this project.  I guess i feel that discussions here have become a rush to silence as oppose to discuss.  Although it is just an observation and a concern on my part.  I apologize if it offended anybody, however i stand by my orignial assertion that I feel RFA is becoming a venue to push personal agendas, and expirement on live RFA's. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:20, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure to whom your reply was intended, but I should clarify that my statement was in regards to Durin, not you. Sorry for any confusion. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 18:31, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Nobody's saying anything about WP:POINT violations? Fine. Then DROP the accusations entirely. The veiled threats against people is chilling to discussion. I stand by what I said. Nobody here is editing in bad faith, and that includes all parties. Knock it off. --Durin 18:23, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Durin: "veiled threats"? A threat can only exist if some negative action is suggested or threatened. You're the one who brought up WP:AN/I and I'm the one who rejected it. Nobody has said that anyone is editing in bad faith (in fact, you're the one who introduced the words "bad faith") ... however, that doesn't mean making a point in good faith (i.e., thinking that it is for the benefit of the encyclopedia) is any better. As I'm not even sure whom you're replying to, I'll leave it at that. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 18:31, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Two words: instruction creep. --Tony Sidaway 18:24, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * What veiled threats are you referring to? I am a little confused here. I have made no threats, am only expressing what I believe to be a valid concerns, apparently along with another editor. If I am concerned that this has the possiblity to be a detriment to this project, then I will take a stand for it and not, "Drop it" because you disagree. Please not, i am making no claims of bad faith, i am just making claims that we need to discuss it. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:26, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * We have plenty of existing ways to deal with content disputes, and that is exactly what this is, sort of a lame one too. HighInBC(Need help? Ask me) 18:30, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * For the record, and perhaps I should have started this threat under a new heading. I do not either supoort or reject winhunters proposal.  My concerns are complelty independant of the above proposal, however the above proposal made a good place to start attempting to address them.  -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:32, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Ya, I have to agree with those pointing out that this is major instruction creep and I thus would not support such a rule. --Iamunknown 18:32, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Hey Durin, I seem to have stepped on some sensitive toes of yours with my comment above. I'm sorry for that. I wasn't trying to target you or your experiment. It should be evident from my comments during Matt Britt's RFA that I support your format. I even support your "live" experiment (I think) except that, taken to an extreme, it's a rolling disaster for RFA. There are many and frequent proposals to reform RFA. If every time somebody gets a brainstorm for a new (oftentimes not really new but a previously proposed) way to reform RFA, they use it in a live RFA, we will have a confusing plethora of RFA formats and a "maze of twisty little passages, none alike". RFA will become an "Adventure" and not one that anyone will enjoy.

The saving grace to the first Matt Britt RFA was that the RFA community cut you the slack to let the experiment run to completion (although with much moaning and complaining along the way and some heavy-handed insistence on your part that your experiment run to completion without modification). However, we can't tolerate such experimentation on an ad-hoc basis. As I proposed earlier, we should set a standard RFA format with/without sections, with/without tallies and then require RFA candidates to stick to that. Then, having done that, we should have a controlled process for proposing and experimenting with new RFA formats.

As I proposed earlier, maybe one or more b'crats could volunteer to manage the process of new RFA formats. Not that they would decide on a new format but they could serve as the gatekeeper for proposed new formats saying things like "Hold up your experiment. We just had one last week and we don't want to burn out the RFA editors with another new proposal." or "Your proposal was tried 3 months ago and here are the results of that experiment." Or, if not the b'crats, then a task force formed from members of the RFA community.

Right now, there's nothing to stop another nominator/candidate from running another RFA format "live" experiment today.

--Richard 18:35, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Nor should there be. This is another presentation of the idea that we must have consensus in order to try something. I have maintained and will continue to maintain that the regulars on this talk page are incapable of achieving consensus on this. A zillion times people have attempted to run experiments, garner input, etc without touching the main page. What happened? Gridlock. I refuse to accept that as one of the tenants of fixing a system we must adhere to one of the chief things that is wrong with it; it's paralysis from inability to make a decision.
 * Your proposal for a committee to process experiments is bureaucracy. Nothing will come of it. Even if there was such a committee, people would argue vociferously against their actions as being against supposed community consensus.
 * The experiments I have conducted have caused no harm to the project. None. Repeatedly, I have asked people to demonstrate how these experiments have caused harm. Nothing has been brought forth to support this. The experiments have been done with the knowledge and consent of the nominees. Further, though I disagree with the decision on Matt Britt's first RfA, I find no issue with a bureaucrat closing a nomination as an insufficient tool to determine consensus. Bureaucrats are put in place to evaluate consensus on RfAs. If they can't, they can reject the RfA. It's not hard.
 * People keep insisting that there's consensus on this, that, and the other thing. Recently, it's been about whether we should have tallies or not. Some very ardent supporters of the tallies are absolutely insisting that consensus is we must have the tallies. You know what? I've been digging through the archives of this talk page. I still have more work to do, but everything...everything...I have found so far has shown that in fact the tallies were added to all existing noms back in February of 2004 by Ed Poor, who at the time was not even a bureaucrat, and that there was no attempt to gain consensus to do so. Subsequent to that, beginning a month after that move, there's been no agreement that the tallies are a good thing. For example, Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_adminship/Archive_17. I reserve further comment, but it appears so far (and I've been through a considerable amount of the archives so far) that the tallies were never something that achieved consensus. Yet, people insist there is consensus for them. --Durin 19:11, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

The Point of RFA
What is the point of RFA? To determine if the community trusts an individual with a few extra tools through a judgement of consensus. While there may be some varying degrees of interpretation, that is my interpreatation of what it boils down too. I guess the question that frustrates me is what RFA is not. I do not see RFA as an sandbox, a place to expirement with new ways of determening consensus. When it boils down to it, that is really what we are trying to determine through an RFA? Why not expirement with another process, one that does not have real people. While we say that adminship is no big deal, it is somewhat to my belief the contrary, and in fact, the large amounts of discussion here are almost hypocritical with that statement. The fact is, I have seen alot of work here recently on trying to "revamp" the RFA, or that it is broken. The cact is that we are not truly addressing the problem which is what is consensus, and what is the best way to determine it? I believe that this problem stems out much further than rfa into WP:AFD, and WP:RFCN, as well as many other areas of wikipedia. While I am fairly sure that this rant will fall on deaf ears, I urge this community to go about a different way of solving this problem, and not use "live targets" in an expirement to solve a problem that does not only exist in the WP:RFA process. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:41, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * On the other hand, if the point is to determine if trust exists for an individual, then the format or process is not nearly as important as some people seem to believe. It is not a stone tablet, but an organic process that can be improved (albeit with caution and deliberation). -- nae'blis 18:45, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I will agree, and I am not saying it is set in stone, and am not adverse to changing it. I agree trust is an important factor, but againt, it comes down to how do we judge it?  The foggy hazy answer is consensus, the problem is, consensus is hard to define.  Please dont get me wrong, i am not fighting against change to RFA, i am just asking that we dont define the problem via the solution.  In this situation, I do not believe that the problem is RFA is broken, I believe the problem to be issues regarding appropriate jdugement of consensus.  Does this seem to be a valid assertion? -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:49, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * My other concern is live tests. I know it is hard to test something like this but, i think a good long discussion regarding the best way to determien consensus would go along way before we all start making changes on our own.  I agree that being bold is important, however i feel it is also important to step back and look at the big picture before making massive changes.  (guess I have been a software developer with SOX for too long. lol)-- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:51, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * And once again the insistence that we conduct no 'live' experiments, when every single experiment tried on non-live thought experiments has resulted in pure gridlock. You're victimizing yourself; Wikipedia is very definition of evolution. Every article can and should evolve over time. The notion that we must adhere to a process and never experiment until everybody agrees we should experiment would have us give up on Wikipedia if we were to follow press story after press story after press story. Unleash yourself from it. --Durin 19:17, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * What I think is that the current process is doing what it's supposed to be doing just fine. "If it works, don't fix it." is all I have to say. · AndonicO Talk 18:56, 24 April 2007 (UTC)